For generations...nae CENTURIES it has been the social norm in a couple that the male half is older, or at least the same age as the female. It was normal for example in ancient Rome for girls usually aged about 9-15 to marry a man aged 30-40 years old. But alas! Times are a-changin'.
I don't know why it is frowned upon for a women to be the older one in the relationship. I was accused at school at the age of 17 of being a "cradle snatcher" when dating someone just one year below me who was 16. I faced more grief again when my boyfriend after that was also younger than me...by 3 months. Most people probably couldn't tell you why they think its wrong. If you ask they tend to hesitate and just kinda say, "...well...I dunno...just weird isn't it?"
I'd be lying if I didn't say that sometimes I also think that it's a bit strange and stammer a half thought-out response. Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore (aged 33 and 49 respectively) had a bit of controversy when they initially got together but after a short while this issue seemed to fade. However I have to say that when I first heard, I also thought it was odd. And like I said before - I couldn't tell you why. Maybe it was because I was possibly thinking he was hot, and closer to my age than hers. But I think that largely it was because if we were honest, we are brought up in a society where it's not normal.
- Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore
Recently a few of my friends (no names) have had flings/relationships/one night stands with guys 2,3 or 4 years younger than them and had a lot of stick for it. If they had had this relationship with someone the same sex as themselves and had had the same amount of stick for it, it would be homophobic and socially wrong to mock them. Yet, being an older female seems to be reason enough to be mocked.
It's always an awkward one really, the topic of age differences in relationships. Regardless of which way round the gap is. Who can forget that 16-year-old girl who married that 51-year-old. (Turns out their names are Doug Hutchison and Courtney Alexis Stodden, to be honest, I don't think anyone cared, they were just fascinated by that age gap.) And of course Anna Nicole Smith and her 63 years her senior, billionaire husband.
- "Normal" for the man to be older?
But as I said before....times are changing. In the celebrity world recently we have had Kutcher/Moore as already discussed but also many other celebrity couples where the age gap has been controversially, the 'wrong' way round. My favourite celebrity Kim Kardashian was with Kris Humphries, 4 years her junior. Nowhere Boy lead actor Aaron Johnson who is currently 21 got married at the ripe age of 19 to his girlfriend Sam Taylor-Wood who was 42 at the time, they now have 2 daughters together. And of course those of you from Britain probably got wind of One Direction's Harry Styles' romance with Caroline Flack. For those of you who haven't heard of this, it caused a storm not only because he was 15 years younger than her but also because he was only 17. This was seen as bizarre as, in many people's eyes, he isn't even legally considered an adult yet.
- Flack and Styles
- Taylor-Wood and Johnson
As I said, I think that in the Western world, whether we would like to admit it or not, we are brought up to think that a woman being older in a relationship is 'wrong'. But I think that with everything that is changing in society, and with celebrities leading the way through example, that this view is only bound to change. And I think this change is already underway. Born is the day of the cougar.
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