Virginity Is the Last Taboo
As sexually liberated as we all are in the year 2025, we still can’t shake the sense that there’s something significant about a woman’s first time, writes Kat Rosenfield. (Photo by Orlando/Three Lions via Getty Images, all illustrations by The Free Press)
A secret? A prize? A burden? A social construct? I asked a dozen women who didn’t have sex until later in life: What does ‘virginity’ mean to you?
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It’s Saturday night, date night, and the mood is exactly what it should be. The light is low; the air is cool; a bottle of wine sits open and empty on the countertop, two burgundy-tipped glasses beside it. In the corner, the TV is on, but neither one of them is watching it—the young couple is on the couch, entangled with each other, all hungry mouths and roaming hands. Soon, they’ll be doing more than just kissing; soon, he’ll take her by the hand and lead her to the bedroom, and what’s happening will really start happening.
That is, until she says the three little words that bring the whole enterprise to a grinding halt:
I’m a virgin.
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