Pearl - August 18, 2025


Relationship Virgins： People Who Have Not Even Been In a Relationship

Mentioned
Chloe Jeannie Hertel
Sydney Watson FINALLY Joins The Me Too Scene Alexander Grace Explains How Cooked Generation Z Is

Episode Stats


Length

12 minutes

Words per minute

176.64

Word count

2,130

Sentence count

152

Harmful content

Misogyny

13

sentences flagged

Toxicity

3

sentences flagged

Hate speech

12

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Relationship virgins, a popular term for people who had never been in a romantic relationship, are often stigmatized and judged harshly. People view those without a romantic experience as less happy, less well-adjusted, and lonelier than others.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 What up guys? Welcome to my reaction series. Today we're talking about the truth about
00:00:03.960 relationship virgins. So this is an article written by a woman talking about women that
00:00:09.600 have never been in a relationship. So never had a romantic relationship. Here's what should be
00:00:16.080 a source of pride. Relationship virgins, a popular term for people who had never been in a romantic
00:00:22.140 relationship are often stigmatized and judged harshly. People view those without romantic
00:00:27.620 relationship experience as less happy, less well-adjusted and lonelier than others, according
00:00:32.400 to research. As the number of single people grows in the United States and abroad, many people are
00:00:37.140 taking pride in living outside of the conventions of coupling. In 2017, a story in The Guardian broke
00:00:43.420 the internet. It was about a woman who managed to get to 54 without ever having a boyfriend. She was
00:00:49.160 called a relationship virgin. This story was filled with anguish. The relationship virgin was distraught
00:00:54.660 about her lack of romantic relationship experience and was struggling to find out what went wrong
00:01:00.300 with her. She was so ashamed she would not even use her real name. It's probably a lot wrong. My first
00:01:06.660 guess is there's nothing wrong with her. Oh my God. Only women can write an article. Look it. If there's 1.00
00:01:13.100 something not working in your life, most likely you're not doing something right. If you can point to
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00:02:36.080 Now women are kind of messed up, right? So you could maybe say that if like a marriage ends, 1.00
00:02:41.440 it's not really your fault. But if you could look at, you know, men pulling a lot of hot women,
00:02:46.780 they figured something out, right? And it's the same with women. If there's women that are getting 1.00
00:02:51.080 hot boyfriends, smart boyfriends, whatever boy, rich boy, whatever you want, you're probably doing
00:02:56.920 something. It's probably the weight. The problem, how much do you weigh, lady? The problem instead is with 1.00
00:03:04.700 the pervasive pressures to be romantically involved, the celebration of those who are romantically
00:03:10.040 involved, and the relentless stereotyping and stigmatizing of those who are not. I wrote about
00:03:15.280 romantic relationship virgins when the Guardian story was first published. But I want to revisit
00:03:20.300 the matter because I have glimmers of hope that some of the sadness and shame around this matter
00:03:25.440 is beginning to dissipate. In some instances, people who have never been in romantic relationships
00:03:30.240 are instead justifiably experiencing pride. Feel bad about being a romantic relationship virgin is
00:03:37.560 understandable. I think some people who truly want to have romantic relationships, not just any
00:03:43.740 romantic relationship, but a committing, enduring one in their heart, that's central to who they are.
00:03:49.260 They think they will feel happier and more fulfilled that way, and that their life will be more meaningful.
00:03:54.580 One of the many reasons we should stop stigmatizing them is this. They are in enough pain already.
00:03:59.660 I wonder for whether for some people who are long to be coupled, that feeling can seem like it's
00:04:07.380 coming from within. That is something that that it is something about them as a person and what they
00:04:14.540 really want when oppressive social social norms and expectations are powerfully shaping about the
00:04:21.040 desires they realize. That's important because they would feel less miserable if everyone around them,
