Older men/younger women relationships: Is age really just a number?

This isn't national news.

Unclefred, you should have linked to the podcast you're referring to: here.

Did you actually listen to it? It's clear that there are no biological "reasons" for this "phenomenon". 

I'm about halfway through it right now.

Edited to add: Since the podcast is by The F word, can the mods please move this to the feminism forum?

I have close friends who are happily married and well-suited to each other, even though he is 27 years her senior.  When I first met her and heard her husband was significantly older, I had a completely wrong impression of that relationship in my mind - it took about 30 seconds seeing them together to dispell it.  And as Mr Tea notes, the point in life where the relationship starts makes a difference.  Celine Dion and Rene?  That's a little different case study - the relationship had a creepy power differential.  She was 15 and he was her manager. 

It's often the case that large age differences don't lend themselves to equitable relationships, but it's not always the case.

I don't know I feel uncomfortable about a lot of this podcast. One thing that bothered me was when he talked about how older men/younger woman impacts other relationships because their very existence causes older women to be written off and younger men seen as incompetent. This reminds me of how people disagree with gay marriage because they say it will impact straight marriage. He also talks about how these relationships discourage growth from the men and by saying that the men need to grow by dating women of their own age is a little pie in the sky - I know a lot of men in relationships with peer age and the relationships do not encourage growth within the man. He talks about how women under 25 is getting rushed into something she is not ready for then maybe education to make an informed decision is needed rather than assuming they are to naive to be able to make a clear decision.

Most of what he talked about beyond that was about abusive behaviour and calling men on these relationships. I don't think they should be called on these relationships I think they should be called on their abusive behaviour. They should be called on the power dynamic not the fact that there is an age discrepancy.

I guess the one thing that I felt wasn't getting across is that age differences isn't the problems it is the behaviour that results from a power difference that is the problem.

i agree, the operative word is consenting adults.  it's really no ones business what people do.  

And the whole point of "hindsight" is kind of hard, because obviously the relationship soured at some point so of course people will look back and find something to blame it on like age...but the people who stayed together obviously saw nothing amiss.

The problem is people assume if you like someone younger it's a "thing" you must do all the time (i.e. creepy old guy) but what if you date various age groups and happen to date someone younger...who cares?  Maybe the next person will be older than you or the same age.  Maybe the person just sees people for who they are and if they get along they go for it, while everyone else is stuck caring about what other people think but deep down want to do it?

the point is, if you like to hang out with each other, DO IT!

I'm not comfortable with the assumption that younger women are more vulnerable and more easily manipulated than older women when it comes to dating an older man.  So much depends on personality traits, life experience and circumstance that age should not be the defining factor in any relationship, including those of older men with younger women.

For example, which woman is more likely to be relationship-savvy - an older woman, perhaps recently widowed or divorced, who has had only one partner in all her adult life, or a woman in her 20s who has been dating and having relationships with men for several years?  What about character traits? You can be passive and accepting, or independent and questioning, at any age.

What about the older men who are manipulated and dominated by a young woman?  To what lengths will an older, insecure man go to to keep his young girlfriend or wife happy and commited to the relationship?

Certainly in relationships that have a significant age difference there can be issues of control and power, but those issues come up in relationships where the parties are peers.  Emotional maturity can come at any age - or not at all - and personal empowerment is not confined to any age, or gender for that matter.

voice of the damned wrote:

Hugo Schyzer tells us all about how [url=http://hugoschwyzer.net/2011/04/09/stop-before-you-become-the-dirty-old-... used to have sex with his students on his desk[/url].

And yes, I realize this is meant to show us how lecherous he was back in the day, all the better to emphasize how contrite and shamefaced he is now. But still. The power imbalance involved in a student-prof relationship is a bit more tangible than that involved in a simple age discrepancy.

But I guess as long as he feels very bad about his youthful indiscretions(so bad that he just has to regale us with all the Penthouse Letter-style details), well, that must make it all okay.  

That's an abuse of mentorship for selfish purpose, and he seems to be both contrite (don't believe that for a second) and boasting.  I worked at universities for more than 10 years, and I saw a lot of this.  One relationship comes to mind - that between a woman prof and her grad student.  There's an age difference of about 15 years, but they are happily married and enjoy their lives together.  Most of what I saw was male profs exploiting their position of relative power over student(I wasn't aware of any same-sex relationships at the time) - be they undergrads or grads - and it seemed to me that the women involved had a purpose, some inner justification for the relationship.  The men, the profs and asst. profs. seemed to me to be abusing their position of privilege.

There's no fucking way I would place women as victims in these scenarios - that would debase womens' ability to be self-determining and powerful in their own right.  But I will admit that the power/mentor relationship is problematic because by virtue of its relationship it is unequal.

All I can say as an older guy and minority person at that, is that in Canada those kinds of relationships will experience a lot of stress so the odds are against success.

Her friends and family will be against you right from the start. Suspicion will be high. You may be looking for romance but "they" will see you as a lecherous dinosaur.

Then you add in your non-white status which means you're down the scale as a human being already. She could've had a white guy. Yes I heard that from a co-worker who told me she finally "bagged" a white guy and her family were doing the high five for her.

