用阴道性交这个标准定义处女合理吗？

今天的推送来自网友 Cecilia Zhao 的邮件投稿，她看了TED的一个演讲《What young women believe about their own sexual pleasure？》

演讲链接可点击阅读原文观看

她在邮件中表示：

演讲中有一个观点直接颠覆了她的想法，如果第一次阴茎–阴道性交基本等同于女性疼痛、创伤、阴影、鲜有愉悦，为什么还要用这个纯粹为男性服务的概念来定义处女？是不是应该用其他标准，比如第一次高潮来界定？我们从小到大接受到的性教育，有多少是从女性愉悦的角度出发，而不是预防疾病、暴力侵害、意外怀孕？

她作为一个女儿的妈妈，深受启发，非常想分享给国内的更多女性看到，所以翻译了全文。

For several years now, we've been engaged in a national debate about sexual assaulton campus. No question — it's crucial that young people understand the groundrules for consent, but that's where the conversation about sex is ending. Andin that vacuum of information the media and the Internet — that new digitalstreet corner — are educating our kids for us. If we truly want young people toengage safely, ethically, and yes, enjoyably, it's time to have open honestdiscussion about what happens after "yes," and that includes breakingthe biggest taboo of all and talking to young people about women's capacity forand entitlement to sexual pleasure.

近年来，全美上下一直在讨论校园内发生的性侵案件。毫无疑问的，年轻人必须学会两厢情愿的基本原则。 但我们关于性的讨论也基本上到此为止了。在这种信息真空中，新一代的“偶遇”他人、其他想法的方式——媒体和网络——在替我们给年轻人补上这一课。如果我们真心希望年轻人能安全地、伦理地、并且享受地体验性行为，那我们该开诚布公地讨论一下，彼此确认完“我愿意”之后会发生什么。这包括打破我们最大的禁忌，开口和年轻人谈论女性有获得性愉悦的能力，并且理应享受到这种感觉。

Ispent three years talking to girls ages 15 to 20 about their attitudes andexperience of sex. And what I found was that while young women may feelentitled to engage in sexual behavior, they don't necessarily feel entitled toenjoy it. Take this sophomore at the Ivy League college who told me, "Icome from a long line of smart, strong women. My grandmother was a firecracker,my mom is a professional, my sister and I are loud, and that's our form offeminine power." She then proceeded to describe her sex life to me: aseries of one-off hookups, starting when she was 13, that were ... notespecially responsible, not especially reciprocal and not especially enjoyable.She shrugged. "I guess we girls are just socialized to be these docilecreatures who don't express our wants or needs." "Wait aminute," I replied. "Didn't you just tell me what a smart, strong womanyou are?" She hemmed and hawed. "I guess," she finally said,"no one told me that that smart, strong image applies to sex."

我花了三年时间，和许多15至20岁之间的女孩们讨论她们对于性的看法和体验。我发现，尽管年轻女性认同她们完全有自主权进行性行为，她们未必觉得自己应当从中获得享受。

举个例子，一位常春藤联盟大学的大二学生告诉我，“我家都是聪明而强势的女性：我祖母是个一点就着的暴脾气，我妈妈是个职业女性，我姐姐和我则从不畏惧大声表达自己——这是我们家一贯的作风。”她接着跟我形容她的性生活：从她13岁开始，她经历了一系列一夜情，但都不是那么负责的，不是那么互惠，更不是那么让人享受的。她耸耸肩，“我觉得女生大概就是这样吧，被社会驯化成不会表达自己想要什么的温顺的存在。”“等等，”我回道，“你不是刚刚还告诉我你是个非常聪明而强势的女性吗？”她想了想，撇撇嘴，最后说道，“大概，从没人告诉过我，聪明、强势这些形容词还可以用于我在床上的时候。”

