Ice Cream, Gay Marriage and Catholics

After the last one, this post was always going to come as a disappointment, so I've taken the opportunity to talk about something which is really quite simple.

In a very tasty and unusual move, Ben & Jerry's have recently renamed one of their ice creams in support of equal marriage rights for gay people. This is happening at the same time the Government is discussing plans to change the legal definition of marriage to include same-sex couples... or something like that.

As can be expected, mere consultations on marriage laws has sparked outrage from, among other groups, my old friends the Catholic Church. It's been described as "grotesque" and that it would "Shame the kingdom."

The Church really has no place in this argument. They suggest that changes in the legislation goes against Christian teachings. Well here's the inside scoop: Not everyone is Christian. Marriage has changed already to become a secular practice, not everyone who gets married is a Christian or even religious. 

The only change happening here is to legislation to ensure everyone has equal rights. There's nothing stopping anyone from having a "Christian" wedding, with all the sacred vows maintained. No one is forcing anyone in the Church to sideline their beliefs to give gay couples a religious ceremony, but if you're trying to restrict the rights of a group of people with no justification other than "That's how it has always been", then who gives a damn what you think.

Being Bisexual

Since I started to realise I was Bisexual nearly two years ago, I've been confronted with a number of interesting questions about who I am, and more generally what it means to be Bisexual. These are fine, if people are interested in different lifestyles, particularly in environments as judgemental as a high school, more power to them. However, I've also come across some rather bizarre assumptions about who I am and what I do.

I try not to place my sexuality at the forefront of my personality, but I feel forced to make a post addressing some of the more common and more outlandish ideas about what being Bisexual actually means; because if there's one thing I hate more than a bigot, it's an incompetent one.

1 - Erm... Do you like me?

An almost exclusively male reaction to finding out I'm Bi is the assumption that I must be attracted to them. It's quite an admirable self-confidence that these people display, as if everyone interested in the male sex must be interested in them. The question itself  is usually posed in a scared tone, as if I were some kind of sexual predator, or an excited one, as if the answer they're looking for is "Oh yes, I'd very much like to mount you right now."

Of course, the answer is probably no. I don't like all guys in the same way I - or indeed the person asking - doesn't like all girls. It's about as simple as that.  Being Bisexual does not mean I don't have a type or any kind of standards.

I have felt attraction to one or two of the people who have asked me this, and naturally I said no to preserve the peace in their insane minds, but that's neither here nor there to be honest.