We Don’t Need Sexual Orientation Labels

A few months back a fellow mob blogger wrote an awesome piece about sexual orientation. I didn’t even know about a few. I loved the article, and my hamster wheel began spinning. 

We have titles for every sexual interaction conceivable, and a few I think may not exist outside of FetLife and Craigslist.

Then the hamster wheel stopped. Why? Why do we need a label for everyone? All it accomplishes is to exclude and isolate people who adopt their society-ordained label as their identity and ignore their actual, ever changing, desires.

When I was 16, I determined I was a lesbian. 

I had been coerced (see also: date raped) into sex for the first time a few months earlier by my 22-year-old boyfriend. I felt absolutely nothing close to lust, desire, or orgasm when we were together. At the same time, I developed feelings for a close female friend at school.  

I ended my relationship, I scared off the first girl I had fallen for, and promptly announced to my mom that I was gay. She was surprisingly supportive, I found an LGBT support group for teens, I was excited, and I felt like I had found myself. 

I dated a few women, it didn’t last. Then this sweet deaf boy joined our group. He was gay, but I developed a serious crush on our cute, talented, ballet dancer.

How was this possible? Had I been wrong? I discovered the Kinsey Scale. Decided I was a 4.Therefore, I accepted that I was Bi. My mother quickly shut down her previously accepting attitude. 

Convinced I was “faking it”. I was so hurt and confused. Please understand me, this was nearly 20 years ago.  

The belief that bisexuals were just confused was as common as the belief that all gay men liked musicals and brunch.

This is not a unique story, not really.  So often, we get caught up in labels and titles.   We let these terms define us and determine how we will interact with others of our species.

In my thirty-(none of your business) years, I have seen both good and bad evidence of what this does to our world. I still remember the “Pray the Gay away” movement. The first time someone told me I was going to hell. 

The first time I heard the word faggot, queer, and so many worse ones I can’t write down. We went from LGT to LGBT to LGBTQ to LGBTQPDABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ. 

Why? So we know where we belong? So our social order continues and we don’t offend anyone?  I say, fuck it! Love who you love, fuck whoever gets your rocks off, and stop worrying if you’re a 1 or a 6 or anything in between. It is a whole lot of stress and math that no one needs. 

Let’s see, if I sleep with only women  but only look at gay porn while I dress up like a unicorn, I must be….

I don’t think labels are going away anytime soon. They make us feel safe, defined, and in a lot of ways they have created an open discussion for people to begin examining their own mind.

I guess I am a half pansexual/omnisexual, woman.  However, that doesn’t tell you who I want to take home want me from the bar. 

We either have to accept that sexual orientation is fluid and people redefine their desires on the regular. 

Or we have to accept that the labels may be yet another antiquated method of boxing people into rigid squares and triangles when we may more likely resemble jellyfish.

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Wendy Dawn

An in-the-closet writer eager to express her hidden side and help create a world of free expression.  Because this closet is getting stuffy Twitter handle: Facebook URL:

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