REC*OG*NIZE: The Voices of Bisexual Men by Robyn Ochs

REC*OG*NIZE: The Voices of Bisexual Men Reviews

• 
  kory.

  shoutout to the person who responded to the relationship status question with “I live with cats”.
  
  content/trigger warnings; biphobia, internalized biphobia, rape, stalking, domestic abuse, depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, racism, divorce, ableism, f slur, bullying, homophobia, self harm, coming out, misogyny, slut shaming, nonbinary erasure, religion, drug use, sexual harassment, victim blaming,
  
  i liked very little about this because it’s largely personal histories. which isn’t my preference for queer nonfiction. and just like most other bi books, this one has a lot of binary narratives. but i do like that it’s about bi men, because they’re very underrepresented.
  
  and i appreciate that in the researcher q&a, when asked about all the different mspec labels, the answer didn’t stop at “some people think bi is binary so they use words like pansexual because they think they’re more inclusive”. they also stated, “people whose sexual identity is not determined by the gender of their sexual partners now have a lot of freedom in determining which language best represents how they understand their own sexuality.” it’s so rare in bi books/research, even ones that specifically have a focus on pansexuality, to acknowledge that “bi is binary” is not the only, or even the majority, reason for identifying as pansexual.
  
  some notes:
  
  one of the contributors framed inclusion in such a negative way. they described the editors of the book as being “wonderful and gracious” for simply including all mspec people in the submission calls, which isn’t praiseworthy, it’s bare minimum. they claimed the editors “went out of their way to painstakingly sift through labels to appease/accommodate everyone”, which is an odd way of describing thoughtful inclusion. they assume people “reamed them out” for not being included, which is a wild bad faith assumption to make. plus, if someone was left out, they’d have every right to be upset or criticize it. must be nice to finally have some the kind of visibility and inclusion that means you’re no longer begging for it and the smallest acknowledgement doesn’t mean the entire world to you anymore. good for you, but don’t turn your nose up at those of us who are still begging for the barest acknowledgement, and are still floored when it happens, and still disheartened when it doesn’t.
  
  one of the essays included a story of a man calling a twenty year old woman “little girl” and telling her that just because she’s struggling to take care of three kids doesn’t mean she actually knows struggle, it just means she “chose to spread her legs three times”. and i’m supposed to agree with this man. why are y’all like this.
  
  the definition of queer starts with “originally a pejorative term” which isn’t very accurate.
  
  now, as always, some quotes:
  
  To recognize ourselves as bisexual men, therefore, is a queer reclamation in that it frequently means that we are reclaiming lost or forgotten parts of our stories, our desires and ourselves. But how can you lose or forget yourself? In a world that leaves little room for you to exist, it can be very easy, albeit painful, to get lost or forgotten even within your own gaze and to collaborate with forces that have pushed you aside or rendered you fabrication, foil or folly. Living every day in the between spaces of the sexual landscape, the walls that have been built and policed to maintain the just order of sexual conformity can crowd out the space needed to love and desire as one is moved to do.
  
  There has been an explosion of labels, monikers, handles, representations and identities for people who identify with non-binary, non-monosexual or middle sexualities: bisexual, pansexual, omnisexual, polysexual, panromantic, fluid, queer, questioning, heteroflexible, straight-with-a-twist, gayish, same-gender loving (which doesn’t necessarily preclude simultaneous different-gender loving), MSM (men who have sex with men) or, as Robyn likes to say, PSP (people who have sex with people), and so on. The possible ways to describe the middle sexualities are as limitless as our imaginations. Concomitant with this trend is the simultaneous dismantling of gender binaries with various possibilities such as transgender, genderqueer, genderfuck, gender fluid and agender.
  
  It is clear to us that there is no one singular or universalized experience of being bi/pan/poly/fluid, and therefore it is important for us to reflect that in our work.
  
  People with identities that are non-binary or non-monosexual are simply not seen enough, and men are even more underrepresented, even among bisexuals. Many of the leading, prominent texts on bisexual identity have been authored or edited by bisexual women and fewer than half of the voices within existing all-gender anthologies are those of men.
  
  In 2010 the United States Center for Disease Control’s National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey collected data from 16,507 adults aged 18 and older and found that bisexual men have a higher lifetime prevalence of rape, physical violence and/or stalking by an intimate partner: an incidence of 37.3% compared to 26% among gay men and 29% among heterosexual men.
  
  A 2002 study of 4,234 Australian adults found the bisexual group highest on measures of anxiety, depression and negative affect. The San Francisco Human Rights Commission’s 2011 report, Bisexual Invisibility: Impacts and Recommendations, found that bisexual men were 6.3 times more likely and gay men 4.1 times more likely than heterosexual men to report having had suicidal thoughts or attempts.
  
