Line #29 Main/VirginityFlag


1	Where a person's virginity or absence thereof can be confirmed by some sort of sign or symbol immediately visible on them (that is to say, definitely not requiring a gynecological examination[[note]]In real life, it's not possible to determine if someone has previously had sexual intercourse even with a gynecological examination -- see [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginity_test here]][[/note]]). This can work through magic, AppliedPhlebotinum, or simply social convention.
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3	It's the SisterTrope of BloodstainedDefloration.
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5	Compare DidYouJustHaveSex, NerdsAreVirgins (nerdiness as a Virginity Flag), SexDressed, VirginityMakesYouStupid, VirginPower, VirginInAWhiteDress (clothing as an actual or alleged Virginity Flag), VirginVision (the unjustified form of this). [[noreallife]]
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7	----
8	!!Examples:
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10	[[foldercontrol]]
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12	[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
13	* ''Manga/FairyTail'': Larcade's BrownNote ability has no effect on virgins... unless he specifically focuses it on one person.
14	* Reika from ''Manga/FutariEcchi'' can just tell if a person is a virgin or has already had sexual intercourse by merely looking at them. This allowed her to know instantly that OldMaid Kyoko is still a virgin and Shoko was experienced, though still shocked [[OlderThanTheyLook because she was more concerned about such a young-looking girl to be at a bar]].
15	* ''Manga/{{Hellsing}}'': Played with. When a [[OurVampiresAreDifferent vampire]] fatally drains an opposite-sex human and that human is a virgin, they also become a vampire. If not, they becomes a [[OurGhoulsAreCreepier ghoul]]. While this makes it easy to tell which opposite-sex victims were virgins or not after the fact, most vampires can't tell which humans are virgins or not before they drink. This leads to some vampires who don't want to sire children (like the {{starter villain}}) [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil personally ensuring that their meal is a non-virgin]] before drinking. Millennium-made vampires are different in that drained victims can only become ghouls whether the victim was virgin or not (something Hellsing learned from victims who were far too young to have sex lives).
16	* Everyone in the world of ''Manga/{{Loveless}}'' has kitty ears and a tail that fall off when they lose their virginity. This connection is conveyed through social cues within the story, and exactly what point defines 'the outer border of virginity' is never really defined. For all the sexually charged atmosphere, the lead is a twelve-year-old boy. A grown woman with ears is teased about still having hers, and having already ''lost'' their ears is a sign of some enemy characters' pitiful depravity, but the wider social implications, for example in high school or religious orders, aren't explored, with the most it's addressed being one female high school age character having fake ears that she wears in public.
17	[[/folder]]
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19	[[folder:Comic Strips]]
20	* The creator of ''ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}}'' can't exactly announce when the titular character has sex thanks to newspaper censors, but he [[WordOfGod explained to curious fans]] that he'd show it in-universe by drawing Dilbert's tie uncharacteristically limp.
21	[[/folder]]
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23	[[folder:Fan Works]]
24	* ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/23045743 Here There Be Unicorns]]'' has Conner claiming this as the reason why the titular unicorns showed themselves to his friend Tim. Tim himself is unconvinced, but he doesn't really disregard the hypothesis either.
25	* The fanfic ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8869552/1/Snowmaiden Snowmaiden]]'' implies that everyone in Middle Earth has a VirginityFlag, but only elves can see it. (Overlaps with VirginVision, but the elf claims it is a visible sign in the eyes.)
26	* ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/31953040/chapters/79135735 Sweet Tea]]'' has Qi Qingqi pranking her fellow Peak Lords by serving them a tea that taste unbearably bitter if you're not a virgin. Not only does the very proper Yue Qingyuan immediately spit it out, the seemingly promiscuous [[UnexpectedVirgin Shen Qingqiu]] happily downs his cup.
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29	[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
30	* In ''Film/The40YearOldVirgin'', this is first subverted and then played straight. At first, nobody realizes that the main character is a virgin. On the other hand, the daughter of his primary love interest can tell he's a virgin, somehow having gained the ability to spot anyone's virginity flag simply by virtue of spending her high school days with sexed-up teenage boys.
31	* ''Film/KissOfTheDamned'': Xenia can tell instantly that Anna's a virgin, and therefore her blood is intensely tempting for some unexplained reason. It seems virgins just ''smell'' differently.
32	* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0Z_OWPe6fU The song]] in ''Film/PodPeople'' has an audio technician wearing a shirt that reads "I'm a Virgin". Parodied in the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_zrBgzuNjs MST3K bit]] from the same episode, where TV's Frank wears a similar shirt.
33	* In ''Film/{{Teeth}}'', Dawn wears handmade t-shirt proclaiming abstinence and a purity ring.
34	[[/folder]]
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36	[[folder:Literature]]
37	* As a variant, in ''Literature/AlwaysComingHome'', taking on a sexual partner is the stage where a person starts wearing dyed clothing.
38	* In ''Literature/TheBlackCompany'' short story "Tides Elba", the city's religion the company is stationed in includes that women permanently shave off all the hair below their neckline after losing their virginity. The Black Company being a mercenary outfit full of men with too much time on their hands, this gets discussed at length.
39	* In ''Literature/TheHandmaidsTale'', "Daughters" -- the virgin daughters of Gilead's wealthy men, who will one day be given in {{Arranged Marriage}}s to other wealthy men -- wear [[VirginInAWhiteDress white dresses]] to show that they are virgins.
40	* In ''Literature/HeavenOfficialsBlessingTianGuanCiFu'', Jun Wu has a magic sword that repels the blood of virgins. He uses it to help Xie Lian prove that he cannot possibly be the father of Lan Chang's child.
