Not putting themselves in a box. As LGBTQ+ representation in media becomes more common, some celebrities have pushed back against the expectation that they have to define their sexuality.
“I don’t feel like it’s something I’ve ever felt like I have to explain about myself,” Harry Styles said of his sexuality in a 2017 interview with The Sun. “It’s weird for me — everyone should just be who they want to be. It’s tough to justify somebody having to answer to someone else about stuff like that.”
Other stars like Demi Lovato have embraced pansexuality for its inclusive nature. “I’m so fluid now, and a part of the reason why I am so fluid is because I was, like, super closeted off,” the “Cool for the Summer” singer said during a March 2021 appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, adding that they were attracted to men, women and “anything” in between.
Lovato announced that they are nonbinary during a May 2021 episode of their podcast. “Over the past year and a half I’ve been doing some healing and self-reflective work,” the Sonny With a Chance alum said. “And through this work, I’ve had the revelation that I identify as nonbinary. With that said, I’ll be officially changing my pronouns to they/them. I feel that this best represents the fluidity I feel in my gender expression and allows me to feel most authentic and true to the person I both know I am and am still discovering.”
Cara Delevingne, whose exes include Jake Bugg and Ashley Benson, has settled on the pansexual label as well. “I always will remain, I think, pansexual,” the Paper Towns actress told Variety in 2020. “However one defines themselves, whether it’s ‘they’ or ‘he’ or ‘she,’ I fall in love with the person—and that’s that. I’m attracted to the person.”
Meanwhile, other celebrities like Lily-Rose Depp think you shouldn’t have to choose any label at all. After the model posed for a photo series of people who aren’t “100 percent straight” in 2015, she rejected the notion that she had come out.
“That was really misconstrued, that whole thing,” the Dancer actress, then 16, told Nylon in 2016. “A lot of people took it as me coming out, but that’s not what I was trying to do. I was literally doing it just to say that you don’t have to label your sexuality.”
Scroll through for a list of stars who prefer not to define their sexuality: