Table of Contents
Some Advance Reviews
Dedication
About the Author
Contents
Foreword
Acknowledgements
PART I: WHAT IS BISEXUALITY Chapter 1. The Threat
Chapter 2. Toward a Definition
Chapter 3. “The Bisexual-Intimacy Level”
Chapter 4. Sexuality and the Oedipus Complex: A New Look
PART II: BISEXUALITY AND HEALTH Chapter 5. The Troubled Bisexual—The Healthy Bisexual
Chapter 6. The Troubled Bisexual—Profiles
Chapter 7. The Healthy Bisexual—Profiles
PART III: THE BISEXUAL IN SOCIETY Chapter 8. Sociological Findings
Chapter 9. The Bisexual in History and the Arts
Chapter 10. The Bisexual Future: Present-Day Factors
Appendix A: The Bisexual as Portrayed in the Arts
Appendix B: Bisexual Survey Results
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
The Bisexual Option
Second Edition
Fritz Klein, MD
Foreword by Regina U. Reinhardt, PhD
Copyright © 1993-2012 by American Institute of Bisexuality, Inc.
American Institute of Bisexuality, Inc.
8265 W. Sunset Blvd Ste 105
West Hollywood, CA 90046
This title was previously published by Harrington Park Press, an imprint of The Hayworth Press, Inc., now a division of Taylor and Francis Group, a division of Informa, plc, which graciously relinquished copyright to the estate of the author, who devised it to the present holder, which may be contacted at www.bisexual.org.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.
ISBN: 978-0-985871-72-7
SOME ADVANCE REVIEWS
“An outstanding contribution to our understanding of human sexuality. This updated edition of The Bisexual Option remains the most well-written and definitive book on the subject of bisexuality. Dr. Klein replaces mythology and ignorance with scientific insight and knowledge. This book has had and will continue to have a significant impact on our appreciation of the complexity of the wide range of human sexual expression.”
Eli Coleman, PhD
Director and Associate Professor Program in Human Sexuality University of Minnesota Medical School
“Must reading for anyone seeking to understand the complexities and fluidity of bisexuality. Using a variety of perspectives (clinical, sociological, historical, and literary), Klein destroys the myths of nonexistence and neuroticism often attached to bisexuality…. Most important, the facts and findings disprove the false either-“gay”-or-“straight” labeling that has led to misleading research reports of sexual behavior and to widespread misunderstanding of bisexuality.”
Amity Pierce Buxton, PhD
Author, The Other Side of the Closet;
The Coming-Out Crisis for Straight Spouses
To M. S.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Fritz Klein, MD (1932-2006), was a psychiatrist in private practice, specializing in sexual orientation and relationship problems, short-term therapy using mainly neuro-linguistic programming and Ericksonian hypnosis, and HIV/AIDS therapy for gays, bisexuals, and drug addicts. He coauthored Man, His Body, His Sex (Doubleday &Co., 1978) and co-edited Bisexualities, Theory and Research (The Haworth Press, 1986). Dr. Klein lectured on human sexuality, gave workshops on neuro-linguistic programming and hypnosis, and was a visiting professor I.G.S./F.I.T., Florida. A board-certified psychiatrist, he was a member of the Examining Board of the American College of Sexology and the National Association of Neuro-Linguistic Programming. Dr. Klein founded the American Institute of Bisexuality (www.bisexual.org) in 1998 and served as its Chairman until his death.
CONTENTS
Foreword
Acknowledgements
PART I: WHAT IS BISEXUALITY
Chapter 1. The Threat
Both the heterosexual and the homosexual find the bisexual threatening. The myth of the bisexual’s nonexistence and the stance of “either/or” is discussed.
Chapter 2. Toward a Definition
The various dimensions, facets, and aspects of the bisexual’s definition are given. The Klein Sexual Orientation Grid is explained. An analysis of cultural and biological factors of sexual orientation.
