#'she could still be bi' yeah i know bisexuality exists i'm literally bi

[silv-paru]

when a gay showrunner makes your tokken sapphic character straight out of nowhere

[bisolationist]

You know being a woman abused by a woman I feel like I will never ever be able to connect with them fully.

Like even if we get along and all that I know it's all conditional. That kindness and female/feminist solidarity they all talk about is all conditional.

The second I mention the sex of my abuser and suddenly I'm seen as a gender traitor, they turn angry and attack me. And like you said now I know too much like I can't be expected to trust women, let my guard down with them stand with them etc...

And when I say this the way people talk to me its like sooo condescending like yeah I know misogyny is still a thing I'm a woman too !!! But you can't tell me to ignore women's wrongdoings towards me because men are worse.

Truth is they'll only show me kindness if I had the right type of abuser, went through the right type of abuse and had the right type of sexuality.

I mean I remember whne there was this girl who kind of did something sexual to me I told her to stop but I just kind of like gave in and whne she told everyone about what happened all my female friends were acting super weird towards me as if I was some sort of creep and then when I told them what happened they said smth along the lines of oh come on youre like down for everything (just bc I was seen as bi).

And the problem is I can't discuss this anywhere like literally anywhere if I post smth on my blog I'll have feminists and women say to me oh but you don't know hwo society treats mothers maybe she doing the best she could, oh well that never happened to me etc etc... like I can't deal with this. And on normal spaces like men don't care they'll use my abuse as an excuse to be misogynistic it's such an isolating experience. I don't expect feminists to fight for me like feminism is about female liberation they don't owe me anything but why did they have to go out of their way to attack me, mock me, call me a liar, belittle what happened to me, tell me I'm exaggerating, treat me as If I was betraying tye feminist cause for speaking up like i was a fucking mra, and I'm not even allowed to let my abuse affect me if I have one negative sentiment towards women I'm a pick me I'm sexist I'm this I'm that.

Sorry for this fucking wall of text I'm tired of them treating me this way then turn around and pretend it's not happening you knwo

I'm really sorry it took me a while to get to this. I think I'm starting to dread looking in my inbox and I keep putting it off.

Obviously I'm not in exactly the same boat as you, so I can't fully address the parts about being a woman. But you're definitely not alone - all of the women in your position *I've* talked to feel the same. I have at least one friend that's voiced very similar things (don't worry I asked for permission before linking; she said she'd be open to talking to you if you want). And while I haven't experienced it first hand... I mean... I've seen it. I've seen the anger and vitriol that gets sent you way, the way your trauma is scoured for any excuse to be dismissed, the way you get excoriated as anti-feminists for not pretending it's a lesser deal. Not that you need me to reaffirm it, but you're definitely not crazy.

And I do understand the loneliness. Sometimes I wonder if this is why I subconsciously isolate myself despite having lots of people that express they care about me, enjoy my company, etc. Because I can't fully trust any of them would take this topic seriously, and I just... couldn't bear it if they didn't. Sometimes trying to find people that will accept this, *and* my bisexuality, and have compatible values... I don't know, it feels way too unlikely you know? And that's just for friendship, throw in attraction/sexual compatibility in there and it's like... do these people exist...

The condescension is unbearable. Again, obviously not the same for me, but I'm so TIRED of people throwing it in my face like I'm saying misogyny isn't real? It's so frustrating that bringing this topic up at all invariably gets me listed as an MRA despite my beliefs being the opposite? Or they tell me things like that men are more likely to be the perpetrators against either sex... as if they ever took me seriously with that either? Either way, my bisexuality gets used against me, too. I don't think I've ever been in a situation where the excuses ran out - I guess that's the really disappointing thing. There's always someone willing to come to bat for these people, and they always try to justify their view as the moral and sensible one.

If you feel like you're suffocating about it all, I think you might as well blog about it. Who else are you going to blog for? It's your life! You're the only one that can give your voice power. But at the same time - yeah you're going to get weirdos and rape apologists. If that's too much to bear, that's completely understandable, too.

Anyway I'm not sure I managed to say anything new, but I hope you know I believe your experiences and how you've felt. I hope you know I'm angry on your behalf because you don't deserve to deal with any of the bullshit of how people treat you for it.

[hellomynameisbisexual]

Here's a shortlist of those who realized that I — a cis woman who'd identified as heterosexual for decades of life — was in fact actually bi, long before I realized it myself recently: my sister, all my friends, my boyfriend, and the TikTok algorithm.

On TikTok, the relationship between user and algorithm is uniquely (even sometimes uncannily) intimate. An app which seemingly contains as many multitudes of life experiences and niche communities as there are people in the world, we all start in the lowest common denominator of TikTok. Straight TikTok (as it's popularly dubbed) initially bombards your For You Page with the silly pet videos and viral teen dances that folks who don't use TikTok like to condescendingly reduce it to.

Quickly, though, TikTok begins reading your soul like some sort of divine digital oracle, prying open layers of your being never before known to your own conscious mind. The more you use it, the more tailored its content becomes to your deepest specificities, to the point where you get stuff that's so relatable that it can feel like a personal attack (in the best way) or (more dangerously) even a harmful trigger from lifelong traumas.

For example: I don't know what dark magic (read: privacy violations) immediately clued TikTok into the fact that I was half-Brazilian, but within days of first using it, Straight TikTok gave way to at first Portuguese-speaking then broader Latin TikTok. Feeling oddly seen (being white-passing and mostly American-raised, my Brazilian identity isn't often validated), I was liberal with the likes, knowing that engagement was the surefire way to go deeper down this identity-affirming corner of the social app.

TikTok made lots of assumptions from there, throwing me right down the boundless, beautiful, and oddest multiplicities of Alt TikTok, a counter to Straight TikTok's milquetoast mainstreamness.

Home to a wide spectrum of marginalized groups, I was giving out likes on my FYP like Oprah, smashing that heart button on every type of video: from TikTokers with disabilities, Black and Indigenous creators, political activists, body-stigma-busting fat women, and every glittering shade of the LGBTQ cornucopia. The faves were genuine, but also a way to support and help offset what I knew about the discriminatory biases in TikTok's algorithm.

My diverse range of likes started to get more specific by the minute, though. I wasn't just on general Black TikTok anymore, but Alt Cottagecore Middle-Class Black Girl TikTok (an actual label one creator gave her page's vibes). Then it was Queer Latina Roller Skating Girl TikTok, Women With Non-Hyperactive ADHD TikTok, and then a double whammy of Women Loving Women (WLW) TikTok alternating between beautiful lesbian couples and baby bisexuals.

Looking back at my history of likes, the transition from queer “ally” to “salivating simp” is almost imperceptible.

There was no one precise "aha" moment. I started getting "put a finger down" challenges that wouldn't reveal what you were putting a finger down for until the end. Then, 9-fingers deep (winkwink), I'd be congratulated for being 100% bisexual. Somewhere along the path of getting served multiple WLW Disney cosplays in a single day and even dom lesbian KinkTok roleplay — or whatever the fuck Bisexual Pirate TikTok is — deductive reasoning kind of spoke for itself.

But I will never forget the one video that was such a heat-seeking missile of a targeted attack that I was moved to finally text it to my group chat of WLW friends with a, "Wait, am I bi?" To which the overwhelming consensus was, "Magic 8 Ball says, 'Highly Likely.'"

Serendipitously posted during Pride Month, the video shows a girl shaking her head at the caption above her head, calling out confused and/or closeted queers who say shit like, "I think everyone is a LITTLE bisexual," to the tune of "Closer" by The Chainsmokers. When the lyrics land on the word "you," she points straight at the screen — at me — her finger and inquisitive look piercing my hopelessly bisexual soul like Cupid's goddamn arrow.

Oh no, the voice inside my head said, I have just been mercilessly perceived.

As someone who had, in fact, done feminist studies at a tiny liberal arts college with a gender gap of about 70 percent women, I'd of course dabbled. I've always been quick to bring up the Kinsey scale, to champion a true spectrum of sexuality, and to even declare (on multiple occasions) that I was, "straight, but would totally fuck that girl!"

Oh no, the voice inside my head returned, I've literally just been using extra words to say I was bi.

After consulting the expertise of my WLW friend group (whose mere existence, in retrospect, also should've clued me in on the flashing neon pink, purple, and blue flag of my raging bisexuality), I ran to my boyfriend to inform him of the "news."

"Yeah, baby, I know. We all know," he said kindly.

"How?!" I demanded.

Well for one, he pointed out, every time we came across a video of a hot girl while scrolling TikTok together, I'd without fail watch the whole way through, often more than once, regardless of content. (Apparently, straight girls do not tend to do this?) For another, I always breathlessly pointed out when we'd pass by a woman I found beautiful, often finding a way to send a compliment her way. ("I'm just a flirt!" I used to rationalize with a hand wave, "Obvs, I'm not actually sexually attracted to them!") Then, I guess, there were the TED Talk-like rants I'd subject him to about the thinly veiled queer relationship in Adventure Time between Princess Bubblegum and Marcelyne the Vampire Queen — which the cowards at Cartoon Network forced creators to keep as subtext!

And, well, when you lay it all out like that...

But my TikTok-fueled bisexual awakening might actually speak less to the omnipotence of the app's algorithm, and more to how heteronormativity is truly one helluva drug.

Sure, TikTok bombarded me with the thirst traps of my exact type of domineering masc lady queers, who reduced me to a puddle of drool I could no longer deny. But I also recalled a pivotal moment in college when I briefly questioned my heterosexuality, only to have a lesbian friend roll her eyes and chastise me for being one of those straight girls who leads Actual Queer Women on. I figured she must know better. So I never pursued any of my lady crushes in college, which meant I never experimented much sexually, which made me conclude that I couldn't call myself bisexual if I'd never had actual sex with a woman. I also didn't really enjoy lesbian porn much, though the fact that I'd often find myself fixating on the woman during heterosexual porn should've clued me into that probably coming more from how mainstream lesbian porn is designed for straight men.

The ubiquity of heterormativity, even when unwittingly perpetrated by members of the queer community, is such an effective self-sustaining cycle. Aside from being met with queer-gating (something I've since learned bi folks often experience), I had a hard time identifying my attraction to women as genuine attraction, simply because it felt different to how I was attracted to men.

Heteronormativity is truly one helluva drug.

