Bisexuality has always been a fairly controversial word in modern media; the ‘B’ word of modern television. It is never used, used for a bit of sexy spice, or forced out in the 56th season of a show – Brooklyn 99, I’m looking at you. Most people don’t see media as being that impactful when in our digital world, media is everything. Media shapes the world around us. Art imitates life, life imitates art, and the media’s portrayal of the bisexual isn’t always the nicest.
Never Saying the ‘B’ Word
There is something about the word ‘bisexual’ that television hates. Characters can go through seasons upon seasons of TV, jumping through different relationships, sexual encounters, and such, with people of all genders and still, the word bisexual is simply never mentioned.
My first interaction with the lack of the ‘B’ word was in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. For the 90s and early 2000s, this show did have pretty good LGBTQ+ representation. However, we never hear the word ‘bisexual’. Some would argue that Willow (Alyson Hannigan) goes from a straight girl to a lesbian in a matter of one season. However, this is not entirely true, rather, Willow is an example of another otherwise forgotten demographic. To me, she represents the suppressed lesbian living through the 1990s comp-het. I actually applaud Buffy for this portrayal – lesbian Willow is canon, and I love that.
On the other side, we have a show like Doctor Who, a show that seems to adore bisexuality. With Captain Jack, River Song, and of course, Clara Oswald all being played for laughs throughout the earlier seasons of the revival of the show. The writers of Doctor Who love the aesthetic of the queer, yet they seem to hate any real commitment to it. You need only look as far as last season when they queerbaited the relationship between Yas and 13.
Poor Clara Oswald is the worst contender for this – she is confirmed to have made out with Jane Austen. The Oswin version of Clara from the future – look, this show is confusing – is confirmed to have had a crush on at least one woman. Clara flirts with women relentlessly, and yet, the word “bisexual” is never uttered on screen at all. Doctor Who has a sort of paradoxical treatment of the bisexual person. On the one hand, they want the bisexual character to bring in the younger and queer audiences; on the other, they don’t want to alienate the older conservative viewers. So, we are given a half-hearted compromise.
The real-world consequences of this are seen nearly every day. If you’re a bisexual woman, you’re a straight girl looking for attention, if you’re a bisexual man, you’re just gay and closeted. It feels like living a half-life, where you know you’re bisexual, and you’ve told everyone, but you’re always thinking – am I actually?
The Sexy Big ‘B’
There is something oh-so-sexy about a bisexual. Specifically, a bisexual woman. TV writers seem to love a woman who makes out and sleeps with women – but never actually would date one (because that’s gross!!!).
This is seen in most representations of the bisexual; the sexy, and often misunderstood bisexual.
Like Willow, I’ll start with a positive version of this trope. Oberyn Martell from the popular show Game of Thrones lives life as an openly bisexual man. He is married, yet both he and his wife enjoy sex outside of their marriage. Both characters feel like real people with their own stories – being promiscuous and openly bisexual are simply parts of him. He may be a sexual, very attractive man, but this is not the focus of his plot. He isn’t just there to be a sexy bisexual, nor is his sexuality the major conflict of his story.
‘Game of Thrones panel – Pedro Pascal aka Oberyn Martell’ by Heather Paul is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0
Once again, this is not always the case. The slutty bisexual trope is directly intertwined into many stories. And I want to reiterate this trope is not inherently bad. The issue appears when this is the only version of the bisexual that one comes into contact with. Furthermore, this trope often reinforces the idea that queer relationships are simply not as legitimate as straight ones. This is seen in many shows. For example, in American Horror Story: Hotel, the Countess is portrayed as being in a polyamorous relationship with both a man and a woman. Yet, in the end, she casts aside the woman and says she was simply there for the man.
Bisexual women do not just exist for men.
The final bisexual trope is the idea that we are just greedy, can’t choose, and will just end up being cheaters. This trope is seen in media from Sex and the City to Glee, and even Bones makes a few jokes about Angela Montenegro being unable to choose a side when she begins her affair with Roxy in the show’s fourth season.
This trope can cause major issues in real life – being automatically presumed to cheat isn’t exactly the best way to start a relationship. This presumption is connected to the over-sexualised image of homosexuals in the mid-20th century. It nearly always culminates in the idea that the bisexual will choose a side eventually: the old “it’s okay, she will end up with a man anyway.” This is misogyny. The bisexual man is allowed control of his own sexuality, and the bisexual woman is a slut. Moreover, any other bisexual of any other gender is simply omitted from the media entirely.
In the end, bisexuality in the media is not all bad. However, I don’t think we are quite out of the woods yet. There are plenty of positive portrayals, and hopefully, many more will come. Rosa from Brooklyn 99, Valencia from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, and genuinely many more.
Image: ‘Alyson Hannigan & Amber Benson – Oct 2004′ by Raven Underwood is licensed under CC BY 2.0