Purity

Ellen Goodman had an interesting column in today's Courier-Journal entitled "The Surgical Re-Virgins". The column is about a trend among some immigrant and Muslim women to have their hymens surgically restored to make them more 'marrigeable'. Of course, the whole business of an intact hymen proving virginity is nonsense to begin with. Women are born with varying degrees of perforation of the hymen, and further perforation can occur through non-sexual experiences.

But biology aside, Goodman considers what virginity and abstinence really mean - not just in Muslim culture, but in our own, as well. Abstinence-only sex education has been our government's big push for a number of years now. Goodman questions whether it's all about protection. She suggests that "...the flip side of purity lectures is the conviction that sex - and the girls who have it - is dirty."

Goodman wonders whether it's hymens that are in need of repair or the whole culture. It's not surprising that people have such a difficult time feeling good about their sexuality. If virginity equals purity, where does that leave all the non-virgins?