“I am from a different generation, when sexuality was closeted [and] censored. A lot has changed, to say the least,” says Ted Arabian, a 54-year-old actor living in Los Angeles. “And a lot has to be credited to the media, to television and film and to the individuals who came out. A lot has changed because of brave people. Representation brings about change; I've witnessed that.” A big step in increasing this visibility and authentic representation is making the effort to better understand bisexuality+. “We do make up most of the LGBT community, so there’s no shortage of us,” says Jensen. “They can come and talk to us, it’s okay. … And then going from there would be the appropriate thing to do.” From there, we can better understand how to create these bisexual+ characters onscreen. “Most people, when they write queer characters, seem to make their queerness everything they are. … Coming into yourself and your sexuality are big, important things, but it’s not everything,” says Waite. “I want queerness to be celebrated, and I want queerness to be multi-dimensional.” However, Waite insists that allowing bisexual+ people to write and play bisexual+ roles is what will allow for the richest and most authentic portrayal. “Allowing people to write characters that reflect their lives and their friends’ lives … will help to combat a lot of the stereotypes that have developed over time and that are often very prevalent in media,” she explains, “because people go off of what they know and what they’ve heard, but if you’re going off of what you’ve experienced or what people close to you have experienced, then it will feel more real and it’ll connect to a wider audience and it’ll educate people who have never gone through that or have yet to go through that.”
Ultimately, we need to remember one important thing, according to Baker: “It’s important to show a more diverse world in the media, because the real world we live in is diverse.”
FALL 2018 | ISSUE ONE
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