Europe Looks To Dublin

In June 2001, the first European Bisexual Conference (EBC1) was held in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. At that conference, it was decided to make EBC a biennial event. The second European Bisexual Conference (EBC2) is to be held in Dublin from July 4th to 6th, 2003. This weekend ties in with the Dublin Pride celebrations, guaranteeing an exciting and action packed weekend for all who attend.

The conference is being organised by Bi Irish, a Dublin-based group founded in 1996 for bisexuals and any individuals interested in bisexuality or sexuality in general. EBC2 is open to all, regardless of sexual orientation or sexual preference, and in fact seeks to increase dialogue and discussion amongst members of the queer and straight communities. The conference will be a place to exchange information and experience in the areas of freedom of sexual preference and the position of bisexuality within societies across Europe, and also aims to improve bisexual visibility at the European level.

The conference theme “Loving the Difference” stresses the diversity of sexuality in general and bisexuality in particular. The cultural and social contexts of sexuality are tantamount to our understanding of humans, and these contexts include race and class. By offering a rich and varied programme, ranging from informal workshops, through to discussion groups, through to more formal presentations, EBC2 promises to be an interesting and rewarding experience for anyone who is involved with their (bi)sexual identity. However, the conference programme will not consist solely of discussions and talks. There is also a busy social programme, including of course the Dublin Pride parade and celebrations.

The organizing committee of EBC2 is looking for people who would like to do a session at the conference, which can be a presentation, panel discussion, workshop or performance. While they will consider any proposal submitted, it is felt that the following subjects may have particular appeal:

  • Academic (research, theory, place of in queer studies etc)
  • Activism (organisation; computer/internet; regional/racial/cultural/class differences)
  • Sexuality, relationships and health (sexuality; relationships; differing ability; love and romance; health, including safe sex/HIV)
  • Art and media (film and video; writers/literature; performance; bisexuals in media/culture/history)
  • Lifestyle (spirituality; personal growth/development)
  • Youth and family
  • Gender and sexual identities

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 ‘Inclusive’ EuroPride Manchester Takes Shape

EuroPride, Europe’s largest Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender festival, will be held in Manchester from 15-25 August 2003, and the organisers promise a week and a half celebrating with energy and imagination the pride within the LGBT community. The event will incorporate Manchester’s annual ‘Mardi Gras’ LGBT pride festival.

The tenth festival was awarded to Manchester by the founding organisation, European Pride Organisers Association (EPOA), with the initial licence being awarded to Marketing Manchester. A EuroPride 2003 Ltd company and Steering Group are in the process of being established.

EuroPride Manchester 2003 promises to be an inclusive event and they claim that consultation is to take place with many community groups, organisations and businesses. However when BCN spoke to the organisers of the Manchester bi groups they confirmed that none of them had been invited to take part in such consultation exercises.

The programme for the extended festival is still being devised, and final details of all events will be posted on the website nearer the time.

An enlarged Mardi Gras, focused in Manchester’s gay village will take place from 22 – 25 August. This will be a time to celebrate and party whilst raising money for HIV/Aids and community organisations. The weekend will kick off with a street parade and will include the Vigil during which people can reflect on friends and family affected by HIV/AIDS. Note this means the central part of EuroPride, Mardi Gras, clashes with this year’s BiCon.

The launch weekend will kick off with activity across the city culminating in a single event in a city centre square. This event promises to be ‘family friendly and inclusive to all Manchester residents and visitors’.

Throughout the ten days, a strong cultural element will concentrate on exhibitions and performance across the city, including film, art, music, heritage activity and theatre.

Heading the sporting element of EuroPride 2003 will be the European Swimming Tournament organised by Northern Wave in the Manchester Aquatic Centre on Friday 22 August. Further sporting events are being discussed with organisations in order to include the many queer sports groups in the region.

Debate and campaigning is also to form a component of the Festival programme. The impending repeal of Section 28 (unless it has already gone) and other issues directly affecting LGBT people will be discussed among community groups, police, local authorities, health organisations and many others.

