Not sure why this got struck, but I'd like to see a source for that and "biochemical virginity", as that term returns no meaningful non-wikipedia hits on google. Mairi 05:09, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Struck because I undid my edits because I had insufficient time to complete them. I've now excised all text regarding biochemical virginity pending source information. -SocratesJedi | Talk 07:11, 4 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The Mayo Clinic at one time established a psychological documentation on how people felt after their first sexual experience, common difficulties, etc. This was a mainstream publication that was meant for patients. I saw this a long time ago and the data has probably changed enough to necessitate update, but if anyone can find this it could greatly contribute to the article. 64.31.188.26 00:23, 22 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A meaning then debased and used to exert control over woman by organised religons.

Anyone know of some of the origins of this idea? Would like to know more but not sure where to look.

i think there should be a disambiguation page for this article, because the the word "virgin" is likely to be refered to Virgin Group. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.130.26.25 (talk • contribs) .

You're right. There is already a disambiguation page here: Virgin (disambiguation). This article should have a hatnote that points to that article; I'm adding that now. In the future, don't forget that you can do this yourself. =) Powers 19:26, 8 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, "Why I Am Not a Christian" is not a book by Bertrand Russell. It is an essay (though originally a lecture). But the writer may be referring to a book that bears a similiar title("Why I Am Not a Christian : And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects") that includes that essay with others.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 218.45.160.201 (talk • contribs) .

Don't forget if you see an error, you can edit the article yourself. =) Powers 21:35, 20 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Check this out, Involuntary Virginity it is not uncommon for people who want to have sex but aren't "getting laid" are suffering from extreme shyness or Social Anxiety disorder.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 151.199.249.47 (talk • contribs) .

It's a rather grim topic to raise, but I wonder whether it is notable or not to mention the link between cultural perception of virginity and the practise of infibulation. This is a procedure, largely performed in sub-Saharan Africa, in which a female's (typically young girls) labia majora are sewed together, usually in some combination with female or "pharaonic" circumcision and/or clitoridotomy. The purpose of the procedure is both a cultural milestone as well as a method of enforcing female virginity before marriage. Speaking to the subject of virginity, it is notable as a method which has been used to prevent deflowering before marriage. Clearly, in such cultures virginity must be considered highly valuable, or else such customs would never have arisen. Does anyone else think this is worth mention in the article? Cheers, Kasreyn 06:34, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There are numerous traditions of devices and techniques intended to enforce virginity. I believe they all deserve some mention, including infibulation. Al 04:07, 6 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You're right, of course. Chastity Belts are another example. In general, most cultures throughout history have perceived virginity as a commodity - one which has been bought and sold by men, not women. A great many customs have this belief hidden at their origins. The article mentions modern perceptions of virginity, and religious perceptions, but fails to cover information of anthropological and historical worth. The sad truth is that for the majority of human history (and in some cultures, still to this day), a woman's virginity was a commodity, a marketable good, bought, sold, and traded by her father and/or brothers, typically to the highest bidder. Customs such as the dowry had their origins in this practise. The belief in virginity's value itself has its origins in male motivations predating recorded history - males have a strong urge to ensure paternity. This self-interest led to the preference of virgin females over non-virgin females. (Male virginity, of course, has never had any innate significance, though some cultures have given it some.)

The way women have been mistreated throughout history is surely a depressing topic, but I feel on notability grounds that it should be included here. In western cultures today, virginity may be seen as a sign of strength of will, purity, etc., but through the vast majority of human history it has been nothing but a price tag attached to a woman. Kasreyn 21:51, 6 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Richard Dawkins explained the evolutionary motivations for prefering virgin females rather nicely. The fun part about mankind is that the concept of sexual abstinence eventually became a religious matter and lead to various related acts and concepts like masturbation becoming social taboos. Although female virginity is a topic of its own, the obsession with sexual abstinence at all levels has been rather unisex at various points in history (although there almost always was a moral double-standard by gender, sexual preference or group).

The lengths to which some cultures went to ensure pre-marital sexual abstinence of their offspring is definitely noteworthy, though. — Ashmodai ^{(talk · contribs)} 23:07, 6 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, there's another purpose for infibulation/FGM that you don't raise, which is that in these cultures that practice it, there's generally an issue of demons invading bodies through any orifice (no, I don't know why head orifi don't count), so the infibulation/FGM that we find so totally abhorrent is partially meant as a protective measure. I know that this doesn't make it seem any better or more valid to us, but that's just a fact of the procedure. The other part of this demons thing is that if a person must be killed or pushed out of society for being what we would call "mad" or "homocidal" or whatever very negative and abhorrent condition they might have, that condition is generally understood as and justified for that person having been possessed by a demon through a wound or other demon-passing opening (as which a non-infibulated vulva counts). It's easy to approach these kinds of issues from a very western-culturally-centric viewpoint, but the fact is, the issue is far more complicated than we generally give it credit for.

When activists go into a country where this sort of thing is practiced and say "this must stop" but don't provide for providing other measures that are seen to be as valid as the one that's being stopped, they arguably cause a lot of harm in their interference.

I'm not saying that FGM/infibulation is completely unrelated to virginity, but I'm saying it's far more complicated, and we should really be careful when we talk about it from a purely Western viewpoint, especially since Wikipedia is a global resource. --MalcolmGin 14:01, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've read Dawkins on this, and he's quite likely right. My question now is precisewhy what additional material we need to add, and how we might structure it. Any ideas? Al 04:45, 7 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps a section on "cultural perceptions of virginity"? An overall paragraph or sub-section could note the similarities between various cultures, and then we could get specific about certain cultures' rituals and customs in other sub-sections. Kasreyn 04:59, 7 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This article definitely needs information on how the other world religions view virginity. I'd add it if I could, but I don't know much about it.--Cúchullain ^t/c 02:15, 4 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Latest edit seems not to fit NPOV and the reference link is to Plain Truth Online, not the most neutral of sources. 202.156.6.54 15:14, 3 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This section could potentially benefit if it were rewritten.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 169.229.76.39 (talk • contribs) .

Thank you for your suggestion! When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make those changes. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the Edit this page link at the top. You don't even need to log in (although there are many reasons why you might want to). The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold in updating pages. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes — they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills. New contributors are always welcome. Powers ^T 20:23, 3 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

On the topic of Judaism, I think clarification is needed. The article implies that Judaism is rather lax when it comes to sex before marriage, and that this has been true for its history. However, it is basically common knowledge, thanks to the Christian Gospels, that Jewish law had provisions for the stoning of adulterers, especially the female. In fact, much of Christian law about adultery and virginity comes from texts shared by Christianity and Judaism. The Pentateuch provides many punishments for the taking of virginity, and these often can include the death penalty, especially stoning. Perhaps the law was not often enforced, but it seems to me that the fact that the death penalty was on the books as a punishment for pre-marital sex should disqualify the word "lenient" as a description of Jewish law or practice.

I went on and removed the part that said celabicy is encouraged in Christianity, particularly in the book of Matthew. This is false. The Bible, while it writes about a celebate apostle, does not encourage celebacy. It actually says to be fruitful and multiply (of course, within the bonds of marriage) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.129.5.5 (talk • contribs) .

Sagaciousid 16:01, 10 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Put it back up. Please read the following, hoping it will help. I got this from http://www.new-life.net/premarital.htm

Premarital Sex and the Bible

Sometimes you will hear people say that the Bible doesn't say anything about premarital sex. Apparently this statement is made by people who haven't read the Bible or, at least, who haven't read it thoroughly. The Bible speaks in clear language directly to the issue in both the Old and New Testaments. Here are the Biblical passages with short comments.

Old Testament Scriptures Regarding Sex Before Marriage

Exodus 22:16-17 If a man seduces a virgin who is not pledged to be married and sleeps with her, he must pay the bride-price, and she shall be his wife. If her father absolutely refuses to give her to him, he must still pay the bride-price for virgins.

[If premarital sex occurs, then an Israelite male was to marry the woman he slept with - that is, assuming the father allowed the marriage.]

Deuteronomy 22:13-21 If a man takes a wife and, after lying with her, dislikes her and slanders her and gives her a bad name, saying, "I married this woman, but when I approached her, I did not find proof of her virginity," then the girl's father and mother shall bring proof that she was a virgin to the town elders at the gate. The girl's father will say to the elders, "I gave my daughter in marriage to this man, but he dislikes her. Now he has slandered her and said, 'I did not find your daughter to be a virgin.' But here is the proof of my daughter's virginity." Then her parents shall display the cloth before the elders of the town, and the elders shall take the man and punish him. They shall fine him a hundred shekels of silver and give them to the girl's father, because this man has given an Israelite virgin a bad name. She shall continue to be his wife; he must not divorce her as long as he lives. If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the girl's virginity can be found, she shall be brought to the door of her father's house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done a disgraceful thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father's house. You must purge the evil from among you.

[Premarital sex is viewed as a "disgraceful thing" and "evil."]

Proverbs 5:15-21 Drink water from your own cistern, running water from your own well. Should your springs overflow in the streets, your streams of water in the public squares? Let them be yours alone, never to be shared with strangers. May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth. A loving doe, a graceful deer-- may her breasts satisfy you always, may you ever be captivated by her love. Why be captivated, my son, by an adulteress? Why embrace the bosom of another man's wife? For a man's ways are in full view of the LORD, and he examines all his paths.

[A man's "fountain" should be saved for "the wife of [his] youth." The man is to be a virgin when he takes his wife.]

[In addition to these three Scriptures, there are 32 other verses in the Old Testament speaking about a "virgin" or "virgins." Each of these passages shows that virginity was highly cherished as the standard for God's people.]

New Testament Scriptures Regarding Sex Before Marriage

[When we come to the New Testament we don't have verses explicitly describing the act of premarital sex and its consequences like we do in Exodus or Deuteronomy. It is clear, however, that virginity is still the standard for unmarried Christians and that sex outside the context of marriage is still considered sin.]