41	* The thranx of the ''Literature/HumanxCommonwealth'' look a lot like giant praying mantids. Unlike [[OutWithABang praying mantids]], male thranx only lose their vestigial wings the first time they have sex.
42	* In Creator/MadeleineLEngle's ''Literature/ManyWaters'', only "innocents" can ride unicorns. Otherwise, they disappear.
43	* In the SF shared world of Medea, the resident alien females ''lose a pair of legs'' after having sex.
44	* In ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'', a scarlet sash is the emblem of the Junior Anti-Sex League, which advocates celibacy. [[spoiler:Invoked by one of the protagonists, who has slept with plenty of men while wearing it, and simply wears it to ''act'' like the good patriotic Party member.]]
45	* In ''Literature/TheRedTent'', it's mentioned that among the Canaanite wives that Jacob's sons took, the morning after the wedding night, the mother of the bride would run into the tent and steal the bloodstained blanket[[note]]We now know that neither blood from a broken hymen nor a "tight" sensation are reliable proof of virginity, but this story is set in the Bronze Age[[/note]], to save just in case Jacob wanted "proof" that the bride was a virgin (and therefore that he had paid a fair price for her). The women of Padan-Aram think this is {{Squick}}, and their [[SexAsRiteOfPassage Ritual of Opening]] is designed to make it so that there won't be a bloodstain so no one will know whether they're virgins or not and judge their worth by that.
46	* ''Literature/SongAtDawn'': It is customary for a bride to wear her hair up after consummating her marriage (i.e. losing her virginity.) [[spoiler:Estela doesn't do it after her marriage because John isn't interested in doing it with her. Instead, she does it after a traumatic experience with a stable hand that she doesn't want to admit to herself was a mistake.]]
47	* In Creator/MercedesLackey's ''Literature/TalesOfTheFiveHundredKingdoms'', unicorns are attracted to virgins of the opposite sex. This can cause... [[HilarityEnsues complications]] when someone does not want their virginity (or gender) disclosed. (It doesn't help that unicorns -- [[BrainlessBeauty rather dim under most circumstances]] -- turn into squealing wrecks in the presence of a virgin, meaning that there's really no way to keep it quiet).
48	* In the world of ''Literature/{{Touch\|2017}}'', sex causes people to get a dark patch around one eye called the Mark of Purity. Since the protagonist is a twelve-year-old boy dealing with the aftermath of being raped, this obviously presents a problem if he doesn't want to advertise his issues to the world. When we first meet him he's covering it with his mother's makeup, and he talks to his therapist about options like skin-tone patches or cosmetic surgery. The therapist notes that even under normal circumstances, the Mark's appearance can be pretty awkward.
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51	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
52	* ''Franchise/{{Buffyverse}}'':
53	** ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'': In "Teacher's Pet", the mantis demon prefers to mate with virginal human males (and bite their heads off, pursuant to mantid custom). Her targets include a jock who, after rescue, threatens to sue if word gets out.
54	** ''Series/{{Angel}}'': In a flashback scene, evil vampire Angelus is able to tell that three sisters are virgins just by looking at them. As one of the sisters is a seer, she turns to look at him in horror. It's Drusilla, the woman he will turn into a vampire after driving her insane by slaughtering her family.
55	* In the fourth series of ''Series/{{Misfits}}'', there's a minor character who has the power to make the number of sexual partners a person has had appear on that person's forehead. How the power defines sex for this purpose is not fully specified -- but judging from the effect on characters with known sexual histories, receiving oral sex apparently doesn't count.
56	* ''Series/MotherlandFortSalem'': Literally. All witches have a birthmark-esque mark on them that turns shiny once they've had sex.
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59	[[folder:Music Videos]]
60	* [[http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/bunny The fan-made video]] for Music/{{TISM}}’s "Everyone Else Has Had More Sex Than Me" with everyone's number of either sexual partners or number of sexual escapades written on their shirts. And yep, there's [[NobodyLovestheBassist one poor fellow]] with a "0" on there. And one with "[[NoodleIncident 3.5]]".
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63	[[folder:Mythology and Religion]]
64	* In ''Literature/TheBible'', after King David's daughter Tamar is raped by her half-brother Amnon, the poor girl tears her garment that was reserved for the King's virgin daughters. Her full brother Absolom immediately realizes what happened when he sees her, [[KnightTemplarBigBrother and it does NOT end well for Amnon]].
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67	[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
68	* A variation in ''TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}}'', where women in one multicultural area use hairscarves to denote whether they're single or married. Problem is, one culture uses scarves to indicate singlehood and another indicates marriage, leading to a lot of brawls.
69	* ''TabletopGame/{{Starfinder}}'': Ikeshti that fail to mate during their once in a lifetime rutting season transform into large, muscular, and mindless "riveners" that other Ikeshti consider kill-on-sight.
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72	[[folder:Theater]]
73	* In ''Theatre/MeAndMyDick'', the virginal Sally's [[AnthropomorphizedAnatomy Miss Cooter]] wears a flower prominently, since she has yet to be "[[VisualPun de-flowered]]".
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76	%%[[folder:Web Comics]]
77	%%* [[http://www.pbfcomics.com/227/ The strip called "Preserves"]] of ''ComicStrip/ThePerryBibleFellowship''.
78	%%[[/folder]]
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80	[[folder:Western Animation]]
81	* While not outright stated (it ''is'' a kids' show), ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'' had a scene where Sokka comes out of his tent in the morning wearing a flower lei Suki had been wearing the previous night (and he had been seen in a ReadyForLovemaking pose). So he got lei'd, she got deflowered, geddit?
82	[[/folder]]

Context Main / VirginityFlag