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Like a virgin, but not

Like a virgin, but not
Virginity as a socially-
constructed fallacy

By Natalie Serafini, Opinions
Editor

ating life is peppered

with the internal and
external negotiations on a
certain commodity: sex. More
notably in youth, this involves
negotiating the loss of virginity.
Although your first time is said
to be “special,” and “should
be with someone special,”
it shrinks when stacked up
against the rest of your times to
come, and the disproportionate
significance it’s been given has
made giving away your V-card
more of a social fallacy than
anything else.

This isn’t to say that
the establishment of your
relationship with sex doesn’t
matter at all, or that you should
hand it over to the next person
you talk to. I’m tossing in this
disclaimer, but obviously it’s

a good idea to always make
sexual choices that are safe and
that you feel comfortable with.
What makes having sex right for
one person could make having
sex wrong for another, so the
decision to pop or not pop that
cherry is a personal one.

Returning to why first times
aren't that big a deal, the term
“losing your virginity” seems
steeped in faulty language.

You don’t lose anything from
the experience, but stating it

in such negative terms sets

a corresponding tone. The
supposed loss communicates
that you become less and less
pure with each additional
conquest, and that there’s

an initial fall from grace the
moment you bump uglies.
Personally, I don’t put much
stock in purity, and there’s little
chance that using a part of your
body in the way it was intended
will result in a horrible decline
in character.

Much like it doesn’t initiate
the gradual decay in your
morality, sex doesn’t change
you in other ways, either. We
giggle our way through tween
and young adulthood seeing sex

as some sort of sexy bar or bat
mitzvah where we'll emerge a
new man or woman, but that’s
not the case. You don’t actually
undergo a metamorphosis,
few cry from the pure emotion
of it all, and you don’t gain a
certain special je ne sais quoi.
First times are portrayed in
teen dramas and books as life-
changing, but it’s unlikely that
anyone matures or drastically
changes based on this single,
hopefully positive, event.

Maybe because of the
supposed weight of it all, there
are certain “requirements”
for that first time which are
stated as fact for all people
and situations. If I think of
those teen dramas and novels,
the questions posed in these
situations are not “Do you
know that you want to have
sex with this person?” or “How
comfortable are you with your
relationship?” but “Do you love
them?” The statement isn’t just
“Be safe,” but “Your first time
should be with someone you
love.” I call shenanigans on this
emphasis on love.

If you're waiting for
“The Love of Your Life,” you

could be waiting a long time,

if not forever. Moreover, the
qualifier “Someone you love” is
indefinite—how to differentiate
them from someone you care a
lot about, or even a bit about?
You know when you want to
sleep with someone; love and
experience, or lack thereof,
needn't be deciding factors in
whether or not you get it on.
Besides which, if you want to
have sex with someone, chances
are you care about them, and
you don’t need to define further
than that.

Having sex is a neutral
action that can be tainted or
aided by context, whether
it’s your first time or your
thousandth, but it seems
it’s only ever portrayed in
a select few lights. One of
these lights involves a long
and melodramatic, possibly
tragic, plot. More mildly, girl
meets boy, girl likes boy, girl
sleeps with boy, boy loses girl’s
number. More dramatically, girl
gets pregnant. Or chlamydia.
And dies.

While I acknowledge that
these should all be concerns,
they shouldn't stop you from

A multicultural alternative to multiculturalism

Multiculturalism
has failed in the
preservation of cultures

By Idrian Burgos, Contributor

 

here’s no doubt

multiculturalism serves as
an important pillar in current
Canadian ideology. According
to this pillar, no culture is better
than the rest. Rather than the
“melting pot” ideology of
the United States, where all
immigrant cultures are “melted”
into a single national identity,

Canada, since Pierre Trudeau,
has chosen the “mosaic” option
of all cultures being equal and
celebrated. You can celebrate
your English, French, Indian,
Chinese, or whatever identity
you were born with. You don’t
need to assume the culture of
the dominant society or pretend
to be a member of that society.
Multiculturalism has led to
the widespread celebration

of Canada’s numerous ethnic
identities and has, to an extent,
successfully helped with the
integration of immigrants into
this country, allaying fears of
its threat to national identity.
Multiculturalism has indeed
become part of our national
identity, and it’s hugely
celebrated.

