I was young (15), so I would say over 20 is a little weird now-a-days. It gets to really weird after 25.
As someone said, it isn’t a deal breaker, but it would be odd. If right now (at 19) I went on a date with a guy and he was still a virgin, I’d question to myself why he is still a virgin. If it is for religious reasons, we aren’t really right for one another :p. If it is because he flat out couldn’t get laid, I’d wonder why and what is wrong with him (we are in college, so it isn’t like it’s hard!). If it’s because he just never found someone that made him want to…well, that’s ok.
I’m not sure there is a cut off point for me for chosen virginity. There are any number of totally valid personal, spiritual, religious, or philosophical reasons not to have sex with people until your own personal standards are met. For some people, this means the formalities of union have been completed, for others it means they’ve found their lifemate (regardless of formalities), for others it means they found someone smokin’ hot. To each his or her own.
I get really, really curious as to what those criteria are for people somewhere in the early-to-middle-twenties. In other words, I start needing an explanation long about there. It doesn’t need to be a long one (“I’m waiting for marriage” will do for example), but I kind of want one.
Accidental viriginity is another thing though - I start to wonder about people who haven’t found anyone willing to boink them by about their early to middle twenties. I get really, really suspicious of people who claiming to have never found someone willing to boink them by their late 20’s.
It’s the difference between having standards and being totally unappealing. Standards are sexy.
In either case, experience or no experience isn’t a deal-breaker for me either way. I confess I prefer a certain amount of experience in a partner, but with the right partner, I’m willing to be flexible about the matter. I also prefer my men clean-shaven, but my fiance has had facial hair since the day he was able to sprout it.
Virginity is only a big deal to me when it’s mixed in with other factors - like religious or spiritual beliefs. Or the previously mentioned living-with-the-parents-at-age-35 deal. In other words, when it’s an indicator of other, more profound, personality and philosophical differences.
“Chef, what’s the right age to start having sex?”
“The right age to start having sex is…seventeen.”
“You mean seventeen if you’re emotionally ready and…”
“Nope, seventeen.”
I’ve gotta echo the idea that I’m looking for a person that is equally as curious and intrigued by sex as I am, so I’m afraid that someone who was considerably older than I was (15), would be a turn off. Besides that, I’ve had to “teach” 3 different virgins the ropes, and I’d say unless the innocence thing is a real big turn on, that role gets to be a little old. After a while you don’t want to have to take the reins every time.
Another offshoot of this topic would be “How many partners is too many partners?”, because I’d be a little intimidated by a man who has had 20 + women, while my number remains in single digits.
You know, this is kind of offensive. Not everyone believes that having a sexual relationship is the be all and end all of human interactions. There are people out there who are asexual, and they’re happy, normal people.
I’m 36, still a virgin, not saving myself for marriage, don’t have any of the aforementioned “problems,” and am perfectly content with things the way they are. I’m not one of those types that does everything but P-in-V sex and calls that virginity, either.
Should the opportunity present itself, with someone that I trust, that’ll be great. But I’m not going to go chasing it, either; it’s just not that important on my list of “things to do before I die.”
I’m speaking a bit counterfactually here, because I’ve been with Mrs. Cliffy since we were both 18, so my post is theoretical.
I’d say it would occasion a raised eyebrow at 20 and would cause me to steer away at 25-ish or so. Unless a person has a plethora or other serious problems going on (serious enough to be immediately apparent), if they’re a virgin at 25, they’re almost certainly a virgin by choice. I’m not interested in an adult that doesn’t want to have sex at least some of the time, and while I’d want to date someone for a while and get to know them before getting physical, there’s a point in a relationship in which sex is appropriate, and that point is well, well, well before the point where you’re deciding on whether to move in together or get married. I wouldn’t want to spend all that time on a relationship only to find after months or years that we weren’t physically interesting to each other.
