Pansexuality is a stupid label

[FuzzyBlueElf]

Ok. So here's my problem with "pansexuality." As most people identify it, pansexuality is a natural sexual attraction to personalities and not physical sex. Let me ask you pansexuals something, why do you assume that bisexuals are naturally attracted to physical sex? Bisexuality is simply a sexual attraction to both men and women.

By calling yourselves pansexuals, instead of bisexuals, what you're doing is actually propogating the belief that bisexuals are slutty people who have an abnormal sexual need to be with people of both sexes.

Can someone please tell me why it is so very important for you to segregate and label yourself as something other than bisexual? Because I honestly don't see the need for it.

The only one I can maybe see is if you want to specifically express that you are okay with dating hermaphrodites and transexuals.

Ok. Go.

[CherokeeAlex]

I was under the impression that pansexuality meant you had no problem dating transgendered people as well as "normal" males and females. It's meant more as you don't care what parts they have or which ones they were born with than that you like to screw around. Granted I'm straight so I could be completely wrong on this, I don't really know anything personally about pansexuality.

[FuzzyBlueElf]

CherokeeAlex

I was under the impression that pansexuality meant you had no problem dating transgendered people as well as "normal" males and females. It's meant more as you don't care what parts they have or which ones they were born with than that you like to screw around. Granted I'm straight so I could be completely wrong on this, I don't really know anything personally about pansexuality.

Well, thanks for trying to offer insight, but I know a lot of pansexual people who tell me that they don't think they could date hermaphrodite or transexual people. Which is why I made this thread.

[Epistemic]

Well, I know wikipedia isn't the greatest of sources, but it cites pansexuality as being attracted to any person regardless of gender identity or biological sex. I've never really researched this before, but I suppose it's a pretty interesting concept.

Perhaps those who would exclude transexuals should keep the bisexual label, and those who don't should use the pansexual label.

Bisexual infers that there is only two. Bi. You have a choice between one or the other. So I suppose if you are against the gender divide, you would class yourself as a pansexual as opposed to a bisexual.

[Kroxmnela]

Epistemic

Well, I know wikipedia isn't the greatest of sources, but it cites pansexuality as being attracted to any person regardless of gender identity or biological sex. I've never really researched this before, but I suppose it's a pretty interesting concept.

Perhaps those who would exclude transexuals should keep the bisexual label, and those who don't should use the pansexual label.

Bisexual infers that there is only two. Bi. You have a choice between one or the other. So I suppose if you are against the gender divide, you would class yourself as a pansexual as opposed to a bisexual.

This. Very much so.

While my girlfriend considers herself bisexual, I would classify her as pansexual simply because she's totally cool with my transsexual status. She loves me for who I am and my sex and gender have no effect on that affection. If she did make the effort to ask me not to transition, I would call her bisexual.

Bisexuals are generally more limited to the two sexes, excluding all other options out there, and those that happen to be transitioning between them. They focus specifically on male and female. Not genetalia and the like, but more the different genders, I think. Example: Even for a male, I am more feminine in some areas, but fit the male gender more accurately. But my girlfriend is also able to take interest in the female opposite.

[FuzzyBlueElf]

I don't really know that the above is true though... I don't believe in a significant gender divide. But I'm still attracted to men physically. So, would I be a pan-homo-sexual?

I don't know. I mean, I wasn't really aware that anything more than bisexual was needed because sexuality is specifically meant to be geared toward physiology. Isn't pansexuality more of a philosophy? And if so, shouldn't it be called something else? Like X-gender? Therefore, I would be an x-gender minded homosexual?

[Corrupted Coco]

FuzzyBlueElf

I don't really know that the above is true though... I don't believe in a significant gender divide. But I'm still attracted to men physically. So, would I be a pan-homo-sexual?

I don't know. I mean, I wasn't really aware that anything more than bisexual was needed because sexuality is specifically meant to be geared toward physiology. Isn't pansexuality more of a philosophy? And if so, shouldn't it be called something else? Like X-gender? Therefore, I would be an x-gender minded homosexual?

It's not just transsexual persons either, there are also those who are neither or both genders. In the complicated realm of sexuality, the set labels don't really help much. For instance, my boyfriend sees himself as being mostly straight, but still finds me attractive: a pre-op, pre-hormone transsexual woman. What label would you give that? None of them really tags what he is effectively.

[Kroxmnela]

Like Corrupted Coco said, the current labels really aren't good for classifying people. And I agree that pansexuality isn't as much a sexuality as it is a philosophy, but it's there anyways, to help people start clearing things up. It'll still take a long time yet before we either don't need the labels or actually have a set that fits. The same holds for the genders. There are stereotypes as a whole, for what's typically expected, but they get mixed with most people and are very restrictive for those who actually try to fit them. It's a lot more complicated than the labels make it seem.

[FuzzyBlueElf]

Yeah, it is complicated, but labels are there to simplify things so that your brain can handle ideas more efficiently. That's why humans categorize things the way they do (thank you neuroscientist professor lol). It just seems that the more complicated labels get, the less they work at what they're supposed to do.

I would call someone who was attracted to a pre-op pre-hormone transexual woman either straight, or gay. Depending on whether he was into the personality or the body. If he's attracted to the part that is a woman, he's straight. If he's attracted to the part that's a man, well, then he's probably gay (or maybe bi). I don't know. I mean, I think labels should be self-ascribed, but creating new labels when they aren't even defined properly seems to make things even more confusing instead of simplified.

