#bi oriented

[what-shitfuckery-is-this-ew]

Hey don't mean anything bad by this but I assume your Muslim from your pfp, but you also give queer vibes. My gaydar broken?

Nope.

I'm a queer Muslim!

[epiceneandroid]

radiomogai experiences questions so far

1.) so, for the first question, are you asking "us" or are you asking "me"? because i'm SOME kind of disordered system, and "us" and "me" are partially blurry, partially distinct entities. personally, as ashren, i'd describe myself as some sort of bi oriented, greyrose, panabinary agender mxsc and fxm genderblank person. that makes most sense to me. our system collectively identifies as genderfluid and epicene, even if i don't personally feel the whole epicene thing strongly, and a lot of us, especially me, are objectum. most of us that front regularly have a gender hoard aside from like...sprinkles who feels really uncomfortable labeling pup's gender identity beyond pupgender and epicene and butch.

2.) my personal experience with names as a system is like...names kinda pop into our head for us and they stick. francis george and bonett were both named after a h*talia character (unfortunately), i named myself completely randomly vibes based, etc. our system has a vague fascination with names, so we enjoy seeing a lot of varying names we could've called ourselves. most of our system feels comfortable with they/them except for bonett, who prefers he/him and any neos, and i generally just prefer they/it/null so far.

3.) i guess one of my favorite gender terms would be agender and genderblank, for different reasons. agender is partially kind of a political thing; i want to be treated like a person, after being treated like something to be feared as a former persecutor and current mental illness holder in the system, and genderblank resonates with me because like...whenever i try to actively THINK about my gender, personally, it comes up a blank, empty space.

4.) lol i can't really express my identity through clothing and style i want to buy men's clothes but i can't! i'm semi-closeted and my mom KNOWS our system is some form of transgender but we can't socially transition because she's afraid it'll make us "want a sex change" our desire to get t varies lol most of the time we just want to pass for a sexless, generic person.

5.) i mainly plan for social and legal transition, like, our system's blanket name changing (though i don't know what name we'd use irl; if we can find a suitable one for all of us that we feel drawn to we'll eventually use it), and maybe either estrogen blockers, progesterone, and SARMs or estrogen blockers, progesterone, and low dose t. i'm not sure.

6.) okay, i'm gonna get a little bit critical for a moment, but i'm not fond of the mogai community's pervasive transmisogyny. i understand that there are certain intersex experiences, such as those who are assigned female at birth due to ambiguous sex traits but end up being transmisogyny affected if they desire to still remain women as they were raised (see: eggs at 12 syndrome), that would fall under "afab transfem", but i'm a bit irritated at fellow people who are possibly intersex also like possibly myself, with possible congenital adrenal hyperplasia AND pcos, considering themselves transfem when transmisogyny, unfortunately, and a lot of ways transition relates to gender, relies on assigned sex. it's actually kind of frustrating. at the same time, i feel ostracized from a lot of transfeminist communities for accepting that there are transfeminine nonbinary people who are not perfectly binary, perfectly dysphoric, and perfectly wanting a binary transition, and it irks me because there are so many people i care about who are tma and nonbinary and as a tme nonbinary person, i want to protect them and ally with them as much as i can, and people treat tma women like dirt already so tma nonbinary people are treated like dirt doubly and...people don't get it. and the mogai community isn't very welcoming to the tma nonbinary people who are ostracized from certain communities but ostracized from the mogai community because of this...permissiveness? lack of consideration to tma experiences? it's frustrating.

7.) i don't necessarily think i'll ever find a label i feel comfortable with, but it's like...theoretically, i'd say i'm bisexual, but i and a lot of our system genuinely seems to prefer nonbinary people of any transmisogyny exemption status or even birth assignment rather than cis men, cis women, trans women, or trans men. it's like...nonbinary people 60-80%, binary people 40-20%. but it's not like i'm not attracted to binary identified people, i am, it's just...somehow nonbinary people are far for attractive to us. yet we distinctly feel very multi gender attracted. i don't have a name to put on this label and i don't know if i'll find one i feel more comfortable with than bisexual.

@radiomogai here's mine so far

[glbtrx]

I just can't believe that I JUST now discovered that technically you can't be bisexual (or of another orientation) AND aroace. In this case you should be bi-oriented aroace. How the frick did I not know that. And the flag is like

I struggled remembering the order of the fucking BISEXUAL flag and now I am supposed to remember this? I hate life

[critterwithtoast]

i dont have to be into men to identify as bi (oriented) !

