Bisexuality and ageing

Hello to everyone reading this blog

It has been a long time since I last posted here, longer still since I updated it regularly. There's a whole range of reasons for that - pressures of work and time, new forms of social media that make blogger look positively 20th century - but I've decided to give it another go.

There are many billions of words now online, even more are being written while you are reading this. There is too much out there to keep up with anything that doesn't really hit the mark for an individual reader. Or for an individual writer, particularly when she makes a living contributing to those too-many words, which is why I am changing the focus of this blog.

Who are you?

Looking at the stats for this site, most people come here for information about coming out. Next on the list is celebrities who may or may not be bisexual, or who may have said something about it.

I have nothing at all new to say about coming out, because I did that so long ago. (Even the repeated coming out that all out bi people deal with is simply part of my life.) In any case, the world people come out into now is too different for my initial experiences to be relevant.

So for information about coming out and celebrities, I recomment Twitter. Twitter works very well for responding to (for example) biphobia, homophobia, the various doings of various celebrities, etc. I can't keep up with celebrity doings, and really don't care what they do. But I can see that they are important for many, particularly young, people. If idiots post stupid things about bisexuality, then various bi people will point out the error of their ways far more quickly and forcefully than I would be able to do. And Twitter is also a great place for finding out about things too. 

Ageing

But I am interested now in bisexuality and older people. For the sake of drawing the line somewhere, I'm calling "older people" anyone over 50. 

I am now in my 50s  myself, and what I have to offer the world of bisexuality (and what could possibly be called bisexual theory) is not necessarily what people coming to this blog are after. Nevertheless, blogs are for the writer as much as for the reader - unless you are specifically blogging for money - a way of clearing our thoughts, perhaps, and getting unmonetisable ideas out there.

My thoughts on bisexuality and middle-age/ageing/getting older are what I'll be writing about on this blog from now on. As you will see from the previous post, I did a talk at the University of Nottingham about my experiences of being an “older” bisexual. The site for that event, including the text of my talk, is here. My talk is 4,700 words long, so I'm not posting it in full as a blog post. It's a general talk (not giving away anything hugely personal!) and was designed to be heard in conjunction with Rebecca Jones' presentation on research into bisexuality and ageing. In brief: there isn't much of it.

I have recorded it on Soundcloud, in case you want to listen to my dulcet tones. It's about 25 minutes long and you can find it here.

I did interview - both on email and on Skype - some other bi identifying people over 50 and - surprise - they covered a range of different behaviours, feelings, and so on. But they pretty much all felt invisible, and that's not surprising because they are. 

There are actually many things that haven't really been discussed about sexuality of any sort and ageing, and I think about them more and more these days. I'll write about some of them here. I'll also write in more depth about the issues I addressed in my talk (so you don't need to read it/listen to it) if you don't want to!

But if you are a person of 50+ to whom the concept of bisexuality is personally important - however you identify sexually, as well as if you don't - then I'd love to hear from you. I know there are a lot more of us than we think!

Bisexuality and depression

For long as I’ve been writing this blog, one of the main ways new people find it is by searching for “bisexuality and depression”. I find that really sad, but nothing like as sad as the statistics about bisexuality and mental health.

• A major Canadian study found bisexual men 6.3 times more likely, and bi women 5.9 times more likely, to report having been suicidal than heterosexual people
•  A large Australian study found rates of mental health problems among bi people to be higher than those among lesbians, gay men, or heterosexuals.
•  The UK Mind report on the mental health and wellbeing of LGB people found that bi men and women were less at ease about their sexuality than lesbians or gay men, and less likely to be out.

Bisexuality and mental health is currently a big issue in the bi community. This summer’s BiReCon (the British conference that looks at current research on bisexuality) had bisexuality and mental health as its theme.

At the conference, the speakers focused on what research is currently being done by (bi) psychologists and (bi) activists and considered how mental health professionals could better serve the needs of bi people.

The Bisexuality Report,  which came out earlier this year, also looked at the bad health – mental and physical – experienced by bisexual people. It collated a lot of existing research, including that listed at the top of this post.

Until now, most research on sexuality and mental health has lumped research on lesbian, gay and bisexual people into one queer mass.

What the Bisexuality Report did was to look at how bisexual people (as distinct from lesbians and gay men) experience discrimination and prejudice. It’s fair to say that this discrimination and prejudice has a strongly negative impact on everyone who don’t simply identify as straight or gay.

This includes:

Bisexual exclusion, erasure, invisibility

• Many people, even now, know of no one in their daily lives who is bisexual. 
• When people at large, or organisations, say lesbian, gay and bisexual, they really mean lesbian and gay. Or sometimes just gay.
• Everyone is considered either gay or straight. Really. And if you aren’t now, you are either frightened (really gay) or experimenting (really straight). 
• The concerns of bi people are ignored, trivialised, demonised, laughed at. For instance, when people say things like:

Everyone's bisexual
Men can’t be bisexual
You must be really into sex
Can I watch?
But you’re involved with X person now – that means you’re straight/gay
You’re just confused
Bi people have things really easy

And, connected with that:

Biphobia – in all its many guises

Such as:

• Rejection by the wider queer/lesbian and gay community, whether individuals or groups 
• At the same time as you experience rejection from friends/ family/the wider society for not being straight. A similar sort of homophobia to that experienced by lesbians and gay men, but with added extras 
•  People saying things like: 
• You’re too old/attractive/ugly/straight-looking/queer-looking/monogamous to be bisexual 
• You’re young – you’ll grow out of it! 
• Bisexuals are greedy/disgusting/can’t be trusted

 I could go on… but I’m only depressing myself!

With all that, is it any surprise that so many bi people feel they don’t belong anywhere, that you will never find a lover/s who will truly accept you? That, if you are told that bi people don’t and can’t exist, and if they do there is something wrong with them, that it might lead to lack of self-belief, and ultimately self-hatred?

