Cleavage Diaries: Who is a virgin? Rapper T.I. has his 18 year old daughter’s hymen “checked” for his answer to the question

Her Virginity belongs to him

I was horrified when I read that the rapper T.I. takes his daughter to the gynecologist to have her prodded intimately to check if her hymen is intact. This “test” is not fool-proof in that some women don’t have hymens, sometimes they tear in ways other than sex, and seriously, an 18 year old shares this experience with her father? The author did a great job of talking about how inappropriate this test is in the first place, and how sick it seems for him to be so…involved. So I want to bring up some thoughts that are a little more out there. I am good at out there:

1. Maybe T.I. wants to make a big public display of his daughter being a virgin bc he is trying to provide a sort of alibi for himself. I do not know this, I am just saying…Has he been where he is not supposed to, on account of he already owns her body…is it such a big leap that he should do with that body what he wants. A woman’s right to choose is by extension his right to choose since he owns her. Now that’s deep. I am not saying there was incest, but I am saying I wouldn’t be way shocked…

2. A woman’s virginity has worth to her, we know this, but it has worth to her father as well. If she is a virgin she can fetch a higher “bride price” as they say in Anthropology, or what the groom and his family are willing to pay for her. In America, the expression is, “marrying well,” or “marrying money.” She is a “nice girl,” or a “good girl.” She comes from a “good family.” Her father can expect to get repaid in cash for his diligence as well as in acclaim. He is “protective,” and he disproves the stereotype that black men don’t care about their kids. Is he protesting too much…?

3. T.I. knows how truly dangerous men are to women. In fact, besides our very own selves, the most dangerous people to us are men. Maybe T.I. knows what he does or has done to women, or seen done to women and he is taking a desperate measure to protect his daughter from the dangers he knows are all too real, and worse that we ever publicly acknowledge. It’s like putting barbed wire up around your yard so the home owner, the occupants and the potential robbers all know not to go there, don’t even try. A big guard dog on duty sign. Of all the ways the author lit in to T.I. she never accused him of paranoia.

4. I once listened to a fundamentalist preacher in Honolulu introduce the audience to his three teenage daughters and announce to the crowded room that they were all virgins and would remain so until they were married. The remark was received with wild applause and really garnered him credibility. They did the only thing a girl can do in that situation–smile and (I’m guessing) thank God that no one can read minds. I have always wondered how that worked our for all of them.

5. Do you think it would be better for her if he didn’t care? I actually have no answer. Without a visible male protector, the world could be very risky for her, provided that this is the worst thing T.I. does, but who knows..?

6. I read Princess Diana had to pass this test before she married Prince Charles, which is a union that seems to have worked out in the very long term but was little fun for either of them. The intact hymen thing–that is a symbol of being elite. You don’t need to put your little girl at work in a brothel the way very many people around the world have to do. In the hierarchy of needs, you have got all you need and want and now you have to find something else to twiddle your thumbs about and ponder. You have to be high class in the first place to be eligible to marry well in the first place, the virgin status helps you out-compete the other pricey p***ies.