The harshest judgments came from strangers
December 21, 2023 1:14 AM Subscribe
Age-gap discourse, which is aimed primarily at older men dating younger women, grew out of that movement’s concern with power differentials and with coercion and consent. But it also sits at odds with Me Too’s core ethos — “Believe women” — by raising an outcry on behalf of women who, by all available public accounts, have no complaints about their relationships. Even if they say they are happy, the age-gap critics don’t believe them. from They say they’re happy. Why is it so hard to believe them? [The Cut; ungated]
The revelations of Me Too undercut that logic, showing that powerful men, protected by the institutions they dominated, could harm even the most capable and intelligent women. Age-gap discourse, which is aimed primarily at older men dating younger women, grew out of that movement’s concern with power differentials and with coercion and consent.
They have almost understood something here. Yet the intro example and one or two others are about couples who started dating when the younger person was old enough to have some power within the relationship. That’s quite different from, say, a 39-year old dating a 19-year old. They also describe this as an inconsistency within feminism, yet don’t reference any current feminists, nor seem to understand that there are different strains of feminism that disagree on some issues.
posted by eviemath at 2:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [55 favorites]
They have almost understood something here. Yet the intro example and one or two others are about couples who started dating when the younger person was old enough to have some power within the relationship. That’s quite different from, say, a 39-year old dating a 19-year old. They also describe this as an inconsistency within feminism, yet don’t reference any current feminists, nor seem to understand that there are different strains of feminism that disagree on some issues.
posted by eviemath at 2:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [55 favorites]
If you take the 25 thing seriously, why not also take seriously the decline in reasoning ability which can begin as early as age 45.
posted by Klipspringer at 3:27 AM on December 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by Klipspringer at 3:27 AM on December 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
To a certain extent, a particular couple may be an exception to the rule that huge age differences mean problematic power differentials, but we cannot know or see that from the outside. To a degree, if you do happen to be that exception, you might just have to suffer some extent of social disapproval anyway, much like the child who really wants to be down the mines or the guy who just genuinely wants to work that union job for half the wage. If we just accepted that at face value whenever someone said it, we would quickly find minimum wage abolished, and be back to child labour. We don't want to normalise eighteen year olds dating forty somethings because, even if your individual relationship is the one in a million that is unproblematic, the broader thing is bad for society as a whole.
posted by Dysk at 3:35 AM on December 21, 2023 [56 favorites]
posted by Dysk at 3:35 AM on December 21, 2023 [56 favorites]
I think the thing that they really almost get to, but never quite do, is that someone can both be a predator and also be in a relationship with someone who is consciously making the choice to be there.
I’m of the age where a lot of my male friends in their 40s are confronting this choice - either to try to date women in their 20s, or to date women their own age. The responsible ones often split the difference and go 30s. But they’re often really honest - they want biological children, or often, they want new biological children, in relationships they think they aren’t going to fuck up this time. They want another chance, or a first chance. And for the sketchier ones, they have too much problematic baggage for women their own age. As one particularly clear eyed one said once, “Women our own age call us on our shit.” And for the ones who are looking for casual relationships, they don’t want to be called on their shit. It’s not worth it to them - they’re serial monogamists and plan to move on in a couple of years anyway.
But I see the damage, the human wreckage, these guys leave behind them. The women they promise to marry and then don’t - women who are young enough not to be *naive* but rather simply not to have a peer group which has had these things happen to them. Or worse, women who have taken their advice about life which turns out to be self serving. Women whose student loans they’ve run through. Women who have bought houses thinking they would pay for half of them.
posted by corb at 3:37 AM on December 21, 2023 [69 favorites]
I’m of the age where a lot of my male friends in their 40s are confronting this choice - either to try to date women in their 20s, or to date women their own age. The responsible ones often split the difference and go 30s. But they’re often really honest - they want biological children, or often, they want new biological children, in relationships they think they aren’t going to fuck up this time. They want another chance, or a first chance. And for the sketchier ones, they have too much problematic baggage for women their own age. As one particularly clear eyed one said once, “Women our own age call us on our shit.” And for the ones who are looking for casual relationships, they don’t want to be called on their shit. It’s not worth it to them - they’re serial monogamists and plan to move on in a couple of years anyway.
But I see the damage, the human wreckage, these guys leave behind them. The women they promise to marry and then don’t - women who are young enough not to be *naive* but rather simply not to have a peer group which has had these things happen to them. Or worse, women who have taken their advice about life which turns out to be self serving. Women whose student loans they’ve run through. Women who have bought houses thinking they would pay for half of them.
posted by corb at 3:37 AM on December 21, 2023 [69 favorites]
I think the thing that they really almost get to, but never quite do, is that someone can both be a predator and also be in a relationship with someone who is consciously making the choice to be there.
Yes.
Is this article what the kids nowadays call 'cringe?' Cause I found myself cringing at all of the apologies and apologizing.
posted by From Bklyn at 3:53 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
Yes.
Is this article what the kids nowadays call 'cringe?' Cause I found myself cringing at all of the apologies and apologizing.
posted by From Bklyn at 3:53 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
All I know is, the grossest dude I used to know dated younger women in part because he wanted partners who didn’t have enough lived experience to be able to recognize toxic masculinity when it was being inflicted upon them, and because he wanted to make other gross dudes jealous.
posted by The Card Cheat at 4:29 AM on December 21, 2023 [28 favorites]
posted by The Card Cheat at 4:29 AM on December 21, 2023 [28 favorites]
The existence of any particular successful relationship doesn’t change the fact that this is part of a poisonous pattern. I see this used in academia as an argument against policies barring professors from dating students. “Well, I started dating my husband when he was my PhD supervisor, are you saying our marriage shouldn’t exist?” Well, I guess if you’re stipulating it could have happened no other way, I guess I am.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 4:49 AM on December 21, 2023 [34 favorites]
posted by Horace Rumpole at 4:49 AM on December 21, 2023 [34 favorites]
I started reading but the article kept focusing on appearance and how attractive the people in the first anecdote were and it kind of squicked me out.
posted by an octopus IRL at 4:51 AM on December 21, 2023 [12 favorites]
posted by an octopus IRL at 4:51 AM on December 21, 2023 [12 favorites]
Good article, chavenet, thanks for posting.
When Florence Pugh was 24, she got so much pushback for her relationship with her then-boyfriend, Zach Braff, 45, that she addressed the criticism in multiple interviews and on Instagram. “I’m old enough to be an adult and pay taxes, but I’m not old enough to know who I should and should not have sex with,” she said.
Yup. Standard internet commentary on age-gap relationships is invariably infantilizing, shrill, hectoring, or shrilly hectoring while it infantilizes. It may come from good intention, but it's telling adults that they aren't mature enough to know their own minds (with a side order of "your mind isn't fully formed yet"). I've known plenty of women who got into age-gap relationships, and they've all had a range of experiences... but every single one of them would by irritated at being told their choices or their experience of life was "cringe."
posted by cupcakeninja at 5:05 AM on December 21, 2023 [32 favorites]
When Florence Pugh was 24, she got so much pushback for her relationship with her then-boyfriend, Zach Braff, 45, that she addressed the criticism in multiple interviews and on Instagram. “I’m old enough to be an adult and pay taxes, but I’m not old enough to know who I should and should not have sex with,” she said.
Yup. Standard internet commentary on age-gap relationships is invariably infantilizing, shrill, hectoring, or shrilly hectoring while it infantilizes. It may come from good intention, but it's telling adults that they aren't mature enough to know their own minds (with a side order of "your mind isn't fully formed yet"). I've known plenty of women who got into age-gap relationships, and they've all had a range of experiences... but every single one of them would by irritated at being told their choices or their experience of life was "cringe."
posted by cupcakeninja at 5:05 AM on December 21, 2023 [32 favorites]
In my experience, the junior partners in these relationships are just like those of us in non-age-gap couples: usually "happy" until the very end of the relationship. Then, once they're finished processing the breakup/dating someone else (usually much closer to their own age), they admit to themselves (and then their friends) that a lot of the issues inherent to their May/December thing actually super sucked, and would have precluded long-term happiness or at least have made it contingent on the younger person settling for a very...specific dynamic.
What my (mostly hetero female) friends and I noticed most with older cis male partners: wide disparity in sex drives/stamina (starting when the dudes in question were as young as 40) and energy levels; the senior partner's far lower tolerance for irritation or interruption to established routines; the feeling that the older person had already "been there, done that" and that experiences that were new and meaningful for the younger partner, and that they wanted to share, just weren't ever going to have the same resonance for the other person.
Like most major experiences, the meaning and impact of a romantic relationship in one's life can usually only be assessed in hindsight, by which time it's already too late to prevent any damage that may have occurred. Internet purity culture is weird and deeply irritating, but I don't think it's exactly an L for feminism that Gen Z has noticed the facts on the ground--that these relationships tend to be bad experiences for at least 80% of junior partners--and are interpreting things through that lens.
posted by blessmycottonsocks at 5:06 AM on December 21, 2023 [49 favorites]
What my (mostly hetero female) friends and I noticed most with older cis male partners: wide disparity in sex drives/stamina (starting when the dudes in question were as young as 40) and energy levels; the senior partner's far lower tolerance for irritation or interruption to established routines; the feeling that the older person had already "been there, done that" and that experiences that were new and meaningful for the younger partner, and that they wanted to share, just weren't ever going to have the same resonance for the other person.
Like most major experiences, the meaning and impact of a romantic relationship in one's life can usually only be assessed in hindsight, by which time it's already too late to prevent any damage that may have occurred. Internet purity culture is weird and deeply irritating, but I don't think it's exactly an L for feminism that Gen Z has noticed the facts on the ground--that these relationships tend to be bad experiences for at least 80% of junior partners--and are interpreting things through that lens.
posted by blessmycottonsocks at 5:06 AM on December 21, 2023 [49 favorites]
I was in a May-Dec relationship when I was 19 and would have asserted that it was my choice. It was, but my understanding of my choices or what maturity or compatibility were was unformed. Compared to the young men around me, my 36 yo partner was super amazing. And frankly, I still think on him fondly in most ways and he helped me at a terrible time in my life. But what I needed, in retrospect, was family like him, not a romance like ours.
As a 46 yo I took on supervising a staff of largely 17-24. Year olds and 40+ year old me is horrified that 36 yo him was attracted to me. When you’re having to evaluate young staff’s decision-making skills, what they need in training, how little they really know about, for example, overtime or workplace exploitation (this is getting better only because it’s on social media), how they handle mistakes, etc., you can clearly see that there’s a process of growing into adulthood that goes on. As a cranky GenXer I would like to think we were more mature because we had different responsibilities earlier, we probably weren’t. And my feelings about those young people are anything but romantic. They can be intense — I was the first call one of them made from the hospital where her dad had just unexpectedly died — and meaningful on both ends. But like…there is a cringe there, feelings wise.
So some of the censure is not about feminism or choice or trends.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:19 AM on December 21, 2023 [64 favorites]
As a 46 yo I took on supervising a staff of largely 17-24. Year olds and 40+ year old me is horrified that 36 yo him was attracted to me. When you’re having to evaluate young staff’s decision-making skills, what they need in training, how little they really know about, for example, overtime or workplace exploitation (this is getting better only because it’s on social media), how they handle mistakes, etc., you can clearly see that there’s a process of growing into adulthood that goes on. As a cranky GenXer I would like to think we were more mature because we had different responsibilities earlier, we probably weren’t. And my feelings about those young people are anything but romantic. They can be intense — I was the first call one of them made from the hospital where her dad had just unexpectedly died — and meaningful on both ends. But like…there is a cringe there, feelings wise.
So some of the censure is not about feminism or choice or trends.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:19 AM on December 21, 2023 [64 favorites]
YMMV.
Speaking for myself, and only myself, I was in a wildly uneven May/December relationship for nearly six years and it kinda messed me up for the rest of my 20s. I met them when I was 23 and they were 39. (Alcohol was initially involved, as it was so much of my very very sodden 20s.) They loved the novelty of having a super young girlfriend--they had been married previously--and I remember how often I was told I was adorable and cute because I had no lines on my face and was young and eager. For my part, I liked having a boyfriend who felt mature and worldly. Look at me, talking about real stuff with the grown-ups! Ugh, guys my age could never. But in the end, it really was a massive power imbalance. He had money to do fun long trips with friends (I was never invited), I had my gang of twentysomething friends all ready to make dumb mistakes together. He started to get irritated that I was clingy and that I told him I didn't want kids. It was a painful painful time. In fact, he was the only boyfriend I had in my 20s. I dated and slept with age appropriate people, sure, but none of them ever became relationships.
In hindsight, do I regret the relationship? Not really. Life's too short for that. He ended up having a kid and that changed his life completely. (He didn't marry the kid's mom.) But I wish I had seen that my abandonment Daddy issues really coloured a lot of that choice.
posted by Kitteh at 5:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [16 favorites]
Speaking for myself, and only myself, I was in a wildly uneven May/December relationship for nearly six years and it kinda messed me up for the rest of my 20s. I met them when I was 23 and they were 39. (Alcohol was initially involved, as it was so much of my very very sodden 20s.) They loved the novelty of having a super young girlfriend--they had been married previously--and I remember how often I was told I was adorable and cute because I had no lines on my face and was young and eager. For my part, I liked having a boyfriend who felt mature and worldly. Look at me, talking about real stuff with the grown-ups! Ugh, guys my age could never. But in the end, it really was a massive power imbalance. He had money to do fun long trips with friends (I was never invited), I had my gang of twentysomething friends all ready to make dumb mistakes together. He started to get irritated that I was clingy and that I told him I didn't want kids. It was a painful painful time. In fact, he was the only boyfriend I had in my 20s. I dated and slept with age appropriate people, sure, but none of them ever became relationships.
In hindsight, do I regret the relationship? Not really. Life's too short for that. He ended up having a kid and that changed his life completely. (He didn't marry the kid's mom.) But I wish I had seen that my abandonment Daddy issues really coloured a lot of that choice.
posted by Kitteh at 5:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [16 favorites]
People always talk about age gap discourse as if there were armies of empowered feminists out there ripping the nineteen year olds from their older partners' arms, instead of a society which totally, absolutely, 100% normalizes the idea that young women are prey/commodity/trophy and that a man dating an age peer is a weirdo. Virtually every time you look up a male intellectual or celebrity on wikipedia, you note that he married an age peer when young then ditched her when she was forty to fifty and now has a partner between fifteen and twenty-five years young than himself. If all that was at issue in the divorce was the marriage itself, what was wrong with all the other women roughly his own age?
The problem with age gap relationships between older men and younger women is not a number, or that every single couple is miserable, etc, it's that the structure of society is such that women are dehumanized and treated as commodities - valuable when young, discards when old. If society were not structured this way, we would not see the skewed "the man must be same age or older" stuff all the time; we'd see a much more even distribution, especially as people age.
It's funny - I was just thinking about this the other day. As a young person, back when I was miserably living as a woman, I dated someone older. And of course I hung around in social circles where older guys with women my age was the norm, whether that was twenty five year olds with nineteen year olds or thirty year olds with twenty three year olds or whatever. And those social circles were so full of bullshit! And so devaluing to women! I think about how actually I wasn't treated especially badly and yet how awful that milieu was, and I think about how when I was in my mid-twenties, nineteen year olds looked like toddlers and wondered what the fuck all those men had been thinking. Awful stuff. When I see guys acting like that now I laugh, sometimes directly at them, but wow it's unpleasant.
A side note now that I'm well into middle age myself - why is it that we accept as a norm that a women will date a guy twenty years her senior and nurse him through his final decline in health, but we don't expect anyone to nurse women through their final declines? Let's say you marry a guy who is twenty years older than you - you're sixty five and still relatively strong when he's eighty-five and declining...and then when you are eighty-five and declining, who helps you? I recognize that marriage isn't just about who cares for who, but women get so little care in this society and we are so happy to let aging women sicken and die on their own that it's difficult not to see this old guy/younger women thing as one more way to guarantee that men are cared for to the grave while women are left to flail.
posted by Frowner at 5:44 AM on December 21, 2023 [112 favorites]
The problem with age gap relationships between older men and younger women is not a number, or that every single couple is miserable, etc, it's that the structure of society is such that women are dehumanized and treated as commodities - valuable when young, discards when old. If society were not structured this way, we would not see the skewed "the man must be same age or older" stuff all the time; we'd see a much more even distribution, especially as people age.
It's funny - I was just thinking about this the other day. As a young person, back when I was miserably living as a woman, I dated someone older. And of course I hung around in social circles where older guys with women my age was the norm, whether that was twenty five year olds with nineteen year olds or thirty year olds with twenty three year olds or whatever. And those social circles were so full of bullshit! And so devaluing to women! I think about how actually I wasn't treated especially badly and yet how awful that milieu was, and I think about how when I was in my mid-twenties, nineteen year olds looked like toddlers and wondered what the fuck all those men had been thinking. Awful stuff. When I see guys acting like that now I laugh, sometimes directly at them, but wow it's unpleasant.
A side note now that I'm well into middle age myself - why is it that we accept as a norm that a women will date a guy twenty years her senior and nurse him through his final decline in health, but we don't expect anyone to nurse women through their final declines? Let's say you marry a guy who is twenty years older than you - you're sixty five and still relatively strong when he's eighty-five and declining...and then when you are eighty-five and declining, who helps you? I recognize that marriage isn't just about who cares for who, but women get so little care in this society and we are so happy to let aging women sicken and die on their own that it's difficult not to see this old guy/younger women thing as one more way to guarantee that men are cared for to the grave while women are left to flail.
posted by Frowner at 5:44 AM on December 21, 2023 [112 favorites]
I’m sure if a journalist asked most people in objectively toxic relationships they would say they are happy.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:51 AM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 5:51 AM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
But they’re often really honest - they want biological children, or often, they want new biological children, in relationships they think they aren’t going to fuck up this time.
That is, they often want biological children at the expense of their existing children - they don't have the cash to support Kids Mark 1 sufficiently or the time to make them really feel parented, but they want a few more kids with a younger women in a new family who will get lots of good time with Emotionally Mature Dad (or at least he believes they will). I really hate to see how things go when Family One is openly deprioritized by Emotionally Mature Dad in favor of his trad wife and new baby.