A conference co-ordinated by Manchester City Council (who are notorious for their poor stance on bisexuality despite extensive lobbying by local bi groups – Ed.) will examine these issues.

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 Pension Rights…

As BCN went to press, Labour MP James Purnell was launching a parliamentary bill to give pension rights to unmarried couples – including same-sex couples.

The Bill would ensure that all public sector pension schemes allowed partners to receive from survivor benefits, should the employee die. Married couples in a similar situation already have this right.

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 Changing Sexual Offences

Proposed changes to the sexual offences legislation have been brought forward which have had a mixed reception as something of a ‘two steps forward one step back’ reform.

The Sexual Offences Bill will:
Repeal the current offence of buggery (Section 12 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956)
Repeal the ‘privacy’ provisions which outlaw gay sex involving more than one person (Section 1 of the Sexual Offences Act 1967)
Repeal the current offence of gross indecency (Section 13 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956).
Introduce a new offence, outlawing sex acts in any public place, where the participants know that people who are not willing observers may be able to see them, regardless of the genders of the participants.

These reforms will only change the law in England and Wales, not Scotland or Northern Ireland.

Stonewall have responded by issuing an urgent plea for men who were placed on the sex offenders register because of convictions under the old ‘gay’ sex offences laws to contact them in confidence.

The organisation is planning to campaign to remove people convicted under the outdated laws from the register. Stonewall urgently needs to talk to people who are currently on the sex offenders register for cautions or convictions under ‘gay’ offences such as gross indecency.

Sacha Deshmukh, Stonewall’s Director of Parliamentary Affairs, said “If the new Sexual Offences Bill passes successfully through Parliament, then several people will be on the sex offenders register even though their actions are no longer illegal. We are particularly keen to talk to people who were involved in incidents where one partner was between 16 and 18, or when both people involved were over 18.

“By drafting new sex offences legislation, the Government has made it clear that it believes the old ‘gay’offences to be outdated and unfair. We believe that people’s lives should no longer be blighted by the stigma of appearing on the sex offenders register when the actions that put them there are no longer criminal. But we won’t be able to campaign without people coming to talk to us, in confidence, with their experiences.”
If you are affected and would be willing to provide details of your experience in complete confidence, please contact Helen Marsh as soon as possible on 020 7881 9440.

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 The Dying Days of Clause 28?

The removal of ‘Section 28’ reached an important stage in mid February when a Commons committee agreed that it should be repealed.

The amendment to the Local Government Bill was tabled by MPs from all three parties, including Edward Davey (Lib Dem), Kali Mountford (Lab) and John Bercow (Cons) and was passed in this morning’s committee meeting, after a surprisingly consensual debate.

Commenting after the debate, the MPs behind the moved expressed “quiet satisfaction” and a hope that all parties were moving towards an agreed solution. Labour MP Kali Mountford argued that “Section 28 has not been used since its introduction. Moreover, school governing bodies are responsible for the sex education curriculum in schools, and children now have extra protection in the Sexual Offences Act 2001. So Section 28 is now well and truly redundant.

Liberal Democrat MP, Edward Davey, said, “It is now gradually dawning on most people across the parties that this measure is not just discriminatory, but also makes the difficult job of teaching even harder.”

Adding a valuable Tory voice to the coalition to abolish the notorious clause, Conservative MP John Bercow said, “This is a clearly expressed backbench and cross party view which we all now hope will be respected by members of the House of Lords.”

The Local Government Bill is expected to have its Report Stage in the Commons in the first half of March and then to proceed to the House of Lords.

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 BiMate: Lisa Lovely

Lisa, introduce yourself in no more than 100 words!
Joined Brighton Bi Group in 1984 and came out. Attended 3rd British Bicon in London in 1985 and has attended every British Bicon since, and quite a few International ones. Provided phone contact from home for Bi women from 1986 before Bi phoneline started and worked with original phoneline group until 1993 when parenthood with full-time work made it too difficult to carry on. Currently more active in poly issues as realises that nonmonogomy has always been as important a part of identity as bisexuality.