1 Corinthians 6:16-18 Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, "The two will become one flesh." But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit. Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.

[Sexual intimacy "unites" you with the other person. When this uniting of flesh happens outside of marriage, it is called "sexual immorality." One fleshness is to be limited to the one you marry. This is similar to what we saw in Exodus 22:16-17.]

1 Corinthians 7:1-2 Now about the questions you asked in your letter. Yes, it is good to live a celibate life. But because there is so much sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband. [Notice that to avoid sexual immorality outside of marriage people should marry.]

1 Corinthians 7:8-9 Now I say to those who aren't married and to widows it's better to stay unmarried, just as I am. But if they can't control themselves, they should go ahead and marry. It's better to marry than to burn with lust. [If you are struggling with wanting to have sex, get married. Premarital sex isn't an option for dealing with lust. It's either marriage or you are in sexual sin.]

Ephesians 5:31

"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh."

[Paul is quoting from Genesis 2:24 and affirming the Old Testament standard of uniting in flesh only with your spouse. One fleshness is to happen when a man leaves his father and mother and is "united to his wife." Compare with 1 Corinthians 6:16-18.]

1 Thessalonians 4:2-8 For you know what instructions we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus. It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to acquire a wife in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this manner no one should cheat his brother or take advantage of him. The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit.

["Acquire a wife in a way that is holy and honorable" or you are in sexual immorality. Sexual sin harms others besides those who engage in it. In adultery, the spouse is always wronged. Premarital sex "cheats" the future partner by robbing him or her of the virginity that ought to be brought to marriage.]

Hebrews 13:4 Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.

[Again, it's a pure marriage bed or you are an "adulterer" or "sexually immoral."]

1 Timothy 5:2 Treat older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.

[As a Christian man, if you are not married to her, then she is your sister (who you must treat "with absolute purity").]

1 Corinthians 7:7:28,34,36-38

[Note in these verses how virginity is assumed for unmarried women living in Christian homes. This is the same thing as we saw in the Old Testament. Virginity was the standard for God's people.]

2 Corinthians 11:2 I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him.

[Although this passage is talking about Christ and His people, it uses the analogy of a Christian man receiving his bride "as a pure virgin." Virginity was the ideal. Premarital sex was viewed as sexual immorality - just as in the Old Testament.]

The standard in both the Old and New Testament regarding premarital sex is the same. Premarital sex is considered sin and a violation of the uniting of bodies that should happen only in marriage.

It is important to say, however, that many Christians have violated this standard. THIS WAS TRUE OF THOSE IN THE EARLY CHURCH TOO.

1 Corinthians 6:9-11 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders... will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Christians were sinners before they came to Christ and Christians are still sinners after they come to Christ. If you have violated God's standards of premarital sex, but are repentant, then accept the FACT that you are washed, made pure, and in a right relationship with your heavenly Father. Seek the miracle of His power filling you to overcome further temptation toward sexual sin.

I don't have a lot of experience with Wikipedia, though I've run several Mediawikis on my own. Most of my lack here is not knowing the policies and procedures. To avoid conflict of interest (because I am Hanne Blank's partner), I kept my edit down to adding a link to the FAQ for Hanne Blank's upcoming book on the history of virginity in the External Links. If the link is too Hanne Blank centric, then perhaps it would be better used as a reference for any future edits to the article.

Anyhow, if someone with more experience in the subtleties of POV on Wikipedia could vet and keep or delete the external link, I would love it. I fear I am too close to the subject to be objective, and took lead from the fact that you already have articles from HBlank and HCorinna (a long-time collaborator with HBlank) in External Links. MalcolmGin 15:28, 17 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The only reason for you not to contribute at this article is if you found it especially traumatic in the face of opposition to various points from other editors. In other words, feel free to contribute. You are likely to be able to provide much better information than most people.

I must get hold of the book some time. Best. Alastair Haines 09:55, 27 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The reason I mention this is that the book, part history, part medical scholarship is good quality secondary and tertiary source material to correct many of the citation-less assertions made here.

I do think the article goes in a good direction, but the (especially technical) discussion would be well-informed by a good read of the book in question. kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ISBN 1596910100 --MalcolmGin 20:28, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

google shows no hits and I have never heard of this, is it a troll edit? Blue loonie 07:03, 19 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, it's now removed, was a "funny" vandalism, ha, ha. --Flammingo^Hey 07:31, 19 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

WOW! Thats strange!

Neither a recent SOED nor a fairly old Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology suggests that the derivation of "pussy" in the sexual-slang sense is any different from the derivation of the feline sense. (And Partridge, in Slang and Unconventional English, interestingly gives "puss" rather than "pussy" as the sexual slang, which I suspect also makes the article's proposed etymology from "pucelle" less likely.) SOED does date "pussy" in the sexual sense back to the late C18, so I've removed the description of it as "modern" slang. Barnabypage 17:16, 23 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Somebody REALLY messed up this page. Someone read and correct all of this rubbish! And where has the Sikhism virginity section gone?

Parthenophilia redirects here fix it

This line is untrue: "In males, there is no physically visible indicator of virginity."

Someone needs to incorporate the following in some way that isn't plagerism.

Signs of male virginity, which the tribal examiners claim white doctors either ignore or have simply not learned to interpret, include a “white lacy skin” within the foreskin, a taut and difficult-to-retract foreskin, and the presence of a particular vein that is visible in the penis of virgin but not of sexually experienced males. [...] these and other signs, such as the way in which a young man urinates (urine that sprays is considered a sign of virginity, whereas a coherent stream would be a sign of its loss) [...] http://www.hanneblank.com/main/ex19.html

Sorry, this is pure nonsense. 91.127.245.204 17:01, 2 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I see a problem here, the article says that the hymen is commonly ruptured during physical activity or when using a tampon. However, the Hymen entry says the exact opposite. The internet is even more confusing. Can somebody with proper knowledge correct this and add citations? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.72.75.161 (talk) 10:49, 6 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Women who actively engage, exclusively, with other women sexually through their entire lives cannot reasonably called virgins, most would agree. There should be a discussion on how the lesbian culture views virginity. --MQDuck 02:57, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, I know a lot of people, straight and gay, who would consider a woman who has only been with women sexually to be a virgin. Though I must admit some of them joke about the issue, as in not being too serious in considering that; others seem to believe that, yes, the woman is still a virgin in the technical tense. And like this article notes on, some of them don't really feel that virginity applies to men. Flyer22 03:49, 6 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"The well known advice columnist Dan Savage frequently ridicules such assertions when made by correspondents to his column and podcast Savage Love. His view, shared by many, is that "having sex", explicitly includes sexual activity other than vaginal intercourse, including oral or anal sex, or mutual masturbation. It therefore follows that once an individual has engaged in such sexual activity, they are no longer a virgin in any meaningful sense."

This seems kind of useless. One man's opinion whould be recorded on one man's article. As it is, I have never heard of Dan Savage, and the phrase "well known" fails to convince me that he isnt just a small town newpapre columnist. Id remove this myself, but I'm too timid. Any other thoughts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.101.94.18 (talk) 03:40, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As the article about him indicates, he's a internationally syndicated columnist. The fact that you haven't heard of him doesn't invalidate him as a legitimate source. - JasonAQuest (talk) 23:22, 17 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

He is no expert on the matter, nor has there been a redrafting of the definition of virgin. So his opinion is just that. Just because someone might be "well known" doesn't make them a legitimate source either.

But seeing as this is wikipedia it doesn't really matter. but using one persons opinion is not fact. views can be biased and not everyone feels that way. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Thebirdistheword (talk • contribs) 21:15, 7 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The etymology section of this article was so dreadful and misleading it attracted my attention. In sorting that out, using the Oxford Dictionary and some Latin sources we might clear up some confusion.

There seems to be enough unsourced nonsense on this page that I would have thought even quoting a local radio shock-jock would be a step forwards.

I'm not a Wiki-virgin, I've been around the block a few times. In my experience, articles tend to improve with added quotes from reliable, available sources.

If you're not out to prove black is white, feel free to google up some sources, you'll know which are agenda-pushing and which are informative. Search 'em up and whack 'em on the page. Cheers. Alastair Haines 09:14, 25 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

PS Don't know who rated this as top importance, bit of a sad view on long-term stable relationships. Alastair Haines 09:15, 25 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've watched you fix up this article, and I'm pleased that you worked on it, of course. I do feel that this article should be rated as top importance, however. Flyer22 11:35, 27 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

My apologies, I was a little irritated by the general folk-mythology thingy of "virginity as social construct".

The text suggesting it's just an old-fashioned idea down-plays it to such an unbelievable extent that it suggests the topic actually matters much more to some editors than they would admit to themselves. I don't like readers (especially young or less discerning ones) being confused by text that communicates more about the personal issues of editors than about the subject of articles.

I guess I was just trying to indicate my personal view, that what everyone agrees about is the value of long-term relationships, however relevant or irrelevant sex with a preceding partner may be.

There, now I've said it more plainly.

Anyway, thanks a lot for your encouragement. I intend to do more work on the religious views, because I know good sources on several religions. I know there are good, modern, secular sources in psychology, sociology and history also. Finally, I am sympathetic to the feminist view, but I think it needs to be presented logically and coherently, not assumed as the default, enlightened modern view, which it certainly isn't.

Hope I can live up to my ambitions. Please do the Wiki thing and correct anything you think is wrong. Cheers. Alastair Haines 16:07, 27 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for taking the time to explain your thoughts on this matter further. I get what you mean. And again, I appreciate your fixing up this article (I'm certain that a lot of editors do or will once they see your edits to it). It needed it, and you definitely seem like one of the best editors to do that. Flyer22 22:02, 27 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You say the nicest things. I will probably do some more work over the next few days or so. I really need to think out a logical approach to the whole article. For example, do we need a Historic practices section, Laws regarding virginity section. I'm personally curious to know about these things. I also want to find more psychological studies of women's perceptions of virginity and its loss. Although it's gross, I think we have texts describing Meso American religious rituals involving virgin sacrifice. I may have them wrong, but I believe they sacrificed lots of people, not merely virgins. They should be in the Religion section.