So much of women's sexuality — of my sexuality — can feel defined by that carnivorous kind of validation you get from men. I met no societal resistance in fully embodying and exploring my desire for men, either (which, to be clear, was and is insatiable slut levels of wanting that peen.) But in retrospect, I wonder how many men I slept with not because I was truly attracted to them, but because I got off on how much they wanted me.

My attraction to women comes with a different texture of eroticism. With women (and bare with a baby bi, here), the attraction feels more shared, more mutual, more tender rather than possessive. It's no less raw or hot or all-consuming, don't get me wrong. But for me at least, it comes more from a place of equality rather than just power play. I love the way women seem to see right through me, to know me, without us really needing to say a word.

I am still, as it turns out, a sexual submissive through-and-through, regardless of what gender my would-be partner is. But, ignorantly and unknowingly, I'd been limiting my concept of who could embody dominant sexual personas to cis men. But when TikTok sent me down that glorious rabbit hole of masc women (who know exactly what they're doing, btw), I realized my attraction was not to men, but a certain type of masculinity. It didn't matter which body or genitalia that presentation came with.

There is something about TikTok that feels particularly suited to these journeys of sexual self-discovery and, in the case of women loving women, I don't think it's just the prescient algorithm. The short-form video format lends itself to lightning bolt-like jolts of soul-bearing nakedness, with the POV camera angles bucking conventions of the male gaze, which entrenches the language of film and TV in heterosexual male desire.

In fairness to me, I'm far from the only one who missed their inner gay for a long time — only to have her pop out like a queer jack-in-the-box throughout a near year-long quarantine that led many of us to join TikTok. There was the baby bi mom, and scores of others who no longer had to publicly perform their heterosexuality during lockdown — only to realize that, hey, maybe I'm not heterosexual at all?

Flooded with video after video affirming my suspicions, reflecting my exact experiences as they happened to others, the change in my sexual identity was so normalized on TikTok that I didn't even feel like I needed to formally "come out." I thought this safe home I'd found to foster my baby bisexuality online would extend into the real world.

But I was in for a rude awakening.

Testing out my bisexuality on other platforms, casually referring to it on Twitter, posting pictures of myself decked out in a rainbow skate outfit (which I bought before realizing I was queer), I received nothing but unquestioning support and validation. Eventually, I realized I should probably let some members of my family know before they learned through one of these posts, though.

Daunted by the idea of trying to tell my Latina Catholic mother and Swiss Army veteran father (who's had a crass running joke about me being a "lesbian" ever since I first declared myself a feminist at age 12), I chose the sibling closest to me. Seeing as how gender studies was one of her majors in college too, I thought it was a shoo-in. I sent an off-handed, joke-y but serious, "btw I'm bi now!" text, believing that's all that would be needed to receive the same nonchalant acceptance I found online.

It was not.

I didn't receive a response for two days. Hurt and panicked by what was potentially my first mild experience of homophobia, I called them out. They responded by insisting we need to have a phone call for such "serious" conversations. As I calmly tried to express my hurt on said call, I was told my text had been enough to make this sibling worry about my mental wellbeing. They said I should be more understanding of why it'd be hard for them to (and I'm paraphrasing) "think you were one way for twenty-eight years" before having to contend with me deciding I was now "something else."

But I wasn't "something else," I tried to explain, voice shaking. I hadn't knowingly been deceiving or hiding this part of me. I'd simply discovered a more appropriate label. But it was like we were speaking different languages. Other family members were more accepting, thankfully. There are many ways I'm exceptionally lucky, my IRL environment as supportive as Baby Bi TikTok. Namely, I'm in a loving relationship with a man who never once mistook any of it as a threat, instead giving me all the space in the world to understand this new facet of my sexuality.

I don't have it all figured out yet. But at least when someone asks if I listen to Girl in Red on social media, I know to answer with a resounding, "Yes," even though I've never listened to a single one of her songs. And for now, that's enough.

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

I love that we as a fandom have declared the clem comic an noncanon lmao. i'm curious tho, do you believe clem will get a new love interest? do you think it will be amos or someone else?

Yeah, gotta love seeing a fandom come together to agree on something.... even though that something isn't exactly invoking happy feelings, y'know? Like yeah, the comic sucks and at this point I doubt the trilogy will be much better unless Tillie suddenly starts to understand Clementine and makes some impossibly massive improvements..... but it's nice to see all of us mostly getting along?

As for the whole love interest thing, I'm like 98% sure that Clementine's going to get a new girlfriend in the comics. That's my prediction.

During the dumb xpo thing, Tillie talked about how she's excited to explore Clementine as a queer character in the apocalypse and considering Tillie's other works, I will bet literal cash that Clementine gets a new girlfriend. I don't think Amos will be the love interest, and if he does end up being that for Clem or if Clem gets a boyfriend, then I will genuinely be shocked.

.....Y'know what, I need to get this off my chest and this seems relevant enough-

I was talking with my roommate about this the other night actually. I told her all about my predictions for Clem getting a new girlfriend and how annoying this whole comic is, but also how annoying people are being to Tillie over this and like.... everything is a mess.

My roommate, who knows that literally everything is wrong in the 12 page comic and who I told about the xpo where Tillie talked about Clem being queer is important, asked me how I would feel if she ended up getting Clementine's canon bisexuality wrong, and what if she decides to make Clementine a lesbian?

