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?

When I was 15 I dated a 21 year old who was in the army. It wasn't that uncommon back in the 90s, plenty of my girlfriends were seeing older guys.

I'm sorry but that's disgusting! You were a child!

WTF? So that makes it okay? Unreal

Yes, and thank goodness it's that way. It's frightening the number of older people on here who think it's normal for a grown man to date a child.

It doesn't make it okay though does it? Think back to when you were 21, would you date a 15 year old boy?

And unfortunately it sounds like you're still being gaslit by him if you believe this was okay. Personally I would find it impossible to trust this predator.

My sil was 17 when she started going out with my brother. He was 23. They married when she was 21 and have an amazingly happy marriage. She did like him from 15 ish ( brother worked for her grandfather ) but my brother knew she was too young.

I was 16, he was 23, we’ve been together 25 yrs now, married 19 years. We met in a pub so he initially thought I was older, I had been getting away with saying I was 18 for a good couple of years by that point.

I know 16 is technically the age of consent but I consider it noncey. Why the fuck would someone old enough to have graduated uni be interested in a child studying their GCSEs, they are in totally different life stages. Its not the equivilent of a 22 and 28 year old.

Back in the late 90s this was almost normal. Now I'm 42 I look back and think there was definitely some noncey fucking grooming going on, but when you're 14/15/16 and your 20+ year old boyfriend shows up at the school gate to pick you up in his souped up corsa with bean can exhaust, you feel super "mature" as he takes you to the local macdonalds car park to impress you with revving his engine and doing donuts. And also he can get served for cigs and booze at the local shops... Swoon...

There's alot of emphasis on Asian grooming gangs, but I think thats the tip of the iceberg when you look at ALL ethnicities, we just don't talk about the boy racer white grooming gang types (accept we didn't label them grooming gangs, just groups of 18+ lads going out with literal school girls) and we all know they were everywhere.

It really depends when this happened. Times have changed hugely in the last twenty years, but this would have been normal in the 90s and any time earlier.

I was briefly in a relationship with a 27 year old the year I turned 16. I dumped him after a few months. It wasn't remotely abusive and I wasn't preyed upon, but obviously many girls / women are, regardless of age gaps and so on.

I don't think I'd have contemplated it if I were 15 now, and neither would he. Very different times. Back then, girls were kind of considered grown up from about 13-14, now some of them are still kids til about 25.

Half your age plus seven should be enshrined in law.

the current attitude of any teen sleeping with an over 20 is groomed is a little restrictive imo. My dd(16) was warned and mocked for dating an 18yr old boy by all her friends. It spread to her being made fun of, and her (fucking ridiculous) wellbeing teacher having a word with her. She ended it, despite the relationship being healthy, normal and her and him being happy. That he was an “adult” made him a perv.

meanwhile I was 17 when my 26 year old husband met me 25 years ago. He was a young 26 I was an old 17 and we grew together. We were more in love with every passing year.

I do think it's too much of a gap given her age. He's a fully-fledged adult and she's a schoolgirl. I know there are examples here where it was fine, but I'd venture to suggest that more of these relationships are not fine.

This makes me wonder if the age of consent should be raised to 18. Would help stop older men preying on schoolgirls and would help to protect said girls. Would also help protect girls from sexual pressure during GCSEs/first year of A-levels.

16 is underage to a grown adult of 22. The 22 year old is a pedophile.

A one year age gap???

My Mil was 15 and FIL 20. I always thought was creepy but they were married for 40yrs before she died prematurely of cancer. Still creepy

How rude!!

My kids are 17 and 21 and they are literally same maturity level in my opinion. If my DD told me she was dating a 23-24yr old tomorrow I wouldn’t be concerned. My dad was 8yrs older than my mum and got together at 18 - 26, married a year later.

I was 16 and my ex husband was 23 when we got together (early 2000s). We stayed together 10 years. Although I don't think he was a perve, now I realise that for him it probably gave him an element of control that he wouldn't have had over a woman his age. He was very shy and I think he had confidence with me that he wouldn't have done with an older woman. Everything was always on his terms. On reflection, he had definitely watched too much porn and used to do things in the bedroom I would never have thought of and I would go along with it because I didn't have much self esteem. A few times I woke up to him having sex with me and I stupidly just let him carry on even though I was half asleep. I don't think I even really loved him but I had low self esteem and I was flattered that an older guy liked me. I saw the light when I was 25 though and divorced him (isn't that when your brain fully matures?)...I wouldn't want my daughters dating an older man at the age of 16.

Sorry, it was badly worded. They police themselves about age gaps, which I agree with, as it was the Wild West when I was young. I think 1 year is a bit extreme, yes, but from what I can understand you are “allowed” a bigger gap as you get older.

Guidelines have been put in place nowadays because of what alot of people did when they were younger. What we did (me included) was wrong, but obviously we were too stubborn to take advice, hence now the legal guidelines.
A minor should not be in a relationship with anyone with more than a 3 year age gap.

I was 16 DH was nearly 22, I could never see myself with anyone nearer my age. 35 years married, together for 49 years.

I don’t think it’s the age gap that’s the big concern but the fact that you say he is controlling. I dated a 24 year old when I was 16. Lovely, respectful guy. Made a point of wearing normal clothes (we were in the heavy metal crowd) the first time he came to meet my parents. As to what he saw in me, he was just a bit immature. He’d grown up living mostly with his grandma so I think there’d been issues.

I was 16 and my ex was 23 when we got together in the late nineties. To be fair to him, we’d been dating about 3 months before I told him how old I was, up until then he’d believed I was 18. We stayed together for 8 years and he was and still is a nice, normal person.

It was completely normal for girls to lie about their age back then. We had a choice between hanging out at the roller skating rink or hanging out at the pub, and the pub was infinitely more preferable, so we lied. The boys our own age seemed immature.

Me and DH had a bigger gap when we met and I was 16.