To not look at this couple in the same way anymore?

[AvrilAprill]

At the end of last year I made friends with a mum who’d just moved to the area. We got on great, as did our partners.

However, I’ve now found out that they first got together when she was 16 and he was 20/21. It genuinely makes me feel uncomfortable knowing that, and my husband says I’m being weird

You’re being really weird. They are hardly Lolita and Humbert Humbert. If it creeps you out, just don’t think about it.

I think you are being completely ott. She was of age and its only 4/5 years of a difference.

OK, then - thanks, I didn't know that.

Not the second scenario that I pondered on, then; but it's sounding a lot to me like the first scenario.

I don’t see anything wrong with it. In fact I would find it more odd for a 16 year old girl to date a 16 year old boy because 16 year old girls are so much more mature generally. I certainly didn’t date boys my age when I was 16. I preferred someone who could drive for a start!

Lack of diversity & narrow world view?! We're not talking about interracial relationships here, or same sex ones, this is about adult men in relationships with teens.

I know a LOT of ppl here are feeling personally attacked cos this is how their relationship started & they are still secure & happy - great for you guys, genuinely - which makes it impossible to take a neutral stance. Most adult/teen relationships will be exploitative for, what should be, obvious reasons.

Of COURSE you don't feel like you were exploited, you're happy & that age gap is now irrelevant as adults. I've an old friend who was abused for many many years when young BUT he was kind to her so she has zero trauma. Intellectually she knows she was abused but emotionally she doesn't feel it. That's immaturity you still have even at 16 imo 🤷🏼‍♀️

Of COURSE you don't feel like you were exploited, you're happy & that age gap is now irrelevant as adults. I've an old friend who was abused for many many years when young BUT he was kind to her so she has zero trauma. Intellectually she knows she was abused but emotionally she doesn't feel it. That's immaturity you still have even at 16 imo

I'm going to assume your friend was much younger.

It's a huge stretch to then insist that a legal, mutually consentual encounter is similar to a child whose trust is horrendously betrayed by an adult.
And no I don't think 16 and 20 is definitively a child and an adult, I think people labour that point to make it sound bad.

Exactly this.

None of your business really . I doubt she'd want you as a friend of she thought you were posting this.

Strawman - I didn't say it was illegal. Argue the points I made or nothing at all. If the legal age was still 12, 13 would you still argue this? Were young people more mature 200 years ago?

The age limit is a convenient argument for what is a debate about appropriate relationships. The law is a hard rule, society should use morals to guide it within that framework. Young people of the same age would not be criminalised for sex before that age, they aren't waiting till they are 16. The law is to protect them from predatory adults &, imo, it doesn't do that with a limit of 16.

Should you move to a country where the limit is lower & your 13yo became involved with an adult man, you'd brush it off as 'oh but it's legal so, meh'? No, you wouldn't.

Do your friend a favour and end the friendship. You are horrible and judgemental, even your own husband thinks you are being weird.
Not everyone is the same.
You are just hard work.

That may well be true for some who left home at 16. It wasn't for me. I had a happy childhood, 2 parents, and a sister, all normal and very boring. I left home because I wanted to be independent. I've always hated being told what to do, at home, there were (reasonable) rules, like a curfew and no boyfriends upstairs etc. I hated that I couldn't do what I liked. So, when I'd done my GCSEs, I got a full-time job and moved into a flatshare with 3 of my friends. My parents weren't happy about it but didn't stop me. And the option to come home was always there.

We're not talking about interracial relationships here, or same sex ones, this is about adult men in relationships with teens.

@Caerulea but we're talking about "men" 1 year out of their teens! Would it be seen as predatory and awful if the "man" was 19? It's literally one year!

I should clarify, btw, that I don't think everyone is necessarily ready for a sexual relationship at age 16. People's brains mature at different speeds.

One year is nothing once you're in your 20's, very little changes at that point. By my age (46) 10 years is nothing, so little changes that isn't down to gravity or natural aging.

But even at 19 I'd be DEEPLY uncomfortable at my son coming home with a 16yo girlf. My 15yo will be 16 next year & if he brings home a 19yo bf I would intervene. There are huge changes in those few years, it's still a significant proportion of their lived lives.

As a rule - young people do not agree with you now so why are a bunch of adults, here, trying to say it's fine? They are making these boundaries themselves.

All young people? My young people (21 and 17) don't see a problem with it. If one year is a big difference in your teens then I guess a 19 year old and a 20 year old is also problematic? A 19 year old and an 18 year old? A 17 year old and a 16 year old?

And trying to intervene in teenage relationships is the quickest way to push them closer to each other. Far better to be welcoming and supportive, as well as watchful.

My son is nearly 19, but has only just left secondary school. He is only be two academic years ahead of a lot of 15 and 16 year olds.

Personally, I think it is pretty grim to tarnish all late teens as predators for the pretty normal way a lot of them meet their first boy/girl friends, as siblings of their mates.

I know, how silly.

if the young people are making those boundaries themselves and not being pressurised into it by their year group then surely the problem goes away because they won't do it?

"You believe that if it makes you happy, Jane,"

😂

😂

Caerulea · Today 14:47

One year is nothing once you're in your 20's, very little changes at that point. By my age (46) 10 years is nothing, so little changes that isn't down to gravity or natural aging.

But even at 19 I'd be DEEPLY uncomfortable at my son coming home with a 16yo girlf. My 15yo will be 16 next year & if he brings home a 19yo bf I would intervene.

Good grief! 😂

I’m not surprised this generation of 16-year olds have the poorest mental health in history, with parents who apparently think in black and white, paranoid extremes and stereotypes and who control their children’s real life interractions in overbearing, oppressive ways (whilst dismally failing to put controls on their virtual, fantasy lives).

This. People "intervening" when their 16 year old dates a 19 year old (as above) are asking for a replay of Romeo and Juliet with Whatsapp (mind you, that could have been handy in the original version)

Tell teenagers not to do something really self destructive, they may or may not listen, based on the strength of your arguments or the way the wind is blowing. Tell them not to do something because you have a weird, weird idea of what constitutes inappropriate, forget it. They'll choose the BF/GF every time.

LMFAO 🤣