Difficult circumstances and depression aren’t necessarily linked, of course, but a lack of support can make a bad time so much worse.

So, lovely readers, some questions for you.

Why do you think bi people report so much depression and other forms of mental ill-health. And what do you think we – as individuals and as a community – can do to help ourselves and others?

For more things to think about, I’ve written other posts on bisexuality and mental health here 

Glad to be bi 
My next post (to be published on 7th September) is going to be specifically on being a happy bisexual. It would be terrible if everyone thought that bi people were only miserable when, for many of us, bisexuality is great, something that has added and continued to add to their lives. And for others, their bisexuality is something that just is. A part of them that needs no more explanation than that.

As Tom Robinson sang Glad to be Gay in the 1970s, so we need a (non-religious) Blessed to be Bi for the 2010s.

We need to spell out the reasons it’s great to be bi – even when, especially when, others think it really isn’t.

Which leads on to some more questions for you: What do you love being bisexual? And, if you didn’t always feel that way, how have you made things better? Let me know.

Bisexual blog, Bisexual Pride

It’s five years tomorrow since I started this bisexual blog. I don’t update it regularly any more, but it has been very important to me as an outlet for my ideas on bisexuality when other outlets have seemed a bit sparse. And, as hundreds of thousands of people have visited it, it must have been of some interest and importance to a few other people too.

Below, I’m going to post a link to the entry with which I opened this blog. I wrote about EuroPride, held in London that year. Tomorrow is the Pride march in London too. I had a great time at EuroPride in 2006, but in general I find the lack of politics at Pride in London combined with vacuous celebration a bit wearing and tedious. And believe me, I LOVE celebrations in general.

I think the purpose of Pride should be political as well as celebratory – just as a quick for instance, there are homophobic attacks in the UK, and essential solidarity with people in countries where same-sex is illegal and strictly punished. There are tremendous queer activists, such as David Kato in Uganda who was murdered this year, to honour.

In the Pride press pack, their Love Without Borders campaign is one of the things they do talk about. But if you saw the Pride poster (seen on the London underground, but nowhere that I can find on the interwebs), you’d have to search hard to figure out what sort of Pride it was. Smirnoff Pride, perhaps.

There will be a bi stall and bi banner at Pride, London tomorrow and I really wish those attending all the best. It is absolutely essential that bi people are properly visible and there is even an international campaign about it.

Moving on up
Thanks (in a large part) to social media, there seems to be a lot more of a bisexual community than there was back in 2006, in the UK and elsewhere. Twitter and Facebook have put loads of people in touch with each other, and not just virtually. Ideas spin around the world soon as anything.

Also, there are many more bi bloggers than there were in 2006 when I couldn’t find any British ones at all. It’s very hard to keep blogging in the long term and many have opened and closed. But thanks to the Bi Bloggers aggregator site, organised by the ever-efficient Jen Yockney, anyone who’s interested in British bi bloggers can see that there’s quite a lot of it about. And of course there are many other bi bloggers around the world (particularly North America). If a bi celebrity comes out, or a prominent queer columnist such as Dan Savage opines on bisexuality, there are plenty of other people who can write about it. There are other aspects of bisexuality that people don’t write about, though, and when I write here in the future that’s what I’ll be covering.

Anyway, as anyone who knows a smidgeon of blogging theory can tell you, less is most definitely more. So happy bisexual birthday and Pride – whether it’s been or still to come where you are – and be happy that things really can and do get better.

Here’s what I wrote in 2006.

20th Century Bi - Books and Links

Last Saturday (12th February) about 30 people came to Conway Hall in London for what was a really good bi history event. Sadly, Lindsay River was ill and so didn’t do her talk on creative women of the inter-war period, but Christian Klesse, Ian Watters and I were there. As well as the talk listed in the previous post, I did a personal memoir of the 70s. Nothing too personal...

Anyway, I said to people I would give a few links and notes about my talk Androgynous, Ambisextrous, or "enjoying all life's pleasures" - bisexuality before the sexual revolution - so here we are. I also have audio files of all the talks (from an Olympus voice recorder – won’t play on a Mac without some jiggery-pokery that I don't know about), plus printed versions of the talks that I did. Email me if you’d like them (my address is below my pic, on the right).

Books I mentioned
Queer London, by Matt Houlbrook: a truly excellent book about all sorts of man-man sexual behaviour from 1918-57.
The Secret World of Sex, by Steve Humphries: Oral histories of people in the UK before WW2, to accompany the 80s TV series of the same name.
Sex before the Sexual Revolution, by Simon Szreter and Kate Fisher: oral histories, plus analysis, of married couples in Britain who were sexually active before the 1960s. Recently out in paperback.
Fashioning Sapphism, by Laura Doan, looking at androgyny in the 1920s, and how the "masculine" fashions for women in the early part of that decade became connected with lesbianism after The Well of Loneliness prosecution.
Bisexual Love by Wilhelm Stekel. Originally published in 1922, this radical and almost unknown book has been digitally scanned and is available from Amazon!
Passionate Friendships, by Nerina Shute, in which she writes about her bisexuality and her relationships with women and men, was published in 1992. Nevertheless, it almost never appears on abebooks lists, or elsewhere on the second-hand market. I have only ever seen it in the British Library. Currently, there is one copy on Amazon for £29.50
There is more information about her in Shepperton Babylon, by Matthew Sweet – a great book for anyone interested in British cinema, bisexual or not.

20th Century Bi - London's bisexual history event

February is LGBT history month in the UK and - as promised last year, and the year before - this year there WILL be a specifically bi history event (I think there may even be two. More details at the end of this post).

So... drum roll ... I am co-organising, and speaking at, an event in London called 20th century bi. (Great title, eh. Not my idea sadly, but that of my co-organiser Lisa Colledge.) Here's the details:

20th Century Bi
To mark the 30th anniversary of the bisexual community in the UK, this event will look at some of the big, bad, bold bis who made the 20th century great. A panel of speakers discusses 20th century bisexuals and bisexuality in Britain, as part of LGBT History Month.