Which Olympic sport (current or wished for) could you represent your country in?
Downhill moaning (a Spitting image joke). Actually I’d probably be better at arguing. I’m very competitive but I’m not sure I excel to Olympic standard in anything. I am rather good at Flirting when I’m in the mood.

What’s the best collective noun for bisexuals?
A confusion: Claire Thompson noticed this is a common feeling for bisexuals. When I worked on the bi phoneline I noticed a high percentage of callers named that feeling too.

What’s your favourite film?
I find it hard to pick favourites of anything (another common feeling for bisexuals) but I think my favourit bi film is French Twist. I laughed an awful lot and it rang a few bells.

When did you know you were bisexual?
I spent my first summer at university trying to decide whether or not to phone the Lesbian line after having had my first lesbian relationship the previous year. Then I started going out with a new boyfriend and decided I wasn’t going to give up relationships with men. Shortly afterwards, I came across poster advertising Brighton Bisexual Group…

What’s your favourite sexual memory?
Hard to pick a fave, I’ve recently been remembering two fun sexual memories that happened at Manchester BiCon.

What’s your favourite thing about being bi?
I like being part of a group of people who are very different to each other, but who share a common understanding that bi identity and behaviour are a reality for them and many others.

What’s your favourite sex accessory?
Liquid Silk (the nicest lubricant; feels nice, smells ok and can be found in individual sachets. Looks a bit like come in a nice way!)

Who do you respect most in the world?
For her honesty (about having had her son adopted) and her work – Claire Short. In the Bi world it’s Robyn Ochs. She’s a lovely person, she has made a great committed relationship and she’s done all that work for the community including the international guide.

What/who has inspired you the most?
The peace movement. I was active from 1981 when I was 16. Visiting Greenham Common was an amazing experience which I often reflect on. I did all sorts of things which made a lot of sense at the time and make me the person I am now.

Which historical person would you most like to meet?
Oscar Wilde

What makes you smile?
Observing my baby daughter learning to talk, walk and play.

What is your most unlikely-to-be-fulfilled sexual fantasy?
I remember admitting it at a London Bi Group discussion on sexual fantasies. Lots of people said they had similar fantasies. But I don’t think I want it in print.

What should people try?
Spending time playing with children. One of my bi friends told me she couldn’t bear them, but she let my son ride on her back and was better at playing with him than most people.

What are you most proud/ashamed of?
Leading organising 1991 London bicon, biggest ever UK bicon (possibly only Manchester was bigger) – forgetting to thank Russell for doing the finances in ‘thanks’ speech as I put him in the wrong place in the list.

What about your life would most surprise your 16 year old self?
I have found a primary partner who I can engage in group sex with, and who accepts me having sexual experiences with other people when he’s not involved.

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 “The Hours” A BIASed opinion.

Bias is Shropshire’s bi group and their meeting structure has recently changed to involve weekend social events rather than weekday evening meeting. The first Bias weekend social started as a walk along the river in Shrewsbury in the winter sunshine. It progressed to a pub lunch, then on to a trip to the local cinema to see ‘The Hours’ and concluded (via a few more pubs and a supermarket) in Sonia’s living room where the film was discussed, analysed and generally torn to pieces. Present were Gina, Jenni, Martin and Sonia – whose names conveniently all start with different letters – and the discussion went something along the lines of this:

M: It was certainly based very heavily on Virginia Woolf’s book Mrs Dalloway. Some of the scenes were lifted straight out of it, which was nice. I liked the way the two made contact.
J: Not having read that book, and with the film having bits that were clearly from the book in some ways I wasn’t sure how much of it was based definitely on it.
S: So would it be better if you knew the book beforehand?
M: Often I find if I see a film based on a book I often come away feeling dissatisfied. In this case it was fascinating the way they interwove the stories and the characters and times. That was clever and I think it worked.
S: I found it strange, the way it jumped around from different time periods at the beginning.
G: That kind of thing is what really makes me prick my ears up. It requires concentration
and is more likely to pull me into the story. It certainly happened here.
M: You find yourself working very hard to put together a picture of who these people are and how they fit together.
J: The jumps do get further apart as the film progresses so it’s easier to follow though. It’s just at the beginning it’s a bit full on.
G: By the time it slows down some of the links between the stories are becoming easier to recognise.
J: How about the music? I didn’t notice if it was consistent between the different time periods. Did anyone?
M: There was one point where I wished they’d turn it down, but after I while I realised that it
actually fitted well. The repetitive, oppressive qualities in a lot of ways echoed Virginia Woolf’s life. Were other people aware of the music?
J: It completely passed me by.
G: there was only one point where I really noticed it and that was at a particularly tense point. I don’t cope very well with tension in films and I was aware that the music was really adding to it.
S: I found it really hard to block the music out and concentrate on the film itself because the music was underneath the dialogue a lot. It was one of the most tiring films I’ve seen because of that. I really struggled to hear the dialogue most of the way through.
M: I got the impression subconsciously that the music was almost continuous throughout the film. I’m not sure, I’d like to find out.
J: What about bisexual content? I did notice that in each of the three main time periods there is a same sex kiss. In the two earlier time periods they both happen in front of a child and then the kissers are embarrassed and try to cover it up. In the modern day story the child, well teenager is perfectly relaxed and happy, everyone is out and comfortable with it. From what we know about Virginia Woolf, I think it’s easy to say that we have stories about three bi women over different time frames.
G: Certain elements were really subtle though. I appreciated that. The sexuality of the women was not the main story, it was simply present.
M: It was done very naturally, so at the point where the child is suddenly brought in you realise ‘oh, was something wrong here?’ There is the risk that all these bi characters are seen as seriously fucked up. Well, they are I suppose.
G: Do you think that’s something that the general public would pick up on? Could they blame the fucked up aspects of the characters on their sexuality?
S: I think they might.
M: I would hope that wasn’t the case, but there’s always the danger that people would look for scapegoats. They may see sexuality as the prime suspect. There were certainly no other easy hooks to hang it up on. Actually, now I think about it, there were three characters, one in each time line that were almost out of the thread and suddenly came in and underlined the bisexuality in each timeline.
G: Yeah it was almost as though that was their sole purpose.
J: Really, the film was about not getting involved with a bisexual because they’re all seriously screwed up. A public health warning.
[Various unpublishable comments and laughter.]
G: I find it difficult with any film to say it was about this or that. It was about life. I know that’s really general but it wasn’t about bisexuality. It was themed on bits of Virginia Woolf’s book and on aspects of her life and it simply had bi content too – because her life did.
M: I liked the way it wasn’t all resolved. They didn’t cross every t and dot every i.
J: It does leave things open to interpretation, and depending on how much bisexuality you’re trying to read into it. For example, Laura’s motivations are unclear, whether they are to do with her sexuality or simply the mundanity of her life when faced with the mortality of one of her friends.

Transcript by Gina Roberts

The Hours
Directed by Stephen Daldry, ‘The Hours’ is a film about women and time. It has sometimes been referred to as three films in one as it follows the lives of three women in three different times and alternates between the three story lines with sometimes alarming rapidity. The lives of all three women are strongly influenced by the book “Mrs Dalloway” by Virginia Woolf. With Nicole Kidman, Meryl Streep, and Julianne Moore castas the three main characters and with an equally high quality supporting cast this film was destined to make a mark from the start.

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 How Bisexuals Used To Live

A series reflecting on the ups and downs of the bi movement in the UK. This month, Jo Eadie looks back to the Norwich BiCon in 1992.

