niaking:

If you’re a writer who is young, queer, trans, mixed, POC, and/or female, here are some places you should think about pitching or submitting writing to:

• As Us Journal (indigenous women and women of color, trans women included)
• Mixed Reader (mixed-race folks of all kinds)
• {Young}ist (under 25, social justice-type folks)
• Interrupt mag (women, trans women included)

I personally have never worked with For Harriet or Feminist Wire, but they also seem really cool.

Please add your own suggestions to this list and pass it along.

(via bidyke)

thefirstgaypridewasariot:

lgbtlaughs:

shawnlevy:

Pride not prejudice #rctid

Portland Timber Soccer Fans Take Colorful Stand Against Homophobia

This is actually so cool

(via forrestbondurant)

(Source: letswishuponastar, via 50shadesofacceptance)

bidyke:

cybernotter:

gohomebiphobia:

rainbowbreathingbisexual:

queenlisasimpson:

Coming soon to a text post near you!: backupandround: queenlisasimpson: hello bisexual and otherwise…

toiletdemon:

backupandround:

queenlisasimpson:

hello bisexual and otherwise non-monosexual women.

if lesbians do not want to date you that is not oppression.

No, it’s not. What it is, however, is kind of douchey, if the only reason they don’t want to date us is because we’re bi*. That…

All of the above apart from OP’s blah-blahing

It really is your loss. Also thanks for contributing to the ongoing image of us as empty-headed fucktoys that are okay to sleep with if you’re drunk enough and haven’t gotten with a ‘real lesbian’ at the bar, but completely unsuitable for actually interacting with or treating like human beings

Then you wonder why so many of us haven’t had actual relationships with women and accuse us of faking because of this, like how do we make you comfortable with our existence? Or, to be honest, why the fuck should we, seeing as you don’t seem to care about whether we feel welcome or even human in your ~*Glorious Real Gold Star Lesbian*~ presence

Ding dong I am bisexual so well done.

You’re response is beyond gross and it’s almost in Nice Guy territory. What I was saying is that 

1. Though people in the gay community might buy into bi stereotypes, they are not our oppressors

2. Bisexuals need to sort out our priorities. Combat the stereotypes themselves rather than the outcome.

Dating isn’t the be all and end all of the LGBTQ community. I’ve never understood the focus on “[x] won’t date me because I’m bisexual” when we have so many other issues at hand like the actual stereotypes.

The OP’s point is valid and I feel like a lot has been pulled out from the original post. “If lesbians do not want to date you that is not oppression.” Doesn’t mean biphobia so I don’t know what I’ve missed.

I can understand the response to OP, but I also understand OP. And I do agree that the responses to OP reek of Nice Guy.

The problem though, is I’ve never seen a lesbian or gay man give a reason for not dating bisexuals that isn’t biphobic. It’s usually based off of an assumption that we will cheat on them or leave them for a het paired relationship, or that we are super slutty, not worth dating, attention whores, etc.

No, it’s not oppression, but usually the refusal to date bi women is fueled by biphobia, and is also accompanied by exclusion of bi women from queer spaces. 

I feel the need to differentiate between “lesbians not dating you, a bi/multisexual woman” vs “lesbians refusing to date bi/multisexual women.” I’m not sure which the OP meant, though I assume all the responses have discussed the latter interpretation.

I understand the OP’s point, but if it’s the second interpretation, I feel it’s a little misguided. (If it’s the first, I apologize that you’ve been so misunderstood! But perhaps this will clarify the reaction.) I’ve heard a lot of bisexual people talking about bisexual stereotypes, one of which is the whole “bisexual women are colluding with the patriarchy by fucking men while also fulfilling their lesbian fantasies/bisexual women will always have more authentic relationships with men than with women/bisexual women are trying to attract men/bisexual women are sexually available to men/bisexual means dtf/bisexuals will cheat/bisexuals can’t ‘settle’ or ‘pick one’/bisexuals are no good for long-term relationships” can of worms.

I often hear bisexual people talking about this idea; how it leads to tangible physical harm like sexual assault; how it’s promoted by media portrayals of bisexuals and by prominent gay figures in the GLbt community; how it can be hard to find queer community due to lesbian and gay people who believe bisexuals don’t belong in their space (which generally includes hostility to bisexuals in gay bars, lack of services for bisexuals offered by GLbt organizations, referring to bisexuals as allies, and yes, refusing to date bisexuals due to their bisexual orientation, among other things); and various other issues.

