Answer time: Bisexual MC

Sent by Anonymous :

Hi! I'm currently writing a story with a MC who is bisexual, I was wondering if you knew any posts/could redirect to me a site that lists tropes to avoid, stuff like that, etc., because I want to do a good job of representation. I'm already talking to a bi classmate, but I was thinking the more intel I had, the better the representation would be.

Hi Nonners :)

Well, there’s the TVtropes page on bisexuality, for starters :)

I don’t really know of any other site that specializes in bisexual (or even queer in general) representation but looking through legit-writing-tips, clevergirlhelps, and/or writeworld‘s tags for representation could get you some results.

Also, if your MC is a person of color, I recommend checking writingwithcolor, because tropes that are empowering for white characters can turn out to be damaging to audiences of other origins/ethnicities.

And of course, if your MC isn’t USian, do keep a critical eye for anything you find on tumblr. People here tend to write from an USian perspective, which works well enough for some topics, but which can be vastly off if you place your story in a different country.

That’s about all I have off the top of my head, unfortunately, aside from the usual recommendations: don’t equate bisexuality with sexual proactivity or dishonesty, do not danse around the word ‘bisexual’ and don’t imply bisexuality is a one off thing.

I hope this helps!

 

PS: If any of my bi friends & followers want to chime-in, feel free to reblog the post so Nonners can look through the notes and see your commentary :)