By Mythical Libertarian Woman

Lesbian: ladies who want to bang and/or be romantically involved with other ladies

Gay: dudes who want to bang and/or be romantically involved with other dudes

Bi: anyone who wants to bang and/or be romantically involved with either gender

Pictured: A “Gay”

AND HERE’S WHERE THINGS ALREADY START TO GET COMPLICATED

There’s a controversy raging in the LGBTABCDEFG community about whether “bi” is a sufficiently woke term anymore, due to the ?Gender Is A Spectrum? crowd (see below). Technically speaking, “bi” means two, which means that being “bisexual” or “biromantic” (give me a sec, we’re getting there) is automatically cisnormative (you cis shitlords all know what cis means, right?). So:

– Some people use “bi” to mean “I like everyone and I don’t care about their bits”

– Some people take “bi” to LITERALLY mean “two” and they will use this in very interesting ways, such as “I am only attracted to cisgender women and demigirls, WHICH IS A REAL AND VALID GENDER (see below) and those are my two”

– Some people really only like dudes and ladies and aren’t interested in made-up genders and they’re cisnormative scum

Pan: Many who are of the first “bi” definition of “I like everyone and don’t care about their bits” have decided to abandon the term “bi” and are now using “pansexual” (or “panromantic” – we’re getting there, I swear). The pans and the bis get into angry flame wars on Tumblr for being the same thing as each other but not using each other’s preferred semantics. The pans have managed to convince the alphabet soup gods to add a P onto the acronym for them. Polyamorous people think it belongs to them. Further war ensues.

Bisexual has a pretty pink-purple-blue flag, while pansexual has an ugly pink-yellow-blue flag! (YES, EVERY SINGLE THING ON THIS LIST HAS ITS OWN COLORS AND FLAG. It’s like the Panhellenic Council of identity politics.)

Polysexual/polyromantic: This is not polyamorous. It’s actually yet another division of bisexuality. See, “bi” means “two” and “pan” means “all,” but what if you’re attracted to every gender except cis male scum? Then you are poly, which means “some but not all.”

Multisexual: One more word for the same thing. This one is the umbrella ☂️™ term for all the orientations that are attracted to more than one gender. You know, bisexuality.

Polyamorous: Wants to have more than one sexual or romantic partner. I guess this is an orientation? I don’t know if otherwise straight people who are polyamorous really want to be lumped in with the LGBTQQIAPPP2++ crowd, though.

Asexual (called “ace” for short): Does not experience sexual attraction. This is really straightforward but the ace community is determined to make it about as mind-searingly complicated as the gender crowd. I’m not even sure I can define all these terms in a linear way the way I can for all the rest of them, so just try and stick with me here.

Romantic vs. sexual attraction: Some asexuals are also aromantic*, which means they don’t want to have sex or date. This is also pretty straightforward. You know your spinster great-aunt who never had any beaux (and no female “roommates,” either) and didn’t seem to give a shit? She was probably aromantic asexual. I highly suspect St. Paul was, too, which is how he managed to be so “wtf is wrong with all you sluts, just be celibate like me” in his letters. There just didn’t use to be a word for it because in Biblical times people didn’t care about this crap.

*Also, #NotAllAros are asexual. Some people are aromantic but not asexual. So I guess they want to have sex with people but not be in relationships? They get pissy with you if you say that makes them sound like dicks. #NotARobot

Some asexual people experience romantic attraction without sexual attraction. This probably seems really weird but I think it’s actually not if you think about it? Picture how a lot of couples get when they’re older and don’t feel like banging anymore, except they’ve always been that way and neither partner cares. Their idea of a happy relationship is like snuggling on the couch and being June and Ward Cleaver or something. IMO, I don’t think asexual/non-asexual (called “allosexual” or just “allo” in the ace community) relationships can work unless the allo partner is not all that interested in sex to begin with. Or if they’re polyamorous maybe. Or I guess if the ace doesn’t mind having sex, even if they’re not into it.

>Anyway, this is how we get all the -romantic suffixes on the orientations. Biromantic, panromantic, polyromantic, yadda yadda. That’s for ace people, since they aren’t sexual but they do have romantic feelings for people. Technically straight or gay is “heteroromantic” and “homoromantic” but most people just say straight or gay.

With me so far? Because up to now the ace stuff mostly makes sense, but it’s about to get really ridiculous.

Possibly because asexuality is the trendy new identity for those who don’t want to commit to changing their genders, there are several subcategories that fall under the Asexual Umbrella ☂️™.

Demisexual: People who don’t experience sexual attraction unless they have an emotional bond with someone first. This seems to be Normal to me, but I’m told it’s Not, so it’s an identity now. (This is not the same thing as “demiboy”/”demigirl”/etc! For that, see below.)

