Abstract
In July 2014, we published our rhetorical analysis of the online discourses surrounding a young woman, Natalie Dylan, announcing an auction for her virginity through the Moonlite Bunny Ranch, a legal Nevada brothel, in Sexuality and Culture. Although Dylan did not follow through with her auction she still earned at least $125,000. Given the potential financial gain involved, is it any surprise that another virginity auction would follow? The Moonlite Bunny Ranch announced the “America’s Next Top Bunny Ranch Virgin” competition on their websites in 2015 and introduced the only contestant, Katherine Stone. For this paper, we conducted a critical rhetorical analysis of websites announcing her auction, Stone’s YouTube video explaining her motives, and online discourses that followed. Unlike Dylan, who claimed a third wave feminist perspective that emphasized her right to choose what to do with her own body as well as a right to profit from it, Stone explains, instead, her selfless motivation: she is doing it out of love for her family. Our analysis suggests the public discourses focus on her agency only insofar as she “chose” to auction off her virginity. However, these messages also focus on Stone’s motives—sacrificing for her family and providing for her own self-improvement. Taking into consideration the seemingly contradictory discourses that characterize Stone as both passive and active, self-sacrificing and ambitious, and the virgin and the whore, we suggest that the discourses surrounding her auction queer Latina heterosexuality.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
The deposit was reported in more than one source as $250,000. Typically, the brothel takes 50% of what the women who work there make. It is unclear if owner/proprietor, Dennis Hof, took his typical 50% or not.
As of late May 2017, this website, http://americasnexttopbunnyranchvirgin.com/ still appeared online. However, as of June 15, 2017, it was no longer live.
There is no standard agreement about what term to use to discuss people from what have come to the US from Latin American countries. We chose to use the term Latina/o in line with Asencio and Acosta (2010), who assert that the term Latino suggests a unifying thread based on the “social and political relationship within the US context” (p. 3). While we recognize many differences among groups of Latina/os from different countries living in a variety of contexts in the US, “these pan-ethnic categories provide us with a language and a platform from which to begin to implement social and policy changes in a way that would not be possible had we focused on a single ethnic group” (Asencio and Acosta, 2010, p. 4).
All legal brothel sex workers in Nevada are required to work as independent contractors. The idea is that as independent contractors, they are protected from exploitation as they are allowed to choose their customers, set their own prices, and decide what they will and will not do. The Moonlite Bunny Ranch has been shown, typically, to follow these laws, but that is not necessarily the case with other Nevada brothels that do not appear on television. However, as independent contractors, sex workers in Nevada are also responsible for all of their own costs of supplies, medical testing, room and board, etc. Brothels offer incentives, such as free room and board, for earnings above certain levels, but brothel owners also usually expect 50% of all gross earnings.
Articles were not consistent about whether Stone worked at the Love Ranch, Kit Kat Ranch, or Moonlite Bunny Ranch.
After we submitted this paper, a third virginity auction was announced on one of the Moonlite Bunny Ranch webpages: https://www.bunnyranch.com/blog/selling-virginity/.
References
20-Year-old lady puts her virginity up for sale: Bid now stands at $400 K. (2016, Oct. 23). 3 News. Retrieved from http://3news.com/20-yr-old-lady-puts-her-virginity-up-for-sale-bid-now-stands-at-400k/.
A woman auctioning off virginity to help family. (2016, Oct. 25). The Talk. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9HbuqP0EyQ.
America’s Next Top Bunny Ranch Virgin. (2017, May). Retrieved from http://americasnexttopbunnyranchvirgin.com/.
Arreola, S. G. (2010). Latina/o childhood sexuality. In M. Asencio (Ed.), Latina/o sexualities: Probing powers, passions, practices, and policies (pp. 48–61). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Arribas-Ayllon, M., & Walkerdine, V. (2008). Foucauldian discourse analysis. In C. Willig & W. Stainton-Rogers (Eds.), The sage handbook of qualitative research psychology (pp. 91–108). London: Sage.
Asencio, M., & Acosta, K. (2010). Introduction: Mapping Latina/o sexualities research and scholarship. In M. Asencio (Ed.), Latina/o sexualities: Probing powers, passions, practices, and policies (pp. 1–12). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Ask E. Jean: Virginity for Sale. (2009, Sept. 16). Elle. Retrieved from http://www.elle.com/life-love/ask-e-jean/q-and-a/a10456/ask-e-jean-virginity-for-sale-349311/.
Báez, J. M. (2007). Towards a Latinidad Feminista: The multiplicities of Latinidad and feminism in contemporary cinema. Popular Communication, 5(2), 109–128. https://doi.org/10.1080/15405700701294079.
