Gen Z TikTokers are sharing their experience of embracing a little-known sexuality called “abrosexual.”
Sexual preference involves being attracted to different genders, depending on how you feel at a given moment.
In other words, you may be attracted to men for a period of time, sometimes several years, before moving on to women, and then becoming attracted to them again.
On social media, those who identify as “abrosexual” describe their sexuality as a “changing” and “fluid” part of their personality.
However, some say they have received cruel taunts from friends and family when they tell them about their newfound identity, including the accusation that their sexuality “doesn’t sound real.”
On TikTok, social media user @luciaismagic, who identifies as genderfluid, told her 444,000 followers that “abrosexual is used to describe people whose sexuality changes over time.”
Emma Flint, 32, came out as bisexual for the first time and was met with shock from friends who questioned whether it was “even a label” and claimed it “didn’t sound real”.
One woman who has made her abrosexual journey public is journalist Emma Flint.
The 32-year-old woman confessed that when she was growing up in the nineties she had never heard that term.
“You were either straight, gay or lesbian,” she says, adding that it was often assumed that “everything else was made up.”
But two years ago, when she turned 30, she realized that her sexuality was fluctuating rapidly between lesbian and bisexual.
She came across the Instagram page of Zoe Stoller, a US-based LGBTQ+ creator and activist, where she saw the term abrosexuality used for the first time.
She decided that abrosexuality was what aligned with her the most, despite nasty comments from her friends, including that…‘He was lesbian just last week.’
However, she describes the discovery of her true identity as a moment of enlightenment that has helped her understand herself.
Another video posted by @zoebriskey, told her 74,000 followers that abrosexuality is “fluid.” She added that “it is not pansexuality, although an abrosexual individual may identify as pansexual at some point in their life.”
Often when you talk about your sexuality, you are met with a blank expression followed by a question about the meaning of that term.
But as long as people are respectful, Ms. Flint says she doesn’t mind explaining what the term means.
Elsewhere, on the social media forum Reddit, hundreds of commenters are debating the meaning of the term.
One said: “It’s different for everyone, but all it really means is that your sexuality is fluid (much like how gender is fluid for some people).”
Another commented: “It’s not a choice, changes happen on their own.”
‘Sometimes I’m only attracted to men, and then suddenly I’m attracted to women again.
“And suddenly, I’m back to being just men. I can’t control this, if I could, I’d probably choose to be pansexual all the time.”
It was only after reading the Instagram page of Zoe Stoller, a US-based creator, educator and social worker who seeks to improve the visibility of the LGBTQ+ community, that she first saw the term abrosexuality.
On TikTok, social media user @luciaismagic, who identifies as genderfluid, told her 444,000 followers that “abrosexual is used to describe people whose sexuality changes over time.”
Another video posted by @zoebriskey, told her 74,000 followers that abrosexuality is “fluid,” clarifying that the sexuality is different from pansexuality, which involves being attracted to a person’s personality, rather than a specific gender.
Ms. Flint stresses that the identity does not affect her love life or alter any of her romantic relationships.
She explains that just as being bisexual doesn’t make a person feel differently about their partner, being abrosexual doesn’t either.
“I love the person, more than their gender, so it doesn’t matter if my sexuality fluctuates when I’m with them,” he said.
The only way people can accept different identities, he says, is by learning new terminology.