I cannot recommend this book enough, whoever you are, however you identify. Supporting human rights of freedom or safety is everyone's responsibility, and it is imperative that today's heteronormative society condemns the oppression of minority groups on severe ethical and moral grounds. 

My ideal world includes no labels, I am not even a fan of genders to be honest, they have also bred oppression throughout history and still do whether that is through violence or lack of access to medical care and education, or in first world countries in the environment created in workplaces or seemingly friendly comments regarding their preparedness for a traditional family. I see them as an excuse for intolerances and an us vs. them mentality. There's more to people than their label, and people within a certain society-assigned label are also wildly differently from each other. 

And the same applies to sexuality - my view is that it is a spectrum, similar to the Kinsey scale which is discussed in the first pages. So while I disagree with the premise of the labels, I understand that this is where the world is at the moment, this is how it works. So to break current norms and patterns explanations have to contain words that synthesise the differences. I get that, and I hope it is only the first step forward in creating a diverse and empowering society for everyone, as long as they don't hurt others or the world around them.

So looking specifically at bisexuality, I realised quite early in the book that my views were slightly off. I understood 'bi' as an indicator of the two traditional genders, whereas Julia Shaw argues that it comes as a consequence of 'homo' - 'same' in Greek, and 'hetero' - 'other' in Greek. So actually, it means being attracted to both the same and the other. Julia Shaw explains that pansexualism, which I thought was this definition, is actually the same, and that is how bisexuals define themselves. There is something beautiful about seeing a person beyond their gender, where you look at who makes them their authentic selves rather than what they have in their pants.

I have learned a huge amount from this book. It has made me curious to learn more, yet also angry and sad at the state of today's rights for people who are just different. Let me share a few things that I found were particularly interesting or surprising:
- Bisexuals suffer from being hypersexualised. This means that they are seen as essentially being open to having sex with everyone, leading to both increased sexual violence due to people negating personal interest, as well as being ostracised from both hetero and homo groups, accused of wanting to have the cake and eat it too.
- The consequence to this? Bisexual woman are 7x more likely to experience repeated sexual violence to heterosexual women.
- Orthopsychiatry is a multidisciplinary branch that ties together behavioral health with social justice and well-being.
- UK introduced the first version of its anti-discrimination laws based on sexual orientation in 2000. US in 2020 (so recent!).
- Even in countries where corrective treatments for sexuality have been outlawed, they still continue. They can take the form of forced sex, forced pregnancy, surgery and electrical shocks - something I knew but was still painful to read.
- The notions of sexual orientation labels were introduced as recently as the late 1800s.
- In the UK, less than 40% of those seeking asylum from countries that criminalise homosexual behaviour and acts manage to get it. Because this relies on the subjective outlook of a judge, who makes a decision based on the testimony of the person only, choosing what they want to believe based on their own prejudices.

The reality is that for how beautiful the genuine feelings of love and physical attraction are - they have become tools for persecution and abuse. I stand by those in the LGTBQ+ communities as they fight for their rights and as I continue to educate myself and seek different perspectives to challenge my own prejudices.