Balsam, J. (2016, Oct. 21). Woman auctioning off virginity to rebuild family home. Ask Men. http://www.askmen.com/news/power_money/woman-auctioning-off-virginity-to-rebuild-family-home.html.
Beltrán, M. (2002). The Hollywoood Latina body as site of social struggle: Media constructions of stardom and Jennifer Lopez’s ‘cross-over butt”. Quarterly Review of Film and Video, 19(1), 71–86. https://doi.org/10.1080/10509200214823.
Brunati, B. (2016, Oct. 21). So a woman is auctioning off her virginity in order to pay for her family’s house repairs. Crave. Retrieved from http://www.craveonline.com/mandatory/1148183-woman-auctioning-off-virginity-order-pay-familys-house-repairs.
Buncombe, A. (2016, Oct. 24). Woman auctions virginity to highest bidder to repair family home destroyed by fire. Independent. Retrieved from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/woman-auctions-virginity-to-highest-bidder-to-repair-family-home-destroyed-by-fire-nevada-katherine-a7377811.html.
Bunny Ranch Brothel debuts $$$ One Million Dollar “America’s Next Top Virgin!” competition September 19th—Barely legal 20 year-old college co-ed is first to step up for once-in-a-lifetime virgin fame & fortune auction. (2015, Sept.). Bunny Ranch. Retrieved from http://www.bunnyranch.com/news/americas-next-top-virgin/index.html.
Bunny Ranch brothel kicks off $$$ million dollar “America’s Next Top Virgin!” competition. (2015, Sept. 14). Emm Report. Retrieved from http://emmreport.com/bunny-ranch-brothel-kicks-off-million-dollar-americas-next-top-virgin-competition/.
Cabezas, A. L., Oritz, D., & Valencia, S. (2010). Latinas, sex work, and trafficking in the United States. In M. Asencio (Ed.), Latina/o sexualities: Probing powers, passions, practices, and policies (pp. 207–216). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Cepeda, M. E. (2016). Beyond “filling the gap”: The state and status of latina/o feminist media studies. Feminist Media Studies, 16(2), 344–360. https://doi.org/10.1080/14680777.2015.1052005.
Correa, T. (2010). Framing Latinas: Hispanic women through the lenses of Spanish-language and English-language news media. Journalism, 11(4), 425–443. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884910367597.
Cox, S. (2015, Sept. 22). Feminist Current. http://www.feministcurrent.com/2015/09/22/whats-current-us-house-of-representatives-votes-to-freeze-planned-parenthood-funding/.
Diebelius, G. (2016, Oct. 23). “I am doing it because I love my family”: Woman selling virginity for £325,000 after home burns down. Mirror. Retrieved from http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/i-am-doing-because-love-9109841.
Dobre, C. (2016, Oct. 24). Nevada woman selling virginity for over $400,000. YouTube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnSjnyQA9nw.
Douglas, M. (1966/2007). Purity and Danger. New York: Routledge.
Dunn, J. (2010). HBO’s Cathouse: Problematizing representations of sex workers and sexual women. Feminist Media Studies, 10(1), 105–109.
Dunn, J. C. (2012). “It’s not just sex, it’s a profession”: Reframing prostitution through text and context. Communication Studies, 363(3), 345–363. https://doi.org/10.1080/10510974.2012.678924.
Dunn, J. C. (2016). Going to work at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch: Potentials of rhetorical and ethnographic methods for cultural studies. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies, 16(6), 525–535. https://doi.org/10.1177/1532708616655822.
Dunn, J. C., & Vik, T. A. (2014). Virginity for sale: A Foucauldian moment in the history of sexuality. Sexuality and Culture, 18(3), 487–504. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12119-013-9207-0.
Dyer, R. (1997). White. London: Routledge.
Dylan, N. (2009). Why I’m selling my virginity. The Daily Beast. Retrieved from http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2009/01/23/why-im-selling-my-virginity.
Eaton, A. A., & Rose, S. M. (2012). Scripts for actual first date and hanging-out encounters among young heterosexual Hispanic adults. Sex Roles, 67, 285–299. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-012-0190-y.
Elia, J. P. (2003). Queering relationships: Toward a paradigmatic shift. Journal of Homosexuality, 45(2–4), 61–86. https://doi.org/10.1300/J082v45n02_03.
Esparza, M., Katz, R. (Producers), & Narva, G. (Director). (1997). Selena [Motion Picture]. USA: Warner Brothers.
