The holidays are when we are hit with some incredible and memorable skits from our fave media outlets. But I recently ran across a few worrying throwbacks:

I was scrolling down a YouTube rabbit hole when I landed on an SNL video from 2021 titled “The Night I Met Santa.” In it, Billie Eilish plays a breathy songstress channeling Marilyn Monroe’s old Hollywood glamour. Flanked by backup singers (played by Kate McKinnon and Ego Ngowim), she explains that she’s thrilled by the idea of meeting Santa. Miraculously, she does one night! But, for some reason, she doesn’t want to be vulnerable in front of St. Nick. So, instead of responding earnestly when Santa starts asking about her behavior, she goes on the attack:

“He said my name and I said ‘yes.’ He asked if I’d been naughty or nice And I said, ‘who’s asking, virgin?’”

There was a strange sexual subtext now in the “naughty or nice” part, as the bit was implying Santa was slut-shaming. It could have been a great dig; Santa’s seemingly only willing to reward “nice” girls with gifts, so the apparently “naughty” character claps back. But if it was intending to address a gendered form of sex-shaming, it did so by introducing one.

That set me off. I started looking for other references to male virgins on SNL. Wasn’t long before I found one. In another skit from the same year, “Three Sad Virgins,” we find Pete Davidson’s character humble bragging about the nonstop paparazzi shots and toasts in exclusive clubs with celebrities. Backed by a trap beat, Davidson explains:

“All my friends are cool and famous Except these three sad virgins…”

Three sad virgins, What? Three sad virgins, Whoa!

The camera pans to three young, white, and geeky looking guys. These “virgins” hop up to protest that they have had sex, “just not super recently.” Davidson attempts to reassure them they are simply playing characters in a parody video. They are only supposed to represent archetypical “sad virgins,” he explains, and somehow this appeases them. But the next verse finds him making specific references to their other supposed physical and character flaws — being dumb, having fart breath, and having a weird penis — about which the characters spiral in horror and embarrassment.

At the very least, this video does appear to be making a commentary about celebrity culture. The unfamous desperately want the approval of the famous. But of course, creating distinctions between the cool and uncool is the basis of fame.

Here’s the trouble with these male virgin jokes being bandied about by liberals: they treat straight men as if their identity should be tied to conquests. It suggests a (straight) man who has never put any meat in a taco is not worthy of respect.

What’s weird is, I thought men defining themselves as extensions of their cocks was the kind of meat-headed 1980s rom-com bullshit that we, leftists, now identify as a lynchpin of “toxic masculinity.” I’m pretty sure that one of the main problems with players and fuckboys — the common titles today bestowed on “toxic” types — is that they try to hustle women into giving up the ass with little resistance and nearly nothing in return? We claimed we wanted men to be sensitive and caring, and to stop objectifying us.

The reality is by virgin shaming we are objectifying them and us. We turn them into extensions of penises that have or have not “gotten wet.” And we giggle delightedly when we find that oops! hahahhahha! This one hasn’t figured out how to get his member into any female! It suggests any vag will do. We’re holes, and holes are interchangeable like Malibu Barbie’s outfits. Just throw any one of them on. Any box will do to get a man this form of gendered respect. It doesn’t matter who the woman is, or if she even feels it. (Here I’m reminded of that troubling Jennifer Lawrence vehicle, No Hard Feelings, where a high school boy’s parents pay her to have sex with their son. So, sex trafficking. But in the end, because she “owes it” to all three of them, she goes through with it! And he can proudly proclaim he’s no longer a virgin. Full. Body. Shudders.)

Weren’t we all shocked and disgusted by the incel/Republican line about men “having a right to sex” that Trevor Noah explored in 2023? We were like, don’t women have a right to refuse?! Yes. But turns out we often treat men like they don’t. It’s an incredible catch 22.

We don’t get to run around being mad at men for being “toxic,” while also shaming them for failing to accumulate the roster of pussy Chris Brown bragged about when he used to want you and her and her and her. Because make no mistake about it, one of the implied victories for Anthony Michael Hall’s character in Sixteen Candles was that he was given free license to assault a hot girl by one of the hot popular guys. She didn’t consent to it or even remember it. But he had an instant aura of cool having finally lost his virginity. That post-rape swag!

Which one do we really want? Intelligent and sensitive men who use their sexuality wisely with willing partners? Or men afraid of being shamed for being virgins, so they’ll devise any plot to get the pussy? So far, we’ve been saying we want vulnerability and intimacy, then laughing in the faces of men who haven’t smashed the ass.

Virgin-shaming is like slut-shaming. They both assign worth based on the amount of sex people are having. This Thanksgiving, let’s be grateful for decent men, for vulnerable men, and for virgins. Let men go sexless, instead of encouraging toxic conquest (read: rape) culture.

— Learn more about Western sexual history in my latest book, The End of Love: Racism, Sexism, and the Death of Romance