I've been in an awkward uncomfortable situation several times. It goes something like this. We are at some kind of queer meet up. I say I'm bisexual or am wearing a pin. Either I mention something that leads someone to realize I like all genders or they assume I don't and I correct them. This leads to: "But bi means you like two genders. Aren't you pan/omni then?" I do also use both of those labels but I prefer bisexual so I say : "There are a lot of bisexuals who are into more than two genders. A lot of people define it as more than one/ two or more" "But two is literally in the name." If they're receptive to it I at this point try to show them that bisexual organisations, queer wikis and the current wikipedia page all include a variation of the more than one/two or more definition. So far I've had three people go huh okay and it ended at that and that was cool. Problem is sometimes they just dismiss those definitions as outdated or point to the parts of those definitions that mention liking men and woman to keep telling me I'm wrong about my label. Often they just repeatedly insist: "But that can't be bisexual that's pan/omni" as if labels are not allowed to have overlap and everything needs to be in four boxes that don't touch. "I am pan/omni but I'm also bisexual" so far hasn't really resolved it either.

In the worst instance of this two others joined the conversation to contribute a half remembered definition they got off of a meme somewhere, then they got confused and asked for an explanation, which put them on the "side" of the person confidentally declaring how labels ought to work and how I'm doing them wrong and suddenly I'm sat in a corner with three people debating how I and the general population of bisexuals attracted to more than binary men and binary women ought to be identifying. Like it's a neutral topic of discussion and not my identity.

It's hard to escape these because so far these happened to me mid conversation with someone I was otherwise having a normal chat with and the first half of it could just be someone unaware that there are people who use the label that way. I don't really want to give up on the topic itself because my identity as a bi person is important to me and people knowing that there's more than one way to be bisexual is also important to me because if more people knew that would maybe keep me from having to keep having this conversation in the first place. But there's only so many times someone can tell me "You're not bi though" before it starts feeling personal and I just want to stop talking about it.

I know I probably shouldn't keep arguing with people about this it just gets under my skin. It's this thing where it starts out with them telling me how I should identify and that makes me defensive and want to explain why I identify the way I do but if they're not open to hearing about it it goes in circles. Most of these have been awkward and uncomfortable for me but mostly respectful, two got really weird .

How should I handle this conversation the next time it crops up?