The Cougar Issue: Why Older Women Are Hot, but Older Men Are Not
She’s 38, full-figured, experienced, and a bit tired. He’s 16 with a skinny, taut body, brimming with raw energy and eager to learn. She invites him in for a drink, strokes his cheek, and her bathrobe falls open…
Our avant-garde theatre recently hosted a “cougar movie” extravaganza. You know–movies where older women seduce young males (usually teenage virgins). It’s hot, it’s sexy, and apparently it’s acceptable–that is, as long as it’s an older woman and a younger man.
Top Cougar Movies
Chances are, you can easily come up with your own list of the top cougar movies of all time. But just to get you started, here are some samples:
The Graduate
“Starring an ingénue Dustin Hoffman who succumbs to the world-weary Mrs. Robinson’s seductive spell.” Down, Mrs. Robinson!
Class
Jacqueline Bissett utters one of the steamiest lines ever to her son’s classmate (Andrew McCarthy in his film debut) in an elevator: “Do you like it better going up or going down?”
The Last Picture Show
Cloris Leachman won an academy award for her powerful cougar portrayal in this film.
American Pie
Stifler’s Mom makes a man out of her son’s high-school friend in the pool room.
My Tutor
The boy looks like he’s 13, and he’s obviously scared, but after many attempts the woman finally gets what she came for.
Private Lessons
At least this boy has something of a man’s body and is old enough to be interested.
No Equal Opportunity for Men
What do Mrs. Robinson, Stifler’s mom, and all the other famous cougars have in common? They get away with it. We think he’s lucky and she’s either hot or pathetic, but I can’t think of any movie that implies immorality.
But what if we reversed the genders? What if Mr. Robinson had seduced Dustin’s teenage sister, or Stifler’s dad had boozed up one of the graduating girl virgins at the pool table? He wouldn’t be a glorified cougar–he’d be a pervert, a rapist, or at least a sicko.
What movie examples do we have here?
American Beauty
Kevin Spacey is applauded for coming to his senses just before deflowering his daughter’s friend.
Last Tango in Paris
Now, this is one of the hottest movies of all time, and what a great treat for Marlon Brando! But she’s definitely of age, so it’s just a question of taste, not morality.
Jack Nicholson also gets away with it in several roles, but even in Something’s Gotta Give, the final message is to get with someone his own age (Diane Keaton).
Maybe It’s Okay Onscreen…
To be honest, I’m not lobbying for change. I’m quite happy being allowed to fantasize about it being me whose 18-year-old babysitter decided to show him what to do on a date. And I’m just as happy to keep seeing a message that we creepy older men had better respect boundaries. But the double standard is still interesting to explore.
I’ll leave you with a song – my own rewrite of Garth Brooks’s fantastic ballad “That Summer.” Would it have been a #1 country hit with this gender reversal?
She came to work for me that summer; teenage girl so far from home.
I was a lonely widowed farmer, hell-bent to make it on my own.
We were a million miles from nowhere, wheat fields as far as we could see,
Each needing something from each other, not knowing yet what that might be.
Till I came to her one evening; hot cup of coffee and a smile
And in a robe that she was certain I hadn’t worn for quite a while.
There was a difference in my laughter, there was a softness in my eyes
And in the air there was a hunger even a girl could recognize.
I had a need to feel the thunder, chase the lightning from the skies
Watch the storm with all its wonder raging in my lover’s eyes.
I had to ride the heat of passion, like a comet burning bright
Rushing headlong in the wind, out where only dreams have been
Burning both ends of the night
That summer wind was all around us; nothing between us but the night
And when she told me that she’d never, I softly whispered “That’s all right.”
Then she watched my hands of leather turn to velvet in a touch
There’s never been another summer that she has ever learned so much.
[Photo by ||!prliignore20||]
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January 18th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
No, the difference here is that in the movies you quote, the younger man/older woman thing is portrayed as perverse, unusual or even comic, not common or acceptable in society, and it's that controversial edge that makes people find those films sexy.
On the other hand, older men paired with women 20+ years younger than them is incredibly common in films. Let's start with, oh, every James Bond film ever made. And then almost every film Richard Gere's made since he turned 40. In everything from My Fair Lady to The Lord of the Rings, heroes are frequently paired with romantic leads young enough to be their daughters. In fact, there's a 2005 comedy called Rumour Has It (based on The Graduate, funnily enough) where Jennifer Aniston sleeps with Kevin Costner despite the fact she initially suspects he IS her father.
The only genuine double standard here is that the older man/younger woman combo is by and large accepted, unless the female is under the age of consent (most of the males in your examples are not). But can you imagine a studio pairing Helen Mirren or Meryl Streep (or even Julia Roberts or Michelle Pfeiffer) with Leonardo diCaprio or Tobey Maguire as a normal couple? Doubt it. Bet you wouldn't blink twice if it was Kate Winslet and Mel Gibson though, huh?
January 18th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
Well pointed out Mel. In an interview with Ellen to promote the film “Prime”, Meryl Streep recalls how for a moment she was refreshingly excited to hear that the film was about a love affair between an older woman and a younger man, until she found out that the 'older' woman was Uma Thurman, and that Meryl was being offered the role of the “older, older woman”.
I'm not really buying the “No Equal Opportunity for Men” in this context. Equal opportunity in the film industry has a loooong way to go before I get too concerned about a few older women “getting away” with something that is so normalized for older men.
January 18th, 2009 at 10:02 pm
Wow. So true. There is a HUGE double standard. There's an almost hard-wired societal urge to safeguard young girls from the (often successful) advances of “dirty old men”. The cougar thing is probably OK to discuss because it's so extremely rare in the real world that no hard-wired prejudices against it were ever even necessary.
Posting anon as this subject is such social kryptonite.
