#pan even

Hi lovely!!! This took me a minute to write and meditate on because I wanted to express it right.

Okay, so bisexuality is described as “sexually attracted to both men and women”. Pansexuality is described as “not limited in sexual choice with regard to biological sex, gender, or gender identity”. Meaning, bisexual people feel attraction to both men and women, while pansexuality is more of the idea that you are also attracted to people who don’t identify as either female or male. I can’t personally speak for bisexual people, because I am pansexual, but the reason I ID as pan is because I think it better represents who I am attracted to. I am attracted to men and women, but I’ve also been attracted to genderfluid or nonbinary people who don’t identify as either a man or a woman. That’s not to say a bisexual person couldn’t be attracted to NB/genderfluid/gender non-conforming people/etc., it’s just that I personally think I’m attracted to more than only men and women :) To add onto this while I’m at it, there is a lot of stigma against both sexualities because “can’t we just pick one” etc. and if you are pan or bi, don’t listen to it!!! Pansexuality and bisexuality are real and valid. We are not just “selfish”, and we’re not gay when we’re dating the same gender and we’re not straight when we’re dating the opposite gender. We are an entire community, a separate entity, and we are valid. I have seen a lot of posts saying that people ID as pan and not bi because “pan implies that there’s more than just 2 gender identities”, and that sends a wrong message that bisexual people don’t believe that there are more than two genders. Do not believe it. I have also seen a lot of posts saying that pansexual people are “transphobic” because we’re invalidating trans people by thinking of them as not real men or women. This is NOT TRUE. Trans people are whatever gender they feel that they are, and that’s that. Trans men are men and trans women are women if they ID that way. Non binary and gender fluid and every other gender ID is whatever gender that they feel they are, and that’s that. BUT, given that not everyone identifies as man/woman, pansexual is the idea that you could be attracted to those people as well. Some describe it as “falling in love without caring about what their gender is”, that’s kinda true, but it again sends a negative message about bisexuals, as if they don’t or can’t like people who ID as something other than male or female. This isn’t true. Don’t believe it.