Meghan Murphy and I had a spirited series of exchanges here on the blog and at her site. But though we disagree about pornography and the decriminalizing of prostitution, we agree on some other issues — including the general inadvisability of older men/younger women relationships. (Particularly when the “younger woman” is 25 or less and the older man is 10 or more years her senior.)
We taped a lengthy interview last week and it airs tomorrow, Monday, July 18th, at 12 noon Pacific Time. You can listen to it live here. It will be set up to stream on the site not long after air time, and will also appear as a podcast (eventually) here.
I remember this post, Hugo. http://hugoschwyzer.net/2006/10/08/does-the-libido-mature-a-musing-on-desire-and-ageing-in-response-to-fiona/
You have said over and over again that you have a history of being peer-sexual. As someone who witnessed at least som of your sexual affairs with students many years ago, I can say that your actions usually seemed to match your words. (DId you know you had a rep for hitting on only white female students who were older than the average? Someone even said you had a single mom fetish. You were doing MILFS before it was cool. Of course, I can think of one notable exception… hee!)
Point being, you have this habit of expecting other men to be like you. Great, accept that you often confuse your personal identity with what others should do. Your’e primarily attracted to women your own age and always have been. Great, so how many men do you think are like that? How many of your male friends your age think that forty-something women are hotter than twenty-something women? I’d guess it is a pretty low percentage of men.
This affects how people hear your words on older men & younger women sexual relationships. Easy for you to say because you were never interested in crossing that line. Of course, had you not gotten clean when you did, you would have crossed it sooner or later.
It’s telling me that Meghan,a radfem who hangs out with people who hate you), would find this one thing to agree with you on.
Alexa: my experience is similar to Hugo’s; I wouldn’t really be interested in a younger woman, even if I did find her superficially “hot” (and if I were available, naturally!) But as for the average man, you do appear to be more correct than I would like to believe. Here’s OKCupid’s wonderful research on the subject. Looking at men at 40, for example, it looks like they are most interested in women around the age of 30.
I’d like to believe that data from a survey on a dating site would be systematically biased, because “the good ones are taken”, but in the absence of other studies, I would have to accept that yes, on average men do prefer younger women.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Fathering three children, aborting two and letting some luckless dupe take the rap for the third, that’s just great. Fifty millions of abortions, that’s just fine and dandy. Pornography, prostitution, voluntarily childlessness, all that stuff Hugo has no problem with, but somehow this issue (which there are no good or genuine moral reasons to disagree with, unless you’ve been drinking the California cultural-liberal kool-aid) this issue is the hill Mr. Schwyzer chooses to die on.
What’s unclear to me is why civilised people should treat this unrepentant drug-addicted, promiscuous babydaddy as any sort of authority on gender or sex toppics.
@Alexa & @SpudTater – I think you are missing the point(s): 1) that is, it’s not that many men don’t seek out younger women, but rather that it is social conditioning that has made them do so, as well as male power and privilege, rather than biology, 2) This is problematic for a number of reasons outlined in the interview.
No one’s arguing this doesn’t happen!
Re: This is problematic for a number of reasons outlined in the interview.
As I said, it’s only problematic if you’re one of the martini-drinking, Santa Monica cultural-liberal chattering classes, who’s let too much Foucault and too much marijuana corrode your intellect. The rest of us don’t have any problem with it.
Yeah Alexa and Spudtater, you should ignore evolutionary biology arguments because they lack empirical rigor, and then accept a social constructivist arguement which is equally lacking in empirical rigor.
Don’t ask any questions, that way there won’t be any contradictions.
@Hector_St_Clare – I am none of the above. @Mike – Do you also think that abuse, misogyny, patriarchy are all completely ‘natural’?
Hector, though I do currently live a few miles from Santa Monica, I haven’t had a martini since 1998 and haven’t smoked pot in an even longer stretch. And I loathe Foucault, haven’t been promiscuous since Clinton was in office, and am deeply repentant for those things that weigh on my conscience. And Meghan, a Canadian with impeccable anti-porn and anti-prostitution credentials, certainly doesn’t fit into your bizarre archetype.
Meghan Murphy,
It was meant to be an expression of contempt and mockery for feminists and cultural liberals in general, not for you in particular.
@Hector,
I may smoke a little pot but I’ve never had a martini. I’m a woman who likes looking at porn. (Wake up and smell the 21st century, jerk; women masturbate too.) I’m a woman who votes Democratic because I don’t want a bunch of fundamentalist preachers deciding how I should live my private life. But I don’t live in Santa Monica. Right now, I live in Arcadia, California, where my congressman is a Republican.
Hugo and Megan,
Nice to hear the two of you talk. There are just a few things I wondered about from your conversation.
First of all Hugo I’m not so sure that it’s a good idea to paint gay and lesbian culture as outside of heterosexual patriarchal culture. While these two cu lures are different I think it’s important to keep in mind that they do interact with each other, and that patriarchy does have a big role in gay culture.
I also know Megan tried to bring up class a little to steer the conversation towards intersectionality, but I wonder if there might be another way to consider intersectionality on this topic. This topic was very centered around how age difference often begets abuse, but age is not they only factor in abusive relationships of course. So my question is what is different about an age differential relationship where there is abuse, and an abusive relationship where there is small to no age difference. I guess I would just like to better understand how age difference, specifically, interacts with abuse?
Really Hugo, You Loath Foucault? lol! I don’t
Once again, I’m dumbfounded by the idea that who someone finds attractive is grounds for any sort of ideological discussion.
Some guys like younger women. Some gals like older men.
