I read your articles on bisexuality. You say it is normal to be attracted to the same sex. Is it abnormal not to be? I have never felt any attraction to the same gender (male), and my girlfriend says that she has never felt attracted to women.

T.C.

In discussing the range of human sexual experience and orientation I certainly don't mean to imply there's anything wrong with heterosexuality, or with NOT having had any feelings of attraction to one's own gender.

Perhaps some of the confusion comes from using terms like "normal" and "abnormal," which actually refer to the PREVALENCE of something. Think of what statisticians or mathematicians call a "normal curve," also referred to as a "bell curve" due to its shape when the distribution of whatever's being measured -- grades, for instance -- is plotted on a graph. The middle, or highest part, of the normal/bell curve represents the statistical average, or most common grades. The right-hand "lip" of the bell represents the highest grades, which are relatively few in number, while the left-hand "lip" represents the lowest grades, which are also fewer in number.

If you plotted sexual orientation or attraction among the general population on a graph, you might find the middle or tallest part of the curve representing folks who are basically heterosexual but occasionally have or have had feelings of attraction to their own gender, because that's fairly common. One lip of the curve might then represent heterosexual people who have never had any feelings of attraction to their own gender, while the opposite lip of the curve might represent homosexual people who have never had any feelings of attraction toward the opposite gender. (Theoretically there would be a continuum, and bisexual people would probably fall somewhere in between the exclusively homosexual folks and the basically heterosexual folks who have had some same-sex feelings.)

The trouble is that terms like "normal" and "abnormal" tend to be used as if they're synonymous with "healthy" or "unhealthy" -- or when you get right down to it, "right" or "wrong." But what's statistically "normal" -- referring to what occurs quite often -- might not necessary be healthy or right. One example is in regards to eating. Many clinicians who work with people with eating or body image problems try to encourage NATURAL, rather than NORMAL eating ... because these days the average, or normal, eating pattern for women (and a growing number of men) tends to be either unhealthily restrictive or unhealthily immoderate. ("Natural" eating, by the way, is usually defined as eating in accordance with one's appetites and body needs, but not in a perfect balance, because none of us is perfect.)

OK, back to another basic human appetite -- sex. If you and your girlfriend have never had any same-sex feelings of attraction, that's probably what's natural for each of you ... just as it may be natural for someone else to feel differently. That doesn't mean that you're right and anyone with a different feeling is wrong, or you're healthy and they're sick -- just that what's natural and right for YOU may be different from what's natural and right for someone else. (I realize that some political or religious conservatives may have a different opinion, but they can write their own columns.)