You might be sexually fluid and not realize it — or even care

You’d think Miley Cyrus and Cate Blanchett just announced “who they were wearing” at the Oscars. That’s how nonchalant the news was that they consider themselves “sexually fluid.”

Simply put, they have an ever-changing preference for men and women but don't readily employ the word “bisexual.”

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For those of us with a less sexually advanced vocabulary, what exactly is the difference between sexual fluidity and bisexuality anyway? And are more people now likely to “come out” or embrace this as their new sexual identity?


“Fluid sexuality is a more current and inclusive term which speaks to an individual’s sexual orientation that is open and changing, and not gender binary-based, and may lean more heavily towards one gender while open to all genders,” explains Dr. Chris Donaghue, whose first book Sex Outside the Lines: Authentic Sexuality in a Sexually Dysfunctional Culture debuts in July. “I hope to see more people identifying as fluid both in sexuality and gender, because most of us are.”

Amongst individuals in the LGBTQ(F?) community, there appears to be a wide spectrum of beliefs and attitudes about this rise of the label and accompanying cultural awareness.

How one person defines it

Britta Gregor Krabill, a 34-year-old St. Louis library director who identifies as sexually fluid, explains how she came to embrace the terminology.

“I began to identify as bisexual when I discovered that I was attracted to women in my late teens,” Gregor Krabill says. “In the last couple of years, I’ve been trying on different terms to find one that feels right to me. For a period of time I referred to myself as pansexual, which felt more accurate since I’ve found myself attracted to both cisgender and transgender men and women, but that the term doesn’t capture how my sexuality tends to change over time. It’s only recently that I’ve started referring to myself as sexually fluid. No matter who I’m attracted to, it covers the entirety of my orientation.”


Gregor Krabill applauds that more people in the public eye, such as Cyrus and Blanchett, are talking about fluidity in their sexuality.

“It’s important for people questioning their sexuality to see that it’s not abnormal for sexual orientation to evolve as we get older,” she says. “

Finding your orientation changing doesn’t mean that there’s anything wrong with you.

Finding your orientation changing doesn’t mean that there’s anything wrong with you. Some people don’t have a fixed sexual orientation, and it can be a beautiful, exciting thing to explore.”

Of course, there are a variety of terms to describe sexuality and gender, such as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. Additionally, as PFLAG notes, “Today more and more young people are coming out ‘queer’…Think of queer as an umbrella term. It includes anyone who a) wants to identify as queer, and b) who feels somehow outside the societal norms in regards to gender or sexuality.”

But as “sexual fluidity” sees an increase in usage and in representation from Broad City to House of Lies to Bessie to House of Cards, more people are discussing its meaning and impact. In Virginia, Fox News is reporting the Fairfax County Public Schools will soon be formally introducing curriculum “including lessons on sexual fluidity.”

New York writer-director Eric Schaeffer’s recent film Boy Meets Girl stars up-and-coming actress Alexandra Turshen, who The Advocate recently described as putting a “(gorgeous) face to fluid sexuality.” Like many allies of the LGBTQ community, Schaeffer sees traditional labels of “straight” and “homosexual” as limiting and inaccurate. He writes characters who portray the more common fluid nature of most "straight" people's experiences.

Schaeffer says, "The more people in the public eye who admit as such and/or write characters, as I do, who portray the more common fluid nature of most ‘straight’ people's experience sexually, the more other 'straight' people will feel ‘normal’ in their behavior.