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A growing share of U.S. husbands and wives are roughly the same age. (www.pewresearch.org)

submitted 4 weeks ago by ModerateImprovement@sh.itjust.works to c/usa@lemmy.ml

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[–] Linktank@lemmy.today 7 points 4 weeks ago (2 children)

The stigma of meeting somebody outside of your own "grade" has increased pretty severely over the decades. I would say that the age of consent issue has exacerbated this since people don't want to be perceived as a pedophile even though a couple of years difference is not really significant. So as the stigma increases you get people who refuse to look outside of their grade and end up finding nobody at all.

This article goes hand in hand with the "People are increasingly lonely" because 17 year olds are worried about dating 15 year olds.

[–] cjoll4@lemmy.world 6 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago)

This may be true for married couples who started dating when they were teenagers. Since you brought it up, I'd be curious to see what proportion of the couples in the study fall into that category. I have a hunch that it's a pretty small percentage, though.

While it's true that there is some stigma against (e.g.) a college freshman or sophomore dating someone who's still in high school, I don't think many people in their right mind would object to a 2-, 3- or even 4-year age gap once both partners are at least 20.

EDIT to add: I don't think 17-year-olds being afraid to date 15-year-olds even registers on the top ten reasons "why people are increasingly lonely." Your take comes across as very high school-centric.

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