How Many Bisexual Parents Are There?

It’s Bisexual Awareness Week, so I thought I’d ask the question: “How many bisexual parents are there?”

Demographer Dr. Gary Gates at UCLA’s Williams Institute was kind enough to answer that question in an e-mail to me. He wrote:

In the 2014 version of the General Social Survey, roughly half of bisexual adults say that they have ever had a child. I usually use about 9 million for the LGBT figure (based on current population estimates and assuming 4% LGBT), roughly half as Bisexual, so 4.5 million.  If half of them have ever had a child, then that means about 2.25 million bisexual parents.

He notes that these parents may have children of any age, some of whom are already adults.

Bisexual parents, however, may suffer from the same invisibility that bisexual people as a whole do. In a previous study on “LGB Families and Relationships,” Gates wisely noted, “In considering the total extent of parenting among LGB adults, it is important to consider that some LGB parents are raising children as part of a different-sex couple.” Most bisexual parents, in fact, were raising children with a different-sex spouse or partner:

Among bisexual adults with children, 51% were married with a different-sex spouse, 11% had a different-sex unmarried partner, and 4% had a same-sex spouse or partner. Among adults who identified as gay or lesbian and were raising children, 18% had a different-sex married spouse and 4% had a different-sex unmarried partner.

It is perhaps too easy to dismiss bisexual parents with different-sex spouses when we talk about “LGBTQ parenting”—but we shouldn’t. Yes, the experience of raising a child with different-sex parents is likely to differ somewhat from that of raising one with same-sex parents. It’s harder to find children’s books depicting one’s family, for example.

That doesn’t mean, however, that we should exclude or ignore bisexual parents, even those in different-sex relationships, when we think of LGBTQ parenting. Perhaps they have been in same-sex relationships in the past and experienced the same type of challenges we have because of it. Perhaps divorce, separation, or widowhood—or being a single parent and later finding someone—will mean they’ll be in a same-sex relationship in the future. Or not. Even if none of those scenarios are true, they will likely view the world with an eye as queer as those of us who identify elsewhere on the spectrum.

Let’s also all try to be deliberate when we use the terms “LGBTQ parents,” “same-sex parents,” or “gay and lesbian parents.” “LGBTQ parents” is the most inclusive, but can sometimes be incorrect or make people invisible if it refers to a group that consists of only part of the full spectrum. “Same-sex parents” is more inclusive of bisexual parents than “gay and lesbian parents,” but excludes single LGBTQ parents. “Queer parents” is a good, broad, alternative in many cases, but has a pejorative history that not everyone likes. I work to use the right term at the right time. I’ve probably failed on occasion, but that’s no reason not to try. I urge all of us to be sensitive to our use of these terms—and to encourage others to do so.

As this infographic from the Movement Advancement Project shows, bisexual people face “significant” stigma, misunderstandings, and economic and health disparities. They are a big part of our community and shouldn’t be an invisible part of it. They will suffer, and if they are parents, their children may suffer, too.