Finally, there are some basic ideas that need logical presentation. If a wife discovers her husband has been sleeping with a young intern at work, and he says, "ah! but that was yesterday, I want to sleep with you today." I'm not sure she'd be very impressed. A virgin bride who discovers her fiance had rather a reputation for sleeping around at college might be equally unimpressed by, "but I wasn't married then, I'll be different when we're together." But I'm assuming that men and women are the same in how they feel and express sexual jealousy, but we just don't know the differences in how male and female brains work in this area yet (though I know some studies have been done).

Then there's the inconsistant logic that speculates that sexual experience outside marriage has little psychological effect, while on the other hand, often the same people, argue that "date rape" is a serious crime that needs addressing with major legislative intervention and public spending.

I think for this article to responsibly address the topic, it needs to find good sources that show clearly the connections between sexual jealousy, romantic love, divorce, rape and virginity. Social perception of virginity doesn't exist in glorious isolation. Finding the good sources that discuss this is the trick. ;) Alastair Haines 02:16, 28 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, Alastair, for that section discussing technical virginity, I like the title "Technical virginity" better than the title "How far is too far?"...mainly because people often use the words "technical virginity" in accordance with that topic. Flyer22 09:47, 28 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree! Silly rush of blood to the head from me. Far too colloquial, not encyclopedic and all that. Thanks for being polite. Revert me! :D Alastair Haines 14:19, 28 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Being German myself, I was rather surprised when I read this paragraph. I wouldn't want to offend anyone, but please abstain from writing about the etymology of another language when it is obvious that the basics aren't mastered. The word "Frauline" (pretended to be "the standard German word for a young woman") doesn't even exist in the German language. Accordingly, the link de:Frauline is broken. There is a German word "Fräulein" (Miss), which is a diminutive of "Frau" (woman, Mrs), but it is definitely NOT the standard German word for a young woman. As a matter of fact, it is (like the English "Miss") used as a title prefix to the name, but not as a stand-alone word (with very rare exceptions that have special meanings). Furthermore, it's not seen as a "title of respect" (sic). To the contrary, it is nowadays considered quite disrespectful by many women (and its use is severely condemned by all feminist organizations). It WAS for some period in history understood as a title of respect due to the fact that it was originally reserved to young women of the aristocracy, but that's the past. As for "Jüngling" which is said to be the male equivalent to "Jungfrau": the commonly understood sense of "Jüngling" is just a boy (very young man, without any connotation concerning the sexual experience, unlike "Jungfrau"), and even that is archaic and very rarely used. The meaning of "Jüngling" as a direct male equivalent to "Jungfrau" does exist (in the dictionary at least) but its usage is close to nil. You'll even rather find the female term applied to a male (possibly in adjectivized form) to denote the lack of intercourse experience than "Jüngling". Sebastian Lammert 23:17, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

You're certainly more expert than I. So, I take it you are saying the 2006 film, Das Fräulein, is an ironic reference to aristocratic young women from some point in history?

Fräulein Ripley of Die Zeit is just old-fashioned?

I presume the bloggers at 'it's this fräulein's world' and 'fräulein anna's weblog' are just being provocative? And their lower case F is not a sign of modern contextualization?

You wouldn't approve of BeoLingus?

And you'd disagree with de:Wiktionary?

Bedeutungen:

1. ledige junge Frau
2. veraltet Titel für ein Fräulein[1]
3. umgangssprachlich scherzhaft Mädchen

What you say sounds rather similar to English. Miss is still a title of respect, although it is certainly discouraged by feminism. Despite that, in English, a significant number of women still choose to use this title, as such it is one of the options available in drop-down menus on electronic forms.

Unfortunately, feminism is not the authority on language use, nor are those who take offense at various usages.

Apart from the missing umlaut, the only error I can see you pointing out is that Fräulein is not the normal word for a young woman. What is?

The point of the text regarding this is mainly that Jungfrau is not the normal word for young woman. Is that incorrect? Alastair Haines 09:04, 5 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I noticed there's a link at the beggining of the article to a "feminist criticisms" section which was never created.

Also, it struck me as rather odd that there wasn't a discussion any discussion of how the definition would relate to gay men, lesbians, or bisexuals.

For example, for example, would a bisexual young woman be considered a virgin if she'd "had sex" with women, but "only messed around" with men? Even if the "messing around" that she was doing with the guys was exactly the same sort of activity as she was doing with the women when she was "having sex" with them.... Helvetica 05:30, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There actually was a discussion above about lesbian women on this matter, if you can call it a discussion, that started...but didn't really go anywhere... The section above titled Homosexual Female Virginity. And as I stated above, plenty of heterosexual men, for sure, would still call a woman who has only had sex with women a virgin. They would still consider her a virgin if she just "messed around with", such as oral sex, with them as well. Some gay and lesbian individuals even joke about the woman still being a virgin. But a deeper discussion here is needed concerning this matter, of course. Flyer22 06:36, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Also, as I look higher on this talk page, another section related to this matter was briefly discussed — the section titled Homosexual virginity.

Most of my gay and lesbian friends have had sex with people of the opposite sex before, some more than others. I haven't come in contact with too many gold-star lesbians and gay men. Flyer22 06:49, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have. As a self-avowed bisexual, the gay guys I know often find my heterosexual experiences remarkable... and sometimes even "icky". With fewer L/G people trying to pass as straight, exclusively homosexual activity is becoming more common. And most would snicker at the notion that their lack of het-sex makes them "virgins". - JasonAQuest (talk) 00:27, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There is some discussion of the issue under Technical virginity. The discussion does need to be organized better. If no one else does it, I'll get to it eventually. I think a possible logical framework could be:

• Objective virginity -- broad common definition probably penis in vagina, academic definitions of sexual debut.
• Subjective virginity

• Self-perception -- psychiatry will have a lot to say about this
• Social perception

• literal view -- it's about the hymen, hence popularity of heavy petting w/out intercourse (the "don't spoil me" view)
• moral view -- it's about sexual activity and attitude, not the hymen

• Special cases
• Rape -- problematic for literalists, however, morality is concerned with choosing sex outside marriage
• Homosexuality

• Male -- penetrative sex has particular significance
• Female -- place of orgasm in assessing significance of sexual experience

Personally, I think the rape and homosexuality cases tell us most clearly what people consider significant (or not significant) in various forms of sexual debut.

Also, although I don't expect we'll find a lot of literature about it, I'd be fascinated to know more about date-rape -- where a virgin girl says "yes, no, yes, no, no, no" and ends up giving in and even reaching orgasm. I could imagine being extremely distressed, overwhelmed, guilty and angry all at once, and not knowing how to move forward or who to share it all with. Alastair Haines 07:08, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The above framework looks like a good way to organize the information, and would definitely be a step forward. - JasonAQuest (talk) 23:36, 17 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Some feminists have claimed that most societies value female virginity more highly than male virginity, but interpret this negatively as sexism against women. History evidences laws and customs that required a man who seduced or raped a virgin to take responsibility for the consequences of his offense by marrying the girl or by paying compensation to her father on her behalf.[6]"

This is the fourth paragraph under "In Culture". The problems I see here are first, the generic "some feminists" tag- which feminists, who said this? Second, the italics on "women" in the first paragraph- the only point I can see to these italics is to imply that feminists are silly and that the virgin status is sexist against men. Third, and this is more of a logic problem that a wiki problem, the second sentence evidences that "a man who seduced or raped a virgin to take responsibility...by marrying the girl or paying compensation to her father" as an apparent counterargument to the apparently outlandish generic "feminist" belief that female emphasis on virginity is sexism against women. Guys, if somebody raped you and the "punishment" was that you had to marry your rapist against your will or get your father paid off (gee, I wonder what would happen if a woman was raped by her father..?), would you consider that sexism against men?

I feel that this entire paragraph should be deleted, but I would like to hear what other people think first. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.169.57.148 (talk) 22:13, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't feel that all of that should be deleted. The mention about how some feminists see the very notion of virginity as a sexist construct because it rarely applies to men (the original wording that was there for that part, or something close to it) should definitely be mentioned. As for all of that you brought up as a whole, I would say that it needs work, of course. Re-wording and sourcing. Flyer22 (talk) 23:00, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This article needs some work, especially what is currently entered under Culture. We all seem to be agreed on that. I'm rather suprised at your view that no feminists have ever criticised the high status of female virginity. Perhaps you've read some that praise this? Cite them! It'd be great to hear feminist approval of women choosing to express their sexuality exclusively within marriage, despite men hounding them to do otherwise. I'm sure they exist, I've read some.

The italics are simply a concise way of avoiding stating the usual point of view, that girls are broadly more "protected" than boys. Actually, this is explicitly stated in a lot of feminist writing. They consider it patronizing. I'm sure you are right, the feminist view needs to be presented very carefully, because some argue for more protection, while others argue for less. Fortunately, feminist discussion of virginity is not a big part of the overall literature on virginity. We can note that feminists are divided on the ethical issues (it's hardly core to feminist theory) and move on.

I don't understand your last point. I'm not aware of girls ever being forced to marry their rapist. The punishment for rape is death (for the man) in the Bible, and in many other cultures. I am aware of historical accounts of women who have demanded their rapist marry them, and of this being ignored! But the rape case is extreme, much more commonly young people have become sexually involved and societies have imposed constraints on men who are unwilling to marry under the circumstances. Very frequently women have consented to sex on the basis of a promise of marriage, which is then renegged on. I've read several recent journal articles on this sort of thing, it is still the case today. In fact, female child molestors often claim to have fantasized about marrying the boys they seduce. I seem to recall it is true of the four Canadian school teachers convicted in recent years.

