Definitions of Pansexuality to Avoid

As pansexuality is seemingly a fresh sexual identity to the mainstream, article upon article scrambles to explain it to audiences that may have never heard of it before. This is obviously a natural and good response to learning about relatively new terminology.

An issue here, however, is that almost all of these articles rely on comparisons to other identities — especially bisexuality — which actually spread misinformation and hurtful ideas in the process. Sometimes, they’re not even accurate to all pansexuals. This problem is especially dangerous when pansexuality is still an emerging orientation to the public, meaning that the first encounters many people have with it will be filled with inaccuracies.

Here is a brief rundown of the most prevalent explanations of pansexuality and why they’re harmful. Keep in mind that every description listed here is documented.

Definitions

Attraction to transgender people, unlike other sexualities, which only include cisgender people.

Why it’s biphobic: It disregards bisexual history. We’ve been allied with transgender communities since they existed. Claiming that bisexuality is transgender-exclusive feeds into biphobic and transphobic rhetoric and makes no sense if you don’t also believe that straightness and gayness are transgender-exclusive, which they’re not.
Why it’s transphobic: It implies transgender men and women are different genders from cisgender men and women, and reinforces the notion that denying attraction to transgender people is perfectly acceptable rather than rooted in transphobic assumptions about us and our bodies. It also ignores the fact that many transgender people are gay, straight, or bisexual.
Why it’s insulting to others: It invalidates every gay/straight/bi person with transgender partners.

Attraction to nonbinary people, unlike other sexualities, which only include men and/or women.

Why it’s biphobic: Same as the first. Bisexuals can and do date nonbinary people. The American Institute of Bisexuality (AIB) says “Bisexuality is an orientation for which sex and gender are not a boundary to attraction.” In other words, someone’s gender wouldn’t prevent a bisexual from finding them attractive, so being nonbinary wouldn’t automatically be a dealbreaker.
Why it’s transphobic: It exhibits a misunderstanding of nonbinary identity, implies that one needs a unique sexuality to be attracted to nonbinary people (which is false), and ignores the fact that not only are many of us gay, straight, or bisexual, but some of us are also men and/or women. “Nonbinary,” “male,” and “female” are not mutually exclusive.
Why it’s insulting to others: It invalidates every gay/straight/bi person with nonbinary partners.

Attraction to all sexes, unlike other sexualities, which do not include intersex people.

Why it’s biphobic: It’s false. Even if we were to define orientation around physical sex (which far fewer people do nowadays) where male gayness, for example, would be “attraction to males,” bisexuality would still be attraction regardless of sex.
Why it’s transphobic: It relies on cissexist assumptions of physical sex that excuse transphobes saying, for instance, they aren’t attracted to transgender men because they’re “only attracted to males.”
Why it’s intersexist: It implies that people can not only tell whether or not someone’s intersex without their disclosure, but justifiably reject “intersex” as a category in one’s attraction. This is not possible to do, as not even all intersex people know they’re intersex; it isn’t a wholly separate sex or gender category. It also ignores the fact that many intersex people are gay, straight, or bisexual.
Why it’s insulting to others: It invalidates every gay/straight/bi person with intersex partners.

Attraction regardless of genitalia; “hearts, not parts.” In contrast, other sexualities are genitalia-specific.

Why it’s homo/biphobic: It reinforces the stereotype that gay and bisexual people are shallow and sex-obsessed. Plus, bisexuals have also described their sexuality this way.
Why it’s transphobic: It equates genders to genitals, even though people can have any gender identity regardless of their physical characteristics. This excuses transphobes who justify their aversion to transgender people by saying they only like penises or vaginas (as if there aren’t transgender men with penises and transgender women with vaginas).
Why it’s inaccurate to pansexuals: Some pansexuals claim genital preferences or otherwise prefer sexual relations to romantic endeavors.
Why it’s insulting to others: Nobody is only attracted to genitals⁠ and nothing else — arguably, quite a few aren’t attracted to them at all. Someone doesn’t need to see their prospective crush nude to develop feelings for them. Orientation is not inherently or solely sexual. It’s inaccurate and condescending to paint everyone else as sex-obsessed, or even act like such an obsession would be bad.

