virginity

Welcome to the latest installment of Ms. Opinionated, in which readers have questions about the pesky day-to-day choices we all face, and I give advice about how to make ones that (hopefully) best reflect our shared commitment to feminist values—as well as advice on what to do when they don't.

Dear Ms. Opinionated, I'm a college student of 21, and engaged to a 30 year old man with whom I've been for two years. He's very respectful and loving and I plan to marry him after I graduate (in a little more than an year), but chances are we might move in together before that. Right now, he lives in another city almost two hours away, so seeing each other ends up tiring and consuming—time and money-wise. The thing is, our parents will probably oppose. My mother has had terrible experiences with being a single mother, and then moving to an unknown country to end up in a psychologically abusive relationship, plus has very traditional views (i.e. sex after marriage). His parents are traditional Christians. None of them know my fiancé and I have already had sex. How can I bring up the possibility of moving in together without gaining opposition from the people we expect the most support?

This week on Grey's Anatomy, spiders and virgins and condoms, oh my! Find out what the Grand Rounds bloggers think about it after the jump, and sound off with your own thoughts. Here there be spoilers!

The interwebs are a-buzzin' with talk of 22-year old Natalie Dylan and her plan to sell her virginity online to pay for a master's degree. The bidding on the women's studies major's "maidenhead" (and yes, Fox News called it that in all seriousness) is up to 3.7 million, and the um, transaction, is set to take place at the Bunny Ranch in Nevada. It seems that people can't wait to ask questions about this situation like, Is this legal? Is the price too high? Can Dylan do this and still call herself a feminist? The blogs and articles go on and on.

Obviously these are valid questions to ask of this situation. But I think that to get to the root of this issue the question we should really be asking ourselves is, Why do we care so much about this in the first place? Is virginity really THAT important? And why is everyone being so creepy about it?