Older men, younger women, and casual encounters
I could write a whole blog on my pet peeves, but, instead, I started this blog. So you all will have to put up with the occasional peevish post. This is one of those.
I know there are a lot of older men out there looking for fun, and that's great. There are some older women, too, who are looking for the same sort of thing, and I look forward to being among them in another 10, 20 or 30 years, depending on what counts for old for you.
Something that bothers me, though, is older guys who try to pick me up. Oh, sure, I suppose there's no issue with a 50 year old fellow trying his luck with me, but all of my ads or profiles say my age (I was 28 when I started posting ads to CL, now I'm 29), and they all specify that I want to hook up with someone around my own age. And despite my clear specification, it's not uncommon for me to get a somewhat sheepish response from guys 15 years my senior talking about how young they are at heart, and if only I would give them a chance, I'd find older men to be quite fantastic.
Now, there are two problems, here: First, it always annoys me when someone knows he doesn't fit my criteria but decides that I probably don't really mean it, whatever "it" may be. "I smoke, but only between bouts of lovemaking. That doesn't matter, right?" Or, "You said you like to use condoms, but what if I pull out before I come?" Given the short length of most ads, the things that a person bothers to put in are likely to be things that are important to him or her, and worth acknowledging. The second, thing, though, about the older guys, is that it's such a pattern. I don't actually get a lot of men trying to get me to change my mind about what I'm looking for. For example, I don't have loads of email from married men saying, "Won't you make an exception for me, pleeeease?" I do, however, have loads of such email from older men.
I know that lots of older men are fantastic in bed, and I'm closing off lots of opportunities to sleep with men who know what they're doing with a woman's body. And I'm not saying no to them because I don't like grey hair (I do, actually, especially that salt-and-pepper thing guys with really dark hair get) or find older men unattractive. I could go into my various reasons for wanting to be with men my age, but the point is, that's what I want, and that's what I'm posting about. And I still get about 40% of my responses from men who are at least 13 years older than I am.
This makes me wonder: Can these men read? Do they care what their partner wants? Would they pay attention to other things I say are important to me? Can they not get a hot woman their own age? Have they bought into the obnoxious beauty myths of our culture that say that women aren't hot after 40?
They probably can pick up lots of women my age, but I'm not one of them, and that's why I'm clear in my ads that that's not what I'm looking for. That doesn't seem to stop them from trying, though.
Comments
In my online fishing, I have regularly gotten contacted by men in their 60s and I am 24! And my cut-off is quite reasonable, I won't consider anyone that is twice my age. . .
Posted by: Ellie | February 22, 2006 9:02 AM
Your cut-off is much more generous than mine! I try to stay within 10-11 years of my age, with some exceptions for people who write a really stellar introduction that doesn't wheedle at all on the age issue, just acknowledges it and proves that the author is worth making an exception for.
Posted by: ClueChick | February 22, 2006 9:43 AM
This is just another example of guys "not getting it." Men can't identify clues and, unfortunately, we don't understand blatant statements, either.
I've had my fair share of older guys writing to me, but this is when I didn't specify a gender preference. So I changed my setting to "women only" and still had guys writing to me. Usually they say something like, "I could be a real good friend to you!!!" Which just makes me want to take a long shower and scrub the creepiness off me.
Those guys who wrote to you were probably thinking, Sure, she stated an age preference, but I'm different! I just have to state my case and then she'll see!
Slightly off topic, but how many responses do you get in a day, CC? I've heard too many horror stories from women about some loser guy who approached them and came on too strong and made a total dork of himself, etc. I made some kind of vow that I would never approach another woman again; I can't even remember the last time I went up to a woman and introduced myself or whatever. I just keep to myself and if someone wants to talk to me, they can come up and say hi or whatever. I've been on a lot of dates in the past year, so I guess it works.
Posted by: aaron | February 22, 2006 1:13 PM
In the one personal ad that I have online, I specify that I'm 36 and "almost exclusively interested in younger men (but will make the occasional exception for older men who have successfully conquered their tendency to be condescending)." I haven't gotten a message from anyone older than 39 in forever, although I have wound up receiving a few notes from guys in their early-mid 20's who run in the same social circles as my 17-yr-old daughter, which is somewhat icky. My Decade Rule (no guys more than 10 years from my age, in either direction) has worked quite well, for the last several years.
And you are entirely correct about, "Would they pay attention to other things I say are important to me?" The answer, I've learned, is "Not so much."
Posted by: Lil | February 22, 2006 2:58 PM
aaron: How many responses do I get a day in what context? Online, it depends on if I have an ad active on CL, or have been visiting the various other sites where I have profiles. Offline, of course, it depends on if I'm going out, where I'm out, and if I'm wearing my bitchy face or my friendly one.
Posted by: ClueChick | February 22, 2006 10:53 PM
Honestly, I can't blame the older guy who responds past the cut-off. Or the smoker, or the long-distance guy or the whatever. What have they got to lose? It isn't like there are hundreds of reasonable w4m CE ads out there, so they have to work with what they have. Maybe 99% odds you'll blow them off for their non-matching criteri[on|a] but that's 1% better odds of getting laid than not responding.
And if we are to really get super honest here, I've bent my rules and I know you have too. Since the rule-bending possibility exists, and they know it, they'd be fools not to at least seek an exception, if your post really strikes a chord with them.
Some really useful advice would be to explain to the fellas how to write a response that will be most likely to make you bend the rules.
Posted by: sapiophile | February 23, 2006 8:54 PM
Oh, and younger guys do the same thing. I don't have any firm upper age limit (I *heart* older guys *swoon*) but I have a stated lower limit of 35, and a real honest-to-goodness lower limit of 30. Other than the marrieds, the most common doesn't-meet-the-stated-criteria response I get is from young uns, on down to 17!
Posted by: sapiophile | February 23, 2006 8:57 PM
as sapiophile wrote, part of it is that there are just so few w4m ads, that any guy looking through them is going to a) be an idiot and write something to each one, often without even reading them, or b) not be an idiot, but still seriously consider every w4m ad where the woman seems interesting or there's some hook that makes them interested - even if there are some criteria mismatches.
And, as sapiophile said, most everyone will make an occasional rare exception, so what've they got to lose?
One more factor is this: There are even fewer w4m ads that state an age in the 30s, 40s, or highter. You write, "Have they bought into the obnoxious beauty myths of our culture that say that women aren't hot after 40?" - as you've noted yourself, some of the same things men buy into, women do too. Perhaps if more older women used CE, and actually posted their age, there'd be more options for the older men.
Posted by: Cos | February 24, 2006 5:17 PM
As I said, since my stated upper age limit is very high (and I'm usually amenable to going even higher for the right guy) I don't run into this same problem. But since my lower limit is fairly high, I run into lots of young men who want to peruade me to dally with them.
They are generally pretty graceless about this. The most common approach is to sell themselves by dissing older men and bragging about their stamina or good looks. This is a fatal mistake because 1) I like older men, so dissing them offends me personally; 2) despite the myth, I haven't found young men to actually have more stamina; and 3) I think old guys are really hot, so the more a boy tries to tell me how different he looks from an old guy, the less interested I'll be.
One recent young man stated emphatically how much happier I'd be with a young stud like him behind me instead of an "old mule". "Old mule" has now become a standing joke with my favorite fella, age almost 50.
Posted by: sapiophile | February 24, 2006 7:24 PM