Estevez, M. (2016, Oct. 21). A woman is selling her virginity for over $400,000 at a Nevada brothel. Vibe. Retrieved from http://www.vibe.com/2016/10/katherine-stone-employee-at-nevada-brothel/.
Faulkner, S. L. (2003). Good girl or flirt girl: Latinas’ definitions of sex and sexual relationships. Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, 25(2), 174–200. https://doi.org/10.1177/073998630325803.
Foucault, M. (1972). The archeology of knowledge. New York: Pantheon.
Foucault, M. (1977). Language, counter-memory, practice: Selected essay and interviews (D. F. Bouchard & S. Simon, Trans.). Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Foucault, M. (1990 [1978]). The history of sexuality: An introduction, Volume I (R. Hurley, Trans.). New York: Vintage Books.
Garcia, L. (2012). Respect yourself, protect yourself: Latina girls and sexual identity. New York: New York University Press.
Gaspar de Alba, A. (2003). The Chicana/Latina dyad, or identity and perception. Latino Studies, 1(1), 106–114. https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.lst.8600002.
Gatollari, M. (2016, Oct. 24). This 20-year-old is auctioning her virginity to buy her parents a new home after theirs burned down. Distractify. http://distractify.com/sex-relationships/2016/10/24/katherine-stone.
Gill, R. (2007). Gender and the media. Malden: Polity Press.
González-López, G. (2004). Fathering Latina sexualities: Mexican men and the virginity of their daughters. Journal of Marriage and Family, 66, 1118–1130. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0022-2445.2004.00082.x.
González-López, G. (2010). Heterosexuality exposed: Some feminist sociological reflections on heterosexual sex and romance in US Latina/o communities. In M. Asencio (Ed.), Latina/o sexualities: Probing powers, passions, practices, and policies (pp. 103–116). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
González-López, G., & Vidal-Ortiz, S. (2008). Latinas and Latinos, sexuality, and society: A critical sociological perspective. In H. Rodríguez, R. Sáenz, & C. Menjívar (Eds.), Latinas/os in the United States: Changing the face of América (pp. 308–322). New York: Springer.
Gowan, M., & Treviño, M. (1998). An examination of gender differences in Mexican–American attitudes toward family and career roles. Sex Roles, 38(11/12), 1079–1093.
GrimReaperNextDoor. (2016, Oct. 23). Katherine Stone selling her virginity (current bid $400,000). YouTube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xm97oGGqTZs.
Green, S., Griffith, M., Renzi, M. (Producers), & Kusama, K. (Director). (2000). Girlfight [Motion Picture]. USA: Green/Renzi & IFC.
Gutiérrez, R. A. (2010). A history of Latina/o sexualities. In M. Asencio (Ed.), Latina/o sexualities: Probing powers, passions, practices, and policies (pp. 13–37). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Harvey-Jenner, C. (2016, Oct. 24). This 20-year-old woman is selling her virginity for more than £300,000. Cosmopolitan. Retrieved from http://www.cosmopolitan.co.uk/love-sex/news/a46813/20-year-old-woman-selling-virginity-house-burned-down/.
Hill Collins, P. (1995). Pornography and black women’s bodies. In G. Dines & J. M. Humez (Eds.), Gender, race, and class in media (pp. 279–286). Thousand Oaks: Sage.
hooks, b. (1992). black looks, race and representations. Boston: South End.
Kristeva, J. (1982). Powers of horror: An essay on abjection. New York: Columbia University Press.
Manning, J. (2015). Paradoxes of (im)purity: Affirming heteronormativity and queering heterosexuality in family discourses of purity pledges. Women’s Studies in Communication, 38(1), 99–117. https://doi.org/10.1080/07491409.2014.954687.
Manning, J., & Kunkel, A. (2014). Researching interpersonal relationships: Qualitative methods, studies, and analysis. Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Mayo, Y. Q., & Resnick, R. P. (1996). The impact of machismo on Hispanic women. Journal of Women and Social Work, 11, 257–277.
McGee, M. C. (1990). Text, context, and the fragmentation of contemporary culture. Western Journal of Speech Communication, 54, 274–289. https://doi.org/10.1080/10570319009374343.
Mene, R. (2016, Oct.). The sad reason a 20-year-old woman is auctioning off her virginity at a Nevada brothel. Independent Journal Review. Retrieved from http://ijr.com/2016/10/720738-after-her-parents-home-got-burned-in-fire-daughter-will-action-off-virginity-to-buy-a-new-house/.
Molina Guzmán, I. (2007). Salma Hayek’s Frida: Transnational Latina bodies in popular culture. In M. Mendible (Ed.), From Bananas to Buttocks: The Latina body in popular film and culture (pp. 117–128). Austin: University of Texas Press.
