Awareness
July 26th marks Polysexual and Polyromantic Visibility Day, a time for all of us to lift up Polysexual voices, learn about the Polysexual community, and recognize the validity and strength of those who identify with the term.
The origin of the term can be traced back to the 1920s when it was used to refer to Polyamory rather than Polysexuality. This usage continued for some time, but in the last couple of decades, the term has taken on a completely new meaning as a complete identity with a diverse and vibrant community surrounding it. Polysexuality falls under the multisexual umbrella, which also includes—among others—Bisexuality, pansexuality, and omnisexuality. Polysexual folks experience romantic and/or sexual attraction to any combination of genders, but crucially, not necessarily all genders. Polysexual folks claim a distinct identity apart from other multisexual labels, and it is imperative that this fact is recognized.
The Polysexual flag was posted to Tumblr on July 11th, 2012, by a user who went by “Samlin” to the blog @fuckyeahpolysexuality. Samlin had noticed the fact that Polysexual folks had no flag of their own, and swiftly decided to rectify that fact. Taking inspiration from the Bi and Pan flags to show the connection between these identities, the Polysexual flag takes the blue and pink stripes from both flags—signifying attraction to men and women respectively—and adds a green stripe of its own in between, to represent attraction to those outside the gender binary.
Polysexual and Polyromantic Folks You Might Know.
Unfortunately, despite identities across the Gender, Sexual, and Relationship Diverse (GSRD) spectrum seeing hard-fought-for representation grow in the last few years, Polysexual folks are still lacking a wide variety of authentic, genuine representation in the media. This is something we must work to rectify. Everyone in the GSRD community deserves to see themselves represented on paper and screen alike. Thankfully, we do have one example, albeit not explicit. According to at least one source, someone involved in the making of the show has said that Kaldur’ahm, one of the titular team in Young Justice, was intended to be Polysexual.
As is the case with every community under the GSRD umbrella, Polysexual people face countless challenges across the world, and some of those struggles—particularly invalidation—can even come from people who are also part of the GSRD community. This is something we must work on, for all those who have either a multisexual or less well-known identity. For this Polysexual and Polyromantic Visibility Day, those of us outside of the Polysexual community must fully commit ourselves to supporting and uplifting polysexual folks and their voices and must remember to continue to uphold this commitment every other day of the year.