Demiromantic: Doesn’t experience romantic attraction unless there’s an emotional bond I guess? But like…that’s just…what happens when you date someone, I think. Like, when you first meet someone you don’t immediately go HELL YEAH ONE TRUE LOVE. Even Disney movies don’t do that anymore. BUT IT’S AN IDENTITY NOW OKAY ☂️™

Gray-A/Grace: Okay this is the one that really gets me. It is:

sometimes experiences sexual attraction

but not always.

There’s not even a specific set of parameters the way there is for demisexual. It’s literally an orientation for I AM NOT HUGH HEFNER. Don’t get an erection every time you see a girl walking down the street? Congrats, you’re gray-A, you can pick up your Marginalized Identity card at your local GSA office.

Finally: THE A IN THE LGBTQIA+ ACRONYM IS FOR ASEXUAL*, NOT ALLY #GiveItBack

*”And aromantic!” scream the aros**
**”And agender!” scream the snowflakes who aren’t happy with the 47 other gender options intersectional feminism has provided them

Moving on from sexual orientation to gender:

Pictured: A “Transgender”

Transgender: You all know what it is. The term is generally just used for MTF (male-to-female) and FTM (female-to-male), but some of the gender non-conformists want the T in addition to some extra alphabet soup letters because they heard whoever has the most letters wins the gold medal in the oppression Olympics.

Transsexual: The term for people who have actually had gender reassignment surgery. I think this is kind of being phased out, though, and people are just using transgender regardless of surgery status.

Trans*: Someone on Tumblr started using this a while ago because the * made it inclusive of both transgender and transsexual. It was really popular for like a year and then the meme became that “trans*” was oppressive for reasons. (Supposedly whoever invented it was actually a secret Nazi spreading anti-trans propaganda or something. Or maybe a pedophile. I don’t remember.) Now if you use “trans*” you’re a shitlord, prepare to be roasted.

Nonbinary: Someone who identifies as neither male nor female. Can use a variety of pronouns, from the relatively easy to parse “singular they” to the made-up but at least somewhat well-known “xe/xir” to a whole host of invented pronouns, such as those found here.

Note that this is not a finite list! You can also make up your own brand new ones and expect everyone to use them (I know people who have!) under penalty of law. Go nuts!

Genderqueer: Nonbinary

Gender non-conforming: Nonbinary

Enby: Nonbinary

Agender: Nonbinary

Two-Spirit: Nonbinary with a Native American flair (NOT TO BE USED BY WHITE PEOPLE YOU CULTURALLY APPROPRIATIVE SCUM ?)

All these things are the same but they each get their own letter on the acronym! BECAUSE THEY ARE IMPORTANT AND VALID.

Demigirl/demiboy/demiwoman/demiman: Not the same thing as demisexual or demiromantic. It’s someone who sometimes feels like their assigned gender and sometimes doesn’t. This is sort of the gray-A of gender.

Bigender: One person. Two genders. At the same time. In practice, this can get a little Me, Myself & Irene. I think “genderfluid” might also fall under this, but sometimes people use “genderfluid” to mean “nonbinary” so your guess is as good as mine.

Transracial and/or transspecies/otherkin: NOT A REAL THING, STOP THROWING THAT OUT THERE TO MAKE US LOOK BAD, WE WOULD NEVER

Intersex: Previously known as hermaphrodite. They have a medical condition, I’m not sure what they’re doing here.

+: Make sure to include the + at the end of the acronym to include any letters you might have missed! No matter how many letters you include, you will always have missed some. I’m sure I missed some on this glossary! People will still be mad at you for forgetting their letter, of course, and they will likely start a hashtag movement against you, but at least you’ll have the defense of having sort of included them with the +.

Other terms of note:

Queer: All of us ?️‍? Even the straight gray-As. It’s a beautiful term we reclaimed. YOU’RE NOT ALLOWED TO USE IT.

TWOC: Trans Women of Color. The most holy of identities, trumps all other letter combinations.

AFAB: Assigned female at birth (now sometimes called “CAFAB: coercively assigned female at birth” to reiterate what shitlords parents and doctors are for indicating biological sex on birth certificates).

AMAB: Assigned male at birth; see above for CAMAB.

MOGAI: Some people are saying we should use this as a catch-all instead of adding letters to the acronym. It stands for “Marginalized Orientations, Gender Alignments and Identities” (I think). But someone on Tumblr said it was invented by a shitlord (like the “trans*” person). Then someone else said no, that’s “MOGII.” Then the #discourse devolved into a flame war.

Folx: Colloquial use of the word “folks” jumped 8000% after Obama entered office! But “ks” is such a heteronormative letter combination. “Folx” is so much more inclusive!

Queer-platonic partnership/QPP: Sometimes people who say they’re aro-ace want to date each other but don’t want to call it dating because they’d have to give up one of their letters. So they date each other anyway but call it a “queer-platonic partnership.” Aces who use this term for a m/f relationship get sternly admonished by the Rainbow Police, and then there’s an epic flame war over whether straight aces should even be allowed to sit with us.

Sometimes QPPs are called zucchinis. Make of that what you will.

Pictured: A “Queer-Platonic Partnership”