Chapter 3. “The Bisexual˗Intimacy Level”
The difference between emotional and sexual intimacy. The connection between intimacy and hetero- and homophobia. A profile of a heterosexual male who is able to be emotionally intimate with men.
Chapter 4. Sexuality and the Oedipus Complex: A New Look
An explanation of the Oedipus complex. The view that both homosexuals and bisexuals are able to resolve it successfully. An example showing how one bisexual male has resolved it.
PART II: BISEXUALITY AND HEALTH
Chapter 5. The Troubled Bisexual-The Healthy Bisexual
Definition of neurosis and the various types of troubled bisexuals, as well as the healthy functioning of the bisexual.
Chapter 6. The Troubled Bisexual-Profiles
Four troubled bisexuals: Nora, Walter, Ann, Donald.
Chapter 7. The Healthy Bisexual-Profiles
Three healthy bisexuals: Harold, Hazel, Jane.
PART III: THE BISEXUAL IN SOCIETY
Chapter 8. Sociological Findings
The lack of a bisexual community or subculture. Sociological findings by various researchers. Results of survey taken of a bisexual social group.
Chapter 9. The Bisexual in History and the Arts
A list of famous bisexuals in past and present. Profiles of Alexander the Great, Oscar Wilde, Somerset Maugham, and Colette. A review of the Greek civilization as well as the Bloomsbury Group. List of examples as well as a discussion of three works in which the bisexual “ideal” and “truth” are portrayed.
Chapter 10. The Bisexual Future: Present-Day Factors
A discussion of the nine factors that will influence bisexuality in the future: AIDS, sex roles and stereotypes, androgyny, friendship and lovers, family, “gay lib,” the women’s movement and feminism, myths, dilemmas.
APPENDIX A. The Bisexual as Portrayed in the Arts
APPENDIX B. Bisexual Survey Results
Bibliography
FOREWORD
As a bisexual woman and a psychotherapist, it seemed both natural and important for me to research bisexual women because so little work had been done in this field, and of the little that had been researched, there were very few studies on women. When in the course of my work for a PhD, I found the first edition of Dr. Klein’s book, it was immediately meaningful to me, both professionally and personally. Since that time, I have used The Bisexual Option as a tool for therapy in both individual and group work.
Fourteen years ago, when Dr. Fritz Klein first set out to write The Bisexual Option, neither the New York Public Library nor the Index Medicus contained any reference to literature on bisexuality. What little there was available largely denied the existence of the bisexual. Individual lifestyle preferences recognized today as “bisexual” were labeled “heterosexual with homosexual tendencies.” Many treatments were used to assist in changing behavior, rather than supporting and maintaining a healthy lifestyle integrating all sexual preferences.
Dr. Klein’s work presents a continuum of sexual, social, and emotional preferences over time, within which all of us can recognize ourselves and others around us. Self-awareness about one’s sexuality is a continuing process, and The Bisexual Option i
s a book we can return to again and again for self-knowledge. I have found it useful myself to return to the book several times over the nine years I have been associated with Dr. Klein in San Diego.
In childhood, I erotically fantasized about and experimented with both boys and girls. My puberty was entirely void of feelings for girls, and these same-sex feelings did not return until my late teens, at which time they brought to me the recognition of my own bisexuality. I have spent my adult life happily married while maintaining secondary relationships with women with the full knowledge and consent of my husband.
Dr. Klein’s presentation of the healthy bisexual and the troubled bisexual provides another scale on which we can locate ourselves. Identification on this scale as well changes with time and experience. The description of the healthy bisexual sets a model against which we can compare ourselves and toward which we can strive.
Many people are confused and fearful of recognizing and accepting their sexual preferences. Without direction and counsel they may never proceed beyond the question, “Am I a bisexual?” I recommend this book to my patients who are confused or uncertain about their sexual preferences. They return to therapy knowing they are not alone and with a clearer set of questions about themselves. Bisexuality is much more than a sexual preference. It is a framework of social, emotional, behavioral, and ideal preferences as well. We all have a need to belong, but the first acceptance we must have is our own.