And like...... I actually stopped what I was working on because this wave of dread crashed through me at the thought of that, and I could actually imagine it happening because she already got everything else wrong and if she hasn't actually played the games and is pulling this shit out of her ass.... I can't even describe to you the feeling I felt...

I want to believe that Tillie would at least know and respect the fact that Clementine is a canon bisexual. From what I've gathered, Tillie herself is wlw and I don't believe she would erase a bisexual character. She knows that Clementine is a queer character. Clementine's bisexual.

Like obviously, if I'm right and Clementine gets a girlfriend, she'll still be bisexual. Nothing will ever change that.

But I'm going to tell all of you this right now because just thinking about it upsets me.... if for whatever reason, if Tillie Walden actually erases Clementine's bisexuality and makes her a lesbian in the graphic novel trilogy while "exploring what it means to be queer in the apocalypse," I'm done.

I will have nothing left for Tillie. I will no longer support anything she does. I won't condone harassment towards her because that makes you just as shitty, but I will absolutely call that bullshit out and then never support her again. I will never talk about the comic again because how dare you think you can get away with that and still expect me to waste brain cells on your comic? Hell, I will probably be so fucking livid that I'll drive my ass all the way to barnes and noble just to return the books I bought of hers.

Dramatic? Yeah, but y'know what? I've never really touched on this outside of a few "Clem being bisexual is important representation and we love it" but her being bisexual means so much to me. It truly does, I mean.... after the dumb "btw Javi is bi, we just wrote him straight and threw in a line of flirty dialogue with jesus so we can have our cake and eat it, too-- the straight homophobes will still buy our game and the lgbt+ community will love us, win win," I cannot explain the joy I felt when Clementine was written as a bisexual woman and that she was given two love interests that meant so much to the players.

Like.... I dunno, I never got any real bi rep in games or books or movies, especially bi girls, when I was a teen trying to figure shit out. In jr high and high school, I could never find stories that has bi women as a lead because I was too afraid to look anything up. I didn't wanna be caught reading/watching things that were lgbt+ because I had a shitty boyfriend at the time and our friend group were heavily religious and judgmental. My best friend [who I haven't spoken to for years now] was one of those people who claimed to support lgbt+ people.... but also once told me that she thought lesbians were okay but gay men were lowkey gross and probably only into other dudes because girls wouldn't date them. Oh, and I'll never forget the time she told me that bi people don't actually exist because you either like one or the other.

That's a great thing to here from the best friend you've know since you were an infant after you've realized that you aren't only attracted to boys.

But now I'm out of that environment and I haven't talked to anyone from high school since I graduated, and I've felt more free to intake all the things I wish I could've before...

I just.... Clementine is important to me for a lot of reasons. I've played these games forever, I've gotten to watch her grow for years, and she's just so well-written and amazing in tfs, and the fact that the writers wanted to write her as a bisexual woman means so much, I just.... even though it's not canon, I can't help but take this disaster of a comic personally. Just from those 12 pages, everything about Clementine is destroyed and it sucks. It hurts..... but I'm still not holding anything against Tillie herself. Her comic is bad, but that doesn't mean she's bad..... however, erasing Clem's bisexuality would be the last straw for me.

.....This turned into a rant. Sorry about that. You asked a simple question and I dumped my life story on you but I dunno, I needed to get that off my chest because it's been bothering the back of my mind.

I do wanna add once more that I don't think Tillie's actually going to do that... she should know that both Louis and Violet are canon love interests, plus Clementine canonically had a crush on Gabe in ANF. I think if she's going to get anything right, it'll be the fact that Clem is bi.... I'm just expressing a major fear I have and what it would do to me, and others, if it happened..... y'know?

[gettin-bi-bi-bi]

anon whom u asked to elaborate

(I'm a girl 17)I've had guy crushes bit i never wanted to be physically close to them or wanted to be in a relationship with them, not that that situation would've ever arised

but I've been questioning my sexuality for over a year and half now and i THINK i like this girl but i feel like it's not real and i want to be in a relationship with her and want to be close to her but idk if I'm REALLY attracted to her like 'butterflies in stomach' thing didn't happen but i was excited(maybe coz i know she's straight but idk)

and even in future I'd like to be with a girl(physically and emotionally also im pretty sure that im sexually attracted to them) but idk if I'd ever be attracted to them in a way they deserve and with boys i don't think it's physical atleast, idk about emotional cause I've had crushes and all

and i read your last reply and u said if in theory i think i am attracted to them thing but then every bi curious person is bi and so on?

and i think i have the potential to be attracted to women in future but it seems fake( this can also be because of the fact that i know zero lgbt+ people in real life and probably never will because of the situation in my society)

and ik you'll probably say it's internalized biphobia nd like yes maybe but it's been such a fucking long time it's frustating and i still haven't reached a conclusion and i just can't overcome it and I'm exhausted

Thanks for elaborating. And sorry if that’s not the magic epiphany you want to hear but yeah, a lot of that sounds like internalised biphobia/lesbophobia to me.

