FROM THE MAGAZINE, ANYTHING THAT MOVES

Our choice to use this title for the magazine has been nothing less than controversial. That we would choose to redefine the stereotype that “bisexuals will fuck anything that moves,” to suit our own purposes has created myriad reactions. Those critical of the title feel we are purporting the stereotype and damaging our image. Those in favor of its use see it as a movement away from he stereotype, toward bisexual empowerment.

 We deliberately chose the radical approach. We are creating dialogue through controversy. We are challenging people to face their own external and internal biphobia. We are demanding attention, and are re-defining “anything that moves” on our own terms.

 READ OUR LIPS: WE WILL WRITE OR PRINT OR SAY ANYTHING THAT MOVES US BEYOND THE LIMITING STEREOTYPES THAT ARE DISPLACED ONTO US.

 This magazine was created by bisexuals and their friends. All proceeds are invested into its production and the bisexual community. It is published by the Bay Area Bisexual Network and reflects the integrity and inclusive nature of the BABN‌ Statement of Purpose. ATM was created out of pride; out of necessity; out of anger. We are tired of being analyzed, defined and represented by people other than ourselves–or worse yet, not considered at all. We are frustrated by the imposed isolation and invisibility that comes from being told or expected to choose either a homosexual or heterosexual identity. Monosexuality is a heterosexist dictate used to oppress homosexuals and to negate the validity of bisexuality.

 Bisexuality is a whole, fluid identity. Do not assume that bisexuality is binary or duogamous in nature: that we have “two” sides or that we MUST be involved simultaneously with both genders to be fulfilled human beings. In fact, don’t assume that there are only two genders. Do not mistake our fluidity for confusion, irresponsibility, or an inability to commit. Do not equate promiscuity, infidelity, or unsafe sexual behavior with bisexuality. Those are human traits across ALL sexual orientations. Nothing should be assumed about anyone’s sexuality–including your own.

 We are angered by those who refuse to accept our existence; our issues; our contributions; our alliances; our voice. It is time for the bisexual voice to be heard. Do not expect each magazine to be representative of all bisexuals, for our diversity is too vast. Do not expect a clear-cut definition of bisexuality to jump out from the pages. We bisexuals tend to define bisexuality in ways that are unique to our own individuality. There are as many definitions of bisexuality as there are bisexuals. Many of us choose not to label ourselves anything at all, and find the word ‘bisexual’ to be inadequate and too limiting. Do not assume that the opinions expressed are shared by all bisexuals, by those actively in the Bisexual Movement, by the ATM staff, or the BABN Board of Directors.

 What you can expect is a magazine that, through its inclusive and diverse nature, creates movement away from external and internal limitations.

 This magazine is about ANYTHING THAT MOVES: that moves us to think; that moves us to fuck (or not); that moves us to feel; that moves us to believe in ourselves–To Do It For Ourselves!

about BABN…

The Bay Area Bisexual Network is an alliance of bisexual and bi-supportive groups, individuals, and resources in the San Francisco Bay Area. BABN is coalescing the bisexual community and creating a movement for acceptance and support of human diversity by coordinating forums, social events, opportunities, and resources. We support relationships among people regardless of gender, which can include relating intellectually, emotionally, spiritually, sensually, and sexually. We support celibacy, monogamy, and non-monogamy as equally valid lifestyle choices. We support open expression of affection and touch among people without such expression necessarily having sexual implications. The BABN is by nature educational in that we are supporting the rights of all women and men to develop as whole beings without oppression because of age, race, religion, color, class or different abilities, nor because of sexual preference, gender, gender preference and/or responsible consensual sexual behavior preferences. We also support acceptance in areas of employment, housing, healthcare, and education. This includes access to complete sexual information, free expression of responsible consensual sexual activity, and other individual freedoms. Membership is open to all bi-positive people whether or not they consider themselves bisexual.

