LIKE A VIRGIN

THE WHOLE WORLD, 2016

MARIAN VIRGINITY

Considered symbolic by Protestants but very real by Catholics, the virginity of Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ is a model of purity for the Roman Catholic Church, which even established the principle of Immaculate Conception as a dogma in 1854.
Originally imposed probably to preserve the fertility of women and protect them from venereal diseases, as well as to ensure the legitimacy of their offspring, virginity is the subject of a return in American conservative currents which organize balls virgins where young prepubescent girls make a wish to arrive untouched at marriage, a wish of which the father is often the guarantor.

PSYCHOLOGICAL SUFFERING

The cultural pressure entailed by the obsession with virginity creates veritable psychoses in young girls for whom the awakening to sexuality is already the subject of trouble and hesitation. Specialized forums on the internet are littered with distress calls from anonymous girls seeking to fix what they consider to be wrong.
The phenomenon is not recent, however, the tricks to deceive are old: small vial hidden in the sheets, poultry innards prepared by girlfriends, razor blade to make a discreet cut on the wedding night, etc. The complicity of the husband is even more and more often invoked, especially when the couple has already had intercourse before marriage.

TRADE

Opportunistic young women would take advantage of this obsession with virginity to put theirs up for auction.
This is in particular the offer of a site created in Germany, Cinderella Escorts, which communicated on the purchase by a businessman of the virginity of an 18-year-old Romanian model Alexandra Khefren for more than two million dollars. .
The young woman subsequently denied it, the operation probably being just a simple communication stunt for the Escort girls site, but we measure the social obsession with the credulity of the media who dived into the anecdote. to write society notes on the moral decadence of an era.

VIRGINS FOR SALE

In 1885, a scandal broke out in England following the publication of an article in the Pall Mall Gazette. A journalist by the name of William Thomas Stead told how men from high society monetized relationships with young virgins often from the poorest social classes, sold by their parents or specialized matchmakers.
It must be said that at that time, the defloration of a virgin was reputed to cure Syphilis, which added to the atrocity of rape and to the risk of a potentially fatal pregnancy, contamination with one of the most terrible venereal scourges. of the modern era.
Today this myth has persisted and certain beliefs, particularly in South Africa, claim that a sexual act with a virgin could cure AIDS. In 2000 in parts of South Africa, almost 70% of rape victims were children.