I’ve
been watching The Carrie Diaries lately and while it’s an enjoyable and cute
show, I can’t help but notice the annoying emphasis they place on virginity. So
let’s talk about virginity and, more importantly, how it isn’t actually a
thing.
First
of all, how do we classify a virgin? The typical definition is someone who has
never engaged in sexual intercourse – usually referring to the penile-vaginal
variety. Now maybe you already picked up on how heteronormative and
heterosexist that is, but if not, let me explain. Let’s say a girl realizes
from a relatively young age that she doesn’t want to have sex with boys, but
rather with fellow women. She goes through life only engaging in sexual
activity with women, lacking penile penetration. While she meets the
definition, is she really what we’d consider a virgin? The same goes for male
same-sex couples. Or people who engage in a lot of sexual activity but without “going
all the way.”
How
about some historical context? In the past, virginity was used to determine the
worthiness of a bride, her purity. While social class determined the importance
of bridal virginity, the universal reality was that virgins were better than
non-virgins. Sounds pretty outdated, right? Wrong. We can still see society’s
concern with virginity through other socially constructed terms like “slut” and
“prude.” Virginity is both prized and abhorred. We may not use it to determine
worth in the same way, but we’re still obsessed with it.
And now
we’ve reached the inevitable point where I point out the misogyny in it.
Looking at the past, you literally can’t deny that the “virginity=purity” idea
almost exclusively affected women. Pre-marital sex was frowned upon for
everyone, yes, but men weren’t considered less pure afterward. That idea still
exists today. Can we talk about the imagery of “popping the cherry?” Does that
sound pleasant to anyone? Can we talk about how we stress to girls that their
first time is going to hurt (even though it REALLY SHOULDN’T) and that it needs
to be special? In The Carrie Diaries, the main character talks about her thoughts
on losing her virginity and the main focus was “Will it hurt?” “Will I feel
different after?” As a girl, I can confirm “Did it hurt?” is one of the first
questions commonly asked when a friend says they had sex for the first time. And
it’s completely normal. We’ve trained girls to believe it’s supposed to hurt
and more importantly, we’ve trained boys that it’s okay to hurt us.
What else
do we teach guys? That they need to make the girl’s first time special. Because
they’re just sex machines, right? Girls are the only ones with emotional
attachments so a guy just has to respect that. We tell girls that if they don’t
“lose it” with the right guy, they’ll regret it, and sometimes they do. But would
it happen as often if we as a society didn’t stress the importance of your
first time?
Would
we be a better society if we didn’t try to sort the world into “virgins” and “non-virgins?”
If we acknowledged that it’s impossible to do that? What if we let go of a term
with a sexist history that has no modern relevance? If we taught guys that no,
ripping the hymen is not required with initiation into the world of sexual
intercourse? What if we stopped preaching that the first time should be with
someone special, and connecting sex exclusively with love?
Would
we live in a better world?
Of
course.
Stay rad, pals.
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