Sunday, March 14, 2010

Pseudo-Bi Boyfriend?

I'm a gay man in his twenties. My boyfriend and I have been together for about 8 months. He says he is bisexual, but he also says that he is much, much more attracted to men than to women. On the other hand, when we are in a gay bar and he sees an attractive woman he will make remarks to me about how hot she is. It doesn't bother me -- or maybe it does -- because it always seems that he's putting on an act. Would you say he's gay or bi? D

I think you've answered your own question. It's my belief [although I know others disagree] that if a person is overwhelmingly attracted to their own sex and only just a smidgen attracted to the opposite sex, then they are gay, not bi.

It's interesting that you've picked up that your guy may be putting on an act when he acts all "bi" in a gay bar. It seems to me that a genuinely bisexual guy wouldn't have to put on an act or childishly talk about how "hot" some gal was -- in a gay bar with his lover no less.

Some guys just have a need to keep some kind of "attachment" to the straight world. Once they come out as totally gay, they feel, there's no going back. He may also do it because he thinks it annoys you. In other words, he has issues. Some gay men identify as bi out of internalized homophobia, a failure to completely accept that they are gay and that it's okay to be gay. Maybe he has a need to feel "superior" or butcher" or have a more "macho" image, and this is what the "I Like and Fuck Women" attitude provides.

Give him a year or two. He may realize that he's just as gay as you are -- and like it!