I would urge you to reread your own message again and maybe imagine it was someone else, maybe a good friend of yours, saying those things to you. What would you think or say to them if they said something like:

“i want to be in a relationship with her and want to be close to her”

“in future I'd like to be with a girl (physically and emotionally also im pretty sure that im sexually attracted to them)”

“i think i have the potential to be attracted to women in future”

Do any of these statements sound to you like something a heterosexual woman would say? To me they don’t. You are literally saying in various different ways that you are attracted to woman and desire them romantically and sexually. Straight women do not desire romantic and/or sexual relationships with other women. Straight women do not have the potential to be attracted to women - by definition they don’t bc they are heterosexual = exclusively attracted to men. Everything you say confirms that you are attracted to women = that you are NOT straight.

And all the doubts that you are having are internalised crap that’s holding you back. And yes, sure, living in a queerphobic environment where other LGBTQIA+ people are erased (I’m sure they exist around you but have to be closeted), puts you in a very tough position to explore and accept your sexuality. If you cannot connect to the queer community offline then at least try it online, try to talk to people here.

I also want to get into something you said regarding girls which was “idk if I'd ever be attracted to them in a way they deserve”. What do you mean “a way they deserve”? You don’t owe anyone attraction one way or another. Either you are attracted to someone or not. And there are probably as many different ways to be attracted to someone as there are different people. To some you may not be attracted at all, to others a little bit. To some the attraction might be purely sexual or purely romantic or something else entirely or a mix between all of it. And maybe after some time you realise there’s a pattern, for example that whenever you find yourself attracted to men it’s only or mostly sexual without any desire to pursue a romance there; but when you find yourself attracted to women there is more romance involved. Or maybe there’s a different pattern or none at all. But attraction just ~happens~ and it’s nothing that you are obliged to feel a certain way.

If you want to identify as bi then you can, even if those “attraction patterns” aren’t the same for every gender. It’s fine to be bi while having different desires for different genders. And for some bi people, romantic and sexual orientation don’t align perfectly, so you could also see if the split attraction model suits you (for example: bisexual/homoromantic). But to go back to that statement of yours: nobody “deserves” to be attracted to at all. You got that wrong here, my friend. You don’t owe it to anybody that you are attracted to them one way or another. If you have feelings for someone and you are afraid that they aren’t “strong enough” or aren’t of “the right kind” that’s for you to decide and I would always recommend to play with open cards and be honest to the person about feelings and fears and all that. And then they can decide for themselves what they want to make of this information. But nobody ever “deserves” to be the object of your desire in a certain way. Scratch that! It’s a very unrealistic and unhealthy way to look at attraction.

I understand that you are exhausted, that this seems like it’s not going anywhere. But then also consider how far you’ve already come. Think of yourself a year or two ago or even further back and see how much you’ve already learned about yourself. The fact you’re able to reflect on your sexuality that much is an achievement and you can be proud of it. Asking for help and advice is also something to be proud of. I do have my usual “getting rid of internalised biphobia” post here but in your case I would like to primarily advise you to be kind and patient to yourself. And start believing yourself! When you find yourself thinking “I have a crush on this girl/I am attracted to her/I want to be in a relationship with a woman” then remind yourself that those are not the words of a straight women. Try to kill those doubts with pure logic. I can guarantee you that no heterosexual woman desires sex or romance with another woman - if she does then she’s gonna realise sooner or later that she’s not really been straight after all. And furthermore: don’t waste too much energy comparing your feelings for women to your feelings for men. It can be interesting and for some people it’s helpful but for others it isn’t. If it doesn’t get your forward to compare that then just don’t and remind yourself that bisexuality doesn not mean you have to be equally attracted to all genders. It can be different and you don’t need to pick it all apart in detail if you don’t feel like that helps you at this point.

Maddie

[teawiththegods]

SS1: Sorry this is not related to religion or anything. I'm kinda struggling with my sexuality. I used to be so sure I liked girls. e.g when i went to my friends 18th last year, there was this girl there and holy lord. She was, is, the most beautiful human being I have ever seen in the entirety of my brief existence. I cannot even begin to describe, english does not have words adequate enough to tell of her beauty. So when spin the bottle began, i was like, lord pls. ok this is a bit long sorry

