The Countless People Asking ‘Is Michele Morrone Gay?’ After His Selfie With Simone Susinna Proves Bisexuality Erasure Is Still Real

Last night, Michele Morrone broke the internet with a simple selfie. Yes, he was shirtless – but that’s not the point: he was also joined by a fellow shirtless man in a very up-close-and-personal couple style selfie. Posted on the first date of Pride Month and using the caption ‘I’m a liar’, conclusions have naturally been drawn that he may be in a relationship with said man.

When I say broke the internet, I really mean it. According to Google Trends data, there are currently eight breakout search terms related to Michele Morrone’s sexuality. As well as ‘365 Days’ – the extremely problematic film he rose to stardom in – and ‘Simone Susinna’ – the man he was pictured with’, trending search terms include ‘Is Michael Morrone gay?’, ‘Is Massimo gay’ and ‘Is Michelle Morrone gay’ (perhaps the biggest takeaway then is that none of his fans know how to spell his name).

It’s not just people searching for whether Michele Morrone is gay, there’s also endless commentary on social media. The picture he posted has more than 60,000 comments – 50,000 more than his average post – and his name has been trending on Twitter since the photo emerged. Comments like ‘we lost another one ladies’ have over 25,000 likes, with countless others demanding the actor define his sexuality immediately.

Besides the fact that it’s no one’s right to demand answers about anyone’s sexuality, there is a major glaring problem with all of the search: the bisexuality and pansexuality erasure. Michele has been married to a woman, Rouba Saadeh, and has two sons with her. He was also in a heavily publicised relationship with Italian ballet dancer Elena D'Amario after his divorce.

Of course, he could be gay – it’s not outside the norm that a man would come out as gay decades into his life after marrying or being in relationship with women – but it’s also entirely plausible that he could be bisexual or pansexual too, something many seem to have forgotten.

Now, until Michele is comfortable defining his sexuality publicly, it’s entirely inappropriate to make assumptions. This is not to say that he is gay or bisexual then, but to remind the hordes of people that saw his cosy, shirtless selfie with Simone that actually: bisexuality does exist. Sexuality is not a binary, it's a spectrum - a man dating another man could define himself as any number of things, bisexual, pansexual, queer. It's really not as simple as 'that man is dating a man, he must be gay!'.

More than that, being bisexual does not make a man any less datable, nor does it invalidate their relationships with any one person. So before commenting about Michele Morrone's potential queerness being a 'loss for the ladies', it's worth remembering that.

Read More:

Are We Still By-Passing Bisexuality On Screen?

Women Three Times As Likely To Be Bisexual As Men, Study Says

The Complications Of Bisexual Dating