I’ve got a good friend who is a week away from her 30th birthday and is a virgin. We often talk about the comedy of errors that is the single woman’s dating life, and the pattern is beconing obvious – she gets on well with a guy for four or five dates, and then he stops calling. I can’t bring myself to tell her this, but the solution is that she’s got to start putting out!
Well, I am 23 years old, and a virgin. And not by choice: I would like to have a sexual relationship with someone, but I’ve never been able to find a person who wanted the same. (Note that while I’m not “saving myself for the right person” or anything, I’d prefer to be in a serious relationship before having sex, and I’m not actively looking for sex with anyone, anywhere, so maybe that might explain it. I could probably get sex if I absolutely wanted to screw, and it didn’t matter whom or what.)
Looking at the posts in this thread, I guess I’m weird. That’s okay, I already knew that. But let me just ask you something: let’s say I meet you, and we enjoy being together, and you start wondering if you’d like to get in a relationship with me. Then, while we’re talking about sex for whatever reason, I mention that I’m a virgin (it’s not like I’m trying to hide it). Will you be suddenly heavily turned off and not want to see me again? Will you wonder why it is so and start to find the problems I have and you might have missed? Or will you just think “ah, that’s a little unusual but okay” and not change at all how you act with me, given that you think I’m all right and thus it doesn’t matter what other people might have thought previously?
Also, I don’t quite see what is this obsession with sex. The fact that I don’t currently have a romantic relationship (and never have had) bothers me a lot more than lack of sex. I guess I’m just old-fashioned.
If the reason guys aren’t calling your friend back is because she isn’t “putting out” then good riddens to them. I was pretty asexual until I was in my mid-20. I had lots of male friends. Heck, I got along better with the guys then with the women, but it just wasn’t romantic/sexual. At 24 I discovered one of those friends turned into more then that, and things changed.
So, assuming an otherwise well-adjusted adult (or reasonable facsimile) I don’t think there is an age cut off. Sometimes personalities and experiences just are condusive.
Note that I am 29, so the chances of me actually *dating * a 23 YO are not really all that high.
That said, the only reason I would dump a 23-year old virgin on the basis of his virginity was if it was religiously-motivated. I am a strong atheist! I really don’t think we could get along.
Other than that, I’d be interested to know your reasons, sure. Is it because you haven’t found anyone that meets your standards? Ok, do I? Why? How?
Is it because you want a serious relationship? This would be the easiest to understand for me, I think…I waited for a serious relationship first. Of course I was almost 20.
Or is it because you have hang-ups about sex, either from abuse or something else? I hope that I could be kind and understanding, but it is difficult. I would try to be kind and understanding if you were also willing to try and work through it.
Turned off? No, not really. But I’ll assume I’m not going to be having sex with you either, and therefore I won’t pursue you as energetically. And I’d be right to do so, because you say you want to wait until you’re in a serious relationship. Well, how serious can you really be if all you do is chat? That I can do with my friends. Girlfriends/boyfriends are different than regular friends for mainly two reasons – 1) maybe you’ll get married some day, and 2) you can fuck them. 1 isn’t going to happen until quite a bit of 2 has happened, and if 2 isn’t going to happen for months and months and months, why waste the energy?
That describes me perfectly as well, including the age. I’m a virgin at 23 and while I want sex (although I prefer intimacy… the sex is just a bonus), I don’t desire it enough to go find anyone or anything willing to sleep with me to get it. It’ll happen whenever the time’s right and while I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little anxious, I’m not that bothered either.
I am 43 and also feel this way, to some extent. There are times when I am (for lack of a better term) horny as hell–but overall, I can take it or leave it. I read posts where the poster says s/he masturbates 3,4,8 times a day and am taken aback.
I rarely masturbate, am orgasmic with and without a partner (not always, but enough to know that the “wiring” works fairly well), but I don’t understand the need . People talk about getting crabby or tense (or if you’re an adolescent male, blue balls) w/o sex. And I look at them and think, why? or “huh?”