Another piece here - how we expect women to be mature decision-makers and carers the minute they are old enough to give birth, but accept that men are just going to be emotionally lazy idiots until about forty-five, when they are entitled to a new wife and new children. Like, the bare minimum should be that if you are going to be sowing your wild oats until you've lost your all your hair, you should put off having kids.
posted by Frowner at 5:52 AM on December 21, 2023 [45 favorites]
That is, they often want biological children at the expense of their existing children - they don't have the cash to support Kids Mark 1 sufficiently or the time to make them really feel parented, but they want a few more kids with a younger women in a new family who will get lots of good time with Emotionally Mature Dad (or at least he believes they will). I really hate to see how things go when Family One is openly deprioritized by Emotionally Mature Dad in favor of his trad wife and new baby.
Another piece here - how we expect women to be mature decision-makers and carers the minute they are old enough to give birth, but accept that men are just going to be emotionally lazy idiots until about forty-five, when they are entitled to a new wife and new children. Like, the bare minimum should be that if you are going to be sowing your wild oats until you've lost your all your hair, you should put off having kids.
posted by Frowner at 5:52 AM on December 21, 2023 [45 favorites]
Pretty telling that the author of this piece uses a Woody Allen movie from the 70s to show that there used to be "little controversy" about age-gaps. Then totally fails to mention Allen later marrying his wife's adopted daughter, a 35 year age gap!
posted by being_quiet at 6:00 AM on December 21, 2023 [39 favorites]
posted by being_quiet at 6:00 AM on December 21, 2023 [39 favorites]
Men generally die younger than women, which is why they're not around to do caretaking even if it's an age-balanced relationship. It's not a conspiracy on their part.
posted by kingdead at 6:10 AM on December 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by kingdead at 6:10 AM on December 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I wonder if the problem here is that the evidence of a May-December relationship is observable and quantifiable: you can literally see that one person is older, you can check IDs and get evidence of it. Nobody bats an eyelash if you have two thirty-year-olds, one a struggling artist or entrepreneur, one a stockbroker who makes seven figures, and tut tuts over which one has the power in the relationship; they probably congratulate the artist for finding someone to fund their passion, and few assume the stockbroker uses money or stability as leverage to control the artist. The dynamic isn't age, it's that there's assumptions made based on where the person is in life.
One on my 'facts of life', which becomes clearer as I get older, is that adults are just teenagers in old people costumes. So-called adults frequently make the same immature, stupid, selfish, silly, lazy actions you'd expect from a 13 year old. Some people have better costumes which hide the teenager, others don't bother to hide it. This isn't to excuse an older person dating a younger person because 'they're the same' or anything -- but it's to say that assumptions that the older person is somehow more mature, or not on the same level, as the younger person are very general assumptions. I could easily point out how most of the older people in the article are artists of some sort -- they are filmmakers, photographers, 'work in the music industry' -- and make assumptions about immaturity or financial insecurity based on their careers.
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:17 AM on December 21, 2023 [23 favorites]
One on my 'facts of life', which becomes clearer as I get older, is that adults are just teenagers in old people costumes. So-called adults frequently make the same immature, stupid, selfish, silly, lazy actions you'd expect from a 13 year old. Some people have better costumes which hide the teenager, others don't bother to hide it. This isn't to excuse an older person dating a younger person because 'they're the same' or anything -- but it's to say that assumptions that the older person is somehow more mature, or not on the same level, as the younger person are very general assumptions. I could easily point out how most of the older people in the article are artists of some sort -- they are filmmakers, photographers, 'work in the music industry' -- and make assumptions about immaturity or financial insecurity based on their careers.
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:17 AM on December 21, 2023 [23 favorites]
ctrl-f campsite rule.
posted by j_curiouser at 6:27 AM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by j_curiouser at 6:27 AM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
I'm getting divorced right now from an age gap relationship, where I'm the older partner. The gap is almost 7 years, and we met when he was 20, which is retrospect seems pretty gross. He had been living independently since he was 16, so he presented as older, but even so. We got married when he was 23 and I was 29. We're not divorcing for reasons related to the age gap, though it hasn't helped. I didn't have much of what anybody would recognize as power in society, and I tend to defer to him on a lot of issues (especially after I helped put him through law school), and I think any power differential which was there at the beginning has definitely smoothed out over time, because patriarchy.
We've been together for 22 years, and I can simultaneously honestly say we were really happy, and also we shouldn't have ever gotten married to begin with. Even without much of a power differential, the age gap itself causes all sorts of issues (different expectations on when to have children was a big one for us).
I wouldn't give up the time we've had together, but we objectively would have been better off with more age-appropriate partners.
posted by joannemerriam at 6:31 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
We've been together for 22 years, and I can simultaneously honestly say we were really happy, and also we shouldn't have ever gotten married to begin with. Even without much of a power differential, the age gap itself causes all sorts of issues (different expectations on when to have children was a big one for us).
I wouldn't give up the time we've had together, but we objectively would have been better off with more age-appropriate partners.
posted by joannemerriam at 6:31 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
This thread is fairly hetero focused.
A conversation I've had a few times: many queer people in previous generations had their first relationship with someone "inappropriately" older, because it was hard to find people and older gays were often safer to approach than people your own age.
posted by constraint at 6:34 AM on December 21, 2023 [49 favorites]
A conversation I've had a few times: many queer people in previous generations had their first relationship with someone "inappropriately" older, because it was hard to find people and older gays were often safer to approach than people your own age.
posted by constraint at 6:34 AM on December 21, 2023 [49 favorites]
One on my 'facts of life', which becomes clearer as I get older, is that adults are just teenagers in old people costumes.I think that a lot of adults, myself often included, feel like teenagers in old people costumes, but that's a feeling, not the truth. And that becomes really clear when we actually interact with teenagers.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:38 AM on December 21, 2023 [64 favorites]
That age gaps in queer relationships is driven partly by homophobia is pretty telling.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:45 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:45 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
That age gaps in queer relationships is driven partly by homophobia is pretty telling.
What? No. Just... no.
Noping out of this thread now.
posted by rhymedirective at 6:48 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
What? No. Just... no.
Noping out of this thread now.
posted by rhymedirective at 6:48 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Hetero age gap relationships are partly driven by our society’s fetishization of youthful women and manic pixie dream girls and general gender imbalances, these relationships would be way less frequent in a healthier society.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:53 AM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:53 AM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
but that's a feeling, not the truth.
That's where the 'costume' part comes in, and I'm not talking about how I feel about myself, I'm talking about observing other adults: seeing adults, from age 30 to 80, smash things because it's fun, or lack any sort of coping skill when stressed, or show you something they made that they're proud of and then get absolutely crushed when they don't get the reaction they expected, or throw a temper tantrum because they couldn't buy the thing they wanted at the store, or get pouty and indignant when told for the 10th time they can't vape in the workplace...these are the 'natural' human responses, they never go away, we have to learn how to do the socially-acceptable mature response, that's the costume.
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:59 AM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
That's where the 'costume' part comes in, and I'm not talking about how I feel about myself, I'm talking about observing other adults: seeing adults, from age 30 to 80, smash things because it's fun, or lack any sort of coping skill when stressed, or show you something they made that they're proud of and then get absolutely crushed when they don't get the reaction they expected, or throw a temper tantrum because they couldn't buy the thing they wanted at the store, or get pouty and indignant when told for the 10th time they can't vape in the workplace...these are the 'natural' human responses, they never go away, we have to learn how to do the socially-acceptable mature response, that's the costume.
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:59 AM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
ctrl-f campsite rule.
If you do that with the article open, you'll see Dan Savage discussing that directly.
This thread is fairly hetero focused.
It is. In fairness, the vast majority of examples in the article (photos and text) are of heterosexual couples. But anecdotally, just from people I've known, the dynamics of age gaps seem different in the gay relationships I've been close enough to to be able observe.
Virtually every time you look up a male intellectual or celebrity on wikipedia, you note that he married an age peer when young then ditched her when she was forty to fifty and now has a partner between fifteen and twenty-five years young than himself.
Back when I was in grad school, one of the really obvious things was how many older male professors had done this -- divorced their wives about when their kids were in high school or entering college, and then remarry a much younger woman (often a current or former grad student). The funny thing (in that not very funny kind of way) was how often the new wife looked just like the old wife did at that age -- they wanted a carbon copy, just younger and more pliable.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:01 AM on December 21, 2023 [20 favorites]
If you do that with the article open, you'll see Dan Savage discussing that directly.
This thread is fairly hetero focused.
It is. In fairness, the vast majority of examples in the article (photos and text) are of heterosexual couples. But anecdotally, just from people I've known, the dynamics of age gaps seem different in the gay relationships I've been close enough to to be able observe.
Virtually every time you look up a male intellectual or celebrity on wikipedia, you note that he married an age peer when young then ditched her when she was forty to fifty and now has a partner between fifteen and twenty-five years young than himself.
Back when I was in grad school, one of the really obvious things was how many older male professors had done this -- divorced their wives about when their kids were in high school or entering college, and then remarry a much younger woman (often a current or former grad student). The funny thing (in that not very funny kind of way) was how often the new wife looked just like the old wife did at that age -- they wanted a carbon copy, just younger and more pliable.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:01 AM on December 21, 2023 [20 favorites]
That age gaps in queer relationships is driven partly by homophobia is pretty telling.
I guess I'd say that everything in relationships except the impulse to have them is driven by....society. There's no neutral, "natural" relationship state that we can access somehow. Society is misogynist and predatory toward vulnerable people and that's something we can't escape in any relationship just as we can't just decide that we alone are not affected by structural bigotry. At the same time, queer relationships are driven by different forces than straight ones and by more than just homophobia. I mean, you sure do see predatory age-inequality relationships among queer people, but they tend to take a different shape and be less normalized.
(Full disclosure here - all my relationships but one have been with age peers; I have purposefully not pursued people younger than me as I've aged even when they seemed at least somewhat interested.)
~~
As a side note, I really think that as I've aged I've changed, not just learned to pretend better. Like, I have genuinely learned to feel healthier about criticism and hearing no, I've genuinely learned that criticism isn't generally a referendum on my very being, I've genuinely learned that feeling disappointed in the moment will often pass and therefore it's a mistake to obsess about it, etc. I don't think this is just learning to pretend that I don't feel these things; I think I really feel differently, because when I was younger I was so much more miserable about that stuff. I think people do change.
posted by Frowner at 7:02 AM on December 21, 2023 [26 favorites]
I guess I'd say that everything in relationships except the impulse to have them is driven by....society. There's no neutral, "natural" relationship state that we can access somehow. Society is misogynist and predatory toward vulnerable people and that's something we can't escape in any relationship just as we can't just decide that we alone are not affected by structural bigotry. At the same time, queer relationships are driven by different forces than straight ones and by more than just homophobia. I mean, you sure do see predatory age-inequality relationships among queer people, but they tend to take a different shape and be less normalized.
(Full disclosure here - all my relationships but one have been with age peers; I have purposefully not pursued people younger than me as I've aged even when they seemed at least somewhat interested.)
~~
As a side note, I really think that as I've aged I've changed, not just learned to pretend better. Like, I have genuinely learned to feel healthier about criticism and hearing no, I've genuinely learned that criticism isn't generally a referendum on my very being, I've genuinely learned that feeling disappointed in the moment will often pass and therefore it's a mistake to obsess about it, etc. I don't think this is just learning to pretend that I don't feel these things; I think I really feel differently, because when I was younger I was so much more miserable about that stuff. I think people do change.
posted by Frowner at 7:02 AM on December 21, 2023 [26 favorites]
Back in the day, maybe, but you have a machine in the palm of your hand that can get you hooked up with people your own age if that's what you're into. If you're still going older/younger, that's your desire and not some thing where there's one gay in the village and it happens to be the Scoutmaster.
Also, SOME young women want older men because they're established, some of them are more emotionally mature, and older guys can be hot. It's not like it's always an arranged marriage situation where the desire is all on one side. Does it end badly? Is part of it fetishization? Yes, but what isn't?
posted by kingdead at 7:03 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Also, SOME young women want older men because they're established, some of them are more emotionally mature, and older guys can be hot. It's not like it's always an arranged marriage situation where the desire is all on one side. Does it end badly? Is part of it fetishization? Yes, but what isn't?
posted by kingdead at 7:03 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I’m reminded of when Thurston Moore left Kim Gordon for a much younger woman. Like was there anything wrong with what he did? Not really, if he’s not happy, he should do stuff to make him happy. The point is that OF COURSE he left her for a younger woman, and OF COURSE it wasn’t the other way around, and if it happened to Kim Gordon, it could happen to literally anyone.
We all know there exists relationships between a younger man and an older woman, but the fact that they are a lot rarer, not nearly as predictable, and not ensconced in a culture where old women prey on young men are all really relevant facts!
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 7:08 AM on December 21, 2023 [15 favorites]
We all know there exists relationships between a younger man and an older woman, but the fact that they are a lot rarer, not nearly as predictable, and not ensconced in a culture where old women prey on young men are all really relevant facts!
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 7:08 AM on December 21, 2023 [15 favorites]
I'm 7 years older than my (male) husband, I think we are happy. We just had our first kid. I do worry about what will happen when we're both even older though. I'll be in my fifties when the kid graduates high school.
posted by subdee at 7:15 AM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by subdee at 7:15 AM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
Nobody bats an eyelash if you have two thirty-year-olds, one a struggling artist or entrepreneur, one a stockbroker who makes seven figures, and tut tuts over which one has the power in the relationship;
Oh yes, we absolutely fucking do, and the lower earner inevitably gets fucked over in the breakup in these relationships, too, just like she gets eventually fucked over when she's the younger woman. Not always, but often enough that it's never a surprise.
posted by knucklebones at 7:39 AM on December 21, 2023 [14 favorites]
Oh yes, we absolutely fucking do, and the lower earner inevitably gets fucked over in the breakup in these relationships, too, just like she gets eventually fucked over when she's the younger woman. Not always, but often enough that it's never a surprise.
posted by knucklebones at 7:39 AM on December 21, 2023 [14 favorites]
Such a different world, from the 70s. When I was a teen, I was out at 13. I learned how to meet gay adults. I was very aware of the possibility of someone trying to manipulate me, so had barriers. When I was 16, I got involved with a mature gentleman. He was actually out to help. I was homeless when we met.
He ended up being the most important influence on my life. I had no idea at the time, what was happening. But it resulted in me having a circle of friends that were mostly grad students at Columbia. We lived in the neighborhood.
HUGE advantage, for a midwestern gay boy, whose father couldn't handle a gay son.
posted by Goofyy at 7:40 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
He ended up being the most important influence on my life. I had no idea at the time, what was happening. But it resulted in me having a circle of friends that were mostly grad students at Columbia. We lived in the neighborhood.
HUGE advantage, for a midwestern gay boy, whose father couldn't handle a gay son.
posted by Goofyy at 7:40 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
This article has a lot of instances of "an anonymous person on the internet said":
> In a post on X with nearly 5 million views, a self-described feminist made the case...
> In one viral TikTok...
> ...one widely discussed tweet contended.
"SOMEONE NEEDED A QUOTE FOR THE PAPER SO I TOLD THEM ALL MEN WERE RAPISTS. SSSS...."
You can write an article about sensitive topics like, say, the tragedy of men who are falsely accused of rape by women. But you need to be real damn careful you aren't venturing into the well-tread territory of misogyny.
This article does not exercise that level of care.
posted by AlSweigart at 8:06 AM on December 21, 2023 [12 favorites]
> In a post on X with nearly 5 million views, a self-described feminist made the case...
> In one viral TikTok...
> ...one widely discussed tweet contended.
"SOMEONE NEEDED A QUOTE FOR THE PAPER SO I TOLD THEM ALL MEN WERE RAPISTS. SSSS...."
You can write an article about sensitive topics like, say, the tragedy of men who are falsely accused of rape by women. But you need to be real damn careful you aren't venturing into the well-tread territory of misogyny.
This article does not exercise that level of care.
posted by AlSweigart at 8:06 AM on December 21, 2023 [12 favorites]
Warning: wall of text ahead. TL;DR the challenges of age gap relationships are real and affect both parties, but love will find a way.
Mr. Carmicha and I met when I was in my early 30s and he was in his mid 50s. At the time we were in adjacent professions and he was famous, in that world, while I was up and coming. We started collaborating and after a few years we began seeing each other after his wife passed away. I was greatly relieved to be with someone who wasn’t pressuring me to have kids, which was the dealbreaker that had already sank a marriage for me. What saved me from the power imbalance stemming from disparities in age, wealth and prominence (and my own deferential nature) was the years we spent partnering on consulting engagements, because I have some specialized expertise he lacks and which the clients value. I would advocate for that perspective and he would defer to me. The collaboration set up a dynamic of mutual respect, consultation and consideration that served us well in our personal relationship. It was also helpful as he started stepping away from the profession while my star was still ascending. He cheered me on and never pushed me to retire before I was ready. He definitely gave up a lot of classic early retirement activities because I wasn’t ready to quit.
Over the years, the looming implications of our age gap have been like a mountain you see in the distance while driving; sometimes you don’t see it at all, but sometimes it surprises you that it’s suddenly closer. And now I am in my early 60s and he, while an athletic and intellectually curious person, is starting to show some decline in his mid-80s. He still loves downhill skiing and goes hard, usually getting in 50-ish days per year. But he also gets seriously injured about every other year, probably because he still skis only the most difficult terrain, which hasn’t been great; I have negotiated some concessions from him, like no more going out of bounds, and he agrees that the next time we’re getting a home health aide to help manage his recovery if it’s complex.
I’m emerging from a period where I was developing some resentment about the coming burden of his old age, and questioned whether I made a terrible mistake marrying him ~25 years ago, but we are able to talk about it. I have taken on all of the administrative responsibilities in our life together as well as most physical and maintenance tasks, except the garden where we now have landscapers to help. “Well, I guess I need to take on X now,” been a refrain in my head that comes up more frequently now. I’ve started making big trips without him and he never, ever objects except to say that he will/did miss me.
His daughter, who has become a good friend and is about fifteen years younger than me, and I compare notes often and check each others’ perceptions. Regarding my actuarially-predicted eventual widowhood, in a recent family meeting about inter-generational matters she reassured me, saying, “You take care of him and I’ll take care of you.” I believe her, but I’ve also taken steps to mitigate that burden and/or ensure I’m ok if that doesn’t happen and I need help.
