Can men be bisexual?

Say it ain't so!!!! I'm shook.

 

I'm actually curious too.

 

The discussion has been very helpfully, as well as the disagreement. As a fairly asexual person myself I don't have any personal experiences to draw from.

 

Well, it's what I like to read, so that's why I started writing in that genre. As to why I enjoy the genre in general it's because as a straight woman I like penises. When you have two guys its like, double the penises! Three guys? Three pen-...well, you get the picture. I think I watch more gay porn than some gay men do.

That said, I'm very wary of fetishizing gay men, so that's where the romance and the rest of the storytelling comes in. I want to see and write these gay male characters as whole people, with the full range of human emotions and experiences. Otherwise I'm treating them like toys for my privileged amusement, which is 100% not cool.

I'm not rare as you might think - there are a lot of straight women who write m/m. Bay would probably know best, but I believe the majority of m/m authors are. It's the cottage industry no one knows about.

 

I have to admit, I expected this thread to be an absolute trash fire when I saw the title* and amount of pages it'd gathered in a short span of time. Pleasantly surprised it's been so civil and informational.


(* Nothing against you, @FeigningSarcasm - certain things just tend to be hot button issues on here.)

 

When I first started writing m/m back in my fanfiction days I gave my husband that exact explanation, as he somewhat taken aback by the news that his wife of over 20 years suddenly had an interest in writing about men falling in love and having sex with each other. Bless him, he just shrugged and said "I guess that makes sense." He's been so awesome - I ask him about "guy stuff" all the time for my books and he's super accommodating and helpful.

 

You know what you are, I don't. If you think your sex with men has a different quality than your sex with women, who am I to say that isn't true? I believe you. I'm just saying one need not have romance in order to have sexuality. I've had sex with men I had no romantic interest in. But I have no sexual attraction to women.

I have a bisexual friend who recently got married. I doubt the fact he fell in love changed his sexuality.

 

Men definitely can be bisexual. I can say that because I am myself, and I've never been in denial or really at odds about that. Sexuality is innate and natural to that person, it's not to do with being fashionable or even image-driven at its heart. It's purely to do with who you like and who you don't. I can find both men and women attractive but there are some men and women that I wouldn't find attractive because that's just the way it is. Whoever says it's a myth is either joking or simply finds the idea strange. But in reality, it's pretty normal. It's like anything that is natural to you, there's no choice in it, it's just part of who you are.

 

This is my experience as well, though my handful of serious relationships never lasted. There are men and women who cheat and men and women who don't. The proportions might differ by gender but without looking at research I'm reluctant to say that is a fact.

Honestly @LostThePlot, I don't understand where your conclusions are coming from if they are not solely based on your personal experience and personal experience is not going to be the best evidence for any of us.

 

One of my exes and I had sex for months after we broke up. It lasted until I met a new guy. We both liked the sex but were simply no longer in love.

 

Isn't that what you're doing when you watch gay porn???

 

Again, good for you. I have done exactly the same thing. I'm not saying that people can't have sex with people without being in love with them, quite the opposite. My point was that mostly people get attached to the people they sleep with, even if they try not. Are you going to tell me that's not true? That most partners people have had here are people they felt nothing for?

 

I'm sorry, let me google that for you: https://www.truthaboutdeception.com/cheating-and-infidelity/stats-about-infidelity.html

Top line:

• It is estimated that roughly 30% to 60% of all married individuals (in the United States) will engage in infidelity at some point during their marriage (see Buss & Shackelford for review of this research). And these numbers are probably on the conservative side, if you consider that close to half of all marriages end in divorce (people are more likely to stray as relationships fall apart; also see, who is likely to cheat).

So; a conservative estimate is that half of married people cheat during their marriage . Are you going to tell me that this is some weird thing that only I know about? What do you think that says about people in relationships less committed than marriage?

And, just to be clear here; I've never said anything is fact. I've just said what I think and what experiences I've had. And now you want some citations for that because you don't like what my experiences tell you. Dude, come on.

It's kinda funny to me when people read posts that are full of 'I think' and 'I believe' and 'in my experience' and then pull a face and ask for something more scientifc than my experiences. And then they turn around and say 'Well it worked for me this one time' and think that's ok. I mean, are we talking about what we think here? Or are we talking about the science?

 

I don't think it's true but perhaps that depends how one defines "most".

Define "felt nothing for". If by that you mean romantic and you are just going by the numbers, I'd say for certain I've had sex with more guys I was not interested romantically in than with guys I was interested in, being a child of the free love generation and all.

Doesn't mean I didn't like the guys at all, of course I did. But I wasn't interested in a relationship for sure.

 

Of course many people enjoy sex without romance. Only a select few are born with souls.

 

*sighs*

Yes, but neither does yours. Your experience worked out. Wonderful. And one of mine did too. But I've seen maybe twenty different sets of people try to become friends with benefits and I've seen maybe two of those work out ok. All the others ended with jealousy, with fights, with screaming arguments where one partner got more attached even after pinkie promising that they wouldn't do that.

And that's why I say, even though it's worked out for me before, that in general I don't think it's a good idea. That in general people end up getting attached to the people they sleep with. And maybe I'm wrong. But there's only so many times I can see people try (and advise them against it) and then see them fail in the exact same way before I start to think that actually this is a normal thing; for people to start having feelings for the people that they are fucking.

Why is this being treated like something controversial; that people generally develop feelings for people they are sleeping with? No, not in all cases. And I never said in all cases. But in general they tend towards that.

 

Let me see if I understand what is going on here.
Promiscuous people are ok (albeit more likely to
share STI's)
Cheating is stigmatized on ethical/moral grounds.
Sex and intimacy are not synonymous when it is strictly for gratification.
Straight women like gay romance.
Men can be bisexual.

Hmm...This has wandered into some odd territory.
Wow this got complicated in a hurry. But it is all
rather entertaining.

 

Well, porn in and of itself is inherently objectifying regardless of orientation. So yes, in that respect I guess I am. But I believe that the same is true of straight folks who watch straight porn - the actors are all being objectified as sexual objects.

 

Hang on; are you even arguing that I'm wrong? Like, for real are you? Because you aren't forming any kind of argument. You just seem to be thinking that generally means the same as every time. And that's not the same. If you want to argue whether that in general those kind of relationships don't work out then by all means make that argument. But you really do seem to be saying that because you made it work one time that means that it's impossible for such relationships to be poorly advised in general. These are not exclusive positions. You can have one work out and I can have one work out and they can still in general be bad ideas.