[orientation-archive]

PT/men-pref bi

woman-pref bi.

masc-pref bi.

fem-pref bi./end PT

Man-Pref Bi

For any bi oriented person who have an attraction preference for men

….

Woman-Pref Bi

For any bi oriented person who have an attraction preference for women

….

Masc-Pref Bi

For any bi oriented person who have an attraction preference for anyone of any gender who present’s masculine

….

Fem-Pref Bi

For any bi oriented person who have an attraction preference for anyone of any gender who presents feminine

[lgbtqtext]

[crying-in-converse]

How can you be aro/ace and bi?

Not trying to be rude btw just curious

ohh yess good question. and there are actually multiple answers.

so the definition of aroace is little to no romantic or sexual attraction. so you can be bi with that little attraction.

there are also a label oriented aroace which is where someone doesnt experience ANY romantic or sexual attraction but experiences other attraction that is significant enough to label. so you can label yourself as bi oriented, lesbian oriented, gay oriented, pan oriented, etc.

aroace is an umbrella term for anyone under the spectrum of aroace. so demiromantic/demisexual, grayromantic/graysexual, etc. if you fall under the spectrum of aroace you can use the label aroace. (only if u are on both spectrums though!) so you can be bi and demiromantic/demisexual, etc

[majorasnightmare]

taps mic

minthara

*uproarious applause*

okay so like. obviously everyone here knows and understands mintharas romance route is fucking incredible, like we are ALL on the same page here and telepathically communicating our agreement. shes a compelling fascinating character with a fantastic blend of firmly held political beliefs and hypocrisy and surprising mindfulness that makes her a thrill in any party, playing good OR evil.

her character is absolutely magnetic, made all the more enthralling by her stellar voice work and delightful party banter

so. we all know why WE love minthara. but something I find equally engaging is why SHE likes US. the way the companions experience desire is already more interesting and in depth than a lot of older, more familiar rpgs that have to make sure companions are equally approachable regardless of how exactly you spent those many hours in character creation, with actions and dialogue choices capable of boosting their opinions and engaging their romantic interests being accessible more or less regardless of playstyle. this is what gave rise to the dreaded "player-sexual" term: a romancable npcs who seems utterly devoid of sexuality or desire EXCEPT for your player character specifically, regardless of gender options selected at the very beginning. the dialogue options presented are so personalized and plot relevant as to reveal nothing at all about their lives outside of the narrative, and any ambient party chatter is loose and vague enough as to avoid potentially turning an interested player away. the end result is an npc who is technically canonically bisexual, but avoids engaging with sexuality or desire in any meaningful way and only expresses that bisexuality exclusively through the fact the player can choose either of two gender settings at creation before romancing them.

minthara, and all of the origin companions, are NOT that, thank GOD. the degrees to which companions openly discuss their desires vary, but are nonetheless fairly consistently present, but we arent here for them. we are here for lolths specialest princess and her 4d8 smite not including paralyzing critical damage. and minthara specifically is a fun choice for analysis because she is Loudly and Proudly Menzoberranzan. which means WE get to play with drow gender politics and cultural influence on the expression of gendered desire! YIPPEE

okay so the biggest misunderstanding I get repeated by people who kill minthara at the grove is that she hates men. which is crazy because, last time I checked, her personalized greetings actually only check for being a high elf of any gender, being a drow man, or being a drow woman, and everyone else gets a more generic true soul greeting. and i KNOW most of these people arent playing male drow. she MIGHT call female true souls sister offhandedly when she implores you to attack the grove, but admittedly its been a while since I checked her dialogue and this is an off-the-top-of-my-head ramble and not a cited analysis. anyways back on topic. minthara is pretty openly biased against drow men, specifically, which continues to a lesser degree even after being rescued from moonrise, but is highly contextual and pointedly SPECIFIC. minthara does not, in my experience, make off the cuff derogatory comments towards men as a general thing. she has menzoberranzan politics and ideology, for sure, but her phrasing around those tends to be more careful (saying the honor of matricide better belongs to a daughter than a son, which really only tracks through the lens of menzoberranzan politics and less so through a lens of generalized man hatred).