Speakers are:

Sue George: Androgynous, ambisextrous, or “enjoying all life’s pleasures”: being bisexual before and after the sexual revolution

Christian Klesse: 'Re-writing the scripts of Love. The Critique of Monogamy, Polyamory and Bisexual Intimacies in the late 20th Century'

Lindsay River: Lesbian... or bisexual? The (mis)naming of creative women of the early 20th century

Ian Watters: Bisexuals at Pride: The somewhat partial story of bisexual involvement in the annual London Pride celebrations

Our individual talks will be followed by a panel discussion and Q&A.

Everyone is welcome to this bi-positive event.

Saturday 12 February 2011
2.30 - 4.30 pm

Conway Hall (Bertrand Russell Room)
25 Red Lion Square
London WC1R 4RL
(nearest tube is Holborn)

Tickets £5 (£3 unwaged) from EventElephant here and at the door (all profits to BiCon Helping Hand Fund)

Wheelchair-accessible venue: for Conway Hall access details contact Carina on 0207 242 8032










Manchester

There's also an event in Manchester on Feb 15th. It doesn't sound as specifically historical as ours, but nevertheless good stuff. This information is taken from Biphoria's website.

As part of LGBT History Month 2011, on Tuesday, 15 February we will have a special event to launch our new publication "Getting Bi in a Gay/Straight World". It will be at the Levenshulme Inspire centre, 747 Stockport Road, Levenshulme M19 3AR, from 7pm to 9pm. Come along, and if you have them, share your memories of bisexual Manchester.

Have a great LGBT History Month everyone, and I hope you will go to one of these events - bi or not - to celebrate our history.

Celebrate bisexuality day

It’s 23rd September today, and more people than usual are wearing purple. They’re doing that, because it’s International Celebrate Bisexuality Day or, as it has been rebranded this year Bi Visibility Day. Whichever, it’s a sort of mini-pride, and it’s all ultra-good. There’s more here about events in the UK, events in the US here, and information about why it started here.
I’ll probably be at one of these events tonight, but not wearing purple, which always makes me look sickly.

However
It’s no doubt just a co-incidence, but the numbers of LGB (not T, don’t know about T) people in the UK seem to have gone down. Official figures from the Office of National Statistics released today indicate that the LGB population of the UK is only 1.5%. There’s info about it from the Guardian here. The ONS asked people how they defined their sexuality, and this is the answer. Simples.

But but but ... What does it mean? Apparently interviewees were given four categories, and asked which best described them: heterosexual/straight, gay/lesbian, bisexual or other. That’s surely too broad-brush. For instance, someone who is now monogamously married, but has had significant lesbian relationships in the past, might well consider that heterosexual/straight “best describes her” but it best describes her behaviour as it is now, not her feelings, her past, her desires, all the things that make up sexuality. She might be “behaviourally heterosexual” but that’s only part of the story.

According to the ONS (in the Guardian):

“ ... the [previous] higher estimate [of LGB people] was based on different sampling methods and responses to questions about sexual attraction and behaviour both in the past and present."

But isn’t that the right way to assess sexuality? Which category “best describes you”! To my mind, that over-simplifies something which is often complicated.

The stats are odd in other ways too. Sixty-six per cent of LGB people, according to this, are under 44. What does this mean? That older people have “turned straight”? That more young people are gay these days? That queer sexuality is something that happens to the young? I don’t know. Interestingly, quite a high proportion of this 1.5% says “bisexual” best describes them.

It does seem strange to me that, when Kinsey did his famous reports estimating the gay/lesbian population of the US as 10% (this may not be precisely what he said; do correct me if I’m wrong), homosexuality was both hidden and stigmatised. This figure was accepted for a long time.

Now, homosexuality is very much less hidden. There are far far more openly gay, especially gay (and lesbian, and bi) people than there were when I was young. Yet consistently, official numbers go down. In the 1950s, it was 10%; more recently, it has been accepted as being 5%.

Purple power
As someone once said: There’s lies, damned lies, and statistics. Who knows what any of these figures mean.

What concerns me most, is that queer people’s issues will be ever more marginalised if we are seen to be such a tiny minority of the population. I simply don’t believe that it is true.

As to why bi people have taken on purple: I guess it’s because pink = gay (and, because it is the colour stereotypically loved by little girls, nothing Real Men should have anything to do with). Also, pink (for girls) mixed with blue (for boys) = purple for any and everyone.

Whatever, tonight I will be having my cake and eating it. I hope you will too.

Blogging bisexuality at BiCon

I know, I know, the gaps between posts on here are getting longer.

It's quite hard to keep up the momentum when there's so very much else to do. In particular, I have my MA to hand in, in just over three weeks time. That's 20,000 words I am paying to write!

Anyway, in the meantime I am giving a talk on 26th August at BiRecon, the academic/research part of BiCon - the UK annual gathering of bi people that this year is both held in London and is an International BiCon too, with people from many countries attending. Here's a wikipedia site on the history of BiCons which made me downright nostalgic.

With that in mind, I have some questions:

Do you, or have you, used blogs as part of coming out as bi? If so, was it helpful? Do you write a blog yourself about coming out bi? If so, what sort of impact has it had? If you blogged about bisexuality, but have now stopped blogging, why did you stop?

If you could let me know - either here, or at sues_new_email at yahoo dot com - sooner, rather than later, I'd be ever so grateful.

xxx

LGBT history month

In the UK - although not anywhere else, as far as I know - February is LGBT history month. The US has its month in October.

As with most years, there are no specifically "B" events although some were nearly planned. Next year, next year. There are other good things, though, which might be worth a look.

There should be some bi history stuff at this year's International Conference on Bisexuality (the 10th! and held in London this time) at which I will be speaking. About.... something or other.