I love him dearly, and all in all it’s been a good trip.
posted by carmicha at 8:25 AM on December 21, 2023 [61 favorites]
Mr. Carmicha and I met when I was in my early 30s and he was in his mid 50s. At the time we were in adjacent professions and he was famous, in that world, while I was up and coming. We started collaborating and after a few years we began seeing each other after his wife passed away. I was greatly relieved to be with someone who wasn’t pressuring me to have kids, which was the dealbreaker that had already sank a marriage for me. What saved me from the power imbalance stemming from disparities in age, wealth and prominence (and my own deferential nature) was the years we spent partnering on consulting engagements, because I have some specialized expertise he lacks and which the clients value. I would advocate for that perspective and he would defer to me. The collaboration set up a dynamic of mutual respect, consultation and consideration that served us well in our personal relationship. It was also helpful as he started stepping away from the profession while my star was still ascending. He cheered me on and never pushed me to retire before I was ready. He definitely gave up a lot of classic early retirement activities because I wasn’t ready to quit.
Over the years, the looming implications of our age gap have been like a mountain you see in the distance while driving; sometimes you don’t see it at all, but sometimes it surprises you that it’s suddenly closer. And now I am in my early 60s and he, while an athletic and intellectually curious person, is starting to show some decline in his mid-80s. He still loves downhill skiing and goes hard, usually getting in 50-ish days per year. But he also gets seriously injured about every other year, probably because he still skis only the most difficult terrain, which hasn’t been great; I have negotiated some concessions from him, like no more going out of bounds, and he agrees that the next time we’re getting a home health aide to help manage his recovery if it’s complex.
I’m emerging from a period where I was developing some resentment about the coming burden of his old age, and questioned whether I made a terrible mistake marrying him ~25 years ago, but we are able to talk about it. I have taken on all of the administrative responsibilities in our life together as well as most physical and maintenance tasks, except the garden where we now have landscapers to help. “Well, I guess I need to take on X now,” been a refrain in my head that comes up more frequently now. I’ve started making big trips without him and he never, ever objects except to say that he will/did miss me.
His daughter, who has become a good friend and is about fifteen years younger than me, and I compare notes often and check each others’ perceptions. Regarding my actuarially-predicted eventual widowhood, in a recent family meeting about inter-generational matters she reassured me, saying, “You take care of him and I’ll take care of you.” I believe her, but I’ve also taken steps to mitigate that burden and/or ensure I’m ok if that doesn’t happen and I need help.
I love him dearly, and all in all it’s been a good trip.
posted by carmicha at 8:25 AM on December 21, 2023 [61 favorites]
I'm watching this in real time right now. I [straight guy, mid-50s] have an old and dear friend [gay guy, a year older than me] who broke up with his long-term age-appropriate BF and almost immediately started dating and is now about to marry a 22M. My friend is middle-class; this kid comes from some hardscrabble background and is also like a foot taller than my friend. My friend pays for everything: dental work for the fiancé, clothes, supposedly college tuition soon. I'm... troubled by all this: there's nothing that seems not totally un-fishy about it. But in discussing it with other friends, it appears that this is considered significantly less problematic among gay men than it would be among straight folks. If my friend were straight and engaged to a 22F, I think there'd be a lot of people who would say "hold up, here".
The oddest part about all of it is that the young guy's family both adores my friend and are all super supportive about their son being both gay and in a relationship with someone who is actually eight years older than his own father. They LOOK like the kind of people who would have a lot of trouble with a gay son, but no, everything is cool, here, which baffles me even more.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 8:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
The oddest part about all of it is that the young guy's family both adores my friend and are all super supportive about their son being both gay and in a relationship with someone who is actually eight years older than his own father. They LOOK like the kind of people who would have a lot of trouble with a gay son, but no, everything is cool, here, which baffles me even more.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 8:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
They say they’re happy. Why is it so hard to believe them?
Anybody who spends five days looking at relationship advice boards knows that 9/10 times someone writes about a relationship with a big age gap - gender regardless - it’s toxic as fuck and the person writing in insists until they are blue in the face that their relationship is different. Until they come back six months later after the breakup.
That’s why it’s hard to believe them. Because it’s always a lot easier to see toxicity from the outside. For everybody.
posted by bq at 8:37 AM on December 21, 2023 [15 favorites]
Anybody who spends five days looking at relationship advice boards knows that 9/10 times someone writes about a relationship with a big age gap - gender regardless - it’s toxic as fuck and the person writing in insists until they are blue in the face that their relationship is different. Until they come back six months later after the breakup.
That’s why it’s hard to believe them. Because it’s always a lot easier to see toxicity from the outside. For everybody.
posted by bq at 8:37 AM on December 21, 2023 [15 favorites]
I agree with those saying the age of the younger partner matters - my time in academia has meant I've spent a lot of time with 18-22 year-olds as well as grad students in their mid-late 20s, and there really is a notable difference. There have been students where I've thought "they are mature enough I could imagine being their friend after I'm no longer their teacher" but even the more mature ones are still way too kid-adjacent for me to possibly want to date them - even if they're legally allowed to vote/drink.
I know a few hetero May/December relationships that appear healthy and have lasted a long time (and if a 7-year gap counts, then this includes my parents). While they don't all share all of these traits, they all tick at least most of these boxes:
1. The guy's previous dating history was mostly or entirely women his own age, and he didn't meet the younger woman because he was purposely looking for a younger woman - it happened organically (not a dating app). Nor where they in the sort of social milieu Frowner describes above.
2. The woman, even if younger, wasn't necessarily less sexually experienced than the guy.
3. The woman never became financially dependent on the guy.
4. Pre-relationship, they had friends in common - friends who would call foul if the woman was being manipulated.
5. They took things slow.
I also have female friends who enjoyed brief flings with dashing older men - there is also the truth that many women in their 20s don't want to settle down, and are happy to enjoy the material perks of wealthier suitor for a bit, particularly if he's relatively well-preserved.
And I have one female friend who recently got out of a decade+ relationship with an older guy that, by her account, started out great but dragged on way too long and got very toxic in the end, which was hard for her to really grapple with until she was out of it.
I imagine gay male relationships are less likely to be toxic given fertility is never at stake (or at least, not in the same way) and they are less likely to be monogamous, so it's not like the younger guy isn't able to explore his sexuality outside of the older partner. The one gay May/December relationship I know of where the younger guy later had regrets was a monogamous one.
TL:DR - my observation so far in life is that it really depends. There is no universal answer, and strangers acting like they know the truth of celebrity relationships is a bit absurd. But I also think it's good that as a society, we have more discussions about the potential harm of such relationships, not so that they'll be outlawed or shunned, but so hopefully the ratio of toxic:healthy age-gap relationships will improve as we learn to navigate them with more care.
posted by coffeecat at 8:38 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
I know a few hetero May/December relationships that appear healthy and have lasted a long time (and if a 7-year gap counts, then this includes my parents). While they don't all share all of these traits, they all tick at least most of these boxes:
1. The guy's previous dating history was mostly or entirely women his own age, and he didn't meet the younger woman because he was purposely looking for a younger woman - it happened organically (not a dating app). Nor where they in the sort of social milieu Frowner describes above.
2. The woman, even if younger, wasn't necessarily less sexually experienced than the guy.
3. The woman never became financially dependent on the guy.
4. Pre-relationship, they had friends in common - friends who would call foul if the woman was being manipulated.
5. They took things slow.
I also have female friends who enjoyed brief flings with dashing older men - there is also the truth that many women in their 20s don't want to settle down, and are happy to enjoy the material perks of wealthier suitor for a bit, particularly if he's relatively well-preserved.
And I have one female friend who recently got out of a decade+ relationship with an older guy that, by her account, started out great but dragged on way too long and got very toxic in the end, which was hard for her to really grapple with until she was out of it.
I imagine gay male relationships are less likely to be toxic given fertility is never at stake (or at least, not in the same way) and they are less likely to be monogamous, so it's not like the younger guy isn't able to explore his sexuality outside of the older partner. The one gay May/December relationship I know of where the younger guy later had regrets was a monogamous one.
TL:DR - my observation so far in life is that it really depends. There is no universal answer, and strangers acting like they know the truth of celebrity relationships is a bit absurd. But I also think it's good that as a society, we have more discussions about the potential harm of such relationships, not so that they'll be outlawed or shunned, but so hopefully the ratio of toxic:healthy age-gap relationships will improve as we learn to navigate them with more care.
posted by coffeecat at 8:38 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
In this thread: a lot of judgement informed by opinions and concepts and not so much insight.
It might really be true "... that these relationships tend to be bad experiences for at least 80% of junior partners," but what fraction of relationships that don't have this particular differential also turn out to be bad experiences for one partner or the other? I mean, it's not like the default relationship is one where the partners live happily ever after. Not to mention how bad it can be to not be in any relationship at all, when you really really want to be in one.
Sometimes these relationships get started because the older partner really is not up to speed for an equal relationship, and I expect that these cases are the ones where (if the older partner never does get up to speed) the relationships don't last long and older partner winds up in a sequence of them. In these cases I suppose it would be OK to be critical of the older partner, but some kind of compassion would probably be preferable. Sometimes in these relationships, both partners grow into the relationship and it lasts. Sometimes the older partner learns some lessons by the time the relationship is over and their next one is more equal.
I think in this thread there is some perception of real harm that happens sometimes, and a real stereotype of bad behavior from which the harm results, and people want to reduce the harm by specifying what kinds of relationships people should be in. But that approach is always doomed to lose, for reasons too long to fit in the margin of a blog comment.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 8:41 AM on December 21, 2023 [14 favorites]
It might really be true "... that these relationships tend to be bad experiences for at least 80% of junior partners," but what fraction of relationships that don't have this particular differential also turn out to be bad experiences for one partner or the other? I mean, it's not like the default relationship is one where the partners live happily ever after. Not to mention how bad it can be to not be in any relationship at all, when you really really want to be in one.
Sometimes these relationships get started because the older partner really is not up to speed for an equal relationship, and I expect that these cases are the ones where (if the older partner never does get up to speed) the relationships don't last long and older partner winds up in a sequence of them. In these cases I suppose it would be OK to be critical of the older partner, but some kind of compassion would probably be preferable. Sometimes in these relationships, both partners grow into the relationship and it lasts. Sometimes the older partner learns some lessons by the time the relationship is over and their next one is more equal.
I think in this thread there is some perception of real harm that happens sometimes, and a real stereotype of bad behavior from which the harm results, and people want to reduce the harm by specifying what kinds of relationships people should be in. But that approach is always doomed to lose, for reasons too long to fit in the margin of a blog comment.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 8:41 AM on December 21, 2023 [14 favorites]
I’m reminded of when Thurston Moore left Kim Gordon for a much younger woman. Like was there anything wrong with what he did? Not really, if he’s not happy, he should do stuff to make him happy. The point is that OF COURSE he left her for a younger woman, and OF COURSE it wasn’t the other way around, and if it happened to Kim Gordon, it could happen to literally anyone.
Now, sadly I'm no accomplished musician, but the "OF COURSE" part is why I don't pursue meaningfully younger people*. Part of life as a reasoning being is thinking "what are the OF COURSE I WILL PARTICIPATE IN STRUCTURAL BIAS, I CANNOT BE EXPECTED TO DO OTHERWISE things and can I compensate for how I'm programmed by society".
Your brain always tries to trick you with "my situation is different" thinking. You, and you alone, aren't racist or ageist or sexist or making bad decisions about money and substances - it may LOOK that way to an outside observer but they don't know your beautiful interiority. But everyone has interiority.
I don't want to look at my relationship history and say "OF COURSE, whenever I had leverage I used it to reinscribe unjust biases and devalue older women, personally".
*What is "meaningful" in this context? I guess I'd say it's "no more younger than I'd be likely to date older" - if I feel that I would be unlikely to date someone a decade older, I'm not going to date someone a decade younger. And I feel like you've got to be honest with yourself here, no "oh I GUESS I would date someone a decade older IF they were super hot and youthful and fun, so of COURSE I will date someone a decade younger".
posted by Frowner at 8:43 AM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
Now, sadly I'm no accomplished musician, but the "OF COURSE" part is why I don't pursue meaningfully younger people*. Part of life as a reasoning being is thinking "what are the OF COURSE I WILL PARTICIPATE IN STRUCTURAL BIAS, I CANNOT BE EXPECTED TO DO OTHERWISE things and can I compensate for how I'm programmed by society".
Your brain always tries to trick you with "my situation is different" thinking. You, and you alone, aren't racist or ageist or sexist or making bad decisions about money and substances - it may LOOK that way to an outside observer but they don't know your beautiful interiority. But everyone has interiority.
I don't want to look at my relationship history and say "OF COURSE, whenever I had leverage I used it to reinscribe unjust biases and devalue older women, personally".
*What is "meaningful" in this context? I guess I'd say it's "no more younger than I'd be likely to date older" - if I feel that I would be unlikely to date someone a decade older, I'm not going to date someone a decade younger. And I feel like you've got to be honest with yourself here, no "oh I GUESS I would date someone a decade older IF they were super hot and youthful and fun, so of COURSE I will date someone a decade younger".
posted by Frowner at 8:43 AM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
I’m reminded of when Thurston Moore left Kim Gordon for a much younger woman.
Kim Gordon was older than him, so maybe he was finally breaking away from his groomer.
posted by betweenthebars at 8:50 AM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Kim Gordon was older than him, so maybe he was finally breaking away from his groomer.
posted by betweenthebars at 8:50 AM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Gordon is 5 years older than Moore, Moore married someone 25 years younger then him.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 8:59 AM on December 21, 2023 [22 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 8:59 AM on December 21, 2023 [22 favorites]
I've known a fair number of people who've done age gap relationships, though a lot of those people are also non-monogamous and date people across a spectrum of age. And my big takeaway is that age gap relationships have to be understood as a fundamentally different kind of relationship from relationships between generational peers. When that's understood from the get-go, when it's communicated about, and when both of its participants act honestly on that awareness, then they can often develop healthy, respectful flavors of intimacy. And when the people involved just try to overlook their various age-related asynchronicities, things tend not to go that well.
Put another way, relationships don't have to be perfectly equal as long as they're equitable. And a part of creating an equitable relationship involves being open-eyed about the inherent inequalities involved. (That's not just true of age-gap relationships, but they tend to be disproportionately less equal than other categories of relationship, and they overlap with other de-equalizing forces like gender, money, social connection, etc.)
A few of my closest AFAB friends dated men in their 40s while they were in their late teens and early twenties, and by and large have nothing but good things to say about their exes. Both they and their partners were aware that there would be major differences between them; they figured out what kinds of connection they did want to have, and the ways in which they didn't anticipate connecting well; they talked about whether their relationship had an anticipated end date well before that end came. Most of those relationships ended, but one friend is still married to that man, and the two of them have a pretty incredible relationship. (Though that marriage is one of the non-monogamous ones, so each of them also both has other partners closer to their own age.)
From anecdotal observation, it feels like there are people who pursue age-gap relationships in ways that raise immediate red flags: namely, they are exclusively interested in people significantly younger than them and have no significant relationships, romantic or otherwise, with people closer to their own age in their desired gender(s). Of the ones with decent intentions, the ones who mean well, there're still a lot of situations that end poorly, because they just don't anticipate the ways in which things can curdle.
The only type of person who I've seen consistently practice this kind of thing healthily is the sort that does their homework, comes in extremely prepared, communicates to an exaggerated extent, and makes sure that there's as little ambiguity as to what's going to be involved as possible: they ask a shitload of questions, they express a whole lot of expectations, and they don't jump into anything until they've established solid ground. But then, that's the kind of person who puts their partner's well-being almost above their own—as in, the primary factor in whether or not they'll pursue a relationship is how certain they can be that it will be good for the other person. And that's somewhat unusual for any kind of relationship, but I think it's seen as particularly unusual in relationships like this, specifically because they're often pursued by people who, as many people in this thread have said before me, see their partners as essentially disposable, or whose interest in their would-be partner is relatively superficial.
Basically, my experience is that the exceptions prove the rule, but that the rule is less about age gaps in specific and more about ethical and self-aware conduct in relationships more generally. When these relationships work, they work because the people in them approach dating one another in responsible, caring, eyes-open ways. And those people are outliers, because most folks who date other folks simply don't put that much consideration into what they're doing. Even the ones who wind up happy in love often wind up there by accident, and stumble a lot along the way. In age-gap relationships, the obstacles are considerably heightened, and the odds of accidental success are a lot lower. And there's no way to divorce heterosexual age-gap relationships from the toxic heteronormative ideas that get fostered on men and women both, in ways that lead men to pursue younger women for unhealthy reasons and also often make the prospect of older partners more alluring for the younger women in question. It's possible to work past that, but at the very least, it takes genuine, non-trivial work.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 9:08 AM on December 21, 2023 [20 favorites]
Put another way, relationships don't have to be perfectly equal as long as they're equitable. And a part of creating an equitable relationship involves being open-eyed about the inherent inequalities involved. (That's not just true of age-gap relationships, but they tend to be disproportionately less equal than other categories of relationship, and they overlap with other de-equalizing forces like gender, money, social connection, etc.)
A few of my closest AFAB friends dated men in their 40s while they were in their late teens and early twenties, and by and large have nothing but good things to say about their exes. Both they and their partners were aware that there would be major differences between them; they figured out what kinds of connection they did want to have, and the ways in which they didn't anticipate connecting well; they talked about whether their relationship had an anticipated end date well before that end came. Most of those relationships ended, but one friend is still married to that man, and the two of them have a pretty incredible relationship. (Though that marriage is one of the non-monogamous ones, so each of them also both has other partners closer to their own age.)
From anecdotal observation, it feels like there are people who pursue age-gap relationships in ways that raise immediate red flags: namely, they are exclusively interested in people significantly younger than them and have no significant relationships, romantic or otherwise, with people closer to their own age in their desired gender(s). Of the ones with decent intentions, the ones who mean well, there're still a lot of situations that end poorly, because they just don't anticipate the ways in which things can curdle.
