To find a 49 yo man dating a 19 yo girl creepy?

[NatVoll]

I am aware of the fact that "this is none of my business and yada yada", but come on!

Family friend, aged 49, just announced he has a new girlfriend. She is 19. I am horrified, but my sister thinks there is nothing weird about it.

AIBU to think that a 49 yo man dating a 19 yo girl is absolutely creepy?

Ha. I’ve got plenty of experience. When I was 16 my rapist violent boyfriend was 25. When I was 19, my (different) rapist violent boyfriend was 31.

I spent my teens being used by creepy older men. And believe me, being an abuser is something you get better at with age. Older men are much better at being dominant and controlling than younger men, especially as they’ve had time to get rich and money just makes abuse so much....easier.

A 19 year old can quite easily have an unhealthy relationship with another 19 year old.

Very true, but I would argue that the motives of a 19 year old young man looking to date someone the same age as him quite different to that of a 49 year old. As alluded to already, two relatively inexperienced young people stumbling their way through a relationship is a leaning curve for both parties, there is some semblance of a level playing field from the offset. An older man who has several relationships under his belt or even a few marriages as well as I imagine being in a much stronger position financially opens the door to all sorts of potential manipulative and controlling behaviour.

Wow, the steaming piles of judgement. Bugger off, lol. I dated a 40 year old when I was 19 and have always been interested in older men. At the end of the day it really is none of your business. And it doesn't matter in the slightest that you pathetic people find it "creepy". Get over yourselves!

Some people on this thread have such a weird view of nineteen year old women.

They’re too young to know their own minds, can’t have anything in common with someone older, spend their time pouting into selfies and watching TOWIE and getting pissed.

At nineteen I was caring for my mum in the mid-end stages of fatal alcoholism, studying for a degree full time, working part time, volunteering for a suicide hotline, and spending my free time going to see live music, playing the piano and seeing friends.

How is that different from many people in their twenties, thirties, forties, fifties?

I made a really close friend at that age, a man twenty years older, through our voluntary work. We had a lot in common and naturally grew closer as the months and years progressed due to shared experiences and having lots in common. He was (and is!) happily married but we couldn’t have been closer as friends and a decade later as he’s terminally ill we’re still the best of friends and I’ve been part of his family for his years/honorary auntie to his son and help his wife a lot to care for him as he’s dying.

Given that the only difference between that and a romantic relationship would be the addition of attraction and sex, I fail to see how it’d be weird for us to have dated if it’d worked out that way? We had zero attraction ever and it’s always been 100% platonic but if a nineteen year old can be so close to a 40+ year old as a friend, why not as a partner?

Nineteen year olds are adults, many have had plenty of life experience of different kinds and just like older people, they vary in maturity. Many are independent, living alone, balancing studying at a high level with working, or pursuing careers, or raising children.

There is some really gross ageism on this thread with all kinds of weird stereotypes about young adults. Most young adult women (and men) I know have much more maturity than to cast aspersions and judgments on others based on stereotypes. I dare say the people on this thread who are convinced a nineteen year old is a helpless naive dumb teenager being preyed on are the ones who would have been unable to hold their own in a relationship at that age, which is of course fair enough: but that’s no reason to tar every other individual with your own brush.

Here here Lollypopsapple.

I was married with a child at 19. 19 is an adult, not a child.

This thread is filled with awful people. Most of you are so ready to judge this guy as being a bad person and assume the girl is just some poor victim who has no choice in the matter. I hope you all feel ashamed because you should. You know nothing of the situation and yet you're jumping to conclusions. And your poor children must suffer from having such judgemental parents. No point talking to ignorant people though, it's like trying to get blood out of a stone

And yet here we are Goth237 – still trying to reason with those who have no interest in being reasonable… !!

I've noticed that on MN there is a tendency to infantilise young adults, particularly young women.

From the age of 19 to my late 20s I dated a lot of men. Some many years older, some younger. Construction workers, a doctor, a lot of IT professionals, many diferent walks of life. I learned from every one of these relationships, and also learned from the life experience of each of these men. For obvious reasons, the older ones had more life experience and had learned themselves more from these experiences, and I got the benefit of that. I regret not one of these relationships. I was not always "in love" but I liked and respected all of them.

I'm in my 50s now and have been married for over 20 years. If I should find myself for some reason dating again, I would not use age as a criteria for choosing who to date.

I have to suspect that much of the comments about creepy, pervy, predatory, grooming, etc come from a place of fear of being replaced in a relationship by a younger woman and a refusal to grant younger women the respect to choose their own relationships.

I don't feel an ounce of shame for thinking a 49 year who dates a 19 year old as pathetic.

It may not be illegal, but it's wrong. My eldest daughter is almost nineteen. I am forty two. It would feel all wrong her dating a man who is seven years older than me!

When my 21 year old son had a relationship with a 53 year old woman a lot of people said 'If they are happy, why not?' so surely the same applies with a 19 year old girl and a 49 year old man.

When my 21 year old son had a relationship with a 53 year old woman

and how did you feel about that relationship?

I'm not ashamed for finding it creepy, perverted and pathetic, too.

MargaretDribble I would not agree with a 21 year old man and a 53 year old woman either, though I suspect there would be less condemnation.

When my 21 year old son had a relationship with a 53 year old woman a lot of people said 'If they are happy, why not?'

Because he'd be giving up having kids entirely in that setting, too, and sure, he may say he never wanted them, but really, it's a form of conditioning over time because that's never going to happen with a woman who's that old.

On top of the fact that it's completely disgusting someone so old would be diddling with someone who's barely as adult.

Well, I wouldn't think, "If they are happy, why not?" I'd think as poorly of a 50 year old woman who dated a 19 year old, male or female.

Someone who shacks up with someone barely out of their teenage years is likely to be a sad sack who only seems impressive to someone thirty years their junior.

I wasn't happy. I was worried. I couldn't understand why a woman of that age would want to go out out with a 21 year old.
The point I am making was that somehow because he was male people seemed to think it was fine. It wasn't. He has told us quite a lot since that makes it clear that we were right to worry.

OP you said this man was a family friend. As such, I expect that he has many good qualities that make you want to be friends with him. What are they, and why would you think these qualities would not make him attractive to others?

I don't feel an ounce of shame for thinking a 49 year who dates a 19 year old as pathetic

And you shouldn't feel ashamed but it does say more about you than it does about them, especially if you don't know them.

Any old 19 year old dad? Would they not have to be interesting as well? Have a personality that you were comfortable with? Or is it just access to their youth?

da

I have to suspect that much of the comments about creepy, pervy, predatory, grooming, etc come from a place of fear of being replaced in a relationship by a younger woman

Hmmm. OR, they come from people like me, who spent their teen years being abused by older men.

People who’ve had a lovely time tend to be fine saying ‘I had a lovely time’. People who have been abused find it much harder, naturally, to articulate their experiences.

Just because a few people shout loudly doesn’t make the rest of us jealous nutters.

Obviously there'd have to be some sort of connection between us.