ON BUTCH AND FEMME

Bisexual women using butch and femme:

gay & bi women going to the same clubs: Source 1, Source 2

bisexual etymology: Source

lesbian separatism: Source

tribade: Source

butch/femme: Source

more on butch/femme; Source

origins of bi movements: Source 1, Source 2, Source 3

lady with history & women’s studies + LGBT studies degrees: Source

ball culture: Source

ON THE LABEL BISEXUAL

The first English-language use of the word "bisexual" referring to sexual orientation was by the American neurologist Charles Gilbert Chaddock in his 1892 translation of the 7th edition of Krafft-Ebing's seminal work Psychopathia Sexualis. Prior to this, "bisexual" was usually used to mean hermaphroditic, often in reference to plants. Under any label, openly bisexual people were rare in early American life. One notable exception was the openly bisexual poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, who received the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver in 1923.[1] The 19th century poet Walt Whitman is usually described by biographers as either bisexual or homosexual in his feelings and attractions. In the early 20th century, during the Harlem Renaissance, blues singers Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith made no secret about their relationships with both men and women[2] and songs like "Sissy Man Blues", "Freakish Blues" and Rainey's "Prove It on Me" spoke openly of homosexual and bisexual relationships.[3]

BISEXUAL NEVER MEANT ONLY TWO:

“Bisexual—being emotionally and physically attracted to all genders.” - GLSEN in fucking 1998

“Do not assume that bisexuality is binary or duogamous in naturs [...] In fact, don’t assume that there are only two genders.” 1990 Bi Manifesto

“But there are also many bis, such as myself, for whom gender has no place in the list of things that attract them to a person.“ 2002

“Bisexual people are those for whom gender is not the first criteria in determining attraction.” 2003

“Assuming that all bisexuals are never attracted to trans or genderqueer folk is harmful, not only to bi individuals, but to trans and genderqueer individuals who choose to label themselves as bi.”

“Bisexual: A person who is attracted to people regardless of gender (a person does not have to have a relationship to be bisexual!)” 2003

“These data support the argument that, for some bisexual individuals, sexual attraction is not gender-linked.” 1992

1974

Kate Millett concluded her December, 1974 talk by lauding ‘the very wealth and humanity of bisexuality itself: for to exclude from one’s love any entire group of human beings because of class, age, or race or religion, or sex, is surely to be poorer - deeply and systematically poorer.’

quote from “The Bisexual Movement’s Beginnings in the 70s“, Bisexual Politics, referring to 1974

1984

J: Are we ever going to be able to define what bisexuality is?

S: Never completely. That’s just it – the variety of lifestyles that we see between us defies definition.

Boston Bisexual Women’s Network Newsletter, January 1984

1986

I believe most of us will end up acknowledging that we love certain people or, perhaps, certain kinds of people, and that gender need not be a significant category, though for some of us it may be.

From an issue of Bi Women: the Newsletter of the Boston Bisexual Women’s Network, 1986

"The Bisexual Community: Are We Visible Yet?" by bisexual activist Lani Ka'ahumanu, written in 1987

1990

[B]isexual usually also implies that relations with gender minorities are possible.

Bisexuality: a Reader and Sourcebook, Thomas Geller, 1990

1992

Bisexuals fall in love with a person, not a gender

A bisexual’s survey response in Closer to Home: Bisexuality and Feminism, Weise, 1992

With respect to our integrity as bisexuals, it is our responsibility to include transgendered people in our language, in our communities, in our politics, and in our lives.

“The Next Natural Step” by Naomi Tucker, Anything that Moves, No. 4,1992

1995

The bisexual community should be a place where lines are erased. Bisexuality dismisses, disproves, and defies dichotomies. It connotes a loss of rigidity and absolutes. It is an inclusive term.

Martin-Damon, K., “Essay for the Inclusion of Transsexuals”. Bisexual Politics. New York: Harrington Park Press. 1995

[B]isexual consciousness, because of its amorphous quality and inclusionary nature, posed a fundamental threat to the dualistic and exclusionary thought patterns which were - and still are - tenaciously held by both the gay liberation leadership and its enemies.