It is true that in many societies girls are married in their early teens, and probably do not assert any particular preference, if a sexual liaison is being pushed to marriage by her father. The extremely bizarre and awful case of father raping daughter is punishable by death in the Bible. All societies condemn incest (obviously not all with a death penalty though).

What do you think, by the way? Is it healthy, safe and rewarding for young women to "experiment" sexually, and for the men to similarly have no obligation towards those they sleep with? Do you have a favourite writer or writers on the subject? I highly recommend Katie Roiphe as an example of a very authentic feminist viewpoint. Alastair Haines (talk) 10:24, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You misunderstand me. I am not saying that no feminists have ever criticized the high status of female virginity, quite the opposite. My main complaint with the passage in question is that it uses a very generic "feminist" tag to make this point. Which feminists, where? I want specific names, especially when the paragraph makes no mention of arguments supporting this belief- the second sentence is entirely an argument against the generic statement of "some feminists" in the first, only the second sentence recieves a citation while the first does not, making it look more credible.

I also don't see how the italics help make the view more concise. This might be a case of having to agree to disagree- when I read that sentence, the italics seem to imply that the idea of valuing female virginity higher than male being sexist against women as absurd. "but interpret this negatively as sexism against women" seems pretty transparent to me. I just do not see how putting women in italics clarifies anything. It looks to me like an editorialization, and I am hard-pressed to see how it adds anything to the article.

The last point, again, you misunderstand me. I am not personally aware of girls ever being forced to marry their rapists either (though I do find it perfectly believable that such a thing has happened). The reason I brought it up is because in the paragraph I dispute, appears the citation: "History evidences laws and customs that required a man who seduced or raped a virgin to take responsibility for the consequences of his offense by marrying the girl or by paying compensation to her father on her behalf". I would like to remind you that this citation comes from the Bible- assuming that whoever put the citation up was citing it correctly.

Again, the issue I am taking on here is implication. This sentence follows the previous one where the italicized "women" appears to denigrate the generic "feminist" position that high female virginity status is bad for women. By starting out with "history evidences", the implication here is that the generic "feminist" are basing their argument on nothing, while "history" has evidence proving the generic feminists wrong. And this is, of course, another error since the passage quoted is not history, but a law of the Bible In any case, the implication is that the above passage is proof that women are at a benefit thanks to the high status of virginity, because the crime of seduction or rape is apparently equally penalized by marriage of the paying of compensation to her father. The passage makes an editorial comment- we have generic feminists with denigrating italics on one hand and history with a citation on the other. Can you honestly write down that this passage has no biases on which one we ought to believe?

I must remind you that what you or I think about what possible benefits, if any, there are to young women experimenting sexually is irrelevant for the sake of this passage. As editors, we should be trying to avoid having any obvious bias in the articles, and what I see in this passage is clear, obvious bias which does not seem to have any purpose except to make the reader think, unqualified, that generic feminists are unreasonable and that history vindicates the position that the high emphasis many societies place on female virginity is always good for women. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.169.15.162 (talk) 17:35, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I can completly understand where you are coming from, but the sentence is a plain statement of fact. You have to read between the lines to get what you are saying. Actually, the sentence is absolutely true, plenty of feminists say it, you admitted that yourself. That you think they are contradicting themselves is your own original research not what the article leads you to. Their view is not contradictory, just surprising, and quite clever.

That men traditionally protect women's virginity has been thought by most people to be favouritism towards women throughout history. Feminism has been unique to suggest that men paying for meals, taking out garbage, buying diamond rings etc. etc. is disadvantageous to women and something they should stop accepting, for their own sake.

Now, if you think that is a biased argument against feminists you are wrong on three counts. First, it is not biased, it is just an argument, and a published one (many recent writers have made versions of it). Secondly, if you think it is my personal opinion, you are also wrong. Thirdly, if you think it actually "disproves" feminism you are wrong.

The feminist argument is subtle and good at this point. What they argue is that if women accept favouritism from men they make themselves dependent on that favouritism. Men should not have to do all the work. This is one of the reasons feminism has been so successful. Men have, not surprisingly, been quite happy to accept women taking more of a share in carrying the work-load of society.

The feminist ideas regarding virginity are also popular with men. Instead of having to promise to marry girls, men have enjoyed being able to break up with them, because "virginity doesn't matter any more". It's not up to us to say how good and brilliant this new feminist led intiative is. Nor for us to say how deep and dark all this unholy fornication is. The article cites the religious views in their own space. However, it is our business to report what the views are.

It might be wise to avoid the word sexist, because it is hard to see how forcing men to marry someone who let them have sex with them is favouring men. However, since the word sexist is used with regard to this, we need to give fair representation to those who argue both sides of the coin. Wiki can neither favour one side or the other.

But Wiki cannot be held responsible for conclusions readers form for themselves. An unbiased presentation of communism may attract some readers and repel others, without their being any "criticisms of Communism section". To say "Adolf Hitler was a fascist dictator" sounds biased, but it isn't, it's just a statement of fact. It is the reader who is biased against fascism and dictatorship. ;) Just because you don't think the direction of sexism is ambiguous with regard to valuing virginity doesn't mean everyone thinks that. The solution is to show both points of view and, in due course, if no one else does this, I shall. Cheers. Alastair Haines 13:22, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I just deleted the passage. Since everyone seems to agree that the paragraph in question needed a rewording at the very least, I am hoping no one will take it upon themselves to restore it.

Bear in mind that I am not suggesting that the passage is wrong or discusses issues that should not be discussed- I deleted it because it discusses them in a brief, inaccurate, slanted way. I think we can all agree that articles are better off with no discussion of certain issues than brief, inaccurate, slanted ones. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.169.15.156 (talk) 17:14, 29 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I restored it before reading your comment about having removed it, though I saw you pop on my watchlist as having been the latest person to comment on this talk page. I just don't feel that that entry should be deleted completely. I'd ather one of us change the wording and possbily expand on it. Either change the wording back to what it originally stated, then work on it from there, or change it to something different in wording about the topic, is what I suggest, but not total removal. I mean, it's an interesting part of the topic of virginity and some feminists have indeed criticized the double standard of virginity. I'm going to restore that passage back to what it was originally, as in a few days ago, and then we can work together from there with it. If the source or sources we use for that topic does not say which feminists, then I feel the word "some" is quite adequate enough. I personally never ask "which this or that?" when I see the word "some", rather I know that it means some and obviously it's not specified as to what particular group, especially as it's usually more than one group. Flyer22 (talk) 19:02, 29 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I change that entry back to this wording: Some feminists have claimed that the very notion of virginity is a sexist construct, since it is rarely applied to men, even in societies that prize virginity most highly.^{[citation needed]}.

I honestly don't see anything wrong with it worded that way about some feminists concerning this subject, except for the fact that we need a valid citation for it. I don't feel that should be too difficult to come by. Flyer22 (talk) 19:10, 29 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, it will be impossible to find such a citation, because virginity is not a notion it is a fact. Hence academic literature (hundreds or thousands of articles) that discuss sexual debut and the age of consent etc. The problem with the sentence, is that it is a way of talking about virginity as if it is all in the mind and it shouldn't be there. If you like, it is a "thinly veiled attack" on valuing virginity. Unfortunately, virginity is simply a brute fact with social and psychological aspects that continue to be discussed in the literature and probably always will be. Additionally, probably a billion people of Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist culture or commitment are not likely to go away in the near future.

I doubt that feminist have claimed the notion of virginity to be a sexist construct, but what I do know they claim is that placing different value on male and female viriginity is sexist. That involves two things: one, that people are treated differently on the grounds of sex; two, that the difference is experienced negatively for one of the sexes. Treating people differently on the grounds of sex is not sexism, it is one of the ways to get more women involved in various occupations. Height, weight and fitness requirements in the armed forces are lower for women than for men. That is not considered sexist (partly because it advantages women), but mainly because this is not thought to disadvantage women, nor the men.

Virginity is a tricky discussion, but the feminists who argue for devaluing female virginity argue one of two quite different positions. Basically, both argue that the "double standard" with regard to sexual purity is sexist; however, one group argues that girls should have the same freedom as boys to experiment sexually, the other group argues that boys as well as girls should be encouraged to keep virginity until marriage. The former group are the vast majority, the latter group include almost all the billion or so people still influenced by traditional religious values.

The last point is particularly relevant to another problem with the sentence. It speaks of "societies that value virginity most highly". There are several problems with this sentence, and again they are as subtle as the suggestion that virginity is a notion. The first is that, in fact, marriage and sexual jealousy are cultural universals, hence virginity is valued significantly in all cultures. It is true that some value it more than others, however, the impression the sentence gives is that some cultures have a high value and others have none, or that it is simply unrecognized in some cultures, which is just not the case. By following the word notion by society the whole sentence suggests virginity is a "cultural construction", not a physical and psycho-social reality, treated differently but recognized and significant across all cultures.

There are also some logical problems. Firstly, does the sentence think virginity is something women have or that men have? It must be something women have, because it is not often applied to men. But think again. If it can be applied to men, then it's not something exclusive to women. Or think yet again, if it is something that is a cultural notion and not a reality, then if societies have it for women, then that's all there is to it. If societies apply it to both, then that's all there is to it. If it's not real, but only in the minds of the society, we can't expect them to apply it according to objective reality, it can't be sexist, it just is.

Think about the suggestion that societies that value virginity highly don't value virginity in men. Is that valuing virginity? The word virginity is being used in two different ways five words apart. What the sentence means is: "societies that value virginity in women most highly don't value virginity in men."

