Forums → The Tavern → Age Difference.
| 36 | 19751 |
I don't know if this has been discussed before. It's random, hence placing in The Tavern.
Age difference. What are your views on age difference and why is it so different in real life versus online?
Obviously there's different situations that will bring out different viewpoints. Where i am coming from is, age difference, romantically if usually frowned upon when you're younger - that is a 13 year old dating a 20 year old is usually viewed as wrong, but a 20 year old dating a 27 year old isn't. The reason i thought of this was actually the users of AG: As an active member i talk to numerous people. The age ranges from 13 to 30something [I think].
Now i get on very well with this young teens and older adults but in real life, i wouldn't be able to have a "friendship" as such with a young teen. Is it acceptable online because you don't have to be around them? If you were a parent, wouldn't you be worried your child was talking to someone several years younger/older? Final thought: Is it just me, or does it seem more acceptable for such a gap in age between friends on AG as opposed to a live chat room etc?
- 36 Replies
So you think forums are better because they portray a persons personality more?
Not really. I act slightly different on a chat I frequent than I do on here, but that's because I have to watch what I say and can't talk about certain things here. In threads you also have more time to respond to people, on chats they kinda expect you to respond in a certain amount of time and there's a limit to how much you can type.
If this was said a few years ago, I would have gone and found examples of everything you said you didn't do.
Dawg. You gotta realise that I've never been that way. I've never went for that position. Just because I answer a few questions around the site doesn't mean I'm gunning for an internet position that'll take up a lot of my time. It's silly, I have more important things to worry about.
I don't really want to badmouth people on here, but if it gets you off my back so be it. Remember Frank? We all knew he was going to be a mod someday. He fit in perfectly with everything, like he was created just to be a mod. Now think back to CT around the April Fools' joke. I distinctly remember him mentioning he was gunning for that mod position since some of you thought mods were actually getting fired. Now look at me, if I truly wanted to become a mod, I would clearly act more like Frank. No, I will not do that now or ever.
I'm not the type of person to put on a fake smile and try to be nice to everyone, nor am I going to try to start conversations with people I have little-to-nothing in common with. It's an indifference; there's 7-8 people internet people that I have regular conversation with and none of them seem to use this site anymore, I have no plans on trying to increase that number.
I'm just trying to clear the water with you and a few others.
i personally have friends with age differences in real life as well as online too (not by 7 years in real life but still) and i think that its completely fine. About dating though i think that the reason that its ok for 20 year olds to date 27 year olds because they have more of a connection than 20 years olds have with 13 year olds. Think about it: both 20 and 27 year olds have finished high school, can drive, can drink, have to work, pay bills, and go to a lot of the same places. 13 year olds are still in middle school, and they are a lot less mature and ready for the world. Therefore the two situations end up being completely different.
Fast paced interactions force you to make quick decisions, which often leads to you seeming less mature. If you can sit, and think out a post before you type it, you're more likely to say something worth saying.
But doesn't that open the theory that your maturity on a forum is calculated and not a true reflection of your personality?
I want to throw something into the mix, just for conversational purposes and to see your opinions:
About dating though i think that the reason that its ok for 20 year olds to date 27 year olds because they have more of a connection than 20 years olds have with 13 year olds. Think about it: both 20 and 27 year olds have finished high school, can drive, can drink, have to work, pay bills, and go to a lot of the same places. 13 year olds are still in middle school, and they are a lot less mature and ready for the world. Therefore the two situations end up being completely different
What about a 20 year old with the mind of a 13 year old being friends/more than friends with someone of the same mental capacity. If they're not sexually active, is it really all that wrong?
well jeff, here in Israel there is an easy Calculation for it - your age {for after 18}- half the age of the older person + 7. this way, a 18 years old can date 16, a 20 can date 17 and so on. its get wierd when you are a pedo {yea, a 1 years old can date a 7.5 girl...}, but in most case its work.
any who,
in forums, when you write you mostly think twice befor commenting. also, if we look on AG, the ones who come here are not the instegram guys on youtube {dont try to offend anyone}. here come the people who want to talk, so they have some maturity which most of these young teens dont have. secondly, {not trying to offend again}, the 30+ you talked about who chat here, are open minded people and also Updated in a reasonable degree about pop culture, gaming and stuff. if you will go to teh forum of the pacific union of lumberjacks you will see that a 15 yeas old kid wont fit in, so in the amsterdam club of medieval North Italian poetry.
and mostly, because you dont see the people voices. you dont feel threat or shame when reading, are you?
its harder to guese my age when i write then when i speak.
i saw peoples who i was sure are pass 18 and found out them being 15+-. and some guys who i was sure were my age and they were 25-+ {no, i dobnt talk about pedos...}.
and for the last sentence, a mature realation is based, we cant denay, on some sort of sexual relationship.