The only type of person who I've seen consistently practice this kind of thing healthily is the sort that does their homework, comes in extremely prepared, communicates to an exaggerated extent, and makes sure that there's as little ambiguity as to what's going to be involved as possible: they ask a shitload of questions, they express a whole lot of expectations, and they don't jump into anything until they've established solid ground. But then, that's the kind of person who puts their partner's well-being almost above their own—as in, the primary factor in whether or not they'll pursue a relationship is how certain they can be that it will be good for the other person. And that's somewhat unusual for any kind of relationship, but I think it's seen as particularly unusual in relationships like this, specifically because they're often pursued by people who, as many people in this thread have said before me, see their partners as essentially disposable, or whose interest in their would-be partner is relatively superficial.
Basically, my experience is that the exceptions prove the rule, but that the rule is less about age gaps in specific and more about ethical and self-aware conduct in relationships more generally. When these relationships work, they work because the people in them approach dating one another in responsible, caring, eyes-open ways. And those people are outliers, because most folks who date other folks simply don't put that much consideration into what they're doing. Even the ones who wind up happy in love often wind up there by accident, and stumble a lot along the way. In age-gap relationships, the obstacles are considerably heightened, and the odds of accidental success are a lot lower. And there's no way to divorce heterosexual age-gap relationships from the toxic heteronormative ideas that get fostered on men and women both, in ways that lead men to pursue younger women for unhealthy reasons and also often make the prospect of older partners more alluring for the younger women in question. It's possible to work past that, but at the very least, it takes genuine, non-trivial work.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 9:08 AM on December 21, 2023 [20 favorites]
Honestly, I think that 90% of the age discourse is social media addicts enjoying a socially acceptable way of being judgy assholes about other people’s relationships.
I throughly enjoyed shit-talking Thurston Moore when he gave that super cringe interview about his new girlfriend, but it really isn’t my business and I’m not going to delude myself into thinking that is dismantling the patriarchy.
posted by betweenthebars at 9:08 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
I throughly enjoyed shit-talking Thurston Moore when he gave that super cringe interview about his new girlfriend, but it really isn’t my business and I’m not going to delude myself into thinking that is dismantling the patriarchy.
posted by betweenthebars at 9:08 AM on December 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
Braff/Pugh Discourse appeared to be a classic Age Gap Discourse, but was in fact largely a veiled Attractiveness Gap Discourse. Particularly acute in light of That Selfie, and the fact that the Well, He Is Much Richer Than Her Mitigation was not in play.
posted by Klipspringer at 9:22 AM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Klipspringer at 9:22 AM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
I am uncomfortable with age gaps. Always kind of hated them, especially older man/younger woman because most of the time it has all the issues stated here. The older the woman is at the time of it starting, the less it's an issue, but it just happens SO much.
I have a friend who's 65 and her husband is 18 years older and dying. They have a great relationship, they didn't meet when she was an inappropriate age, she tends to call the shots, etc. but the age issues are very legitimate. Like she's going to have to plan a life without him in retirement, basically.
However, now that I'm at one of those ages, I find that guys my age are (a) not single, (b) I'm terrified of Midlife Crisis Dudes, and (c) finding myself attracted to younger, not older. Not that that's gone great either, mind you. But it creeps me out that I might be one of those skeevers now.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:25 AM on December 21, 2023 [5 favorites]
I have a friend who's 65 and her husband is 18 years older and dying. They have a great relationship, they didn't meet when she was an inappropriate age, she tends to call the shots, etc. but the age issues are very legitimate. Like she's going to have to plan a life without him in retirement, basically.
However, now that I'm at one of those ages, I find that guys my age are (a) not single, (b) I'm terrified of Midlife Crisis Dudes, and (c) finding myself attracted to younger, not older. Not that that's gone great either, mind you. But it creeps me out that I might be one of those skeevers now.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:25 AM on December 21, 2023 [5 favorites]
My wife is seven years older than me. Should I be concerned about what other people think about this? Should I be interviewed for a Think Piece? I'm concerned! ;)
Admittedly it was odd when we first met. I was 22, she was 29. We leaned into the weirdness and lived together for ten years before getting married 22 years ago. But now? She's 60 and I'm 53. She has way more energy than me and looks the same age as me, maybe younger depending how we are dressed.
One thing that never got in our way was kids. She decided at a young age that she did not want any. All her sisters have multiple children. I came from a tiny family and neither of my siblings had kids either. I grew up in a neighborhood without many kids. I have never even changed a diaper in my life. It took me several long, awkward years in my mid-20s to 30s to even be able to relate to my child nephews and nieces. I just never "got" kids and never had a desire to have them.
Yes I had a horrible decade and eventually got sober, so that almost ended things, but I'm dry now for five years.
Should I be concerned?
posted by SoberHighland at 9:30 AM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
Admittedly it was odd when we first met. I was 22, she was 29. We leaned into the weirdness and lived together for ten years before getting married 22 years ago. But now? She's 60 and I'm 53. She has way more energy than me and looks the same age as me, maybe younger depending how we are dressed.
One thing that never got in our way was kids. She decided at a young age that she did not want any. All her sisters have multiple children. I came from a tiny family and neither of my siblings had kids either. I grew up in a neighborhood without many kids. I have never even changed a diaper in my life. It took me several long, awkward years in my mid-20s to 30s to even be able to relate to my child nephews and nieces. I just never "got" kids and never had a desire to have them.
Yes I had a horrible decade and eventually got sober, so that almost ended things, but I'm dry now for five years.
Should I be concerned?
posted by SoberHighland at 9:30 AM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
one thing I've noticed in age gap relationships is the tendency for the younger person to mature out of it. That is, twenty year old and thirty year old connect and it works for a while. But what twenty year old has fully matured? Whereas many a thirty year old has settled in, become pretty much who they're going to be for the balance of their life.
I was personally nowhere in a bunch of ways when I was that twenty. But by twenty-five, I'd more or less found my balance, and part of this balance was reflected by the fact that my network (friends, neighbours, colleagues etc) was almost completely different. Almost everyone I'd thought important to my well-being, my status, my interests etc when I was twenty, wasn't anymore. Including one particular older "friend". They were long gone, completely out of my life. Nothing particularly dramatic had happened. I'd just done a pile of growing/maturing. They hadn't.
posted by philip-random at 9:52 AM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
I was personally nowhere in a bunch of ways when I was that twenty. But by twenty-five, I'd more or less found my balance, and part of this balance was reflected by the fact that my network (friends, neighbours, colleagues etc) was almost completely different. Almost everyone I'd thought important to my well-being, my status, my interests etc when I was twenty, wasn't anymore. Including one particular older "friend". They were long gone, completely out of my life. Nothing particularly dramatic had happened. I'd just done a pile of growing/maturing. They hadn't.
posted by philip-random at 9:52 AM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
SoberHighland: No. Only a 7 year gap, relationship already lasted 30 years, everybody apparently happy? You sound fine.
posted by joannemerriam at 9:59 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by joannemerriam at 9:59 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Men generally die younger than women, which is why they're not around to do caretaking even if it's an age-balanced relationship. It's not a conspiracy on their part.
Kingdead: that's bull.
Men dying younger than women has nothing to do with why men don't take care of women in old age. The majority of men don't do caretaking for women period, whether it's old age or sickness. Divorce is one way men handle an ageing or sick spouse. Otherwise, care is outsourced. It either defaults on to the children (especially daughters) or if there's enough money, on to an in-home caregiver, or it's off to the nursing home she goes. A man who will feed and change diapers for his ill or aging spouse is a nonpareil.
posted by BlueHorse at 10:03 AM on December 21, 2023 [30 favorites]
Kingdead: that's bull.
Men dying younger than women has nothing to do with why men don't take care of women in old age. The majority of men don't do caretaking for women period, whether it's old age or sickness. Divorce is one way men handle an ageing or sick spouse. Otherwise, care is outsourced. It either defaults on to the children (especially daughters) or if there's enough money, on to an in-home caregiver, or it's off to the nursing home she goes. A man who will feed and change diapers for his ill or aging spouse is a nonpareil.
posted by BlueHorse at 10:03 AM on December 21, 2023 [30 favorites]
And a part of creating an equitable relationship involves being open-eyed about the inherent inequalities involved. (That's not just true of age-gap relationships, but they tend to be disproportionately less equal than other categories of relationship, and they overlap with other de-equalizing forces like gender, money, social connection, etc.)
I think this is the key, and that minimizing the risks that come with an age-gap relationship is inadvisable. Is it occasionally possible for people to be in a healthy age-gap relationship? Sure. But that is very much the exception rather than the rule, and a lot of the people who suggest proceeding with caution are doing so from personal experience, myself included.
It's not a great idea to build a house on the banks of a river but plenty of people live alongside rivers all the same. Some people are perfectly happy and have yet to run into a problem, but that's no guarantee that their home won't eventually flood. Other people have experienced flooding but have acquired tools and developed skills to manage floodwater, and they remain content. Still other people have had their belongings destroyed or even watched their houses wash away.
Ideally, anyone considering living alongside a river would go into the situation conscious of the risks that come with what they're doing, and actively working to address those risks. But for most people, avoiding those risks entirely and seeking shelter elsewhere is the way to go.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 10:03 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
I think this is the key, and that minimizing the risks that come with an age-gap relationship is inadvisable. Is it occasionally possible for people to be in a healthy age-gap relationship? Sure. But that is very much the exception rather than the rule, and a lot of the people who suggest proceeding with caution are doing so from personal experience, myself included.
It's not a great idea to build a house on the banks of a river but plenty of people live alongside rivers all the same. Some people are perfectly happy and have yet to run into a problem, but that's no guarantee that their home won't eventually flood. Other people have experienced flooding but have acquired tools and developed skills to manage floodwater, and they remain content. Still other people have had their belongings destroyed or even watched their houses wash away.
Ideally, anyone considering living alongside a river would go into the situation conscious of the risks that come with what they're doing, and actively working to address those risks. But for most people, avoiding those risks entirely and seeking shelter elsewhere is the way to go.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 10:03 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
When I was 16, I got involved with a mature gentleman. He was actually out to help. I was homeless when we met.
He ended up being the most important influence on my life. I had no idea at the time, what was happening. But it resulted in me having a circle of friends that were mostly grad students at Columbia. We lived in the neighborhood.
HUGE advantage, for a midwestern gay boy, whose father couldn't handle a gay son.
While not necessarily starting so young, a lot of the gay men I've known (especially back when I was young) had those kind of simultaneously sexual and mentor/mentee relationships with older men when they were younger. The difference between that and the typical heterosexual dynamic, in my purely anecdotal experience, is a built-in assumption that later in life you might take on the older gentleman role. Versus the stereotypical younger woman/older man relationship, where the built-in assumption is definitely not that twenty years from now she would be with a younger man.
But again, I'm seeing that from the outside of the community and don't want to be making universal assertions from purely anecdotal observations.
posted by Dip Flash at 10:04 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
He ended up being the most important influence on my life. I had no idea at the time, what was happening. But it resulted in me having a circle of friends that were mostly grad students at Columbia. We lived in the neighborhood.
HUGE advantage, for a midwestern gay boy, whose father couldn't handle a gay son.
While not necessarily starting so young, a lot of the gay men I've known (especially back when I was young) had those kind of simultaneously sexual and mentor/mentee relationships with older men when they were younger. The difference between that and the typical heterosexual dynamic, in my purely anecdotal experience, is a built-in assumption that later in life you might take on the older gentleman role. Versus the stereotypical younger woman/older man relationship, where the built-in assumption is definitely not that twenty years from now she would be with a younger man.
But again, I'm seeing that from the outside of the community and don't want to be making universal assertions from purely anecdotal observations.
posted by Dip Flash at 10:04 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
I don’t think this is a radical position but adults shouldn’t be engaging in sexual activity with 16 year olds.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 10:27 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 10:27 AM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
The majority of men don't do caretaking for women period, whether it's old age or sickness.
In heterosexual relationships, men are 6 times more likely to leave an ill spouse, compared to relationships where the man becomes ill.
I'm having thoughts these days that I can't even put into words, but I guess I would suggest people be cautious and keep an eye out for all the ways our patriarchal and capitalist society is pushing back hard on voices that point out abuse and suggest being mindful of the way society exploits the disadvantaged and vulnerable.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 10:44 AM on December 21, 2023 [19 favorites]
In heterosexual relationships, men are 6 times more likely to leave an ill spouse, compared to relationships where the man becomes ill.
I'm having thoughts these days that I can't even put into words, but I guess I would suggest people be cautious and keep an eye out for all the ways our patriarchal and capitalist society is pushing back hard on voices that point out abuse and suggest being mindful of the way society exploits the disadvantaged and vulnerable.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 10:44 AM on December 21, 2023 [19 favorites]
A man who will feed and change diapers for his ill or aging spouse is a nonpareil.
I just want to say that my father cared for my mother during her long, brutal decline, and my grandfather cared for my frail grandmother until his own death. One reason I find crappy, selfish male behavior so frustrating is that I grew up among men who did do care work, who did marry with intent and stay committed for the duration, who did treat girls and young women like girls and young women, not like sexual commodities. It's not actually that weird - these were not bohemian people, they were straight suburbanites with regular jobs, fulfilling hobbies, etc. It's always a choice to refuse to care for an ailing spouse, to pursue much younger women, to cheat, to be emotionally lazy, to discard your unsatisfactory Mark 1 children for a new wife and baby.
posted by Frowner at 10:44 AM on December 21, 2023 [48 favorites]
I just want to say that my father cared for my mother during her long, brutal decline, and my grandfather cared for my frail grandmother until his own death. One reason I find crappy, selfish male behavior so frustrating is that I grew up among men who did do care work, who did marry with intent and stay committed for the duration, who did treat girls and young women like girls and young women, not like sexual commodities. It's not actually that weird - these were not bohemian people, they were straight suburbanites with regular jobs, fulfilling hobbies, etc. It's always a choice to refuse to care for an ailing spouse, to pursue much younger women, to cheat, to be emotionally lazy, to discard your unsatisfactory Mark 1 children for a new wife and baby.
posted by Frowner at 10:44 AM on December 21, 2023 [48 favorites]
there is also the truth that many women in their 20s don't want to settle down, and are happy to enjoy the material perks of wealthier suitor for a bit
yep, it's the campsite rule, not the homestead rule, to paraphrase savage.
posted by j_curiouser at 11:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
yep, it's the campsite rule, not the homestead rule, to paraphrase savage.
posted by j_curiouser at 11:26 AM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
To a certain extent, a particular couple may be an exception to the rule that huge age differences mean problematic power differentials, but we cannot know or see that from the outside. To a degree, if you do happen to be that exception, you might just have to suffer some extent of social disapproval anyway, much like the child who really wants to be down the mines or the guy who just genuinely wants to work that union job for half the wage. If we just accepted that at face value whenever someone said it, we would quickly find minimum wage abolished, and be back to child labour. We don't want to normalise eighteen year olds dating forty somethings because, even if your individual relationship is the one in a million that is unproblematic, the broader thing is bad for society as a whole.
It's pretty damn telling that it took only three comments here before someone compared the younger adult in age gap relationships to literal children who don't know their own good, and no one even batted an eye.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 11:47 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
It's pretty damn telling that it took only three comments here before someone compared the younger adult in age gap relationships to literal children who don't know their own good, and no one even batted an eye.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 11:47 AM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Good thing that "childhood," "age appropriate," and "healthy" are settled concepts, unchanging over space and time and from group to group, otherwise the conversation could persist in perpetuity, its participants safely able to argue past one other and dismiss good points with bon mots and high dudgeon.
posted by cupcakeninja at 12:00 PM on December 21, 2023 [12 favorites]
posted by cupcakeninja at 12:00 PM on December 21, 2023 [12 favorites]
Men generally die younger than women, which is why they're not around to do caretaking even if it's an age-balanced relationship. It's not a conspiracy on their part.
Except that half the reason they usually die younger is because they don’t take care of their medical shit until women drag them kicking and screaming into it. So yes it kind of is a conspiracy on their part.
posted by corb at 12:18 PM on December 21, 2023 [14 favorites]
Except that half the reason they usually die younger is because they don’t take care of their medical shit until women drag them kicking and screaming into it. So yes it kind of is a conspiracy on their part.
posted by corb at 12:18 PM on December 21, 2023 [14 favorites]
> I'm the older partner. The gap is almost 7 years, and we met when he was 20, which is retrospect seems pretty gross.
> I'm 7 years older than my (male) husband, I think we are happy
> My wife is seven years older than me. Should I be concerned
It is so telling that we all think women are "the older partner" in a het relationship if they're just SEVEN years older than the men. This would never in a million years be considered an age-gap relationship if the man was older by 7 years! I know that first hand, I met my ex husband when I was 18 and he was 25, we were together for 17 years, and that was never described as an age-gap relationship by anyone. Not even by my parents who were so opposed to the match that they disowned me for a few years! They would have used any insult to hurl at me over this relationship but they didn't use this one.
posted by MiraK at 12:25 PM on December 21, 2023 [21 favorites]
> I'm 7 years older than my (male) husband, I think we are happy
> My wife is seven years older than me. Should I be concerned
It is so telling that we all think women are "the older partner" in a het relationship if they're just SEVEN years older than the men. This would never in a million years be considered an age-gap relationship if the man was older by 7 years! I know that first hand, I met my ex husband when I was 18 and he was 25, we were together for 17 years, and that was never described as an age-gap relationship by anyone. Not even by my parents who were so opposed to the match that they disowned me for a few years! They would have used any insult to hurl at me over this relationship but they didn't use this one.
posted by MiraK at 12:25 PM on December 21, 2023 [21 favorites]
My dad had 18 years on my mom, but both of them had been married (my dad for a long time, no kids, my mom for 18 months) and they met when she was in her late 20s and both were divorced. This was in the 1960s and while it may have been a bit odd then, it wasn't considered downright immoral the way folks talk about it now.
They were very happy together in what most people considered a bit of an unusual marriage. He travelled a lot, mostly internationally, probably 1/3 of the time during my childhood, so 3-4 months of the year in 1-3 week periods, leaving her alone at home with me in a time when international calling was super expensive. So my mom was home alone with me and made a lot of house and parenting decisions herself because things had to be done and there was no way to consult my dad. She did care for him during a serious illness (cancer) when I was in grade school; my grandmother (her mom) stayed with me while she was out of town with him for cancer treatment. She did not care for him during a decline because he died early at age 70 of a heart attack, leaving her a widow at 52. She did not remarry or even date. Not because of my age--I was in college--but because she didn't want to marry again and nobody could have lived up to my dad.
