Sexual attraction is sexual attraction, regardless of orientation. You must be either straight or gay, but nothng else.Īt this point (I'm 57), I am more open to the reality that sexuality is not limited to one particular orientation, interest, or lifestyle. I have gay friends that deny bisexuality is a possibility. Was I gay, but enjoyed women? Was I just curious? Was I bisexual? Why did I have to be just one or the other? All sorts of questions went through my mind. But, I was still aware of societal expectations of being 100% straight or gay, and that caused further distress because I wasn't sure what label to put on myself. It wasn't until 2004 when I finally admitted my desires to myself, and felt that a weight had been lifted. I became aware of my same sex curiosity when I was 19, and struggled with denial, shame, embarrassment, guilt, and confusion for years. For men at least, as I said in my OP, I'm guessing that equally strong attraction to either is quite rare though not non-existent. It's true that for someone who is truly bisexually inclined, sexual behavior is a choice, and in today's society, a Kinsey 1 or 2 will probably choose to be exclusively straight, while because of opposite social pressures in the gay community, a Kinsey 4 or 5 may be almost exclusively homosexual. Religious fundamentalists often say that "homosexuality is a choice." This statement is half-true, but not in the sense that they intend: for a Kinsey 6 or even a 5, homosexuality is not a choice any more than heterosexuality is a choice for a Kinsey 0. In contrast, today, someone who is mostly heterosexual but with some attraction to men would be less likely to act on the latter because of the prevailing social attitude that requires you to identify as 100% straight (or 100% gay). People reading accounts of famous ancient Greeks or Romans having both homosexual and heterosexual experiences often make remarks like "why were there so many more bisexual men back then than now." I doubt that they were - it was simply the case back then that a Kinsey 1-2 would occasionally indulge his lesser attraction to men because there was no stigma attached to doing so. Now that I've accepted myself and my desires, I'm a 3. So back in the day, I may have been a 1 on the Kinsey scale. I probably still lean to hetero-romantic, but I could easily see myself in queer relationships these days. Although I've seen my romantic attraction changing in the past several years as well. At least as much as sexual attraction has been in the past in this country. Romantic attraction is probably still heavily influenced by societal pressure now. I think sexual and romantic attraction are separate issues. Most tests I've found deal with sexual attraction. I'm guessing the results would be skewed because I've been super freaking horny without any contact with many people for a few months as well. (Your sexual orientation is 96.4% heterosexual, 82.1% homosexual, which places you in the bisexual quadrant.) These don't take into account attraction to trans or non-binary people. I found another that is less limited, but still limited IMHO. I also think the Kinsey Scale (scored a 3 btw) is limited. It feels freeing, so I have hope at this point.
So I'm just kind of arriving at queer now. If I find that person sexually attractive I just allow myself to be attracted, that person's gender identity isn't significant to that. I could be pansexual as I don't care what someone's gender identity is anymore. As I've grown older I'm realizing the labels are probably holding me back (my experience, I'm not trying to say this belongs to anyone else). Then when I was more open with myself, I saw myself as bisexual leaning toward women. For a long time I thought of myself as 'flexible', mostly because I couldn't accept I might be bisexual. I've gone through a lot of changes with my self-identification. The gatekeeping in the LGBTQ+ community can be exhausting. Some of this is due to the straight community not being able to deal with men that want to be with men as well as women and the gay community not being able to deal with men wanting to be with women (by active choice) as well as men. I believe that if it weren't for major societal pressures for men to be attracted to either men or women fairly exclusively, we'd see a lot more fluidity in sexual attraction when it comes to men. I've written about it previously, but my first sexual experience ended up being with my best friend when we were high. I look back at that time and realize that I didn't allow myself to find men attractive because I would have been harassed more than I already was (I was bullied a lot in school). So I had a hard time exploring who I was. It was more than a little complicated at that point as it was perfectly fine for women to be bi, but not guys.
I'm 54, so I came of age sexually in the '80s.