“The Bisexual Movement’s Beginnings in the 70s”, Bisexual Politics, edited by Naomi Tucker, 1995

As bisexuals, we are necessarily prompted to come up with non-binary ways of thinking about sexual orientation. For many of us, this has also prompted a move toward non-binary ways of thinking about sex and gender.

1998

The probability is that your relationship is based on, or has nestled itself into something based more on the relationship between two identities than on the relationship between two people. That’s what we’re taught: man/man, woman/woman, woman/man, top/bottom, butch/femme, man/woman/man, etc. We’re never taught person/person. That’s what the bisexual movement has been trying to teach us.

My Gender Workbook, Kate Bornstein, 1998

PANSEXUAL DAMMAGE TO BI AND TRANS PEOPLE

“Pansexuality basically means it’s about hearts, not parts,” she said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re male, female, trans male, trans female, nonbinary — everyone’s hot to me.”

-  Boston’s 49th Pride Parade is a bright and colorful affair, Boston Globe,  June 8, 2019

“On the other hand, the term ‘pansexual’ includes all genders and all sexes: man, woman, transgender, intersex”

-  This Is What It Really Means To Be Pansexual, Gentside, March 17, 2019

“He told me that pansexuality meant you could feel attracted to people of all genders – boys, girls, transgender people, non-binary people”

- My Label and Me, Metro, 21 Feb 2019

“you’re attracted to people, regardless of whether they’re a man, a woman, gender-expansive or transgender.“

-  What Does It Mean To Be Pansexual?, Marie Claire, September 2018

“The meaning of pansexual is clear: someone who is attracted – either emotionally, physically or both – to all genders. This includes cisgender, transgender, agender and gender nonconforming individuals.”

- What’s the Real Difference between Bi- and Pansexual?, Rolling Stone, June 2018

“Pansexual is basically a more liberal version of bisexual,” Aguilar said. “It means you don’t care about someone’s gender or identity or sexuality, you just like them for them. For instance, I am dating a guy right now, but I would be open to dating a female, or someone who is transgender.”

-  SAGA celebrates LGBTQ+ pride, The Shield, October 12, 2017

“A pansexual is someone who can be attracted to males, females, transgender people and those who identify as non-binary (not female or male).— Mel Evans”

- A quote from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary page on “pansexual”, 2019  

In Fiction:

Lando Calrissian from Solo: A Star Wars Story is pansexual because he is sexually interested in robots and aliens (2018)

Deadpool is pansexual because he has a broad sexual interest in…everything. (2016/2018)

On Reality TV:

First Dates has its only trans woman go on a date with a pansexual. (2018)

The Bi Life has its only trans woman go on a date with a pansexual (2018)

Naked Attraction has its only trans woman as a candidate for a date with a pansexual (2018)

Sex Education defines pansexuality as “attraction to personality/soul and not gender” using the hearts not parts definition AGAIN (2019)

Them. cites the I am Pansexual livejournal community as their only source for the early pansexual community before 2010 (though they don’t link to it), and I think it’s worth checking out the early archives, because there’s a lot of, “I could fall in love or be sexually attracted to anyone whether they be male, female, TV/TS even a hermaphrodite”, and, “ Pansexuals love people of all genders, male and female, but unlike bisexuals, pansexuals love transgendered, androgynous and gender fluid people, people who don’t fit into the categories of male or female”.

