By Bahoz Dara
Sex is exceptionally bizarre; it’s an intricate paradigm unlike any other human act. Sex culture is built up of so many components, all diverse, all of which are victim to mass pressure, yet as a whole are still disguised as simplistic clichés.
The greatest of these socialistic commonalities that I have personally come across is the actual commencing of sexual activity: the almighty loss of virginity.
Most ideals regarding having sex for the first time are portrayed as very cookie-cutter and transferable to every person, when in reality the first experience for everyone varies.
I didn’t begin to understand the mass amount of assortment in thoughts, opinions and experiences regarding virginity loss, until I came to terms with losing my own.
My primary sexual intercourse was incredibly unplanned, and completely on the opposite end of the ideal virginity loss spectrum that I had formulated for myself years prior.
It ended up being a drunken mess, in a town far away from home, with a male who although was not a bad guy, but not really a character I would depict as a friend at the time, or you know … ever.
I can still recall the feeling I had the next morning, it was a mix of confusion, disappointment, with just a dash of embarrassment; not the perfect combination I had always hoped I would feel.
Also, I clearly recall obsessing over the fact that the first person I allowed inside me had an awful taste in music, I think this component alone ruined my fantasy of a first love- Macklemore still sucks by the way!
Despite all these aspects that I had never wanted, I can honestly state that this event was a prominent milestone within my life; I grew to better understand both others and myself.
My journey of self-acceptance produced a very vital question “is there too much pressure placed upon individuals about how and when they should lose their virginity?” In order to obtain a more accurate depiction of this concept, I looked to my peers for assistance, each from various different levels of sexual experience and backgrounds on their views, beliefs, and experiences.
Those who had already lost their virginity shared their initial experiences with me. Out of the ten or so people I spoke to only two who had the “perfect” occurrence that younger me so desperately desired; the others lost theirs to strangers, in a best friend pact, to someone they were seeing for a minimal amount of time, or an acquaintance at a party. It was semi-satisfying that I wasn’t alone in my situation, and that perhaps the “norm” I grew up with was not actually what many people undergo.
The details also varied among every participant’s life event; there was not a set age, time, or location, which everyone had followed. To me the vast range in experience and overall variety of certain elements, exhibits that there really isn’t some sort of guide we as a society should be following.
Although, there was one outstanding similarity in every contributor’s belief towards having sex for the first time and that was it should be when you are ready.
I also adopt this moral, I believe one should wait the moment they feel comfortable, and wish to engage in consensual activity with someone who is consenting in return; it should be a situation lacking coercion, and pressure.
All other painfully specific details seem to be frivolous; we are different people, we lead different lives, why must every distinctive individual lose their virginity in the same way, and at the same age?
Take your time friends; there is no rush to awkwardly rub your privates with another person. Just remember, as someone who’d rather stay anonymous told me, “no one chooses who they vote for in elections based on when and how they first had sex.”
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