Letters to the editor about virginity

My first virginity column garnered two letters to the editor! It's funny because I keep getting this "and in The Village Voice no less!" reaction, as if by the very nature of my column being in the Voice, I should think a certain way. It's a compliment, yes, but to me, a backhanded one. Not all liberals think alike, not all feminists, not all...any group, I would imagine.

Right of refusal

Re Rachel Kramer Bussel's "Pure and Simple: The Case Against Having Sex" [ Lusty Lady, October 25–31]: This virginity issue is hilarious. In 1980 I decided to go to San Francisco on holiday. While I was there I watched a news story about the Chastity Club with total bemusement and incredulity that people could be so loopy. They even had badges and pillowcases with cartoons that said "NO!" Weeks later I met this gorgeous woman named Barbara, and we went to the Exotic Erotic Arts Ball on Polk Street, where I was entertained by an unbelievable gamut of exhibitionists. We ended up at her apartment, and to my horror she had one of the "NO!" pillowcases. Not my lucky night.

Clive Warner

Monterey, California

Bussel is great and brave to tackle anything (in a popular newspaper such as yours) with a fair view of this once perfect morality that has now become a persecuted morality. Congratulations on preserving free speech in a more-than- ever oppressive medium.

Rachelrose Siwoff

Denville, New Jersey