One of my friends tells me that she has an abiding memory of me ordering endless portions of beans on toast for my daughter at the canteen at the Norwich bi conference. Perhaps this is what made me make such strident efforts to have a wider range of vegan options at the 1993 conference – including sending vegan cookbooks to the canteen staff. But what I remember about the canteen is the buzz of conversations – I was there with a large contingent from the rather successful Nottingham Bi Group, which we had set up earlier in the year and which was going from strength to strength.

Of course, what you have to remember is that 1992 was a great year to be bisexual. There had been a series of events around the country called ‘Politically Bi’ in which bisexual politics was being hammered into shape (one of which was infiltrated by a News of the World reporter who had his own distinctive take on the event). The previous year had seen the world’s first International Bisexual Conference in Amsterdam – so we felt truly global – and 1992 would see the follow up taking place in London, so it felt as if the UK was well sited on the international bisexual map. (How that conference lived up to those hopes is a tale for another day!). And Bifrost, the national bi newsletter, had been running monthly for just over a year (some sort of a record in bisexual publishing circles).

Bifrost’s clout was such that Norwich was attended by a formidable contingent from the world of lesbian and gay activists eager to seek the advice of the bi community. Bifrost’s editor had phoned up several lesbian and gay phonelines to ask what she should do as a supposedly newly out bisexual, and was given advice such as ‘join the local lesbian group but don’t tell them about your boyfriend’. And the results of this survey had been run as a story in Bifrost prompting Lisa Power and Linda Semple from the London Switchboard to come down to the conference to find out how to do their job properly. Which, make no mistake, we told them.

So it was with all that euphoria pushing us along that we made it down to Norwich, for a seriously packed weekend at the Tenth National Bisexual Conference (that much-contested word ‘Bicon’ had yet to make its first appearance). The University of East Anglia is surreal place – all concrete towers and walkways, feeling like something out of Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange with its resolutely 60s look. And it somehow always felt odd to see that always vibrant breed, the bisexual conference attenders, walking around those drab pebble-dash walls.

Alongside the usual delirious mixed bag of massage workshops, SM for beginners, and pagan rituals (pagans were big in the bisexual community back in the twentieth century), what I remember most was the welcome seriousness of the conference’s gender politics. In the sexually charged atmosphere of a bi conference, men often think they have a license to try it on, and an impressive public role-play set out the limits of what constitutes an innocuous chat-up line, and what will get you thrown out of the conference.

My own contribution was to co-facilitate a workshop on ‘Are Men Oppressed?’, with my friend Simon and I putting quite forcefully the case that they weren’t. At any rate, Simon put the case forcefully: I looked forlornly at a series of incomprehensible keywords written on the back of an envelope. Keywords, I had been told, were guaranteed to spark your memory so that you could deliver eloquent and interesting statements purely by glancing at them. My keywords sparked absolutely nothing. So when we came to the final ‘what have we learnt today’ round, I told everyone that I had learnt I could not speak from keywords written on the back of an envelope(and as if to prove the point, I still write out every lecture that I give in enormous detail).

More successful were two substantial parallel workshops, one for men and one for women, that fed into a mixed plenary which sought to thrash out issues of how to unlearn oppressive behaviours – rather than, as all too often happens, everyone hoping that bisexuality somehow guarantees justice and niceness in and of itself. It’s a commitment to tackling issues of gender inequality and oppression which I think subsequent conferences have yet to match. As so often in the past, issues of gender inequality were focused through questions of the use of women-only spaces by trans women and although resistance to transgender integration remains at bi conferences, in my head this was the last conference
where there was serious resistance to fully integrated spaces.This was also just about the last conference to have a crash space in which conference attenders bedded down for free in their sleeping bags at night. Subsequent stringent policing by fire and safety officers ensured that this never happened again at other venues.

But my abiding memory is that we cornered the market in finding a bisexual stand-up comedian, Bob Boyton, who managed to split the conference in two (with some inevitable fence-sitters). He was too vituperative for many, but my favourite line went something like: what’s the good in David Bowie being bisexual – with teeth like that you wouldn’t want to risk a blow-job from him anyway . The faint-hearted may have felt that the follow up about kicking them all off his face went too far.

