I Propose This As The New Bi Flag.

I propose this as the new bi flag.

For reasons why I think we need a new one, click here.

Specifically, I like that this design highlights diversity among bisexuals, abolishes the 50/50 standard, and focuses on actual bisexuals (as traditionally signified by the purple area of Michael Page’s design) rather than giving 80% of the space to homosexuals and straights ppl, while still preserving some contiuity with the cherished old design.

I took the outer two colors from this post by @dogsbeesandhalloween (please alert me if you mind that I used them; if you do I will take this post down and come up with slightly different hues).

still agree with this except would phrase some things differently and stay the fuck out of the terf debates. i can't say anything of substance on it since it's not my battle. but sure i still agree that everyone gets to love exactly who they want and trans people are important, need full rights and i want to be a continuously improving ally to them

on the “female” experience

Terfs are so keen on defending the uniqueness of Life As A Female. But as a female, I’d like to challenge what that even means.

I have a vagina. I have breasts. I have higher estrogen and lower testosterone levels than the average young person. I have ovaries and a uterus and I menstruate once a month. And I expect to carry, give birth to, and breast-feed a child one day. These primary aspects give rise to secondary ones: I have to worry about contraception when I have sex, I use menstrual hygiene products.These are the things I accept as the “female experience”, though it doesn’t bother me in the slightest when people only experience parts of it and still talk about those parts.

And then there’s the “woman” experience. And this, the entirety of gender, to me, is only a system of discrimination, and its analysis is only a tool to dissect that discrimination. Being a woman is not something that intrinsic to me; being a woman is the product of life-long exposure to a set of expectations, limitations, and threats which my society dumps on people who are born with similar bodies to mine.

I used to love the word “woman”. It was magical to me. But at this point, when I examine the questions: What is womanhood? Other than the fear of assault? Other than conditioned and model-learned sweetness, meekness, helpfulness, and social competence? Other than the elaborate set of behaviors learned to evade unwanted advances from non-women? Other than learned preoccupation with the appearance of one’s body? Other than being expected to raise your children full time, give up your career, take maternity leave? … when I honestly examine these questions, the only answer that rings true to me is: “Nothing”. In the absence of differential social treatment, there is no “womanhood” beyond the biology-based female experience.

Needless to say, it surprises me that anyone would choose to live as a woman despite not being required to, except to demonstrate solidarity, which is clearly not the point in most transwomen. I assume it has something to do with how, unlike class or race, gender is a sword that cuts both ways - not equally, but still both ways. Men and women both wear shackles, and I guess some might prefer one set over the other, and that might not be the set they were assigned by society. This is only slightly more revolutionary than simply embracing the gender you were assigned - slightly more, because it demonstrates within certain limits the (theoretical, not practical; of course gender roles have developed from biological differences in non-arbitrary ways) arbitrariness of the gender-to-sex-relationship. But it certainly isn’t worse than being cis and happy with your gender. So I have few battles to pick with binary trans people. (Also, honestly, there are so few of them! Wouldn’t it be a far better idea to just focus on cis men?) They can do whatever they wish and live with whatever pair of shackles they wish.

I, however, would like no shackles at all. And I would like my children to have to wear none at all. And I feel no desire to defend my exlusive right to wear the woman shackles from anyone else.

The only truly revolutionary gender identity - if I were to assign radness that way - is nonbinary (in all its variations). In fact, I would quite respect a movement of political nonbinary-ness (analogous to political lesbianism, but hopefully less damaging) by people who feel like me: I am not “a woman”. I have a body with female features, just like I have a small body with light skin and blonde hair and a funny nose. I incresingly reject the idea that those physical features should be allowed to define my identity, my mind, my options, or my social role. I am not “a woman”, I have been raised and treated and discriminated as one. It’s not something I am, it’s something I have suffered. And I see no reason why we should continue to suffer it.

