Oh, and while we're on the subject of bisexuality...
The splashy results of a study conducted at Northwestern University in Illinois and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto made the newspapers last week. Researchers recruited 101 men—38 guys who said they were homos, 33 guys who said they were bi, and 30 guys who said they were straight—and showed them porn in attempt to answer that age-old question: Are bi guys all liars? The guys' dicks were wired up, they were shown girl-on-girl porn and boy-on-boy porn, and their arousal levels were measured.
"Three quarters of the [bisexual] group had arousal patterns identical to those of gay men," the New York Times reported. "The rest were indistinguishable from heterosexuals." In English: 75 percent of the bi guys only got aroused watching boys; the other 25 percent of the bi guys only got aroused watching girls. None responded equally to images of men and women.
So what does it all mean?
"We couldn't find a bisexual arousal pattern," Gerulf Rieger, the study's lead author, told me. "The conclusion that I draw is that most of the men who identify as bisexual behave like gay men in their arousal patterns. Does that mean [75 percent of bisexual guys] are truly gay? I can't say. But it could mean they are confused about their sexual orientation."
That some men who ultimately identify as gay claim to be bisexual for a time is a well established fact, so it's entirely possible that the 75 percent of the bisexuals whose dicks were wired up in Rieger's study are on their way to embracing their big, gay selves. But what, I wonder, is up with the 25 percent of bisexual guys in the study who responded to the girl-on-girl porn but not the boy-on-boy porn? There's no such thing as a closeted straight guy, so what exactly is up with them?
"They might be straight," Rieger speculated, "but go in for sex with other guys because it's so much easier for a male to have quick sex with another male than with a woman. But their true sexual feelings are still for women."
Needless to say, Rieger's study has kicked off a shitstorm. The study was co-authored by Dr. J. Michael Bailey, a professor of psychology at Northwestern University and the author of The Man Who Would Be Queen: The Science of Gender-Bending and Transsexualism, a book many homos feel is deeply homo- and trans-phobic. John Aravosis has been kicking the shit out of Bailey, and the study, on his influential blog, AMERICAblog.org.
Rieger, however, rejects the notion that Bailey hates homos. "It's very hard for me to be subjective when I hear that criticism," said Rieger. "I'm very fond of Michael Bailey. I'm his grad student and I'm gay. He is not homophobic."
Bailey's myriad issues aside, I don't think the study can be dismissed out of hand. At the very least it jibes with, er, field observations I've made of male bisexuals. The sad fact is that male bisexuality is rare, much more so than female bisexuality. While there are a lot of guys out there having bisexual experiences—probably more than ever, God bless them—there's a difference between someone's true sexual orientation and their sexual capabilities. A lot of guys like STUD—predominantly straight guys who enjoy messing around with other guys—will tell you they're bi. But these nominally bisexual men are not emotionally available to other men—in other words, these guys may have sex with other guys, but, like STUD, they only have relationships with women. Which is why dating bi guys isn't something most gay men are willing to do. Even if the bi guy you're dating is single, you're still just his piece on the side.
Comments, anyone?
The G-man says: You are GOOD
r3x29yz4a is my hero!
rex says I'm a commie, asshole, fag!
