Virginity, What’s Up with That? by VaVaVooom Staff - Kaela

Virginity, what’s up with that? “Virginity” has been a topic of conversation for centuries and usually focus on who has it and what that means socially. More recently, virginity has been the subject of conversation because rapper TI spoke about accompanying his 18 year old daughter to gynecologist appointments specifically to have her hymen (and therefore her virginity) checked.

As soon as news about his absurd behavior reached the public, there was a lot of understandable backlash reflecting the overall outrage individuals, especially individuals who have vaginas, felt about his choice as well as concern being voiced about the welfare of his daughter.

I could write countless articles on this situation; I could write about the unnecessary violation of personal autonomy this man has subjected his daughter to and about the humiliation she has gone through at the hands of healthcare professionals to appease the desires of a man who has an outdated knowledge base at best and a sadistic need to have control over women’s bodies at worst.

There are a lot of possible directions I could go with this article, but an excellent place to start is a discussion about that virginity actually is. For as long as the concept of virginity has existed, the definition of what it actually is hasn’t been solidified. The most literal definition of virginity is, “the state of never having had sexual intercourse” which we are taught means having penis in vagina sex, but what about people who don’t have penis in vagina sex?

Also, older definitions of virginity stated a virgin was a woman who did not “belong to a man”, which still leaves a fair amount of grey area and is still very slanted towards vagina owners experiencing shame when virginity is “lost” regardless of the terms under which it was “lost”.

There are some people who would argue the significance of the hymen is relation of virginity, but is there even a connection? Seems like there are more questions than answers. Out of all these questions, the hymen and its significance is probably the simplest to answer. The hymen is a thin piece of fleshy tissue that is located at the vaginal entrance. Whenever someone talks about the hymen is relation to virginity it’s usually because they have been taught that it is a solid piece of tissue that can only be broken during sex.

Contrary to this belief, the hymen usually has a naturally occurring “hole” in it to allow for period blood to flow through. The hymen is just a varied as vulvas meaning that the opening in the hymen can be so large that it doesn’t look like there is a hymen at all while sometimes the hymen be a solid piece of tissue. However, even if the hymen exists as a solid piece of tissue there are still a variety of ways that a hole can be created (“popping the cherry”) including physical activities ranging from riding a bike to playing a sport to even inserting a tampon.

The connection between the hymen and virginity is nonexistent and only supports an out of date understanding of vaginal anatomy, is not scientifically supported, and is mostly just fear mongering to scare vagina owners away from having complete bodily autonomy and feeling free to explore all the parts of their bodies.

Virginity, in it’s truest essence, is the developmental passage from childhood into womanhood, and is never simply a physical process. It is composed of many psychological, spiritual and societal elements as well. It is a gradual awakening to the fullness of one’s erotic life. This part of a vulva-owning person’s life is a transformation over time and through experience, and only that person can know when she/they have arrived into a new state of being. Anyone whom truly cares for such a person will treat her/them with reverance and respect for such a beautiful and complex awakening.