I should probably say right up top that despite the hype, teenagers are notengaging in intercourse more often or at a younger age than they were 25 yearsago. They are, however, engaging in other behavior. And when we ignore that,when we label that as "not sex," that opens the door to risky behaviorand disrespect. That's particularly true of oral sex, which teenagers considerto be less intimate than intercourse. Girls would tell me, "it's no bigdeal," like they'd all read the same instruction manual — at least if boyswere on the receiving end. Young women have lots of reasons for participating.It made them feel desired; it was a way to boost social status. Sometimes, itwas a way to get out of an uncomfortable situation. As a freshman at a WestCoast college said to me, "A girl will give a guy a blow job at the end ofthe night because she doesn't want to have sex with him, and he expects to besatisfied. So, if I want him to leave and I don't want anything to happen ..." I heard so many stories of girls performing one-sided oral sex that I startedasking, "What if every time you were alone with a guy, he told you to gethim a glass of water from the kitchen, and he never got you a glass of water —or if he did, it was like ... 'you want me to uh ...?'" You know, totallybegrudging. You wouldn't stand for it.

首先我要声明的是，尽管备受炒作，比起25年前，现在的青少年并没有发生更多阴茎-阴道性行为，或者开始的时间更为提前。但是，他们会更多地进行其他的性行为。当我们忽视这些，认为这些“并不算性行为”的时候，我们在默许不安全和不尊重的行为发生。特别是口交，青少年认为口交没有阴茎-阴道性交那么亲密。女孩们会告诉我，“那没什么。”当男性是被服务的一方时，女孩们好像都被洗脑了一般。女孩们会出于许多原因愿意给男伴口交：这让她们觉得自己很有魅力；这是一种提升优越感的方式；有时候，这也是摆脱尴尬处境的一种办法。

西岸大学的一名大一女生告诉我，“约会结束时，如果女孩不想和男孩做爱，但男孩又希望被满足的话，女孩就会给他口交。如果我想他不碰我就离开的话……你懂的。”我听到如此多的女孩单方面地给男孩口交，这让我忍不住问她们：“这么说吧，如果每次你和一个男生单独相处的时候，他都让你去帮他拿杯水，但他从来不帮你拿，或者即使他帮你拿了，也是一副特别勉强的样子。你不会容忍他这样对你的吧？”

Butit wasn't always that boys didn't want to. It was that girls didn't want themto. Girls expressed a sense of shame around their genitals. A sense that theywere simultaneously icky and sacred. Women's feelings about their genitals havebeen directly linked to their enjoyment of sex. Yet, Debby Herbenick, aresearcher at Indiana University, believes that girls' genital self-image isunder siege, with more pressure than ever to see them as unacceptable in theirnatural state. According to research, about three-quarters of college womenremove their pubic hair — all of it — at least on occasion, and more than halfdo so regularly. Girls would tell me that hair removal made them feel cleaner,that it was a personal choice. Though, I kind of wondered if left alone on adesert island, if this was how they would choose to spend their time.

但并不总是男孩不愿意给女孩口交，而是女孩自己也不愿意接受口交。女孩们对她们的生殖器有种羞耻感，她们觉得下体很肮脏但又很神圣。女性对于自身下体的感受直接影响到她们是否能享受性行为。然而，印第安纳大学的一名研究员Debby Herbenick，认为女孩们对于下体的认知严重受社会影响。前所未有的压力都在告诉女孩们，处于自然状态的阴部被认为是不好的、不被接受的。研究表明，约75%的女大学生会选择把阴毛全部剃光，其中超过一半的人会规律性地剃毛，剩下的人则是偶尔会。女孩们会跟我说，剃毛让她们觉得自己更干净，这只是她们的个人选择。但我好奇，如果哪天她们要是漂到一个无人岛，她们还会不会把时间花在这件事上？

Andwhen I pushed further, a darker motivation emerged: avoiding humiliation."Guys act like they would be disgusted by it," one young woman toldme. "No one wants to be talked about like that." The rising pubichair removal reminded me of the 1920s, when women first started regularlyshaving their armpits and their legs. That's when flapper dresses came intostyle, and women's limbs were suddenly visible, open to public scrutiny.There's a way that I think that this too is a sign. That a girl's most intimatepart is open to public scrutiny, open to critique, to becoming more about howit looks to someone else than how it feels to her.

