Whenever I see a news report or article on abusive age gap relationships, a pattern becomes extremely evident. A pattern which tells the age gap wasn’t the real problem.
Then what was the problem? Well. The same as in any abusive relationship, with someone older or younger, with someone the same age, or someone of a different race. The guy was an asshole.
Yes. No other way to say it. The horror stories of “abused girls” who were with men a decade or more older than them come not from him being older, but from him being an overall dubious person.
One simple tour on the web tells you that happens to same age couples too, it happens to any couple in which one of the partners is trash.
In fact I would dare say we hear these horrible stories because they are convenient to the mainstream. Why do we never hear of the opposite? Of healthy age gap relationships which lasted for years, or even led to marriage? We don’t hear them because we don’t hear of healthy relationships in general.
People in healthy relationships rarely brag of them, rarely talk of them, rarely show them to those out of their private circle. People in unhealthy relationships however do let people know they exist.
Both before, and after the relationship hits rock bottom, they show them.
If it is doomed to fail, but not a horror story, they will brag of how perfect it is on social media, until it isn’t. By then they will break up and eventually take separate ways.
If it was a horror story they will keep it quiet until the breakup, and then they will write an article online, or tell their story as a cautionary tale. And in the process they will accuse anyone within the demographic of their abuser of being abusers.
Said abuser might be older, might be younger, might be of the same or opposite sex, might be of a different race, different nationality, different whatever, or the same. What matters is they will drag anyone with some commonality with them, except for one thing, they will never drag the douchebags.
Those articles are always shit like “I dated a white guy and it sucked.”, “I dated a Japanese salaryman and I wanted to die.”, “I dated a nerd, it was awful.”, or “I was 14, he was 30 and it was hell.” They never say “I dated a douchebag.”, “I dated a narcissist” (Well. That one is starting to show up as people slowly start going to much needed therapy.) or “I dated an unemployed guy who did crack on the street.”
They focus on their demographics, and not their actions. They focus on the things they can make collective, and not the things that made them individuals. Why? Because otherwise it would mean the flaw is on them, and they would be unable to slander entire demographics.
Just think about it. Why does the phrase “They’re all the same” always is bemoaned by both men and women who have bad relationships? Are they all the same?
No, they aren’t. Those people have shit taste and pick terrible people to be on dates with. But facing that is painful. Being accountable for their poor choices is a horrible thing, anathema to them. So they will put the blame on the girl being “upper class” or the guy being “fifteen years older” instead of thinking of what they really were, assholes.
Don’t date assholes, and stop lumping everyone from one demographic in the same place as the assholes you dated.
The Monthly Truth Seeker. 