something else that i think gets widely overlooked, (and this will be relevant), is that minthara is funny. she has a very flat deadpan style of humor that relies on a rugpull at the end for its punchlines. why exactly is this relevant, you may ask? well as i was discussing how minthara tends to specifically demean drow men, you may have thought to yourself "wait, but minthara says LOTS of rude things to my male party members ALL the time!" well. shes literally joking. and that isnt me speculating, either! if, playing as origin gale, you recruit minthara and spend your playthrough interacting with her, and survive to the epilogue party, you get a dialogue option remarking on how she consistently calls gale "the wizard". in that dialogue branch, minthara goes on to explain she has been consistently paying close attention to gale AND the kind of person she is, and says she does things like refuse to use him name SPECIFICALLY because she KNOWS hes taking it as teasing and that she enjoys doing that! we know gale tends to interpret minthara's harsher dialogue more positively just by his reaction to her recruitment, and this dialogue confirms its a two way street for them. her calling gale a third son after he asks if shes going to say something awful? thats them playing with each other. canonically. and this is consistent with ALL of the male companions! she playfully insults astarion by calling him a pleasure servant, knowing astarion prides himself on vanity and his good looks, and astarion responds equally playfully about how shes inadvertently complimented how beautiful he is, knowing she dislikes saying nice things so openly. minthara teases wyll about mizoras flirtatious nature and her MO of seducing people into pacts specifically because she knows he prides himself on being a slow burn romantic, and then teasingly compliments him by saying a failure to seduce him would be a bruise on her pride (revealing that she thinks highly enough of wyll to consider him a prize worth bragging about, even in the hypothetical context of an impartial one night stand).

mintharas FUNNY and while she rarely lets herself openly admire others, she DOES try to joke with them! understanding this about her recontextualizes a LOT of her party banter and makes a lot of her interactions more genuinely wholesome. the only male party member minthara actively dislikes is minsc, and its explicitly because he repeatedly refers to ass so often (in the context of butt kicking but. it IS a lot), and her tone there implies it has an objectifying feeling to it when minthara overhears the things minsc says.

minthara also openly admires gortash, repeatedly and without prompting, and she admires him specifically for a lot of the traits she finds enjoyable period. hes competent, pragmatic, and ambitious, but willing to compromise and ally himself with others if it suits him, and i feel like a more quote-unquote "misandrist" minthara would not so blatantly admire such a man for the very traits that allows one to excel in Lolthite society without making at least SOME passing mention of gender, at the very least something closer to her comments regarding dolors matricide. as far as ive experience, minthara only really brings up her explicitly gendered distaste ONLY in regards to drow men. minthara is generally fairly good at contextualizing her own experiences to the culture she was raised in, and avoiding generalizing those experiences to other cultures. shes MUCH more likely to assume something is specific to her home than assume it to be universally true, and i feel like this is especially true regarding gender politics. as far as i can recall, her only slipup is referring to the ruling body of baldurs gate as matriarchs before correcting herself to patriars, and pointedly those are both highly gendered terms associated with positions of political and familial power.

this has been a whole lotta Post about why minthara does not in fact Hate All Men, but thats honestly because theres just more to discuss there. minthara openly admires and desires women, and unlike some of her subtler character traits, minthara being sapphic is one of the few things people can pick up on right out the gate. there simply isnt as much to say here that doesnt veer into more cut and dry upfront aspects of mintharas desire, rather its how she engages with and desires masculinity that has the caveats here. mintharas desires in women are what she finds baseline attractive: she enjoys a go getter. she finds ambition and hungry power seeking to be attractive, and ruthless pragamaticism is a major selling point for her, and admirable all on its own. she enjoys when someone is coldly calculating, and she thinks its hot when you kill people and dont give a shit. none of these desires are gendered, rather, they are simply traits more common and encouraged among the women she grew up and around. these are not innately feminine traits, but they are culturally feminine in mintharas experience. in short, gortash is admirable because he acts like any other admirable drow woman minthara would find back home. minthara understands both of these things to be true: that this is not inherently gendered but simultaneously how SHE expresses her gender, and furthermore are culturally gendered from a society she admires and misses in equal measure (even if she no longer agrees with the underlying theocratic reasoning behind it).

