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Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
8,297 posts, read 14,166,733 times
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..... Different here. Relationships between, for example a 16 year old and a 24 year old are normal. if the age gap becomes to big, people worry about it.
Not only is this looked down on in California, it's highly illegal and will result in the 24 yo (male or female) being imprisoned for several years, and then required to register as a sex offender for the remainder of his/her life. Legally they have to inform everyone in their neighborhood of their sex offender status or go back to prison. The term "sex offender" covers everyone from a brutal rapist to someone in a loving relationship, so that registering in a neighborhood as a sex offender often results in severe harassment by people who assume that it was coercive and violent.
Not all states have the same laws. In most states the age of consent is 18, but there are some where it is 17 or 16, iirc.
What age do children / teenagers begin to pair off in your culture?
Kids tend to have their first boyfriends or girlfriends around the age of 11 - 13 here...
I was in Jr. High in 50 - 52, and I clearly recall that the idea of having a girlfriend began to loom very big, and as our school provided lots of social events having a "date" for a ball game or a dance started taking place.
Our Jr. High grades, 7-8, were in the same bldg as the high school, and we used the same gym facilities, study halls and noon time recreation as kids in grades 9-12....and their social habits were avidly copied, which included the idea of having a date and/or a girlfriend.
The school played records over the PA system during lunch hour and many kids danced in the gym during this time. We Jr. High kids hung out in the bleachers and watched them, until a few of the more daring among us began to ask a girl to dance.
Before I met my wife, I've been in a couple of relationships with girls from Southern Europe. These were pretty girls, invariably dressed to the nines, very sexy, very meticulously made up. But when it came to physical contact, they were also surprisingly prude, sometimes even awkward and embarassed. Being used to Flemish and Dutch girls, who in general don't seem to have many issues with the physical side of a relationship, this took me a bit off guard. It also led me to believe that there really is a difference between Latin and Germanic Europe when it comes to sexuality.
I know there are some exceptions but as an average or norm this seems very young. Serious relationships or just holding hands in the schoolyard?
Somewhere between the two.
In my school, boys started having "girlfriends" and girls having "boyfriends" as early as late third grade (age 9), but they were few. However, many more were the boys who admired girls from a distance, and girls who admired boys.
In 5th and 6th grade (ages 10-12), dedicated, romantic girlfriend - boyfriend relationships began forming with much greater frequency. Boys and girls usually dated within their respective clique-pairs (a boy clique would be aligned with a girl clique), which would eventually become a single clique. These relationships, however, were short-term - as little as a day to a few months - and the couple was in each other's presence only during class (although they may have communicated by phone as well).
In 7th and 8th grade (ages 12 - 14), relationships lasted longer (1 month to as long as 1 or 2 years in rare cases), were often more physically intense (making out), and the couples did not see one another merely during school hours but often met at malls or movie theaters, usually driven by their parents, who had varying views on the children's newly-awakened sex interest. Pairing off was still done in "clique-pairs" (e.g. the popular boys would date popular girls). School dances fomented this phenomenon; they were often the site where such relationships were created, and also the site where they were broken off. I went to a few school dances in 7th grade, and there was invariably a girl crying in the lobby outside the gymnasium where the school dance was held, surrounded by a group of consoling friends. During this time, it is acceptable to have a boyfriend or girlfriend one year younger or older than you.
The freshman year of high school (ages 14 - 15) was a transitional period. It was the year before most of my class got their driver's license. The girls were looked on as fresh meat by the upperclassmen, who can drive; and the girls look on the upperclassmen as more mature and powerful than the "freshies"; they paired off, and the upperclassmen sometimes deflowered them. It was marginally acceptable for a 12th grader (aged 18) to date a 9th grade (aged 15).
In the last three years of high school, boyfriend-girlfriend relationships sometimes (as in rarely) culminated in marriages, and whatever the case were definitely longer in duration then they tended to be in previous years. They were much more serious - often the pair is inseparable and does everything together - and in many or even most cases, sexual. The average age of sexual debut in the United States is 16 - 17; more than half of high school seniors have had intercourse. These changes arise not just do to other social and personal factors but because most students had personal automobiles beginning in 10th grade. I passed the driver's test and got mine the summer after 11th grade; I was one of the last.
Before I met my wife, I've been in a couple of relationships with girls from Southern Europe. These were pretty girls, invariably dressed to the nines, very sexy, very meticulously made up. But when it came to physical contact, they were also surprisingly prude, sometimes even awkward and embarassed. Being used to Flemish and Dutch girls, who in general don't seem to have many issues with the physical side of a relationship, this took me a bit off guard. It also led me to believe that there really is a difference between Latin and Germanic Europe when it comes to sexuality.
This seems to hold true in Latin America as well. Girls, beginning at 15 years old, often "dress to impress" and post pictures on social networking sites that if a young lady here posted it, would instantly draw dirty comments from fellow boys and the jealousy and gossip from girls. Yet they do not seem to see any contradiction between this and remaining "pure" or at least fitting into the tight restrictions imposed on them by their families. One of my former Costa Rican homestay sisters, now all grown, has a friend who, in almost all her pictures, shows off her cleavage in a very ostentatious manner; yet on her "Information" page she claims to be "Living her life for a God" and is a fan of "God" and a number of other Christian pages. Likewise, my friend in Mexico's girlfriend has some pictures that would slightly risque by Minnesota standards, but her dad, if her came home to her boyfriend deflowering her, would probably kill him.
Not only is this looked down on in California, it's highly illegal and will result in the 24 yo (male or female) being imprisoned for several years, and then required to register as a sex offender for the remainder of his/her life. Legally they have to inform everyone in their neighborhood of their sex offender status or go back to prison. The term "sex offender" covers everyone from a brutal rapist to someone in a loving relationship, so that registering in a neighborhood as a sex offender often results in severe harassment by people who assume that it was coercive and violent.
Not all states have the same laws. In most states the age of consent is 18, but there are some where it is 17 or 16, iirc.
That's why I made that posting here. I know this is a big difference between Middle-Europe and California (maybe USA in general). Is it something new? In my opinion, it became morally (and legally) wrong in California during the past decades.
That's why I made that posting here. I know this is a big difference between Middle-Europe and California (maybe USA in general). Is it something new? In my opinion, it became morally (and legally) wrong in California during the past decades.
It goes back about 20 years, and came about due to radical feminists and right wing law-and-order types getting together to make said laws stricter. It is probably not a coincidence that said laws became stricter at the same time as when California became more nonwhite especially Southern California. The laws existed prior to that time but they were not enforced much and the sentences were more lenient.
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
8,297 posts, read 14,166,733 times
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The laws existed prior to that time but they were not enforced much and the sentences were more lenient.
Exactly, majoun. It's become rabidly enforced AND apparently that's what people want - around here, unlike in most of the world, there is no distinction between child rapists and loving relationships. It's all a "sex offense". I've actually literally been harassed by "Neighborhood Watch" types in a small town when going out for long walks (doctor's orders), simply because (as I found out much later) someone had started rumors about me that I was a child molester. You'd think that the lack of a victim would stop them, but no, it's become such a huge crusade that people would literally scowl and shake with rage when I walked by to the grocery store, and would aim their headlights at me.
And no, I didn't even have a "loving relationship" or any other with teenagers, though I certainly believe that's possible. You'd have to discount all of history to argue otherwise.
This is NOT the country I grew up in, not just for this but in so many other ways. So stupid, so vicious, so eager to imprison its own citizens and blow up imaginary terrorists overseas, both at huge expense ..... then we complain about the budget deficit and try to cut down on health care to fix the situation. It's too late for me to go elsewhere, though.
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