I mean, if pansexuality meant the same thing to everyone, it would be much more useable, but I don't think it does. So what does it say when you say you're pansexual? Not much to me besides "I am sexual with a variety of people, probably more than bisexuals though that may not be true."

[disastrous MISHAP]

There's honestly a label or word for just about everything nowadays. Some people are more attracted to other's personalities, yes. Some people have certain preferences that could be deemed as insane. It's just a label that people put onto themselves because they feel that they can identify with others of that particular label.
I knew a pansexual once that liked men, women, and animals.. Wouldn't that make them more of a tri-sexual of some sort?

[x__Death-Of-Glitter__x]

I think it's a perfectly valid thing for people to identigy as.
Like other people have said, pansexuals can be attracted to all genders, rather than both genders. The only thing it assumes about bisexuals, is that they can only be attracted to two genders.

I suppose it usually applies to people attracted to males and females, but this just got my thinking. If someone is attracted to one of the more commonly recognised genders (males or females) as well as being attracted to...say...transexuals, with no attraction to any other genders, does that make them bisexual? Seing as there are two genders they're capable of being sexually attracted to?

[Lilyrox227]

Morkael

Epistemic

Well, I know wikipedia isn't the greatest of sources, but it cites pansexuality as being attracted to any person regardless of gender identity or biological sex. I've never really researched this before, but I suppose it's a pretty interesting concept.

Perhaps those who would exclude transexuals should keep the bisexual label, and those who don't should use the pansexual label.

Bisexual infers that there is only two. Bi. You have a choice between one or the other. So I suppose if you are against the gender divide, you would class yourself as a pansexual as opposed to a bisexual.

This. Very much so.

While my girlfriend considers herself bisexual, I would classify her as pansexual simply because she's totally cool with my transsexual status. She loves me for who I am and my sex and gender have no effect on that affection. If she did make the effort to ask me not to transition, I would call her bisexual.

Bisexuals are generally more limited to the two sexes, excluding all other options out there, and those that happen to be transitioning between them. They focus specifically on male and female. Not genetalia and the like, but more the different genders, I think. Example: Even for a male, I am more feminine in some areas, but fit the male gender more accurately. But my girlfriend is also able to take interest in the female opposite.

okay first i need to ask
where did you get that cute blue chicken duck thing!?! its so cute!!!
but anyways i think bi means that you are physcally attracted to both people but pansexual is where its just the personallty
but idk im straight so i was just kinda guessing or well giving my opinon

[La Veuve Zin]

I was just thinking of reviving my thread in which I pretty much stated the same thing. 3nodding

I'll just restate what I said in the ED thread: the sex, not the gender, of people to whom you're attracted determine your sexual orientation. You can either have just X chromosomes, or X and Y. At most, you're either male or female or somewhere in between. You can pretend you're outside the gender binary, but no one is outside the sex binary. Someone may be intersexed, or transgendered, or what have you, but they do not have a Z chromosome or a W chromosome.

If sexual orientation were determined by gender instead of sex, then guys who liked tomboyish girls would be gay.

Two options for a person's sex means you're either asexual, monosexual, or bisexual.

Stop making up terms to pretend you're a special snowflake.

[FuzzyBlueElf]

La Veuve Zin

I was just thinking of reviving my thread in which I pretty much stated the same thing. 3nodding

I'll just restate what I said in the ED thread: the sex, not the gender, of people to whom you're attracted determine your sexual orientation. You can either have just X chromosomes, or X and Y. At most, you're either male or female or somewhere in between. You can pretend you're outside the gender binary, but no one is outside the sex binary. Someone may be intersexed, or transgendered, or what have you, but they do not have a Z chromosome or a W chromosome.

If sexual orientation were determined by gender instead of sex, then guys who liked tomboyish girls would be gay.

Two options for a person's sex means you're either asexual, monosexual, or bisexual.

Stop making up terms to pretend you're a special snowflake.

Thanks la Veueve. I was wondering if anyone else had a similar issue with the term.

I will say that there are arguments that biological sex is just as socially constructed as gender, which I could explain, but none of the pansexuals I've talked to even know about that argument.

But really, if pansexuality is just a label to identify that you don't believe in a binary gender system, then can't you identify yourself as "insert sexuality here" and bring up that aspect in a discussion? It seems to me that people want to have this discussion anyway, so why not let it be a discussion instead of a label?

And to one of the above posters, I wouldn't qualify transexual as a gender in and of itself either. That's why there is the FTM and MTF labels.

I've heard of third gender politics and philosophy but I really have a feeling that not many pansexual labelers have.

And if you like animals, that is also NOT a gender. That's a species differentiation, and that needs to be made clear. There is no willing consent on the part of animals as well as children. I don't like the idea of this vague "pansexual" label that can include anything under the sun. Children can also not give consent, and I'm starting to get a little paranoid that ***** is going to be lumped into this discussion. :/

[Epistemic]

FuzzyBlueElf

Yeah, it is complicated, but labels are there to simplify things so that your brain can handle ideas more efficiently. That's why humans categorize things the way they do

It is not a universal to divide into two genders. There are a few cultures that either still do or used to recognize a third gender. In some cases, those in the third gender were seen as being endowed with special powers in the tribes. There are actually...5? I think different gender sets in the human genome. We do actually divide them up and label them. XX=female XY=male and the rest are considered in western culture to be syndromes or disorders. We're not very friendly to the others, we call them a mutation basically.

Either way, that's still not even taking into consideration gender identity "disorders" (there's that word again) or cross-dressing, etc. There's a huge amount of variation in human gender and sexuality. We just lump it into male/female, and refer to the other categories as either non-existent or "disordered".
~Tanek