A recent post by a-little-bi-furious discusses Tumblr backlash against bisexuals as a way to keep people distracted from some of the very serious information about bisexual oppression that’s recently come to light. I absolutely do not believe that was the intent of the OP, but in an environment where otherwise accurate posts will distort truths or avoid inconvenient truths, anything with the intent of shutting up bisexuals appears suspicious.

*I do not doubt that there are bisexual women who feel entitled to relationships with lesbians. However, the OP comes across as addressing “bisexual women,” rather than these bisexual women, which is where the problem lies, since bisexual people are being routinely criticized for discussing serious issues by having those issues reduced to the simplest, most trivial aspects of the problem.

Awesome commentary. I bolded the most important parts.

I need to reiterate cybernotter’s point, that the phenomenon of lesbians refusing to date bisexuals is not the end all of harm caused to bisexuals by way of biphobia: it’s the visible end result of much broader oppression. It reflects wide negative attitudes and treatment against bi people, and it causes real harm. I have indeed read cases in which bisexual women were sexually assaulted or raped by lesbian partners as a direct result of biphobia. We also all know about the extreme social isolation that bi people need to contend with, which I believe is a major cause of bisexual depression and suicidality (which, lest we forget, bisexuals suffer from in much higher levels than straight and gay/lesbian people).

Presenting this fact as if this is the worse thing that has ever happened to someone on the grounds of biphobia is simply insulting to all those who have been assaulted, raped, felt isolated and depressed, or committed suicide.

It also makes it out as though gay and lesbian communities are the main source of biphobia and monosexism, which in turn makes the problem of biphobia/monosexism appear anecdotal at best. If biphobia and monosexism really were nothing but an inner-community problem, that would certainly have reduced from the importance/priority of bisexual issues - after all, these types of inconvenience pale in comparison with the real, material oppression of many lesbian, gay and trans* people. But this is not the world we live in. In the world we live in, inner-LGBT communities’ negative attitudes is a reflection of a much broader type of oppression, which is largely performed and perpetuated by straight society.

Talking about biphobia/monosexism as if they were only performed by gay and lesbian people:

1. Scapegoats gays and lesbians for all oppression of bi people.
   
2. Minimizes and trivializes our oppression.
   

gaywrites:

Canada has lifted a policy that banned men who have sex with men (MSM) from donating blood, though certain restrictions still apply. 

Like the policy currently in place in the United States, Canada’s policy enforced a lifetime ban on donation by MSM as a way of “protecting” the blood supply from diseases like HIV that are associated with gay sex. Now, MSM will be able to donate as long as they haven’t had sex with another man in the last five years. 

“Recent scientific data and advances in transfusion safety led us to review the exclusion of men who have had sex with another man. This change is scientifically justified and will in no way endanger the high degree of safety of blood products,” Dr. Marc Germain, vice president of medical affairs at non-profit blood management organization Héma-Québec, said in a separate news release.

According to Héma-Québec, there is still the need for an exclusionary period, due to the fact that some groups are “at risk of infections that can be transmitted through transfusion.” The organization went on to say, “The frequency of HIV transmission among men who have had sex with other men (MSM) is still higher today than in the general population.” In 2011, approximately 46.7 percent of people living with HIV in the country were MSM.

This is a step in the right direction — and the U.S. should be taking note — but it’s not enough. The deferral period in Britain and Australia is one year; in South Africa, it’s six months. Hopefully one day we’ll realize that this is a policy rooted in ignorant stereotypes, and we’ll abolish it entirely. 

gaywrites:

A teenager in Florida has been expelled from school and charged with two felonies simply because her girlfriend’s parents disapprove of their relationship. She now faces two years of house arrest and a year of probation.

Kaitlyn Hunt was a popular student at Sebastian River High School, participating in everything from cheerleading to basketball. Hunt began dating another female student and the latter girl’s parents became enraged, according to Hunt’s parents. Kaitlyn was 17 at the time the relationship began, while her girlfriend was 15. Upon Kaitlyn’s 18th birthday, her girlfriend’s parents sent the police to the Hunt home and the teenager was arrested.

Hunt was charged with two felony counts of lewd and lascivious battery on a child. Then, weeks before her graduation, Hunt was expelled from school. 

“[The girlfriend’s parents] are out to destroy my daughter,” Hunt’s mother told the Examiner, “because they feel like she ‘made’ their daughter gay. They see being gay as wrong and they blame my daughter. Of course, I see it 100% differently. I don’t see or label these girls as gay. They are teenagers in high school experimenting with their sexuality — with mutual consent. And even if their daughter is gay, who cares? She is still their daughter.”

