There’s this thing that happens sometimes, where you’re clicking through the news, or through the Google alerts you masochistically set up to alert you to any time that someone says “bisexual” in the media, and you see a headline like:
Comedian Fern Brady: ‘Bloody everyone says they are bisexual now’
It is natural, I think, to assume that that Guardian piece is going to be an oped where Comedian Fern Brady shares her opinions (good or bad) about bisexuality, or maybe an interview with her that’s about coming out or hating queers or, you know, just something that is predominantly about The Bisexuals™️. And so it is strange, then, to click through and discover that what the piece actually is is a little “how’s things with you” type of interview that’s a promo for Brady’s new book, and that the sole mention of bisexuality is this one exchange:
You came out as bisexual on the BBC’s Live at the Apollo in 2018. Did that feel like a monumental thing to do?
Not so much now because bloody everyone says they are. I was bisexual back when it was still gross and embarrassing.
Indeed, the piece has far more mentions and substantive discussion of Brady’s autism than her bisexuality. And yet! It is bisexuality, and not autism, that manages to make the headlines.
And, look, I’ve made a living in the media for something like fifteen years*. I spent a number of years writing blog posts**. I understand how the sausage is made, I understand that headlines don’t always reflect the piece. I understand that the headline is about getting someone to click — and in getting me to click, the editors over at The Guardian succeeded at their jobs.
But I think it is also pretty fair to point out that there is something kind of gross about bisexuality — about my sexuality — being seen as the most interesting, most essential aspect of an interview that has almost nothing to do with it. There are plenty of clickbaity things to lift from the interview with Brady. Certainly, some of what she says about her autism seems perfectly designed for a headline that will get some mice amovin’ — and yet it is still this one largely inconsequential (and let’s be serious: pretty gross and rude, especially out of context) line that manages to be the headline to the piece.
I’ve been thinking more these days about my relationship to attention, and what I do and don’t want as a middle-aged lady who’s been online for over half her life, especially as social media, uh, has rapidly devolved into a flaming, shit-filled trash can. And where I ultimately land is that while I’m not opposed to attention (I’m writing this newsletter, after all), I want it to serve a purpose. That frantic “but I’m building my brand!” pursuit of attention at all costs that so many of us have been taught to value just feels so hollow to me now, which is why my primary use of social media at the moment is practicing my Hebrew on Bluesky***.
And — because I promise you that that paragraph was not randomly lifted from a completely different essay, this is not The B+ Squad by ChatGPT — that is basically how I feel about bisexuality. If we’re going to talk about it, I want it to meansomething. The thing that unites all the essays and articles and videos that make me so tired is that they’re just empty chatter, just bisexuality brought up because it’s viewed as sensational, just the B word dropped into the convo to make sure everyone’s awake and paying attention.
It is, I think, analogous to that hoary trope of the two girls kissing to get the boys’ attention — except unlike that behavior, this actually hurts bisexuals. (The girls are just doing whatever the fuck they want and that is fine.) Because it repeatedly reinforces this idea that bisexuality is shocking enough to warrant top billing even when there’s nothing else to say, that bisexuality doesn’t warrant any substantive conversation, just shock and awe.
I’m trying to push back on it, obviously. Hopefully it’s working, but it’s a slog. We probably can’t change the media — certainly not on a mass scale, especially not while that industry, too, is circling the drain while also somehow being on fire — but at least we can have these meaningful conversations between ourselves. That’s not nothing, I think.
* Ugh
** Double ugh
*** .אני רצינית! קשה לי אבל גם כיף? אם אתם רוצים למצוא אותי, אני פה.
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