Virginity vs Promiscuity and Everything In Between: My Experience

Most students see university as an opportunity to break away from the confinement of parents and revel in the fact that for the first time ever, they have the freedom to do whatever they want. Maybe to get as drunk or drugged up as humanly possible without Mum nagging in your ear, but most importantly, it is the freedom to sleep with as many people as you can.

Fresher’s Week is universally stereotyped as the week for such ‘FREEDOM.’ I have heard so many student’s stories (both from UEA and other universities) about how many people they had managed to have sex with in Freshers Week, leading to quite a few notches on bedposts.

Then there is the LCR. I can’t count the number of times either myself, my friends or someone I know has spotted a fellow student having sex in the toilets, outside, or even on the dance floor.

Then take drinking games; the game ‘I Have Never,’ or ‘Never Have I Ever,’ is a classic drinking game amongst party goers where people feeling tipsy often branch out to strip poker, or any other kind of game that leads to the removal of clothing or revealing their most embarrassing sexual antics.

It is the truth! We all know it happens! There is no denying that university life revolves around sex; it always seems like just about everybody is doing it, and are all doing it at the same time.

Of course there is absolutely nothing wrong with this; people can do whatever the hell they like. However, for some students, this kind of rampant sexual behaviour, seconded only to the rabbits that roam around campus, is actually not at all that liberating.

So I’m going to come out and say it; I am a third year university student and yes, I am still a virgin.

Unfortunately, in real life, that is something that is actually a lot more difficult to admit; hence why this article is anonymous, as cowardly as that may seem.

However, I ask you not to judge me for my anonymity; it is actually quite difficult to presume what people’s reactions to this will be. Literally, I have no idea, and this is usually the reason as to why I don’t reveal my sexual exploits, (or rather, my non-existent ones) and try to avoid the topic of sex as much as I can in social situations.

What I do know is that the majority of you will be shocked. Which is understandable; it is unusual in this day and age for people to still be virgins at 20/21 years old, especially at University.

My natural assumption is that most, if not all of you who read this article will have a negative reaction to it because that’s how I feel … the truth is I’m ashamed of my virginity.

The close friends that I have told this to said I shouldn’t care; it isn’t something to be ashamed of. Yet I can’t seem to bring myself to agree. Who can blame me really? Everything these days seems to be about sex. I can’t be the only one who is confused.

We live in a world where we’re told how under age sex is bad, and how shocking Britain is for having one of the highest rates of teen pregnancy in Europe but also one where people are praised for acting like an abstinent Disney star. Either way, sex is thrust in our faces (no pun intended).

Just look at the media and the huge list of TV shows aimed at our age group showing young people fucking just about anyone and anything that can move. We are part of the Skins generation that glamorises promiscuity, where anyone who isn’t doing it by 18 is either, and I quote from Skins, “ridiculously ‘un-cool’, or just plain pathetic.”

Not to mention that the minute you go to a routine check-up at the medical centre you are bombarded with questions about pregnancy, the pill and STI’s, whilst having a free Chlamydia test shoved in your face. No I do not have a sexually transmitted infection and I am not pregnant, not unless I am about to be impregnated with the new and forthcoming Messiah. So stop asking me!

It’s usually around this point that I begin to tear out my hair and consider becoming A-sexual.

Whichever way you look at it, people today naturally assume young people must be having sex. And that’s just too much pressure.

Some of you may think, ‘if you’re so bothered, what don’t you just do it?’ But, it’s just not that simple. At least not for me anyway.

I’m sure other people are more than happy to go out and sleep with a random stranger they just met and good for them; they clearly have the confidence to do something like that, and that is their prerogative … but that’s just not for me.

So what can I do but just sit and wait to be in a relationship? ‘The right way to do it’, as some judgemental people have told me. Again, that’s easier said than done, and just another pressure put upon my head. Believe it or not, and as much as you may argue against this, it really isn’t easy for a girl to find a boyfriend, especially when all the boys I usually meet are either so immature they might as well be in nappies, or they are just looking for nothing more than sex, and that’s not exactly a self-esteem booster.

You might ask, ‘well isn’t that what a boyfriend is used for?’

No. It is not. What would be the point in that? If it was, I might as well have gone out and lost my virginity at 16.That wouldn’t be the reason for me getting with someone. If it happened then great, if it didn’t, I’ve waited this long haven’t I?

The point is that I want to lose my virginity to someone that I really, genuinely like, maybe not someone I can see myself walking down the aisle to (I’m still young for Christ’s sake), but someone that I can trust enough to understand my issues about it and still want to be with me regardless.

Similarly, I’m never going to actively seek out a boyfriend; I’d like to think I’m not quite that desperate. When the time comes, it’ll happen, it just hasn’t happened yet, and for the time being, I actually enjoy being single. Is there anything wrong with that?

Maybe I’m over-reacting; perhaps I should try to see my virginity as an opportunity rather than a setback; you hear stories all the time about how people regretted their first time and wish they could go back and wait just that little bit longer. Some people have even told me that my decision to wait is admirable and that hanging on to it is something to be envied rather than mocked, similarly I can guess that some of you couldn’t care less; I guess it’s a matter of opinion.

I’m not really sure why I wrote this article, I know I should take my own advice and not care. Still, it does get me down sometimes but I’m not going to justgo out and lose it because I feel pressured to.

All I can say for now is that for anyone else that is still a virgin at university, and feeling the same confusion and pressure that I am, just remember that you’re not the only one! Your virginity and your body are your own to do whatever you want with. And whatever you choose to do with it, whether to lose your virginity or hang on to it for the rest of your days, well, that’s nobody else’s business.