From: orc@vpnet.chi.il.us (david parsons)
Subject: Re: Bisexual idenity and community (was Re: A hug request and ...) 
Organization: Department of Atomic Text Units
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 20:07:29 GMT

In article <C0nMx1.IqD@news.udel.edu> seamus@ravel.udel.edu (James G Dilmore) writes:
[On acceptance in the bi community, among other things]
|>
|Is it that too?  A general acceptance of varying viewpoints.
|trad, hippie, retro, fencesitters and *even* trainspotters (ick:)
|I have found this acceptance in most bisexuals.  Or do I just know
|the right ones?

   Perhaps you've found the right ones.  I've noticed that most of
the bisexuals I know are generally left wing and accepting, but so
are the sci-fi fans I know, and so are the artists and actors I
know.

   There could be a degree of compassion in the bisexual community
coming from what a distressingly large part of the rest of the
world thinks of us - when you're persona non grata, it's easier to
sympathise with and accept the views of other people (barring the
views of the people that wish us dead, of course.)  Some
similarities can (could?) be found in the sci-fi community -
there's a large collection of people who thinks that fen are insane
at best, and so the community has dealt with that by embracing
strangeness. (Of course, the sci-fi community also has a collection
of, umm, conservative nutcases (tm), just like you can find in the
queer community.)

   The more conservative queerfolk out there seem to be a lot more
keen on unobtrusive assimilation, and so will keep a very low
profile so as to not get confused with the more outre people. 
These people, on the other hand, seem to be the ones most keen on
being vocally obnoxious about asserting rights, and letting other
people have their rights, and will be the easiest to find if you're
looking for (pick your group)


|OK let me rephrase.  I don't see it as the only factor in the formation 
|of this community.  I see more commradery to attribute it to just that.  
|Maybe I am making things up inside my head (never again - Anyone know the
|group?).

   Friendship has a lot to do with in.  The initial motivation,
though, will be the one common ground, and from there you can
decide whether or not you wish to continue to know these people.
(it gets complicated: my initial association with the UofC bi group
happened pretty much only because I knew they were bi (and, given
my disassociation from the queer community in chicago, my main source
of info I had about the bisexual community here was the Net) and
accessable.  Ditto for soc.bi; aside from drooling over the writing
style of some of the posters here <insert *evil* orcish grin> from
before the formation of the group, my main interest in starting to
read the group was just to see what a bispace was like.  Of course,
now that I know <in whatever sense of the word you'd like ;-)> a
moderately large subset of the people here, I stick around, even
when the place is half-buried in fluff...


|I think this is part of it though.  But that is
|a negative definition (in terms of a negative).  I think that it is
|more of a positive definition which I find here on soc.bi.  What then is
|this centered around?


   hugs and flirting.  It's in the charter ;-)



|>|Now to the fluff.
|[e-invitation, with request for detail, and other blatant flirting]
|>
|Understood.  But hey a guy can flirt can't he.

   (see above ;-)

|And when you issue me a
|challenge like that I cannot refuse.  :)  Seriously Alles klar.  I
|understand where you are coming from in the other thread.

   Challenge?  Oh, no, e-sluts don't challenge; they either sit
around and look innocent or subtly make passes (I've found a good
subtle approach is "I'd like to have sex with you")


|>   So, are you gonna post details?  Or will we have to make things
|>up, and (smiling lazily) post them for you?
|>
|"The only thing worse than being talked about 
|is not being talked about." Oscar Wilde.

   Yes, but after you left the tapioca pits with X and V, my
sources weren't able to follow, being <ahem> distracted.  That's
the problem of a volunteer organization; you just can't send them
to orgies without having them stop work for the evening.


|BTW, this has nothing to do with Zoe's post.  I know that story too
|but as she my lips are sealed.

   That's okay, I'm sure that the full story of that interlude will
be coming (so to speak) back to slander central sooner or later.


|I won't say much, but I will quote one of the participants.
|"Look over there.  That's my girlfriend making out with two of my
|good friends."
|:)
|I was a friend.  :)

   This is unusual?  Doesn't this happen on a regular interval to
everybody?


|Jim "who needs e I'm just a slut" Dilmore.

    Hee.  After last year, where each and every one of my, ahem,
interludes (modesty forbids me saying just how many there were)
were made possible by the net, I will persist in giving credit
where credit is due.   Never underestimate the power of the net,
and what the proper use of it is ("Arranging one's love-life")

                ____
  david parsons \bi/ "Not half the slut I want to be, but probably more
                 \/   than I can afford to be :-)"