I think I know why American women have this kind of an insecurity.

I did not get any kind of a "dirty", "inadequate", etc. message about my vagina.

My mother stressed the need to use the shower hose in the right direction when washing the perineum - from front to back and not vice versa. She explained that urine is sterile while feces is not, and that it was important not to push the germs from behind to the front and up the vagina. Checking on the web now, I see that she was almost right - urine might not be exactly sterile by the time it leaves the urethra, but it is almost sterile. And although I have not done it, I have read about rectal (using a synonym to avoid asterisks) sex - they stress the importance of hygiene. So the message that the vagina is very clean BY ITSELF and needs to be protected was basically correct.

Later, in the States, back before the campaign against antibiotic abuse started, I got antibiotics prescribed to me all the time, in cases in which they were not needed (I had a lot of sinus infections and other respiratory infections (bronchitis, ear infections - the whole nine yards) - basically back-to-back). The antibiotics would instantly give me a vaginal yeast infection. So I learned that the vagina had a fragile micro-flora that gets easily disrupted. That does not make it DIRTY. It makes it vulnerable, but not dirty

Yet later, I started buying an Italian hygiene product - a foam for washing the vulva. The advertising copy stressed the right pH balance of the product. It was great to use it, but hard to replenish my stash, so I switched to the product line from the Sweet Spot labs that is available in the US. It does not feel as good to use it because it is liquid - I prefer the foam - but it does the job beautifully. That the vagina has a specific pH that needs to be respected does not make it DIRTY.

So basically it is an organ that needs to be treated with care and without too much intervention, to avoid disrupting its micro-flora (the "good" bacteria that live there), to avoid changing its pH, and to avoid having germs enter it from the back. That kind of treatment - being careful, using gentle rather than harsh cleansers, etc. - underscores that it is a body part that requires respect.

Cf. - a commercial for Summer's Eve which still sells douches even though they are harmful at worst and a waste of time and money at best.

This is their current commercial - apparently, in the past they had a commercial with mom and daughter walking on the beach and talking about the fresh clean feeling.

So that message - that vagina is by itself dirty and needs to be cleaned by commercial products to get a fresh feeling - is not something girls and women should hear.

Since they do hear it, it is no surprise that they become self-conscious.