SS2: ok we back, sorry, i just have a lot of feels atm. I hope this is ok. Sorry. Where was I, spin the bottle. I literally have never wanted to kiss and hug and love someone more in my brief life so I was in. I also was so fkn afraid oml! Again, cannot describe the fear. SO the bottle spins a few times and it doesnt hit me, or her, its everyone else. i am just there, stock still and so afraid, cause I have never kissed anyone or been kissed, let alone by someone so divine! and then I spun it an SS3: and it landed on her. and i stg i had a heart attack or an outer body experience. and she could see i was hesitant so could my friends (I feel like i should clarify it was a few girls and one guy, and I am a girl so this is new territory for me) but they asked me if i had every kissed anyone and I was like no cause twas the truth and my mumma didnt raise no liar. But i was just frozen in my spot looking at her like a dumbass cause she was so mcfreakin beautiful and so she was like SS4?: she was like how about you kiss my cheek. So i did and oml, she was so soft and her eyes are so beautiful and yeah. and then i spun the bottle again and it landed on another girl and so i kissed her cheek and then stuff and 100% regret, not kissing her like deep deep regret but at the same time, ya girl was aboutta have a full on anxiety attack, not hyperbole, like my breath was fkn gone. but still big big regret and at this point your probably like, well there is your answer however SS5 (im sorry this is so long but i have no one to talk to about this and i cant get it off my mind tonight): However, (context, i came out as bi a few years ago) My parents sat me down and were like "Are you really bi because aside from dropping the term, ha gay, or, thats how i knew i was bi, here and there, you don't talk or express this." and i couldn't speak. I felt like I had become totally mute. I wanted to say bisexuality was a spectrum and that yeah, maybe i like lots of dudes but i was SS6: (SO SORRY!!!) but i was so sure that i liked girls. and they took my silence as proof and I couldn't say anything. I had nothing so they were like, "you cant pretend, it doesn't end well" and I was like ye, i know thanks except i couldnt talk so i sat there like a dumbass just agreeing with what they said cause i made sense, and it does make sense. my mum said "you can have huggy touchy relationships with girls without it being sexual or romantic" which made sense. but at the same time, i SS7: (Yikes this is long im so sorry), I can guarantee you, the way i wanted to worship that girl was romantic af. I didn't want to talk boys or converse over common interest and that be all. For the hour or so that I talked to her till the moment, she curled up in my lap (twas a party, she was drunk and i wasn't going to do anything cross my heart hope to die also i a lot of person and I sort of think we had a thing but idk again she was drunk so all kinda nullified). In the hour or so i talke SS8: Sorry, as i was talking to her that night. I kinda rlly wanted to ask her out on a date. I wanted to spoil her, learn beside. Like she cooks and like real health food stuff, and she is so beautiful. I almost got cooking lessons from her but we're both so busy. Her passion is just so beautiful. I want to take her on picnics, hug her, forehead kiss her, I wanted to shower her in rose petals, buy her flowers, I wanted to have late night talks with her and know her ins and outs. We talk a while SSLastoneipromise: we talked a while after the party but, not anymore, I still follow her on instagram but, she's so far away and things are how things are sometimes and i get that. but my point is. She makes me question my questioning. Like was i right the first? Why can't I talk about it when it's important? like I know, 100%, that i was and am attracted to her, with feelings i do not have for my friends. I am frustrated and just want to know what is going on in my head! does that make sense? SSiknowisaidthelastonewastheLASTonebutitsthisone: i feel like i should mention that its not just her there are other women, i find attractive. i am just so sick of questioning and i am tired (sorry i am slightly sleep deprived which is why i am being a wanker) and I just want to exist as is and it not be a thing. like... does it matter if don't like tons and tons of girls, does it matter that is just one here and there that just blows me away

Just because you don’t or can’t talk about it doesn’t negate your feelings or your sexuality. Like I couldn’t talk about my abusive relationship for awhile so does that mean I wasn’t abused? I don’t talk about being a Hellenic Polytheist most of the times, does that mean I’m not one? No it doesn’t and the same applies to your bisexuality.

You are what you say you are. You said you felt so sure you were bisexual so that means you’re bisexual. No one else has the right to tell you who you are or to make you question what you know to be true in your heart. 

And you def can’t go by straight people or really anyone who isn’t bisexual, because there’s so many misconceptions on what bisexuality is and how its expressed, biphobia, and bi erasure that majority of the time non bisexuals have no fucking idea what they are even talking about. So don’t even listen to their nonsense. 

If the label of bisexuality resonates with you then claim it. It’s yours. 

[calmer-chameleon]

If this is awkward or intrusive, pls ignore, but but I'm I'm pretty sure you're the only person I've ever seen talk about this. A long time ago I remember you saying something about the only way you could imagine being be being in a relationship with a man is if you picture yourself as also aa ma. Is there a name for this or is that a wlw experience? I'm really struggling to figure out if I'm a straight woman or not and I can't figure out how to Google this concept or understand it better

(pt2) again I apologize if that's weird or notsomething that you want to talk about, I totally understand. I just live in avery small town and I don't know really any non straight people that that I canconnect with around here, and like I said your blog is the only place I've everreally heard that discussed before and I've been thinking about it a lotrecently

----

It’s not intrusive orweird at all and I do not at all mind talking about it! So here’s what it is. Ican’t say that I actually imagine myself in relationships with men as a man, assuch. To me this is mostly something I like to joke about. I think it isextremely normal to be able to tell which people of a gender you’re notactually attracted to are attractive, so of course I can tell which men arehot/cool/attractive even though I have zero desire to date them or sleep withthem. Because I’m gay, I just tend to see attraction and love and sexual desireas directed to a person of the same gender as default because that is how Iexperience those feelings. I can’t relate to the heterosexual dynamic becauseit’s something I’m very much uninterested in, so when I as a fun thoughtexercise picture what my life would be like if I were a man I picture a gayman.

Me and a gay malefriend of mine talked about both relating to stuff this way, he made a commentabout some celebrity man being hot and I said something like “yeah if I was agay man I’d definitely fancy him”, and then he said he also relates to women hecan tell are attractive that way, thinking “if I was a lesbian I’d date her”. Wemade jokey posts about what we’d look like and who we’d date if we swappedgenders and were gay the other way, and some other gay people joined in onthis. I want to stress again that none of us see this as some kind of veryserious phenomenon or important understanding of ourselves, it really is just afun topic to joke about.

I have a straightfemale friend who told me she experiences attraction to men as a veryfundamental part of herself and could easily imagine being a gay man, but couldnot imagine being attracted to women at all, so I don’t think this conceptappealing to someone has to mean anything about who they’re interested in.

