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wrong.
    Abstinence-only classes are part of the reason why one in four young American women have a sexually transmitted infection (STI), 31 and are cer- tainly to blame for the disturbing revelation that teens in Florida believe drinking a cap of bleach will prevent HIV, and a shot of Mountain Dew will stop pregnancy. 32 These are the organizations with billboards peppered across America’s highways telling young women, Wait for the bling and The ultimate wedding gift is your virginity. 33
    All of these messages—which position certain young women as the ideal, substitute sexual purity for real morality, and commodify virginity— are part of a larger effort to roll back all women’s rights. The virginity move- ment is seeking a return to traditional gender roles, and focusing on purity is the vehicle toward that end.
    When I emailed my high school ex to let him know about this book, I asked him about our first time and what he took away from the experience. Like mine, his memories were wrought with uncomfortable moments* and questions. He remembers writing the date above his bed as a way to add per- manence to a fleeting moment. I was surprised to learn, however, that his views about women’s sexuality weren’t any more sophisticated than what I remembered them to be during our teenage years.
    “No matter how sexually curious or ‘ready’ a girl is, she seems to be able to keep her wits about her a bit better than her male counterparts, so more is expected of [women], and rightly so,” Josh wrote to me. This is an all-too-

    * Like his trying to hold back by staring at a bottle of Drakkar Noir cologne and attempt- ing to spell the name backward.

    jessica valenti 39
    common assertion—the idea that women are somehow less sexual than men and are therefore the gatekeepers of sexual morals. It’s a fundamental notion of the virginity movement, however, so I shouldn’t have been so shocked to hear this line of reasoning being regurgitated by my former boyfriend. After all, the purity message is widespread. But it’s one thing to hear the media use this type of language about Britney Spears; it was quite another to hear an ex- boyfriend use it about me. At the end of the day, though, it is about me—it’s about all of us. However theoretically we’d like to discuss issues of virginity, purity, and women’s moral value, the fact is, they affect all of us.

40 the Purity myth

    c h a P ter 2
    ta i nted love

    “Your body is a wrapped lollipop. When you have sex with a man, he unwraps your lollipop and sucks on it. It may feel great at the time, but, unfortunately, when he’s done with you, all you have left for your next partner is a poorly wrapped, saliva-fouled sucker.”
    d a r r e n w a s h i n g t o n,
    an abstinence educator at the Eighth Annual Abstinence Clearinghouse Conference 1

    the above Quote is one i rePeat often when speaking at colleges and feminist events. It’s shocking, telling, and, frankly, disgusting. Unfortu- nately, it also epitomizes the message that the virginity movement is working so hard to send to women: Sex makes us less whole and a whole lot dirtier.
    I’ve never understood what it is about having sex that makes women dirty. I can recall countless conversations I’ve had or overhead over the years about women’s supposed sexual dirtiness. Struggling with the irrationality of it all, I’ve often wondered how it’s possible that a penis could have such power, that by merely being in the vicinity of a woman’s genitals, it could transfer some kind of ambiguous filth onto us. Or perhaps women are just born dirty, and the sex merely reinforces our sullied selves’ true nature.

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    When I’ve gotten engaged enough to argue commonsense points about the sexual double standard—Aren’t men sullied as well? If you use a con- dom, are you less dirty because you don’t actually come in contact with the penis?—I’ve been met with refutations, mostly from men, about how women who