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Bisexual chic is a phrase used to describe the public acknowledgment of bisexuality or increased public interest or acceptance of bisexuality. Another usage describes a faddish attention towards bisexuality. [1] Bisexual chic is often accompanied by celebrities publicly revealing their bisexuality.
In the United States, the 1920s was a decade of social experimentation, particularly with sex. This was heavily influenced by the writings of Sigmund Freud, who theorized that people would behave in any manner to satisfy sexual desire. With the well-publicized image that sexual acts were a part of lesbian women and relationships, sexual experimentation was widespread. Large cities that provided a nightlife were immensely popular, and women began to seek out sexual adventure. Bisexuality became chic, particularly in America's first gay neighborhoods. [2]
The phrase itself came into wide usage in the 1970s, on the tail end of the hippie movement, which extolled free love. During the glam rock and disco era, there was a media-generated fascination with bisexuality in the club scene and among musicians such as Elton John, David Bowie and Patti Smith; in fact, in 1980, Time magazine referred to Bowie's persona Ziggy Stardust as "the orange-haired founder of bisexual chic." [3] [4] At the same time, bisexual groups formed in several large US cities, heralding the birth of the modern bisexual civil rights and liberation movements. [5]
The phrase can be used to imply someone is only pretending to be bisexual because it's fashionable at the moment. [6] Alternatively, it can be used to assert that someone is free of taboos, experimental, in touch with both masculine and feminine aspects of themselves, and therefore potentially a better lover or even a better person. [7]
Though the terminology is attributed to the 1970s, a bisexual trend occurred in the 1920s. In Vice Versa: Bisexuality and the Eroticism of Everyday Life, Marjorie Garber argues "the twenties has been linked to the popularization of Freud (or "Freudianism"), the advent of World War I, and a general predilection for the daring and unconventional: bobbed hair, short skirts, the rejection of Prohibition and Victorian strictures." Examples of this include drag balls, and the success of artists such as Ernest Hemingway, D. H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, and Marlene Dietrich. [8] Looking back from the 70s, writer Elaine Showalter accused Woolf and the Bloomsbury Group of bisexual chic when she warned Woolf and her friends of indulging "the fashion of bisexuality." [9]
After a strain of social movements centred on LGBT rights like the Stonewall riots in 1969, from the 1970s onwards, awareness of bisexuality was on the rise and non-conforming sexual behaviors were seen as an act of social defiance. In 1972, the hit musical film Cabaret featured a love triangle with a man and woman fighting for the same (male) lover. The author who inspired it, Christopher Isherwood, was among the first openly homosexual celebrities. [10] Other prominent cultural representations of the 1970s include The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Sunday Bloody Sunday (film) . In the 90s, under the influences of the contemporary hipster subculture, [11] which symbolizes the resistance against mainstream lifestyle and encourages unconventionalities, more and more people started to speculate about their own identity as well as sexuality.
The phenomenon of bisexual chic can also be attributed to the growing number of celebrities disclosing their bisexual identity. For example, in 1995, the lead vocalist of punk rock band Green Day, Billie Joe Armstrong, came out as bisexual in an interview with The Advocate. [12] In the media, Madonna's music videos for "Justify My Love" and "Erotica" and her book "Sex" featured same-sex eroticism. Openly bisexual comedian Sandra Bernhard was featured as a bisexual on the popular television sitcom Roseanne amidst the trend. To illustrate the trend, Roseanne later found herself kissed by another woman and was "consoled" by Bernhard's character, bringing bisexuality to Middle America. [13] The 1992 film Basic Instinct featured a glamorous bisexual murderess played by Sharon Stone. Mainstream singer Janet Jackson recorded a cover version of Rod Stewart's "Tonight's the Night (Gonna Be Alright)" in which she sings to a woman with whom she is about to engage in a ménage à trois , saying, "This is just between me … and you … and you …".
