Self-respect is a casualty of casual sex

Why do women have smaller feet than men? So they can stand closer to the kitchen sink. What do you call a woman who has lost 95 percent of her intelligence? Divorced. Bigamy is having one wife too many, but so is monogamy.

Everyone’s heard a "woman joke" before. And because I personally enjoy humor, I tend to scoff at those who say that these kinds of statements belittle women and discourage gender equality, which women have been working on for years now and are still striving toward. While I’ll never turn down telling a joke that finds humor in the fairer sex, there really is an issue with gender equality. But it’s the women – not just the men – holding back the movement.

Imagine this scenario. You’ve been out with your friends partying and meeting new people when a guy you just met asks you back to his place for the night. You chalk it up to the "college experience" of a one-night stand and go with a person you’ve never met before and, after tonight, may never even see again.

And why shouldn’t you? You’re a smart, college-aged student who can make her own decisions. Besides, your male friends take girls home for the night, too, and it’s no big deal. The double standard is ridiculous, anyway.

But unfortunately, the infamous "double standard" – ridiculous as it may be – is a very real thing. It’s true that men can do this or that and not meet as harsh a judgement as women who do the same thing. It isn’t right, and it isn’t fair. But is having sex with a virtual stranger the best way to counteract this effect?

Waking up the next morning beside someone whose last name is a mystery to you isn’t empowerment. By having the same attitudes as more sexually willing men, women are inadvertently undervaluing themselves to their male counterparts.

So, while you may be thinking that having meaningless intimacy from time to time sets you on the same playing field as men, it doesn’t, because in reality, all you’re doing is setting yourself up to be used by the very men you attempt to emulate.

And trust me, guys interested in hooking up with you for only a night couldn’t care less that you’re just as smart, funny or talented as they are. And when he leaves after it’s over, ideas of respect and gender equality definitely aren’t going to be on his mind.

Unfortunately, having these types of relations seems to be the "cool" thing now. It’s almost a given you’ll see at least one girl in party attire making that "walk of shame" during your four years at WVU.

The media only encourages this attitude. With Ke$ha lyrics like "I eat boys up, breakfast and lunch" to the promiscuous character Samantha Jones from Sex and the City, women seem to be getting the green light to have these types of relationships.

Some may say these women are actually promoting gender equality by sleeping around "just like the guys," but in reality, having casual sex doesn’t make women equal to men; it demeans them to something played with one night and tossed away the next morning.

Now, I’m not saying every girl who has had a one-night stand does it for the misguided belief of promoting feminism. The biological need to have sex is a completely understandable urge. But, even so, sleeping around to relieve this desire doesn’t help your gender achieve equality, because most men (and a majority of other women) are going to think you’re a means to an end; you’re the hand that scratches the itch, nothing more or less than that.

So, the next time a new guy at the bar asks you to spend the night, don’t just brush it off as having a college experience or flipping the bird to the double standard. You’re only promoting the idea that women can be used for sexual gratification, not the idea that you deserve the same gratification in return.

If you keep agreeing to casual sex, you’re only setting your own gender back from the ideal, equal world women have been working toward for so long.