Dating a virgin ~ the holy grail of dating or a burdonsome responsibility? Discuss.

Jacquiem you are my volunteer community leader of choice.

You should do workshops to explain how to be concise, witty and completely devoid of sanctimonious overtones.

I like you.

It took me a long time to read all the posts in this thread...

I know plenty of people who feel that sex is of primary value in relationships. Granted, their idea of "relationship" is a little skewed, but still. And these people absolutely do get married for the very wrong reasons and end up divorced. I have a cousin who, when asked why he married his now ex-wife, responded "because she was great in bed."

Just because you don't know any of these people it doesn't mean they don't exist. And just because the poster you quote has a viewpoint different from yours, it doesn't invalidate her opinion or make her naieve.

Perhaps you know these people--I don't doubt they exist in the world. I would also bet that your cousin had many other reasons for marrying his now ex-wife--feelings he doesn't have anymore and doesn't care to talk about or remember, so it's easier for him when people who (rudely) ask him why he got married to answer flippantly with it being because she was good in the sack.

I might be totally wrong about your cousin (I am sometimes wrong).

However, I am still entitled to my opinion that believing most marriages fail because people had sex before they married is naive.

No one ever compares these anecdotal marriage failures to the marriage successes where the couple didn't wait for sex. I personally know many successful couples who didn't wait--more than have been divorced.

Sorry, Trixie, I think I failed on two out of three of your compliments on my last post :-(

Well if you look at the impact my endorsement had on the length of Jacquesne's last post I still feel that you're leading by example.

I like what you've written. I personally have a fairly casual attitude toward sex and in the past I have separated the physical act from the emotional commitment of love. For what it's worth, and as I've posted earlier, I prefer sex with an emotional commitment but if I haven't got the emotional commitment I'm not always prepared to go without sex. I neither hold it up as the ideal nor apologise for it. It is part of my psychological make up.

Having said that I've just had dinner with my good friend and ex boyfriend. We had truly amazing sex and a perfectly pleasent 6 month relationship that ended nearly 5 years ago. Despite all our compatibilities we simply didn't fall in love and somewhat reluctantly decided to end it. Good sex isn't a good relationship. If we had continued to fool ourselves we would have grown to despise one another which is kind of what you were saying. We did maintain contact, and we regularly meet up. We have never had 'lapse' sex and have maintained a strictly platonic relationship since we split and I am happy to say it is one of the most rewarding and constant friendships that I have.

Just saying .........

You are wrong about my cousin. Good thing you didn't put money on that bet. The question wasn't asked "rudely" as you put it, because it was in response to extremely disapaging comments he made about his ex. So you got a two for one being wrong on this one.

I never said you weren't entitled to your opinion, I commented about belittling or dismissing someone else's opinion because you don't agree with them. You can disagree without being disagreeable.

I know lots of folks who had sex before they were married and are happily married, too, but that's not my point.

I also know quite a few people who put more of a premium on getting some sex than they did on getting to know the person they had sex with. All these people have been in a string of bad relationships, divorced a few times, or are still in marriages with people they hate and regularly cheat on. The preoccupation with sex got them into the messes they are in because pursuing sex was their focus, not knowing the person before they had sex with them. So, no, sex before marriage isn't necessarily the problem, but sex before getting to know who you're getting into a relationship with or marrying really is. THIS is my point.

One of the reasons some people prefer to wait until marriage to have sex is to be able to focus on bonding with another person and getting to know them without the distraction of sex. For some, engaging in the act of sexual intercourse is the ultimate experience in knowing someone on the highest or deepest level, not the introduction or part of the getting-to-know-you process. And for others, separating sex from affection and love is difficult. So they prefer to wait for sex until it is with the person they are married, or at least monogamously committed, to and prefer to date people who feel the same way. Yes, some do prize and pursue virginity/abstinence for silly and immature reasons, but for some people, the reasons are personal, spiritual, and important. (Trying to bring it somewhat back to the thread's topic, here.)

Sometimes people who believe this way may not be able to express this, and if they do, sometimes they do it with condescention. That's not nice, either. I hope I didn't. But it doesn't change the fact that for some, pursuing great sex over a great person does cause realtionship problems, including marrying someone you really don't know and eventually divorcing that person because you had no idea what you were getting. It may seem like a remote possiblity and "anectodal" to you, but I see it too often for me to believe it doesn't happen more frequently than people like to admit.

I try to stay away from using quantifiers beyond "some" or "many" (and I try to stay away from that one) when I discuss issues, because I know I don't know the "most" about or of anything I haven't actually lived myself.

You are wrong about my cousin. Good thing you didn't put money on that bet. The question wasn't asked "rudely" as you put it, because it was in response to extremely disapaging comments he made about his ex. So you got a two for one being wrong on this one.

I never said you weren't entitled to your opinion, I commented about belittling or dismissing someone else's opinion because you don't agree with them. You can disagree without being disagreeable.

.....snipped....

Sometimes people who believe this way may not be able to express this, and if they do, sometimes they do it with condescention. That's not nice, either. I hope I didn't.

One of the reasons some people prefer to wait until marriage to have sex is to be able to focus on bonding with another person and getting to know them without the distraction of sex. For some, engaging in the act of sexual intercourse is the ultimate experience in knowing someone on the highest or deepest level, not the introduction or part of the getting-to-know-you process. And for others, separating sex from affection and love is difficult. So they prefer to wait for sex until it is with the person they are married, or at least monogamously committed, to and prefer to date people who feel the same way. Yes, some do prize and pursue virginity/abstinence for silly and immature reasons, but for some people, the reasons are personal, spiritual, and important. (Trying to bring it somewhat back to the thread's topic, here.)