This letter originally appeared in the American Scholar on September 4th, 2018. Setting aside much of Sandra M. Gilbert’s problematic cover article in the summer issue, “In the Labyrinth of #MeToo”), I would like to focus on three paragraphs. In the middle of her piece, soon after describing the rape of an unconscious woman behind a Dumpster that landed Brock Turner so disgustingly light a sentence that the sentencing judge was recently recalled by voters, Gilbert asks, are

This article originally appeared on May 31, 2018 on Medium. In a world in which no one is straight, and yet also in which everyone seems to be very straight, I give you permission this June to call yourself bisexual. You could also call yourself pansexual. Or fluid. Or queer. The point is, no one ever tells us that we can, so if you need permission this Pride, here it is. Your gold-plated, engraved invitation. You. Yes you. YOU can call yourself bisexual. “No one is 100% stra

This article originally appeared on April 25, 2018 in ReWire.News. In early April, the LGBTQ publication Queerty ran a piece called “Why does bisexuality still make us so uncomfortable?” in which the author, Jeremy Helligar, describes the moment that a date told him he was bisexual. “I told him it didn’t matter to me, but I lied,” Helligar writes, explaining that the stereotype of bisexuals having “more options” made him nervous. Although Helligar says he’s not the type to “s

This article originally appeared on the Huffington Post on April 13, 2018. In a USA Today opinion column published Thursday, contributor James Bovard takes issue with a new study finding 36 percent of students at colleges and universities experienced food insecurity in the last month. The study looked at data from 43,000 students at two- and four-year schools from 20 states and Washington, D.C. Researchers also found that 36 percent of students experienced housing insecurity

This article originally appeared on ReWire.news on April 17, 2018. The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is a federally administered survey that provides some of the most crucial data in the United States on the demographics of crime victims, including their sexual orientation and gender identity. The NCVS is administered to youth and adults in households across the country, but last week the Bureau of Justice Statistics issued a public comment proposing to raise the

This article originally appeared in ReWire.news on April 4, 2018. In early March, 12-year-old Andy Leach of Mississippi died by suicide. The causes of death by suicide are never fully known. But there is evidence that he had been struggling at school after telling his peers that he thought he might be bisexual. He experienced bullying and harassment there as a result. And Andy wasn’t alone: Bisexual young people (who make up the largest proportion of LGB students) face intens

This article originally appeared in the Advocate on September 27, 2016. Despite making up more than half of the lesbian, gay, and bisexual population, bisexual people are often overlooked and invisible. Bisexual people are frequently assumed to be gay, lesbian, or heterosexual based on the gender of their partner. Yet when bisexual people are open about their sexuality, they face increased levels of violence from intimate partners; rejection by community, family, and peers; a

This article appears in full in At the Intersections. Please visit the site for the full text and citations and to read more about the experiences of LGBTQ youth experiencing homelessness and how to support their success. The largest proportion of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) youth experiencing homelessness identify as bisexual: in a recent study of street outreach programs by the Administration on Children, Youth, and Families, 20.0% of youth identified as bisexual, comp