Hi Anon, thank you for the question. This is actually a pretty loaded question that can incite significant debate/upset so I hope my answer can remain relatively conflict free. There are certain misconceptions about around the ‘bi’ prefix - literally meaning ‘two’ - as relating to gender. That is incorrect. Like homosexuality and heterosexuality, bisexuality has its roots in science, studies of ‘sexual pathology’, where bisexuality was used to describe people who had sex with men and women. The ‘bi’ relates to both same sex and other sex attraction, just as homosexual means same sex attraction and heterosexual means opposite sex attraction. The word bisexual - as originally formulated - was the bridging of the two binary ends of the sexual orientation spectrum, and it encapsulates all fluid orientations which is why bisexuality sometimes functions as an ‘umbrella term’ within which many different identity labels fall, those labels appealing to different people for different reasons, which are typically very personal.
The word pansexual (‘pan’ meaning ‘all’) is sometimes differentiated from bisexuality on the grounds that for pansexual people, gender is irrelevant, which can sometimes (depending on how such explanations of pansexuality are framed) suggest by implication that bisexual people don’t experience multifaceted attractions to people of different genders, that bisexuality is linguistically rooted in an adherence to binary gender and is, by extension, a transphobic failure to recognise gender beyond cis male and cis female, on account of the implications of ‘twoness’ within the word itself. Not only does bisexuality not originate from that kind of nuanced understanding of gender, but placing such limitations on the definition of bisexuality rewrites recent history. Bisexual literature such as the 1990s manifesto produced by the Bay Area Bisexual Network (x) suggests that bisexuality as a sexual orientation has never demanded a strict adherence to either a 50/50 weighting of attraction or to gender binaries: “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.”
Many bisexual people feel the label is as fluid and inclusive as the pansexual label and the two are frequently used interchangeably. Some people use one, some people use both, some may use neither. I myself use ‘bisexual’ and ‘queer’, the latter speaking to the ‘queerness’ of my non-binary gender identity in a way that, for me, reflects that no specific label currently feels right for me in that regard. Labels - for those who find them useful - are intimate and personal choices and I have no issues whatsoever with people adopting whatever labels suit them best or using no labels at all. Sexuality is fluid and people may find themselves more aligned with a particular identity at a different point in their lives and that too is equally valid. What I do take issue with is when labels are described in a way which misunderstands identities where people already feel erased, misunderstood and invalid, or where definitions get repurposed in a way that marginalises other groups that ostensibly should feel part of broader LGBTQ+ communities. Examples would include if somebody might say ‘I identify as pansexual because bisexual is transphobic’ which not only grossly misunderstands bisexuality, but also demonstrates an ignorance of how many transgender people actually identify as bisexual themselves, or ‘I was bisexual but now I identify as gay and therefore bisexuality is a stepping stone’, or ‘pansexuals are by definition anti bisexual’. How you choose to identify is your choice, but harm can occur when in seeking to explain ones own identity in a way that invalidates or misrepresents another or which purports to speak on behalf of those with identities which are not our own.