Moore, M. (2011, March 3). Churnalism exposed: A new website identifies press release copy in the news. Columbia Journalism Review. Retrieved from http://archives.cjr.org/the_news_frontier/churnalism_exposed.php.
Natalie Dylan.mp4. (2008, Dec. 7). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do3otUSbTpA.
Peck, J. (2016, Oct. 26). Woman auctions off virginity so her family can eat. Death and Taxes Mag. http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/307957/woman-auctions-off-virginity-so-her-family-can-eat/.
Pendleton, E. (1997). Love for sale: Queering heterosexuality. In J. Nagle (Ed.), Whores and other feminists (pp. 73–82). New York: Routledge.
Perring, R. (2016, Oct. 24). Desperate woman to auction off virginity for £325K after family home burns down. Express. http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/724363/Woman-sell-virginity-legal-brothel-money-house-burned-fire-Katherine-Stone.
Peterson, G. (1998). Social consequences of unchastity. In F. Delacoste & P. Alexander (Eds.), Sex work: Writings by women in the sex industry (2nd ed., pp. 231–246). San Francisco: Cleis Press.
Pratt, S., & Hare, B. (2016, Oct. 24). Why she put a price on her virginity: This is Life with Lisa Ling. CNN. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/20/us/legal-brothels-selling-virginity-this-is-life/index.html.
Raffaelli, M., & Ontai, L. L. (2004). Gender socialization in Latino/a families: Results from two retrospective studies. Sex Roles, 50(5/6), 287–299.
Ready? (2016). PHOTOS: Beautiful Katherine Stone auctions her virginity for over £325,000. Campus Heat. Retrieved from http://campusheathq.com/ready-photos-beautiful-katherine-stone-auctions-her-virginity-for-over-325000/.
Rodriguez, K. (2016, Oct. 25). Woman auctions virginity to raise funds for family home destroyed by fire. Breitbart. Retrieved from http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/10/25/woman-auctions-virginity-family-home-destroyed-fire/.
Romo, L. F., Nadeem, E., & Kouyoumdjian, C. (2010). Latina/o parent-adolescent communication about sexuality: An interdisciplinary literature review. In M. Asencio (Ed.), Latina/o sexualities: Probing powers, passions, practices, and policies (pp. 62–74). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Sacca, P. (2016, Oct. 21). Woman auction off her virginity ‘because I love my family.’ Brobible. Retrieved from http://brobible.com/girls/article/woman-auctioning-virginity/.
Szathmary, Z. (2016, Oct. 22). Woman, 20, is selling her virginity at legal Nevada brothel run by Dennis Hof after blaze destroyed her family’s home…and the bidding has already reached $400,000. Daily Mail. Retrieved from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3863082/In-economy-blame-Woman-20-selling-virginity-legal-Nevada-brothel-wake-blaze-destroyed-family-s-home.html.
Traynor, M. (2000). Purity, conversation and the evidence based movements. Health, 4(2), 139–158. https://doi.org/10.1177/136345930000400202.
Vidal-Ortiz, S. (2010). Religion/spirituality, US Latina/o communinities, and sexuality scholarship. In M. Asencio (Ed.), Latina/o sexualities: Probing powers, passions, practices, and policies (pp. 173–187). New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Villarruel, A. M. (1998). Cultural influences on the sexual attitudes, beliefs, and norms of young Latina adolescents. Journal for Specialists in Pediatric Nursing, 3(2), 69–79.
Wang, A. B. (2016, Oct. 25). ‘It’s my decision’: This woman is auctioning off her virginity to help her family. The Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/10/25/its-my-decision-this-woman-is-auctioning-off-her-virginity-to-help-her-family/?utm_term=.a2af9ccb1dda.
Woman selling her virginity to buy new home (2016, Oct. 26). Daily Break TV. Retrieved from 8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_m-cMtQMpCs.
Yep, G. A. (2003). The violence of heteronormativity in communication studies: Notes on injury, healing, and queer world-making. Journal of Homosexuality, 45(2–4), 11–59. https://doi.org/10.1300/J082v45n02_02.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
Both authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Ethical Approval
This article does not contain any studies with animals or human participants performed by any of the authors and therefore no IRB or informed consent procedures were necessary.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Dunn, J.C., Vik, T.A. Virginity for Sale II: Queering Latina Heterosexuality in America’s Next Top Virginity Auction. Sexuality & Culture 22, 1432–1451 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12119-018-9535-1
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12119-018-9535-1