A French bisexual picture
For a long while I've been meaning to scan in this picture, which was given to me a couple of years ago. It's an illustration from a French magazine of the 1920s - possibly one called Modes Nouvelles (or new fashions) - and it's drawn by one Gerda Wegener.

It's entitled "Elle ou Lui, Lequel Choisir?" which means "Her or Him, which one to choose?"

Clearly set in a mixed gender, pansexual club or cafe of some sort, in this wonderland anyone can dance with anyone, and the men look only slightly masculine and the women only slightly feminine - or vice versa. This was a time, just after the first world war horrors, where strict Victorian-style notions of gender went right out of the window, women cut their hair and shortened their skirts. Both men and women went for an androgynous look. I think it's hard for us to realise now how revolutionary that was.

So, in this pic, we are left wondering who is doing the choosing?

Most likely it is the be-gloved lady sipping her diabolo menthe through a straw, looking at the saucy yet ever-so-slightly dangerous man and woman on the right.

But what is the woman in the green dress thinking. And, indeed, what do we think. Him or Her, which one should I choose? It doesn't really matter. Maybe one today, and the other tomorrow.

Oh, Paris in the 20s. What a fabulous place to visit for a holiday.

Happy new year

Many people’s favourite bisexual, Angelina Jolie, is in the news again (well, the Daily Mail, if that counts). According to that esteemed [sic] organ, both she and the lovely Brad don’t rate fidelity as important to their relationship. They got this factlet from a new book Brangelina: The Untold Story of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, by author Ian Halperin, via a German newspaper Das Neue.

Many people don’t think that physical exclusiveness is essential to a happy relationship. Infidelity (in the sense of lying) is another matter. I think not lying is essential to a happy relationship myself. Not being "physically exclusive" (aka polyamory) is entirely up to the people concerned.

Apparently, Brangelina don't "restrict" each other. That's nice. And it seems that Jolie and her ex Jenny Shimizu kept a jungle love nest for “trysts” – one of those words that never appears in ordinary vocabulary. Perhaps only celebrities have them.

However, as a mother (only of one) I am baffled that parents of six - even with "help" - have the time and energy to pursue more than one sexual relationship but perhaps I am being lazy.

Anyway, this non story has given me the chance to add another pic of the toothsome couple - and when Ms Jolie is pictured here, my blog stats always leap up. I’m cheap like that. Sometimes.

For a more nuanced view of some bi stories in 2009, take a look at the Bisexuality Examiner here with its best and worst bisexuality stories of 2009.

In other news
I have done a bit of tidying on this site, by removing most of the blogs I had linked to on the right. It is telling that, in the three and a half years since I started writing here, almost all of the personal blogs I listed then are no more. Blogging consistently over a long period is hard and, if you start to do it for personal reasons, often outlives its point. Others come to take their place.

Anyway, the ones I have added here are (at the moment anyway) posted to regularly and hopefully will keep you amused, entertained, challenged and supported.

If you know of any other good sites or blogs, especially your own, let me know as it is easy to miss them. I know there are more to add but I can't find them right this minute.

My last blog of 2009
For those of you whose New Year’s resolution is to act on your bisexuality, which often seems to people to come here at this time of year, I would say “go for it”. To me, anyway, the fact that you are thinking about it and weighing up your options means that you have a good chance of making it work for you.

Bisexuality is not necessarily difficult – from my point of view it is cause for celebration, something that I am proud of and is an intrinsic part of myself – but for many people it certainly can be. Perhaps those who find it easy-peasy tend not to comment on this blog! But I hope that even people who have found it difficult are on the way to a happy bisexual life.

Have a great 2010.

Bi The Way comes to London

Bi The Way, a US documentary looking at attitudes to bisexuality in America, is finally coming to the UK. It will be at the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival on March 30th and April 3rd. Online booking opens next Monday March 3rd, unless you are a BFI member when you can book by post now.

Now, no doubt this discussion will be very old news to people reading this who live in the US, where it has been blogged about ad nauseam – so what are your thoughts? Have you seen this film?

Because, although there is very little in the way of bi films out there (the first-ever bi doco at the LLGF as far as I can remember), this one doesn’t sound particularly entrancing.

Of course, any film/book/TV programme that is meant to represent an almost entirely unrepresented (in the sense of analysis, rather than 'phwoar') group can’t possibly win completely. But my hackles do rise when I read: "is bisexuality having a media fad or is the 'whatever' generation having its own sexual revolution"?

But, more than anything, it was the comprehensive shredding on it by the thoughtful blog Bi-Furious that makes me wary.

Anyway, ticket provision willing, I’ll be seeing it and reporting back.

Is there a ‘bisexual’ in LGBT history month?

Well no, probably not. This February's UK-based yearly event is, as in all other years, probably entirely “b” free.

A trawl through the website (10% of the 367 events anyway, before I got bored) indicates nothing specifically bi. There are lots of events where bi people could well be included among all-encompassing “gay” events. But nothing to imply that bisexuality might have a history in and of itself.

Anyone who might think it does could do worse than look at the links to this blog’s history posts. I have listed them on the right of this page. History is my thing, you see (well one of them! I am bi, I have lots!).

The ever-active Jen Yockney posted on bimedia.org that there was just one event with a bi speaker. This happened last week – but on a Tuesday morning!

Who do I blame?
Well, not the organisers. They publicise the events, it seems, they don’t arrange or commission them. This is a great “month” to put on, regardless.

A society that thinks that bi people in the past were really gay? So therefore to see bi people separately is simply wrong? Possibly.

A bi community that has shrivelled away, so that putting on any events is asking a lot of a very small number of people? Not really.

It’s true, too, that lesbian and gay history (particularly gay men) is much more documented than bi history. It can (and often does, and certainly used to) take in anyone interested in same-sex.

So I am left with no one to vent my frustration on. Ideas, anyone?

