New Yorker Article

@JenMac and Uraniumfish maybe this is another result of the consumerist culture we live in.. the desire to have nice things is so intense that they would do anything at all to gain access to the goodies.. In Asia its extremely common for very young women to go out with old white men .. all for the money and the goodies they can offer them.. in Singapore my friends contemptuously term it the 'ang mo' syndromme.. ang mo i.e. white man with red hair ..I guess to describe the light hair..

@uptowngirl Funny, and I have a thing for red headed men...though historically, the ones I've liked haven't like me much in return. I guess they're all too busy dating those super-young Asian girls...?

@Uraniumfish I think that's true to many of the S.E.Asian countries.. a male friend once had a chat with a NY cab driver about this issue - white men gravitating towards Asian women..and the cabbie who was Russian said it was because Asian women were submissive and more likely to listen/please a white man than a white woman.. how cliched can you get???

@ajadedidealist He is certainly not the only one to has this fetish.. scores of white guys seem to have it as well...

Tons of dudes in Williamsburg all seem to have Asian girlfriends as well. We have jokingly considered it a hipster requirement: skinny jeans, indifference, asian girlfriend, copy of Franny and Zooey . . . .

Maybe there are just a lot of Asian hipster girls?

@ajadedidealist I used to have a boss - who owned a fancy Chinese place in the East Village - who was obsessed with Chinese women, and all things Chinese really. To the point of creepiness. And he was a rich white daddy's boy, too....

@everyone I am totally grossed out by this.. last night I was at a fancy restaurant in Phuket in Thailand and at the next table were three middle aged European men who were dining with these young Thai women who were all giggly and squeely and all over these dudes.. yuck!!! actually no matter how old these guys seem to be , they manage to attract young Asian women!! Have seen tons of such 'couples' around..

Ugh. I hate when I see couples with vast age differences between them, no matter which sex is the elder of the two. It creeps me out in general. How much can you really connect with someone who is vastly older than you or significantly more immature? It seems like it just about is always the case that people are in those situations for the wrong reasons, and the most obvious ones.

@BroadwayBK I really agree with you on that, BroadwayBK. I know a guy who never seems to date girls past 20, and it hasn't changed even as he has grown older. It's almost like he can't be with a woman who he could actually have a meaningful conversation with. How sad is that?

@BroadwayBK and DBlack I too am repulsed by it.. what is it with these men?? are they somehow trying to cling on to their fast fading youth by going out with much younger girls? and these women too do they just want a sugar daddy and nothing more ? I was in a foul mood for most of my holiday and I do really think that these mis-matched couples swirling around me had a lot to do with it ..

@DBlack Yeah, there is no way you can really be intimate with someone who is in no way on your level or in the same place in life...

@uptowngirl I think there is just a lot of shallowness involved.... I mean MAYBE some relationships with gaping age gaps are stable ones, but I haven't seen it.

True. I may joke about being attracted to suave, debonair older men, but surely people in January-December relationships must realize how ridiculous they look - the men look naive and foolish and the women, predatory.

Hah! I saw some model chick in SoHo the other day being literally led by the hand by her very successful looking older man companion. She looked totally laughable, like a lost little girl who's used to being led from one place to another and not having to think a single thought in her pretty little head. Meanwhile the guy? I would have so gone for the guy. He wasn't all that bad looking, about 40, and looked totally confident, well dressed, knew who he was. I just do not, not at all, understand why having that kind of arm candy is important to a man like him. Dude, find a woman you can actually talk to, hunh? That poor girl with him looked so pathetic, all she had going for her was that she was a model. Which in my opinion is not all that much.

Indeed, @uraniumfish - I wish those suave 40 somethings would try to take me out to dinner, model or not! I can see the attractiveness of debonair gentlemen of a certain age far more than I can see the appeal of vapid model-types. I'd rather date a 40 year old educated man who was intelligent, well-spoken, etc., than a 19 year old Abercrombie (male) model, on the average (now if Abercrombie model happened also to be a novel-writing philosophy major with a passion for Italian cooking...)

I agree that it can be really creepy. But, my dad always says a man isn't a man until he's 40. So, I guess if you actually want to date someone who has his crap together, it's most likely gonna be of the older variety. But, I don't get what a man sees in an 18 year old gazelle who can barely say "gazelle" but can definitely say "Prada."

So what do you guys think of relationships that go in the opposite extreme: older women, younger men?

I tried going out a few times with a guy who's only 3 years younger than me and I wanted to slit my throat. I don't frown upon the older woman / younger man scenario, I just don't think there are that many young men who don't act like 12 year old boys. And, I can't date someone with the maturity level of a frat dick.

@BroadwayBK That might be true for the same reasons that a 45 year old guy can't be rightly said to really make a connection with a 25 year old girl. But it's amazing how many more times the older guy-younger girl pair happens as opposed to the older woman-younger man.

@BroadwayBK: Is that true? I mean promoting older women with younger guys. It seems to be happening a lot more than we are aware of.

Take a look at this website:

http://www.angelfire.com/stars4/lists/couples-age-differences2.html

Sure, @hhusted. I just mean that as we (women) grow up, we are taught both implictly and explicitly by the media that "good" traits in a husband or partner are intelligence, maturity, and an ability to "provide for" us - protect us, financially support us, etc. (I bet a boy's mother rarely wonders how his potential girlfriend will "provide for the family!") Financial stability, emotional maturity, and general "settled-ness" are all qualities of older men, by and large, rather than young college kids or what have you.

Likewise, men are taught in the same way that an ideal girlfriend is "hot" - of course - but also willing to be in some sense "led"/someone who looks up to them/someone they can take care of. These are all qualities associated with youth - being new and inexperienced. Thus do women of all ages seek out oftentimes a partner that conforms to these societal expectations - as do men - and you end up with far more May-December pairings than December-May.

@Uraniumfish: And you think suburban man don't do that. I know many men, especially clients, who live in the suburbs and have it all together. They are smart, dress well, and know what they want. Maybe you have been living in NYC for so long that you favor NYC guys. If that is your choice, more power to you. Just don't put down suburban men, because I happen to know a few of them who can run rings around city men. I happen to be one of them. My girlfriend told me I have two sides to me. One side is friendly, sweet, kind, and generous. The other side is mean as hell. You get in my way, or mistreat me, and I take you down a few notches, and won't look back.