There were a lot of things that I would consider problematic by modern standards in my childhood, like physical punishments that we would now consider abusive were normal, but my parents' marriage was happy and, if not entirely equal, a lot more equitable than a lot of modern discourse would make it sound. And the inequities had less to do with individual choices than my parents not bucking expectations for heterosexual marriages. Specifically I think my mom would have been happier if she'd kept working and not had me.
I know times are different and the choices available to romantic partners of all genders are different now. At the same time, when I say "my dad was 18 years older than my mom", I get this look, or some super rude comments, that come from assumptions that have nothing to do with the truth of my lived experience as the child of that union.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 12:40 PM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
They were very happy together in what most people considered a bit of an unusual marriage. He travelled a lot, mostly internationally, probably 1/3 of the time during my childhood, so 3-4 months of the year in 1-3 week periods, leaving her alone at home with me in a time when international calling was super expensive. So my mom was home alone with me and made a lot of house and parenting decisions herself because things had to be done and there was no way to consult my dad. She did care for him during a serious illness (cancer) when I was in grade school; my grandmother (her mom) stayed with me while she was out of town with him for cancer treatment. She did not care for him during a decline because he died early at age 70 of a heart attack, leaving her a widow at 52. She did not remarry or even date. Not because of my age--I was in college--but because she didn't want to marry again and nobody could have lived up to my dad.
There were a lot of things that I would consider problematic by modern standards in my childhood, like physical punishments that we would now consider abusive were normal, but my parents' marriage was happy and, if not entirely equal, a lot more equitable than a lot of modern discourse would make it sound. And the inequities had less to do with individual choices than my parents not bucking expectations for heterosexual marriages. Specifically I think my mom would have been happier if she'd kept working and not had me.
I know times are different and the choices available to romantic partners of all genders are different now. At the same time, when I say "my dad was 18 years older than my mom", I get this look, or some super rude comments, that come from assumptions that have nothing to do with the truth of my lived experience as the child of that union.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 12:40 PM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
never in a million years be considered an age-gap relationship if the man was older by 7 years .. I was 18 and he was 25
What?
Not questioning your individual experience, but a LOT of people would describe that as an age gap relationship. Both now and in the past.
posted by Klipspringer at 12:42 PM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
What?
Not questioning your individual experience, but a LOT of people would describe that as an age gap relationship. Both now and in the past.
posted by Klipspringer at 12:42 PM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
I still like the calculation of (Your Age)/2+7 = (Reasonable Age to Date)
It works very well from about age 15 and up: if 18, then 16+, if 20, then 17+, if 30, then 22+, if 50, then 32+, if 60, then 37+. It's a good guide that recognizes that age gaps matter a lot less when the younger partner is older.
I could see couples outside of these ranges working if younger partner is in their mid-20s or older; I don't think anyone would be concerned about someone who is 50 dating someone who is 27 or 30 would be exploiting them. But I would look seriously askance at someone who is 30 dating a 19-year old.
posted by jb at 12:56 PM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
It works very well from about age 15 and up: if 18, then 16+, if 20, then 17+, if 30, then 22+, if 50, then 32+, if 60, then 37+. It's a good guide that recognizes that age gaps matter a lot less when the younger partner is older.
I could see couples outside of these ranges working if younger partner is in their mid-20s or older; I don't think anyone would be concerned about someone who is 50 dating someone who is 27 or 30 would be exploiting them. But I would look seriously askance at someone who is 30 dating a 19-year old.
posted by jb at 12:56 PM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
I see this used in academia as an argument against policies barring professors from dating students. “Well, I started dating my husband when he was my PhD supervisor, are you saying our marriage shouldn’t exist?” Well, I guess if you’re stipulating it could have happened no other way, I guess I am.
When it comes to dating someone you teach and/or supervise, it has nothing to do with age: you could be a 35-year-old professor dating a 40-year old graduate student and it would be inappropriate to date because you are like their boss. You also should never be involved with one of your employees.
In my experience, most blanket bans on faculty dating students were specific to undergraduate students because they do tend to be much younger and are in a very different place in their life. Whereas many graduate students are over 25, have moved into a more established, professional stage of their career, and have more of a co-worker relationship with faculty who aren't their direct supervisors, especially if the faculty aren't in the same department. With these changes and without the direct reporting relationship, it's a lot less problematic.
posted by jb at 1:07 PM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
When it comes to dating someone you teach and/or supervise, it has nothing to do with age: you could be a 35-year-old professor dating a 40-year old graduate student and it would be inappropriate to date because you are like their boss. You also should never be involved with one of your employees.
In my experience, most blanket bans on faculty dating students were specific to undergraduate students because they do tend to be much younger and are in a very different place in their life. Whereas many graduate students are over 25, have moved into a more established, professional stage of their career, and have more of a co-worker relationship with faculty who aren't their direct supervisors, especially if the faculty aren't in the same department. With these changes and without the direct reporting relationship, it's a lot less problematic.
posted by jb at 1:07 PM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
I've never forgotten how much of my twenties was spent fending off the advances of older men who felt absolutely entitled to young women. In 1994 I began using a telephone dating system which I continued to use off and on for the next ten years or so, until I finally got a computer and internet access and could use internet dating sites. Users of this telephone system recorded a personal ad and selected an age bracket for it to be placed in. I always stated clearly in my ad that I wanted someone my own age and supplied a specific age range that I was willing to date within. And I just could not believe how many guys would put their ads in a lower age range than they were, lie about their age, and/or totally ignore my stated age boundaries in order to get me to talk to them, then once they had me on the phone and admitted that they were significantly older than me and I said I didn't want to date them, they would chastise me for being "narrow-minded" or "thinking too much in a box", demand to know why I wouldn't date them, and be completely dismissive of any reasons I gave in return. (i.e., One guy was 17 years older than me and lectured me on how "age was just a number". I asked him if he'd be willing to date a woman who was 17 years older than him, and he said, "Oh no, that's completely different!") It happened SO MANY TIMES.
Then, by the time I was in my mid-thirties, it had become next to impossible to even get a beverage meet up with a guy off a dating system. When I was browsing internet profiles of guys my age, profile after profile would loftily specify they wanted women younger than them. I hardly ever got contacted by any men my own age. Most of the guys who did contact me were in their fifties and sixties -- and again, they were ignoring the fact that I said in my profile that I only wanted someone my own age and had provided a specific age range I was willing to date within. They got nothing from me but a prompt blocking, but it made me angry that I had to keep dealing with that.
I never let any of those older guys railroad me into dating them, but the countless experiences I had of dealing with them has had a definite and lasting impact on me. I have such a repugnance for that kind of gross misogynist entitlement and it always raises my hackles whenever I come across it. I can't bear the sight of Leonard DiCaprio because of it.
So yeah, there can be May/December relationships that are happy and functional, but I believe they tend to be the exception, and I also know from experience that people who are in dysfunctional, abusive relationships don't always fully recognize it.
posted by orange swan at 1:21 PM on December 21, 2023 [26 favorites]
Then, by the time I was in my mid-thirties, it had become next to impossible to even get a beverage meet up with a guy off a dating system. When I was browsing internet profiles of guys my age, profile after profile would loftily specify they wanted women younger than them. I hardly ever got contacted by any men my own age. Most of the guys who did contact me were in their fifties and sixties -- and again, they were ignoring the fact that I said in my profile that I only wanted someone my own age and had provided a specific age range I was willing to date within. They got nothing from me but a prompt blocking, but it made me angry that I had to keep dealing with that.
I never let any of those older guys railroad me into dating them, but the countless experiences I had of dealing with them has had a definite and lasting impact on me. I have such a repugnance for that kind of gross misogynist entitlement and it always raises my hackles whenever I come across it. I can't bear the sight of Leonard DiCaprio because of it.
So yeah, there can be May/December relationships that are happy and functional, but I believe they tend to be the exception, and I also know from experience that people who are in dysfunctional, abusive relationships don't always fully recognize it.
posted by orange swan at 1:21 PM on December 21, 2023 [26 favorites]
When it comes to dating someone you teach and/or supervise, it has nothing to do with age: you could be a 35-year-old professor dating a 40-year old graduate student and it would be inappropriate to date because you are like their boss. You also should never be involved with one of your employees
What if I told you they married and won Nobel prizes together?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 1:21 PM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
What if I told you they married and won Nobel prizes together?
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 1:21 PM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
My data point WRT this is that I was married for almost a decade to a woman who was 16 years older than me; I was 29 at the time of the wedding, but I'd had little experience in relationships, and a lot less than her. When the marriage started to break up, and I'd moved out, in one of the meetings that we had--maybe the one that led me to believe that we'd never really fix things--she offhandedly mentioned that she'd taken a trip to her hometown, by herself. At that point, we'd made plans to go there more than once, only to have her unilaterally back out at the last minute. When I pointed this out, she admitted that she'd never really wanted to take me to her hometown because she'd be embarrassed for some of her relatives to see how young I was.
Now, in retrospect, there were a lot of other problems with the relationship (we'd had a pretty short engagement, for one thing), but I still have to wonder why she at least didn't tell me so that we could talk it over. I also wonder how much general societal prejudice against intergenerational relationships was to blame, and how much of it was just her. (We could have gone to her hometown, which actually has a population of over a million, and simply not visited those relatives.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:30 PM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Now, in retrospect, there were a lot of other problems with the relationship (we'd had a pretty short engagement, for one thing), but I still have to wonder why she at least didn't tell me so that we could talk it over. I also wonder how much general societal prejudice against intergenerational relationships was to blame, and how much of it was just her. (We could have gone to her hometown, which actually has a population of over a million, and simply not visited those relatives.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 1:30 PM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
I've been mildly amused that in my brief attempt to get back on the Dating Apps recently as a cishet woman in my 40's that dudes old enough to be my dad (late 60's & 70's) are still pretty common in my inbox. Like, this started when I was about 12 years old (not the inboxing, but the propositions) and I'm wondering if it just never ends? I'm not even conventionally attractive! This is of course not to say that older people don't have something to offer to younger partners and that a wonderful guy in his 60's might be a great fit personality-wise, but I don't have children because I've never had the spoons or resources to provide adequate care and attention, and right now, the only elders I have the headspace to worry about are my actual parents.
Although yesterday I got hit up by a guy 10 years younger, and god, even 35 seems young to me now, so :shrug:
posted by smirkette at 1:31 PM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
Although yesterday I got hit up by a guy 10 years younger, and god, even 35 seems young to me now, so :shrug:
posted by smirkette at 1:31 PM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
One thing about May-December relationships like mine (22-year gap) that seldom receives attention is that you spend time in a state of anticipatory grief while younger than most people are when it hits, barring partner illness. That also ratchets up anxiety even when something simple happens, like when the partner is late without explanation. Probably five years ago, a friend commented that she didn't know what she'd do if her partner died suddenly. I realized, sadly, that I knew exactly what to do, both in the immediate aftermath and subsequently, and I had for awhile.
posted by carmicha at 1:39 PM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by carmicha at 1:39 PM on December 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
Your specific age-gap relationship can be absolutely perfect, and other age-gap relationships you can think of can be absolutely perfect, and there can also be queer, poly, or otherwise non-cisheteronormative age-gap relationships that exist outside the dynamic in question in one way or another, and there can STILL be something very problematic about fairly widespread societal trends of late middle-aged men divorcing their wives and remarrying women decades younger, men anywhere from their mid-twenties to their mid-sixties trying to sleep with girls as young as teenagers, and men in positions of power viewing younger women subordinate to them and dependent on them for employment as an appropriate dating pool.
posted by kyrademon at 2:45 PM on December 21, 2023 [30 favorites]
posted by kyrademon at 2:45 PM on December 21, 2023 [30 favorites]
I have never even changed a diaper in my life.
It's not that I wouldn't change a diaper, if a child needed it. But I think you identified for me another minor life goal!
posted by tiny frying pan at 3:35 PM on December 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
It's not that I wouldn't change a diaper, if a child needed it. But I think you identified for me another minor life goal!
posted by tiny frying pan at 3:35 PM on December 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
1) Getting old: best sex ever.
2) Unless your plane crashes or you get into a car wreck, one of you will die first.
3) Age Gaps are bad when one of the partners has bad intentions--I guess that applies to all relationships. (see #4)
4) Older doesn't necessarily mean smarter, but sometimes the older person has more experience at manipulation. But be wary of the comely lass or laddie who knows how to bring out the "fool" in an old fool.
5) If you try sometimes, you might find, [baby], you can get what you need.
Disclosures: My first two marriages were with women (who were within a year of) my own age. They lasted two years and five years, respectively. My third marriage lasted 28 years, with a wonderful woman seven years my junior. I was a miserable excuse of a husband the first two times, but by the third marriage, I was a lot better at it. I still seem to have some things to learn.
posted by mule98J at 3:54 PM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
2) Unless your plane crashes or you get into a car wreck, one of you will die first.
3) Age Gaps are bad when one of the partners has bad intentions--I guess that applies to all relationships. (see #4)
4) Older doesn't necessarily mean smarter, but sometimes the older person has more experience at manipulation. But be wary of the comely lass or laddie who knows how to bring out the "fool" in an old fool.
5) If you try sometimes, you might find, [baby], you can get what you need.
Disclosures: My first two marriages were with women (who were within a year of) my own age. They lasted two years and five years, respectively. My third marriage lasted 28 years, with a wonderful woman seven years my junior. I was a miserable excuse of a husband the first two times, but by the third marriage, I was a lot better at it. I still seem to have some things to learn.
posted by mule98J at 3:54 PM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I have mixed feelings about Dan Savage, but I feel like one of his quotes from the article is dead on:
“If you’re the older partner in an age-gap relationship, you should welcome a higher degree of scrutiny ”
If you’re looking at an individual relationship, an age gap should be a sign to look closer. It should invite additional scrutiny on whether there are other signs of a power imbalance, whether abusive behaviors are present, and whether the younger partner has thought through the implications of the older partner’s age and their aging.
Frequently that scrutiny will turn up other warning signs. Sometimes it won’t, and in which case, great! But don’t go ignoring that “check engine” light for the hell of it.
(As a note: I’m intentionally talking about how to think about individual relationships, because a lot of the article and discussion seems to be about how particular people are being criticized on the Internet, or folks’ feeling about celebrity relationships.
I strongly agree that society’s fucked-up treatment of young women especially is a big part of this dynamic, and should be discussed in structural ways. But I also think that’s not a license to be an ass about any specific couple without learning more about them.)
posted by learning from frequent failure at 3:54 PM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
“If you’re the older partner in an age-gap relationship, you should welcome a higher degree of scrutiny ”
If you’re looking at an individual relationship, an age gap should be a sign to look closer. It should invite additional scrutiny on whether there are other signs of a power imbalance, whether abusive behaviors are present, and whether the younger partner has thought through the implications of the older partner’s age and their aging.
Frequently that scrutiny will turn up other warning signs. Sometimes it won’t, and in which case, great! But don’t go ignoring that “check engine” light for the hell of it.
(As a note: I’m intentionally talking about how to think about individual relationships, because a lot of the article and discussion seems to be about how particular people are being criticized on the Internet, or folks’ feeling about celebrity relationships.
I strongly agree that society’s fucked-up treatment of young women especially is a big part of this dynamic, and should be discussed in structural ways. But I also think that’s not a license to be an ass about any specific couple without learning more about them.)
posted by learning from frequent failure at 3:54 PM on December 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
I agree with the points above that this is not something that we probably want to normalize in our society.
But I also am having a hard time seeing this as any different from other mistakes people make in relationships? People date alcoholics and drug addicts that are bad for them. People date assholes and jerks and all kinds of people that they shouldn't date.
Why is it that for these relationships in particular, people think you shouldn't even be able to make the mistake at all? Yes, I know people are young and immature but when is someone an adult? Is 25 and 55 ok? 30 and 60? Maybe we just let people make their own mistakes because thats life and you make choices and some are good and some are bad and you learn and life goes on.
Anybody who spends five days looking at relationship advice boards knows that 9/10 times someone writes about a relationship with a big age gap - gender regardless - it’s toxic as fuck and the person writing in insists until they are blue in the face that their relationship is different. Until they come back six months later after the breakup.
That’s why it’s hard to believe them. Because it’s always a lot easier to see toxicity from the outside. For everybody.
This is true for almost every failed relationship? Everyone says they're happy until they're not. The friend that complains all the time - eventually their friends tell them to GTFO or shut up and of course on the internet they can complain forever. It's trendy for people to refer to all exes and all past relationships as toxic. Just because someone complains after, doesn't make me automatically think they were hiding it before. Perspective is everything and all that.
Nobody bats an eyelash if you have two thirty-year-olds, one a struggling artist or entrepreneur, one a stockbroker who makes seven figures, and tut tuts over which one has the power in the relationship;
...
Oh yes, we absolutely fucking do, and the lower earner inevitably gets fucked over in the breakup in these relationships, too, just like she gets eventually fucked over when she's the younger woman. Not always, but often enough that it's never a surprise.
So we need to only date within our social/economic class now?
Power imbalances are only a problem when it comes to assholes. If people in power didn't commonly abuse that power, and instead made it part of their awareness in their actions to avoid abusing, then none of these relationships would be seen as so bad. I think we've been making progress on reducing the number of assholes (hopefully? long arc of progress and all that...)
posted by LizBoBiz at 5:24 PM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
But I also am having a hard time seeing this as any different from other mistakes people make in relationships? People date alcoholics and drug addicts that are bad for them. People date assholes and jerks and all kinds of people that they shouldn't date.
Why is it that for these relationships in particular, people think you shouldn't even be able to make the mistake at all? Yes, I know people are young and immature but when is someone an adult? Is 25 and 55 ok? 30 and 60? Maybe we just let people make their own mistakes because thats life and you make choices and some are good and some are bad and you learn and life goes on.
Anybody who spends five days looking at relationship advice boards knows that 9/10 times someone writes about a relationship with a big age gap - gender regardless - it’s toxic as fuck and the person writing in insists until they are blue in the face that their relationship is different. Until they come back six months later after the breakup.
That’s why it’s hard to believe them. Because it’s always a lot easier to see toxicity from the outside. For everybody.