Moving on
I kind of think this shouldn’t happen next year. There ought to be at least a few more events on bisexuality throughout the ages. So who would run it? Get money for speakers’ expenses? Any ideas? It would be interesting, no?

At any rate, I promise to do a few more bi history posts on here this month. I do, I really do.


PS I went on a work-sponsored “writing for the web” course today. And I am tailoring this piece accordingly. Can you tell the difference between this and what I have written before, dearest regular readers? This piece seems very tabloidesque to me.

World Aids Day

There’s slow blogging, and there’s slow blogging – and I seem to be indulging in both. Not on purpose, mind. I’m too serious for the light and frothy, and can’t post thoughts without considering them first; and too stressed and overworked to post often. I mean, two and a half months since the last one! Ridiculous.

But this is World Aids Day, and even the most desultory bisexual blogger can’t let that pass without posting something.

I have been thinking a lot about the recent (to me) past over the past few weeks, as I have been unpacking and repacking the things that came from the loft in my old house and putting them in the loft in the new one.

In the late 80s and early 90s I was quite involved in the London queer scene (although its effect on my sexual and romantic life was negligible, as I was mainly attracted to Cuban New Yorkers at that time). It was a mixed gender place, this queer scene, with lots of lesbians having sex with gay men - flamboyant, energetic, challenging, experimental. We talked about safer sex a lot, and how to make it more exciting, but there was never a thought that it wasn’t an essential part of being a politically, sexually conscious person. That was still fashionable in those days.

So I’ve been looking at stacks of old magazines – Square Peg, Shebang, Quim – that came out of the arty gay scene in London at that time. Square Peg was mixed men and women, and arts-based with beautiful paper and production values. Shebang was a fun lesbian mag; Quim was an arty-lesbian sex mag. This seemed very daring at the time, but only lasted a couple of issues.

But the daring came from desperation about the queer future: the homophobia, the prejudice, the turning back to conventional morality because of Aids which affected women as well as men - although obviously men were the ones whose lives were at risk. The early 90s, when Quim was published, was also the aftermath of the lesbian sex wars, where what it meant to be a lesbian (not, definitely not, bisexual) was discussed endlessly and viciously. It was part of the end of "sisterhood" I think, but a mixed queer political scene - Act-Up, for instance - did thrive for a few years in the UK, and may still be going in the US. Then, of course, there was also the bi community which - from my perspective anyway - was going pretty well at that time.

Remembering People with Aids
Everyone who knew any queer people at that time was affected by Aids - and it baffles and infuriates me when I meet individuals today (either heterosexuals of any age who have lived sheltered lives, or young LBT people) who claim it has nothing to do with them. The first person I knew who died of Aids was in 1987 – but after that, circles of acquaintances went down like ninepins. I was lucky not to lose anyone really close but I still remember all those young men I went clubbing with in the early 80s who were dead 10 years later. It makes me absolutely fucking sick to think about it.

Of course, it’s different now – at least in countries where AZT is readily available. There’s a really nice picture gallery on the Guardian site, looking at various people around the world dealing with HIV/Aids in some way.

But it still gives me a chill when I see people all over the world who are still dying of this disease. Or when I read about young men in the UK who are having sex with each other completely unprotected, thinking that HIV is no big deal because they can take a pill. Think about it buster, taking a pill for your whole life, risking heart disease, tumours, a whole range of things neither you or I know about yet... The latest person I know (in Britain) to be diagnosed with HIV was in 2007, so this is by no means an old story.

In 2008, the necessity for this message hasn't changed a bit.

This blog is two today

Today this blog celebrates its second birthday. Yes, with this very post and my musings on that year’s Europride, I opened what is the longest-lasting bisexual blog in the known universe.

Whither blogs – will they wither and where are they going – is something that often bothers media pundits. Last week Roy Greenslade sparked off a discussion, commented on mostly by journalists whose opinions ran along the continuum of: a) journalism is great, blogs are white noise; b) blogs are the future, journalists have to have one, ordinary people are empowered etc; c) blogs are great, mainstream journalism is rubbish. However, as one commenter pointed out, the comments were far more interesting than the piece itself.

Good blogs, bad blogs
My own position is quite straightforward: blogs can be great, and the internet offers writers terrific opportunities to get their work to readers. Journalists who believe – as many do – that they can’t see the point of blogging, or don't recognise that it is a terrific tool for self-promotion, or say that they don’t want to write for nothing – are missing a career-building trick. What the mainstream media offers readers, and what blogging offers the mainstream media, is complementary.

It’s not true, though, that all blogs are equal. To start with, most bloggers give up pretty quickly. And writing every day – standard advice for building up a readership – means that pretty soon people are writing about nothing much. Unless they are brilliant writers – a few are – that means the quality goes down. In any event, there is too much to read on the internet, together with books, newspapers, magazines etc. I don’t suppose I’m the only one who just can’t keep up with people who blog every day.

What this blog is for
As I have written here from time to time, I am a journalist (editing more than writing) but what pays me money is nothing to do with what I write here. If anyone ever wanted serious writing on bisexuality then I’m your woman. But, as one of the reasons I started writing this blog in the first place was because my commissioned book on bisexuality couldn’t find a home after its original publisher closed down, I doubt that semi-serious writing on bisex – as distinct from erotica, or trivia, or straightforward academic books - in the UK can pay its way. Not everything can be monetised. As the profit motive in publishing is more important than ever, and booksellers sell ever fewer titles, the prospect for what is euphemistically called “mid-list” writers dims.

Still, onwards and upwards, and those of us who have things to say have a way of getting them out there. I doubt whether my musings that were produced via the dead tree route ever saw the light of day in Indonesia, or Nepal, or Western Samoa – which they have through the web.

This blog is a niche “product”, for people who are interested in the issues around bi/sexuality rather than erotic stories, coming out tales, complaints about boyfriends/girlfriends, polls about what turns you on and so forth. All of those most definitely have their place, just not written by me. They are also more popular than what I write.