Anyway, who wants to spend time with a 25 year old whose only way to socialize is staring at a tiny cell phone screen and Facebook? Once the novelty factor of having an attractive girl with a lot of energy and looks wears off, trust me - you'll never look back.

Kanada2America wrote:

Anyway, who wants to spend time with a 25 year old whose only way to socialize is staring at a tiny cell phone screen and Facebook? Once the novelty factor of having an attractive girl with a lot of energy and looks wears off, trust me - you'll never look back.

I think you're being abit unfair to twenty somethings, they're not all I-pad addicts and not all IPadders are kids.   It can be a little sad seeing some old guy chasing after young women, acting like a fool hopelessly trying to relive their own youth.   And anyone who uses their relative authority or experience to exploit others sexually is by definition a creep.  Sexual harrssment I believe it's called.

OTOH now that I'm hitting middleage myself I find that I can appreciate young women more.  Not just because they're young and bright and beautiful; I also enjoy their relative openness, their generosity of spirit, their easy optimism and energy and willingness to take chances on something new.  All things I wish I had more of myself.   And some are deeper and more mature IME than many middleagers I've met.   I doubt this next generation will ever get the chance to become as privileged in attitude as so many of my own generation has.  But then women have always grown up quicker than most guys do anyhow.  I also find I'm enjoying the company of older women more than I used to too.   Funny.

I have a lot of misgvings about where 'high-tech' is taking us too K2A, in fact I think that would be a good subject for another thread, but I don't think we can generalise too much here.  Before fibreoptics and microchips became common I wasted a lot of time just hanging around and "chillin".   And some of the rudest, most parochial people I've dealt with have been middleaged and older.  I have a hunch us elders were commenting on declining standards of behaviour among kids since the invention of fire started making us all soft.

Anyhow, thanks in part to this particular thread I decided to stop worrying about age differences and all the possible complications and ask out a cute twenty something I've been flirting with.   Lucky for me, she also seems to prefer direct contact to the virtual kind, and even better doesn't seem to care about my receding hairline.  Been slowly retreating since I was 26.

*thread drift*  I am abit worried still, does anyone here have any June/September experience that could be useful for an old fool like me?  All I can think of is not be too staid and settled and not get too pompous about my own opinions.   I really do like her and hate to end up a bad memory, am I missing something?

pookie wrote:

Erik: Forget about her age,  Treat her as a human being, with equality and respect.

Well said.  In my life I have had various relationships with both older and younger women.  The largest difference in age was 17 years but the woman I was involved with was the mother of two with the oldest being eight.  Her life circumstances meant that when I met her in her early twenties she was in no sense still a kid.  On the other hand when I was 27 I dated a 19 year old for a couple of months and discovered we had nothing in much in common except physical attraction because she was still a teenager and acted like one.  I vowed then never again to date anyone under 21 no matter how hot they looked and what signals they were sending me about their attraction to me.  I used to ridicule my mid twenties to mid thirties male peers who liked to date high school girls because they seemed to like the power imbalance that they couldn't get in a relationship with women.

I have also dated woman both in my twenties and in my fifties who were ten years older than me.  I found those relationships to be very good. The older women I dated in my twenties taught me many things that dating younger women had not.  

But as Pookie said the key is equality in the relationship not the age difference.   I am now in a wonderful committed relationship with a woman who is my equal in every respect.  Both of my long term spousal relationships have been with women who were 5 years younger than me but I see us as basically the same age.

Mutual respect of course has to be concrete.  Being willing to do at least half of the necessary domestic drudgery chores without being prompted is something every woman I know takes seriously as a sign of respect.  If a man thinks it is her job to clean the toilet every time then that says way more about respect than almost anything else.

I wanted to post at least one update here, even if it's just slightly egocentric thread drift.   So far everything has gone even better than I'd hoped.  She's really great, we're having a lot of fun together, and no major misunderstandings.   I even get along well with most her friends, but turns out most are quite well educated and not into partying more than I'm still willing or able....  Everyone I know thinks she's great too, but no surprise there.  (my one slightly petty minded concern) Turns out that she is abit older than I'd first thought, closer to thirty than twenty, so the only small cloud on the horizon now is knowing that she'll eventually want someone abit younger for the future -even If I do look young for my age still.  :)  I'll just leave that bridge to her and the future, any possible pain will I'm sure be worth it.

But yes, under 20 probably is too young still for anyone middleaged, but who can ever tell whos right for whom, let alone tell THEM that?  I never regretted any relationship I had with anyone significantly older than me either (other than my moments of immaturity and insecurity) and I hope they never have themselves.       

unclefred younger men/ older women couple also exist!

Still like i said before as long as it consentual, no prob!

Back to reality again. It's all about choice and mutuality Lefauve, I agree.  Fundamentalism is all about removing it.  Noone else is ever going to tell me who I should or shouldn't go out with anyhow, and I wouldn't think of trying that on others -except perhaps if they were my own kids and being misled by someone much older.   That will never be for me though; not too old to have kids but would be too old to raise any, not with my inability to quit smoking.  My fate is that I may have finally met the perfect one just a bit too late in life.   Still, worth trying to make it last as long as possible.   Ever feel that siren like tone to their voice or see how the light on them changes, when you first fall?  Its all true, real life magic.   :)