I HAVE however seenother lesbians, often women that are much younger than me and grew up aroundinternet “queer culture” say that they questioned for a while if they weremaybe gay trans men before coming to an understanding of themselves aslesbians. They explained this as realising they were very uncomfortable being aguy’s girlfriend, but not immediately realising that was because they weren’tinto guys, and mistaking it for a desire to be a guy’s boyfriend instead. I can’tsay I’ve ever felt that way, but that might very well be because when I was ateenager I had literally never come across even a mention of the existence ofgay trans men. I can sort of relate to it still in the sense that I had a phaseas a teenager/early 20s when I was just very interested in gay and bi men and felta strong kinship with artists like Freddie Mercury, George Michael, Boy George,Adam Lambert and Ola Salo from the band The Ark as well as with ‘feminine’straight male musicians. I thought they were stunningly beautiful men but neverpictured myself being with them sexually or romantically. I still feel a kinshipwith them now as well, which I now understand as being about wanting to befeminine without being demure and girly, which effeminate male rocker typesembody for me.

This is becoming avery long answer and I’m kind of moving away from the point I think! You sayyou’re questioning whether you’re a straight woman, and I’d advise you to dosome introspection about what attraction feels like to you, and who you feel ittowards. I’d say try on the idea of being a non-straight woman, withoutworrying about labels for now. How do you feel about the idea of existing inthe world as a woman who dates other women, has sex with other women, does thatsound like something that would make you happy? If you come to the conclusionthat it does, you are interested in the idea of being with another womanromantically, sexually, intimately, then you can if you want to asses if youcould feel those things towards a man as well or if you only feel it towardswomen. The words ‘bisexual��� and ‘lesbian’ are just words that we as humans madeup to describe experiences that existed before those words were there todescribe them, they are authentic and genuine experiences that women can have andnot subcultures that you have to make yourself fit into.

You say you live in asmall town, do you at all have access to transportation to a larger town nearbywhere there might be gay events? Just being around gay couples can be verynourishing and allow you to picture yourself as a potential gay person even ifyou’re just kind of there as an observer and not ‘part of the scene’. If there’sno town like that near you, I think it wouldn’t be a bad idea at all to try andsee if there are any gay/bi women in your area that you can connect with online.I think people use meetup.com for stuff like that but I’m not sure, maybe otherpeople have some advice for how to find lgbt people in rural areas?

And lastly, feel freeto ask me more stuff or if you comfortable to come off anon we can talkprivately!

[tinkdw]

My sisters been sending your (amazingly) written metas, but I'm still confused as to what "Performance!Dean" is. Could you explain? ❤❤❤❤❤❤

Hi! Thank you!

Performing!Dean is a tag that many of us use to explain the way that Dean portrays himself to the outside world, suppressing parts of himself that he doesn’t think should be outwardly shown.

It’s a form of SUBLIMATION (a psychological term meaning to repress emotions / a part of oneself), a term which he actually uses in 12x05.

It’s a great example. The writers KNOW that we associate Dean’s love of pie with women / being comfortable / the home and family feeling, and cake with the repressed side of him (it is repeatedly used in this context, Dean really wanting it but never allowing himself to have it or just nibbling at the edges). It’s quite a famously known concept.

So… when Sam asks Dean if he wants pie and Dean says no, which basically never happens, when Sam then looks so DONE and starts talking about how Mary is gone and… (the implication being he is about to mention Cas being gone too)… then Dean says nope nope I am FINE and Sam FINALLY calls Dean out on it, saying “Dean, it’s called SUBLIMATION”.

And Dean finally relents and says “Yeah, its kinda my thing”. (And then later in the diner he is seen to have eaten a whole slice of cake in front of Sam and no-one makes a big deal out of it….)

WE ALL SCREAMED. DEAN ACTUALLY IN THE SCRIPT, OUT LOUD, HAS SAID THAT HE SUBLIMATES.

Because THIS is Dabb again taking what has been IN THE SCRIPT and in the show for 12 years and building on it, making it BLATANT. Because we are building to endgame now, SPN isn’t likely to last past season 13-14, so the character arcs that were set up in season 1 (and 4 for Cas) need to be tied up, so we, the audience NEED it to be made obvious when it has just been in the subtext. THAT IS WHY SO MUCH IS SO BLATANT THIS SEASON. Ie Performing!Dean, Destiel, Sam and the MoL story, Mary being the catalyst for Dean’s self acceptance arc and Sam’s self forgiveness arc around Lucifer (which I think will be much more blatant next season re: Jack as his mirror).

With Performing!Dean it started to be made a bit more obvious since Sam told Dean that he was ‘kind of butch’ and people probably thought he was ‘overcompensating’ in season 2 but it still stayed subtext, Dean checking out a few guys here and there, only really getting with women when he was having his ‘I’m going to go to Hell and need comfort’ or ‘Sam is dead, Cas left’ moments or since he met Cas, whenever Cas had left, making Dean feel crappy and rejected or had just DIED, using it as a coping mechanism, even blatantly role playing in season 9 after he feels so bad about kicking Cas out of the bunker etc to the point that in 12x18 it is so blatant that this is what it is about, they even have Dean saying outloud that he is settling for Sam’s omelette mere seconds after clearly having settled for the waitress because she wasn’t what he really wanted on top of all the other give aways…

Anyway, it’s not just about his sexuality or feelings for Cas, there are many other aspects too, and those are the ones that are cemented in seasons 1-3. Most of these seem all to stem from John and if you see snippets from John’s journal it makes sense.

