Pansexual (dictionary)

BoyWiki Dictionary: Pansexual (dictionary)

adj [pan-sek-shoo-uhl]

¹ Sexually attracted or open to all people regardless of gender, gender identity, or sexual orientation.

² Sexually attracted to everyone.

A pansexual is a person who is attracted to a wide variety of sex partners. In its most literal form, it refers to a person who is attracted to any and all possible sex partners. However, in more common use, a pansexual is a person whose sexuality encompasses multiple traditional sexualities. For example, a person who is attracted to men, women and boys could be termed a pansexual, since his attractions are both bisexual and pedophilic.

Some pansexuals who identify themselves as boylovers find the use of this term to be offensive, but others consider it to be the most correct way to describe their sexual attractions. Parallels can be drawn by considering the difference between a homosexual and a bisexual. While bisexuality includes homosexuality by definition, most bisexuals identify themselves as such and not as homosexuals. By the same token, pansexuality can include pedophilia, and therefore a person whose broad range of sexualities includes pedophilia might be more properly referred to as a pansexual.

While no formal inquiries have been made into this topic, anecdotal evidence suggests that many self-identified boylovers and girllovers might be more correctly described as pansexuals.

A related term, polysexual, is sometimes used interchangeably with the term pansexual. However, the most literal interpretation of the word polysexual refers to one with multiple sexualities rather than a person whose attractions include all sexualities. In this sense, the term polysexual may be more technically correct, but pansexual is the term most often seen in general usage.