Still, as over 101,000 people have read this blog since I started, there must be a demand for it. Thank you, readers!

B-free LGBT history month

Another month, another theme, and February in the British Isles is LGBT History month. Or, to be more accurate, gay history with a few lesbian events, some trans stuff if you’re lucky, and nothing bisexual whatsoever… month.

Still, as the only bisexual blogger with a strong interest in and a reasonable knowledge of history (probably) I can add my two groats’ worth.
So, to start us off, a bisexual novel of the 1920s: Dusty Answer.

Judith is a lonely child (and later woman) whose (rich, by normal standards of our time and hers) parents don’t take much notice of her. She does, however, live next to a house where a group of cousins come to spend summers. In the years leading up to the first world war, she falls in love with this family - Charlie, Mariella, Julian, Roddy and Martin - finding them entrancing. Charlie and Mariella marry very young during the war, but Charlie is killed, leaving Mariella - a widow at the age of 19 - to bring up their son alone.

Judith – and Roddy and Martin – goes to Oxford, where she falls in love with Jennifer. Their relationship is described in very romantic and sensual terms:
“She roused herself at last as Judith bent to kiss her good night.
‘Good night my-darling-darling,’ she said.
They stared at each other with tragic faces. It was too much, this happiness, this beauty.”
And much in similar vein. Jennifer runs off with another woman, however.

Roddy, who Judith falls in love with later, has a constant companion in the shape of Tony. Tony is an artist who spends much time in Paris…

It all ends sadly, this melancholy tale, but not because they have chosen the wrong gender love objects. Everyone is fated to be unhappy in love, and in life for that matter. Absolutely everyone in this novel is miserable.

But while no one actually has sex with anyone – this was published in 1927 after all – I would certainly argue that this is a bisexual novel. The characters seem to moon after individuals and no character cares or indeed seems to notice whether they are men or women. Of course, they all intend to marry. That’s what people did then. But love existed outside that too.

When I was a student in the late 70s, I read and loved this book. It was recommended to me by Kate Millett (not personally, of course, but in her autobiography Flying where she talks about reading it.) Now that I am back at the university I came from, I got the self-same copy out – now rather more tatty than it was 20 whatever years ago – to read again.
Dusty Answer is a rites of passage novel, something that would have appealed to the young woman I was when I first read it. Now I am more struck by how old-fashioned it seems, how snobbish and privileged the characters are. And how sad – the melancholy seeps from every page. All Rosamond Lehmann’s books (that I have read anyway) have this melancholy.

I think it’s almost certain that Rosamond Lehmann knew that parts of her characters’ lives could be construed as homosexual (she was living in bohemian London, where there was rather a lot of it going on at the time!). But, as I have written quite a lot on this blog, the “dichotomous view of sexuality” – you’re either straight or gay – didn’t have a hold over society in quite the way it does now. She wrote some interesting things about the reactions to her writings here.

A fascinating period piece, but a lot harder to "relate to" than I remembered.

Underground at the House of Homosexual Culture

This coming Saturday, I’m going to be spending the day at the above, running the tea stall. There’ll be beverages, and fairy cakes – of course – and Santa’s little helpers of every gender. The wonderful writer Sarah Waters will be opening it. So if you’re in London, come on down.
I won’t be the only bi curiosity on show: those socially-minded folks The Bisexual Underground will have a stall. They meet monthly in a London pub for darts, board games, chatting and so forth.
And I think the Bi Underground is about it for the organised London bi scene at the moment – I can’t even tell if the London Bi women’s group is still going, or the London main group that was active for 20 years. Of course, there are places like fetish superclub Torture Garden – a “not safe for work site” - of course, where there is no shortage of behavioural bisexuality on display. Male/male couples, female/female couples, female/male couples, groups of friends or lovers, people who are clearly transsexual or whose gender is hard to determine… Everyone can be gorgeous if they have made an effort; everyone has a chance of being desired by someone there.

Is there a bi culture?
I’ve been asking myself this question quite often lately and I think the answer is probably, sadly, no. The reason for the question is that I’m hanging out a lot with, and seeing lots of events advertising: lesbian and gay culture, lesbian and gay communities, bla bla bla. This event is, after all, organised by the House of Homosexual Culture. They are great blokes and I love them. Bisexuals have a place on the gay scene, and always have had, even if we haven’t been recognised. But is that enough? Could there ever be a house of bisexual culture?
It's hard to imagine. Bi people are too diverse. That’s why I have a link called 57 Varieties. Some bi people veer towards gay culture, others straight. There’s no one thing we all want.
There’s a queer culture – encompassing all sorts of people who happen to be not mainstream heterosexual, but which leaves out many “straight-acting” bis. And there are subcultures with lots of bisexual people – swingers to anarchists and hippies (well, I think the anarchist bit is true, anyway).
But can you call the few bi groups, conferences, newsletters and so on a culture? Not really. I’ve tried to define (for myself) what “a bisexual culture” might encompass but I can’t. Clothes, creativity, music, secret signals to indicate to someone that you might be bi? No. There isn't any of that.
There is, though, a history of bisexuality – in particular how it was seen by the general public - ranging from bohemians and the Bloomsbury Group in the 1920s and 30s, David Bowie in the 70s, the influence of feminism and the sexual liberation movements around the same time, plus the organised bi community. That’s something you can trace, and I’ve stressed that quite a bit in this blog. It’s something to hold on to.

Something for the weekend

It's Celebrate Bisexuality Day on Sunday (23rd) - a bit shocking really in the "where has time gone" kind of a way. So what to do, ladies and gentlemen, what to do?

Well, most people will probably be carrying on as normal, possibly having a drink, or dipping into a box of chocolates, doing usual Sunday stuff. There doesn't seem to be a lot of organised activity this year, compared with last.

The main celebration I can find in the US is in Boston this evening (Thursday 20th) where they are launching a new Bisexual Health book.