00:04:26.720 including our matrimal, matrimanical, popular culture stopped being so unenlightened in their 0.94
00:04:34.000 thinking and so judgmental. So this is female rationalization and cope. So this is basically 1.00
00:04:39.000 women saying, um, I, I'm trying to cope with the fact that I'm not lovable, wantable, or hot.
00:04:46.880 It's a tough realization. You know what I mean? Like, I think the worst I'll tell you story when I was
00:04:53.220 young. So when I was younger, I had some very attractive friends that played volleyball and
00:04:58.920 there's, I mean, you got, you guys know how volleyball baddies are. And, um, the worst feeling
00:05:04.320 ever is when guys are like, who's your friend? And like, especially when you have a beautiful friend
00:05:09.280 and it's like every guy's asking always, you're like, yeah, I'll just, but this is what I mean.
00:05:16.000 Women, we, it's like, we know there's a difference in outcomes for women, but it can never be us.
00:05:21.120 Like sometimes you're just not good enough. Yeah. So the judgmental of the judgment begins with the
00:05:27.200 very term that got popular, popularized relationship virgins, like so many other uses of the word
00:05:33.080 relationship. It hijacks it, narrowing its meaning to just romantic relationships. In fact,
00:05:37.740 relationship is a big warmhearted wording. It encompasses friendships, family ties, bonds with
00:05:44.220 neighbors and mentors, um, and more. In addition to romantic links, if you have had any kinds of
00:05:52.880 relationship, then you are not a relationship virgin. So again, this is women rationalizing 1.00
00:05:57.720 being in a situation ship. Uh, look, it's half, it happens. I'm not here to judge, but that's an L. 1.00
00:06:04.200 Okay. That's, that's objectively just an L you're feeling, um, that you are the feeling that you are
00:06:10.700 being judged for never having had a romantic relationship can be real. My colleagues,
00:06:15.620 Wendy Morris and Jeannie Hertel and I did research on the topic before the term relationship virgin
00:06:21.520 was popularized. We created pairs of brief biological sketches of male and female, 20 something year
00:06:27.100 olds for each pair. Everything about the person in the sketches were identical, except this,
00:06:32.060 that in one virgin version, they were described as having been in at least one romantic relationship
00:06:38.880 in the past. And in the other, they were described as having no romantic relationship experience. We
00:06:43.900 found that in some ways, the romantic relationship virgins were evaluated harshly. For example, they
00:06:49.000 were viewed as less happy, less well-adjusted and lonelier than adults out of the same age who did not
00:06:53.960 have a romantic relationship experience. Um, not all of the perceptions were negative though. For example,
00:06:59.820 adults who have never been in a romantic relationship were not seen as any more self-centered or envious
00:07:04.760 than those who do not have romantic relationship experience. Why the stigma must make, why the
00:07:12.200 stigma may be subsiding. So when women say we're getting rid of the stigma, that means we're all
00:07:17.100 doing a bad behavior together so we can make it more normal. So we're not judged. Um, it's kind of
00:07:21.300 like the way only fans is almost not abnormal anymore. It's because they de-stigmatized it and it does work.
00:07:28.160 It does work. Like if everyone's doing something, you might not like it, but it does become more
00:07:31.980 normal. Um, just about every time the census brew reports a new data results show that the number
00:07:37.680 of single people is growing in the United States, nearly half of all people, 18 and older are
00:07:42.000 unmarried. The biggest group by far of people who are not married is people who have never been
00:07:46.080 married. The rise of single people is not specific to the United States. Even more stunning were the
00:07:51.000 results of a Pew survey conducted just before the pandemic and published in 2020. It showed that half of
00:07:57.020 all solo single people did not want a romantic relationship or even to date. Of course, plenty
00:08:02.000 of people who are single have never had romantic relationship experience, but the number who
00:08:06.680 haven't even had a romantic relationship is increasing alongside the number of people who
00:08:11.000 stay single. When more and more people share a particular experience, it becomes increasingly
