Thoughts about Virginity

By Shannon McDermott

Growing up Catholic, I was raised to believe that staying a virgin meant you had self-respect.  Although not all Catholics necessarily believe this, it seems to be a common belief among people who are strongly religious.  My mother would try to put strange ideas in my head — she'd urge me to keep my virginity for as long as I could because it was one thing I had control over.  She'd tell me that my body was my temple, and that any respectable man only wants to marry a "pure" woman, etc.

Rather than being taught to have sex when I felt I was ready, I was taught that having premarital sex was wrong, and that people around me would view me in a negative way if I had it — that my value as a woman would decrease.  Thankfully, I got older and realized how ridiculous this way of thinking is, as it blatantly regards women as property. 

As I see it, a female "saving herself" because she personally feels she is not ready, is fine.  A female "saving herself" because she won't give in to the pressure society or her peers put on her to have sex, is fine.  But "saving herself" in order to stay "pure" — that's sexual repression. 

But, then, repression is a two-way street — if a female is having sex because she feels that by a certain age she should, or because if she doesn't, she'll be branded a "prude," she's also being repressed. 

Personally, I view sexual liberation as making your own choices based on what you truly want, not based on what you feel you ought to do or on what you feel is acceptable in the eyes of others.  I don't see how viewing it any other way would make sense. 

Something interesting to think about is why so much emotional emphasis for a lot of girls/women is put on good old everyday heterosexual penis-in-vagina intercourse, even if they aren't waiting for marriage or abstaining from it because having it would make them a 'slut' or a 'whore'.  Not that there's anything necessarily wrong with intercourse, but I think most people don't know why they focus so strongly on it, and they never ask themselves why they feel the way they do. 

What makes intercourse any different from other kinds of sex, after all? Sex is sex, right?  Oh no, I'm sorry — a lot of people would say — only heterosexual intercourse is sex. 

That kind of attitude leads me to believe that common attitudes towards virginity are not only discriminatory and degrading to women, but heterosexist as well.  Patriarchal even, as the emotional emphasis on penis-in-vagina sex is usually attributed to women far more than to men.  Also, it leads to the way of thinking that sex is for reproduction and for reproduction only. 

The dictionary definition of virginity is: the state of being pure, unsullied, or untouched. 

Now in my opinion, there needs to be a new word used to describe sexual inexperience, or the definition should be changed to just that: sexual inexperience.  No special value should be placed on any kind of sex until it ceases to be sex and becomes "lovemaking".  So I guess in other words, no special value should be placed on any kind of sex, period.  It's only fair.