In the 21st century, bisexuality (or manifestations thereof) was shown or alluded to in the films Kissing Jessica Stein , Y tu mamá también , Mulholland Drive , Alexander , Kinsey , and Brokeback Mountain , in the television series The O.C. in the US and Torchwood in the UK and in Lady Gaga's music videos for "LoveGame" and "Telephone". In the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards, Madonna kissed Britney Spears and then Christina Aguilera; many news and tabloid outsources referred to it as "lesbian chic". [14] [15] The 2008 hit song "I Kissed a Girl" by Katy Perry had bi-curious lyrics. According to surveys by the CDC in the US, a larger number of female college and high school students in America are experimenting with other women than ever before and, in a surprising twist, actually report being encouraged to do so by pop culture for the first time. [16]
Despite the visibility and acceptance of bisexuality brought by the effects of bisexual chic, this phenomenon has been criticised for its "trendy" property rather than a genuine act of advocating bisexual equality. The idea of bisexuality being chic is also detrimental to the bisexual movement as "faux bisexuality" gives bad credits to bisexual people that their sexuality is only a form of art, not a real sexual orientation. [17]
It also misleads people who are bi-curious, which means questioning their attraction to both sexes and possibly end up being monosexual, to identify with being bisexual. [18]
A lesbian is a homosexual woman or girl. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with female homosexuality or same-sex attraction. The concept of "lesbian" to differentiate women with a shared sexual orientation evolved in the 20th century. Throughout history, women have not had the same freedom or independence as men to pursue homosexual relationships, but neither have they met the same harsh punishment as gay men in some societies. Instead, lesbian relationships have often been regarded as harmless, unless a participant attempts to assert privileges traditionally enjoyed by men. As a result, little in history was documented to give an accurate description of how female homosexuality was expressed. When early sexologists in the late 19th century began to categorize and describe homosexual behavior, hampered by a lack of knowledge about homosexuality or women's sexuality, they distinguished lesbians as women who did not adhere to female gender roles. They classified them as mentally ill—a designation which has been reversed since the late 20th century in the global scientific community.
Bi-curious is a term for a person, usually someone who is a self-identified heterosexual, who is curious or open about engaging in sexual activity with a person whose sex differs from that of their usual sexual partners. The term is sometimes used to describe a broad continuum of sexual orientation between heterosexuality and bisexuality. Such continuums include mostly heterosexual or mostly homosexual, but these can be self-identified without identifying as bisexual. The terms heteroflexible and homoflexible are mainly applied to bi-curious people, though some authors distinguish heteroflexibility and homoflexibility as lacking the "wish to experiment with sexuality" implied by the bi-curious label. It is important when discussing this continuum to conclude that bisexuality is distinct from heterosexuality and homosexuality rather than simply an extension of said sexualities like the labels heteroflexibility and homoflexibility would imply, due to the prominent erasure and assimilation of bisexuality into other identity groups. To sum it up, the difference between bisexual and bicurious is that bisexual people know that they are sexually attracted to both genders based on personal experience. Bicurious people are still maneuvering their way through their sexuality.
The Kinsey scale, also called the Heterosexual–Homosexual Rating Scale, is used in research to describe a person's sexual orientation based on one's experience or response at a given time. The scale typically ranges from 0, meaning exclusively heterosexual, to a 6, meaning exclusively homosexual. In both the male and female volumes of the Kinsey Reports, an additional grade, listed as "X", indicated "no socio-sexual contacts or reactions" (asexuality). The reports were first published in Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948) by Alfred Kinsey, Wardell Pomeroy, and others, and were also prominent in the complementary work Sexual Behavior in the Human Female (1953).
Femme is a term traditionally used to describe a lesbian woman who exhibits a feminine identity or gender presentation. While commonly viewed as a lesbian term, alternate meanings of the word also exist with some non-lesbian individuals using the word, notably some gay men and bisexuals. Some non-binary and transgender individuals also identify as lesbians using this term.
Biphobia is aversion toward bisexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being bisexual. Similarly to homophobia, it refers to hatred and prejudice specifically against those identified or perceived as being in the bisexual community. It can take the form of denial that bisexuality is a genuine sexual orientation, or of negative stereotypes about people who are bisexual. Other forms of biphobia include bisexual erasure.
"Lipstick lesbian" is slang for a lesbian who exhibits a great amount of feminine gender attributes, such as wearing make-up, dresses or skirts, and having other characteristics associated with feminine women. In popular usage, the term is also used to characterize the feminine gender expression of bisexual women, or the broader topic of female–female sexual activity among feminine women.
"New queer cinema" is a term first coined by the academic B. Ruby Rich in Sight & Sound magazine in 1992 to define and describe a movement in queer-themed independent filmmaking in the early 1990s.
Heteroflexibility is a form of a sexual orientation or situational sexual behavior characterized by minimal homosexual activity in an otherwise primarily heterosexual orientation, which may or may not distinguish it from bisexuality. It has been characterized as "mostly straight". Although sometimes equated with bi-curiosity to describe a broad continuum of sexual orientation between heterosexuality and bisexuality, other authors distinguish heteroflexibility as lacking the "wish to experiment with ... sexuality" implied by the bi-curious label. The corresponding situation in which homosexual activity predominates has also been described, termed homoflexibility.
LGBT culture is a culture shared by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer individuals. It is sometimes referred to as queer culture, while the term gay culture may be used to mean either "LGBT culture" or homosexual culture specifically.
Lesbian erotica deals with depictions in the visual arts of lesbianism, which is the expression of female-on-female sexuality. Lesbianism has been a theme in erotic art since at least the time of ancient Rome, and many regard depictions of lesbianism to be erotic.
Bisexual erasure, also called bisexual invisibility, is the tendency to ignore, remove, falsify, or re-explain evidence of bisexuality in history, academia, the news media, and other primary sources.
Bisexual pornography is a genre of pornography that most typically depicts men and at least one woman who all perform sex acts on each other. A sex scene involving women and one man who all perform sex acts on each other is generally not identified or labeled as bisexual.
The questioning of one's sexual orientation, sexual identity, gender, or all three is a process of exploration by people who may be unsure, still exploring, or concerned about applying a social label to themselves for various reasons. The letter "Q" is sometimes added to the end of the acronym LGBT ; the "Q" can refer to either queer or questioning.
Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, to more than one gender, or to both people of the same gender and different genders. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, which is also known as pansexuality.
Sexual fluidity is one or more changes in sexuality or sexual identity. Sexual orientation is stable for the vast majority of people, but some research indicates that some people may experience change in their sexual orientation, and this is slightly more likely for women than for men. There is no scientific evidence that sexual orientation can be changed through psychotherapy. Sexual identity can change throughout an individual's life, and does not have to align with biological sex, sexual behavior, or actual sexual orientation.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer+(LGBTQ+)music is music that focuses on the experiences of gender and sexual minorities as a product of the broad gay liberation movement.
The following outline offers an overview and guide to LGBT topics:
Bisexual literature is a subgenre of LGBT literature that includes literary works and authors that address the topic of bisexuality or biromanticism. This includes characters, plot lines, and/or themes portraying bisexual behavior in both men and women.
In LGBT slang, a "gold star lesbian" is a lesbian who has never had sex with a man, and a "gold star gay" is a gay man who has never had sex with a woman. The terms can be joking, sincerely held identities, or stereotypes within the LGBT community. When used sincerely, the terms have been criticised as exclusionary towards bisexuality and other experiences of gender and sexuality, and as stigmatising survivors of sexual violence.
The history of bisexuality concerns the history of the bisexual sexual orientation. Ancient and medieval history of bisexuality, when the term did not exist as such, consists of anecdotes of sexual behaviour and relationships between people of the same and different sexes. A modern definition of bisexuality began to take shape in the mid-19th century within three interconnected domains of knowledge: biology, psychology and sexuality. In modern Western culture, the term bisexual was first defined in a binary approach as a person with romantic or sexual attraction to both men and women. The term bisexual is defined later in the 20th century as a person who is sexually and/or romantically attracted to both males and females, or as a person who is sexually and/or romantically attracted to people regardless of sex or gender identity, which is sometimes termed pansexuality.
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