Regardless of how slow and tedious our childhoods seem to go, in retrospect everything happened so quickly. One day you wake up and you’re not a kid anymore, you have adult responsibilities and things need to get done. At the same time, you enter into the world of expression through sexuality, something you shouldn’t have experienced as a child. It’s brand new and in the blink of an eye it’s all about sex, sex and more sex. But before you can become completely sexually active you have to go through that awkward, unavoidable situation of virginity – wonderful. Even though everyone comes out of the womb a virgin, there has always seemed to be a disadvantage for women, making an already uncomfortable situation even more uncomfortable – again, wonderful.
Seeing as my mother is relatively conservative I was raised from the get go that sex was meant to be shared between two people who loved each other, were well into their twenties and planned to spend the rest of lives happily together, settled down, wedded and kids on the way. I was taught that sex wasn’t something you handed out and it’s an extremely sacred thing. To this day, I still think sex is more special and generally more enjoyable when it’s with someone you care about, but the idea that it’s awfully sacred and only something you do with someone you love is so out-dated and places a volume of pressure on women. Maybe this wouldn’t be as unbearable if we treated women and men alike but this is reality and that simply doesn’t happen. The double standards that women and their sexuality face go unsaid, and it’s time we put these virginity myths and toxic ideology to bed.
No, a woman does not become “impure” after she has sex for the first time.
This, to me, is the epitome of double standards in our society concerning women and sex. The hypothesis is that as soon as a woman partakes in sexual intercourse (specifically with a man she is not in a committed relationship with or even married to) she suddenly becomes a godless sinner, she has been touched by the hands of the sex devil and there is no going back! This mentality can cause extreme problems to multiple degrees. Lets say a young woman is a victim of rape, she already has to deal with the sole baggage of rape itself but now she is seen as “impure” and this idea has actually caused many close family bonds to become estranged because this links to the idea that some girls who dress provocatively or more revealingly are “asking for it.” Another example may be that a woman simply wants to enjoy sex even if she is not in a relationship (which isn’t a crime) but it is impossible to do so without the heckling from other people (who she isn’t affecting in any case) who can’t mind their own business. This concept of impurity after sex has never been applied to men. Instead sex is associated as power which men can use to their advantage, and the younger a boy can lose his virginity the better. This of course isn’t the same for everyone and everywhere but it’s a general standard that society has set.
There’s never a “right” time for a woman to lose her virginity.
The statement above is pretty evident, and it makes the battle on virginity one million times more difficult for young girls who are already going through uncomfortable teen experiences. Female sexuality is displayed in front of our very eyes everywhere we go now. It’s on TV (advertisements for makeup, cars, chocolate, sunglasses, the list goes on), magazines, video games, social media etc. You can’t escape the naked body. This will naturally encourage young women to become sexually active at a younger age then in the past and will also allow young men to expect it sooner. However, when a young girl does decide to have sex for the first time there is always going to be a wave of criticism. “She’s too young!” or “where are her parents?!” But if she decides to wait she is “prude” or “frigid.” It just feels as though some men don’t like the idea of women losing their virginity at all, but this doesn’t make sense since these are the same fellas who are having sex every weekend. Obviously I am not condoning the act of sex between children, and I don’t personally encourage the act of sex at all until at least sixteen, because it’s when you know slightly better and are more aware of the world and the consequences. But naturally everybody grows at their own pace, and it should only be done when the time is right for you, not on anybody else’s watch, whether that is sixteen or twenty two.
Stop shaming women for whatever choices they decide.
Period.
