Thursday, November 22, 2007

The question of Virginity

Our culture bestows on us that women are second degree creatures, not only by men but even some women themselves (I know many women who strongly believe that they are nothing without thier husbands because they are women and they even deliver the same concept to their children) So it is logic that the upper creature has more privilage than the lower one. As a matter of fact, this privilage includes many things that are related to sex, a man is so proud to show his sexual preferences to everyone, he has the right to talk about which women he likes and why, watching TV he can comment that this woman is sexy, and so on, while a girl usually keeps these comments to herself or her friends. Our society does not look at a man who sleeps with women outside marriage in the same way it looks at women who do the same. Similarly, a man can have a girlfriend and considered normal by his family, mothers are very proud to see their sons with girls while their reaction will be dramatic if she discovers her daughter is seeing someone. although religion does not separate in such things. Apart from sex, something like smoking, people get shocked to see women smoking while a smoking man is something u never stop at, although scientifically there is no difference, smoking harms both equally. a man is allowed to go out with his friends and stay out late while a girl should be home by 9 or 10 because she is a girl. An the list is endless. Virginity is complicated in our culture, it encompasses many things, among which: 1-Some men see it a sign of chastity, because a girl is either a virgin or not and if she's not a virging you can never tell if she has been with 1, 10, 100, 1000 men. 2-A non virgin means that she has some experience in sex, most men do not like that because this means the woman can identify if he's good or bad while with a virgin wouldn't be able to tell. 3-Of course the "I am the first" pride, that feeds the male ego. 4-A virgin gives a sense of security to the man that she will never betray him after marriage. Virginity is a representative of the honour of a whole family. Most men deal with women as sexual objects, while men are not, as if women have no desire, so the woman has to be covered while a very good looking man is not requested to hide his beauty, although the story of Joseph the prophet proves that men can be a source of sexual attraction to the point that the ladies cut their hands. A funny thing, our language has a word that describes a sexually attractive woman (Mozza) but there is no equivalent word for men :)

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for ur reply to the PTP question of virginity.It took me a while to process the fact that an Egyptian man sent it. i even forwarded it to my female friends to prove my point or the bone of contention we always have:open minded men do exist. the men i met(i dont want to be accused of generalization of results) make decisions and behave in a way that totally conform with the society especially their male community. They do not want to encounter pressure or accusation from their male fellows and therefore they tend to adopt ready-made attitudes.deviating from the norm might lead to serious repercussions that they do not want to bear. Many women behave the same way too. it s a bit difficult to find those(males or females) who are courageous enough to state their opinions which is opposing to that of the society. I agree with what u said except for the part of Prophet Joseph because desires work differently for men and women.It takes a woman a "Joseph" to react but for some men(especially harassers on the streets)a female no matter how she looks(whether she s plain or a real beauty)is a stimulus that urge them to react(regardless of the type and intensity of response).Examples of sexual harassment on Cairo streets tell a lot about the mechanism of desires in men and women.

Heba,
language instructor and MA student

Anonymous said...

tani you're talking about men's vs. women's sexuality? :)) Yes, some men are attractive... but mind you, men are not as attractive as women khales. And this is one of the logics/reasons why women are asked to cover themselves up while men are not. A woman can "easily" seduce a man, and NOT vise versa! Look at our video clips channels you'll find more semi-naked women than men... in fact, it's rarely when media uses a male body to attract viewers. When are you gonna admit we are much more attractive than you men ya Meto? :P

In case you don't know, "mozza" is used for both men and women. Sometimes the word "mozz" is also used. With upper classes, the word "babe" is used bardo.

We ba3dein ta3ala hena, change your settings so that you can accept comments from people with blogs other than blogspots :)

Anonymous said...

you know what ya mohamed, i think that women's brain and thinking is totally different from men's. Men are usually tend to be more shallow minded than women and this is why men tend more to look at women and examine every minute detail in them. But for a woman to look at a man she sees more than just a body. She tries to creat a picture of his personality too. Aagain this is not applicable to all women or men, but am talking about the majority of them. Most men are attracted to women because of their looks and figure, on the other hand most women are attracted to men because of their brains. Again, i think this is because women are much mature than men.
The fact of a man and a woman living together without getting married is not accepted in owr society because we are a society that all we care about is judging each other. And we love to pin-point, all the time, the faults in other people, a perfect way to hide our faults. But if u look at it from the religion prespective, marriage is :1- two people accept to live with each other, 2- the people around them know about the relationship and accepting it. It was never mentioned that there must be "katb ketab". But again since we are a society mabeysebsh 7ad fe 7alo, this is a typical result.
As for marriage it is not that if the woman is virgin so the man would gurrantee her loyality. Men always take their wives for granted. He can do whatever he likes to do, still he is not wrong since he sleeps at the end of the day with his wife. Because he is a man he has the right to expeience love with some one else. But she doesn't have this right "she is a woman". She came to his life for reasons to give birth to his kids and satisfy his needs; in bed, eating, cuddeling. But she does not have the right to be "loved".
Life is very strange for this we all are looking forward to live in heaven.
Heba Mostafa (Banhawi's wife)

Anonymous said...

Just a few comments on Heba's post:

I do agree with you ya Heba about men's vs. women's perception of the opposite gender.

As for living together vs. marriage, there is something called "itiba3 2oly el amr" (following those who govern/rule". And since it is something motafaq 3aleih among almost all islamic countries that there should be a marriage contract, then we should follow this. Besides, if we assume that living together is accepted religiously (which is not), this will open the door to transgressions like one-night-stands or relationships that would last for a few months. A marriage contract is not a mere sheet. It is rather a pond. It makes breaking up harder than if you were in just a living-together relation. And I think this is the whole idea behind marriage; creating ponds and connections, right?

Anonymous said...

I see two issues in this thread, the superiority and the virginity.

Concenring the superiority, i would say that unfortunatly this is the society truth although it has no stand of reality. What makes me mad is that some people try to base it on religion!!
I remember watching a kids program on TV that shows a right and wrong behavior. In the wrong behavior they showed some male kids messing up their rooms and in the right behavior they showed some female kids fixing up the same room!! EXCUSE ME!!!!

For the virginity issue, i would like to add that the Egytian law grants a man who finds his wife or HIS SISTER with another man and kills him or both, it gives him a lighter sentence than a wife finding her husband with another woman and kills him or both. And the claim is that the man is defending his honour!! So i guess a woman has no honor in the law.
Thanks GOD for being there to judge us at the end. No thanks for the law.


RH

Anonymous said...

I remember that thread of emails on PTP that Camel started with Marquez' novel... I was workng in Reuters at that time... I remember even what I was wearing that day... :)

That was my reply back then...
http://sleeplessrou.wordpress.com/2007/11/22/in-reply-to-would-you-divorce-a-non-virgin/