Bodies on Bodies
Body Count: the number of people someone has been sexually intimate with.
The concept of a body count is an evolution of purity/virginity culture in which women have to remain untouched for their future husbands and a man’s masculinity is dictated by his sexual conquests. This antiquated idea in new packaging permeates hook-up and dating culture in the 21st century and is one of the dumbest online debates — a plague on social media platforms.
This clip is from the 2001 movie, American Pie 2. Only the first 1.5 minutes is relevant:
It introduces the “Rule of 3” popularized by this series. The “Rule of 3” sums up prevalent ideas of men vs. women’s social status as defined by their sexuality — the idea that someone’s worth so affected by the number of sexual partners they’ve had that people are driven to lie in order to maintain or protect their social standing.
Who gives a fuck?
So who even gives a fuck? The short answer is everyone — whether we confirm or deny it’s importance (or remain uninvested in this conversation) this perception of chastity remains an important part of our social lives, especially when it comes to love and dating.
Featured below are a few tweets focused on this cultural phenomenon. This feature doesn’t represent a criticism of the twitter users themselves, rather they present a window into the culture that births this discourse.
Some twitter users, self-proclaimed hoes, and sex radicals call for us to divest from the practice of body counting and its’ restriction of sexual freedom. I would agree, but I ask how do we accomplish this goal?
This strange evolution of chastity culture cannot be dismantled without real divestment — more than an individual commitment to indifference, this means a large scale dismantling of the ways that our culture and social structures reinforce ideals of female virginity as the success model. To combat our enemy we must know it — what is this culture of sexual status that exists all around us, where does it come from, and where has it taken root?
What is Chastity Culture?
The rhetorical cycle on social media seems to return to this topic like clockwork. Some feel very invested in the idea — that one’s value is dictated by their perceived sexual status. Others are committed to ending the conversation and debunking social myths that exist around body counts.
One idea that seems to be communicated in a million different ways is the theory that a higher body count hurts a person’s ability to form emotional connections and long-lasting romantic relationships — “someone” being women. Whether more sexual partners keep women — who are so much more “sensitive” — from being able to form “emotional attachments” or to truly establish a “soul tie” with an optimal male partner, these ideas are about as new as sliced bread.
Hiding under the guise of women’s best interests, these types of statements are a patriarchal masquerade. Even if they are supported and propagated by many women, ideas like this tend to serve the desires of men who want untouched, unsullied, unexperienced sexual and romantic partners — the types of women that can be taken advantage of and controlled. I would argue that in our society this coincides and augments a type of sexual grooming that many women endure, a practice in which their sexuality is framed around the satisfaction of their future husbands and women are left in the dark surrounding their own pleasure.
This is just a rebrand of an old ass Victorian era practice, in which the strict codes of comportment for men and women created such a wide divide in sexual knowledge and experience that men were at a distinct advantage. When you factor in the reality that women were also barred from political empowerment, and economic independence, the sexual puppetry of their wives was an easy feat for Victorian men who wanted their women to act as sexual objects and servants to fulfill their needs without expressing their own.
Our imaginations of the Victorian era (1837 - 1901 A.D.) run wild with romantic and sensationalist preconceptions. Despite this, the Victorian period created social rules, roles, and ideas that continue to influence cultures around the world.
The 19th century was an era of great contradiction. Sexual shame, puritanism, and repression characterized social interactions, meanwhile a counter-culture fascinated with sexual deviancy ran amuck behind the scenes.
According to Dr. Holly Furneaux, a professor of Victorian literature and culture at Cardiff University, prostitutes were a point of fascination for Victorian era art and culture, proving that despite the prevailing culture folks were going to find ways to satiate their sexual desires.
Although ideas of female chastity were not introduced by the Victorians, they established the distinct double standard that is recognizable today. Dr. Furneaux’s article cites the Matrimonial Causes Act of 1857, in which a wife’s infidelity alone was reason enough for divorce, but overwhelming evidence of other abuses were necessary to divorce a husband. Additionally, the Contagious Diseases Acts of the 1860s targeted prostitutes for forced medical examinations in an effort to reduce the spread of STIs in the armed forces.
Dr. Furneaux cites the poet Coventry Patmore with defining the timely concept of an “Angel of the House”. Patmore’s poem by the same name describes a wife serving as a goddess of tranquil domesticity for her husband, fulfilling his every need, and somehow maintaining her virginal purity even as a wife and mother. What the poet describes here is an impossible contradiction, and an expectation that no woman could possibly meet. One cannot be both pleasing wife and virgin mother, yet this is what was expected.
[WARNING: Spoilers for Season 1 of Bridgerton]
This is a screenshot from the Netflix show “Bridgerton” that revolves around the romantic courtship between Daphne Bridgerton, and the Duke of Hastings: Simon Basset. In this scene Daphne’s brother (Anthony) and Simon are set to duel. This conflict between good friends was the result of Simon’s supposed slight against the Bridgerton family’s honor.
After Daphne and Simon are caught in a heated kiss, Anthony demands that Simon marry his sister in order to maintain her honor — in Regency era Britain, unmarried women could not be unchaperoned with unrelated men, and being caught in this romantic embrace was a mark of shame against Daphne and her entire family. Simon’s refusal to marry Daphne put her chastity in question, making her and all her sisters unsuitable for marriage.
