Read Virginity Lost: An Intimate Portrait of First Sexual Experiences Online
Authors: Laura Carpenter
Virginity Lost: An Intimate Portrait of First Sexual Experiences (51 page)
See also Omolade 1983, Wyatt 1997. Tolman (1996) found a similar pat- tern among urban Latinas, who are also popularly viewed as promiscuous.
All quotes in this section from E-Bay Sucks (n.d.); Wylie 1999; Reiter 1999;
New York Post
1999.Another version of the story circulated in which Cornworth’s virginity
drew only embarrassingly low bids.
Wylie 1999.
The possibility of the commercial exploitation of virginity prompted much outcry from moral conservatives in the case of another virginity-related Internet hoax, in July 1998, when two alleged 18-year-olds, Mike and Diane, announced their plan to lose their mutual virginity live on the Web on August 4, 1998.
Goffman 1963, 3. The stigmatizing process unfolds in the same manner whether the deviant attribute is actually perceived or merely inferred. Social dis- crediting hinges on the distinction between actual and virtual social identity; a person is discredited when their actual identity (who they really are) is discrepant from their virtual identity (who they appear to be). We generally assume that the people we meet are what they appear to be, lacking concrete reasons to think otherwise (Goffman 1959).
Such labeling often entails negative stereotyping (Heatherton et al. 2000). The stereotypes associated with a stigma are often interpreted as evidence of the stigma. For instance, virgin men are often derogated as unpopular, unattractive, and effeminate; those traits, conversely, may be viewed as indicating a man’s vir- ginity.
Goffman 1963.
Goffman (1963) distinguishes between
passing
(deliberate concealment) and
covering
(using subtle strategies to minimize a stigma).One common claim is that virgin women’s gait differs from that of nonvir- gins. On the folklore of detecting virginity, and the fallibility of tests of virginity (including physiological tests), see Kelly 2000, Weis 1985.
See especially Jones et al. 1984.
For example, in the United States, HIV/AIDS has been highly stigmatiz- ing in part because many of the first sufferers came from relatively powerless, al- ready-stigmatized social groups — gay men and injection-drug users (Brandt 1987; Sontag 1989).
One-fifth of the women (7) and about three-fifths of the men (16) had thought of virginity as a stigma at some point in their lives. Four women and 15 men saw virginity as a stigma at the time of their own virginity loss.
By using this term, I mean only that these men and women saw them- selves as stigmatized at the time they lost their virginity, not that they were inher- ently stigmatized or that others agreed with their self-assessments. Stigma is, as noted above, socially constructed and highly contextual.
The classic sociological treatise on stigma is Erving Goffman’s (1963)
Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity.
This chapter also relies on the work of Jones et al. 1984, Link and Phelan 2001, and Heatherton et al. 2000.Of the 19 people in this group, 9 lost their virginity with a boyfriend or girlfriend, 3 with a close friend, 3 with an acquaintance, and 4 with a virtual stranger.
Most of these men and women were relatively young (16 or under) at vir- ginity loss.
On people’s reluctance to expose others and tendency to give them the benefit of the doubt, see Goffman 1963, Jones et al. 1984.
On the stigma of homosexuality, see Plummer 1979. Young adults in one recent study spoke of “first sex” in ways that indicated they saw it as a means of demonstrating their heterosexuality; this pattern was more pronounced among the men than the women, perhaps because masculinity has historically been linked more closely to sexual performance than has femininity (Holland, Ra- mazanoglu, and Thomson 1996). Gay and bisexual boys tend to describe sexual encounters with girls as something they did to “test” their sexual identity, whereas lesbian and bisexual girls characterize sex with boys as something they’d “expected” (Herdt and Boxer 1993; Savin-Williams 2003; though see Raymond 1994).
This was true regardless of the sex of the partner with whom they lost their virginity. That Kendall did not
consciously
experience his virginity and ho- mosexuality as a dual stigma may be due to his relative youth and early stage in coming out when he lost his virginity. See Goffman 1963 on the co-presence of stigmas.Four of the 6 gay men who saw virginity as relevant to their lives (i.e., to same-sex sexuality) interpreted it as a stigma at the time of virginity loss, as did one of two bisexual men.
Two-thirds of the stigma group expected
intense
physical pleasure from virginity loss.Anderson 1995.
Bowser 1994.
