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Opinions

There will be blood

Fake hymens and slut shaming

By Natalie Serafini, Opinions Editor

[eee I’m a member of that feminine mystique Betty Friedan once got so uppity about. I’ve spent the requisite hours and dollars on magazines; I’ve ignored homework in favour of camouflaging a zit; I’ve done the whole “Tm too fat” thing and subsequent obsession with salads. Of course the list of what it takes to be a woman nowadays goes on, but you get the basic gist. Imagine my shock and chagrin when I heard of what is—for some women—a requisite to respectable femaleness: a fake hymen.

The target audience for the product seems to be countries where virginity is integral to securing a husband.

Companies like the Hymen Shop tout the artificial membrane’s ability to restore virginity with “no needles, [and] no costly operation.” Whether you want to feign your virginity for the big night or spice up your married life with multiple fake hymens, this is the place for you! Of course the product isn’t actually for the womans happiness and well-being; or it is, but only in the sense that a thin layer of membrane lies between a woman being marriageable and being destined for spinster-ship. Falling for imitation artificial hymens (ones that aren’t the genuine Hymen Shop article) will apparently incite anger in the husband upon his finding out he was tricked into marrying a less than virginal woman. Which brings me to the conclusion that fake hymens—like breast implants and vaginal

bleaching—are not for the woman’s pleasure, sexual or otherwise. Who wants to shove a fake membrane that dissolves into blood up their vagina? I get enough real blood once a month, thank you very much. They attempt to be discreet, but the Hymen Shop describes its services with a wink and a leering nod. “Since hymens can be broken via physical activity or even by the use of a tampon, many women are concerned about restoring their virginity.” It’s true that hymens can be broken in a variety of ways. Yet, if a tampon or “physical activity” (due to their subtlety, I’m forced to assume that they mean exercise rather than sex) caused the hymen to break, I doubt many people would refer to that as a loss of virginity. In which case, there’s no need to worry about restoring it, because it wasn’t lost.

Idealism versus realism

Struggling to have integrity

By Natalie Serafini, Opinions Editor

Wanins fora newspaper, I write from week to week about things that frustrate me. Because I’m rather idealistic, I frequently write about the horrible, horrid world we live in and why people ought to be more morally-minded. I’ve ranted and railed against ambivalence, sweatshops, bug-killing, and able-bodied people who use the handicap button to open doors.

T really screwed myself over.

To explain: during

the Korean War, some captured US soldiers were sent to prisoner

of war camps in China. At the camps, prisoners would be asked to make mildly anti-American statements like, “The United States is not perfect.” Gradually, the prisoners would be asked to explain exactly how the United States wasn’t perfect, and would later write an essay on how America was imperfect. The men would begin to change their beliefs to be consistent with what they’d written.

No, I’m not ina prisoner of war camp, and I’m not being brainwashed. Instead, I’ve set myself some pretty high standards that I have to struggle to meet. Or at

the very least, pout and sulk through meeting. By publishing these idealistic beliefs—even if I do believe them—I’ve set myself up for hypocrisy. I’m not trying to sound all “Woe is me;” I know leaving bugs alone and depriving myself of making certain purchases isn’t a hardship. But I feel guilty and wasteful if I drive anywhere, even though I walk pretty much everywhere. I won't even get into the remorse I felt when, attempting to avoid the culpability of buying sweatshop products, I accidentally bought leather shoes from a secondhand store. When I started on my no-killing- bugs frenzy, I encountered the flaw to my plans—a fly in the ointment, if

But that isn’t the real concern. The concern is with shaming women for being sexually active and then capitalizing on that shame.

Many people may be shaking their heads in disappointment and disgust at the way these misogynistic, fundamentalist countries treat their women. Oppression of women is pretty blatant in countries where women are pressured into buying fake hymens.

Well, Western society isn’t much better. Our appearances, thoughts, actions, and speech are shaped by a fundamentally sexist society. There are wrinkles in our thinking habits that sometimes get ironed out by feminists. Those ideas that women aren't intelligent enough to vote, women aren’t intelligent enough to work, women are only glorified baby-making flowerpots. But language

you will. I tried to catch- and-release a fly that was perched on a window by using the old paper and cup attack. Unfortunately, I didn’t take into account the fact that I have terrible aim and hand-eye coordination. Pathetic as it is, | somehow managed to hit the fly with the edge of the cup, effectively killing it via dismemberment. This all led to a downward spiral of “Dammit, I’m Lenny from Of Mice and Men,” but it also led to a disproportionate amount of guilt.

While I haven't been brainwashed into thinking or acting a certain way, I worry someone’s going to catch me lacking integrity. And I’ve begun to think this

is still peppered with “bitch,” “slut,” “whore,” and “ho,” and we live in arape culture that blames the survivor rather than the perpetrator. Apparently the feminine mystique lies at the point between prude and slut. While we aren't exactly selling fake hymens in drug stores, we're still guilty of slut shaming. I’m angry that artificial hymens are a thing, but I’m not about to blind myself to the fact that we have a similar problem here. Maybe it’s not as obvious as the fake hymen slogan, “Kiss[ing] your deep dark secret goodbye,” or maybe it just seems smaller because we're living it. Whatever the case, we can’t delude ourselves into thinking sexism— along with slut shaming and the devaluation of women—isn’t a problem.

manic high horsed-ness isn’t so much with the healthy—the altitude alone is a lot to deal with. You can’t take on all the world’s issues. Yes, if you have a way to make the world a slightly better place, you should. This isn’t a free pass to leave all the lights on in your home, drive out to Newfoundland, and club some baby seals while sporting a suit of leather. Instead, I’m suggesting that it isn’t healthy to obsess over being a decent human being all the time. Of course it’s important to strive to be a good person, but there’s a whole lot of bad out there; it doesn’t make sense to take the blame for it all.

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