It's a doc on bisexuality, and it may just be the first glimpse into a whole new battleground. Young people, instead of packing their pickups and heading out to protests, are organizing in another way. They're rejecting labels. They're experimenting with new chemicals. They're practicing sexual uncertainty.
In a political climate that promotes absolutes, in a country that thinks in gay and straight, are we witnessing the newest kind of revolution?
Produced by former California Congressman Michael Huffington, BI THE WAY traces the roots, transformations, and "comings out" of bisexuality in American culture and responds to the recent scientific studies and newspaper articles that have been interrogating or affirming the prevalence of bisexuality--through a roadtrip-style anthropological cum pop-cultural exploration of the phenomenon. We're determined to find out if the new 'fad' of bisexuality (in high schools and colleges across America) is really just a fad, as it's being portrayed in many articles (Ms., Glamour, Teen, the Washington Post), or if it's a systemic change in young people's perceptions of their own sexuality.
Our film intimately follows four young (ages 15 - 29) lives in different parts of the country and then also 'tests the waters' of our country's tolerance and its concept of the bi through interviews with the makers of "The OC," Ani DiFranco, sex researchers, Dan Savage, Angelina Jolie, teens, politicians, activists, Alan Cumming, a cage fighter, 'change' therapists, the director of "Planet of the Bisexuals," George W. Bush (ok, his agent's calling me back), college students, religious leaders, musicians, historians, the guys at Burger King, and the list goes on.
We're highlighting young people who are 'under the radar' questioning their sexuality without really drawing attention to it, or even necessarily being aware that they're doing it...
We aim to find out why and where some young people get to choose a life beyond definitions, and can question the way they love without social and emotional consequences, while others still fight a raging battle for acceptance. Learning how this generation of teens challenges social definitions will increase understanding of how outrageous and indeterminate sexual categories are, and will let us know which parts of the country still need help in accepting their sons and daughters, and themselves, as they are.
We use our main characters' stories as a jumping off point to explore the larger issues of bisexuality: What does the word bisexual really mean? What are the stereotypes of and challenges to a bisexual lifestyle? Can any label on sexuality really describe a person? And where is our society's sexuality headed?
So let's do it! Involving lots of underwater equipment and the cameraman from The Squid and the Whale, BI THE WAY is a truly hip, strange, beautiful documentary with the potential to change the world... Or at least spread a little chaos.
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