Raindrops - I´m sure you´d find more men keen on marrying virgins than women who want to stay virgins till their wedding day. I think it´s got something to do with the penis complex of men and fear of being compared to others. Also, it may be what Vineyards calls "branding."

Vineyards - virginity in the western culture gained commercial sense. If sex sells, then virginity will sell as well, just to a different target group.

I, personally, find it ridiculous to believe that virginity is something that should be offered only after legalised committment. Still, I strongly feel it´s important to choose your first partner right (as well as all others that may follow ).

Why only in western cultures? in all cultures nowadays it gained commercial sense bec there is no natural necessity to stay so.

and what is funny, that men want to marry virgin and have "whore" in bed next night ... marry virgin is cool. live with virgin is boring. and being virgin is not only ab physiology, but mental condition

I can always use myself as an example because I believe I remained a virgin (as a male of course) much longer than most girls. I was something like 24. I was raised in a setting where it was taught it would be cruel to sleep with girls before marriage.

Turkey was like an iron curtain country then. There was isolation from the world, from the other sex and from everything that could potentially give you pleasure. Still, I was a lot luckier than the generation before me. Today, young people are living in a country vastly different from the restrictive society of our childhood.

Of course, the town I lived in (Bursa) was and it still is much more conservative than Istanbul.

What I would teach my children is not that it´s important to stay a virgin until they´re married. I don´t want their hormones to influence their decision to get married

What I would teach them is to at least wait until they are adults. I think it´s crazy that some people use their virginity at 13, 14, 15 years old... When I think about how I was at that age, I was surely not capable of making adult decisions. The decision to have sex is one of those adult decisions. It can have so many consequences, when you are not careful. When you are young you tend to underestimate the dangers behind certain decisions (like having sex unprotected).

I will also teach them that it is smart to save that experience for somebody that you love. It´s not just a body-thing, but a heart- and mind-thing as well.

Being a virgin or not doesn´t say much about the person in my opinion. Not being a virgin doesn´t mean you have taken the decision to have sex lightly. For me, what I look for in a partner is not virgnity, but some brains behind the decisions they make, including the one to have sex or not.

nice intention ... think all parents or parents-to-be have the same.

but cildren at age 12-13-...-16 are sure they are already adults. they want to become adults (much later they will want to stay children as long as possible). they want to be as all others around (if friends smoke, they will likely do the same or at least try). with virginity - there wont be another try .

they are sure that this current love is true one and for the rest of the life. they will blame parents in all sins. besides that some of children have developed desires by that age. Probably "developed" society inputs there either. But it is rules of developing of certain body that belong to  certain kid. One can think of book only at age of 15 or max about kissing class-mate´s cheek. the other will have fully grown desires. And these desires will rule the person at that age because it hard to rule them even being much older.

children want to live here and now. age after 20 is age of old age. Children are maximalist, not philosophers.

i would make my children too busy to think of early loosing virginity, in wide sense, to widen horizon, to have big variety of interests, goals and dreams. and what a strange and quiet opposite feeling, when it comes to your own children ))))

And I would like to teach my son respect - both to himself and to other people. I´d like to make sure that when (not if) he decides to have sex, he´ll be well aware of all the risks it exposes him to: pregnancy, STDs, emotional distress etc. But the decision will ultimately be his, at the time when he wants it...

At the same time, I also planned that I wouldn´t give him sweets, would not let him watch tv or sleep with us. Yeah, right. People always have excellent ideas before they have children

what is wrong with sleeping with parents?

im so jealous of you!

Back in the day when people got married at a young age the concept of staying a virgin until being married was a much simpler task.  Not so long ago, it was not uncommon for women to get married between the age of 17 and 20.  Most women married older men who had already finished college and could offer a "good life" for their new bride.  My Mom, who is now 65, once told me that it was not uncommon for a girl in the 1950s to leave high school to get married.  It was not concidered taboo or something bad.  In fact, my mom was one of them.  She often talks about women who went to university to get their MRS. degree....which simply means they went to find a husband.  Once they did, they left school.  

The fact is, culture in the West has changed drastically in the last 50 years.  Our concept of what is acceptable and what is not has changed with it.  Today we would concider a girl leaving high school to be married at a disadvantage to her peers when a mere 60 years ago, this was concidered the cultural norm.  Anyway, I think the concept of staying a virgin until marriage now, is somewhat unrealistic.  Many women don´t get married until they are well into there 20s and 30s.  In many middle eastern cultures it is still normal to get married very early on in life, making virginity a much more realistic goal.  

I think little girls and boys at the age of 12, 13, 14...having sex is a totally different issue.    

I´m going to copy the things my mom did It led to me not losing my virginty at the age of 13, 14, 15, etc.  I already learned how babies were made at the age of 8, from an informative book. I learned what a condom was at the age of 10. It wasn´t intentional though. We were watching a comedy movie where a guy made a joke about a condom. So, I asked my mom what the joke was about Her face when I asked...priceless.

A lot of the girls that get married at virgins are way younger then I was when I lost my virginity. I know a lot of people think a person his an adult when they hit puberty, in the girls case get their first period. It´s simply a middle stage, your body is not full-grown yet, so I don´t think you should be using your body that way. Ofcourse as a parent you can only do so much, but at least you can try Even when I was legally an adult, and had a boyfriend for a year, who was very ready for it... I waited. I wasn´t ready yet, in my opinion. And I´m glad I waited as long as I did. And I´m also glad I didn´t wait until getting married

Personally, I think the decision to have sex or wait is very personal and different for everyone.  I am comfortable with my decisions and have no regrets.  My wish is that my children can say the same thing, not that they follow some crazy tradition of remaining a virgin until they are in the legal bonds of marriage!