再追问下去，我了解到了一个更为隐秘的动机：试图避免被羞辱。“男生看上去会被阴毛恶心到嘛，”有个女孩告诉我，“没人会喜欢别人说起自己时是那种语气的。”这股兴起的剃阴毛热潮让我想起上世纪20年代，女性开始固定地刮腋毛和腿毛的时候。那时候无袖连衣裙开始风行，女性的四肢突然进入了公众的视野，随时接受陌生人上下审视的目光。我觉得这和现在是一样的，女孩们最为私密的部位开始接受他人的审视，阴毛给自身的感觉反而没有别人怎么看来得重要。

Theshaving trend has sparked another rise in labiaplasty. Labiaplasty, which isthe trimming of the inner and outer labia, is the fastest-growing cosmeticsurgery among teenage girls. It rose 80 percent between 2014 and 2015, andwhereas girls under 18 comprise two percent of all cosmetic surgeries, they arefive percent of labiaplasty. The most sought-after look, incidentally, in whichthe outer labia appear fused like a clam shell, is called ... wait for it ..."The Barbie."

这股剃毛风还引发了阴唇整形术。这是一种修剪大小阴唇的手术，也是少女中最迅速风靡起来的一种整形手术。2014至2015年间，这种手术增加了80%。所有接受整形手术的病人中，18岁以下的女孩只占2%，然而阴唇整形术中她们占到了5%。顺便说一句，最受欢迎的阴唇看上去像个肥厚而紧闭的蚌壳，猜猜俗称叫什么？

“芭比娃娃。”

Itrust I don't have to tell you that Barbie is a) made of plastic and b) has nogenitalia.

我想我不用强调了吧，第一，芭比只是个塑料娃娃，第二，芭比压根没有阴部好嘛！

Thelabiaplasty trend has become so worrisome that the American College ofObstetricians and Gynecologists has issued a statement on the procedure, whichis rarely medically indicated, has not been proven safe and whose side effectsinclude scarring, numbness, pain and diminished sexual sensation. Now,admittedly, and blessedly, the number of girls involved is still quite small,but you could see them as canaries in a coal mine, telling us somethingimportant about the way girls see their bodies.

阴唇整形术如此风靡，引得美国妇产科医师学会（ACOG）都严正声明，这个手术鲜有医学必要，安全性没有保证，并有诸多后遗症，如留疤、失去知觉、疼痛和降低性敏感度等等。的确，幸运的是现在接受这种手术的女孩人数还比较少，但她们是一种预警，我们可以看到女孩们都是怎么看待她们自己的身体的。

SaraMcClellan, a psychologist at the University of Michigan, coined what is myfavorite phrase ever in talking about all of this: "Intimatejustice." That's the idea that sex has political, as well as personalimplications, just like, who does the dishes in your house, or who vacuums therug. And it raises similar issues about inequality, about economic disparity,violence, physical and mental health. Intimate justice asks us to consider whois entitled to engage in an experience. Who is entitled to enjoy it? Who is theprimary beneficiary? And how does each partner define "good enough"?Honestly, I think those questions are tricky and sometimes traumatic for adultwomen to confront, but when we're talking about girls, I just kept coming backto the idea that their early sexual experience shouldn't have to be somethingthat they get over.