Now, that was one heck of a long essay to address one tiny sentence. Unfortunately, it's got to do with how tricky words can be. A normal reader picks up only the following:

1. feminists aren't happy about virginity
2. they think it's unfair to women
3. they think it's a wrong way for people to think
4. different societies value virginity differently
5. many societies don't apply virginity to men

Now, bearing in mind we happen to know (3) and (4) are wrong or irrelevant, I suggest we remove them, they can only give feminists a bad name. The sentence is appalling, no self-respecting feminist would write it. However (1), (2) and (5) are all true to some extent, i.e. there are many feminists who dislike the distinction implied by virginity. They discourage Miss in favour of Ms for similar reasons. They don't like the way society categorizes women according to their sexual/marrital relationships, and they like the way they perceive men to be free of such categorization.

There is so much to cover here, that it needs it's own section, not a single sentence. Eventually I will write it if no-one else does. However, in the mean time, I'm afraid I will have to delete the current sentence again. I provided an alternative that covered the facts. It's up to you and others whether you restore that or provide something else, but the current sentence is misleading and inaccurate on several points, subtle though they are. Alastair Haines (talk) 12:51, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As you state, I do want something added to this article about the feminists view: "(1), (2) and (5) are all true to some extent, i.e. there are many feminists who dislike the distinction implied by virginity." I'll probably just wait for you to type it up. Flyer22 17:21, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"A virgin is a young woman characterized by absence of sexual experience"; this statement needs to be changed. A virgin is simply a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. There are major NPOV problems with this article. Alison88 (talk) 22:54, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually the statement was changed, it used to be modified by the word "historically". Feminists actually get their etymology correct on this issue, the history of usage in English according to OED is explicit about this. The word first only meant virtuous young women, only later did it refer explicitly to sexual integrity. But the point is, it explicity arose as a reference to female referents, and is still used strictly that way in the biological contexts.

The second sentence explains the way the word is broadened in normal usage.

Regarding NPOV, I agree, the virginity in culture section reads very dismissively of virginity, which may represent some recent Western views. It's rather late 20th C US-Euro-centric, but it is hard for English Wiki to get beyond this, of course, and what's the point in complaining, when Wiki allows us to change things. By all means be bold, and start sourcing all the historical and non-English cultural descriptions of the place of virginity, which gives a more accurate overall picture. Alastair Haines (talk) 07:29, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just stopping by to say that Alastair is right on about the original and historical meaning of this word. But, of course, he already knows that. Flyer22 (talk) 08:06, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Men can certainly be called 'virgins', according to Christianity. The Book of Revelation explicitly mentions the '144,000' men who are prophesied to stand with the 'Lamb' (the new Jewish king) on the Mountain of Tsiyon in Jerusalem (the capital) at the end of the reign of the age of foreign rulers (Roman emperor, etc.). These men are explicitly called 'virgins'.

Revelation 14:1-4 (KJV)

And I looked, a Lamb stood on mount Sion, and with him a hundred [and] forty four thousand, having his Father's name written in their foreheads. And I heard a voice from heaven, and the voice of harpers harping with their harps: And they sung as it were a new song, and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth. These are they which were not defiled with women. For they are virgins. These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no guile. For they are without fault before the throne of God.

The Book of Revelation is written from within a Jewish context that doesnt value 'perpetual virginity'. These 144,000 should probably be understood as something like 13-year-old men, who are perceived as too young to be guilty of crime, albeit in Revelation they are uniquely goodwilled. (They evidence a forerunner of the custom of the right of passage of Bar Mitsva.) In any case, these young men are explicitly called 'virgins' (Greek παρθενοι parthenoi), and the passage is rife with the Hellenistic (Platonic) spiritual ideals associated with virginity. --Haldrik (talk) 19:41, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

PS, the phrase 'defiled with women' must be understood in context. It is idolatry that defiles, not the women per se! Revelation refers to the custom of sacred prostitution, where all-male 'block parties' (symposiums) customarily invoked their foreign gods, while offering guests the evenings entertainment, including female sex workers. (High-class prostitutes were among the few highly educated women of ancient times.) Some among the early Jesus movements taught 'freedom from the Law' permitted participation in these overtly idolatrous parties, but Revelation opposes them. Revelation 2.14: 'I have a few things against thee, because thou hast them that hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a stumblingblock before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed unto idols and to commit fornication.' This Greek word unhelpfully translated 'to commit fornication' (πορνευσαι porneusai), only means 'to avail prostitution', and specifically, the problem is these prostitutes are part of parties offered up to idols. Anyone who partakes of them partakes of the gods. Anyway, the 144,000 'virgins' were simply too young to participate in these adult parties, so they couldnt be 'defiled' by this idolatry (not by these prostitutes per se).--Haldrik (talk) 20:53, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

please define coitarche in this article since it links here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.125.28.36 (talk) 02:18, 4 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for this request and alerting us to the issue. Coitarche sounds like it uses two Greek words to form a technical term for sexual debut, which is the standard academic way of refering to virginity.

Virginity does not exist, sex does, and when it does it has effects, hence being possible to study, unlike virginity. Virginity is simply a way of speaking about people who do not experience the effects of sexual activity.

Sexual debut is significant for study in broadly two ways. Firstly, it marks the boundary between those unaffected by sexual activity and those affected. Secondly, early sexual history often involves unique psychological issues, as with early history in any activity.

If I find time I will seek references to coitarche and simply place it in parentheses as a synonym after sexual debut (and followed by the best reference). Anyone can do this though, just do some research, hit "edit" and include the references. Alastair Haines (talk) 09:50, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am having serious issue with the retranslation of the etymological definition of the word "virgo" used on this page and its corresponding assumptions. Based on the 1st web link used at the bottom of the page which redirects one to the Online Etymological Dictionary, the definition of the word "virgo" is a "maiden, unwedded girl or woman". This gives no indication of the specific age (it covers all ages maiden/girl - woman), or their respective sexual experience. I feel this is important to note, as there is an understanding in ancient cultures that a "woman unto herself", ie not being possesed by family or husband, was considered a "virgin", and it is believed in many circles that these women were actually in service to goddess worshipping temples, and therefore did not need a husband to care for them.

Even if the group writing this entry disagree with this view, I believe in the service of impartiality and it being a "-pedia" of information, it is important to give ALL the aspects information connected to a subject and let the reader do her/his own research. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lilithgrrl (talk • contribs) 23:25, 2 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Lilithgrrl, I'm not quite sure where you have got your information from. In most ancient cultures I have studied, almost the only independent women were widows and prostitutes -- neither were considered virgins, for fairly obvious reasons. In all other cases men were required to work to support and protect their women -- wives, daughters (and slave girls if they were rich).

Some of the most ancient writing we have include laws outlining the duties of men towards their households, and other laws regarding state support of widows. It is true that prostitution, including institutional prostitution like temples and harems, was widely practiced, and these women were provided for by payment from their clients, or by temple or royal revenue.

Your "woman unto herself" sounds like a woman who provides for her own needs. The first named author in recorded history is a woman, a priestess of Inana, of the royal family. She appears to have been something of a maverick. Her financial resources were probably derived from her family, but, whether she earned what she had or was just lucky, she seems to have had sufficient independence to have been able to get away with "bucking the system" in various ways once she had it.

Anyway, the only way we can know what people did in the past is to read the writings that have survived and to inspect the "rubbish" they have left behind -- broken pottery, food scraps, tools, weapons, jewellery and so on. Sometimes we have to guess, sometimes experts make different, contradictory guesses. By and large, though, it seems there are some generalizations we can make about how men and women organized the way they lived together. This is the important thing, the actual way people live. There are interesting questions that come up when we look at the words used to describe the way people live.

Many languages have no word for "a person without sexual experience". It's not that people didn't have sex, or that everyone did so there was no-one without experience. It's just that some communities are either too shy to talk about it, or don't care much about it. Other languages have a word, which only refers to sexually inexperienced women, not to men. Often such words presume the women are young or includes pre-pubescent girls, since historically most women have been sexually active from soon after puberty. Perhaps that's good, perhaps that's bad, who's to say? Whether good or bad, that just seems to have been the way of it, but it involves some of that "experts with different guesses" factor.

There are important differences in the modern western world. Men are no longer required to financially support women for life if they have sex with them. In fact, men can also divorce women any time they like without having to provide a socially acceptable reason. Women are now expected to be independent and support themselves. Statistics suggest women, on average, still become sexually active some time in their teens, but now this frequently does not involve marriage and promises of life long financial support from their husband. Since this is now our society we're talking about, there's a lot of writing about whether this is good or bad. Legally, our society has only been this way for about 30 years or so, so when experts talk about it being good or bad, again we're guessing about future consequences a bit.

It's a very convenient arrangement for men in particular, which is possibly one reason it has been so successful. At the cost of doing 50% of the housework, men can expect their current partners to provide 50% of the household income. That's got to be a good deal, wouldn't you think? Perhaps it's good for women too, you've got money to pay others to look after your children, if you don't feel like doing it yourself. In fact, you should probably only need to pay half of it, because the fathers should be paying the other half. But the bottom line here is that men are never responsible for more than half, whereas in the past they were responsible for 100%.

Bringing this back to the point, all this means there is now confusion about translating words for a virgin into English because, where they exist, they carry associations derived from their cultures. A word for sexually inexperienced typically carries an association of youth, because sex normally starts at an age that seems young to most speakers in most historical and non-western cultures. On the other hand, the word virgin is probably changing in English too, because in a culture where people might typically have several sexual partners over the course of their life, the focus is on the present one of several, rather than the early stage of a lifelong relationship. For most speakers in our aging western society, virginity describes a time long past departed with a person you never see any more and with whom, on average, you probably did not end up having children.

The word virgin in English, is probably most used by teenagers talking about a state they are anticipating leaving as soon as possible, marking a kind of entry into adulthood -- whose made it and who hasn't. There's literature on this (and even some TV documentaries).

So where does this leave us? Well, there are two questions I can think of. What does the word virgin mean in modern English usage -- i.e. what associations does it carry? The other question is what values do historical societies and modern non western ones place on sex, children and life-long marriage and family that makes a word for sexual inexperience a word worth having?