To cap it all, The Guardian ran a full-page feature on the conference, presenting it as vibrant, exciting, supportive, and challenging – where the attenders clearly genuinely cared about each other, as well as being at odds on a number of key issues. And it must have been high from that vibrancy that I stood up as a representative of the Nottingham Bi Group when we offered to run the conference for 1993.

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 Bi & Poly: “Plural Loves”

Plural Loves: Designs for Bi and Poly Living
Edited by Serena Anderlini-D’Onofrio (2004)
New York: Harrington Park Press

(Co-published simultaneously as Journal of Bisexuality Volume 4,
Numbers 3/4 2004).
ISBN 1-56023-293-5 (Paperback) ÂŁ17.17

Plural Loves brings together historical, theoretical, literary, fictional, and activist writing in an examination of the common ground between bisexuality and polyamory, with the aim of setting out ‘designs for bi and poly living’ for the new millennium.

According to the editor, the willingness of bi and poly people to experiment with alternative models of social organisation is a key area of common ground between the two communities.

Four contributors to the collection provide discussions of their own lifestyles-unfortunately, three of these contributors are involved in group marriages within the same European tantric community (Komaja), so this section of the book doesn’t even begin to address the diversity of bi and poly lifestyles.

Another area of common ground identified by contributors to this collection is that of spirituality, and several chapters discuss the links between bisexual polyamory and pantheistic spirituality.

Alternative communities, argues the editor, are often linked to pantheistic spirituality and an emphasis on global harmony.  Komaja’s group marriages are also tantric circles, while polyamory on premodern Maui with was linked its pre-colonial polytheism.  While these are interesting points, again there’s a lack of acknowledgement of the complexity and diversity of bi and poly approaches to spirituality.

In two interesting articles on masturbation, Betty Dodson and Eric Francis argue that solo-sex can be seen as a bisexual and polyamorous experience, given that it’s a same sex activity, and that most people are polyamorous in their fantasy lives. They also argue that masturbation can be a spiritual practice, pointing out the role of group masturbation in ancient religious rituals, and arguing that such rituals, which reflect the
increasing interdependence of globalisation, might well constitute ‘the future of sex’.

The representation of bisexuality and polyamory in the arts and the media is another area examined in this collection. Hasan Al-Zubi’s chapter ‘Sweet Dreams’ examines how metaphors of bisexuality and fetishism are employed in two nineteenth century novels, while Wayne M. Bryant discusses the portrayal of polyamorous bisexuality in film since 1968. Sam See, meanwhile, provides a queer reading of three mid-twentieth century British plays.

The strongest contributions to the volume, in my opinion, are those which examine the politics of bisexuality and polyamory.  In a fascinating article on cheating, Pepper Mint discusses how, while monogamy is seen as virtuous, bisexuality and polyamory are often seen as ‘cheating’. Bi and poly people ought to resist being positioned as ‘cheats’, argues Mint, by pointing out that in order to ‘cheat’, you have to be monogamous in the first place.

In a similar vein, Nathan Rambukkana’s contribution discusses the similar coming-out experiences of bi and poly people, who often find themselves stuck between the straight and gay worlds, as well as the pressure on straight polyamorists to identify as bisexual.

There really are some excellent chapters in this
collection, and I’d particularly recommend those by Mint and Rambukkana, but overall Plural Loves makes for a frustrating read.

Firstly, the book is poorly edited – typographical and grammatical errors, plus the occasional clumsy sentence and poor translation, irritate the reader, and, articles on similar topics are scattered throughout the book, making it difficult to follow the line of argument being advanced.  The editor’s own contributions to the book also contain some surprising and distracting elements: for example, she casually remarks, apropos of nothing, that she doesn’t believe HIV is transmitted through sex, but fails to explain this extraordinary statement.