John says he is proud of Dean when he kills monsters, womanises, drinks etc etc. So guess what a young impressionable Dean learned was the best way to act in life?

Now, over the years bits have come out here and there. Every time we see Dean with a sexual partner he has been the submissive one, he is clearly an extremely giving lover and very caring. He is not a dude bro womaniser at heart, he cares for all the women he sleeps with enough to be kind and gentle with them, even the waitress in 12x18 who really he doesn’t REALLY CARE about, she’s just a coping mechanism, but he is still extremely sweet with her.

He drinks for years of course, he is a functioning alcoholic for most of the show, but lately he has switched to coffee… unless something really bad is going down. Like when we saw the empty bottle in his room in 12x19…

He listens to old rock music because it reminds him of his mom and dad, not because he is a real metal head. Yeah absolutely he loves it too I’m sure, but really it’s the emotional pull. And we haven’t heard him do so since 12x07. Just saying. He also admits to liking Taylor Swift in season 10, after firstly saying HELL NO, same with the cucumber water in 12x07. It’s not the music or the water or whatever as such, that is absolutely NOT what we are saying is making us feel Dean is bisexual or has a hidden side to himself, its the fact that he HIDES it first then admits to it afterwards, that is the essence of Performing!Dean.

When Sam drinks the cucumber water, no-one batted an eyelid, that means nothing to us, because Sam is super comfortable with who he is in THIS respect, even though he carries guilt etc, but that is another subject. But because Dean made a huge deal about how uncool and basically unmanly it was, after all we know of him over the years, THEN went and drank it anyway, saying “shut up” when Sam is like “seriously?!” THAT is where the Performing!Dean meta comes from. And Sam is the same as us, he doesn’t care if Dean is bi, or if he likes Taylor Swift or cucumber water or WHATEVER, what he DOES care about is the fact that Dean feels the need to hide it from him.

There are so many small points along the series that point to a lot of Dean’s persona being fake or exaggerated and how sometimes Sam knows and sometimes he doesn’t, it would be funny if it wasn’t tragic.

Deep down Dean Winchester is a soft, kind and generous soul who just wants to be loved and to help people.

WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT WE SAW IN 12x11. THIS IS THE EXPOSITION EPISODE FOR PERFORMING!DEAN AND THE CORE OF THIS WHOLE SEASON BECAUSE THE WHOLE SEASON HAS BEEN ABOUT THIS, WHICH IS WHY 12x22 IS THE CHARACTER LED FINALE, BECAUSE IT IS WHERE THIS FINALLY COMES DOWN.

So yeah, the fact of the matter is that Performing!Dean has been there all along, since the PILOT, over the years it has been showed to us that it exists then some of the walls have started coming down. If anyone dares to tell me that Performing!Dean isn’t a thing (which I was told earlier this season, lmao) then I will kindly point them towards 12x11 and 12x22.

Also, let us not forget that even though 12x11 was mostly an exposition for Performing!Dean when he lost his memories, again harking back to the HEART is the person, NOT their memories theme of the season, we also were given the golden snippet that DEAN RODE LARRY BEFORE HE GOT WACKED WITH MAGIC. This is to show us that Dean’s walls are coming down this season. When Sam called him up on it in a way that seemed to be taking the piss, Dean, rather than attempt to deny or tell him to shut up actually embraced it and gloated about how GOOD he was at it. ATTA BOY DEAN!

With the resurrection of Mary and Dean’s near - complete death experience it seems that Dean got to the point in season 12 where he just didn’t want to hide from himself anymore and so let these walls down further, there were small snippets of this in nearly EVERY episode. 

12x11 was the exposition for casual viewers to see this side of him more clearly (in the same way that 12x19 was for Dean and Cas’s clearly more than platonic relationship, which will not be built on with HUGE LEGO BRICKS since Cas died), and now with the grenade launcher as a metaphor, Dean literally blew down his walls in 12x22. The culmination of this story was his confrontation with Mary where he explains WHY he always had this facade, because he had a shitty childhood, had to be a parent to Sam and that it wasn’t FAIR and he didn’t cope with it well at all.

So. There we have it. Performing!Dean is REAL, it was there ALL ALONG, we were RIGHT in seeing it because it is confirmed in 12x11 and then addressed and to some extent dismantled in 12x22, and the meta idea that the grenade launcher is associated with Performing!Dean was ALSO used.

Just… wowzers.

I don’t expect Dean to suddenly act completely differently now, he won’t, there are just some aspects of him that will be slightly more obvious or he won’t hide certain parts of himself. He still isn’t completely done with this, as Jensen himself said that there will be more of this to come in season 13…

I expect him to perhaps once or twice order a slice of cake or an ice cream sundae, to listen to the radio and not turn it over if a pop song comes on, to be more open with his feelings towards his family (and yeah, Destiel is a part of this for sure), a nice turn around but also not jarring, because it’s just a PART of Dean, not his whole self, a lot of what we see is really fully him, so it’s not that he is going to completely radically change!

Anyway, its all very exciting as the metaphorical death of Performing!Dean is just a part of what most of us see as a positive endgame for TFW and it is all looking pretty good so far :D