To think a 22 year old dating a 16 year old is dodgy?

[Corall]

It was a family member. They are married now. It was the 16 year olds first relationship, she had only just turned 16, doing her GCSEs.
I find it off putting, makes me think badly of the man. He’s always been controlling.
But others think it was fine. AIBU to want to avoid him?

Hi, I was 14 at the time and I am pretty confused about it all. I’m sorry you had to spell it out.

it’s quite hard actually.

But thank you for replying

Hey. Steady on. And age gap of 13 years is pretty unusual but there no call to describe it this way and a bit rude surely? They are clearly happily married - hence the post.

Why do people keep producing this canard about people being "happily married"?

a) How can you possibly know they're "happily married"? You know they're "married". The rest is conjecture.
b) This doesn't justify an adult man targeting a child for a sexual or romantic relationship. In some circumstances slaves grew to feel something close to affection or gratitude for their owners. It doesn't mean its OK.

If any 29 year old told me they wanted to date a 16 year old they fancied then I’d happily tell them they were vile. I’m not sure I would be able to stop myself tbh!

I know exactly who you’re talking about. I can’t go near her page since I found that out. It creeps me out so much.

No well adjusted man in his twenties would be interested in a teenager. Nothing will convince me otherwise.

My daughter started going out with her ex husband when she was 17 in year 13 and he was 26. Of course initially I was concerned but once I got to know him I was perfectly fine with it and never gave it any more thought.
No one else in my middle class family of professionals( saying this in case some people on here think we come from some kind of uneducated background where this is common) had an age gap of more than a year for generations so it was quite unusual. Eventually after years together they married and had a child. There was no question of him thinking she was jailbait or grooming her in any way, he adored her. The marriage did eventually breakdown due to events which were nothing to do with inequality or manipulation or grooming.

I should have come back to answer the question that was asked to me.

if my daughter came home at 16 and told me she was seeing someone who was 25, no o probably wouldn’t be happy about it. But I would do what my parents did for me, get to know him, be there for her and not just shut it down.

ot would be very hypocritical of me if I just said no not happening not allowed. When me and her dad are so happy together and always have been.

This is gross. A man in his mid/late twenties shouldn’t be sniffing after schoolgirls.

Well it happened and it wasn't gross. He had had 2 previous longer relationships lasting a couple of years with women the same age, so it wasn't as if he made a habit of going after much younger women. The relationship started 2 months before she was 18 and an adult, free to make her own decisions.

It happened because we’ve normalised adult men thinking it’s acceptable to date female children.

A well adjusted, sensible, decent man in his mid twenties wouldn’t be continuing to pursue a girl they fancy once they realised their weekdays consisted of studying for A levels. It would put them off so much and make them feel uncomfortable to the extent it would be an absolute no go.

Could you, in your mid twenties, have imagined meeting a bloke and when you asked him what he did for work he said “oh I’m in year 13 doing maths, history and business studies” and continuing to have dated him?! Of course not. Because you are decent and sensible, presumably.

Parents trusted their teenagers more after the 1960s.
Sixteen year olds were given freedom and thought independent enough to leave school, work and train at university. They moved in with friends.
The average age for marriage was lower.
Fewer students stayed and finished school.
People/women were getting married all the time at eighteen.

Possibly your brother and his wife would have the same personalities and relationship dynamics regardless of when and whom they married.
It was certainly legal.

Does your SIL say she is being abused?
Does your brother mistreat you or his family?
Could you recommend that he is charged based on actual evidence - facts that you remember where he was criminal and different from many other men of his era?

It was and is gross. I'm sorry that your daughter was exploited in this way. I hope someday she can talk through what happened with a professional and come to terms properly with what happened.

All this talk of marriage and babies is bizarre. As though the fact that the relationship lasted a while is proof it wasn't wrong in the first place. There is a famous reality TV couple with lots and lots of children that have been married for decades. She had their first baby when she was 14 and he was 17. The length of the marriage and the number of kids doesn't make that fine either. People need to give their heads a wobble.

Isn't the age of consent 16 nearly all over the World?
Was your brother in a position of supervision - a teacher?
Otherwise it seems fine.

At what age do you think that it becomes acceptable for someone to have a relationship with an age gap and what would be the permitted gap in your opinion?

