Billie Eilish Slams Variety For ‘Outing’ Her

Billie Eilish is not taking her "coming out" story by Variety lightly, slamming the publication for "outing" her. Though the "What Was I Made For?" singer told the publication she thought the public's knowledge of her being attracted to women was "obvious." But she didn't appreciate them running the story, making a "grand gesture" of her coming out.

In her interview with Tiana DeNicola, Eilish was asked if she meant to come out in the publication's cover story from earlier in the week. Eilish reiterated her statement on Saturday of still being afraid of women and thinking they were pretty while laughing about it. DeNicola then asked her if she had intended to share her LGBTQ+ identity. Though Billie said she wasn't necessarily coming out or believing in the labels, she did not like how media outlets were reporting about it following the cover story and interview. "Why can't we just exist?" the award-winning artist said. "I've been doing this for a long time and I just didn't talk about it. Whoops."

Responding to the story on Instagram Monday (December 4), Eilish posted a series of photos, the first seemingly taken from sitting on the toilet. With a belt buckle of two women crawling, the 21-year-old musician wrote: "thanks variety for my award and for also outing me on a red carpet at 11 am instead of talking about anything else that matters i like boys and girls leave me alone about it please literally who cares stream 'what was i made for.'"

As for balancing her masculine and feminine sides, Eilish previously said she feels comfortable expressing “a balance of both” sides of herself. Still, she said, “I feel the most powerful when I feel masculine.” She finds power in femininity, but feels better being more masculine in the way she walks, stands, what she wears, and her facial expressions.

Bisexuality is a term used to describe a person who has the potential to be physically, romantically, and/or emotionally attracted to people of more than one gender, not necessarily at the same time, in the same way, or to the same degree. Per GLAAD, the "bi" in bisexual refers to genders the same as and different from one’s own gender. This doesn't mean just men and women.

Despite comprising more than half of the lesbian, gay, and bisexual community, bisexual people tend to feel misunderstood and isolated because of the hyper-sexualization in media. In addition to that, people cast bisexuality as a phase, or something that people do to draw attention, or to cover-up being gay or lesbian. The Los Angeles Times reported that bisexual people "avoided coming out because they didn’t want to deal with misconceptions that bisexuals were indecisive or incapable of monogamy — stereotypes that exist among straights, gays, and lesbians alike." Multiple research studies have shown that people who are bisexual are more likely to binge drink, engage in self-harm, and have suicidal thoughts than gay, lesbian, or straight people.

According to GLAAD, there is a term called "bi-erasure," which is "a pervasive problem in which the existence or legitimacy of bisexuality (either in general or in regard to an individual) is questioned or denied outright." Being bisexual doesn't mean they must have had any sexual experience in order to identify as such. Some people use the words bisexual and bi to describe the community, with others may use bi+, which is intended to be inclusive of those who call themselves bisexual, pansexual, fluid, queer, and other words that describe people who have the potential to be attracted to more than one gender. Those who are exploring whether or not they are attracted to people of the same gender or of other genders might use the term "bicurious."

See below which celebrities identify as bisexual.