Bisexual

 is an m-spec sexual orientation.

Alternate Names

 * Bi

Etymology
The Greek prefix bi- means "two," sometimes interpreted to refer to "two genders," as bisexual individuals are attracted to two or more genders.

Definitions

 * Bisexual is a broad and inclusive term that describes physical attraction, romantic attraction, or sexual behavior that is not limited to one sex. - bi.org, 2022

History
Throughout ancient history, bisexuality has been well documented. Ancient Japan and China have prints depicting relationships in complex detail, including same-sex relations. In Japan, they were called shunga. Ancient Greece is considered to have been accepting of LGBTQ+ individuals and have records of men and women having relations with other men and women.

The first use of the word "bisexual" to refer to human sexuality was in Krafft-Ebing's work that American neurologist Charles Gilbert Chaddock translated into English as Psychopathia Sexualis: a Medico-Legal Study. The work was a pathologisation of sexuality and considered homosexual a mental illness, 'bisexual' was used to refer to those who were both heterosexual and homosexual. Prior to this, the word "bisexual" was used in reference to intersex plants.

In 1948, Alfred C. Kinsey, an American biologist who was bisexual, published two books on the topic of sexuality named Sexual Behavior in the Human Male and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female. He formulated a scale, which went from 0-6 with 0 meaning exclusively heterosexual and 6 being exclusively homosexual.

Statistics
According to Gallup, 4.0% of adults in the U.S. identify as bisexual in a study in 2022 to follow up their previous study done in 2012. The numbers of openly LGBTQ+ individuals increase throughout time, and it is possible for the number get higher with each passing study.

In GLAAD's "We Are On TV" report from 2022, there was a total of 95 regular LGBTQ+ characters, as well as 46 LGBTQ+ recurring characters, across Amazon, Hulu and Netflix in 2020-21, 28% of these being bisexual characters. 65 women, 33 men, and one non-binary character were the ones included.

Controversy
Many have argued that bisexuality is transphobic and excludes non-binary individuals, but that is not the case. The bisexual manifesto, Anything That Moves: Beyond the Myths of Bisexuality, states that there are more then two genders and bisexuality is not exclusive to the attraction to the binary.

Perceptions and Discrimination
Bisexual individuals are considered the "invisible majority" of the LGBTQ+ community. There is a large amount of erasure of bisexual and bisexual individuals throughout history.

A 2013 CDC report round that 61% of bisexual women and 37% of bisexual men reported experiencing rape, physical violence, and/or stalking by an intimate partner at some point in their lifetime. Another study of bias against bisexual individuals revealed that 14% of Americans felt that bisexuality was not a legitimate sexual orientation.

Subsets

 * Bifluid (Sexuality)
 * Biflux
 * Bifluix
 * Squirrel Bi