OTHER

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3oz9sITFeg - Bisexuals from Stonewall telling their stories

https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/stonewall-bisexuality-lgbtq-exclusion/ - Bisexuals not being accepted in the LGBT community

https://www.culturalconsent.com/vol1-no1/bi-is-enough - Bi is ENOUGH

https://atm.silmemar.org/manifesto.html - Anything That Moves (Bisexual Magazine in which the Bisexual Manifesto first appeared in)

Bisexuals are 4x more likely to commit suicide than gay or straight people

Bi Is Enough: Parting With Pansexuality

Pansexual history& public impact of pansexuality

More pansexual history

Bi-/homo-/transphobic defintions of pansexuality

More LGBT-phobic defintions of pansexuality and their public impact

Pansexuality reinforces stereotpyes about bisexuals

In the 1960s, bisexual activists Stephen Donaldson and Martha Shelley were leading gay rights activists, and their bisexuality pissed off the gays!

From Donaldson:

“I took a lot of flak from the leaders of the homophile organizations for being bi. For a couple of years I was having an affair with Martha Shelley, leader of the New York Daughters of Bilitis and later the Gay Liberation Front. As she described it, “We used to walk into these [homophile movement] meetings arm in arm. It was a scandal…but at the same time, because the two of us were so blatant and out there in the public being pro gay, they certainly couldn’t afford to throw us out”.

[Bisexual Politics, Naomi Tucker, 1995]

Bisexuality : a reader and sourcebook (1990) by Thomas Geller described “pansexual” in two ways: the first as sexual arousal via inanimate objects and animals, and the second as attraction which includes intersex people. However, it also specifies that attraction to intersex people is implied in the word “bisexual”, concluding that the first definition of pansexual is more useful.

ON THE ORIGINAL DEFINITIONS OF PANSEXUALITY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7okG7y14kqQ - Video by a trans person on bi being INCLUSIVE THE ENTIRE TIME

It’s a well established fact that bisexuals are suffering in greater numbers than ever expected, in some ways worse than gay and lesbian populations, but that’s not what’s important. What’s important is bisexuals are “gross sluts”, so the research should be ignored.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/michaelwaters/lgbt-rights-movement-sexual-fluidity-bisexuality-pride?utm_source=dynamic&utm_campaign=bfsharefacebook&ref=mobile_share&fbclid=IwAR0AV1tTFIcBgz4ycXWi-YzGp3QrNEsXlvPCHNB1N-MNcaKWHjZftSJNfJw - Failure in LGBT community

MORE BIPHOBIA

The specter of the “bisexual AIDS carrier” had become a major demon in the AIDS story by the late 1980s. “The potential role of bisexuals in heterosexual transmission of AIDS has been gravely underestimated,” announced the Atlantic Monthly in 1987 under the provocative subhead, “Bisexual: Is He or Isn’t He?” Bisexuals, said Newsweek the same years, were becoming the “ultimate pariahs of the AIDS crisis.” The emblem of a dangerous and immoral duplicity, a “homosexual posing as a heterosexual,” the bisexual became, as one analyst reflected, “the epidemic’s new bête noire…a creature of uncontrollable impulses…whose activities are invariably covert.”

“AIDS Specter for Women: The Bisexual Man,” read a headline on the front page of the New York Times in 1987, introducing a dramatic article that described bisexuals as “often secret and complex men” who cannot admit their homosexual activities, even - sometimes - to themselves. “The figure of the male bisexual, cloaked in myth and his own secretiveness, has become the bogeyman of the later 1980s, casting a chill on past sexual encounters and prospective ones.” The scare words are already in place: specter, bogeyman, not only mythic but “cloaked in myth,” lurking on every psychic and erotic street corner to ambush the unsuspecting.

The sterotype of the cheating bisexual husband, “unwilling or unable to control his dangerous double love life,” becomes a natural and inevitable scapegoat for the transmission of AIDS to an “innocent” and unsuspecting population. Cosmopolitan, warning its readers about “The Risky Business of Bisexual Love,” presented a checklist of clues to help in detecting a bisexual man: “If a man’s eyes follow other men, be very cautious.” “Be suspicious if he seems intensely interested in how other men dress.” “If he looks into another man’s eyes for even a microsecond longer than it takes to make socially acceptable eye contact, beware. Heterosexual men do not do it,”

BI ERASURE FROM HISTORY