Attraction without a preference or gender-specific attraction. In contrast, bisexuals have a gender preference or different attractions to different genders.

Why it’s biphobic: It’s false. While there are bisexuals who have favorites, many bisexuals experience the same attraction in more-or-less the same way to all genders. In fact, a common biphobic stereotype is that we’re indeed indiscriminate — and therefore indecisive and greedy.
Why it’s inaccurate to pansexuals: A number of pansexuals have gender preferences, and some only want to enter relationships with one particular gender.
Why it’s generally problematic: It ignores the fact that gender preferences can often form through internalized homo/biphobia, misogyny, living in a homophobic area, dysphoria, or trauma, which is generally not a recommended criterion to base one’s entire identity on. It’s unrealistic to act like people will be attracted to all people in the exact same way, because we’re all individuals.

Attraction primarily to personality; attraction to “people, not genders”; genderblind attraction, unlike other sexualities, which prioritize gender.

Why it’s biphobic: Plenty of bisexuals see gender as generally irrelevant to their attraction; this sentiment has been recorded since the 1970s.
Why it’s insulting to others: It paints everyone else as arbitrarily shallow. Pretty much everyone is attracted to people’s personalities; it’s a cornerstone of human socialization. It’s unrealistic to think that, for instance, a straight man would enter a relationship with a woman he loathes simply because she’s a woman.
Why it’s inaccurate to pansexuals: Some pansexuals have gender preferences.
Why it’s generally problematic: The concept of “genderblindness,” while a nice concept, is unrealistic and dismissive— under our gender-binarist patriarchy, we see gender and act on gender biases whether we want to or not. “Genderblind” sentiment can also be seen as trivializing gendered experiences and issues, including transness and misogyny. (More on this here.) Not to mention, people with genders are still people, and the idea that everyone is inherently attracted to gender itself (as opposed to the people who most commonly have that gender) is debatable. I wouldn’t count on many people being turned on by the abstract concept of wo/manhood.

Attraction to all genders, unlike bisexuals, who are only attracted to two genders.

Why it’s biphobic: It’s false. Many bisexuals understand themselves as attracted to all genders. The “only two genders” definition of bisexuality depends on a misunderstanding of what “bi” means in this context (attraction to “similar and different” — not necessarily “two” — genders) and is virtually nowhere to be found among bisexual activists, literature, or organizations. The AIB tells us that “[b]isexuality is inherently inclusive of everyone, regardless of sex or gender.”
Why it’s transphobic: It encourages not only viewing nonbinary identities as entirely divorced from wo/manhood but believing that people can define their sexualities around (including or excluding) nonbinary people. Claiming that bisexuality can be attraction to “men and demimen” or “women and nonbinary people but not men” tokenizes and often misgenders the nonbinary people in question. It’s also just unrealistic. We exist outside models of sexuality.

Attraction to all gender expressions, unlike other sexualities, which are only attracted to specific presentations.

Why it’s inaccurate to pansexuals: Some pansexuals are only attracted to masculine, feminine, or androgynous individuals.
Why it’s generally problematic: It implies that other sexualities inherently exclude people solely based on their mannerisms or style of dress (which would further entail that, for example, a gay man attracted to feminine men has a different orientation than one attracted to androgynous men), when in reality, no other sexual orientation has ever been historically defined in terms of expression because all genders can be masculine, feminine, or androgynous. Anyone can be attracted to any gender expression.

Attraction to all genders, unlike bisexuals, who are not attracted to all genders.

Why it’s biphobic: It’s false. Many bisexuals understand themselves as attracted to all genders. Even vaguer definitions of bisexuality like “attraction to more than one gender” and “attraction to similar and different genders” are other ways to say “attraction to all genders.” The AIB tells us that “attraction to both same and different means attraction to all.” After all, “similar to” and “different from” are essentially the only two relationships one entity can have with another.