  There is no singular “bisexual experience,” let alone a single word with which to name it.
  
  Fifty-one of the sixty-four who responded identify as bisexual or include bisexuality as one of multiple identities. Other identities reported include: fluid, pansexual, queer, Two-Spirit, sissy, faggot, butchqueen, polysexual, freak, sacred whore, Bodeme, “Bisexual in a Same Gender Loving Relationship,” pomosexual, straightish, “not specified” and “I don’t give a fuck.”
  
  To the bisexual movement: May this book contribute one more building block to the ongoing body of work documenting and reflecting on the lives of bisexual, pansexual, polysexual, fluid and non-monosexual queer people and sparking further conversation.
  
  Bisexual men experience greater misunderstanding and stigma than the general population—more than gay men and even more than bisexual women—and it is my experience that gay men convey much of that prejudice.
  
  At this point I am unwilling to accept the notion that my sexuality is fixed in any way whatsoever. Men such as myself coming out (once again) as bisexual are expanding the way in which we queer our world, creating our own unique sexuality, because we can. And why shouldn’t there be as many sexualities, as many ways to love, as there are humans, or stars in the sky?
  
  Labels are words, and their meanings are rarely (read: “never”) static.
  
  A man can only be a “manly” man if he has sex exclusively (and often) with women, or at least one woman. If a man has any sexual inclinations beyond that, then suddenly he is no longer a man. He is labeled feminine or weak or gay—as if those are synonyms. To the heteronormative man, “gay” is an indictment. Yet the same standards are not applied to women. Bisexual women are seen in a completely different light. A woman who steps outside of the heteronormative standard might be seen as empowered and taking charge of her sexuality, free to experiment without losing her femininity. Katy Perry can kiss a girl and like it and sing a song about it. And many will applaud her for it. All this at a deep level speaks to just how fragile our culture’s sense of masculinity is for all males, but that is another talk show.
  
  What I am articulating, or trying to at least, is that sexuality, even with its growing labels, isn’t nearly as cut and dried as the actions they engage in. Hence the reason for the various labels as a whole to begin with.
  
  Maybe you just end up being amazing and coming up with your own unique label to describe your identity. All of those labels are equally beautiful and deserve to be celebrated. However you identify, I promise to respect whatever label currently describes your identity but, please, return the favor.
  
  To be bisexual means something slightly different for everyone who identifies this way.
  
  Queer, in all senses of the word, is probably the best word to describe me. Queer is political. Queer is something “off the norm.” Queer is sexual and gender minorities. Queer rejects traditional sexual and gender identities. Queer is outside the bounds of normal society. Queer is breaking the rules for sex and gender. One can be queer and bi. For that matter, one can be queer and straight.
  
  In terms of identity labels, there are many people who identify as bisexual, and this alone contradicts the statement that nobody is bisexual: identity matters. This is the key issue in determining how many people are “actually” bisexual; individuals determine this for themselves.
  
  Because traditional sexual continuum scales place two sex/genders at opposite ends, some of these sexual identity categories which aren’t organized around partner sex/gender don’t fit anywhere on them (such as queer). Unfortunately, these sexual identity labels have yet to gain much traction when it comes to research, because there are so many potential categories and a large group is needed for any one of them to be statistically significant. A number of studies end up excluding participants who identify as something other than gay/lesbian, straight or bisexual, because there are too few. This is one reason why we don’t have good numbers when it comes to how many people actually identity within these categories. However, just because they might not be statistically meaningful, doesn’t mean they aren’t meaningful at all.
  
  It is a mistake for anyone to universalize their own experience and assume that others will necessarily share their identity trajectory, thus invalidating other people’s identities.
  
  Our decisions about how—or even whether—to label are highly personal and are informed by our context. There is no “correct answer” and we are not promoting the use of any particular label, and we hope that you will respect each individual’s right to self-definition.
• 
  Jan

  Disclaimer: this anthology of work by bisexual men contains artwork by my husband Hew Wolff. It gets an extra star from me for bisexual content. Like many anthologies based on identity politics, the quality of the work is uneven. However, the groundbreaking collection contains enough good work to make it worth reading, and its purpose goes beyond the strictly literary and artistic.
• 
  Justin Cascio

  Audaciously broad, this Lambda-nominated anthology contains a broad diversity of voices and approaches to the subject of male bisexuality. If you have a bi man in your life, buy two copies: one for him, and one for yourself.
• 
  Steve Carter

  This is a collection of testimonials from bisexual men expressing how they feel about their situation in the USA territory in which they live.
  The stories vary because there all a lot of different layers of this since no one is really alike with these sexual things, I mean, if they are honestly looked into, explored.
  Most are happy to be bi, some feel oppressed by the outer world’s reaction to them and somewhat bitter about the whole thing. Many are annoyed by the bipolar assumptions of our time and see them as inaccurate, in the least, to intentionally dismissive of the variation they are.
  They express feelings of not being comfortable with either of these poles.
  I agree. The born this way gay culture is clearly not for me anymore than the exclusively heterosexual assumptions. So here is what I might write if I were involved with a book like this.
  