While, as Dr. Klein points out, bisexuals have a high tolerance for ambiguity, they nonetheless represent the most complex state of sexual relatedness. In the end, it is not our preferences that lead us to a rich full life but rather our capacity for intimacy.
As leader, since 1984, of the Bisexual Forum, an organization founded by Dr. Klein, I have had the opportunity to work with individuals along the full spectrum of preferences so well described by the Klein Sexual Orientation Grid.
Meeting several times a month in a variety of group discussions and social settings, we have created in San Diego a social and support environment for a bisexual lifestyle. In the present state of awareness about bisexuality, the next stage of social development in America will appear when we are able to integrate a bisexual lifestyle into the prevalent social fabric, as has already occurred in many European countries. Dr. Klein’s work has provided much of the foundation for this growth.
Regina U. Reinhardt, PhD
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am most grateful to the many people who have aided me in this work. First I want to thank all those who were kind enough to give of their time and share their histories with me. I have rearranged and changed the details of their stories to ensure confidentiality.
Chuck Mishaan, the director of the Bisexual Forum, was most helpful in every way. Both Aphrodite Clamar and Peter B. Field devoted many hours in diligent research. This effort is truly appreciated. I am indebted to Ed Hanlon for his enthusiasm and help. Special thanks go to John DeCecco whose encouragement made this second edition possible.
The author gratefully acknowledges permission to include material from the following:
From THE CITY AND THE PILLAR by Gore Vidal, Copyright © 1948 by E. P. Dutton & Co., Revised edition Copyright © 1965 by E. P. Dutton & Co., by permission of the author.
From ESCAPE FROM THE SHADOWS by Robin Maugham, Copyright © 1972 by Lord Maugham, by permission of the publishers, McGraw-Hill Book Company.
From THE FOX by D. H. Lawrence, Copyright © 1923 by Frieda Lawrence, renewed 1951, by permission of The Viking Press.
From GIOVANNI’S ROOM by James Baldwin, Copyright © 1956 by James Baldwin, by permission of The Dial Press.
From THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS by Ursula K. LeGuin, Copyright © 1969 by Ursula K. LeGuin, by permission of the publishers, Ace Books.
From MAN & WOMAN, BOY & GIRL by John Money and Anke Ehrhardt, Copyright © 1972 by The Johns Hopkins University Press, by permission of the publishers.
From NEUROSIS AND HUMAN GROWTH by Karen Horney, Copyright © 1950 by W. W. Norton & Co., Inc., by permission of the publishers.
From ORLANDO by Virginia Woolf, Copyright © 1928 by Virginia Woolf, Copyright ©1956 by Leonard Woolf, by permission of the publishers, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.
From OSCAR WILDE: A BIOGRAPHY by H. Montgomery Hyde, Copyright © 1975 by Harford Productions, Ltd. by permission of the publisher, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Inc. (Note: Apart from a few brief notes, this letter, now in The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, is the only one from Wilde to his wife that is known to have survived.)
From SEXUAL BEHAVIOR IN THE HUMAN FEMALE by Alfred C. Kinsey, Wardell B. Pomeroy, Clyde E. Martin, and Paul H. Gebhard, Copyright © 1953 by W. B. Saunders & Co., by permission of The Institute for Sex Research, Inc.
From SEXUAL BEHAVIOR IN THE HUMAN MALE by Alfred C. Kinsey, Wardell B. Pomeroy, and Clyde E. Martin, Copyright © 1948 by W. B. Saunders & Co., by permission of The Institute for Sex Research, Inc.
From SEXUAL DEVIANCE AND SEXUAL DEVIANTS edited by Eric Goode and Richard Troiden, Copyright © 1974 by E. Goode and R. Troiden, by permission of the publisher, Wm. Morrow & Co., Inc.