In London, there's Poly Day on Saturday - there's a fair old overlap between the organised poly and bi communities, so expect to see some people there.

In Holland, also on Saturday, they are having a Bisexual Symposium.
If, like me, you don't read Dutch it's easy enough to automatically translate it. It seems as if they are getting the results of a big survey of 50,000 people entitled "How Bi Are You", which used Fritz Klein's sexual orientation grid. When I find out some more about it, I'll let you know.

So on to Sunday, and in Glasgow: at the MED cafe at the LGBT centre on Bell Street, they'll be serving bi-pride coloured cocktails during the afternoon and evening.
Is that a sky-blue pink cocktail then, and if so what's it made of?

Apparently, though, Second Life is where it's all at. At a blog called Second Life Insider, I found this.

September 23 is Celebrate Bisexuality Day the world over, and now it's finally come to SL. Erasmus Hartunian of the BiCafe Beach Place will be holding an event from 5 AM to 7 PM SL Time that will include Live concerts, DJs, Fashion Shows, Art Exhibits, Games, and Contests, with over $100,000 in prizes and give-aways scheduled for every hour of the day.

Interestingly, SL boasts the largest association of bisexuals in the world -- its Bisexuals in Second Life is over 1200 members strong. BiCafe.com, the longest running social web site for bisexuals founded in 1997, has its virtual home in BiCafe Beach Place, and will be celebrating its 10th year anniversary at this event. Come join the party and show your support!

Hmm.... does anyone who reads this blog go on Second Life? Maybe Second Lifers spend all their time there instead of the wider internet world.... When I get a home computer with a broadband connection that actually works properly, I'll check it out.

Divine decadence darling

Like a fair swathe of London last weekend, I had a brief “Sebastian Horsley experience” on Saturday.

I went to The Last Tuesday Society dinner and ball where the dandy/artist/writer addressed us as part of the launch of his book Dandy in the Underworld. Mr Horsley, His Royal Lowness, looked spectacular, wearing a sequinned suit that had to be one of the most gorgeous outfits I have ever seen - like black mirrored water. His famously stunning girlfriend and muse, Rachel 2, was indeed jaw-droppingly, hypnotically beautiful. (I wonder what it’s like to be a muse… do you have to actually do anything, or is doing something exactly what you mustn’t do?)

Anyway, SH has built up a bit of a reputation for himself as being the embodiment of decadence in a Baudelaire, Byron, Earl of Rochester, overdosing 60s pop star, “I have had sex with X-thousand prostitutes” and “my clothes are my art” kind of way. His main claim to fame, in so far as he has one, is being sacked as sex columnist of the Observer newspaper for answering questions about oral and anal sex a bit (lot) too graphically. (But they were the ones who published his answers. They could always have asked for a rewrite.) And the other was through crucifying himself (literally) in the Philippines in the name of art. He fell off.

The reason he’s appearing in this blog is because of his sexual behaviour. His notorious mention in his Observer column of: “I’ve buggered and been buggered by men and I’ve buggered and been buggered by women”. While being simultaneously homophobic and misogynistic, it seems. Still, for someone who writes as if he is appalled by practically everyone, he seems to have quite a few friends, many of them women or gay men.

Not many people can boast (the right word) of being having anal sex with a mass-murderer - the by-then reformed gangster Jimmy Boyle, apparently , like SH does. While Boyle was also having an affair with his wide. Lawks! And unrepentantly taking shedloads of drugs too.

This, then, is the polar opposite of the wholesome bisexual activist approach to bisexuality. It’s the “all life’s pleasures” approach – why wouldn’t you have sex with that gorgeous person? Why wouldn’t you try this that or the other sexual activity – it might be fun?

Certainly, dandyism - which is a growing scene in London at the moment, and one I certainly enjoy very much - has a homoerotic element to it, whatever the overt sexuality of the men who are involved. Personally, I love men who take an unusually close interest in their appearance and could look at them all day. It is possible to make yourself into a work of art: dandyism reminds me of one of my all-time heroes, Quentin Crisp, who certainly knew how to give good front and quip elegantly.


Earthy crunchy me
But I’m useless at decadence myself. If I do something even mildly naughty – such as not going to bed till 4am or getting drunk – it takes me several days to recover. When I had hospital-administered morphine I couldn't believe anyone would take it for fun. I live on salad, for heaven’s sake. I don’t mind observing it, though, from a pretty safe distance.

Not that I know what it is really - I read The Decadent Handbook without really being any the wiser about what decadence is. But I suppose sex and drugs and rock'n'roll, with a bit of added death-wish, probably covers it.
Obviously, a life solely consisting of self-destructive self-indulgence is actually pretty boring and empty. Not to mention short. Women never really get to be decadent, either. To be decadent, you need money, leisure, no children or other people to look after; people, preferably servants, to do the cleaning up for you. And perhaps that’s why decadence seems to be having a bit of a moment: because everyone in Britain now is expected to work so bloody, unrelentingly hard. To be career focussed and desperate to pay off the credit cards and the mortgage. To not smoke and only eat healthily and never take any risks we haven't paid good money for (white-water rafting, anyone?) Faced with the hamster-wheel of the modern world, it’s not surprising that people dream of drug-fuelled orgies – of which there were surprisingly few in The Decadent Handbook.

Of course, much of SH’s decadence is really a fantasy – in the Story of O sort of way. I had expected to feel at least queasy at his readings but SH, for all his claims of being the devil incarnate, or at any rate one of his henchmen, was very funny and seemingly self-deprecating. His book sounded very entertaining; his relationships quite sad and difficult.

I had intended to buy it and get him to sign it with some kind of lurid message. But by 2.30am, when I left the ball, he, his books, and Rachel 2, were long gone. Oh, I thought, they've gone off to put their feet up with a cup of cocoa. But no, nothing so cliched. They had changed into matching red sequinned outfits and gone to the second launch of the night - for his Soho exhibition Hookers, Dealers, Tailors.

