The Role Of Virginity In The Purity Myth

Virginity has always been something society has obsessed over and is a social construct that desperately needs to be changed. Even though sexual purity is a complete myth, it has been taught over and over to women that being a good person all depends on whether or not they’re sexually active. In The Purity Myth by Jessica Valenti, a radical and well-educated feminist, she says, “…Women are led to believe that our moral compass lies somewhere between our legs…Whether it’s the determining factor in our “cleanliness” and “purity” or the marker of our character, virginity has an increasingly dangerous hold over women. If affects not only our ability to see ourselves as ethical actors outside of our own bodies, but also how the world interacts with us.” Not only is this teaching women that their personhood hinders completely on their

Rachel Simmons, psychologist and author, released a book a few years ago called The Curse of the Good Girl, in it she said “good girls” are walking a fine line, in attempt to be something but not too much of something as to be dirty. Society conditions women when they are young, but they aren’t the only ones who are conditioned. The impact this has on young men and boys is just as harmful because while girls internalize these messages, boys grow up to continue enforcing them. In another work by Valenti, called He’s a Stud, She’s a Slut: The Sexual Double Standard, she stated, “Men who have a lot of sexual partners are studs, Casanovas, pimps, and players. Never sluts.” Which, of course, is the complete opposite for women who have multiple sex partners. A situation like this occurs quite often, where two guy friends are comparing their lists of conquests, and they found that they had slept with the same