This is true for almost every failed relationship? Everyone says they're happy until they're not. The friend that complains all the time - eventually their friends tell them to GTFO or shut up and of course on the internet they can complain forever. It's trendy for people to refer to all exes and all past relationships as toxic. Just because someone complains after, doesn't make me automatically think they were hiding it before. Perspective is everything and all that.
Nobody bats an eyelash if you have two thirty-year-olds, one a struggling artist or entrepreneur, one a stockbroker who makes seven figures, and tut tuts over which one has the power in the relationship;
...
Oh yes, we absolutely fucking do, and the lower earner inevitably gets fucked over in the breakup in these relationships, too, just like she gets eventually fucked over when she's the younger woman. Not always, but often enough that it's never a surprise.
So we need to only date within our social/economic class now?
Power imbalances are only a problem when it comes to assholes. If people in power didn't commonly abuse that power, and instead made it part of their awareness in their actions to avoid abusing, then none of these relationships would be seen as so bad. I think we've been making progress on reducing the number of assholes (hopefully? long arc of progress and all that...)
posted by LizBoBiz at 5:24 PM on December 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
Nobody but NOBODY has answered the most basic question/s... Mrs. IndelibleUnderpants is younger than me. We have had a long term relationship and marriage for 26 years. Her Grandmother was in a retirement home and started 'dating' a much younger guy which was the talk of bingo/knitting/crafting/general get-together sessions. 'They're alone in that room together you know.' ' Well that is plain scandalous'. 'I wish it was me in the room right now' etc.
So... please tell me exactly what is an 'acceptable' and 'unacceptable' age difference and why. Then, following some posts I will answer the two questions arising from what I have stated above...
posted by IndelibleUnderpants at 7:02 PM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
So... please tell me exactly what is an 'acceptable' and 'unacceptable' age difference and why. Then, following some posts I will answer the two questions arising from what I have stated above...
posted by IndelibleUnderpants at 7:02 PM on December 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Honestly, I think the younger the younger partner is, the worse it is. We have a whole lot less complaints when someone's 30 vs 50 as opposed to 18 vs 38. If you're at least into your late twenties when the relationship starts, it doesn't seem quite as bad to date someone older. At least that person's not so fresh/new/innocent/has no idea what they are getting into if the older partner turns out to be shady.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:53 PM on December 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:53 PM on December 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
Why is it that for these relationships in particular, people think you shouldn't even be able to make the mistake at all?
I’m sure someone, somewhere on the internet, thinks this, because you can find basically any opinion once on the internet. But as a practical matter, this seems to be a straw man.
Yeah, people will think it’s a bad idea. Reasonable people will have negative opinions about in an older partner who dates exclusively younger people for obviously bad reasons, or an older partner who dates someone younger in which the power differential is an obvious problem (eg. a 39-yo dating a 17-yo who was still in high school when the relationship began, in one particular example of my acquaintance) and especially who seems to be exhibiting other red flags (such as each successive girlfriend having been younger than the next for a decade, denying that there could even potentially be an issue with that, and neglecting (literally and financially) his own underage child in order to pursue the child’s at-the-time best friend, in the example of my acquaintance noted above; or the 37-yo who started dating a 21-yo after having been in a bit of a mentorship role to younger folks in community theatre, including her since she was 15 and going to school with his adopted kids, in another slightly less egregious case of my acquaintance (she at least had some experience living in her own and holding down her own job when they started dating and before they moved in together)). But there doesn’t seem to be any serious suggestion that the age for statutory rape be raised to 25 anywhere.
As an ethical matter, I think it’s reasonable to expect fully adult people to understand that teenagers explore their sexuality as a normal developmental stage, which sometimes includes making or trying to make bad choices for themselves, and to expect fully adult people to make more responsible decisions about the way they interact with teenagers no matter what is on offer from the teenager. I certainly have made decisions about friendships and who I’ll associate with in response to the above-mentioned late-30s guys’ actions, and local community theatre groups have made decisions about their involvement (especially the first guy) as well. This isn’t incompatible with supporting the younger people involved, or that it doesn’t reflect negatively on a teenager that they might be attracted to an older person (or anyone that they might want a relationship in which they are socially or economically - not, or not just, sexually - a sub), or supporting the same age difference in a relationship between people who are both a bit older and more experienced.
posted by eviemath at 8:33 PM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
I’m sure someone, somewhere on the internet, thinks this, because you can find basically any opinion once on the internet. But as a practical matter, this seems to be a straw man.
Yeah, people will think it’s a bad idea. Reasonable people will have negative opinions about in an older partner who dates exclusively younger people for obviously bad reasons, or an older partner who dates someone younger in which the power differential is an obvious problem (eg. a 39-yo dating a 17-yo who was still in high school when the relationship began, in one particular example of my acquaintance) and especially who seems to be exhibiting other red flags (such as each successive girlfriend having been younger than the next for a decade, denying that there could even potentially be an issue with that, and neglecting (literally and financially) his own underage child in order to pursue the child’s at-the-time best friend, in the example of my acquaintance noted above; or the 37-yo who started dating a 21-yo after having been in a bit of a mentorship role to younger folks in community theatre, including her since she was 15 and going to school with his adopted kids, in another slightly less egregious case of my acquaintance (she at least had some experience living in her own and holding down her own job when they started dating and before they moved in together)). But there doesn’t seem to be any serious suggestion that the age for statutory rape be raised to 25 anywhere.
As an ethical matter, I think it’s reasonable to expect fully adult people to understand that teenagers explore their sexuality as a normal developmental stage, which sometimes includes making or trying to make bad choices for themselves, and to expect fully adult people to make more responsible decisions about the way they interact with teenagers no matter what is on offer from the teenager. I certainly have made decisions about friendships and who I’ll associate with in response to the above-mentioned late-30s guys’ actions, and local community theatre groups have made decisions about their involvement (especially the first guy) as well. This isn’t incompatible with supporting the younger people involved, or that it doesn’t reflect negatively on a teenager that they might be attracted to an older person (or anyone that they might want a relationship in which they are socially or economically - not, or not just, sexually - a sub), or supporting the same age difference in a relationship between people who are both a bit older and more experienced.
posted by eviemath at 8:33 PM on December 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
(The first guy in my comment above is also a “self-described feminist”, for what it’s worth. /insert eyeroll + side eye emojis here/)
posted by eviemath at 9:06 PM on December 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by eviemath at 9:06 PM on December 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
My ex and current guy are both dudes a few years younger than me who look older ( thanks for the delayed graying genes Mom). My theory on this is that I like the more evolved attitudes of younger dudes but am also attracted to guys who are extremely responsible and mature types. It balances out.
But I have never had a serious thing for anyone more than ten years younger, because somewhere around there I start feeling maternal (or maybe sisterly) and protective instead and want to ask them if they're eating properly, and have they found a good therapist? And so on. The (few) times much younger guys have given me the eye it was like being flirted with by a baby bird, adorable, but not going anywhere.
But my only real rule is that nobody really knows what a relationship is like except the people in it. If no abuse is taking place and everyone is of age, well, my opinion isn't really relevant.
posted by emjaybee at 9:07 PM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
But I have never had a serious thing for anyone more than ten years younger, because somewhere around there I start feeling maternal (or maybe sisterly) and protective instead and want to ask them if they're eating properly, and have they found a good therapist? And so on. The (few) times much younger guys have given me the eye it was like being flirted with by a baby bird, adorable, but not going anywhere.
But my only real rule is that nobody really knows what a relationship is like except the people in it. If no abuse is taking place and everyone is of age, well, my opinion isn't really relevant.
posted by emjaybee at 9:07 PM on December 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
As a woman i think it's very common to go through a a series of horrifying realizations with this.
When i was like 16-19, i had a lot of friends who were dating men who were 25-30. It bugged me a bit at the time, but i didn't think too much of it. Some of those guys were weird, some of them weren't. By the time i was in my 20s, there were a lot of like 23~ year old woman, 40~ year old man relationships.
When i hit my late 20s it hit me like a brick wall how fucking weird it was to want to date a 18-20 year old, and as i've moved into my 30s it's felt more and more fucked up every year. Like, i distinctly remember my friends boyfriends who were my current age and it just seems absolutely insane to me. I'm not even quite 35, and 20 year olds just come off as high schoolers to me.
It's also been very, very noticeable and apparent that i don't run in any social circles where anyone is in a relationship like that. I have quite a few friends in their mid 20s, but they're all dating people their age. Everyone my age is dating... other people my age, at least. Some of them are 27-35 and dating people who are 45~ but that's just, not weird, and not the same vibe at all.
This is a bit rambly but my thesis here is, what are these mens social circles like? Who do they spend time around, other than the young people that they're dating? I have a very queer existence, but i just don't run across them. Like, is this as socially unpopular of behavior as it feels to me?
posted by emptythought at 2:07 AM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
When i was like 16-19, i had a lot of friends who were dating men who were 25-30. It bugged me a bit at the time, but i didn't think too much of it. Some of those guys were weird, some of them weren't. By the time i was in my 20s, there were a lot of like 23~ year old woman, 40~ year old man relationships.
When i hit my late 20s it hit me like a brick wall how fucking weird it was to want to date a 18-20 year old, and as i've moved into my 30s it's felt more and more fucked up every year. Like, i distinctly remember my friends boyfriends who were my current age and it just seems absolutely insane to me. I'm not even quite 35, and 20 year olds just come off as high schoolers to me.
It's also been very, very noticeable and apparent that i don't run in any social circles where anyone is in a relationship like that. I have quite a few friends in their mid 20s, but they're all dating people their age. Everyone my age is dating... other people my age, at least. Some of them are 27-35 and dating people who are 45~ but that's just, not weird, and not the same vibe at all.
This is a bit rambly but my thesis here is, what are these mens social circles like? Who do they spend time around, other than the young people that they're dating? I have a very queer existence, but i just don't run across them. Like, is this as socially unpopular of behavior as it feels to me?
posted by emptythought at 2:07 AM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
I have a very queer existence, but i just don't run across them. Like, is this as socially unpopular of behavior as it feels to me?
Not being flippant here: I think that was a major impetus for the article. It is or is perceived as socially unpopular. The people I know in relationships with substantial age gaps (or that started with significant power differentials!) either don't tend to talk about it, or they bring it up regularly, so I'm not sure about frequency in my social circles (white, many sexualities, academic, etc.). Like, I'll know someone for months or years, and they'll casually mention the 10-year gap or whatever.
The few guys I've known with very substantial age gaps have tended to have their own social circles that don't really overlap with their partners'.
I agree with the points above that this is not something that we probably want to normalize in our society.
Unless I'm mistaken, no one has actually linked here information beyond that in the original article, pointing to how normal it is or is not. Here are some statistics about age gap relationships (the framing of the stats will make many roll their eyes). Also, from Wikipedia.
posted by cupcakeninja at 4:51 AM on December 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Not being flippant here: I think that was a major impetus for the article. It is or is perceived as socially unpopular. The people I know in relationships with substantial age gaps (or that started with significant power differentials!) either don't tend to talk about it, or they bring it up regularly, so I'm not sure about frequency in my social circles (white, many sexualities, academic, etc.). Like, I'll know someone for months or years, and they'll casually mention the 10-year gap or whatever.
The few guys I've known with very substantial age gaps have tended to have their own social circles that don't really overlap with their partners'.
I agree with the points above that this is not something that we probably want to normalize in our society.
Unless I'm mistaken, no one has actually linked here information beyond that in the original article, pointing to how normal it is or is not. Here are some statistics about age gap relationships (the framing of the stats will make many roll their eyes). Also, from Wikipedia.
posted by cupcakeninja at 4:51 AM on December 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Nobody but NOBODY has answered the most basic question/s... Mrs. IndelibleUnderpants is younger than me. We have had a long term relationship and marriage for 26 years. Her Grandmother was in a retirement home and started 'dating' a much younger guy
Well, my hot take on this matter is that it's fine for women to date much younger men but never okay for men to date much younger women. And that's because the former does not amplify structural oppressions in society but the latter does. The former by it's very nature goes against structural forces in society and is an inherently exceptional situation.
The latter follows along the unfair and oppressive ruts set up by society, it's normalized, and therefore automatically suspect until proven otherwise. Each instance of the latter needs to be investigated before we can accept it to be an exceptional case.
posted by MiraK at 4:58 AM on December 22, 2023 [5 favorites]
Well, my hot take on this matter is that it's fine for women to date much younger men but never okay for men to date much younger women. And that's because the former does not amplify structural oppressions in society but the latter does. The former by it's very nature goes against structural forces in society and is an inherently exceptional situation.
The latter follows along the unfair and oppressive ruts set up by society, it's normalized, and therefore automatically suspect until proven otherwise. Each instance of the latter needs to be investigated before we can accept it to be an exceptional case.
posted by MiraK at 4:58 AM on December 22, 2023 [5 favorites]
Each instance of the latter needs to be investigated before we can accept it to be an exceptional case.
'Investigated' by whom? Who is this jury of 'we' that must pass formal adjudication before random people's interpersonal relationships are deemed acceptable? When did everyone's life choices become mandatorily submitted to the jury of everyone? Are we all famous people now, subject to the court of public opinion and collective judgment regardless of whether or not we lead public lives?
I fully understand and support that some interpersonal relationships are problematic because of unequal power dynamics that amplify any abusive and/or manipulative behaviors...but holy shit, a lot of this thread needs to get over itself. No adult requires anybody else's permission to live their lives, mistakes and all. Your judgments are just your own opinions on other people's life choices, which is to say, spectator commentary. No one here holds any moral authority over anyone else.
posted by LooseFilter at 6:08 AM on December 22, 2023 [11 favorites]
'Investigated' by whom? Who is this jury of 'we' that must pass formal adjudication before random people's interpersonal relationships are deemed acceptable? When did everyone's life choices become mandatorily submitted to the jury of everyone? Are we all famous people now, subject to the court of public opinion and collective judgment regardless of whether or not we lead public lives?
I fully understand and support that some interpersonal relationships are problematic because of unequal power dynamics that amplify any abusive and/or manipulative behaviors...but holy shit, a lot of this thread needs to get over itself. No adult requires anybody else's permission to live their lives, mistakes and all. Your judgments are just your own opinions on other people's life choices, which is to say, spectator commentary. No one here holds any moral authority over anyone else.
posted by LooseFilter at 6:08 AM on December 22, 2023 [11 favorites]
The few guys I've known with very substantial age gaps have tended to have their own social circles that don't really overlap with their partners'.
IME, this is true. In my former age-gap relationship, I was hanging out with his friends (all of whom had partners around their own age), but he would never hang out with mine. I will say that my dating someone that much older also meant my own friends weren't interested in hanging out with him either, finding our relationship odd.
posted by Kitteh at 6:19 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
IME, this is true. In my former age-gap relationship, I was hanging out with his friends (all of whom had partners around their own age), but he would never hang out with mine. I will say that my dating someone that much older also meant my own friends weren't interested in hanging out with him either, finding our relationship odd.
posted by Kitteh at 6:19 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
IMO anyone thinking that if someone has a problem with a 38 year old dating a 18 year old then they must have a problem with a 80 year old dating a 60 year old then they're either arguing in bad faith or just not paying attention to anything.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:34 AM on December 22, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:34 AM on December 22, 2023 [13 favorites]
(Is anyone actually thinking that? I don't think that's been asserted in this thread...is this just a strawman tossed out there for fun?)
posted by LooseFilter at 6:39 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by LooseFilter at 6:39 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
Being a professor, I’ve interacted with a lot of 18-24-year-olds, getting to know many of them quite well, and my firm opinion is that they are absolutely not “grown” yet. I have not felt a hint of romantic attraction to any of them because they are larval, not yet possessed of the adult characteristics that would make them even register as potential partners to me. They change and transform so much in the four years I work with them, and still at graduation they are only half-formed as human beings. And meeting them a few years after graduation, it’s like they’re whole new people again. They are actively engaged in the process of becoming their own adult self. An age-peer would be growing and changing along with them, but I cannot imagine, as a mature person, what my ethical role would be in that journey. I have my own needs and desires, and having disproportionate power in the relationship, I don’t see how I would avoid hindering their growth in some ways, to keep them from changing from the person I first fell in love with, and also pushing them to change in other ways that suit me but don’t let them authentically come into themselves. It’s entirely too fraught.
posted by BrashTech at 6:44 AM on December 22, 2023 [11 favorites]
posted by BrashTech at 6:44 AM on December 22, 2023 [11 favorites]
Is anyone actually thinking that?
The article that is the sole subject of this fpp is arguing that all age gap relationships are equally scorned by society. The article is poorly researched and sets up a variety of straw men, and it would align with my personal observations if this were another straw man set up by the article. But it comes from the fpp article itself, not our fellow Metafilter commenters.
posted by eviemath at 7:22 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
The article that is the sole subject of this fpp is arguing that all age gap relationships are equally scorned by society. The article is poorly researched and sets up a variety of straw men, and it would align with my personal observations if this were another straw man set up by the article. But it comes from the fpp article itself, not our fellow Metafilter commenters.
posted by eviemath at 7:22 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
Investigated' by whom? Who is this jury of 'we' that must pass formal adjudication
Whomever's approval the older man in question is seeking. (He's free to ignore anyone's disapproval, obviously.)
posted by MiraK at 7:25 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
Whomever's approval the older man in question is seeking. (He's free to ignore anyone's disapproval, obviously.)
posted by MiraK at 7:25 AM on December 22, 2023 [2 favorites]
IMO anyone thinking that if someone has a problem with a 38 year old dating a 18 year old then they must have a problem with a 80 year old dating a 60 year old then they're either arguing in bad faith or just not paying attention to anything.
18 year olds aren’t fully baked and I don’t mind saying it, call me what you want.
posted by bq at 7:55 AM on December 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
18 year olds aren’t fully baked and I don’t mind saying it, call me what you want.
posted by bq at 7:55 AM on December 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
The Ipsos poll and the majority of the Wikipedia article that cupcakeninja linked upthread also focus entirely on specific numeric age gaps, without considering proportional age differences between partners in a relationship. (The Wikipedia article has a section on the half plus seven rule, but doesn’t mention proportional age differences in any other section.) So the conflation of 18yo-38yo and 30yo-50yo relationships seems to be a thing that occurs (even though it seems obvious to me that proportional rather than absolute age gaps would be the more relevant framing).
posted by eviemath at 8:03 AM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by eviemath at 8:03 AM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
Metafilter: We are all disgustingly miserable hypocrites, jealous of anyone who seems to experience any level of happiness
posted by Rykey at 8:21 AM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by Rykey at 8:21 AM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
As ever "scorned by society" means "a minority of people in the internet criticize this thing on ethical grounds and some people who have been hurt by it talk about their experiences".