Not sure if that makes me asexual, but I know it makes me different. I get a little tired of being told by women’s mags and friends etc that there must be something wrong with me. “Low sex drive” is a sign of depression etc–if so, I’ve been depressed my whole lifelong…
I dated a 25 y/o virgin (male)–and I thought at the time, “what’s up with this?” but then again, this was pre-AIDS time frame. I de-flowered him and in the process, he ruptured his foreskin and had to have surgery(I’m sure we were the talk of the ER that noc). Talk about instant turn off!
We did have sex one more time after his operation, but he broke up with me shortly afterwards. He is married now, with kids, as am I. Guess things just took longer for him–no biggie. Of course, I am in my 40’s, so if I met a man who at this age had not had sex…I would look askance at him. But we probably could be friends (barring any extreme eccentricities etc).
Hmmm – according to a lot of the answers here, I’d be in trouble. I was a virgin for an annoyingly long time. it wasn’t through choice or religious conviction. Or through opersonal preference. wasn’t physically disgusting or revolting, didn’t have seriously limiting personal habits or philosophy or anything else toxic, according to my friends. But i had a hell of a time even getting dates, let alone a steady girlfriend. Or a one-night stand, for that matter.
But based on what several folks have said, I wouldn’t get screwed, so I’d be screwed.
Luckily, I eventually found women who weren’t appalled by the idea of elderly virgins.
Unless the guy is a brain surgeon and has spent the last 20 years finding a cure for cancer, if he’s over 40 and still a virgin, I get alarm bells ringing in my head.
30’s provided there’s a legit reason - such as concentrating on school or research, etc is ok.
But if the guy is 35+, doesn’t really seem to have some amazing career that took 15 years of studying to achieve, and hasn’t been a priest up till now, I think I might be a bit put off. Obviously, if he had many other redeming qualities I could probably get past it, but it wouldn’t be a selling point, for sure.
Yes, that was more of a impersonal “you”. I think that 23 and 29 years olds are maybe slightly too far apart in terms of at what point they are in their lifes.
I’m not sure why people tend to first think of religious motivations when it comes to adult virgins. I guess there are just more religious conservatives where you are than where I am. In my case, I am an atheist too, so that’s not the reason.
I’m not sure if you’re asking me to tell you why I’m still a virgin, or if that’s just an example of what you’d ask the hypothetical someone who’d interest you and would be a virgin. So I’ll answer briefly. The main reason is (and I know you’ll say that makes me unattractive, but I’m working on it) that I have self-esteem issues. I’m still having trouble conceptualizing the fact that it’s possible for women to be attracted to me. So of course, I always assume that they’re not interested. As I said, I’m working on this, but it’s very hard to change. Add to this the fact that I’m rather introverted, so I tend to prefer being alone than going out of my way to meet new people. I think that’s a fair summary of it.
I think I have reasonably high standards. There are a few things that I would like to see in a potential partner (one of them is “not being horrified by my being a virgin”), but most of them are not necessary. I would give a good look and probably a chance to anyone who would show an interest in me.
Yes, I want a serious relationship. I’m not looking for one-night stands, or other exclusively sexual relationships, and one of the reasons is that as a virgin, I probably need some practice before being good at sex, so I want to start with someone who’s willing to be patient with me. Another is that, as I said before, I crave emotional and physical intimacy more than just sex per se.
I don’t think I have serious hang-ups about sex. I like sex. I’d certainly be enthusiastic about the whole thing.
Well, given that you’re named Cliffy, I’ll assume that you’re a man, and therefore you probably wouldn’t interest me anyway. Sexually, I mean. I’ll ask you another question, though. Suppose you meet a nice twenty-something man. You two become friends. Then, at some point, you learn that he is a virgin. What would be your reaction?
Well, by serious I don’t mean “this is my soul mate and I’ll be with her forever”. I mean “I’ve known this woman for some time, we spend a lot of time together, we both enjoy it, and I think I love her. I’d be willing to get this relationship on another level”. In other words, I want something that’s not just sexual and that has a decent chance of lasting at least a few months.