Bonus round: Pansexual people see their sexual orientation as a way of thinking that is disconnected from traditional ideas of gender, unlike other sexualities.

Why it’s biphobic: Bisexuals have theorized bisexuality as inherently non-binary and gender-transgressive for decades, and we still do.
Why it’s homophobic: Gay men and lesbians have, too, understood their sexualities in ways that turn traditional notions of gender on its head (see butch/femme culture, for instance). Attraction to the same gender inherently subverts these notions because most gender roles assume and expect heterosexuality.
Why it’s insulting to others: For the same reason the “attraction to nonbinary people” definition is harmful — it implies that other sexualities are not attracted to nonbinary or even gender-nonconforming people as they’re inherently divorced from traditional gender ideology and rules. In reality, anybody can understand their sexuality as disconnected from this, even cisgender heterosexuals. This mindset is not unique to any label.

“Well, what definition should I use?”

The answer’s quite easy:

Attraction to all genders; attraction regardless of gender; attraction where gender is not a boundary.

Simple, accurate, and doesn’t assume anything about anyone else. No comparisons are necessary.

As a general note, “all genders” and “regardless of gender” communicate the same concept. “Regardless” doesn’t necessarily mean not caring and it’s not the same as being “genderblind”; some people who use the “all” definition don’t care about gender, and some who use “regardless” for themselves have a gender preference.

Think of it like this: if someone likes all flavors of cake, they’d be happy to eat a slice regardless of its flavor, even if red velvet is their favorite. If you’re attracted to all genders, then you can be attracted to people no matter what their gender is (i.e., regardless of gender), and if you would date someone no matter what their gender is, you’re open to dating people of any and all genders. Essentially, gender is not a determining factor in your attraction.

“So how do I explain the difference between bisexual and pansexual attraction?”

You can’t. Every definition of pansexual orientation — even the bigoted ones, like those implying that liking transgender women makes a straight man bisexual — are also ways a number of bisexuals have described (their) bisexuality. No definition of either label is universally agreed upon (I’ve even seen, on rare occasion, pansexuality defined as attraction to “both men and women,” “three or more” or just “many” genders), and there is simply no definite material difference between these two labels in terms of desire.

The AIB—which explicitly supports alternative labels for bisexuality — also says that “labels like pansexual, polysexual, omnisexual, and ambisexual also describe a person with homosexual [same-gender] and heterosexual [different-gender] attractions, and therefore people who have chosen those labels are also bisexual.”

Not to mention, there are people who identify as bisexual and pansexual simultaneously, not claiming to have two sexual orientations. If there are people who find so little difference between the two labels that they can comfortably identify as both, that should speak on how they’re actually used in real life (i.e., to communicate the same attraction).

The closest thing to a difference between in desire is that not every bisexual considers themselves attracted to transgender/nonbinary people, but you could say the same thing about gay and straight folks, and we shouldn’t distinguish orientations this way in the first place. It excuses transphobia from individual bisexuals, implies that pansexuality is inherently more inclusive or less transphobic, and normalizes the idea that “transgender,” “nonbinary,” and “cisgender” are clear-cut categories that we can find attractive or reject in their entirety.

If someone wants to discuss differences between the labels in other ways unrelated to attraction, they could talk about the histories of each term and the primary goals each one typically has (Shiri Eisner notes that bisexuality “comes from a type of political thought based on sexual identity” and focuses on how society treats bisexual attraction, while pansexuality is more based in gender identity and focuses more on awareness of transgender/nonbinary people), but when it comes to actually explain pansexuality, there’s no need to try pulling it apart from other labels. Some words being synonymous with others doesn’t inherently delegitimize any of them, and identities don’t need to be mutually exclusive with all others. Trying to posit bisexuality and pansexuality as inherently separate restricts the diversity within both labels.

An Injustice!