Some Lose It, Some Use It
I don’t really remember losing my virginity, which suits me very well, as I tend to think that attaching any weight to my first sexual fumblings does nothing for me and everything to uphold the forces that oppress women. That said, I do find the uses that people are finding for this construct very interesting.
For instance, an 18-year-old in Siberia made almost $28,000 by selling off her virginity on the Russian auction site 24au.ru at the end of October. The young woman, who goes by the moniker Shatuniha wrote, “I am in urgent need of money, so I am selling the most precious thing I possess. I am ready to meet up soon, even as soon as tomorrow, and I am ready to have my virginity verified. I can come to a hotel at Predmostnaya Square with a document confirming my virginity, and with a person who will take the cash and leave, so that I am not fooled. This person will take away the money, but I will stay… The money should be cash only.”
On October 31, an individual offering 900,000 roubles (USD $27,950) won the auction. The bid, offered by someone going by the name Evgeniy Volnov, was 100,000 rubles (USD $3,100) over the asking price. When Krasnoyarsk police were contacted by the Siberian Times about it, they said they had “no right to give a moral assessment” of the situation. They believe the deal is genuine and added that it breaks no laws because it does not “fit into a description of the Prostitution clause from the Code of the Administrative Violations.”
The Times noted that the teen had previously placed an add to sell her virginity on another site. In the April posting, she said she would soon be turning 18 (the age of consent in Russia is 16, by the way), adding, “I want to urgently sell my virginity. I want to sell it at a very expensive price to someone who can properly appreciate it. I have no bad habits, and I am nice looking. I live in Krasnoyarsk but I am ready to travel to any other city.” It is not known whether anything came of that auction, or if that’s the only one. And the only thing I can come up with when I think about that is, good for you. Good for you for illustrating the uneven treatment of sex-workers and for getting something out of this useless construct — maybe even twice!
Meanwhile, in London, a 19-year-old art student is planning to lose his virginity before an audience on January 25, 2014. Clayton Pettet envisions the performance art piece as a way to destigmatize losing one’s virginity. The piece, titled “Art School Stole My Virginity,” will feature safe anal sex between Pettet and his partner to completion. Afterward, they will invite the audience to have a conversation about the themes in play.
“Since culturally we do hold quite a lot of value to the idea of virginity I have decided to use mine and the loss of it to create a piece that I think will stimulate interesting debate and questions regarding the subject,” he told the LGBT blog Queerty. “The key thing about performance art is that it should only be performed once, and this is the ultimate once-in-a-lifetime performance.”
Header image by eleanor ryan. In-post photos, Shatuniha on left and Pettet on the right.