two kids in kindergarden who decleared they are a couple are just playing. so these modern 10 kids who kiss and everything. they mostly just play, and want to feel mature. and as we see, they even may have sex {all these teens parents...}. they dont do it because Sexual attraction. they just act as they belive a couple need to.
we are in our base animals, just like a penguin. and the realation of a penguin is for a new generatin to be born, ao the paprents geans will keep "living, not for them go hunting fish togheter for fun or hang out.
lets just say, when a 'boy' is "not in a sexual mod of thinking", boobs might look disgusting. what guys find so attractive in those two pices of fat and meat?
they just want to 'find' the best parent for there baby.
so a 13 years old kid, who dont yet 'active in parthner finding mod',
only look for the feeling as a mature, or his systems are starting to work.
so, a 13 years old is not built for a mature relation. they may play a couple, but not be one. also all these guys who are affraid from Commitment. they have the sexual maturity, but not yet the Emotional maturity needed for a real relation.
Belive me, i just finished 3 years of "Introduction to Psychology" class.
I don't know danielo, i get where you're coming from but i disagree on a few factors.
1. The age thing at the beginning is actually pretty interesting, so thanks for that ! :]
2. Your opinion on forums is similar to mine, although there are always exceptions. Mainly on this site [Imo]. You have kids who are more clued up on the intellectual stuff than adults here, and teens who are astonishing with programming, where as other users regardless of age have no idea about. So i don't think forums split base on age - i think it's more general knowledge of the subject and interest.
3. This is where i disagree with you. Your opinion of course, so it's not wrong [Dur]. Just struggling to understand you:
hey even may have sex {all these teens parents...}. they dont do it because Sexual attraction. they just act as they belive a couple need to.
Ten, sure, is a bit young, but i think teenagers have sexual relations based on sexual attraction. Not because it's what's expected. I know there are people who give in to pressure, and people who feel like they need to in order to get it out of the way and be "cool" or whatever, but i think sexual attraction certainly plays a part in it. I mean, you tend to find the person you're in a relationship with attractive, and i think regardless of age there's some form of desire. I know for example when i was a teenager, i obviously found the person attractive, and as a lady who doesn't give it up easy, i choose not to have sex [regardless of gender] outside of a committed relationship. These were my morals, but boy, it's not what i didn't want to.
lets just say, when a 'boy' is "not in a sexual mod of thinking", boobs might look disgusting. what guys find so attractive in those two pices of fat and meat?
they just want to 'find' the best parent for there baby.
I don't get what you mean here. So if a boy isn't sexually active, or have sex on his mind, boobs are disgusting? What does boobs have to do with finding the best parent for their baby?
so, a 13 years old is not built for a mature relation. they may play a couple, but not be one. also all these guys who are affraid from Commitment. they have the sexual maturity, but not yet the Emotional maturity needed for a real relation.
I was in quite a serious relationship at thirteen. I know there are exceptions to the norm and maybe i was one of them, but at thirteen it was pretty intense. Granted it was with another female and she was a very years my elder. But i was both emotionally and physically ready for her, and she'll always be my "first love" kind of thing. So i think depending on your capacity, you can let someone in at a young age. I guess circumstances matter.
It's a lot more acceptable on the internet because you don't really know how old the person is, and even if you do, you aren't really thinking about that when you interact with them. The internet is very impersonnal. You don't have to be staring someone in the face who's ten years older and think "wow they're old. this is kinda weird". No one does that on the internet. I baisically see everyone on here as my own age, but I know they aren't.
What does boobs have to do with finding the best parent for their baby?
More milk for the baby? That's some old-fashioned male instinct right there.
I was in quite a serious relationship at thirteen.
I'm sure I could have handled one as early as 11 (I was always physically and mentally advanced for my age).
However, what must be kept in mind is that at a certain age, you stop seeing people in their early teen years as people in your age range and start seeing them as children. Mental maturity or not, most people aren't interested in being in a committed relationship with a child. A 52-year-old with a 28-year-old is not a huge deal because even though one lover is old enough to be the other lover's parent, they're still both adults living in the adult world; but a 23-year-old and a 13-year-old, though the age difference won't matter at all in another 10 years, is a huge difference because one lover is an adult and the other is a child. Even though the 13-year-old may have the same mental maturity as the 23-year-old, he/she is still physically a child and is therefore still living in a child's world; while the adult, who may have the maturity of a 13-year-old, is still perceived as an adult and is living in the adult world.
These points may have already been covered. I'm just expressing why I think this age difference thing is such a big deal in this day and age. After all, it wasn't a concern 100 years ago.
i see your point jeff. damm im speechless :/
and about the boobs thing, what i mean is, that when a small kid {very small} see the oposite sex parts, he is disccused of even fear.
even in more orthodox communities, girls talk about the oppostite sex parts as "ugly". the spoiled roman girls called it "ugly pilum".
only after he is getting mature, he get attracted to it. in the age of 10+- the kid start to feel something for them, even when he dont realy know "what to do with it". it is shown by young kids who go to porn sites or just watch nude pictures, and thats it. just watching. they are curios, they feel something, but dont have the 'need' to do anything. they also dont look at a parthen as someone who they need to realy care for {sure the Environment teach them so}.
