Smart Bitches Trashy Books | All of the romance, none of the bullshit.

I’m still trying to wrap my brain around all the thoughts that this article from MSNBC shook loose regarding women who undergo surgery to reattach their hymens so that they can be virgins again. Jane sent me the link and her reaction mirrored mine: EAAAAAUUUGH!

Since then my brain has been gnawing on the issue, and forcing me to examine my own horror. Why am I so squicked? And under what circumstances would someone want to surgically reattach their hymen? I can understand wanting to reclaim one’s own virginity if it was forcibly taken away by rape or assault, and I see the necessity when women are subject to honor killings should they dare have sex outside of sanctioned wedlock. But investing external value into the presence of a hymen such that one might pay a surgeon a good amount of money to reattach it for the pleasure of someone else… I don’t get it.

I also thought about and went back to re-read Candy’s and my discussion about virginity in the romance novel and how it’s a powerful and sacred construct affecting both heroes and heroines. But would a romance heroine be believable if she had her hymen reattached?

The surgery itself raises a lot of questions that I’m still puzzling over, not the least of which is how important virginity is in and outside of our culture. Outside of RomanceLandia, is losing your virginity important, and would you want it back? Me? No, thanks.

The balm to my what-the-fuck so far has been this interview series with the creator of The Virgin Project, a comic book that details individual’s experiences losing their virginity. Pages from The Virgin Project are making their public debut at the Seattle Erotic Art Festival Gala. Man, do I ever want to go to Seattle. If any of you ladies see the exhibit, please do let me know what you think!

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Categories: Random Musings • The Link-O-Lator

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