EDIT: Oh and before somebody brings up homophobia, I am not homophobic. This is not a homophobic notion. I have nothing against people who only experience romantic and/or sexual attraction to people with similar physical characteristics, and/or to people who have been socialized in the same way. That’s a-okay and you’re highly welcome to keep all of the words that you have coined for that and express your attraction in exactly the way that you wish. You’re also welcome to not sleep with trans people if you’re not attracted to them, and that is not transphobia on your part. It’s only transphobia when you come up with political/philosophical justifications for why you won’t sleep with them. And it’s only homophobia when trans activists try to attack the “moral acceptability” of your attraction. Both is unnecessary and unkind.

Life tip: Tell straight people their sexuality turns you on

damn girl. you sure have a lot to learn. how about leaving lesbians alone for a start. accept yourself first then you won't feel that desperate need to belong that gets in the way of your empathy. okay it is as I feared, much of this blog is so cringe...

the feeling of relief when you realized you weren’t going to have to marry a man one day is literally like taking your first breath after being fucking buried alive

Wow. This is... absurd. To the degree where it could be turned into a sketch. Unfortunately, also super cringe. Honey, just stop trying to understand the "physics of gender". Why are you assuming there would be logical rules to follow, and especially, that people would agree on a set of rules? Just let it go. This is not a problem that the world needs you to solve, and you don't need it solved either.

In general, all these posts from that time just ooze the over-eager and hyper-invested need to a) understand and b) belong. That's where almost all the cringe originates.

Bisexuality and non-binary genders

So I’ve been trying to work out the definition of bisexuality when including nonbinary genders, and I’m lost. If anyone has input or literature that I ought to read, please tell me.

Option 1

bisexual = attracted to > 1 genders

homosexual = attracted only to one’s own gender

heterosexual = attracted only to one gender which isn’t one’s own

=> an agender (or other nb person) attracted to only women/only men would be considered heterosexual (which might be offensive too since i assume y’all would rather identify as queer? but idk please correct me?)

Option 2a

bisexual = attracted to > 1 genders

homosexual = attracted only to one’s own gender

heterosexual = attracted to any number of genders > 0 but not one’s own

=> bisexuality would be a subset of heterosexuality, which is super counter-intuitive and erasive to bi people.

=> a binary person who is only attracted to non-binary people would be considered heterosexual (which might be offensive too since i assume y’all would rather identify as queer? but idk please correct me?)

=> this set of definitions would make heterosexuality more inclusive than homosexuality; this seems both offensive to homosexuals, and counter-intuitive if a goal is to challenge the heteronorm

Option 2b

bisexual = attracted to > 1 genders one of which is one’s own

homosexual = attracted to only one’s own gender

heterosexual = attracted to any number of genders > 0 but not one’s own

=> a binary person who is only attracted to non-binary people would still be considered heterosexual.

=> still challenges homosexuality more than heterosexuality

Clearly, these conventional definitions aren’t working out so well with more than two genders. So instead, I propose a definition of heterosexuality that takes into account the heteronorm. I suspected (perhaps naively) that non-binary people might feel offended if called “heterosexual” and thus perhaps nominally deprived of their queer “status”.

=> But please tell me - do y’all want to be “eligible” for heterosexuality, or would you rather avoid being labelled that?

Option 3

bisexual = attracted to > 1 gender

homosexual = attracted only to your own gender

heterosexual = binary and exclusively attracted to the other binary gender

=> now i’m not non-binary so i don’t know if y’all feel happy with this. but i naively suspect that it’s relatively rare for a nb person to be attracted exclusively to members of their own nb gender (again please correct me if i’m mistaken). so i suspect that homosexuality makes as little sense applied to nb people as heterosexuality.

Option 4

bisexual = attracted to > 1 gender

homosexual = binary, attracted to at least one gender but not the other binary gender

heterosexual = binary and exclusively attracted to the other binary gender

=> creates great overlap between homosexuality and bisexuality

=> binary people who are only attracted to nb people would be homosexual then. idk how homosexuals and nbs feel about this

Option 5

bisexual = attracted to > 1 genders OR attracted to > 1 genders one of which is one’s own

homosexual = binary, attracted only to one’s own gender

heterosexual = binary, attracted only to the other binary gender

This last one is the set of definitions that makes the most sense to me … up to this point. But it could definitely be improved. And I have no clue which definition of bisexuality would be better. My head is sweimming.

It’s not vanity. It’s worship.

[images used as basis can be found when you click on the individual images]