Those questions have answers in lots of books out there. Some of the answers are different in different books. I'd like to know the names of a few books that give each of the different types of answer. I've found a few, and put them in the article. You can do that too. There aren't all that many rules about Wiki. Just "if it came from a book you can't delete it" and "you're not allowed to argue that your books are better than someone else's books if your books disagree with one another -- both should be allowed in the article."

If you have read something you think adds new information to the article, or presents a new point of view, just put it in. Few people (or even teams) ever read everything written on a single subject, so if you see a gap, fill it if you can. Cheers. Alastair Haines (talk) 11:57, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The Catholic Encyclopedia is excellent on this topic. Augustine and Aquinas are also excellent. The western traditions regarding virginity are very easy to recover with these superb sources. Thanks for pointing us to what ought to have been an obvious place to start. Alastair Haines (talk) 07:39, 26 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm happy to discuss the New Testament references relevant to a recent editors proposed improvements. There's more space to discuss these through to agreement at this page, than in edit notes. Please drop a line. :) Alastair Haines (talk) 14:01, 22 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I did leave you a message on your talk page. The original greek uses the term "Sodomites". Interpretation of that has been controversial, and there is no common agreement. As 1st Corinthinans is cited, we should remain faithful to it. 1st Corinthinas was written iriginally in the Greek langage.

If we are citing 1 Corinthians, (6:9 apparently) we should do so accurately, and not give one editors personal interpretation. The reader can understand that the citation was against sodomites (the act of sodomy?) and interpret that according to their own personal convinctions, without us mis-interpreting for them.

The sin of the sodomites is interpreted by many people in many different ways. Here is one I googled [1] regardless of this persons view, it is obviously open to wide interpretation, and few people interpret that to mean "homosexual intercourse". The most commonly intrepreted perspective of biblical scholars seem to be that Sodomy at that time referred to immorality, idolatry and possibly bestiality (intercourse with animals, as part of idolatry worship). Regardless, if we use the original greek translation, and let each individual choose their own interpretation, we do no disservice, and risk no mis-interpretation.

1 Corinthians 6:9 [2] 9 Stephens 1550 Textus Receptus h ouk oidate oti adikoi basileian qeou ou klhronomhsousin mh planasqe oute pornoi oute eidwlolatrai oute moicoi oute malakoi oute arsenokoitai

Latin Vulgate 6:9 an nescitis quia iniqui regnum Dei non possidebunt nolite errare neque fornicarii neque idolis servientes neque adulteri

King James Version 6:9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,

Bible in Basic English 6:9 Have you not knowledge that evil-doers will have no part in the kingdom of God? Have no false ideas about this: no one who goes after the desires of the flesh, or gives worship to images, or is untrue when married, or is less than a man, or makes a wrong use of men,

Weymouth New Testament 6:9 Do you not know that unrighteous men will not inherit God's Kingdom? Cherish no delusion here. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor any who are guilty of unnatural crime,

Young's Literal Translation 6:9 have ye not known that the unrighteous the reign of God shall not inherit? be not led astray; neither whoremongers, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor sodomites,

Atom (talk) 16:00, 22 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For someone who doesn't understand the Greek or the Latin you are very bold in your claims. Your Latin doesn't actually include the two relevant words. The Greek is perfectly clear, they are well known words and even have modern Greek and English cognates.

More importantly, you don't seem to understand the meaning of sodomy in English. The word is derived from the biblical story of Sodom, where the men were so committed to homosexuality that they rejected the offer of sleeping with Lot's virgin daughters, desiring to sleep with his male guests instead.

Sodomy, still an offense in many countries and states around the world, is explicitly anal penetrative sex. Although originally refering to male only participants, the term has extended usage in that anal penetration of a women is also sodomy. The verb is to sodomize.

The two relevant Greek words in Corinthians are malakoi and arsenokotai, both plural forms, the first is 2nd declension (masc.), the second is a masc. noun of the 1st (fem.) declention. Arsenokoites is a man who sleeps with other men. Malakos is a broader, vaguer word meaning something like "effeminate", i.e. a man who is not masculine.

I do really appreciate your attempt to protect Wikipedia from unwarranted bias in translation, but there are standard tools for that job—LSJ and BDAG, which I have now cited.

Thank you for stimulating this improvement to this entry. Alastair Haines (talk) 16:23, 22 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually sodomy, legally speaking, in most contexts is very general, and has been applied to be oral sex, anal sex and bestiality. It has been mean't to be essentially, unnatural sex. Sex in a position other than the missionary position once applied as sodomy. Sodomy is no longer illegal in the United States.

Your interpretation of Arsenokoites is only one. It literally means "male-bed" or "male-coitus".

I am reviewing your cites in more detail. LSJ and BDAG I don't agree with you that the "plainest" interpretation ("a man who sleeps with other men") is the one that should be used. If it is controversial or debatable in meaning, then per WP:NPOV alternative meanings should be given. The alternative to that is to do no interpretation, and supply the original word and let readers decide. If you debate that "sodomy" or "sodomites" should be used, then perhaps we can agree on another interpretation (most used by bible interpreations) or the original greek. But, I wholly disagree that the interpretation of the word is not controversial. You may mean that the literal translation is not controversial. The meaning at the time (sense in context and their relevance in different cultural settings) is controversial, and is the point of the citation in Wikipedia. It boils down to, in this case (not generic biblical interpetation) the question of "What did Paul mean when he wrote the letter to the Corinthians?" The current day answer is "We aren't really sure, it is open to many interpretations". If you asked a spectrum of biblical scholars, they would not agree with one another. The reason there are many different bibles with different text interpretations indicates that biblical schoalrs at the itme those bibles were interpreted did not read it the same way.

Back to Wikipedia. Since religious leaders from many different Christian sects, biblical scholars today, and biblical scholars who write the various versions of the bible (and us) do not agree on the meaning, and in fact few of them interpret the meaning to be "homosexual intercourse", we can't say in Wikipedia that it means that. I'm open to finding compromise, or finding a balanced view, but not to quoting only the most conservative (minority) viewpoint in the article Atom (talk) 17:19, 22 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We should write another Wikipedia article on this topic, and refer to that. ;) Atom (talk) 17:19, 22 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I seem to have missed your replies. I notice you say you disagree with my "interpretation" as you call it, then you correctly state what the word means literally after checking the sources I provided. The literal rendering you give is identical to what I supplied, which is hardly surprising since you based it on the same reliable sources I did. I no longer see that we have any disagreement except in English. Sodomy, check any dictionary, means "penetrative anal sex". I'll need to see sources to believe other "definitions" you supply above. Actually, that's the only thing you really need to answer your curiosity on this subject. Some Bible translations interpret arsenokoites as 'sodomy', others don't. I think it's a fair interpretation, it's just that many people don't know what 'sodomy' is, but everyone knows what 'homosexual sex' is. They are the same thing (for men). Hope it's all cleared up now. It's not a topic I care to spend much time considering. ;) Alastair Haines (talk) 07:26, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just dropping a note to alert any regular page watchers that Abtract stalks me to various pages and deletes anything he thinks he can make others believe could be questionable. He's occasionally moderately clever about it, but this is not one of those occasions. POV requires addition to articles, not subtraction. If only one POV is documented, the others need to be. In this case Abtract's only made work for himself. He will need to provide a source for an alternative POV to prove that he is not guilty of gaming the system. If he can't source an alternative POV, then he has to admit he had no grounds for reversion except hounding yours truly. Normally I'm too kind to confront him as directly as this, but after six months and giving him chances all the way to ArbCom, my patience and his luck have just run out.

Enjoy Wiki, friends, but don't make hounding other editors one of your joys.

What are we going to do about Abtract? Nothing! Even though the longer he spends picking a target sentence or paragraph, the longer it takes to see through him, we can still see through him faster than he can select his target. Restoration is the work of a moment. The longer he targets the work of one editor, the more clearly he is exposed.

Please cite your sources that tell us that chastity is improperly discussed in other academic literature. Please tell us who criticises DM Buss and colleagues who make psychological connections between viriginity and chastity. My tone probably won't win you over as a friend, but it will hardly lose me one, will it? Alastair Haines (talk) 10:37, 25 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Don't want to get involved in whatever arguments you and Abstract are having, perhaps you could go to mediation? In this particular instance, I agree with the removal of your paragraph. "Virginity derives its significance from this context, because it distinguishes between unmarried women who have had no sexual partners and those who have." - you would really need a reliable source for that. Please do not enter a revert war on this. BananaFiend (talk) 10:42, 25 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, I think that chastity needs to be mentioned in the intro. For a long time, there were three types of chastity: virginal, conjugal, and vidual. (This last one was omitted from the article about Chastity, so I added it - with a source, but only in the section on Abrahamic religions.) In many places there are still laws that are based on all three forms of chastity, although the last isnt usually explicitly written in law, there are still echos of it family law.

I would like to see sources provided here that would support the second part of the paragraph; my source implies virginity is just one form of chastity, and that chastity was the true objective - However my source is about one worldview; we need sources from other worldviews.

Perhaps we also need some debate about whether this relationship between the concepts should be mentioned in the lead. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 11:26, 25 November 2008 (UTC) P.S. There is no need to talk about Abtract; we talk about the content, not the editor![reply]

In reply to Banana, sexual jealousy is a human universal (Donald Brown, Human Universals), a good scientific treatment of why is found in DM Buss, The Evolution of Desire. There are many other writers from various diciplines. You can see some of their comments in the article itself, and there is more related information in some of the bibliographic articles—news reports from France (this year) of a marriage being cancelled because the wife was not a virgin, for example.

There are three distinct concepts in the evolutionary psychological literature: "sexual jealousy", "chastity" and "virginity". Sexual jealousy in men leads them to prefer virgins for marriage which positively correlates with later chastity and the evolutionary advantage of investing in children with one's own genes rather than someone else's.