The problem here is that it
actually does a disservice to the
cultures it’s supposed to protect,
and to their preservation and
celebration in Canada.

First of all, I disagree with
having a Canadian version of
the melting pot. It’s quite funny
to see the “Canadian values”
all Canadian immigrants must
adopt, with their law and order,

parliamentary democracy, and
human rights principles—
essentially no different from
the “American values” all
American immigrants are
required to adopt. The danger
lies either in the domination

of minority cultures by the
majority culture, like in Quebec,
or the subsuming of all cultures
to an incomprehensible set of
values. While the melting pot
certainly isn’t a good model

for dealing with immigrants,
multiculturalism is no better of
a model.

One problem with
multiculturalism is its
trivialization of cultures.
Messages encouraging the
celebration of culture intend
things like food or dance.

The deeper beliefs and values
found in every culture aren't
much discussed. When they
are, it’s often for the sake of
that culture’s promotion. Not
much is done to set these values
against the context of a new
land, to plant these cultural
beliefs in a different soil—
with the historic exceptions
of the English, French, and

Aboriginal cultures, which
were “Canadianized.” The
transplanted cultures from
Ukraine and Japan remain
Ukrainian and Japanese

in their new place—not

much transformation in
accordance with different
conditions or a limited

degree of “Canadianization.”
Trivialization insults cultures,
while self-preservation prevents
them from participating fully in
Canadian society.

Other problems with
multiculturalism are its
relativization of cultures and
failure to provide a larger,
unifying identity. The former
stems from multiculturalism’s
cultural equality principle, the
latter from multiculturalism’s
cultural-centrism. The distinct
characteristics each culture
can contribute alone to society
are dampened by the “all
cultures are equal” rule. The
encouragement to celebrate your
culture and other cultures leads
to celebration of “culture” alone,
without providing a larger
framing identity under which
all cultures can swear allegiance,

having sex if they’re addressed
beforehand—and afterwards. If
you get chlamydia, make sure
you address that afterwards, too.
These cautionary tales function
more or less to prevent people
from becoming sexually active.
When you're bombarded with
the idea that when you have
sex you will lose your partner
(all the worse if you’ve waited
for The Love of Your Life) /
get pregnant/ get chlamydia/
die, all of this adds up to the
subconscious understanding
that you'll be punished for a loss
of virginity and purity.
Sometimes sex is an
important, life-changing
experience, but until you’ve
lived out your life, it’s hard
to discern which moments
changed it. For the time being,
sex isn’t about having a life-
changing experience—or at
least, it’s not about going in
search of one. It’s about having
sex with who you want to because
you both want to. Sex, whether
it’s your first time or your
hundredth, doesn’t need to be
more complicated than that.

coexist peacefully, and play
important roles in a continuing
narrative of nation. And
Trudeau’s liberalism doesn’t
qualify.

The melting pot keeps
cultures under a dominant force.
Multiculturalism emphasizes
culture to the point where both
culture and the territorial reality
beyond it are endangered. Can
an alternative that does true
justice to cultures and ensures
the survival of a country exist?

Sir John A. Macdonald
encouraged Canadians to be
Canadians above all. Thomas
D’Arcy McGee saw that the
Irish can only be Irish under
a tolerant constitutional
monarchy. Joe Clark talked of a
“community of communities.” A
strong state identity can provide
stability and a sense of purpose
for the cultures under it. Each
culture should contribute its
best values to national identity,
reshaped by local peculiarities.
This combination of general
identity and specific cultural
contributions can best serve the
welfare of smaller communities
and of the larger community.

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