You say adult men shouldn't date children so presumably you think adults should be able to date other adults? Or maybe you don't and you think there should be a category where adults need to be 21, 25 or 30 before they are allowed to date with an age gap?

But then there could still be issues couldn't there? A 45 year old man dating a 25 year old woman sounds on paper as if it wouldn't work but I don't see how it could be stopped, and could be a loving mutually supportive and respectful relationship.

In my daughter's case she was almost 18 and 5 months later went to the local university but lived away from home in halls as was her plan all along. Although that much older he was a student at the same university, having gone there as a mature student and was at the end of his first year. He was therefore surrounded by a lot of much younger people, often socialised with them etc. So their circumstances were very similar.

Oh don't. You know how massive-aggressive you're being and it's gross to make unpleasant insinuations about a long-term relationship that the poster is probably perfectly happy in.

I can see why these kinds of gaps were viewed differently a few decades ago - people left school early and were often working at 16, and a level of maturity was expected, so probably less of a developmental gap between that and someone in their early twenties. And there wasn't the same social stigma.

It's different now as it would be very stigmatised and the majority of 16 year olds are probably much younger for their age due to how they're brought up.

Grim that, 29 year old getting with a 16 year old.

I don't agree with this at all.

Sometimes we are all capable of cognitive dissonance and denial. It's really difficult to accept that the man you love and have built a life with is also capable of exploitation and manipulating children. It's a common problem in grooming cases where girls and women really struggle to accept that they are victims. I think the more people that call out the behaviour for what it is the better.

It doesn't matter how mature you feel and how this is encouraged by your partner. You are still a child at 16/17. Your frontal cortex is nowhere near fully developed and the difference between the brains of a child of this age and an adult will be plain to see in a brain scan. Any idea that the relationship can be in anyway equal is an illusion.

That's what's gross?

Don't worry, most posters who disagree haven't made 'insinuations' about how disgusting this is, we've been pretty direct about it. Quite frankly, most people would be disgusted by this relationship because it feels wrong to normal, well adjusted adults. I feel sorry for the woman, imagine having a child with a grown man who fancies girls in their mid-teens. That's fucking gross.

The person in question has presumably been an adult for decades though and it's entirely up to them about how they feel about a relationship they entered legally and consentually.

And no I wouldn't be pleased if my sixteen year old daughter had a much older boyfriend. I don't live in a society where that's currently considered acceptable.

I'm not so naive that I don't realise I might feel differently if it was the norm and considered socially fine. Decades ago it genuinely wasn't as big a deal - I remember my mum describing boyfriends with cars and jobs that she had when she was 15/16 and she seemed unfazed at men that age showing me interest when I was mid teens as well.

Nobody can make anybody else feel a way about anything. This is true about legal and illegal activity. Ethical and unethical behaviour.

Sometimes though it takes someone else to shake you out of your denial and cognitive dissonance. Someone unequivocally acknowledging that what happened was not ok. It doesn't matter about laws and social norms at the time. We are more enlightened now and science has helped us to understand more about brain maturity and the impact this has on our decision making.

This is why attitudes have changed towards 16 and 17 year olds.16 and 17 year olds must now stay in some form of education or training as they are too young to make the decision to stop learning. We don't let them smoke or drink because this adversely impacts young brains more than more mature brains. The science is informing our approach.

The facts remain, if you got into a long term relationship at 16 with someone in their mid/late 20s your brain development will have been mismatched. This should have been obvious to the adult in a way it wasn't necessarily obvious to the child. The fact that the adult continued to pursue the relationship in this context is gross and almost certainly involved some element of grooming

Why the assumption that all 17 year olds were doing A levels? I had finished mine a few months before I was 18. And I was working full time and doing them in evening classes. As well as living in my own flat

You were still a child. Your frontal cortex would have reflected this and therefore your decision making. You therefore wouldn't have been allowed to vote or legally drink.

Another poster missing the point. We haven’t discussed the outcome of the relationship. We are discussing the point where a grown man is attracted to a child. How the relationship plays out is not particularly relevant. A grown man still got into a relationship with a 16 year old, yes, just legal to have sex, and that’s utterly fucking grim. We know why they do it. We know.