Natalie Dylan: I Raise Many Questions, And Offer Few Answers

A rare event for me - offering few answers. But this is one of those times where I really don't have many clear views on the subject matter, and prefer to spark debate.

The subject matter is Natalie Dylan's article at Daily Beast explaining, "Why I'm Selling My Virginity". She writes:

When I put my virginity up for auction in September, it was in part a sociological experiment—I wanted to study the public's response.

...

Like most little girls, I was raised to believe that virginity is a sacred gift a woman should reserve for just the right man. But college taught me that this concept is just a tool to keep the status quo intact. Deflowering is historically oppressive—early European marriages began with a dowry, in which a father would sell his virginal daughter to the man whose family could offer the most agricultural wealth. Dads were basically their daughters’ pimps.

When I learned this, it became apparent to me that idealized virginity is just a tool to keep women in their place. But then I realized something else: if virginity is considered that valuable, what’s to stop me from benefiting from that? It is mine, after all. And the value of my chastity is one level on which men cannot compete with me. I decided to flip the equation, and turn my virginity into something that allows me to gain power and opportunity from men. I took the ancient notion that a woman’s virginity is priceless and used it as a vehicle for capitalism.

Read the whole article to make sense of what follows!

At Feministe, the question was raised, "just how subversive is this really?"

I posted the following thoughts and questions in the comments thread over there, but I feel they deserve a post of their own - I would love for readers to discuss, debate, etc in the comments thread!

1/. The fetishisation of virginity and the value put on it by men is one of the driving forces of sex trafficking, and in particular the traffickers’ choice of underage girls as their victims.

2/. What happens if the winner decides to resell her virginity without using it (in other words, decides to pimp her out)? If virginity is treated as a market commodity, why shouldn’t the winner seek to profit from the transaction in some way other than by having the “honour” of being the first dude to fuck her?

3/. (Inspired by freedomgirl’s comment) What if a lesbian wins the bidding?

4/. It’s not actually an auction if the highest bid is not guaranteed victory. It is more like a tender for bids from service providers, or for buyers of a company (where the winning bid is the best offer for shareholders but also takes into account other issues).

5/. It’s not subversive because of the symbolic value placed on a woman’s virginity, and the fact that this is being presented as a one-off (that is, she is not setting herself up as a prostitute/callgirl/escort). These combine to make it reinforce the patriarchal “gatekeeper” role of women, who are expected to wait for a man to prove himself “worthy” (in this instance, by having the best bid).

6/. In light of points 4 and 5, what will the reactions be of men whose higher bids are rejected in favour of a lower but “better” bid? In what ways will this reaction reflect on and reveal the nature of male privilege and entitlement?

7/. Her virginity is currently valued at $3.8M - does that mean that she would have been underselling herself if she had opted for marriage to a partner who hadn’t spent that much on her? Given that a man making median earnings and working for 40 years will make less than $2M in his working life (working 40 years multiplied by $45k p.a. = $1.8M - even corrected for inflation along the way it won’t reach $3.8M) what conclusions can we draw about the relative value placed on Natalie Dylan’s virginity?

8/. Considering market forces and the laws of supply and demand: if, as she says, she may be at the start of a new trend, how far might the market value of a woman’s virginity fall? What would it take for it to fall to zero (or as near to zero as makes no odds)?

9/. Again, if this is the start of a new trend, and returning to the point about age, ethnicity, attractiveness and other factors - would there be a role for “sexual estate agents” (I think “estate agent” is “realtor” in US English?) who assess the likely selling value of a woman’s virginity before she chooses to put it on the market? Would those same agents provide a service to women seeking to sell their virginity and helping her to advertise it in the best way possible - and collect a commission fee at the end? In what ways would these differ from/be similar to, escort agencies that operate now?

***

Note that the only definite answer I give is point 5: it definitely isn't subversive in my opinion, because it is wrapped up so heavily in the idea of virginity as special, and because it reinforces the "worthiness trap" by which women are set up to be at once the reward for a man's success, but also must adjudicate based on rules that men generate (for example, the rules of an auction). The fact that she states that the winning bid is not necessarily the highest bid, does go a little way to assuage this, but again, as my point 6 elaborates, what would the reaction be from someone finding out that a lower bid than his had won? In fact, in more mundane, everyday interactions, anger, violence, and hatred towards women in general, and the woman who picked the "less worthy" guy in particular, are common themes - and common themes in literature and Hollywood when they deal with such storylines.

That's all I'm going to write: please, people, give me some feedback on the questions I've posed!