From TOWARD A RECOGNITION OF ANDROGYNY by Carolyn G. Heilbrun, Copyright © 1973 by C. G. Heilbrun, by permission of the publishers, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
From THE TWO WORLDS OF SOMERSET MAUGHAM by W. Menard, Copyright © 1965 by W. Menard, by permission of the publisher, Sherbourne Press.
From WOMEN IN LOVE by D. H. Lawrence, Copyright © 1920, 1922 by David Herbert Lawrence, renewed 1948, by Frieda Lawrence, by permission of The Viking Press.
PART I: WHAT IS BISEXUALITY
CHAPTER 1
The Threat
The New York Public Library, known for its liberality, has two monographs on bisexuality. No books.
Why?
The Index Medicus, which lists all articles appearing in scientific journals on every conceivable medical subject, had 47 pieces on homosexuality. None at all on bisexuality. The category is omitted altogether.
Why?
The New York Psychoanalytic Institute, one of the major organizations of its kind in America and, indeed, in the world, has in its library catalogue over 600 items on the subject of homosexuality–and only 60 on bisexuality.
A few weeks prior to gathering the above information for the first edition of this book, I received a call from a friend asking me to lunch. Liz is the wife of a successful New York designer of women’s clothes. There was an urgency in her tone that caused me to respond with an immediate yes, although I was quite busy.
“I’m free tomorrow,” I said.
“I need to talk to you today.”
“How about a drink around four?”
“Your office?”
“Fine.”
When she arrived I poured her a drink. As we sat down she said, “Do you always offer your patients a drink?”
“I hardly consider you a patient.”
“Well, I don’t know. You’d better turn on the tape. I may never say again what I’m about to say now.”
I switched on the machine.
“You know that Bill and I have been married for over twenty years.”
“Quite happily, from all appearances.”
“In our case appearances are not deceiving. We are very happy.”
“So you and Bill are not the problem.”
“In a sense, we are. How do I put this?” She sat a while staring into her glass. “About a month ago we were at a dinner party and this psychologist was there, an expert of some kind. He was holding forth on the nature of sexuality and he said that the homosexual and heterosexual were facts of life, and that the bisexual didn’t exist. Bill challenged that opinion and the psychologist just took him apart, saying that the bisexual is nothing more than a closet gay. Bill really felt bad when we left. Bill said he didn’t believe anything the psychologist said, but still he couldn’t come up with an effective rebuttal. Since that incident we’ve been in constant dialogue over bisexuality. We’ve
talked about little else, and it’s begun to affect his work and our lives. There are the children to think about, and... oh my God, I don’t know where to begin.”
“Which of you is bisexual?”
“We both are.” She stopped to light a cigarette. “Does that surprise you?”
“It’s been rumored for years that Bill is gay and that your marriage is a front.”
“Do you believe that?”
“No.”
“What do you... what have you believed about us?”
“That you are a couple very much in love. That Bill is bisexual and that you are heterosexual.”
“You didn’t suspect about me?”
“No. I suppose because you haven’t been that open about it. Bill has been known to flirt now and then with both men and women.”
“He hates the ‘gay’ label. Not because of the connotation–God, half the people we know are gay–but because it simply isn’t true. I feel… ah… well, that’s it. I really don’t know how to label myself. Neither does Bill. For years we entertained the possibility that we were superneurotic. But now Bill feels that he’s not neurotic but just the opposite. Healthy.”
“What do you think?”
“You know that there is a flood of opinion out there that would drown both Bill and me with an army of experts to say that you can’t be bisexual and healthy. Bill is better off being thought of as gay, with his marriage as a front, than he is as a bisexual.”
“Does Bill know you called me?”
“Yes. We both want to resolve this. We hate being told we don’t exist sexually. Do we? Does the bisexual exist outside of being a confused gay, or just sex-mad?”
“Not according to many experts.”
“How do you feel?”
“One, I think it’s a presumption to tell people they do not exist. And two, I think the bisexual not only exists independently of the homosexual label, but exists period.”
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