Every few days I see a post about a woman, usually between the ages of 18-25, in a relationship with a man 10-20 years older and nearly ALL the replies say the exact same thing. He's a predator, he's creepy, she's just a baby, she's a child, he's manipulating her, she's being taken advantage of, etc.
I've never understood this and have always felt that it's hugely sexist and disrespectful to women. Over 18 is an adult. Assuming that she doesn't know what she's doing and that the older man is a creep and is preying on her is taking away her agency as an adult to make her own decisions. Many will say, "it's legal, but it's creepy", which just further serves to insult the woman as an immature person who can't make decisions for herself.
Society needs to stop shaming adults' decisions of who to date. It's unusual, yes. It's uncommon, yes. But it's not abnormal, it's not creepy and it if someone is taking advantage of the other, age isn't the reason. I've personally seen large age gap relationships and most of the time, they are just two people who like each other's company. And in the cases where one was manipulating or using the other, guess what, it was more often the younger one doing so, not the older one. That's just what I've seen, though.
And as for "what on earth would they have to talk about?" Huh, well, maybe the same things people of similar ages talk about???
I don't know about y'all, but most of the conversations I have with people my age revolve around hobbies, music, movies and tv, daily events, news, politics, something I recently learned, personal problems, professional problems, etc. I have friends that range from 15 years younger than me to 20 years older than me and we never seem to have a problem finding things to talk about and relate about.
Levels of maturity? ha! I've met just as many immature women in their 30's, 40's and 50's as I have in their 20's. Clingy, emotionally stunted, constant crying over stupid things, inability to be responsible and pay bills on time or be respectful to others, etc... this is not the exclusive domain of young people.
Of course, there are general differences for different generations but that is not necessarily a bad thing. One can learn from the other.
Really, it comes down to compatibility. If you have a 40 year old man that loves to go to raves and has a playlist full of edm music, then him dating a 40 year old woman who just wants to sit at home and drink wine while sitting in front of the tv and complaining about politics is way more weird than if he were to date a 20-something who loves the same music and activities. (Simplified example, but the point should be clear.)
For the record, this all applies to younger men and older women too, but in general people are a lot less critical of that -- which just furthers the point that criticizing young women dating older men IS sexist.
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