Mahay, Laumann, and Michaels 2001; Upchurch et al. 1998.
Put differently, these young men incorporated what Robert Staples (1995) called the myth of Black sexual superiority, originally a racist stereotype imposed on Black men, into their self-identity.
White 1999; Anderson 1995; Sterk-Elifson 1994; Wyatt 1997.
My research supports studies finding greater gender disparity among Blacks than Whites (e.g., Wilson 1986; Upchurch et al. 1998). Mahay, Laumann, and Michaels (2001) found greater gender disparities in beliefs and smaller dif- ferences in behavior among African Americans than European Americans.
Bowser (1994) argues that the sexual double standard is less pronounced among Blacks than Whites.
On interracial dating and sexual relationships, see Ford, Sohn, and Lep- kowski 2003.
Wyatt (1997) traces this mistrust to attitudes that developed during slav- ery and Reconstruction, when Black women could not control their sexuality and Black men could not protect their wives and daughters as they believed they ought to do. See also Collins 2004, Staples 1995.
My research supports previous studies suggesting that perceptions of peers’ behavior are more influential than peers’ actual behavior and that close friends’ beliefs and behaviors have a greater impact than those of acquaintances (Billy and Udry 1985b; Kinsman et al. 1998).
Heavy petters in the stigma group typically had encounters with several (often casual) partners, while remaining virgins.
If Pam had subscribed to the “feminine” view of virginity as a gift, her excitement might have stemmed from a sense that receiving Marty’s virginity would prove she was special to him. However, her interest in having sex in a weeks-old relationship suggests she was inclined to view virginity as a stigma or process. By a similar token, HIV-negative individuals may sympathize with peo- ple who have contracted HIV from blood transfusions because it is easy to think, “That could have been me.” Jones et al. (1984) note that ambivalent reactions to stigmatized people are much theorized but not widely tested empirically.
Goffman 1963; Jones et al. 1984. Although one might imagine that peo- ple who drew on the stigma frame would prefer experienced partners for their ostensibly greater willingness to have sex, no one I interviewed suggested as much.
Bromley and Britten (1938) note similar patterns.
Alternatively, individuals may seek to overcome their stigma by master- ing skills seen as off limits to people with that stigma — for instance, a virgin might seek attractive romantic partners—or by putting an unconventional spin on their identity, such as extolling “virgin chic.” In my study, the first practice was extremely rare among the stigmatized and the second nonexistent; however, gifters and processers used these strategies when confronted by people who saw them as stigmatized.
Goffman (1959, 1963) argues that strangers are especially likely to pro- tect one another from losing face in awkward social situations.
One of the hallmarks of stigmas is their capacity for disrupting social in- teractions (Jones et al. 1984). Despite posing few pitfalls for ordinary interac- tions, virginity may well disrupt those in which sexuality plays a central role, such as romantic relationships and friendships that rely on sexual banter for amusement. Although Bill’s stigma disrupted his interaction with Diane, she did-
n’t attribute the disruption to his stigma, even though his awkwardness gave her reason to question his appearance as a normal, i.e.,
nonvirgin,
adult man. She may have been giving him the benefit of the doubt (Goffman 1959).See Goffman (1963) on the tendency of stigmas to leave lasting marks after their removal, and on the tendency of people who have overcome a stigma to conceal their former stigmatized status. People who are seen as not responsi- ble for their stigma (like virgins, who are born that way) typically receive more favorable treatment than people who are thought to have caused, or perpetu- ated, theirs (Jones et al. 1984). Since virginity is universal, the extent of a per- son’s shame at having his
former
virginity discovered seems to depend on whether he lost his virginity in stigmatizing conditions.The fact that he’d lost one motivation for pursuing sex—getting rid of virginity—made it easier for him to delay. Bill might have been less sensitive to Diane’s reaction had he not felt so intensely stigmatized in the first place.
In this, they resemble the women who retained their vision of virginity as a gift even after disempowering experiences.
Holland et al. (1996), for instance, found that making fun of male per- formance was one of the few ways young British women felt able to assert them- selves during virginity loss.
The third is Scott Lindstrom, a 25-year-old, heterosexual White man from a working-class family. When he lost his virginity at age 19, his girlfriend angrily accused him of sexual ineptitude. In contrast, Don Coulter (32, hetero- sexual, White, working-class background) said his girlfriend responded sympa- thetically to his clumsy performance and was pleased by his virginity. None of the men who concealed their virginity from male partners reported discovery or ridicule.