things that are culturally feminine in menzoberranzan are her baseline point of desire in seeking a partner, and she seeks those traits in potential partners regardless of gender. however, things that are culturally masculine in menzoberranzan are general traits she finds distasteful. the gendered politics of menzoberranzan are such that the gendered role of a drow man is one of being a sycophant, one who bolsters his own social standing by attaching himself to a powerful woman and then people-pleasing enough to avoid being discarded. The role of being a drow man is one of debasement, victimization, asskissing, and servitude, with the permissible reactions to this role being a kind of desperate ambition to carve a bit more breathing room within the box without meaningfully breaking free of it (see: most wizards being drow men). And minthara almost universally dislikes all of that. However, something thats culturally masculine in AND out of menzoberranzan is a trait minthara DOES desire in her partners, with it even being one of her key emotional lynchpins: protectiveness. A lot of male drow consorts are expected to both go out of their way to protect and give their lives for their matriarchs, and the biggest threat to a matron mother is usually only other matron mothers, and the agents they move through. a consort CAN be weaponized as a threat in this way, but its more like poaching, in that a consort is promised a better position with a higher ranking house in return for aiding the destruction of his current house. In this way Menzoberranzan maintains its culture of duplicitious intrigue and discouraging vulnerability, while simultaneously having an admirable model of masculinity one can idealize in a culture that actively subjugates men as a gendered role.

The safest thing a drow man can be without being pathetic to the point of disdain, is a loyal guard dog. And thats something minthara openly craves in her partner, having someone to guard her back and protect her from threats, and more importantly someone to guard her vulnerability. minthara admires the culture of menzoberranzan, and views her childhood (and the traumas it inflicted) positively because of her pragmatic acknowledgement of her skillset, knowing that it would not be nearly so keenly focused and practiced had she not grown up the specific way she had. Simultaneously, the loneliness and paranoia it instilled in her is something she desperately wants relief from, and only really seeks that out from a romantic partner.

Mintharas bisexuality is so compelling to me because of how her desires are so couched in her heritage while she avoids removing them from that context. The things she wants, what she finds attractive, the traits that take her from a passing fascination to a deeply committed relationship, are gendered in a way that would make it difficult for her to be satisfied with the average gender conforming individual from her home city. And this is more or less confirmed by Minthara only really mentioning one actual lover, having a plethora of suitors instead. Minthara desires a partner who has to come off to her as feminine to be attractive, but masculine to fully commit to them, and that particular set of traits would be hard to reliably find in a society where gender dynamics are harshly enforced and strictly stratified. Its a very distinctly bi-and-pan experience where even if you DO find a partner thatd hypothetically pass as a het couple, you do so in such a way that fails to conform to the gendered norms of your partnership and STILL manages to trip flags for being queer even if your literally a m-f couple.

Its a deeply lonely experience that echoes so much of mintharas character, that i find it difficult to engage with her narrative without coming back to HOW minthara experiences attraction in the first place, what she wants and how she wants it and who she wants it from and when she feels shes allowed to have it. Her romance route is endlessly rewarding to me because of it, engaging with this deeper level of her character and her desires and how she expresses them and how Minthara herself interacts with gender roles in the context of drow expressions of romance and sexuality (not even getting to her alurlssrin dialogue! an eilistraean expression of love!!) and its just SO immediately interesting and engaging that even though minthara has a full act LESS of general content, she manages to be equally as dynamic and in depth as most of the origin companions.

i just. love minthara and i love the way she loves.

[make-space-for-as]

Anyone else with this aroace experience?

I know the aroace community is not a monolith. I know we all have very diverse experiences. But I was thinking about how so many aroace folks had the "I think I'm bi or pan" moment because they felt the same/nothing for all genders.

I had the "I think I'm bi" moment too. But for me it was because I DID feel something for different genders. I felt incredibly strong tertiary attraction to boys and girls (this was 10 years ago and I was queer-sheltered so I had yet to meet an out nonbinary person), and bi felt like the right descriptor. I didn't have to "fake" crushes like so many aroaces. I just confused my squishes for crushes and blended in.

Even after I realized I'm aromantic asexual, bi still feels part of my identity. I relate to a lot of the bi experience. I feel strongly for several different genders, but I'm attracted to them differently. The way I'm attracted to guys is totally different than how I'm attracted to girls and nonbinary folks.

This is why the term "bi-oriented aroace" means so much to me. It describes my experiences with tertiary attraction perfectly.

[avephelis]

IRREFUTABLY CANON!!

