Organization: Queen's University at Kingston
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 16:56:46 EST
From: Graydon <SAUNDRSG@QUCDN.QueensU.CA>
Newsgroups: soc.bi
Subject: Re: Understanding
 <MUFFY.92Dec22111050@remarque.berkeley.edu>
 <92359.003759SAUNDRSG@QUCDN.QueensU.CA> <1hbkouINNo76@agate.berkeley.edu>
 <MUFFY.92Dec23234918@remarque.berkeley.edu>

In article <MUFFY.92Dec23234918@remarque.berkeley.edu>,
muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu (Muffy Barkocy) says:
>In article <1hbkouINNo76@agate.berkeley.edu> mlloyd@ocf.berkeley.edu (M.
>Lloyd)
>writes:
>>Graydon <SAUNDRSG@QUCDN.QueensU.CA> writes:
>>>And, Muffy, why *do* you regard yourself as bi, rather than say, as
>>>a person with catholic tastes in sex partners?  (honestly curious).
>
>>*splutter*  OK, I'm not Muffy (I can't wear that black stretchy
>>non-dress *nearly* as well as she can), but *splutter* all the same.
>>I
>>have no idea what that question is supposed to mean.  I, for one, would
>>happily respond "I'm both".
>
>I feel pretty much the same way as Mike, here.  I don't think I
>understand the question.  However, I wouldn't really say that I'm
>"both".  I don't care about the sex of my partners; in our society, that
>is called "bisexual," so that's the word I'm using.  "Catholic" suggests
>more of a lack of discrimination, or, that I like *everything* in my sex
>partners.  That is certainly not the case.  I like them to be
>intelligent, I like them to be feminists (*grin*), I have all sorts of
>preferences, and all sorts of dislikes.  I'm "catholic" only in the
>matter of gender, and that is not even certain, as I do not know that I
>have met or like all the possible genders, whatever they may be.
>
>To answer your question more simply, I do not have interest in all
>people as lovers, so "catholic" is inappropriate.
>
>So, how about you, Graydon?  Are you bisexual?  Catholic in your tastes
>in sex partners?  Or what?  And why?
>
>Muffy
>--
>
>Muffy Barkocy                      | ~Can you tell me how much bleeding/it
>muffy@mica.berkeley.edu            |  takes to fill a word with meaning and/
>"amorous inclinations"? Aha! I'm   |  how much how much death it takes/to give
>not "not straight," I'm *inclined*.|  a slogan breath?~ - Bruce Cockburn

I probably didn't edit that enough, but I've figured out how to get
around the mailer's wired in netiquette, so who cares...

I'm probably not someone you'd regard as bi; I can imagine sex with
men, there are a couple of very good male friends it has occured to
me to wonder what sex would be like with, but other than that I'm
sexually attracted to women.  (Ideally, tall, slender, pale women
who delight in life, are suffused with fierceness, and have souls
like swordblades.)   *Emotional* attraction seems gender neutral.

What I was trying to get at was what you mean by 'bi' - I have a
lot of trouble believing that everyone uses the word the same way.
Wasn't meaning to imply lack of discrimination with 'catholic' -
maybe I should have said something like 'plumbing not a significant
element of criteria'?

I am purely confused as to wether or not plumbing, per se, is an
important element in the attractiveness criteria I'm using; I have
much less in the way of aesthetic criteria for men than for women,
but I'm not clear on how plumbing related that is.

If you wanted to argue that I'm using a gender biased aesthetic I'd
tend to agree; what maybe I'm asking is what saying you're 'bi'
is intended to communicate about your aesthetic.

(A question which may well be grounds to send me to the bit bucket
as a clueless het-boy... :)

Graydon
Newsgroups: soc.bi