密西根大学的心理学家Sara McClellan为此发明了一个说法：亲密关系中的公平。这是我谈到这些话题时最爱的一个讲法。这告诉我们性也带有权力的、政治的意义，就好像家里谁负责洗碗，谁负责吸尘一样。和其他不平等一样，和经济差距、暴力、肢体或精神残障一样，性也带来同样的问题。亲密关系中的公平让我们着眼于一些让人不那么舒服的问题：谁应该投入这段体验？谁应该享受性？谁是享受的主体？亲密关系中的双方各自都怎么定义“好”的性？说实话，这些问题可能会让许多成年女性难以回答，甚至无法面对。但当我们面对女孩时，我始终觉得她们最初的性体验不该是她们需要跨越的一个障碍，需要克服的一个梦魇。

Inher work, McClellan found that young women were more likely than young men touse their partner's pleasure as a measure of their satisfaction. So they'd saythings like, "If he's sexually satisfied, then I'm sexuallysatisfied." Young men were more likely to measure their satisfaction bytheir own orgasm. Young women also defined bad sex differently. In the largestever survey ever conducted on American sexual behavior, they reported pain intheir sexual encounters 30 percent of the time. They also used words like"depressing," "humiliating," "degrading." Theyoung men never used that language. So when young women report sexualsatisfaction levels that are equal to or greater than young men's — and they doin research — that can be deceptive. If a girl goes into an encounter hopingthat it won't hurt, wanting to feel close to her partner and expecting him tohave an orgasm, she'll be satisfied if those criteria are met. And there'snothing wrong with wanting to feel close to your partner, or wanting him to behappy, and orgasm isn't the only measure of an experience ... but absence ofpain — that's a very low bar for your own sexual fulfillment.

McClellan在她的研究中发现，相比年轻男性，年轻女性更容易将伴侣愉悦与否当做自己是否满足的标准。她们会说，“如果他满足的话，我就很满足啦。”年轻男性则更容易以自己是否达到高潮来判断满足与否。两者对糟糕的性的定义也非常不同。全美最大的性调查显示，年轻女性的性生活30%都会带来疼痛。她们形容性生活时会用“压抑”、“羞耻”、“低级”等词。年轻男性从来不会这么形容。所以研究显示年轻女性与年轻男性同等甚至更为享受性生活时，这其实是很有欺骗性的。如果女孩对性行为的期待只在于不会疼，想要和伴侣更亲密，期待男方能高潮，那当这些标准达到时她就会觉得满足了。想要和伴侣更亲密，希望对方能享受，这当然没什么错，虽然高潮并不是唯一可采用的判断标准。但希望不要感到疼痛？作为性满足的标准，这实在是低了点。

Listeningto all of this and thinking about it, I began to realize that we performed akind of psychological clitoridectomy on American girls. Starting in infancy,parents of baby boys are more likely to name all their body parts, at leastthey'll say, "here's your pee-pee." Parents of baby girls go rightfrom navel to knees, and they leave this whole situation in here unnamed.

想想这些，我意识到我们其实对女孩们进行了一场精神上的阉礼。从婴儿时期开始，男宝宝的父母更倾向于清楚地说出他身体各部位的名称，至少会说“这是你的小鸡鸡。”女宝宝的父母则从肚脐跳到膝盖，中间那段完全不提。

There'sno better way to make something unspeakable than not to name it. Then kids gointo their puberty education classes and they learn that boys have erectionsand ejaculations, and girls have ... periods and unwanted pregnancy. And theysee that internal diagram of a woman's reproductive system — you know, the onethat looks kind of like a steer head —

连名称都不提，还有什么比这更能诠释“避而不谈”这四个字？进入青春期，孩子们在学校接受性教育，他们了解到男生会勃起，会射精，而女生呢？她们会有月经，还会意外怀孕。他们看到女性生殖系统的器官图，看上去像个三岔路口。

Andit always grays out between the legs. So we never say vulva, we certainly neversay clitoris. No surprise, fewer than half of teenage girls age 14 to 17 haveever masturbated. And then they go into their partnered experience and weexpect that somehow they'll think sex is about them, that they'll be able toarticulate their needs, their desires, their limits. It's unrealistic.

然后两腿之间的部分就被阴影覆盖住，遮掉了。他们从来没见过外阴，更不要说阴蒂了。难怪14到17岁之间的女孩们有一半以上从来没自慰过。然后她们开始有男伴，我们就指望她们神奇地无师自通，会认为她们自己才是性的主体，能够清楚地说出她们想要什么，怎么样舒服，哪里是禁区。这根本不可能。

Here'ssomething, though. Girls' investment in their partner's pleasure remainsregardless of the gender of the partner. So in same-sex encounters, the orgasmgap disappears. And young women climax at the same rate as men. Lesbian andbisexual girls would tell me that they felt liberated to get off the script —free to create an encounter that worked for them. Gay girls also challenged theidea of first intercourse as the definition of virginity. Not becauseintercourse isn't a big deal, but it's worth questioning why we consider thisone act, which most girls associate with discomfort or pain, to be the line inthe sand of sexual adulthood — so much more meaningful, so much moretransformative than anything else. And it's worth considering how this isserving girls; whether it's keeping them safer from disease, coercion,betrayal, assault. Whether it's encouraging mutuality and caring; what it meansabout the way they see other sex acts; whether it's giving them more controlover and joy in their experience, and what it means about gay teens, who canhave multiple sex partners without heterosexual intercourse. So I asked a gaygirl that I met, "How'd you know you weren't a virgin anymore?" Shesaid she had to Google it.

但有一点我要指出的是，无论伴侣的性别，女孩们都会花更多精力取悦伴侣。在同性性行为中，高潮的差异消失了。年轻女性和年轻男性享有同样数量的高潮。同性恋和双性恋女孩都告诉我，和女生在一起，她们觉得不受束缚，可以尝试各种让她们舒服的方式。

这些女孩还对处女的定义提出了质疑。不是因为阴茎-阴道性交不重要，但我们的确应该反思一下，为什么这样一种让绝大部分女孩联想到疼痛、不舒服的行为，得以决定女孩到女人的转变？这个行为被定义得如此重要，如此有决定性，为什么？再想想这对女孩有什么影响吧：这是让她们远离了传染病、胁迫、背叛、或者侵害，还是更近了？这个定义是在鼓励一种互相关爱、愉悦彼此的关系吗？她们会怎么看待这种定义以外的性行为？她们是否能更多地掌控、享受这份体验？这对同性恋女孩们又意味着什么？她们可以有过多个性伴侣但仍旧没有过阴茎-阴道性交。我有一次问一个同性恋女孩，“你怎么判断你还是不是个处女？”她说，我得谷歌一下。

AndGoogle wasn't sure.

但谷歌不确定答案是什么。

Shefinally decided that she wasn't a virgin anymore after she'd had her firstorgasm with a partner. And I thought — whoa. What if just for a second weimagined that was the definition? Again, not because intercourse isn't a bigdeal — of course it is — but it isn't the only big deal, and rather thanthinking about sex as a race to a goal, this helps us reconceptualize it as apool of experiences that include warmth, affection, arousal, desire, touch, intimacy.And it's worth asking young people: who's really the more sexually experiencedperson? The one who makes out with a partner for three hours and experimentswith sensual tension and communication, or the one who gets wasted at a partyand hooks up with a random in order to dump their "virginity" beforethey get to college?

她最后决定，她第一次和女友做爱达到高潮后，她就不再是处女了。我听了觉得，哇！设想一下，如果这是我们对处女/处男的定义会怎么样？没错， 阴茎-阴道性交很重要，但这不是唯一重要的事。不把性爱当成是一场冲向终点的比赛，把高潮当做贞操的标准让我们重新定义性爱，让我们联想到温暖，爱慕，激情，渴望，抚摸，亲密。更值得问年轻人的一个问题是，什么样的人才算是老司机？一个和伴侣花上三个小时细细探索交流的人，还是一个在聚会上喝得烂醉，和随手钓上的陌生人开房，只为在上大学前摆脱“处女/处男”这顶帽子的人？

Theonly way that shift in thinking can happen though is if we talk to young peoplemore about sex — if we normalize those discussions, integrating them intoeveryday life, talking about those intimate acts in a different way — the waywe mostly have changed in the way that we talk about women in the public realm.

