Anna Paquin Says She's A 'Proud Bisexual' In Response To Trolls

Anna Paquin shut down criticism of her marriage to Stephen Moyer by reminding her followers that bisexual erasure is also a form of bigotry

With the month of June serving as a global celebration of the LGBTQIA+ community, it’s an annual reminder that there’s so much work that needs to be done to not only amplify queer voices and visibility, but also to understand that someone’s identity doesn’t change based on who they’re partnered with.

Ahead of this year’s Pride celebrations, Anna Paquin is reminding her Instagram followers that just because she’s married to a man, she is still proudly bisexual — and that bi erasure is a form of bigotry even if someone is in a relationship that appears to be hetero-passing.

Paquin has been married to her True Blood costar Stephen Moyer since August 2010, and came out publicly as bisexual in a video for a campaign to promote LGBTQIA+ equality in March 2010. But she still has to remind fans and followers that her identity is no less important just because of her husband’s gender, taking to Instagram to shut down criticism of her sexuality and her marriage.

On May 17, the mom of two celebrated International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia, an annual worldwide event that aims to “draw attention to the violence and discrimination experienced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex people and all other people with diverse sexual orientations, gender identities or expressions, and sex characteristics,” by sharing two posts to her feed, writing in her caption that she was “sending love to [her] #lgbtqia+ siblings.”

In her caption on the second post, she addressed bisexual erasure directly, writing “#bipride💖💜💙 #fuckbierasure #binotconfused.”

It still didn’t stop people from taking to the comments section to write things like they’re “tired of seeing ‘bi’ celebrities constantly advocate for it only to end up conventionally married to men with multiple children, living out the so-called white-picket-fence life.”

Paquin was having none of it, posting both to her Instagram Stories and to her main feed to remind fans and followers that bi erasure is a form of bigotry and hatred. She shared a screen grab of one particularly nasty comment to Instagram Stories, writing above it, “Ah yes … the ‘you aren’t queer enough’ BS.”

She then reminded followers that they can happily hit the ‘unfollow’ button if they’re going to “put their bigotry on display” in the comments section of her posts.

In another message, she wrote, “I’m a #proudbisexual who is married to a wonderful human who happens to be a man,” captioning the post, “”If he doesn’t have a problem with it why should anyone else? #loveislove🌈 #fuckbierasure #bipride💖💜💙” after sharing more messages from trolls on her posts.

The Flack star has been vocal about bi erasure for years — in a 2014 interview, the late Larry King asked her if she was a “non-practicing bisexual” and she explained that her sexuality has not changed just because she’s spending her life with a man. “I am married to my husband, and we are happy monogamously married,” she replied.

When King asked if she “was” bisexual, she summed it up flawlessly. “Well, I don’t think it’s a past tense thing,” Paquin said. “Are you still straight if you’re with somebody? Doesn’t mean you’re not, if you were to break up with them or you were to die. It doesn’t prevent your sexuality from existing. It doesn’t really work like that.”