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June 28, 2012 - So I alluded to my disappointment with the representation of most bisexual characters in media in my June 19th comic and blog. This comic attempts to explore the idea in a bit more depth.
Like most sexual identities that deviate from the societally accepted monogamous heterosexuality, bisexuality faces a lot of prejudice. Because of its open attitudes to forming romantic relationships with both genders, there seems to be a tendency to categorize bisexual individuals as overtly sexual as they theoretically have a larger number of sexual partners to choose from and the differences between the genders is viewed as so extreme, they'd logically miss one if they ever settled down with one partner. Once a bisexual person does settle down, there's also a tendency to categorize that person as "picking a team" (I love Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but it annoys me immensely that they decided to make Willow specifically lesbian instead of bisexual, negating most of the romantic feelings she expressed towards Oz before meeting Tara), as if the most important quality of a person is a gender and not the other elements of his or her character a bisexual person became attracted to.
I don't believe physical attraction to the opposite gender completely disappears when a bisexual person settles down with someone else. Maybe some part of him or her does miss the experiences he or she could have with the opposite gender, but the relationship he or she has formed with one individual becomes so strong that he or she doesn't consider taking actions that could hurt his or her partner.
Sex is a very emotional experience. It involves opening oneself up to another person and trusting one's partner's respect for the intimacy of that moment. Star doesn't care about the physical act, she cares about the intimacy (or at least finding someone to fake it with). What hurt her the most about her relationship with Steve was that he shared this intimacy with someone else without her knowledge. She wanted that moment to just belong to her and Steve.
No one likes being hurt, and Star will probably never admit how much Steve hurt her. She hates to look weak, and to a certain extent I try to present her as constantly projecting a heartless attitude as a defense mechanism against getting hurt. I'm not necessarily saying there's necessarily a heart behind those walls she's built around herself. Seriously if there is one, it's buried pretty deep. But despite what claims Star may make to the contrary, I've never really felt the idea of being bisexual to be a particularly liberating sexual identity. From a pessimistic perspective, the more people you open yourself up to or find yourself with the potential to open yourself up to, the more opportunities you create for all those people to hurt you, which to me makes a lot more sense as to how to approach writing a bisexual character rather than have them galavant about having all kinds of sexual adventures.
-D
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