The first sentence did say "A bisexual person is one who can become romantically involved with persons of either sex." I've changed it into something which is much more unweildy and which I like less, but which I think is more accurate. The way the sentence was did not take into account people who are in a heterosexual relationship for a length of time (unhappily, one presumes) before leaving their partners and announcing that they are gay or lesbian. --KQ
The article says:
- According to modern sexological ideas, the majority of people are to some degree bisexual. Most people have some attraction to either sex, although usually one sex is preferred. Only a minority (5-10%) can be considered fully heterosexual or homosexual.
What a load of tripe! I'll contain my comments on this page,though, until I can find some evidence to cite that this is junk science. <>< tbc
- I suggest taking it out and moving it to here to the talk page until whoever wrote that can back up this rather bizzarely bold assertion with some references. --AV
- I agree.
The source of that information is probably the Kinsey Reports on Sexuality in the Human Male and Female. Kinsey et al got that figure by creating a 7-point scale. 0 was purely heterosexual, 3 was 50-50 bisexual, 6 was purely homosexual. The point the above author is trying to get across is correct according to Kinsey's research, though maybe you've misinterpreted. It's not saying that most people are 50-50 bisexual, it is saying that most people are predominatly heterosexual or homosexual with some degree of bisexuality. Kinsey et al claimed that most people aren't totally devoid of feelings for the sex other than the preferred one, its just that these feelings are a lot less strong than those for the preferred sex.
Like most things Kinsey said, this is pretty controversial; but I have never actually seen any *scientific* refutation of the idea of the scale (though since I've read hardly any sexology, there may well be scientific refutations somewhere out there.) All I've ever seen are conservative authors (e.g. Judith Reisman, Kinsey's archnemesis) who argue that the idea of sexuality being a continuum has no scientific basis. But they don't have any evidence that it has no scientific basis, I'd say it a priori makes sense, that many conservative authors (with their ideas of homosexuality being a choice and of homosexuality being "curable") themselves presume it, and that when Kinsey et al showed people the scale and asked them where they fitted they didn't all choose 0, 3 or 6, which is what you'd expect if the scale didn't reflect reality to some extent.
On the other hand, maybe his numbers as to the percentage of the population at each point on the scale are biased. Reisman argues that Kinsey's sample was biased towards prisoners and the college-educated, and that self-selection resulted in an excess of people with 'unconventional' sexual interests. Maybe she is right. I don't know if she is; and I don't know how the figures in this instance would be affected if she is right. -- SJK
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