00:08:16.180 implausible to insist that there is something wrong with all of them. What's more with strength
00:08:20.420 in numbers, sometimes they start to organize and fight back. They begin to challenge other
00:08:25.100 people's prejudice rather than internalizing them. So, okay, that's kind of BS. But what
00:08:29.080 happens is women are sharing the same men. Therefore, some women are only selected for 0.97
00:08:33.240 situationships, not relationships. And that's an L. And instead of taking it, eating it, internalizing
00:08:38.920 it, improving, maybe shooting a little lower next time. Women, we just have a tendency to 1.00
00:08:43.100 try to make it normal and just do the same thing over and over again until we crash out.
00:08:48.360 So, from shame to pride. Something very significant has happened in the years since my colleagues
00:08:53.600 and I started doing our research on the stereotyping of people who have never had a romantic relationship.
00:08:58.620 People who are not interested in sex or romance or conventional coupling are discovering that
00:09:03.620 they share those experiences with more people than they realize. They are understanding their
00:09:08.220 asexuality or aromanticism or their single status at heart as an orientation or an identity,
00:09:14.880 not just a casual preference and deficiency, and definitely not a deficit. It just means
00:09:19.980 you got to lose weight. We are in an obese country. So, if you're just fat, well, then
00:09:25.680 you just like being by yourself, men and women. Women want, even fat women want fit men. It's 0.91
00:09:30.760 not fair, but it just is what it meant. Men will take chubby women, but chubby women won't 1.00
00:09:35.460 take fat men. I know you're thinking that's not fair. Well, I'm just telling you what's going
00:09:39.840 on. They're creating their own forums, events, and collections of resources. With regards
00:09:44.940 to asexuality, I think it's fair to say that it has become a social movement. As I explained
00:09:50.480 previously, investment in sexually or romanticism or romantic coupling no longer feels as compulsory
00:09:56.220 as it did before. More significantly, many take pride in living outside of the conventions of sex
00:10:01.340 and romance and coupling rather than being shamed by it. One of the raps on people who have never
00:10:05.960 had a romantic relationship is that they are not fully an adult. I'm not a romantic relationship
00:10:11.020 virgin. I dated and had a few romantic relationships when I was younger, but I'm single at heart.
00:10:15.980 Conventional romantic coupling was never going to suit me. I don't think I was ever less an adult
00:10:20.860 when I was in the game because that's when I was trying to be someone I was not. Suppose I already
00:10:25.500 knew what I know today that I never want to put a romantic partner at the center of my life, that I'm
00:10:30.060 single at heart, which means that that single life is my best, most fulfilling, most meaningful life.
00:10:34.980 If I had been a true romantic relationship virgin, if I had never dated or gotten romantically
00:10:41.040 involved because I knew that wasn't who I really was, I would look back with pride. I wouldn't be
00:10:47.320 ashamed to be a romantic relationship virgin. I'm a little ashamed that I'm not. Yeah. So
00:10:52.020 I mean, this is just unattractive people. I'm not saying you got to be like the hottest person alive,
00:10:58.560 but you got to be thin. And let me, is there a picture of this woman?
00:11:06.280 Chloe. Let's see. She's going to look exactly. Uh, Chloe, Chloe, Chloe, Chloe. I don't see her.
00:11:14.720 Chloe. Yeah. And that's the, that's the thing. Um, you got to get out of the kitchen to get in the
00:11:23.300 game. Men have a little bit of leeway with this because they can get clouded or be funny or like,
00:11:29.720 you know, call women fat and, you know, make them feel bad about, you know, there's,
00:11:34.100 there's approaches. Like we all know that guy that's super ugly, but somehow pulls hot women. 1.00
00:11:39.020 Um, yeah. So yeah. So again, overall though, this is just women rationalizing an L when men take L's, 1.00
00:11:50.400 they at least know it's an L. The challenge with women is we tell each other it's not an L 1.00
00:11:54.240 and then pretend that everything's good when it's not. But let me know what you guys think
00:11:59.200 in the comments. Make sure you like the video on your way out, subscribe to the channel and I'll see
00:12:02.660 you next time. Bye.