Infuriating. So many things wrong with this.

First, this is a case of homophobic parents blackmailing a girl they don’t like in a slimy, roundabout way that serves to mask their bigotry. I can’t believe what a cheap shot they took. Absolutely disgusting. 

Second, “I don’t see these girls as gay”? Cool, thanks, Mom. Thank goodness she’s not disowning her daughter, but I don’t totally see this as being supportive either.

Third, there’s a petition circulating to drop or lessen the charges against Kaitlyn. Go sign it. And try not to lose faith in humanity, even though people like this exist. 

seananmcguire:

queersuperteens:

The Girl Who Pretended To Be A Boy, from The Violet Fairy Book compiled by Andrew Lang, on Project Gutenberg.

Just.  You guys.  IT’S A CLASSIC FAIRY TALE ABOUT A PRINCESS WHO GETS TURNED INTO A BOY AND IS SUPER FREAKING HAPPY ABOUT IT AND THEN GETS TO MARRY THE PRINCESS SHE RESCUED. 

Thank you, Seanan McGuire, for mentioning that a story like this existed.  And thank you, whoever that person who sent her an ask saying the story was in one of the Fairy Books, for sending that ask.

I AM SO HAPPY OMG.

There you go, somebody found the Colored Fairy Book this is from!

(via queerbookclub)

bialogue-group:

queerbookclub:

I recently finished another collection of Alison Bechdel’s amazing Dykes to Watch Out For. It struck me that her comics dealt with the same issues and divisions regarding assimilation, corporatism, and bi & trans inclusion that queer activists still struggle with today. In 1994. And she was killing it.

Essential reading.

Yeah on that bi & trans* inclusion thing … we (the frequently overlapping) trans* & bisexual communities have been working on it together since, what, at least 1974 … so next year it will make 40 years now. Are we there yet?

bidyke:

timelordtimeshare:

So lemme get this straight, you’re in the monosexism and biphobia tags saying that monosexism doesn’t exist and is homophobic and biphobia isn’t a big deal etc, and your big defense is: you’re bisexual…

Well, I’m bisexual too jackass and I’m of the opposite opinion, do we cancel eachother out or what?

Or are you just privilegeing your thoughts, analysis and experiences over everyone else’s because you’re one of the “good bisexuals” and not one of those mean old bi tumblr social justice warriors that rock the boat with statistics and critical thinking?

Literally the worst arguement ever, try again, or don’t.

I think the bisexual biphobes phenomenon is disturbing, but also makes sense.

First - people who have only heard about the monosexual privilege checklist second hand, or who have read it without reading the disclaimers and clarifications around it - don’t actually know what it’s about. I think that most people who have heard about it, heard about it on this level. Especially on tumblr, where like +90% is read-a-single-post-and-reblog. These people have no real reason to assume that the list is about anything other than gay and lesbian people, because biphobia is widely considered as an inner-community type of “inconvenience”. Very few people actually know about the terrible statistics and more structural forms of oppression working against bi people. When people think about biphobia, they think “Oh, it’s the stereotypes/nasty attitudes we get from gays and lesbians”. Without a framework to think about this concept, people will fall to whatever they do know. They have no way of knowing that the list means something else completely.

Second - bi people have an interest in being on gays and lesbians’ “good side”. They do, in fact, get cookies for it. Their opinions are validated and supported by gay and lesbian people and communities, they are well received, and allow them to get ally cookies. Stepping down on bisexuals as a group is one of the quickest ways to get validation and support in gay and lesbian contexts, whether liberal or radical. It does and will get you points. So there’s the benefit in that - I think it’s a survival technique which allows some bi people to step into gay and lesbian communities on the backs of all bi people and communities.

samorchard:

I did a comic about marriage equality…

(Original: http://www.roostertailscomic.com/?p=1588)

(via lgbtlaughs)

jenyockney:

A little UK bi history timeline from “Getting Bi in a Gay / Straight World”, which you can get as real live inky bi booklet from BiPhoria

(via biconfessions)

imagine-dragonlords:

thewayweride:

If you’re lesbian and you fall for a guy
FINE
If you’re gay and you fall for a woman
FINE
If you’re bisexual and you have a preference for girls
FINE
If you’re bisexual and you have a preference for guys
FINE
If you’re pansexual and have a…