Quote:
Originally Posted by SinisterUrge
Without a maidenhead (aka. hymen) you're not a maiden = Not a virgin. Don't listen to people who tell you 'rape doesn't count' or 'sex with toys doesn't count'. Its really simple, if you have an intact hymen, you're a virgin. If your hymen is broken, even from something non-sexual, you are not a virgin.
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I did a search for definitions of 'virgin' and got the following list:
•a person who has never had sex
•Virgo: (astrology) a person who is born while the sun is in Virgo
•being used or worked for the first time; "virgin wool"
•Virgo: the sixth sign of the zodiac; the sun is in this sign from about August 23 to September 22
•pure: in a state of sexual virginity; "pure and vestal modesty"; "a spinster or virgin lady"; "men have decreed that their women must be pure and virginal"
•A Virgin (or maiden) is, originally, a woman who has never had sexual intercourse. Virginity is the state of being a virgin. It is derived from the Latin virgo, which means "sexually inexperienced woman", used typically of adolescents, but also of older women, and even goddesses.
There's no mention of hymens at all. The state of the hymen can, in some circumstances, be used to test to see if a woman might be a virgin - if it is there (untorn) she is, if it isn't there (or is torn) it is inconclusive. But there is no official mention of the hymen in any of the definitions I can find. In a medical dictionary I found a line 'the classic finding in [female] virgins is an intact hymen' but nothing about that being a requirement.
Many women, as mentioned by other posters, tear their hymens in totally non-sexual activities, such as horse-riding - do you really believe, for example, that a 12 year old girl who has torn her hymen through horse-riding is not a virgin? I certainly don't.
You are, of course, entitled to your opinion on your own virginity but I'm particularly upset at your line "Don't listen to people who tell you 'rape doesn't count' " - Think of the pain you could be causing to a rape victim reading that. Rape is not a sexual experience - it is a violent crime. A woman or girl who has been raped or sexually assaulted is not sexually experienced, regardless of the state of her hymen.
I don't wish to tell you or anyone else what to think. As I say, you are certainly entitled to think of victims of sexual crime as non-virgins but those people are also entitled to think of themselves as virgins, and that may be hugely important to their self-esteem and recovery.