It's not enough that it is entirely normal for middle aged men to dump their age-appropriate partners and start over with much younger ones and basically normalized for grown men to target any teenage girl from sixteen on up - if we don't actively cheer for the behavior, well, the oppressed have become the oppressor. Feminism has gone too far, etc. You've got to lick the boot in our free speech society.
There is absolutely nothing that prevents older men from dating younger women - pretty much as young as the age of consent - except when the younger women have the ability to say no and choose to decline. There is no powerful cultural consensus against it; it is completely normal. If anything, the most powerful cultural phenomenon is "I resent it when much younger women won't go out with me, we should take away their rights so they can be forced into it".
posted by Frowner at 8:33 AM on December 22, 2023 [27 favorites]
It's not enough that it is entirely normal for middle aged men to dump their age-appropriate partners and start over with much younger ones and basically normalized for grown men to target any teenage girl from sixteen on up - if we don't actively cheer for the behavior, well, the oppressed have become the oppressor. Feminism has gone too far, etc. You've got to lick the boot in our free speech society.
There is absolutely nothing that prevents older men from dating younger women - pretty much as young as the age of consent - except when the younger women have the ability to say no and choose to decline. There is no powerful cultural consensus against it; it is completely normal. If anything, the most powerful cultural phenomenon is "I resent it when much younger women won't go out with me, we should take away their rights so they can be forced into it".
posted by Frowner at 8:33 AM on December 22, 2023 [27 favorites]
Frowner, I'm always grateful for your articulate and incisive commentary. Thank you.
I've been picking up on the hard push in all kinds of internet spaces as to women needing to lick the boot and "feminism has gone too far, etc." (including here at Metafilter) and it terrifies me.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 9:56 AM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
I've been picking up on the hard push in all kinds of internet spaces as to women needing to lick the boot and "feminism has gone too far, etc." (including here at Metafilter) and it terrifies me.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 9:56 AM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
god, even 35 seems young to me now, so :shrug:
Someone once asked me when I was in my 40's whether I would consider dating guys in their 20's. My quip was: "I remember what dating 20-year-old guys was like from when I was also in my 20s, and that's exactly why I do NOT want to date guys in their 20s."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:53 AM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
Someone once asked me when I was in my 40's whether I would consider dating guys in their 20's. My quip was: "I remember what dating 20-year-old guys was like from when I was also in my 20s, and that's exactly why I do NOT want to date guys in their 20s."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:53 AM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
I saw this discussion blow up on Tumblr a few weeks ago. Yes, I assure you, there are people out there who think a 50 year old man dating a 47 year old woman (or vice/versa) is a predator, because age gap. People online tend to take this stuff to extremes, and boy, has it ever been.
posted by rednikki at 12:21 PM on December 22, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by rednikki at 12:21 PM on December 22, 2023 [7 favorites]
Other people don't have to like or approve of age-gap relationships or "accept" them by making the couple part of their social circle. And being concerned if you think someone is in an abusive relationship of any sort is a good thing, though from what I've read the best thing to do there is to keep in touch to offer a way out when the abused partner is ready to leave.
I guess I just think shunning people for dating or marrying a person you think is too old/young is weird to me. If the relationship is (part of) a revelation that changes how you feel about your friend's character to the point where it ruins the friendship, that makes sense. But you could also try adding people of a different age group to your social circle? I guess I believe in intergenerational friendships strongly enough that ruling out intergenerational romances on principle is weird.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 12:30 PM on December 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
I guess I just think shunning people for dating or marrying a person you think is too old/young is weird to me. If the relationship is (part of) a revelation that changes how you feel about your friend's character to the point where it ruins the friendship, that makes sense. But you could also try adding people of a different age group to your social circle? I guess I believe in intergenerational friendships strongly enough that ruling out intergenerational romances on principle is weird.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 12:30 PM on December 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
... now people think we object to older men dating much younger women because we are uncomfortable with intergenerational amity? And people think we're expressing our objections by shunning the much younger woman? That's a brand new straw man, that is.
posted by MiraK at 3:23 PM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by MiraK at 3:23 PM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
I saw this discussion blow up on Tumblr a few weeks ago. Yes, I assure you, there are people out there who think a 50 year old man dating a 47 year old woman (or vice/versa) is a predator, because age gap.
Something WRT Tumblr in particular is that its membership/commenters still seem to tend to skew pretty young, and thus may not have much life experience to draw on. I'm still moderately astounded thinking about the thread in which someone seemed to think that they could get their local power grid up and running using box fans as little windmills just by going to the local Home Depot and, you know, just sort of figuring things out. I've also seen a lot of ageism there, with people arguing vociferously that middle-aged and older people should stay out of fandom, period, even fandoms that they helped create.
posted by Halloween Jack at 3:36 PM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
Something WRT Tumblr in particular is that its membership/commenters still seem to tend to skew pretty young, and thus may not have much life experience to draw on. I'm still moderately astounded thinking about the thread in which someone seemed to think that they could get their local power grid up and running using box fans as little windmills just by going to the local Home Depot and, you know, just sort of figuring things out. I've also seen a lot of ageism there, with people arguing vociferously that middle-aged and older people should stay out of fandom, period, even fandoms that they helped create.
posted by Halloween Jack at 3:36 PM on December 22, 2023 [6 favorites]
There’s a lot of “when I was 20 I dated someone in their 40s and it wasn’t great” and a conspicuous absence of “I’m 40 and currently dating a 20 year old”. Hmmmmm
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 7:10 PM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 7:10 PM on December 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
There’s a lot of “when I was 20 I dated someone in their 40s and it wasn’t great” and a conspicuous absence of “I’m 40 and currently dating a 20 year old”. Hmmmmm
Over and above the reasons a person might not want to admit that in this discussion given the overall tone, I'm guessing that there is a smaller number of 40+ year olds (mostly men) for whom this is their thing -- they date one younger person after another. They're like, the non-celebrity version of DiCaprio, but they aren't the majority by any means.
Then, there is a much larger number of people who as 20-somethings dated an older person once or twice. Maybe the enjoyed it, maybe hated it, but then they moved on in life to more normative age-synchronous relationships.
(Personally I'm in neither camp, I've always had relationships very close to my age, but I've watched friends and colleagues take different paths on this over the years.)
posted by Dip Flash at 7:48 PM on December 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
Over and above the reasons a person might not want to admit that in this discussion given the overall tone, I'm guessing that there is a smaller number of 40+ year olds (mostly men) for whom this is their thing -- they date one younger person after another. They're like, the non-celebrity version of DiCaprio, but they aren't the majority by any means.
Then, there is a much larger number of people who as 20-somethings dated an older person once or twice. Maybe the enjoyed it, maybe hated it, but then they moved on in life to more normative age-synchronous relationships.
(Personally I'm in neither camp, I've always had relationships very close to my age, but I've watched friends and colleagues take different paths on this over the years.)
posted by Dip Flash at 7:48 PM on December 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
Mod note: One removed; please don't call people / their comments "insane" when you mean "I feel like this is a bad take." Explain your own ideas and don't attack others.
posted by taz (staff) at 11:07 PM on December 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by taz (staff) at 11:07 PM on December 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
As some mefites are aware, I’m a domestic violence victim advocate. I’ll be honest, I didn’t read the entire article because today is Saturday and that article was too much like being at work. But I read far enough to feel the need to mention (after reminding everyone that the worst domestic violence isn’t physical) that I spend most of my time during every single first meeting with a client (2-3 hours) listening to them talk about the relationship, and continuously pointing out the instances of power-and-control abuse. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve had to say “You are an adult; they don’t get to make decisions for you and tell you what to do.”, to extremely intelligent, competent women whom you would never guess were in an abusive relationship. They invariably stop short, look confused for a second, and then it dawns on them: “You’re right! Oh my god, why didn’t I see what he was doing to me?!? I feel so stupid!”
There is very often, although not always, an age gap of 10 years or more. But in every single relationship, it’s all about power and control, and age gaps definitely play into that. Almost every single one of these women were living successful lives before they entered into the relationship, and some are still successful by society’s measurements - they are nurses; they run businesses; they manage to get advanced degrees while raising 3 children and dealing with an abusive partner who has untreated PTSD/manic depression/schizophrenia/drug use. On the outside, they look great and if asked, they would say their relationship is great, because they’re too embarrassed to tell anyone, or, more often than you’d suspect, they don’t actually realize that it’s not great. Not yet. Then one day, something clicks in their head, and they come to see us.
And as I said, I didn’t read the entire article, but a search showed they didn’t mention Courtney Stoddard. Courtney was so sure that she wasn’t being abused that she went back to him more than once, over the course of more than a decade, IIRC.
posted by MexicanYenta at 5:40 AM on December 23, 2023 [14 favorites]
There is very often, although not always, an age gap of 10 years or more. But in every single relationship, it’s all about power and control, and age gaps definitely play into that. Almost every single one of these women were living successful lives before they entered into the relationship, and some are still successful by society’s measurements - they are nurses; they run businesses; they manage to get advanced degrees while raising 3 children and dealing with an abusive partner who has untreated PTSD/manic depression/schizophrenia/drug use. On the outside, they look great and if asked, they would say their relationship is great, because they’re too embarrassed to tell anyone, or, more often than you’d suspect, they don’t actually realize that it’s not great. Not yet. Then one day, something clicks in their head, and they come to see us.
And as I said, I didn’t read the entire article, but a search showed they didn’t mention Courtney Stoddard. Courtney was so sure that she wasn’t being abused that she went back to him more than once, over the course of more than a decade, IIRC.
posted by MexicanYenta at 5:40 AM on December 23, 2023 [14 favorites]
And people think we're expressing our objections
Who is the collective 'we' in the thread for whom you are speaking?
posted by LooseFilter at 6:24 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Who is the collective 'we' in the thread for whom you are speaking?
posted by LooseFilter at 6:24 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
It seems clear to me from context that MiraK was referring to people (both on Metafilter and off) who had expressed similar concerns about the potential for unhealthy power differentials in certain age gap relationships as themself.
Not every “we” has to nor intends to include you, and I’m sure no one reading this thread will lump you in with MiraK. … Wait, you’re not the guy I knew in college who was upset about the title of the women’s health book ‘Our Bodies Ourselves’ because he thought that anything using “our” should relate to him, are you?
All of us here on Metafilter come from different backgrounds, and we have a range of neurovariety, so of course not everyone will pick up on context clues all the time, and it’s good form when writing our comments to try to make any context or assumptions explicit. But maybe first try asking with a more open and generous rather than fighty approach when something isn’t clear to you, hey? In cases like this thread where you seem to have had several questions or confusions about the context, I think it would also be quite reasonable to - after a re-read of the article and earlier comments on your own in case you missed some details that were already presented - request that fellow Mefites take a little more care in writing clear comments.
And when you want to express an opinion, just express your opinion. On an abstract level, I can see the humor in JAQ-off comments in this thread as sly metacommentary about older men dating much younger women being dicks. But it doesn’t really help us have a productive conversation.
posted by eviemath at 7:09 AM on December 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
Not every “we” has to nor intends to include you, and I’m sure no one reading this thread will lump you in with MiraK. … Wait, you’re not the guy I knew in college who was upset about the title of the women’s health book ‘Our Bodies Ourselves’ because he thought that anything using “our” should relate to him, are you?
All of us here on Metafilter come from different backgrounds, and we have a range of neurovariety, so of course not everyone will pick up on context clues all the time, and it’s good form when writing our comments to try to make any context or assumptions explicit. But maybe first try asking with a more open and generous rather than fighty approach when something isn’t clear to you, hey? In cases like this thread where you seem to have had several questions or confusions about the context, I think it would also be quite reasonable to - after a re-read of the article and earlier comments on your own in case you missed some details that were already presented - request that fellow Mefites take a little more care in writing clear comments.
And when you want to express an opinion, just express your opinion. On an abstract level, I can see the humor in JAQ-off comments in this thread as sly metacommentary about older men dating much younger women being dicks. But it doesn’t really help us have a productive conversation.
posted by eviemath at 7:09 AM on December 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
And when you want to express an opinion, just express your opinion.
That's my point: speak for yourself, please. I don't think every 'we' needs to include me, but several comments definitely have been worded as if they speak for a collective consensus in this thread that is not apparent. Am I conversing with a committee here? It sure seems like it.
rather than fighty approach
I can see the humor in JAQ-off comments in this thread as sly metacommentary
Respectfully, I think this is inference rather than implication, but thanks for the insult, I guess. If my comments/questions are too brief to allow for adequate context, allow me to clarify here that I am confused rather than fighty. But clearly my questions are not germane to the conversation that 'we' would rather have, so I'll just exit the thread.
posted by LooseFilter at 7:30 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
That's my point: speak for yourself, please. I don't think every 'we' needs to include me, but several comments definitely have been worded as if they speak for a collective consensus in this thread that is not apparent. Am I conversing with a committee here? It sure seems like it.
rather than fighty approach
I can see the humor in JAQ-off comments in this thread as sly metacommentary
Respectfully, I think this is inference rather than implication, but thanks for the insult, I guess. If my comments/questions are too brief to allow for adequate context, allow me to clarify here that I am confused rather than fighty. But clearly my questions are not germane to the conversation that 'we' would rather have, so I'll just exit the thread.
posted by LooseFilter at 7:30 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
That's my point: speak for yourself, please.
In this sentence and in my quote to which you allude, we are making different points that are orthogonal to each other. My point was that it is better to state your opinion directly rather than to circuitously imply it via a seemingly rhetorical question (because, yes, your question did come across as opinion rather than actual question). This applies equally well when one is speaking of an opinion shared with a subset of other commenters who, it seems to me, anyone following the thread can relatively easily identify. But I do understand that what seems clear to me isn’t going to seem clear to everyone - and vice versa in other situations, of course. Some phrasing that would make it more clear that you were asking for clarification on the “we” and not trying to state an opinion could be something like, “This is confusing. Could you please clarify who you mean to include in “we”?”
posted by eviemath at 8:06 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
In this sentence and in my quote to which you allude, we are making different points that are orthogonal to each other. My point was that it is better to state your opinion directly rather than to circuitously imply it via a seemingly rhetorical question (because, yes, your question did come across as opinion rather than actual question). This applies equally well when one is speaking of an opinion shared with a subset of other commenters who, it seems to me, anyone following the thread can relatively easily identify. But I do understand that what seems clear to me isn’t going to seem clear to everyone - and vice versa in other situations, of course. Some phrasing that would make it more clear that you were asking for clarification on the “we” and not trying to state an opinion could be something like, “This is confusing. Could you please clarify who you mean to include in “we”?”
posted by eviemath at 8:06 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
If, as you seem to be saying initially, your goal was commentary/opinion, rephrasing it directly could look, for example, like, “Yo, one of the failings of the fpp article is that it uses anonymous sources and posits an opinion as widely held based on a few random examples, without backing that up with any data. Could you not do the same in the comments by using an undefined ‘we’ when stating your opinion?”
posted by eviemath at 8:12 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by eviemath at 8:12 AM on December 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Heh, maybe I shouldn't joke around when there's genuine confusion. :)
By 'we' I meant 'the people on this thread who generally disapprove of older men dating much younger women'. (And in context, the 'not-we' set would be the folks on this thread who think that shit is great because intergenerational mingling! or folks who think it's fine/harmless/not anyone else's business to judge/etc.)
And yes, I'm confident that I can speak for all of 'us' on the specific point that 'our' objection to men dating much younger women is definitely not based on an aversion towards (in the exact words of the comment I was responding to) "adding people of a different age group to ['our'] social circle". My confidence comes from reading this thread in which the actual basis of 'our' objections have been stated multiple times.
posted by MiraK at 9:18 AM on December 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
“I’m 40 and currently dating a 20 year old”. Hmmmmm
I'm 40 (AMAB) dating a 24 year old (AFAB) for three years now and I have no desire to put my relationship up for scrutiny to people who clearly hold me in disdain...
...but for what it's worth our respective (non-affiliated) therapists are cool with it. I definitely feel like an exception rather than the rule but I guess everyone would. The key is to not hide from asking questions like "is this relationship healthy" but to answer them honestly.
posted by Jarcat at 10:08 AM on December 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
I'm 40 (AMAB) dating a 24 year old (AFAB) for three years now and I have no desire to put my relationship up for scrutiny to people who clearly hold me in disdain...
...but for what it's worth our respective (non-affiliated) therapists are cool with it. I definitely feel like an exception rather than the rule but I guess everyone would. The key is to not hide from asking questions like "is this relationship healthy" but to answer them honestly.
posted by Jarcat at 10:08 AM on December 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
I'll be in my fifties when the kid graduates high school.
I'm 58, and my youngest child (of four) is 16. He is, in many ways, the light of my life, but I also wonder whether I would have taken him on if I'd known what one's 40s can do to one, especially if you have, as I did, an exceptionally tough perimenopause.
I'm currently dating a 44 yo, and our 14-year age gap feels bigger to me than some of the age gaps I've had in past relationships, that were bigger. As a young woman, I was very into older women, and relationships in my 20s had gaps like 22-27, 23-38, 23-32, 23-42, and 27-52. At 48, I had a wonderful relationship with a 27-year-old; we are still close friends.
I'm queer and poly, and I have a tendency to be really open to people unlike me. I've always found people my own age hot, but as a young person, I found older people attractive (and I still do), and clearly I'm not opposed to being involved with younger people. But what I learned from being on both sides of the age gap is that there has to be respect. My 27-year-old girlfriend liked to tell me what a "baby" I was, and we did not last long.
But I was going to say, that age gap felt quite big to me. We met in graduate school, where I had come right from undergrad and where she had come after several years in the workforce. It seemed to me that that difference in experience was a really meaningful difference. It was only five years, but our life experiences were very different.
