Why I identify as a bi/pan gay man, and a look into why some people would be bi/pan lesbians: a thread.

There's a lot of reasons why people feel to label themselves like this, some are pretty clean and simple. Mine is... messy. With comphet and trauma making things hard to tell

I'll start with the 'cleaner' reasons, since I also feel them. It's having both an intense same gender attraction, while also really liking nonbinary people. And that's not just masc nonbinaries for me as a bi/pan gay man. It also includes really feminine nonbinary people too.

And there are a lot of transmasc people (who are NOT trans men) who are sapphic/lesbians. They have an close relationship to masculinity. It's fair for them to be included in lesbian attraction, as well as them wanting to be seen as more than just 'woman-lite'. So ppl ID to help

I am very attracted to a lot of transfem nonbinary people. Someone I'm very interested in wants to take estrogen. It happens, and I'll still be interested in them even if they look like a woman. So you'd think, I'm just bi then, right? But what if I told you they ID as a demiboy?

You see, this is why a lot of people identify as bi/pan gay men and lesbians. Nonbinary identities aren't as simple as a lot of people seem to think. And wanting to include them, even the ones you'd think we wouldn't but are interested in, is important to a lot of us.

So, now onto the messier feelings. I feel an attraction to women... as a concept. A theory. I find them attractive in my own time and space, but don't feel comfortable at the idea of anything happening.

I cannot tell if this is from me experiencing homophobia when I thought I was a girl into them, & bulking at a lot from internalised phobia now. Or. If it's from my trauma with being sexually violated by women. So you could say, hey, maybe you're bi but had bad experiences? Well.

I also mainly was attracted to them.. with the idea I'd be the top, at first. When I wasn't aware I'm a trans man. I roleplayed a lot as just a dude and did a lot of m/f. Then I came out, and I was basically only into the idea of being with a woman AS A MAN. To make me more manly

You see, this could be homophobia in two completely different ways. I COULD just be experiencing left over homophobia from when I thought I was a girl and it was bad to like women, OR it could be comphet and dysphoria fuelling my need to be seen as a man.

This, along with me being traumatised by many girls and women sexually, has made it so hard to tell. Especially since that added sexual trauma makes me not be able to tell if I genuinely do like girls but don't anymore because of trauma, or if I just didn't really at all.

Now is a good time to mention that even if you THINK you know what someone's attractions are, you really cannot tell. The best person to know is them. And what I'm saying is... I haven't been able to tell for about half a decade now. So... where does that leave me?

To take what others say, like I have countless times before, and just TRY to make it work and feel good this time? To fit into a neat box? Or... to try something else? This time I've decided to try something else and.. it feels better. A lot better.

I've agonised for so long over what my sexuality is. I've even tried broader more loose terms like queer for my sexuality and it still felt bad. I wanted something specific and solid like others got. And while this isn't the most solid (I actually prefer homoflexible the most)

It feels really good. But then you might ask, 'what about those you're making feel like shit about their own identities?'. I do feel bad on some level, but I feel like a lot of these people have yet to learn... that... how others identify does not hurt how you identify.

Especially since... being a bi lesbian, a pan lesbian, a bi gay man, a pan gay man... these are all *NEW TERMS*. I can somewhat get the upset of 'you're changing what lesbian means and I need it to mean x' if they JUST identified as lesbians, but they... aren't. This is separate.

I also don't think it's a good analysis at all to blame a lot of hurt and genuine crimes on other lgbtq+ folk. To suggest that 'making lesbian include man-likers' is opening up lesbians to assault can be suggesting that bi women and pan women have it coming to them.

And essentially victim-blaming them for the traumatising and life-ruining things they go through because of bigotry. I find that incredibly disturbing, especially as someone that used to be sapphic.

There's also this definition going around that it's a 'lack of attraction to men'. Which would end up kinda including aroace women as lesbians? But I feel like that's something a lot of people arguing against bi/pan lesbians would really hate.

But I think it's just... important to realise that definitions are not perfect. And in fact can never be perfect. The way we humans group things in general? It's never going to be absolute. Try categorising a mushroom, for example. Very contentious topic as to what it is rn.

And I think even more importantly it's good to realise terms can have multiple meanings. That they can have commonly used meanings, and more rare meanings, that do not cancel each other out. Just look at a lot of words in the english dictionary, so many mean different things.

And I think most importantly, we need to understand that everyone who is under one specific lgbtq+ identity... understands that in their own unique way. There's so many ways bisexuality gets defined by bisexuals and they're actually all valid for them as individuals.

It's really common for all of this to happen. Bi lesbians aren't even claiming to just be lesbians, too. It's a new term. But... I think all of this is still important to keep in mind.

And lastly, we gotta talk about lesbian separatism. Just in general.

Before political lesbians (ie women who admitted to not having attraction to women but identified that way For Feminism) came along around the 70s, lesbian was actually more like sapphic as a term. A term all wlw could rally under if they wanted to. But... political lesbians...

They didn't like that. Because it included women who admitted to liking men (that they thought was not feminist) and included trans women (who they saw as men) and butches (who they thought wanted to be men). So they had to do away with that. And that.. is lesbian separatism.

I think it's really important to come to terms with this history behind the ideology of excluding bi/pan lesbians if you want to continue to do so. You must acknowledge where a lot of this comes from, even if you think it's not radfem TERF stuff anymore (which is what PLs were)

To close this off for now, I think it's a strength to accept people for who they say they are. I think that's something that should be core to our community since the denial of who we are is something we've all struggled with so much.

I also just want to say this isn't... extensive. There's so many more reasons why people identify like this, including just being in gay/lesbian culture a lot offline (because bi and pan culture and spaces isnt really a thing). As well as experiencing hatred like they do.

Just... try to be open-minded, please.

coming back to this: how come monosexual lesbians and gays get to have sexualities that are clearly defined but those of us into nonbinary people and those of the same gender get to live in ambiguous hell and have to call ourselves bi? which to most people means we're into the-

-''opposite gender'' too? Like I'm actually a bit peeved about this. and this idea that people outside of the community will understand the nuances of anything to do with gender and orientations????

ultimately ill identify as both bi and gay BECAUSE-

-I don't want women thinking I'll be romantically interested in them when I'm not. So I'll call myself a gay man when not in a safe space. BUT when around queer folks I *WILL* call myself bi because I am into all kinds of nonbinary people and I don't want to misgender them

Also I know in this thread before I was very confused on how I felt about women, and that was because I felt like I'd just be into having sex with them as any other gender. The thing is? I have discovered I'm so asexual I want sex with literally no one. So. Uhhh. Yeah. I'm bi gay