Alas, like so many disappointed fans, I left with my innocence intact.

25 years too many

I was in lying on the grass in Central Park, New York, this day 25 years ago, recently graduated and weeping with excitement at being in what seemed to me the most incredible, amazing place in the world while the fireworks accompanying the 1812 Overture banged and flashed overhead to celebrate Independence Day.

Back across the Atlantic, a man died in London. At the time, no one knew what was wrong with Terrence Higgins, nor its future significance. That didn't last long.

There's an article from the head of the Terrence Higgins Trust in the Guardian today, together with some audio from Terrence Higgins' partner, Rupert Whitaker.

So - 25 years of appalling pain, horror, sadness, and death, yet many people still behave like it has nothing to do with them.

Still not putting it on
According to a study reported on Aidsmap, about men on the gay scene in three British cities - London, Manchester and Brighton - 22% of HIV-negative men reported unprotected anal sex with a man who was either HIV-positive or of unknown HIV status in the last year.

Oh dear. No, worse than that. Why are you risking your health/life in this way?
No doubt many of these men have sex with women too - whatever they call themselves. Now, I know that - according to other studies - bi men seem actually less likely to have very risky sex. Of course, no one knows for certain - as the whole thing's shrouded in secrecy - but anecdotal and, to a certain extent, other evidence indicates that bi men are less likely to have anal intercourse with other men than are men who are entirely gay. Still, I don't want anyone to die of this horrible disease; I don't rate bi men more highly than gay men, for instance, or even men operating under the delusion that they are entirely heterosexual and just having sex with another man because... well, why not? I don't want any of them to get it.

And according to another study, men in the US who have sex with men - gay, bi, whatever, make up over two-thirds of US syphilis cases. Incidences of heterosexually-transmitted syphilis have reduced but this is more than made up for by the increase in it between men. Not only does contracting syphilis show that you are having unsafe sex (although it is very much easier to get syphilis than HIV through oral sex) but it also makes contracting HIV more likely.


You know what to do
This makes my blood run cold. I know I've said it before, but really, some things can't be repeated too often.
Please - do I have to hang on to your ankle like a heavy weight and stop you going off for unprotected sex. Use a fucking condom.
You might have not seen people around you dying of Aids, but I have and it's HORRIBLE. Worse than horrible. Please, no roulette games. Unlike a lottery win, it really can happen to you. And even though treatment is so very much better these days, the health implications are still enormous.
A bi male friend of mine, who spent the 70s and 80s in San Francisco, and who - due to a mixture of luck, monogamy and unrelated ill-health - managed not to contract HIV, told me how he met one of his peer group on the street there recently. They were both very shocked as each had assumed that the other had died. And how sad and sick-making that this was a reasonable assumption.

International day against homophobia

Apparently it's international day against homophobia today (17th May). God knows, the world needs it - and you can find out more from the link in the title of this post.

From Amnesty International, for instance, whose LGBT mailing list I am on, I give you this information about Poland:

Pride Marches
"On Saturday 16 November 2006 the Equality March took place in Poznañ, where about 450 people went out on the street to celebrate the International Day of Tolerance. The March was guarded by around 500 policemen with shields, helmets and dogs. There were about 150 counter-demonstrators who chanted anti-LGBT slogans and the police detained one of them. There were no serious incidents due to the police presence. The next marches will be the March of Tolerance which will take place in Krakow on 21 April 2007 and the Warsaw Equality Parade on 19 May 2007.
Homophobic language
Political figures, including government officials, responsible for public statements such as 'If deviants begin to demonstrate, they should be hit with batons.' and 'LGBT organizations are sending transsexuals to kindergartens and asking children to change their sex' have continued to use openly homophobic language. On 20 February 2007, while on a three-day state visit to Ireland, President Lech Kaczyñski attacked what he called “the homosexual culture” and suggested that widespread homosexuality would lead to the disappearance of the human race. Speaking at a Forum of Europe meeting in Dublin Castle, Mr Kaczyñski said: 'If that kind of approach to sexual life were to be promoted on a grand scale, the human race would disappear”. He also stood by his decision to ban a gay rights march in Warsaw while mayor of the city in 2004.
Roman Giertych, Poland's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education, openly expressed his wish to implement a pan-European ban on 'homosexual propaganda' during a meeting of European Ministers of Education in Heidelberg, Germany, on 2 March 2007. 'The propaganda of homosexuality is reaching ever younger children' Giertych said in the speech released to the Polish media on 3 March. He also continued to promote his controversial proposal to include a ban on rights for homosexuals in any possible future European constitution while the Polish goverment continues to press for references to 'god'."

Shall I put in some witty comments here? No - I shall let this antedilevian twaddle speak for itself.

And that's just Poland. There's some 191 other countries in the world and in at least half a dozen of them, sex really can = death.

Let them eat cake

If you happen to be in London tomorrow, you should come and join me. I'm going to be spending the day with my lovely chums at the House of Homosexual Culture's Autumn Fayre. It'll be a laugh.
Fancy a day of "desexualising sexuality", bringing the gay scene "out of the clubs and into the kitchen"? This is queer London's answer to the village fete.
Ian McKellen (sir) will be opening it - and selling the first fairy cake - then there'll be gingerbreadmen-icing by Gerhard Jenne (of Konditor and Cook loveliness), needlecraft from Stitch and Bitch, a Tupperware stall, Pasta Portraits, a bring-and-buy sale and very many more. Fun for all the (unpretended) family.
And, although this started off as a boys' event, naturally us girls have muscled in too. I've even heard a rumour that there's going to be an edible representation of the history of political lesbianism. Now that's something many of us have had stuffed down our throats; this might be the chance to eat it in a more leisurely fashion.
I'm serving teas, and if you come up to me and mention this blog, an extra big smile will come free with your 50p beverage.

Saturday 30th September, 12noon-5pm, St John's church, Waterloo Road, London SE1

All proceeds to the Food Chain