When I asked if there was an ideal age for virginity loss, people who fa- vored the stigma frame named lower ages than any other group, with more than two-thirds approving of virginity loss at 15 or younger (compared with about one-third of gifters and processers). Several gifters and processers believed that they would have seen their virginity as stigmatizing if they hadn’t lost it when they did.
Emma explained that, at the time, Jonathan had identified himself as bi- sexual; he came out as gay in college.
This ability is one of stigmatized people’s few sources of power (Jones et al. 1984).
Goffman 1963; Jones et al. 1984.
Goffman 1963. No one reported being sanctioned for hiding virginity from friends, but doing so directly was relatively rare, unless all friends were equally eager to deny virginity and moderated their inquisitiveness accordingly.
One of the two viewed virginity as a stigma, the other saw it as a rite of passage.
These stereotypes apply to Black women and urban Latinas with particu- lar virulence (Tolman 1996; Wyatt 1997); however, Asian American women also contend with the sexualized “Dragon Lady” stereotype (Espiritu 2000). Further- more, White and Asian American women are less likely than African American women and Latinas to follow religious traditions that promote the idea that vir- ginity is a gift.
On stigma and rape, see Sheffield 1997.
Rough sex may help some rape victims work through the trauma they ex- perienced (Herman 1997). Ed described recognizing his sexual attraction to men and acting on it as two steps in the same extended learning process. (See also chapter 5.) Having sex with another man, Ed said, “didn’t change how I thought of things . . . [b]ecause the change happened when I realized, several months be- fore, that I was attracted to some men. And it was dealing with that attraction that changed things. Actually doing something about it just seemed . . . a natural progression after the attraction.”
By a similar token, I interviewed several people who had retrospectively added oral sex to the activities they believed could result in virginity loss but who declined to apply those definitions to their own experiences with oral sex before vaginal sex (Carpenter 1999).
None of the Latinos, Latinas, or Asian Americans I interviewed had seen their virginity as a stigma.
Rubin 1990; Sprecher and Regan 1996; Thompson 1995.
The increasing visibility of lesbigay life has not only made it more imper- ative for lesbigay people to
openly
demonstrate their sexual identity, but also has reduced the degree to which heterosexuality is taken for granted, such that het- erosexuals are increasingly required to “prove” their sexual identity.
notes t o chapter 5
Malinowski 1929; Mead 1939. Given the relative permissiveness of the sexual cultures these books described, it is likely that many readers’ interest was of a rather prurient nature. French anthropologist Arnold Van Gennep, who was first to recognize the structural similarities between the rituals celebrating such transitions, loathed the term “puberty rites” and was adamant that scholars should distinguish between rites of physiological puberty and social puberty. Mead and Malinowski were major figures in Anglo-American anthropology’s campaign to influence the public sphere in the wake of World War I (MacClancy 1996).
This discussion relies primarily on the works of Glaser and Strauss 1971, Turner 1969, and van Gennep 1908. Van Gennep coined the term
rite of passageOn the passage from childhood to adulthood in non-Western contexts, see Muuss 1970, Schlegel 1995.
For example, Neil Simon’s 1986 play,
Biloxi Blues.Products of their time, early anthropologists tended to think of virginity primarily as an attribute of women and to frame becoming sexually active as critical to achieving manhood (whereas they framed motherhood as crucial to womanhood). As van Gennep (1908) wrote, “A woman’s first coitus has a ritual character which gives rise to a whole series of rites pertaining to the loss of vir- ginity” (176). On virginity loss as a rite of achieving manhood, see Holland, Ra- mazanoglu, and Thomson 1996.
In her 1970 book,
Culture and Commitment: A Study of the Generation Gap,
and in a regular column for
Redbook
magazine from 1963 to 1979, Mead harnessed anthropological research to reassure parents worried about the psy- chological health and sexual development of their offspring (Mitchell 1996). At the time,
Redbook
’s audience included both genders.Three-fourths of the men and women who drew on this metaphor spoke of it primarily as a learning process, while one-fourth dwelled on its role in con- ferring adulthood.
Some sociologists prefer the term “status passage,” to emphasize the social statuses involved in such transitions (e.g., Glaser and Strauss 1971). “Process” was the term used most often by study participants.