[alldevouringbeast]

not enough orientation play of gay/bi guys the thought of those fat tits just washing over your head the need to breed that whore and put your seed in her fill her womb and claim her in every possible way. warp her body to your desires, after all. you're an alpha. a breeder. a straight as an arrow buck meant to populate. and that's all you can think of now.

putting babies in every. single. womb. none of them can escape you. i'd like to see them try. they'll just succumb to your power eventually.

because you're a beast, and you're going to breed her. because you're a monster, who won't take a no. because you're a god, and you'll make sure new life will spread.

so embrace it. you're a straight breeder. unmatched in your prowess. unmatched in your virility.

so drain those balls and breed.

[galedekarios]

ngl i'm so very tired of ppl trying to justify biphobia in fandom spaces at this point

[lostyesterday]

I’ve seen a lot of joke posts about how Kira is a lesbian because she has short hair but, like, Kira’s appearance is the last reason why I generally read her as a lesbian. DS9 clearly intends to show that Kira is attracted to men, but I have always found this attraction to feel forced and artificial.

As one example, when Kira gets together with Shakaar in Crossfire or Odo in His Way, both episodes focus solely on Odo’s and Shakaar’s feelings toward Kira. Their perspectives are explored extensively, and their romantic feelings toward Kira are very explicitly depicted. Neither episode does anything whatsoever to explore Kira’s perspective on either of them. In fact, before Shakaar and Odo confess their love to Kira, there is absolutely no indication whatsoever that Kira has romantic feelings for either of them. Obviously there are Doylist explanations for this (namely, sexism), but what comes across from a narrative perspective is the implication that Kira suddenly and spontaneously developed feelings for both men after they said they were in love with her. Which is obviously possible – I know some people do experience attraction this way. But it also could read as extremely lesbian. I did the same thing several times when I was younger and thought I was straight. If someone tells you they have romantic feelings for you, and you genuinely like them and enjoy their company, it can be very easy to convince yourself that what you feel is romantic love. And you want to convince yourself, because you want deeply to be connected to other people.

When Kira breaks up with Shakaar because the Prophets let her know they weren’t meant to be together, part of me can’t help but imagine that she might feel relieved deep down. There’s no need, now, to wonder if she truly feels the same way toward him that he feels toward her. There’s an excuse, now, to go back to the way it was before when she didn’t have to interrogate all of her emotions in search of the ones she was supposed to feel.

When Kira tells Odo she loves him enough to let him go in Chimera, and when she truly lets him go in the finale, I imagine what part of her she feels she is losing. Odo is one of her closest friends – one that survived one war and then the next and in the end she lost him anyway. And she has lost so much, and so there can be no relief in this, but maybe in some small way it is still easier to pretend you loved someone the way they loved you once you’ve lost them.

And I compare Kira’s interactions with these men the show describes her as being in love with to her interactions with Jadzia or Keiko or Cretak, and I just find her chemistry with women so much more convincing. There’s no effort behind it – just connection. I don’t think what I’m saying here is the “correct” way of interpreting Kira as a character – it is simply my own interpretation based partially on my personal experiences. But I do think that it is a valid interpretation.

[lovelessrage]

It's Bisexuality Visibility Day, so here's to all aspecs who identify with bisexuality, find pride in their bisexuality, and need the space to celebrate. Whether you're oriented bi, angled bi/on the spectrum of bisexual to asexual, an aromantic bisexual, don't split your attraction, or subscribe to many of the varieties of experiences I can't all list out, I see you. We see you. You have community here and support here, and if you struggle to find it, there will always be spaces to welcome you with open arms. Find your people. Find your joy.

[critterwithtoast]

There was a girl in my class this year

and she tried to spread a rumour that i was bi (it’s an incredibly bigoted school. Like not just LGBTQ+phobia-sucky people on all fronts)

and it didn’t work because of a lot of things its a bit of a long story but basically everyone just went “that’s stupid” and didn’t believe her

and I will never cease to find that entertaining

because unintentionally

SHE WAS RIGHT

[annabelle--cane]

jon figured out the asexuality by himself but georgie had to be the one to tell him he was bi. she didn't even mean to, she had just figured out her own sexuality and was telling jon about it and said "ah, it's felt so nice to talk this through with you, I knew you'd be a cool and understanding about it since you're also bi" and he said "ah um. sorry to break it to you but I'm not?" and she just blinked like. "jonathan. I've known that you're attracted to men since before we even started going out. it can be seen from space whenever you get a crush. did you not realize???"