Another Question

[geminigirl]

(Background: one of the things mactavish and I did as moderators of bisexual is to institute a question of the week. Each week, a question that somehow relates to bisexual stuff is posted, and we collect the answers. Just a way of encouraging discussion in the community sort of thing. This one was kind of interesting, and my friends list tends to be more outspoken about their diversity as a sample than the community does, and so I'm curious about how people feel, not just a group that overwhelmingly identifies as bisexual.)

I watched an episode of Showtime's The L Word" on Sunday night, and one character said to another, "Don't bisexuals have their own team?" So here's your question...

Someteimes we hear people saying "he bats for our team" or "she plays for both teams" or something similar. Do you feel a particular association to a community defined by your sexual orientation-gay, straight, bisexual, kink, poly, furry, whatever?

Comments

[barking-iguana.livejournal.com]

I feel a strong affinity for a community that isn't consistently self-aware enough to always know it's a community, but to me it is. (I mean that the community isn't always aware of itself, not that the people in it are not self-aware as individuals.)

It's the community of people whose sexuality (and usually life outlook in general, too) is driven almost entirely by our own internal psyches, rather than largely by mimicking what we're told we're supposed to feel and do.

Well, I suppose that any such affinity with someone whose needs fit comfortably within the prescribed won't likely be recognized. So for the most part the community is limited to those who have reason to feel oppressed and/or pissed off at expectations of "normalcy" that don't fit us.

It would be tempting, then, to say that what I really mean is "queer" in one of its usages. But I do feel affinity with those whose sexuality fits comfortably into the mainstream (smallish though that stream may be) but who also recognize that that's a coincidence, and not something they stake their identity on. So "queer" doesn't quite cut it, for me.

Beyond that, there are several names I'm more comfortable saying I'm a part of than not a apart of, but they don't seem as important as what I wrote above.