Throughout the show, we see Anthony engaging with a favored prostitute, another Bridgerton brother attending artistic sex parties, and yet another encouraged to sow his wild oats before marriage. Viewers observe many more examples of men speaking of and engaging in sexual acts outside of marriage in the show.
Daphne, on the other hand, has sex with her new husband for months, unaware that he is intentionally “pulling out” to keep her from getting pregnant — unaware that sperm meeting egg is what causes pregnancy and believing that the Duke is infertile. She, considered a woman by 16-years-old, is too young to know such things but old enough to be married off, while her brother — a year her senior — must explore sex and life more in order to be ready for marriage.
Although modern ideals of suitability and virginity are not so strict, they still follow this line of thought. That too much sexual experience or knowledge is sullying — but only for women.
Atlanta rapper, T.I., made headlines in November, 2019 when he publicly spoke about his yearly visits to the gynecologist with his then 18-year-old daughter, Deyjah. He said that he accompanied her on the visits to check that her hymen was intact.
Deyjah Harris later spoke out, revealing her feelings of embarrassment over her father’s comments and her discomfort with the yearly virginity test.
The rapper’s comments were incredibly insensitive and shocking to listeners of the “Ladies Like Us” podcast where he revealed this yearly tradition. Following her birthday since age 16 — within 1 or 2 days — the rapper would schedule a doctors appointment, and have Deyjah sign the necessary consent forms for release of her medical information. Ms. Harris said that the practice was especially hurtful considering the way her father felt about his sons having sex, praising them and their behaviors while she was being tested.
Not only was T.I. unashamed of this yearly visit to the gynecologist with his daughter, many came to his defense on the internet. Plenty of fathers continue to feel ownership over their daughters’ bodies and seek to control their (real or imagined) sexual behaviors.
Luckily, this controversy sparked public debate on the legality of this antiquated practice, many called for a nationwide ban on virginity testing. Although this would be a great stride forward for reproductive rights, sexual liberation, and feminism, the buck doesn’t stop there:
What other practices, traditions, and ideas are we holding on to that do nothing but hurt us? How do we divest from a culture obsessed with virginity to embrace sexual competence, wellness, and freedom?
Brick by brick
When we understand the practice of body counting as part of a larger misogynistic monster we can begin to dismantle its’ presence in our everyday lives from the top down. There are more practices left over from the Victorians and other historical sexual repressives that we should question:
Students who participated in abstinence-only programs were just as likely as their peers who received no sex education or participated in other programs to have sex before marriage
Students who participated in abstinence-only education programs had the same average age for their first sexual encounter and same average number of sexual partners as their counterparts
These programs persist as the only option for many students nationwide, despite the fact that 70% of Americans surveyed disapprove of this ineffective sex-ed curriculum
The Hymen isn’t proof of virginity or a barrier to the vagina, additionally it can be broken by several non-sexual activities
The virginity myth also perpetuates the misconception that vaginal penetration is supposed to be painful the first time, when this does not have to be true
Sex is socially constructed and what does/doesn’t count as a loss of virginity fluctuates across cultures, time, space, and location
The common misconception that tampons breach the hymen and take away one’s virginity persists
School dress codes are overwhelmingly targeted towards girls and women, often in an attempt to curtail sexual attention from boys (and male teachers, gross)
School dress codes often discriminate against LGBTQIA+ students, limiting their expression and acting as a way to punish them for within-code fashion choices that are seen as incorrectly gendered
Dress code violations remove students from the classroom, overwhelmingly impacting the academic performance of girls and other gender minorities with unwanted absences
Dress code violations disproportionately affect women of color and low-income students, particularly Black girls who are 6x more likely to be suspended from school as their white counterparts for similar offenses
Purity Balls and Promise rings remain a popular practice in the United States — where girls as young as 12-years-old pledge their virginity to their fathers for safekeeping until they meet their future husbands
I don’t think I need to say much more about this creepy ass practice
The most important thing we can take from this short exploration of chastity/purity culture is that it’s bigger than our individual ideas, conversations, and practices — it’s structural and so deeply ingrained in our culture that it can be hard to see. When we simply say “fuck it” to body counting we miss the forest for the trees.
We must combat purity culture by being able to decipher it in its’ many forms and fighting to end the structures that reinforce its power over our lives. We should and can challenge others to do the same.
IE. Rather than criticizing T.I. for his yearly virginity tests with his daughter, we should be working towards and supporting legislation that makes the practice illegal IN ADDITION to shaming him.
Instead of dismissing your Aunt Tabatha’s preconceptions about tampons, you might pull out articles and evidence to back up claims that virginity isn’t affected by these devices — and if she’s ready, break down virginity itself.
Maybe we should engage body count discourse on twitter, on our tinder dates, and during our hook-ups as defining moments — someone’s opinion on this has a lot to tell us about their own self worth and how they judge others.
Obviously, not having sex with or dating one person because they're invested in body counting doesn’t create a tide of revolution, but engaging the conversation with conviction and with the intent to educate and connect makes a huge difference. It can often be the beginning of prioritizing yourself in sexual relationships and that is revolutionary as hell.
