Erika Arrojado Professor Lori Bedell CAS 138T 5 April 2012 Saving the Best for Last Sex

- its pleasurable, exhilarating, passionate, exciting, and incredible. At least thats what many people say. I personally wouldnt know. Why? Because I am a virgin and intend to remain so until the day I say I do. In todays society, theres somewhat of a stigma on those who are still virgins in college; being sexually active is considered cool and abstinence is lame. However, if you were to take a moment to think about what the act of sex is really all about, you might feel differently. Contrary to cultural ideologies, choosing to remain chaste and abstaining from sex until marriage could be one of the best decisions a young woman makes. Indeed, sex can give you the instant gratification right now, but within the context of marriage, sex can have much more powerful and amazing results. I want to help college women see that saving sex for marriage truly is the way to go. National expert on abstinence and modesty, Dannah Gresh found that on a campus setting like Penn State 19% claim to be virgins. Obviously, not that many people are keen on the idea of waiting to have sex. So why isnt it a typical college students first choice? I would argue that there are several reasons. Firstly, there are mental and physiological factors. As a student in college, youve reached a point in your life when you have more independence than youve had before. As a result, you feel a sense of empowerment; only you are responsible for your actions, so you can do anything that you want, including sex. Additionally, at this age, sexual hormones tell young adults that they need sex, like they need food or water. Then you might add alcohol into the equation, which could lead you into sexual situations that you never intended. These things add up to a fairly strong sex drive. If all that isnt enough, the media and

societal culture do a good job of perpetuating the idea that sex can be used casually without much thought. Popular songs like Enrique Iglesias Tonight, and Pitbulls Give Me Everything all glorify sex as a simple means of pleasure. In the television show How I Met Your Mother, the character of Barney Stinson has an extensive list of creative ways to get random women to sleep with him. Even in popular literature there are messages of sex without commitment, such as in the erotic novel Fifty Shades of Grey. Its clear that our culture provides todays young people with idea that sex isnt a big deal. We are being taught that theres nothing wrong with using our own bodies to satisfy our sexual needs and desires. Given the constant communication of these ideologies, of course it would be difficult for a college student to say no to sexual activity. In health and sexual education classes, weve all learned that being sexually active increases your risk of contracting a sexual transmitted disease. According to the American Health Association, one in two sexually active persons will contact an STD/STI by age 25 and each year, one in four teens contracts an STD/STI. In addition, there is the chance of unwanted pregnancy. Even with condoms and birth control, it is still possible to become pregnant because those contraceptives arent 100% effective (Center for Disease Control and Prevention). Even with these obvious risks, many college students are undaunted and engage in sexual activity anyway. If the possibility of disease and pregnancy isnt enough for a person to consider a life of chastity, there must be another way. Like I mentioned before, a big part of the issue is the fact that the media only gives us one way of looking at things. Therefore, it might be helpful to give you a different perspective. Because of the messages that the media provides, women tend to think that its their responsibility or goal in life to please a man. A woman might think to herself that if she isnt seen as sexually desirable, then it means that she isnt valuable or good enough. This way of thinking is flawed and it will only cause you emotional suffering. Youll feel a need to give

yourself away through sexual acts and for what? For love? For a closer relationship? In all honesty though, how often does your partner stick around? You certainly deserve love, but is giving away your body really the way to get it? Think about it. Why are collectable items in mint condition so valuable? Its because theyve never been opened, touched, or tainted. They maintain the same perfect state that they had when they were first created. Collectors prize these sorts of things because they know how much value there is in preservation. That is how valuable virginity is and thats how it should be treated. As a woman, you should feel value in being whole and not discern your value by how much you can give away or how much men are accepting of what you have to give. It is not your responsibility to please so you shouldnt let that define who you are. Once you give someone else access to your sexuality, they take a part of you that you cant get back. You might still think Well, its my body, so I can do what I want with it. That is true, but that also means you have the power to choose to respect yourself. Keep your value and keep yourself whole. For that truly loving and close relationship, its better to leave sex out of the equation. That way you can distinguish between love and lust. If you are able to sustain a relationship without forfeiting your body, you know that your partner isnt simply using you for sexual satisfaction. They want to be with you because of you who are and not what you have to give. You dont have to settle for lust. You can empower yourself and your partner to strive for what you were looking for to begin with love. Then when the day comes to commit yourself to another person in marriage, you can give all of yourself knowing that you will get love in return and that someone isnt just taking something that doesnt belong to them. Crystalina Evert, author and chastity teacher, shares with teens across the nation her story of how she came to choose chastity. She talks about how, in high school, she was sexually active and caught up with todays hook-up culture until she realized that it wasnt right. In one of her talks, she said, Granted, at the time I thought it was a lot of fun. [But] the next morning the

fun and games were over and I woke up hating myself and woke up with nothing but disgust and regret. And I knew deep in my heart, it wasnt worth it. Her testimony is very relatable for young women. College gives us many opportunities to just go with the crowd and enjoy a promiscuous lifestyle. Though it may seem like its no big deal, it still takes an emotional toll. Many women like her have admitted regret to their past promiscuity. Research done at the University of California, Los Angelos found that the top three biggest regrets that women have are lost virginity to wrong partner, cheated on past or present partner, and relationship progressed too fast sexually (Dr. Persaud and Furnham). These kinds of regrets can be avoided if you decide to change your behavior when it comes to sex. Crystalina then teaches that its never too late to turn your life around. Once she realized what was wrong with her choices, she decided to become chaste. So even if you havent been living a pure life up until now, theres no reason why you cant start. If Crystalina was able to do it in high school, then certainly you can too here in college. In her letter to women, she wrote With a shadow of insecurity hovering about you, youre always trying to keep others interested. Meanwhile, you give yourself away, ignoring your gut. Dont be controlled by the amount of attention and approval that you receive. Stop being ashamed of yourself. Your worth cant come from who youre with, what you wear, or what others think of you. These are powerful words and they show that sexual activity doesnt determine your value as a person, only you do. I know that this message may be a little difficult to accept for college students. The media exemplifies college as the time to experiment and have fun, maybe even go a little crazy. However, the fact that you are a college student in a college environment shouldnt mean that the decision to stay chaste until marriage becomes harder or impossible. A case in point is the Anscombe Society founded in Princeton University in 2005 (Tuttle). This organization was started by a group of students who were sick of the hypersexualized hook-up culture and wanted to take a stance. In the organizations mission statement, it says [we promote] a chaste

lifestyle which respects and appreciates human sexuality, relationships, and dignity. Therefore, we celebrate sex as unifying, beautiful, and joyful when shared in its proper context: that of marriage (The Anscombe Society). When the group took hold and gained success, it obtained enough publicity that its success spread to other universities as well, such as Harvard, MIT, Stanford, and the University of Texas (Tuttle). This thriving group, which was started by students themselves, sets an example that someone can beat societal norms. You dont have to be stuck in the hook-up culture if you dont want to. You, too, can preserve your value by respecting your body, keep your insecurities about approval from controlling how you live, and decide the chastity is the best choice. By now, you might be considering abstaining from sex or at least holding it at a higher standard so that you dont sleep with just anyone. So then why wait until marriage? Why is that the point where its okay to give myself and not just when Im in love or when I really care about someone? The answer is this: leaving the act of sex until marriage makes it exponentially more incredible and rewarding than if it had been outside of marriage. For one thing, the sex is physically more satisfying. As Dannah Gresh points out in her TED talk, A University of Illinois study found that those having both the hottest and most frequent sex were not college coeds with a variety of sexual partners but middle-aged people in mutually life-time monogamous partnerships. Its the love and commitment that makes the sex more passionate, things that a college student might lack when having multiple partners moving from one relationship to the next. There are a few more reasons why the sex in marriage is better. On an online support group for people who are waiting until marriage, Mike notes that many couples, when they get engaged, decide to stop having sex until the wedding. To explain why, the couple will say its because they want their wedding day to be special. Two implications can be drawn from this statement alone. Firstly, if waiting several months to have sex makes it special when you do

sleep with each other again, imagine how special it would be if youve waited your entire life. Youve waited so long and it becomes totally worth it because, not only do you get to experience the most magical and pleasurable feeling known to man, you get to do so with the one person you love the most. How extremely wonderful is that? Secondly, if youve deemed it necessary to take a break from sex in order to make it special, that would suggest that it has already lost its specialness. You shouldnt have to make sex special; it should already be special. Therefore, if youve saved yourself for marriage, you can be sure that your first time will be as special as can be. In the support group, Mike also mentions that waiting until marriage sets you up to have a fun and exciting sex life. Most couples, by the time they get married, have been having regular sex and might even be living together. As a result, since theyve gone through relationships treating sex lightly in the past, they dont treat it with as much importance in marriage as it should have. Then, the physical relationship gets old and could more easily die out. On the flip side however, if youve waited until marriage to have sex, you are very aware of how important it is and you dont forget that when you enter your marriage. Aside from that, youve never had sex before so its a completely new experience. Instead of becoming old and regular, sex is something that you can really discover and enjoy for the first several years of your marriage. You get to spend those years catching up, instead of burning out like other couples might (Mike). True, sex is amazing and feels good whether you wait for marriage or not. However, its a matter of just how good. If you think living a chaste life is difficult because sex feels too good for you to miss out on now, just think that itll be ten times better if you wait until marriage. The last benefit of waiting until marriage that I want to touch upon is the fact that as a virgin, you would be able to give your future spouse the greatest gift you could ever possibly give the whole gift of yourself. Imagine how happy youd be knowing that your future spouse has never slept with anyone and has remained pure for love of you without having even met you.

What a powerful gift? Youd be silly to not want it. Therefore you should return the favor and do the same thing for your future spouse. Prepare now so that you can give gift of yourself. For me, this sole reason, without all of the other benefits I mentioned, is reason enough to wait for marriage. To illustrate this, I will share a personal story. My boyfriend and I have been together for over three years now and I consider myself incredibly lucky to be in such a loving relationship. When he told me that I was his first kiss, it made me so happy. But at the same time, I was disappointed that I couldnt say the same thing in return. My feelings for him are so strong that I wish that he had been my first kiss. But that is something that I cant give to him. If I felt this strongly about a simple kiss, I knew that would I feel even more strongly when it came to sex. I want to be able to tell my future husband that he is and will always be the only one for me that and I think that is entirely awesome. My decision to remain chaste until marriage makes me happy because I know that itll set me up for a wonderful marriage in the future. Not everyone may feel this way, but if you give it enough thought it may just change your mind. As a young adult, if you remove sex from the equation, both life and love become simpler. You can enjoy your college years without having to worry about STDs, pregnancy, or emotional scars and regrets. You might even find that special person, the one you want to commit yourself to forever, and then the rest is history. So save the best for last youll be glad you did.

Sources The Anscombe Society. The Anscombe Society at Princeton University. MTE, 2009. Web. 4 April 2013. Dr. Peraud, Raj and Adrian Furnham. Sexual Regrest the Latest Research Reveals How Men and Woman Feel Sorry About Sex. The Huffington Post UK. AOL (UK) Limited, 12 Aug. 2012. Web. 3 April 2013. Evert, Crystalina. How to Find Your Soulmate Without Losing Your Soul. Spring Valley: Totus Tuus Press, 2011. Print. Evert, Crystalina and Jason Evert. Romance Without Regret. Presentation. Gresh, Dannah. The Walk of Shame vs The Walk of Fame. Pennsylvania State University. HUB-Robeson Center, State College, PA. 17 March 2013. TED talk. Mike. The Top 11 Awesome Benefits of Waiting Until Marriage. WaitingTillMarriage.org. 24 June 2011. Web. 1 April 2013. Tuttle, Ian. Some Ivy League Students Turn Down Hook-Up Culture. The College Fix. Student Free Press Association, 8 March 2013. Web. 4 April 2013.