What’s really frustrating about this book, however, is that in their eagerness to establish common ground between bisexuality and polyamory, contributors often confuse the two.  There’s no discussion of the tensions within and between the two communities, such as the debates within bisexuality over non-monogamy, and at times, contributors to the volume are patronisingly dismissive of non-polyamorous bisexuality. Francis, for example, describes monogamous bisexuality as ‘denial…Bisexual means both genders and both genders means more than one person.’ (p.172)

As Rambukkana (p.146) points out, many polyamorous people feel pressured to identify as bisexual. What this book lacks is the acknowledgement that the reverse is also true.

Helen

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 Bi Media: October 2005

Captain Jack Comes Back
For those of you whose lives would not be complete without him, Captain Jack will return to Doctor Who according to The Mirror (August 17th 2005).  Pity they couldn’t decide whether he’s gay or bi though…

“… Davies said he had no qualms about making Jack – who starred in five episodes of the revamped show – the Timelord’s first openly gay companion.

“He said: ‘It wasn’t me sort of dying to get a bisexual character on screen. Yes, I’m a gay writer, but I was thinking: Jack’s from the 51st century so of course he’s going to go out with men and women. To get hung up on it is almost too sad for words, frankly.’ ”

Princess Margaret
The Scottish Daily Record (August 19th 2005) reported Princess Margaret being portrayed as a
bisexual, drug taking nymphomaniac in a new TV drama.  “In one scene, Margaret, played by Lucy Cohu, is seen in a lingering kiss with a female friend. In another, she performs a sex act on her then husband-to-be, Anthony Armstrong-Jones.”

Is it me, or does anyone else find the idea of the royal family as bi poster children slightly disturbing?

Kinsey – The Musical!
We’ve had the book and the film… Now it’s the musical, with some slightly inspired casting as was reported in the Daily News (New York) (August 20th 2005).

“Making his Off-Broadway debut this week will be Christopher Corts, who has interrupted his studies at an evangelical seminary to play a bisexual boy toy in “Dr. Sex,” a musical comedy about Alfred Kinsey.”

BCN in the Metro
Metro ran an article (September 14th 2005) called ‘Ready for a bi-try?’, after the phrase coined by Sophie Theobald’s in Biche.  Although the article seemed to be more concerned about lesbians getting used, it cited the Freudian theory that “…everyone is bisexual but we’re brought up to conform in society.”

To our editor’s delight, BCN got a mention in the “Useful links/websites” section at the end of the article – apparently our usual rate of web hits quadrupled.

Higher Rates of Self Harm among Bisexual Women
As reported in the Law & Health Weekly (August 20th 2005), scientists at the University of Melbourne undertook a study to compare the mental health status of early adult and mid-life women.

“Younger, mainly heterosexual, bisexual, and lesbian women had poorer mental health outcomes than exclusively heterosexual women on all outcome measures except anxiety in lesbian women, even after adjusting for age, region, and education.  Mid-age mainly heterosexual women had poorer mental health on all outcomes except for medically diagnosed anxiety.  Bisexual women had significantly higher odds of self-harm than exclusively heterosexual women,” reported scientists.”

Bi Men Still Don’t Exist
The Guardian (29th August 2005) ran a piece on biology and homosexuality (which was a slightly different version of a piece from the Boston Globe on August 14th), repeating recent research claims that bi men don’t exist.

Quite clearly they ran it then, fearing a deluge of letters as a result of a Disgruntled Letter Writing 101 session at BiCon if it had been published a few days previously…

Bi’s Bash Back in the Pink Paper
In the wake of the research declaring that bi men do not exist, the Pink Paper ran some vox pops (July 21st 2005) – the majority of which were somewhat biphobic, saying bisexuals were “undecided-if-you-are-gay”,  “greedy” and that “…it’s true that bisexuality doesn’t exist”.

However, there were anonymous rebuttal letters a fortnight later and by the 1st September edition, Sarah Beth’s pro-bi slating of the vox pops made it to be the Star Letter and there was also an interview piece with Marcus Morgan talking about Bisexual Underground.

Cat

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