What Is Virginity?

There’s so much gossip about who’s a virgin, who’s not, who lost their V-card to whom, and on and on and on . . . but um, what is virginity to begin with?

I know you’re rolling your eyes, and being like, *duh* how can you not know what virginity is? But um, I don’t think it’s as simple as you think it is.

A lot of people think that a girl only has her virginity as long as her hymen–a membrane that partially or totally covers the vaginal opening–hasn’t been broken. That said? A lot of people are plainly wrong. Your hymen can be broken lots of ways besides having sex–like through exercise or horseback riding–so what shape it’s in really is no indication of whether or not you’re a virgin. Let’s throw that one in the trash.

Some other people think that your virginity is over the first time anything goes into your vagina. Don’t listen to these people, either! They’re dummies! Using a tampon will not make you lose your virginity, and neither will having a thorough exam at the gynecologist. Virginity is about sex–and since neither of those things are sex, neither of them affect your V-card. Simple as that.

But now we’re coming to the biggie: Since we’ve established that you have your virginity until you have sex for the first time, what kind of sex are we talking about, exactly? There are lots of different kinds of sex, and not everybody will have every kind in their lifetime. Think about it: Most lesbians probably aren’t ever going to ask a dude to enter their vagina, but that doesn’t mean all lesbians are life-long virgins!

This is where things get a little murky and you can make your own call (for some people, oral sex counts, for others it doesn’t)–but I think you lose your virginity the first time you choose to have sex where your bits down there are in contact with someone else’s down there bits. Girls can do it with boys or girls. Guys can do it with girls or guys. It’s an equal opportunity V-card ditch day!

But let’s back up one tiny bit, because I think there’s something else super important that we haven’t talked about. I said that you lose your virginity the first time you choose to have sex–and choose is a super key word. I know that some people think that your virginity can be stolen from you if you are raped or sexually abused in another way, but I don’t like to give that much power to the horrible people who commit such awful crimes. Sex is about pleasure, and to experience it fully, you have to choose to do it yourself. It’s your decision, and nobody elses. I’m not trying to downplay the horrible stuff rape survivors go through–far from it–but I firmly believe that your V-card is yours and yours alone, and that nobody can steal that special feeling that you’ll have the first time you do it because you want to.