Purity Defined

So. All this discussion of the "Daddy's Li'l Virgin" movement has me thinking about what virginity means. And why it means it.

What's virginity? Or "Purity," to use the new buzzword? Actually, "Purity" is a better place to start, because "virginity" has a fairly clinical meaning that could easily be confused with the social meaning. It's easy enough to coerce an 11 year-old into swearing Purity till marriage, but how, exactly, do we define Purity for little Melanie and her cohort?

Because, guess what--little Melanie is going to be impure.

And, no, I don't mean in a the-more-you-lock-em-up, the-more-they-run-around sort of way. I mean in a by-definition sort of way. If Melanie is going to go through adolescence as anything other than a nun, she's going to be impure.

How can I be so sure? Well, look at it this way. There is a virtual certainty that she will, at some point, kiss someone to whom she is not yet married. Unless she refrains from even kissing before marriage, she's impure.

How's that?

Well, OK. I think we'll all agree that penile/vaginal sex would qualify as "impure." That is, I believe, generally considered to the basic sex act, and the one which most people have in mind when tossing around words like "virginity" and "chastity." So any amount of penile/vaginal sex is clearly verboten.

As a result, a lot of kids being raised on abstinence-only sex ed have taken up the notion that anything else goes. Oral, anal, what have you. Sounds like Rick Santorum's nightmare. Personally, I think it's a hoot. All these squeaky-clean VBS inmates running around, promising their lives to Jesus, listening to Amy Grant, and taking it up the ass (the girls, of course. We all know how much Jesus hates homosexuality).

My friend had a girlfriend like that in college. Wouldn't dream of losing her virginity to anyone except the man she married, but (by report) she could suck the chrome off a trailer hitch. Go figure.

Somehow, I don't think that's James Dobson's version of "Purity."

Then where do we draw the line?

I mean, if a blowjob is unchaste (and I have a hard time imagining that the average Christian father wouldn't agree), then what about a hand job?

Probably "un-chaste." So would manual stimulation of non-genital erogenous zones (aka, "groping") be unchaste if done under the undergarments? What if it's over the undergarments, but under the clothing? Or is it only "chaste" if the hands stay outside of the clothes at all times?

Hmmm. I know that if I had told my high school friends that I was no longer a virgin because I had groped someone through her clothes, they would have questioned my definition of the word. And my sanity. After they stopped laughing.

See where this is going? We could take this all the way up to the aforementioned kissing: is chaste kissing limited to closed lips? Do you lose your virginity if tongues are involved? What if you nibble an earlobe? Does that make Baby Jesus Cry?

Serious: where do we draw the line? There's no really clear division between "chaste" and "unchaste," between "Pure" and "Filthy Whore." Between "True Love Waits" and "Girls Gone Wild"

Unless...

Unless it really is all about penile/vaginal sex. Hmmm. Now why would that be?

If you said "Because it's about the goddamn patrilineage!" go get yerself a cookie.

To protect the patrilineage, there's really only one thing that's required. A total ban (for women) on penile/vaginal sex with anyone other than your husband. You can mess around in all the other ways that you want to, but as long as you keep the sperm away from the ova, we can all agree to look the other way.

Hell, why do you think they used eunuchs (who do not necessarily lose either sexual desire or sexual functioning--just the ability to ejaculate) to guard harems? As long as you're not messing with the patrilineage, you are as "pure" as you need to be.

Now, I'm not saying that the Daddy's L'il Virgin^® crowd are actually giving conscious thought to little Melanie's role in preserving the genetic purity of their bloodline. That's just where the concept of "Purity" comes from. What I think the Daddies in question are thinking consciously is that a) they don't want their girls to be "filthy whores" and b) it's their job to make sure they don't end up that way.

In other words, it's their job to control female sexuality.

"But," I hear you cry, "isn't the job of a parent to control their children (you America-hating liberal who will be justly punished by a wrathful Jehovah by having your daughters turn into disease-ridden sluts)?"

To which I answer: First of all, if it were the "parents" who were involved here, I'd be a little less uneasy. But what with the whole "High Priest" shtick going on, I get pretty queasy about the fact that it's just dad weighing in on little Melanie's proto-sexuality.

But second of all, and more to the point, no. No, it is not the job of parents to control their children. It is the job of parents to teach children how to control themselves.

When EvilGeniusGirl was old enough to understand what a knife was, I didn't make her pledge to never, ever touch a knife unitil she was an adult. I told her that they were dangerous, and that they were for grownups, and that I could cut anything that she needed cut. As she matured, I started showing her how to use a knife safely. I let her help me cut things. I let her use kitchen knives under my supervision. I let her use kitchen knives without my supervision. Finally, at this last birthday, I gave her her own pocket knife. It was my way of saying, "You've shown responsibility. I trust your judgment. It's your decision from now on."

And I figure the Wife and I will do pretty much the same with sexuality. She's still in the "Boys--Ick!" stage, but I don't think it will last a whole lot longer.

So we're going to tell the kids (and already have done so in age-appropriate bits and pieces) the facts, with emphasis on the facts, of life. That p/v sex is fundamentally different than oral sex because only one can get you pregnant, but either can get you an STD. But that you can't get an STD from groping (no, I will not be that crude or graphic with my kids. Jeez.)

This will include the psychological facts as well--that there are very different emotional and psychological meanings/effects that go with different sex acts. Just as some behaviors can get you pregnant and some can't, some behaviors can have a much more serious impact on a relationship, on your self-definition, on your ego, than others.

And that sex is an incredibly powerful force that you don't want to take lightly. In the same way I want to be real damn sure she takes the risks seriously when she's driving, I'm going to want to be real damn sure that she's seriously considering the impact that sex can have on her life (and the lives of others)--physically, emotionally, psychologically, spirtually.

There's a lot going on there, I don't see a clear dividing line. If you're going to insist that there is, that there's a hard boundary between "chaste" and "slutty," I say you either have to endorse the idea that it really is all bout p/v sex and the sanctity of the patrilineage, or admit that you're being more than a little disingenuous with little Melanie.