Now, with the 44 year old, I don't feel so much of a difference between in life experience or whatever, but I do have these moments when, say, my financial advisor will mention something like, "You can begin taking disbursements from your 401(k) in two years," that I feel the very real difference in our positions in life. I certainly felt a lot younger at 44 than I do at 58. Post-menopausal, It's obvious i'm in a different stage of life. This doesn't mean I don't want to stay close to this person; they're quite wonderful. I'm just aware of how much difference a few years can make at certain stages of life.
posted by Well I never at 2:34 PM on December 23, 2023 [8 favorites]
I'm 58, and my youngest child (of four) is 16. He is, in many ways, the light of my life, but I also wonder whether I would have taken him on if I'd known what one's 40s can do to one, especially if you have, as I did, an exceptionally tough perimenopause.
I'm currently dating a 44 yo, and our 14-year age gap feels bigger to me than some of the age gaps I've had in past relationships, that were bigger. As a young woman, I was very into older women, and relationships in my 20s had gaps like 22-27, 23-38, 23-32, 23-42, and 27-52. At 48, I had a wonderful relationship with a 27-year-old; we are still close friends.
I'm queer and poly, and I have a tendency to be really open to people unlike me. I've always found people my own age hot, but as a young person, I found older people attractive (and I still do), and clearly I'm not opposed to being involved with younger people. But what I learned from being on both sides of the age gap is that there has to be respect. My 27-year-old girlfriend liked to tell me what a "baby" I was, and we did not last long.
But I was going to say, that age gap felt quite big to me. We met in graduate school, where I had come right from undergrad and where she had come after several years in the workforce. It seemed to me that that difference in experience was a really meaningful difference. It was only five years, but our life experiences were very different.
Now, with the 44 year old, I don't feel so much of a difference between in life experience or whatever, but I do have these moments when, say, my financial advisor will mention something like, "You can begin taking disbursements from your 401(k) in two years," that I feel the very real difference in our positions in life. I certainly felt a lot younger at 44 than I do at 58. Post-menopausal, It's obvious i'm in a different stage of life. This doesn't mean I don't want to stay close to this person; they're quite wonderful. I'm just aware of how much difference a few years can make at certain stages of life.
posted by Well I never at 2:34 PM on December 23, 2023 [8 favorites]
As the person who made the supposed straw man comment, actually I've been in an abusive marriage with an older man--five years older. I think abusive relationships happen in all age groups and in all directions. I also don't like infantilizing adults, especially women, by telling them their agency in romantic/sexual/partnership relationships isn't real. As a feminist, I object to the idea that a stranger to me thinks that my adult woman self is incapable of making decisions about who to fuck or live with or marry. This is the same logic that leads to garbage like protecting women from regretting an abortion or keeping them from being unhealthily fat. Women already hear judgmental rhetoric all the time. Reinforcing the mainstream view that women can't make decisions for themselves is not a feminist act IMHO.
Abusers gonna abuse but grown up women get to make shitty decisions. Help abused partners get out of shitty relationships where abusive partners control money and other life aspects and when, $DEITY forbid, hitting starts, please, but telling adults that dating out of their age lane is inherently wrong is about your own hangups as much as about whether an individual relationship is abusive.
When I talk about bringing people into your social circle, I mean get to know a couple before you make a firm decision about their relationship instead of using age differences as a proxy for whether it's a good or bad relationship. It's one thing to say a 50 year old man with a long track record of dumping girls at 25 is gross. But not every dude is Leonardo DiCaprio and until you know the partners in a relationship, you don't know that. And if the issue here is that Metafilter is full of Gen Xers and Boomers with icky dude friends who are dating super young women and you think that's gross, deal with that. (And if he's your man's friend and he won't do anything, what are you doing about that?)
I'm not even getting into queer relationships here because I don't know about that, but I know about the difference between abusive and age gap relationships. There can be overlap but the Venn diagram isn't a circle.
And, just because there are judgey people in this thread, Mr Epigrams is the older partner in our marriage. By 23 days.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 3:22 PM on December 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
Abusers gonna abuse but grown up women get to make shitty decisions. Help abused partners get out of shitty relationships where abusive partners control money and other life aspects and when, $DEITY forbid, hitting starts, please, but telling adults that dating out of their age lane is inherently wrong is about your own hangups as much as about whether an individual relationship is abusive.
When I talk about bringing people into your social circle, I mean get to know a couple before you make a firm decision about their relationship instead of using age differences as a proxy for whether it's a good or bad relationship. It's one thing to say a 50 year old man with a long track record of dumping girls at 25 is gross. But not every dude is Leonardo DiCaprio and until you know the partners in a relationship, you don't know that. And if the issue here is that Metafilter is full of Gen Xers and Boomers with icky dude friends who are dating super young women and you think that's gross, deal with that. (And if he's your man's friend and he won't do anything, what are you doing about that?)
I'm not even getting into queer relationships here because I don't know about that, but I know about the difference between abusive and age gap relationships. There can be overlap but the Venn diagram isn't a circle.
And, just because there are judgey people in this thread, Mr Epigrams is the older partner in our marriage. By 23 days.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 3:22 PM on December 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
telling them their agency in romantic/sexual/partnership relationships isn't real. As a feminist, I object to the idea that a stranger to me thinks that my adult woman self is incapable of making decisions about who to fuck or live with or marry.
Who is doing this? Some judgey potentially pre-teens on tumblr mentioned in one of the comments above? I don’t doubt that it happens outside of that context as well. But some of the actual data linked upthread seems to indicate that negative judgement of age gap relationships is still a minority opinion. In all cases in my personal experience, where age gaps involving a younger partner with minimal adult life experience or relationships that are otherwise quite power-imbalanced in an unhealthy way, all judgement is reserved for and directed at the partner that seems to be taking advantage or being the source of unhealthiness or abuse in a relationship. I do tend to run in feminist and pro-feminist circles, and live in a rural area where multi-generational social groups are more the norm (albeit multi-generational romantic relationships, more prevalent than other places I’ve lived, are still fairly rare, and tend to begin when both partners are at least late 20s to early 30s with the stereotypical late 30s guy chasing late teens girl being the notable exceptions).
I have heard that lots of people have the experience that random (non-feminist) people in their lives blame the abused partner in abusive relationships (probably people around me think this, but know enough not to express such an opinion to me or within my hearing). And of course there is the gold digger stereotype (which feminists of my acquaintance note the sexism of).
Given that the article in the fpp tried (I believe incorrectly) to lay this on feminists, I think it’s important in our discussion here to be more clear about attribution.
posted by eviemath at 4:10 PM on December 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
Who is doing this? Some judgey potentially pre-teens on tumblr mentioned in one of the comments above? I don’t doubt that it happens outside of that context as well. But some of the actual data linked upthread seems to indicate that negative judgement of age gap relationships is still a minority opinion. In all cases in my personal experience, where age gaps involving a younger partner with minimal adult life experience or relationships that are otherwise quite power-imbalanced in an unhealthy way, all judgement is reserved for and directed at the partner that seems to be taking advantage or being the source of unhealthiness or abuse in a relationship. I do tend to run in feminist and pro-feminist circles, and live in a rural area where multi-generational social groups are more the norm (albeit multi-generational romantic relationships, more prevalent than other places I’ve lived, are still fairly rare, and tend to begin when both partners are at least late 20s to early 30s with the stereotypical late 30s guy chasing late teens girl being the notable exceptions).
I have heard that lots of people have the experience that random (non-feminist) people in their lives blame the abused partner in abusive relationships (probably people around me think this, but know enough not to express such an opinion to me or within my hearing). And of course there is the gold digger stereotype (which feminists of my acquaintance note the sexism of).
Given that the article in the fpp tried (I believe incorrectly) to lay this on feminists, I think it’s important in our discussion here to be more clear about attribution.
posted by eviemath at 4:10 PM on December 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
Who is doing this?
A person in this thread. I think one of the problems in this discussion comes from some of us (me for one) talking about age-gap relationships in general, including queer relationships of all sorts and older women & younger men, and other people being frankly unable to get past talking about their feelings about older men and younger women, which are only one set of age-gap relationships.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:38 PM on December 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
A person in this thread. I think one of the problems in this discussion comes from some of us (me for one) talking about age-gap relationships in general, including queer relationships of all sorts and older women & younger men, and other people being frankly unable to get past talking about their feelings about older men and younger women, which are only one set of age-gap relationships.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:38 PM on December 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
I don’t see how the comment linked is judging younger women? It’s specifically implying that the accusation that they are doing so is incorrect.
I would interpret the relative time spent on different categories of age gap relationships in this thread as reflective of how much people in this thread are concerned about them being likely sites of abuse or emotional manipulation. If a particular category or example of an age gap relationship isn’t represented in this discussion thread, that likely means that no one here is particularly worried about it or has any preconceived opinion about it. I know I’ve been reacting to the simplistic framing of the article that doesn’t distinguish between proportional versus relative age gaps or when age gaps cause power differentials in a relationship versus when that’s unrelated, and that implies that folks such as myself who have concerns with some age gap relationships are indiscriminate or un-nuanced in our concerns. A lot of what I see on the critique side of things in this thread is responding to just how poorly written the article is, and the implication it makes in creating its straw man argument that no one should be concerned about any age gap relationship of any sort.
There’s also the detail where noticing that living in a patriarchal culture influences stuff as intimate as who we are attracted to, and that broad patterns such as older men dating younger women being more common and accepted than the reverse is indicative of structural sexism does not mean that any individual’s feelings aren’t somehow real. It’s like little girls being into pink and princesses: the prevalence and gender disparity in those preferences is influenced by culture and advertising and such, and we can note the sexism involved; but any individual such girl truly does like pink or princesses. Similarly, all of our food preferences are formed by our upbringing and influenced by subsequent cultural experiences, but that doesn’t mean that Americans in general are deluding themselves about being squicked out by the idea of eating crickets, or that other folks’ distaste for heavily processed food is just political posturing and not their actual opinion.
So the fact that we might (a) notice that while not all power differentials in relationships arise from age gaps and not all age gaps cause power differentials, an age gap is a common source of power differential in intimate relationship, (b) notice that power differentials lead more often to abuse or unhealthy relationships, and (c) notice or critique patterns of gender disparities in both age differentials and power disparities in heterosexual relationships, doesn’t mean that one partner doesn’t have agency in choosing such a relationship. (And power disparities are also on a sliding scale: it’s rarely an all-or-nothing thing.)
posted by eviemath at 6:54 PM on December 23, 2023 [8 favorites]
I would interpret the relative time spent on different categories of age gap relationships in this thread as reflective of how much people in this thread are concerned about them being likely sites of abuse or emotional manipulation. If a particular category or example of an age gap relationship isn’t represented in this discussion thread, that likely means that no one here is particularly worried about it or has any preconceived opinion about it. I know I’ve been reacting to the simplistic framing of the article that doesn’t distinguish between proportional versus relative age gaps or when age gaps cause power differentials in a relationship versus when that’s unrelated, and that implies that folks such as myself who have concerns with some age gap relationships are indiscriminate or un-nuanced in our concerns. A lot of what I see on the critique side of things in this thread is responding to just how poorly written the article is, and the implication it makes in creating its straw man argument that no one should be concerned about any age gap relationship of any sort.
There’s also the detail where noticing that living in a patriarchal culture influences stuff as intimate as who we are attracted to, and that broad patterns such as older men dating younger women being more common and accepted than the reverse is indicative of structural sexism does not mean that any individual’s feelings aren’t somehow real. It’s like little girls being into pink and princesses: the prevalence and gender disparity in those preferences is influenced by culture and advertising and such, and we can note the sexism involved; but any individual such girl truly does like pink or princesses. Similarly, all of our food preferences are formed by our upbringing and influenced by subsequent cultural experiences, but that doesn’t mean that Americans in general are deluding themselves about being squicked out by the idea of eating crickets, or that other folks’ distaste for heavily processed food is just political posturing and not their actual opinion.
So the fact that we might (a) notice that while not all power differentials in relationships arise from age gaps and not all age gaps cause power differentials, an age gap is a common source of power differential in intimate relationship, (b) notice that power differentials lead more often to abuse or unhealthy relationships, and (c) notice or critique patterns of gender disparities in both age differentials and power disparities in heterosexual relationships, doesn’t mean that one partner doesn’t have agency in choosing such a relationship. (And power disparities are also on a sliding scale: it’s rarely an all-or-nothing thing.)
posted by eviemath at 6:54 PM on December 23, 2023 [8 favorites]
I don't disagree with what you're saying; I also think all that really doesn't get at what we can or should do about age gap relationships we know about. My original suggestion that maybe we welcome folks in age-gap relationships into our social circle was taken as a slap at those concerns, when it's closer to a suggestion to evaluate the relationship from a position of knowing both partners, and to be available to help someone undergoing abuse when you see it.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 12:17 AM on December 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by gentlyepigrams at 12:17 AM on December 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
> I also think all that really doesn't get at what we can or should do about age gap relationships we know about.
Ehhh, as strongly as I judge older men who date much younger women, even I don't think we can or should DO something about any particular relationship. Barging uninvited into the lives of two consenting adults isn't the goal, or at least, isn't my goal! At most I'm interested in making sure these men's choices become socially unacceptable. I want to create an atmosphere such that when an man walks into a room with a much younger woman on his arm, he feels the weight of social disapproval squarely on him by default, similar to someone who walks into a room wearing a tattoo of an offensive symbol - he should need to prove himself through word and deed if he wants people to shed their suspicions.
> My original suggestion that maybe we welcome folks in age-gap relationships into our social circle was taken as a slap at those concerns, when it's closer to a suggestion to evaluate the relationship from a position of knowing both partners, and to be available to help someone undergoing abuse when you see it.
Ahhh I see! Thanks for clarifying what you meant. Originally you talked about being in favor of intergenerational friendships, which seemed like a weird reason to defend or support age gap relationships as a concept. If what you were trying to get at was subjecting older men to social scrutiny, I'm very much in favor of that.
posted by MiraK at 5:14 AM on December 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
Ehhh, as strongly as I judge older men who date much younger women, even I don't think we can or should DO something about any particular relationship. Barging uninvited into the lives of two consenting adults isn't the goal, or at least, isn't my goal! At most I'm interested in making sure these men's choices become socially unacceptable. I want to create an atmosphere such that when an man walks into a room with a much younger woman on his arm, he feels the weight of social disapproval squarely on him by default, similar to someone who walks into a room wearing a tattoo of an offensive symbol - he should need to prove himself through word and deed if he wants people to shed their suspicions.
> My original suggestion that maybe we welcome folks in age-gap relationships into our social circle was taken as a slap at those concerns, when it's closer to a suggestion to evaluate the relationship from a position of knowing both partners, and to be available to help someone undergoing abuse when you see it.
Ahhh I see! Thanks for clarifying what you meant. Originally you talked about being in favor of intergenerational friendships, which seemed like a weird reason to defend or support age gap relationships as a concept. If what you were trying to get at was subjecting older men to social scrutiny, I'm very much in favor of that.
posted by MiraK at 5:14 AM on December 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
> telling adults that dating out of their age lane is inherently wrong is about your own hangups as much as about whether an individual relationship is abusive.
Who is saying it's wrong to "date outside your age lane", without making a distinction between dating older vs dating younger?? Nobody!
See, statements such as this one which club together (potential) abuser and victim, the older partner and the younger partner, have the effect of providing cover to gross older men who systematically take advantage of much younger women. Like. Older men exploiting much younger women is a societal epidemic that actually exists. I didn't imagine it. To note this trend's existence and object to older men in age gap relationships is NOT a personal hangup, it is a normal person's reaction to this particular manifestation of the patriarchy irl.
When you club these gross men together with the very same younger women they're exploiting and turn them into some kind of package deal in your statements, as if both sides of this equation are the same? As if judging one must mean we are judging the other? You're deliberately blurring and hiding the difference between abuser and victim. Why would you do that?
Everyone on this thread who judges age gap relationships has made it extra clear that their judgment only applies to the older partner, and many (including me) have made it clear that it's only the older partners who also have gendered power in the relationship (i.e. older MALE partners) who are objectionable. That specificity matters. Don't erase it to score meaningless rhetorical points.
posted by MiraK at 5:47 AM on December 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
Who is saying it's wrong to "date outside your age lane", without making a distinction between dating older vs dating younger?? Nobody!
See, statements such as this one which club together (potential) abuser and victim, the older partner and the younger partner, have the effect of providing cover to gross older men who systematically take advantage of much younger women. Like. Older men exploiting much younger women is a societal epidemic that actually exists. I didn't imagine it. To note this trend's existence and object to older men in age gap relationships is NOT a personal hangup, it is a normal person's reaction to this particular manifestation of the patriarchy irl.
When you club these gross men together with the very same younger women they're exploiting and turn them into some kind of package deal in your statements, as if both sides of this equation are the same? As if judging one must mean we are judging the other? You're deliberately blurring and hiding the difference between abuser and victim. Why would you do that?
Everyone on this thread who judges age gap relationships has made it extra clear that their judgment only applies to the older partner, and many (including me) have made it clear that it's only the older partners who also have gendered power in the relationship (i.e. older MALE partners) who are objectionable. That specificity matters. Don't erase it to score meaningless rhetorical points.
posted by MiraK at 5:47 AM on December 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
I've said what I had to say three times and in the process answered a lot of the complaints about my comments and it's extremely clear to me that further discussion is not helpful. In accordance with my own Metafilter rule, I am bowing out. Happy holidays to those celebrating!
posted by gentlyepigrams at 8:03 AM on December 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by gentlyepigrams at 8:03 AM on December 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
I think one thing that I’d like to add to this discourse -
I’m a woman who preferred to date older men when I was younger, but a large part of the reason I did so was because the men my own age received societal messaging that they didn’t have to be mature, and so they weren’t. The societal messaging that it’s okay for cisgender heterosexual men to fuck around until their late thirties or forties and only then be ready to settle down causes a lot of damage that isn’t just the individual age gap relationships.
posted by corb at 11:22 AM on December 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
I’m a woman who preferred to date older men when I was younger, but a large part of the reason I did so was because the men my own age received societal messaging that they didn’t have to be mature, and so they weren’t. The societal messaging that it’s okay for cisgender heterosexual men to fuck around until their late thirties or forties and only then be ready to settle down causes a lot of damage that isn’t just the individual age gap relationships.
posted by corb at 11:22 AM on December 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
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