The men don't consciously prefer long term chastity for the sake of their genes, they just experience sexual jealousy at the point of mate selection. The word we have for the distinction they make at that point is virgin. Not all men experience the same levels of jealousy, nor make the same decisions, it is a statistical thing, not biological determinism. The same goes for virginity and chastity. Plenty of women are chaste after marriage who weren't before, and vice versa, but the statistical studies and theories are described in the books cited in this article and many other places. I'm not aware of a competing theory.

Sexual jealousy in women has also been studied, it is expressed differently and is presumed to have different causes. It is not so closely tied with chastity prior to marriage, i.e. male virginity, which is actually the "control" for the theory described above.

Read Buss, he writes for educated but non technical readers.

The reason to include something like the final paragraph is to spare the lead from being totally a thesaurus. Some sense of why virginity matters (if it does) needs to be provided, especially since the following section continues with material some would consider technical linguistic stuff. All the thesaurus stuff actually needs some kind of conclusion. It doesn't major on "purity" or "abstinance", it gives a broader feel for the perceptions of English speakers as to what is reasonably associated with virginity, including a common association with the "start" of something rather than the end--"sexual debut" in much scientific material, occasionally coitarche as someone mentioned above.

I hope you feel more confident that the sentence is reliable Banana. Abtract uses FUD to recruit unwitting accomplices in his aim to make my life more difficult by having to re-explain things that are already covered in articles I've worked on. If you doubts are truly your own, I don't mind answering. If they are prompted by the post, then Abtract and anyone like me who drew your attention to this have actually only wasted your time. I apologise to you for that. For your information, we did try mediation, and the mediator encouraged Abtract to keep making personal attacks on me. I wasn't very happy about that, but I'm more unhappy with the mediator than with Abtract. Anyway, I'm not perfect, and I don't expect others to be. John is right in his cleverly small note, which reminds me not to set a bad example and not to make a big deal of things. If we focus on text and sources rather than editors and processes, things are happy and fun at Wiki.

In reply to John, thanks for your research. I'd never heard of vidual chastity. That virginity is viewed as essentially a form of chastity is pretty broad usage of the word, though aim is obviously a worldview. I would like to check if my suspicion is correct that in very recent academic material (well, the last decade) "chastity" is sometimes limited to being a strict synonym of "virginity". The rationale, if any for that would also interest me. I bet I could find out in the Journal of Sex Research at Sydney Uni Library, I hope no one sees me reading it. ;) Alastair Haines (talk) 19:00, 25 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Re: addressing the editor: Firstly, Abtract is addressing the editor in a way that others are not being made aware of, which is deceptive. One could argue they have a right to know. More cynically, I am simply following the say-so of various adminstrators who selectively apply the terms "personal attack" and "fair criticism", as indeed Abtract does himself. If I document content reverts they address content, when they are additionally and primarily behaviour reverts I document that as well. That is not my own approach, that is what I have observed some administrators modelling and approving. Personally, I don't approve, but one way to convince people their own view is incorrect is to reflect it to them. I'd rather not bother, it's unpleasant and it's pointless in this case. However, I'm simply demonstrating how following illegitimate orders breaks the spirit of more important principles. Ultimately, I will simply do what is best and time allows. (unsigned comment by Haines)

Two wrongs do not make a right. Talk pages are for discussing the content, and it is an imposition on fellow editors to talk about other matters. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 19:56, 25 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That is a very fair comment. I agree enough to raise nothing more. But I'm not convinced I was wrong, so I won't strike out or remove. Enough said. Alastair Haines (talk) 09:43, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Chastity is a near synonym of virginity,^[1] the distinction being that chastity views sexual integrity in terms of faithfulness to a spouse, rather than as absolute inexperience. Sexual jealousy is a recurrent theme throughout the history of literature. Virginity derives its significance from this context, because it distinguishes between unmarried women who have had no sexual partners and those who have.

My objection to this paragraph is very simple - after the seventh word (virginity) it is entirely the personal viewpoint of the editor (whoever the original editor was); there is no citation for it. Even the start of this para is dubious because, although chastity can be synonymous with virginity it is more commonly used in a temporary sense (it can be turned on or off whereas virginity can only be turned off, so to speak). Chastity is not limited to faithfulness to a spouse, it can exist in isolation (without a spouse); virginity is not, of necessity, connected with marriage, though of course it has connotations to some men. I have no objection to such views (or counterviews) being included if they are shown to be reported views from reputable sources, but not when they are uncited as they were before I removed the para. It is not my task to give citations for removing material - challenged uncited material may be removed at will, putting it back requires citation - that is the wp way. Abtract (talk) 19:31, 25 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Placing removed text on the talk page is an excellent move.

After the seventh word, the text describes the view of the AHD to the end of the sentence, then literary theorists, anthropologists, evolutionary psychologists and feminists, as mentioned above and as described in the body of the article. They are sourced on the bibliography generally. They are common knowledge and uncontroversial. You have provided no source that gainsays the text to justify your scepticism.

Inline cites are not required for "1+1=2". Though it would not be forbidden. Feel free to add citations gleaned even from the body of the article if you desire.

Your comments about the usage of chastity go well beyond what I have seen in the sources, some relevant portions of which are quoted in the text.

If there are any other points of view being overlooked, describe them and cite them.

Otherwise, the Wiki way is to self-revert. Alastair Haines (talk) 09:15, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have a few moments, I will spell things out even more clearly.

• POV1 Sexual jealousy is a recurrent theme throughout the history of literature. (AH claims all think this)
• POV2 Sexual jealousy is not a recurrent theme throughout the history of literature. (who says this?)
• POV3 People are divided about whether sexual jealousy is a recurrent theme throughout the history of literature. (who?)
• POV4 No one knows if sexual jealousy is a recurrent theme throughout the history of literature. (who?)
• POV5 No one has ever considered whether sexual jealousy is a recurrent theme throughout the history of literature.

Have I left out any options? Can you think of three stories involving sexual jealousy? What about films and songs? What were the primary sources? Can you think of people who may have commented on those texts? How many sources could be cited regarding sexual jealousy in literature? How much space do we have? What is the topic of the article? Alastair Haines (talk) 09:27, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

chastity is more broad in definition (e.g http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/chastity) than simply faithfulness to a partner - one can be chaste and single. Sexual jealousy is a recurrent theme throughout the history of literature. Virginity derives its significance from this context is also too narrow - Virginity is also important due to heredity, inheritance and fears of sexually transmitted disease.

I really do have difficulty with your linking this paragraph to "1+1=2", I'd like to avoid metaphors altogether, but I don't think this one fits anyway - the subject is far more complex, which is why a citation is needed. Can you think of 3 stories that involving illegitimate children?

Sexual jealousy is indeed an extremely strong driving force in many aspects of human life, art, and literature. It would be over-simplifying to suppose that it is the ONLY way in which virginity derives it's importance. BananaFiend (talk) 12:25, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

p.s I have never met Abstract before nor you, these opinions are all my own :)

Reflection on "playful" challenges of text. When something that is essentially obvious is reverted, to restore it with a public explanation looks patronising. A very effective technique, were it permitted, of making someone else's life difficult would be to encourage everyone to challenge everything a certain person did, however reasonable it may appear. That way, if the challenges were dismissed people could cry "rudeness!" If the challenges are answered, they will also cry "rudeness!" Of course, the reality is that such "playfulness" deserves the dismissal or the patronising it receives. Alastair Haines (talk) 09:50, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Response to Haines POV 1 - 5 above: this completely misses the point ... wp is not interested in your POV or mine but only in published POVs. The fact that Haines thinks that "all" think something is a good reason for the initial addition of text but it is not a justification for insisting on the continued inclusion of text. Once text has been challenged, either by its removal or by a "fact" tag , then it has to be justified, either by consensus or by suitable citations, before it is re-introduced into the article. Text may be challenged for a variety of reasons - thought to be incorrect (and uncited), considered dubious (and uncited), considered to be irelevant in the context of the article (even if cited), considered to be the personal opinion of the editor, considered to be the result of original research, and no doubt other reasons too. Once text has been challenged by removal, it should not be re-introduced until citations are found (if that was the original problem), or it has been discussed on the talk page and consensus reached, or even both. The general point to remember is that the burden of justification (citation or consensus or both) is on the editor wanting to include text that has been challenged by another editor; removal of text carries no such burden. Phrases like "They are common knowledge and uncontroversial" don't cut the mustard I'm afraid, see Wikipedia:Avoid weasel words. Abtract (talk) 13:11, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In some cultures, women are not regarded as virgins after a sexual assault, but some people disavow this notion. There are also those who take this "spiritual" concept of virginity further, considering "born again virgins" to be virgins, regardless of their past sexual conduct. After they do this they wish to start a new life and be faithful to their love ones.

I have removed this section as there were no citations for it. Weasel words like "some cultures" and "some people" are not justification for statements that may be true but may not for all the reader knows. Abtract (talk) 17:55, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You are welcome to fix the wording, or if you want serious attention to your concerns, point out where the sentence is invalid using sources to back your point. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 21:01, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In this case, I have a number of problems with the sentences. Although they are uncited, I have not removed them, because although I doubt there is any culture that regards women as virgins after sexual assault, I'd be pretty sure a published source expressing that sentiment could be found. To me, it looks like "original research". But, to this point, I've left the material to see what other editors make of it.

I am more concerned about the next suggestion that this is a "spiritual" definition. I can't see anything spiritual about it per se. However, it suggests the editor who supplied the sentences may have been familiar with Catholic teaching that is very specific about relationships between events, actions and guilt in the area of sexual morality. I think the ideas are poorly phrased, perhaps technically inaccurate as a result, but they can be improved by sourcing, rephrasing and perhaps by relocation in the article. My policy is to avoid removing information content of any article, unless I can source a statement that it is incorrect. Even in such cases, I often make no changes because I simply don't have time to make them properly.