Froid and his 'heir' erikson explaine that a person has "stages". in each of them he have a conflict or a barier to pass, so he can process normaly in life.
at the age of 6-8, you most remmeber or see in little kids around you, is wher they start playing in husband and wife, all the girls suddenly want to be "a mother" when they grow up and stuff. since then, they understand 'sex'. after that and up to the age of 12, sex dont say anything for them. they think "girls are grose" and boys are "ugly". but then, like magic, they start to care for the girl attention. somewher near the bar-mitzva age {12-13}. younger age for girls {you can sure see all these young girls who just follow the older guys}. they can feel love and stuff, and even feel commitment, but they are still quite 'selfish' {most of them}. only at the age of 16-18 they actualy start "to think about tommorow". they start to picture there life with someone.
i dont say that aeveryone are the same. and in our times, these asspect of love get to smaller and smaller kids. you see kids in the seconde grad with "girlfriend". they dont even know what is the diffrunce between boys and girls, only that "girls wear ping and boys blue".
i was in the pool yesterday. i heared a bunch of small kids talk about TV. sudddenly they talked about a TV show called 'asfur'. it containe sex scenes and violance. and they watch it. there parents know im mostly sure. one kids chased the other, so a girl said that "he sound like one character girl friend when they have sex". they were like 10. i most say, i was shocked. and they already have "GF" and "BF". tell me, what they do? play monopoly? they know what a 'couple' should be {this show is not very nice to the 'ladies' lets just say. they are horny creatures who just want to get one of the characters}. and every generation the age get lower and lower. you can say that i am an old fashion guy, but this is moving too fast in my opinion.
i can tell you that i used to live in a "bouble". a comunity wher family was yet a strong base, and to be honest, only Wealthy people, wher Divorced couples are rare and poor families even more. also a quite village like, kids go bare fit outside, every family had utlist 1 family member {mostly a grandfater} who had cows or Crops.
so the term of "girlfriend" was only used in these soup opheras from argentina. i dont say we were completly innocent, we talked about it and "lnew what going on", but a girlfriend at the age of the seven grade was not so normal. now, when my little brother has went to his first grade, some kids asked him if he have a girlfriend. he told them that he his only 7, so said "so?" like every 1 grader most have girlfriend. its just wierd to me. even dudes my age, 18, i see most of them not even know what a couple soppuse to do. they say hey to each other from time to time, kiss, and then go away to there friends. they go out just with other friends. some of them "do it", but they are not a couple. some are indeed couples which i wont be suprised if they will get Married. but some,mostly "the cool guys", dont realy act as a mature couple. they just play. yes, they are attracte to each other, but i see it as palying.
a realation is a mature one when the two partners can hang out togheter, not just for public site and then get almost stranger to each other.
i think this is why our socity want seperation of grades. so the 10-12 wont be change by the more mature 13-14, and them wong get dirty ideas by almost mature mans in the age of 17-18. after thet, a 21 man can talk to a 72 man without any suspicius eye. im finaly freeee! {lol, in the 30 actualy}.
There is a 13 year old "couple" that is sexually active ("friends" of mine)(not any more). If youve been around the relationship thread , you'd see that i am very anti-dating in middle school. Besides that one couple, dating is basically sittIng together at lunch and MAYBE kissing/holding hands after school.
a realation is a mature one when the two partners can hang out togheter, not just for public site and then get almost stranger to each other.
I don't know, what about internet dating?
oh, here come the difffrunce. in an internet dating, everyone know that you wont chat for hours and hours. so once for a while considerd normal. talking like in real life will even be considerd wierd.
its just like a relationship from distance. you talk everyday, sometime twice a day {after a while, in first its much more}. but if you call every hour, you may be considered as "overly attached Bf/GF".
Not sure where I've heard this rule, but I've always thought it to be a general rule for dating.
Take your age, divide by 2, and add 7. That should be the youngest age you should date.
Hence, if you are 18, the youngest you should date would be a 16 year old.
Although it doesn't quite make sense if the age gets too young (a 6 y/o dating a 10 y/o? - you get the point)
. in an internet dating, everyone know that you wont chat for hours and hours. so once for a while considerd normal. talking like in real life will even be considerd wierd.
its just like a relationship from distance. you talk everyday, sometime twice a day {after a while, in first its much more}. but if you call every hour, you may be considered as "overly attached Bf/GF".
Internet dating progresses though - messaging to texting to calling to meeting. Surely the overly attached rule applies to every form of relationship/age.
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