让思想转变的唯一办法，就是我们更开诚布公地和年轻人讨论性——如果我们把性融入到日常生活中，当做一个普通的话题来讨论，用一种与以往不同的视角来解读这些亲密行为——就好像如今我们在公共领域谈论到女性时不再和以前一样。

Considera survey of 300 randomly chosen girls from a Dutch and an American university,two similar universities, talking about their early experience of sex. TheDutch girls embodied everything we say we want from our girls. They had fewernegative consequences, like disease, pregnancy, regret — more positive outcomeslike being able to communicate with their partner, who they said they knew verywell; preparing for the experience responsibly; enjoying themselves. What wastheir secret? The Dutch girls said that their doctors, teachers and parentstalked to them candidly, from an early age, about sex, pleasure and theimportance of mutual trust. What's more, while American parents weren'tnecessarily less comfortable talking about sex, we tend to frame thoseconversations entirely in terms or risk and danger, whereas Dutch parents talkabout balancing responsibility and joy. I have to tell you, as a parent myself,that hit me hard, because I know, had I not delved into that research, I wouldhave talked to my own child about contraception, about disease protection,about consent because I'm a modern parent, and I would have thought ... jobwell done.

来看一个荷兰和美国大学对比的调查：两所相似的大学，随机抽取300名女生参与讨论她们最初的性体验。荷兰女生满足了我们刚才提到的所有期望：她们更少经历不良的后果，比如得传染病、意外怀孕，或者感到后悔；她们更多表示自己的经历有积极的结果，比如她们会选择熟识的伴侣，可以和伴侣良好地沟通，能够主动而负责地为自己的经历做准备，并且享受整个过程。

她们的秘诀是什么？荷兰女生表示，是她们的医生、老师、父母从很小的时候就坦诚地和她们讨论性、愉悦和互相信任的重要性。美国父母倒不一定是对讨论性感到尴尬，而是他们通常把关于性的谈话限制于了解风险、为可能的不良后果做准备。荷兰父母则更多地讨论如何平衡承担责任和享受快感。作为一个母亲，我不得不承认，这让我很受震撼。因为我知道，如果我没有深入了解这项研究，我会和我的孩子讨论避孕，讨论如何防止传染病，强调两厢情愿的重要性，然后我会觉得我已经做得非常好了。

NowI know that's not enough. I also know what I hope for for our girls. I wantthem to see sexuality as a source of self-knowledge, creativity and communication,despite its potential risks. I want them to be able to revel in their bodies'sensuality without being reduced to it. I want them to be able to ask for whatthey want in bed, and to get it. I want them to be safe from unwantedpregnancy, disease, cruelty, dehumanization, violence. If they are assaulted, Iwant them to have recourse from their schools, their employers, the courts.It's a lot to ask, but it's not too much.

然而现在我知道这并不够。我也明白了我对女孩们真正的期望。 尽管伴随着一定的风险，我希望她们将性看作是了解自己的手段，看作是发挥创意、促进沟通的方式。我希望她们能细细体味自己身体带来的感觉，而不是压抑它们。我希望她们在床上可以开口表达自己要什么，并且被满足。我希望她们不会意外怀孕，得传染病，被残忍地不人道地暴力地对待。如果她们受到侵害，我希望她们能诉诸学校、雇主、法庭。这些要求很多，但并不过分。

Asparents, teachers, advocates and activists, we have raised a generation ofgirls to have a voice, to expect egalitarian treatment in the home, in theclassroom, in the workplace. Now it's time to demand that intimate justice intheir personal lives as well.

作为父母、老师、活动家，我们已经培养这一代女孩勇于表达自己，在家里、学校、工作中要求平等的待遇。现在，我们该教会她们寻求亲密关系中的公平了。

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