independent.co.uk
I’ve been asked to stop kissing my girlfriend in gay bars on several occasions. From the outside my girlfriend and I kissing is seen as ‘straight’ therefore we are seen as invading gay people’s safe space
It’s no surprise that so few bisexual men are out of the closet. Whilst many groups celebrated Pride this year with big support and high visibility, bisexuals had to fight hard just to get a spot on the London Pride Parade with organisers putting the inclusion of big businesses such as Skittles ahead of ensuring all subgroups of the LGBTQ+ community were represented.
As Organisers blamed bisexual groups for not applying before the deadline (which closed early) rather than taking the responsibility to ensure bisexuals were represented at their event. Sadly, after the parade, there were reports on Twitter that the cheering stopped as the bisexual group walked past.
a bisexual man, I know the reality of bi invisibility all too well. Despite living in London, I have never knowingly been in a room with even ten other bisexual men around my age. Both gay and straight people have spent their time trying to convince me that I must really be gay. Whilst many believe the LGBT community are there to support one another, the majority of negativity towards bisexuals I’ve experienced has been at the hands of gay men. A study by the Journal of Bisexuality suggested that bisexual people face just as much discrimination within the LGBT community as they do from straight people. Similarly, the Equality Network found the highest amounts of biphobia experienced are within LGBT and NHS services.
Bisexual exclusion comes in many forms, one of the most shocking was the finding that in 2014, only 0.3 per cent of grants aimed at LGBT issues went toward the bisexual community. The issue of how LGBT groups divide their funding between the subgroups is something rarely looked at in the UK. However, the fact that bisexual men have received significantly less support and funding than other subgroups such as gay men is undeniable. The British Sociological Association has found that bisexual men in the United Kingdom are at the bottom of the wage scale, earning 30 per cent less than gay colleagues and perhaps linked, the Workplace Equality Index 2010 by Stonewall found bisexual employees are eight times more likely to be in the closet at work compared to lesbian and gay counterparts. Outside of the work place, mental health suffers too with the Office of National Statistics just recently finding that bisexual people have a lower amount of overall life satisfaction and feel less worthwhile than straight, gay and lesbian people. With minimal funding and biphobia rife in LGBT circles this is unlikely to change.