Finally, the "born again virgins" concept is definitely real, though I'm not sure which groups define how they view this. The people I've heard express this view have not been religious in any way. The language needs a lot of work to clarify context and express alternative points of view. It is strongly moral in implication. Ethical views are not self evident, what is never implies what ought to be the case. So a lot of work is needed here.

In summary, despite many serious difficulties I have with these sentences, in my thinking they are like "memos" from the editor who provided them, and provide valuable pointers for anyone willing to work on the article. These things must be addressed eventually, they are on topic and readers obviously have questions about them, as the supplier of the text is alone sufficient to demonstrate.

I think Abtract might theoretically be entitled to remove this material, but I prefer John's suggestion. There's enough substance here that what is needed is the hard work of making improvements and sourcing rather than the easy way out of deleting. Someone has given us a gift, it's a gift that creates further work, but deletion diminishes Wiki and disrespects the attempt of the earlier editor. At least keeping the ideas on the talk page allows future editors to deal with this material. I'd be content with that.

Alastair Haines (talk) 21:47, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Attitudes regarding male virginity and female virginity have often diverged, however, usually placing greater emphasis on the latter, and even devaluing the former. In modern times it is not uncommon for either male or female virginity in adolescents and adults to be disparaged by peers, as a sign of immaturity.^{[citation needed]}

I have removed this uncited section (note it was tagged in August and no citations have appeared. Abtract (talk) 18:26, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The wiki will not break under the weight of {{fact}} tags. We can discuss this here. Removing paragraphs is not needed unless you can see some error, and/or if you dont believe anyone is interested in fixing the problem. This talk page is active, so you can simply ask here if you want more sources. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 21:07, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think these sentences, like most of the article, are poorly written. I've never yet found time to tidy up this article. Unfortunately, recently, my time at Wiki has been deflected into other things. Respect for other editors time is an important and (to my knowledge) inadequately discussed aspect of Wiki.

Friendly joke. Presumably Abtract either had no social intercourse while reaching adulthood or has not yet reached it. Joke, joke. I would have thought the second sentence common knowledge. It is sourcable all over the place. What is being overlooked here is that fact tags have precisely no authority. They are original research in themselves. They are often used by editors to object to opinions they do not like.

The first sentence is common knowledge, sourced elsewhere in the article and not unambiguously within the scope of the fact tag.

I'd need to check context, but removing material like this can do damage to the surrounding text, injuring any logical flow. Too often I see people willing to remove text they don't like, but not willing to make contextual adjustments that such removals require. My understanding of fact tags is that they allow questionable text to remain in place, while alerting readers to a possible issue. Sometimes all they indicate is that a supporting reference may be helpful, the fact is not in doubt, but a reference, say for more precision or better phrasing would assist future editors or be otherwise helpful for readers.

Example:

• The U.S. was often called the "World" by soldiers in Vietnam.^{[citation needed]}

I might place such a tag, while knowing it to be true for sure, because I want a reference to such use of language in context.

The only way to protect text from wholesale fact tags is to produce a quote farm. There are as many ways (or more) of being unhelpful in tagging articles as there in writing them. There is sometimes an unhealthy assumption at Wiki that writers are no judge of their own work and that criticism is unchallengable. Both these views spell disaster if consistently applied without common sense. The reality is that writers are frequently the best judge of subjects they've researched from sources, and that critics are often biased and seeking to censor opinions unfriendly to their own personal convictions. Whatever our processes at Wiki, we cannot support censorship, especially where it reflects personal prejudice and accepts no burden of proof to show it might be in line with common sense or published sources. Usually, the best way to silence such critics is to encourage them to source their criticisms and document those sources in articles.

To use Abtract's phrase, to my understanding, "That is the Wiki way."

Alastair Haines (talk) 22:08, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In Western marriage ceremonies, brides traditionally wear veils and white wedding dresses, which are believed by many people to be symbols of virginity. In fact, wearing white is a comparatively recent custom among western brides, who previously wore whatever colors they wished or simply their "best dress." Wearing white became a matter first of trendy fashion and then of custom and tradition only over the course of the 19th century.

I have rmoved this section also ... weasel words like "traditionally", "believed by many people", "in fact", and "became" do not make this factual (though of course it may be ... let's see the citations). Abtract (talk) 18:30, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ask and it will be given unto you. Seek and you will find. Delete and others will restore. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 21:11, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that "traditional" could have been intended as a weasle here, but it could also have been precisely the right semantic quantifier. "Western" is likewise part of carefully and accurately scoping the the assertion that follows.

I think this material is extremely tangential to the topic. It is "virginity in popular culture." All that needs to be said is that many people associate virginity with the "pure, unspotted white" of traditional, Western wedding dresses. The history of wedding dresses is irrelevant. Whether the tradition started to suggest virginity is not even discussed. Frankly, it all "smells" to me of even more modern Western fashions of thought regarding sex and women that find virginity an extremely unpleasant and awkward thing, and disparage its value in other cultures.

However, I have heard the urban legends in this text so many times, and to many readers they will come to mind while browsing the article, so I've left them, as stated, with a mental note to come back later and rework them more adequately. It will be a piece of cake to find the history of wedding dresses in reliable sources. It is precisely the sort of thing people do write about. Unfortunately, the internet is full of unsourced urban legends, that do get reproduced at Wiki until someone sources something better.

To conclude, sensitivity to readers is a vitally important, yet intangible, aspect of producing good articles. On the topic of virginity, we will get a lot of teenage readers, a lot of girls (perhaps more boys), a few feminists, a few religious types, and probably the occasional pervert. We might not scratch where they itch with the linguistic material at the topic of the article. However, on this topic, there is room for people to be quite emotionally involved. As I've worked on the article, I've tried to think of how a teenage girl making sense of her virginity might be thinking and feeling, whether she is contemplating sexual debut in anticipation or on reflection.

Stuff about wedding dresses seems extremely petty to me, but I attempt to make Wiki a service to readers. Their issues need to be our issues. Alastair Haines (talk) 22:34, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see the fan club has arrived ... the correct way to handle content dispute is bold ... revert ... discuss. Bold ... revert ... revert is not the wp way, but it was predictable. I challenge each of the three sections above; I do not need citations for my challenge but those who want the text back in do need citations to support their view. Abtract (talk) 21:22, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

When people can't make a case for the revision they want of an article, and are unwilling to attempt to win others to their perspective, it is not uncommon for them to slight their critics, claiming procedure to be on their side.

Because you have met one overly self confident administrator who wasn't competent to understand what you were doing, doesn't mean that other editors are blind.

Your comments above are a personal attack on John, despite his extremely fair and friendly and open interaction with you. He was willing to put a genuine case against me addressing the editor rather than the issue.

All is not lost, do better than me by tackling the issues of John's comments rather than John himself and wiki lawyerism. Wiki rules follow from what is best treatment of issues, they don't define good treatment. Address the issues and you will be within the guidelines anyway.

The first question is always and only "does it improve and maintain Wikipedia". Alastair Haines (talk) 22:51, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As quoted on Wikipedia:Verifiabilty from Jimbo himself; if this doesn't convince you nothing will:

"I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons." Abtract (talk) 23:03, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is not an accident that the quote you mention is melded with the stern warning in policy to not keep uncited facts in WP:BLPs. Nevertheless, I shall source it in due course, and not edit war. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 23:17, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent decision; thanks. Abtract (talk) 23:50, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Good on both of you! I agree that the three paragraphs Abtract has removed are problematic. He did the right thing and copied them to the talk page. I agree that his interpretation of Jimbo is a reasonable one, though I agree with John that it is not being applied appropriately here. This is a sensible disagreement, it is a healthy a constructive thing for two positions to be being advocated.

As regards the sentences removed from the lead, however. They are simply "summary form" statements of common knowledge, and other facts provided with clear support in cited material in the article and in the bibliography. There is no warrant for insistance on removal of text merely because it lacks in line citation. It is both impossible and would be unsightly to source every word of an article.

I will be restoring those words, which contain cited material from the AHD anyway, if no one else does, until someone shows:

• there is no distinction between chastity and virginity;
• there is no reference to sexual jealousy in literature;
• that the context of sexual jealousy is irrelevant to the significance of virginity;
• that mate selection is not the practical point at issue.

The four suggestions above will not be sourced because no one would seriously suggest them. The currently absent text, however, neatly concludes the lead and introduces the main article. The way it may be supported by sources has been described above. They have been unchallenged over the course of a year or so, precisely for this reason.

Removing quality text is very serious vandalism. Adding poor text is less problem because it will attract attention.

If others cannot see clearly when Wiki is being vandalised, it falls to those who can to do what they can to maintain it.

It is not edit warring to repeatedly revert an editor who is unreasonably insisting on vandalism, otherwise 3RR reports would never be made—whoever reported would always be blocked along with the editor they reported.

Neither admins, nor ArbCom have authority over such facts, indeed they can be held accountable for failing to appreciate them.

I feel perfectly comfortable to revert any future reversions by Abtract of the lead sentences without limit in number or time. In fact, the only case against me doing so would be a case that could establish the points I list above. Even were such a case provided, it would not suggest I had erred in any way, since the case was not made prior to my actions.

Avoiding edit wars is not the fundamental rule of Wikipedia. Edit wars can be stopped by page protection at any time. (I know there are other issues.)

I am showing great restraint regarding matters that should be obvious to people with understanding of Wiki.

If Wiki cannot protect quality text from vandalism, volunteers are merely wasting time contributing. That is a far more basic need than allowing people access to contributing. What, indeed would be the point of contributing, unless there were a rational expectation that such contributions may be lasting. Undermine that hope and Wiki truly becomes a form of edit war, the only things that last are those that dance to the tune of vandals.

Alastair Haines (talk) 23:53, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]