  I consider myself lucky to be somewhere on the bisexual spectrum. I like to think that I am closer to basic pre-conditioned and trained, civilized, humanness by being this way. This is not a new concept for me. I have been like this for as long as I can remember. I mean from childhood back in Ohio where there were sexual encounters with other boys playing around doing this and that.
  But even though that went on and was not unusual and really quite natural there was a sort of prohibition given USA sex attitudes and this was Ohio in the 1950s and early 60s. All this activity was done in secret, certainly away from parents. Yet it went on, not with all boys, but certainly not restricted to one of two boys. I guess I just assumed that it was what we did because it was fun and exciting with partly getting away with something.
  
  
  But yet that period was tricky for me. There was an older boy who lived behind our little ranch style house in Ohio. I’ll call him Woody, because that was his name. I have been wondering how much older he was than me and just now did some internet poking around and found a man who kind of has to be him and who graduated from high school in 1965 which would make him at least 4 and probably 5 years older than I because I was born in November and unusually young when I began school at age 5, too young, but that’s another issue. Well, this kid was somehow into me sexually and he was involved with an incident that looms large in my mind because it was so terrible at the time. There was a big apple orchard near where I lived and beyond the end of the orchard, a woods and a lake. One summer afternoon I was out with some of the older boys who I loved hanging out with. The frozen moment outside at the end of the orchard has the boys standing around me and me kneeling. I remember being persuaded to put someone’s penis in my mouth. I’m not sure how old I was then but I know it was before junior high because we had moved out of that neighborhood before I went to junior high. So I’m guessing 10 or 11, but I could have been younger since I lived in that house since age 5. And knowing what I know now it is probably better if I was 10 or younger than say 12 if the other boys were all Woody’s age 4 or 5 years older. Because then they would be getting rather old to be fooling around with this kid. And one would hope, being older, they could have come up with a more secure play area. That day we were suddenly discovered by some girls and enough was going on and exposed that the girls had something to tell. The next thing I knew I was in the kitchen being interrogated by both of my parents regarding if I had put someone’s “pee pee” in my mouth. Honestly sitting here now I don’t know if I did or not. I remember some reluctance at the moment but that could have been added on later to support my story to my parents that nothing went on. Years later my dad told me that he had caught me with Woody another time in Woody’s family’s shed.
  
  Now when I look at Woody’s two Facebook photos and read about how he spent his life, I find it interesting that he has chosen male power roles being an auxiliary cop, involvement with military and some marshal training thing. And there he is as an old man wearing navy whites with 4 small children standing with him, the only other people in his photos. I not saying he went on from back then to career pedifile, but those guys come front somewhere I suppose.
  
  So it this my #metoo moment?
  It could very well be. Woody had no other reason to be involved with me. I was just a little kid who lived down the hill. He had what I wanted, which was to be acceptable to these older boys.
  Did this hurt me?
  I mean I’m aware that my relationships with other men are not normal, whatever that means. I don’t have any close men friends.
  I would describe part of me reaction to others men as being somewhat homophobic. By that I don’t mean some sort of hatred but rather a suspicion that they might be interested in something or that I am and all that is just below the surface and enough to confuse the desire to get together. After all, little me might think, what else do I have to offer being not otherwise successful or engaged in popular male interests.
  Is this related to why I have been such an outsider with no career or anything like that when I had some sort of raw potential that is only apparent in hindsight.
  
  So what goes on with me with men? I periodically seek anonymous encounters in places set up for that and maybe have a little oral or manual interaction. Actually probably trying to recreate the setting at that moment in the orchard since it was loaded with such energy, emotion and interest.
  
  So there you have it. I’m rather old now. Have a really lovely open relationship with a woman who can understand, so now that sex with other women is basically over I can say that I’m not of team straight and have no interest in being straight in its homo and hetro variations.
  
  Anyway, interesting book with writers of various abilities in self expression.
  
• 
  Madly Jane

  Notes
• 
  Joseph

  Hard to rate this as a work on its own merits, since it was more just really important personally to have access to a collection like this. But I guess that's largely why it was compiled in the first place, so it certainly achieved what it set out to do: showcase a cross-section of the many and varied experiences of the all-too-often invisible male bisexuality. Helped me continue to figure some things out, and is otherwise just a fascinating look at a group that isn't really ever known or discussed.
• 
  John

  we need more research like this on Male Bisexuality---