Let’s hope they find each other and live happily ever after.
I met my boyfriend when I was 26 and he was 38, and I wasn’t his preference – yet we hit it off. Been over 2 years together now.
Not sure what the arguments are (I don’t listen to audio stuff, I prefer reading transcripts), but I seriously doubt it was the motivation here.
Meghan,
That’s a clear strawman argument. Accepting that there is a biological basis in mate choice among humans does not automatically mean that one also assumes abuse, misogyny, or anything else has a biological basis.
Furthermore, you are attempting to present a false dichotomy: that the only explanations for observed behavior are either biology or social constructs. In reality there are many other options (including individual illness, rational choice responses, or misdirected impulses, to name a few).
You cannot just dismiss evolutionary biology because you find it inconvenient, especially when your own theory completely lacks empirical backing.
Once again, I’m dumbfounded by the idea that who someone finds attractive is grounds for any sort of ideological discussion.
Because it’s OK to talk about how culture and ideology influence our decisions about shopping, careers, life choices, family planning, and all that – just not about our sex lives.
What are you so afraid of discussing, JohnE?
@Mike, you cannot just accept pop evolutionary biology because you find it attractive.
mythago: So which are the “wrong” stores to shop with? Which are the “wrong” careers to pursue? Which are the “wrong” life choices?
That’s the difference here: the attitude that it’s acceptable to judge age-compatible relationships as “right” and age-disparate ones as “wrong” in all cases. Who are you, or anyone else, to make that judgment? Since when is everyone obligated to have the Hugos of the world vet whom they may or may not fall in love with?
The criticisms I’ve heard against age-disparate heterosexual relationships seem no more sound than those I’ve heard against gay marriage: that they’re bad and harmful things just for failing to adhere to cultural “norms.” Just as gay men are caricatured as predatory, manipulative and lust-crazed bush-lurkers by homophobes, those who condemn May-Semptember romance caricature straight men the same way.
What all the rhetoric boils down to is an elaborate way of saying “I don’t like this because it’s icky.” Well, whose problem is that?
PS: Hector = wingnut idjit troll. Do not feed.
PS: Hector = wingnut idjit troll. Do not feed. lol
Straw man city here.
Nowhere does mythago say there are wrong stores to shop at or wrong career paths to choose.
The idea that all choices are made in a cultural vacuum is delusional, though.
Mythago,
At no point did I state that I find “pop evolutionary biology” conclusions attractive. Please do not put words into my mouth.
What I do find attractive are attempts to find empirical evidence in order to explain human behavior. While evolutionary biology may not be there yet, that is the end goal.
Meghan’s arguments, on the other hand, are the exact opposite of science. Rather than beginning with evidence and working towards a conclusions, Meghan has begun with a conclusion (Patriarchy is the oldest and most basic form of oppression) and tries to force all available evidence to fit that conclusion (big surprise that she finds porn oppressive as she has already defined the entire system as oppressive).
@ A.Y. Siu,
Some choices genuinely do not have a cultural component. For example: among individuals raised in nearly identicle backgrounds (indeed, often in the very safe household!) some people will prefer chocolate icecream and some people will prefer vanilla.
It is silly to say that we have been culturally indoctrinated to prefer chocolate to vanilla or vice versa. If we had, Baskin Robbins would not need to offer 31 flavors, only 1 flavor. Nor is it appropriate to blame biology; icecream of any flavor has not been around long enough for distinct innate preferences to evolve.
There is a case to be made for age disparate relationships to be no different. Just as some people prefer chocolate icecream to vanilla, some people may prefer an older partner to one who is closer in age to themselves.
A.Y. Siu: The idea that all choices are made in a cultural vacuum is delusional, though.
And who, pray tell, made that claim?
Anyway, what are you saying? That yes, people are obligated to have “culture” approve of who they may or may not fall in love with if that choice deviates from some established “norm”?
That would essentially be the position of the anti-gay marriage crowd, and it’s just as bogus when directed towards those who date outside their same age bracket.
If, on the other hand, you are simply pointing out that, by pursuing such a relationship, the lovers in question will have to face the sneering disapproval and impertinence of people in their “culture.” But you know, gays have had to put up with that from time immemorial, too. It does not in any way vindicate such judgmentalism and prejudice.
“If, on the other hand, you are simply pointing out that, by pursuing such a relationship, the lovers in question will have to face the sneering disapproval and impertinence of people in their “culture.”
Then why do they consisently like to make it everyone’s business? Why do they love talking about age so much and the ages of their so called lovers? Everyone I’ve ever met who is in those relationships dumps that information on me. Curiously, I’ve never asked them about their personal lives as I am NOT interested, but they try to make it my business.
Well sure. It would be immensely comforting to be able to understand exactly why people behave as they do, because then we could predict it, right? Problem is that, as you agree, evolutionary biology isn’t there yet, and it’s significantly crippled by its use as a prescriptive rather than descriptive method of explaining human behavior.
No, that’s the attitude you’re pretending everybody holds, so that you can attack the discussion as judgy rather than on its merits. “We can’t talk about why people do X because then you will all say that X is wrong” – huh?
P.S.: You may be making some dumbfuck assumptions here about the relationships of people disagreeing with you. Just a thought.
As for your rather missing-the-point question, the ‘wrong’ store or ‘wrong’ career path is one chosen for bad reasons. I would hope that you would see a difference between Person A choosing a younger partner because he is deeply and mutually in love with that person, and Person B, who chooses a younger partner because she thinks she can exert more emotional and financial control over somebody much younger than she is.