“Sexuality, gender and James Bond are all very complex subjects…” Breaking binaries with Ben Williams
Bisexual Bond expert Ben Williams and I have been speaking for years behind the scenes, emboldening each other to be more openly queer. After they came out as non-binary, we thought it was about time we tackled The Big Stuff more publicly: gender binaries, putting who we’re attracted to into boxes and, perhaps most profoundly of all, what needs to be going down in our personal lives to make sense of Quantum of Solace.
Please note that, while I always aim to make Licence To Queer family-friendly, the video and podcast both contain a few swear words from Ben. Even though Ben was on their “best behaviour” they understandably got quite animated considering the personal nature of much of our discussion.
Another word on words…
I always try to be as inclusive as possible and it’s in this spirit that I provide a mini-glossary below. I don’t intend to patronise anyone, merely be as clear as possible. It’s just that, in our discussion, Ben and me use these terms without defining them and we want to make sure we are fully understood by everyone.
All definitions taken from The Queens’ English: The LGBTQIA+ Dictionary of Lingo and Colloquial Phrases by Chloe O. Davis (2021) [with some of my commentary]
Bisexual. Being attracted to more than one gender. [Although this doesn’t, of course, have to be a neat 50/50 split)
Cisgender. Describing a person whose gender identity matches the gender they were assigned at birth. The term can be shorted to “cis.”
Cishet. An abbreviation for “cisgender heterosexual.” [As Ben observes, near the end of our chat, they may be mistaken for cishet because they have many of the stereotypical visual identifiers of a heterosexual man and they are married to a cisgender woman.)
Non-binary. A gender identity that is open to a full spectrum of gender expressions, not limited by masculinity and femininity. Non-binary people may express masculinity, feminity, both, or neither.”
See also: enby, gender noncomforming, genderqueer.
Here are some of the highlights of our conversation…
Ben on making comments on Bond podcasts that outed him as bisexual:
“The first time I said something I felt my heart beating faster, my throat almost closed off… and I was like, ‘I’ve done it now. Oh no, people will know!’”
Ben on their bisexuality:
“It isn’t unusual and it should be treated as such.”
“From the time I was growing up, there wasn’t so much of an accepting environment to be and thus I have always presented far more masculine and continue to do so. I wasn’t even a hundred percent that I wanted to change my pronouns to be perfectly honest at first but eventually I was like, no, it has to happen. But I guess I have that benefit of being, on the face of it, a white hetero-presenting guy.”
On whether Bond’s response to Silva in Skyfall (“What makes you think this is my first time?”) validates Bond’s apparent bisexuality:
“I’ve always tried to eat up the crumbs that are thrown [to bisexual viewers]. Even when Loki went ‘a bit of both’ I was like ‘Yes!’. My interpretation of that scene… I don’t think [Bond]’s lying. I don’t think it means that he is a bisexual man. He could literally be a heterosexual man who has had a homosexual experience.”
On identifying as non-binary:
“’Can you be non-binary with that beard?’ Yes, I can be! Because this is still coming down to identifiers.”
“There is a difference between a moment of clarity of understanding and how long something has been for… The eureka moment did come relatively recently as I was reading more about the trans community. The more I was reading through it, the more I was thinking: I’m that! This non-binary thing, this describes me. I had some kind of struggles with it going all the way back to childhood. I can’t really define adequately a start point to this but it's all these little markers along the way that now I can look back on and go ‘oh that’s what that was.’”
“[When I was growing up] the terminology didn’t exist. It wasn’t that the people didn’t exist.”
On people’s misunderstandings about gender identity and sexual orientation:
“I’ve known plenty of gay dudes who are as masculine as they come. Conversely I’ve seen more extravagant, more flamboyant men. It’s important to make the distinction that your gender identity is not linked to your sexuality.”
On Bond’s gender fluidity:
“When I see Sean Connery move, he has real fluidity. And I’ve seen a lot of his stuff off camera, behind the scenes. He has a campness.”
“Connery does have a playfulness within him which one could describe as slightly feminine… it’s more the reed as opposed to the oak.”
“When you define a character down to purely binary aspects, masculine and feminine… there’s no dynamism.”
In this far-ranging chat, we also discuss whether or not it’s in our natures to think in black and white; how Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) may help people break their binary thinking habits; the possible roots of transphobia; liminal spaces; the future of Bond and much more.
Read Ben’s Bond articles for MI6 HQ here:
https://www.mi6-hq.com/authors/ben-williams.php
Link to the conversation with gay trans Bond aficionado Jill Leflour which I reference at the start of our chat:
