I prefer using omnisexual but use bi when explaining to people outside the community
The only person I heard “omnisexual” used for was Captain Jack Harkness. So now I have questions. (Funny: Tell me about the aliens you’ve met and flirted with. Serious: What does that word mean to you?)
I’m always and everywhere bisexual. I experience attractions both homosexual (same gender as me) and heterosexual (different gender than me), and I see no reason to change my identity because the kids have different words for it. (Nothing wrong with them using their new words for themselves, but if another Gen Zer tries to negate my identity with “that’s just the same as pan,” I’m glitterbombing everything they own.)
Yeah I’m basically sticking with bi because I went through so much crap for it in the 90s (from pretty much all sides).
I experience being attracted to others as bi attraction (not hetero/homosexual) and I only ever have bisexual sex. So maybe there’s another word that means that and would be a better fit to others, Idk.
I don’t mind including other labels as well, but even now, bi erasure is still a thing in my life, and stepping away from identifying as bi altogether would feel like more erasure.
Just arm yourself with the definitions when kids bug you.
bi - attraction to multiple genders
pan - attraction regardless of gender
The difference is subtle but its there and it matters.Also, no one but you gets to put a label on yourself. That’s also another good argument.
I identify as bi, but when I tried to figure out the difference between bi and pan it seems like bi fits the “attraction to multiple genders” that fits me just fine. I also felt it came down to preference in the end, for me; and I just love the bi flag colors so I think that helped! :)
I’m old enough that it was pretty simple when I was figuring things out and felt the need to define and label myself. It was straight, gay or lesbian, and bi. I was attracted to women so not straight, men so not lesbian, ergo bi. The term covered a lot of ground back then.
I’ve never considered “pan” for very long because so many people who identified as pan a few years ago when it was being talked about a lot defined it as if attraction to things like personality and character weren’t the norm and the very idea was a novel concept discovered by themselves. Rolled my eyes, adjusted my bifocals and let the young folk get on with it. 😋
Now I’m old enough my orientation is basically the social and sexual invisibility of post-fertile middle aged women, compounded by the invisibility of chronic illness and the online nastiness towards middle aged women in general. Too much frustration trying to make myself seen as a person in most spaces.
I keep “bi” as a nod to who I used to be and times past, rather than anything others might find interesting or useful to know.
When talking with people who are less versed in the community: Bisexual.
When talking with people more versed in the community: polyamorous biromantic demisexual.
Of course I was identifying as bisexual way before even I was more versed in the specifics of the queer community.
Hell I knew I was bi before I knew what the words for it were. I grew up in a VERY conservative area with VERY conservative family so learning about queerness was mostly just “it’s bad, and they’ll get [redacted] in time”
So yeah, kinda shite.