January 19th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
Very good points, Mel, thank you. I agree that for the most part it's the men who are accepted or even expected to be with younger women, in movies and in society. It's just in the realm of underage victims that it's reversed. When an older woman deflowers (that is, rapes) and underage boy, she may be portrayed as pathetic or unusual, but in none of the movies I listed is she shown as criminally perverse. And again, I'm not really blaming the movie industry. I feel the same double standard within myself – as unfair and unjustifiable and wrong as it is, I suspect I would be much more outraged if my daughter were subjected to this abuse in real life than my son.
January 19th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Fair call, perhaps I am confused as all the male characters in the movie you quoted seemed to be high school seniors/graduates (and in the case of The Graduate, a college grad) which I equate with an age of around 18, and where I come from, 16 is the age of consent, so none of these stories would involve a crime.
January 19th, 2009 at 9:35 pm
Hmm, I used to know all these laws back when it was relevant… According to the Library of Parliament in 1999, in Canada: “The Criminal Code does not now criminalize consensual sexual activity with or between persons 14 or over, unless it takes place in a relationship of trust or dependency, in which case sexual activity with persons over 14 but under 18 can constitute an offense, notwithstanding their consent.” (http://www.parl.gc.ca/information/library/PRBpu...)
Wikopedia updates that in Canada it's now 16, as of May 2008, while in the U.S. the age of consent ranges from 16 to 18 depending on the state.
So with the exception of the 15-year-old victim in Private Lessons, you're right – it's all probably legal, and probably deliberately so. But I still maintain that our society is more comfortable – on screen and in real life – with an older woman seducing a graduating senior boy that with an older male tutor seducing his high school female client.
March 7th, 2009 at 8:40 pm
Older women are the moms of our culture and they used their mothering position to brainwash young females to believe older males who fancy them are perverts and they programmed younger male children to believe older women who fancy them are cougars.
This whole “age gaps are perveted if the younger person is female” thing wasnt designed by older women to protect young women from “dangerous” older males. It was designed to protect older women from younger women. Older men were just dupes too stupid to see that older women are trying to turn older men into “untouchables”. Sexual second class citizens. notice, they also bash young women who like older men too. “gold digger”. They would never call ashton a gold digger.
Before older women could be considered “hot cougars” in society, they had to first spend 1000 years turning young women into a perversion. They accomplished this by thousands of years of calling any male over 30 a pervert for falling for a 22 year old. Its easy to be “hot” when anybody who likes a young woman is a “pervert”.
When I was 19, I liked older women. My girlfriend for a short while was 32. But now I'm 29 almost 30 and my girlfriend is 20. I have had older women in her family tell me they dont want me in her life because I”m “too old” for her. They dont even care that i'm succesful in business. I'm just too old at 29. Thats when I learned the truth about older women. They call us boy toys if we date someone older than us… and “pervs” if we look the opposite direction from them. That is not sexy. That turns me off to them. Older women have called every generation of boy toys :”dirty ol men” for dating young women when older since the beginning of time. Its the dark side of them they dont think we notice.
Naturally older men never get called “cougars” and young females never get called “toys”. Older males and younger females have never invented cute words for each other. instead, they call each other the greatest words of all. The only words that matter. “husband and wife”. My mom never called my dad a 'cougar”…she called him something much more sacred: hubby.
Older women have 3 flaws.
1) they arent really that hot. Anybody can color over fade with cosmetics. Homosexuals trick males with cosmetics all the time.
2) They call boy toys “pervs” when we turn 29 and fall for a young female.
3) They arent very fertile and thus somewhat worthless to us under 30 guys. We want to be fathers of 3 (5 in my case.).
Anyways, personally i think older women are in a fantasy land. Where exactly are males marrying females our senior in percentages greater than 25% ?
where on earth?
As for the “under age” double standard. There is no double standard. The age of consent is indentical for both genders. If 16 is legal for women in say, connecticut, its legal for males too.
I think women are just desperate to create the illusion they dont live in a world where most males marry someone younger than self. Its a fantasy. I just play along with it..but man.. its a fantasy.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
bull———-men and women are best matched with 4 years of age
**********its a fact*******************
June 10th, 2009 at 11:03 am
What's wrong of an older woman seeking pleasure with a young man? Men have been doing it for centuries and it is widely acceptable.
June 13th, 2009 at 2:56 am
Same here, I find older women very hot, especially those that are well aware of their sexuality and sizzling sensuality. Just like Stifler's mom in the movie American Pie, she's such a temptress of a woman!
July 3rd, 2009 at 12:15 am
Hahaha, great explanation regard the cogar in American Pie! Next scene to pick lol.
July 19th, 2009 at 7:39 am
Well, as an older woman who recently became attracted to someone half my age, I can honestly say the only reason men are bitching about it is that it steps on “their” territory! Over the years men have been dating, sleeping with, and marrying women half their ages, and the world just accepted it. The wives that have made them the men they are by working endlessly to put them through the education they needed for their success are cast aside, as “starter wives”. What are these ladies supposed to do? Dry up? I think NOT.
I believe society is evolving to a poitn where ALL older people in their 40s and above SHOULD ONLY date a person half their age. We have stability, intelligence, and patience, something all the youths need desperately. So, here’s my thing…
Ladies, date your young hot men. Old Geezers, Date your bimbos… between the 2 of you, teach these children respect for a partner and sexual perfection, so that when you are too old to do anything with or for them, they can then meet each other at a marriage/childbearing age of say, 30, and raise strong families and stay together as the children grow. When these kids DO mature into the same age as us, and get bored with each other, as adults often do in this changing world, then it’s THEIR turn to take on a baby to the world of love, and do for them what is sure to make them loving partners.
This should be our way, as a society, because simply…
IT WORKS, as the closed doors thing that has been going on for centuries demonstrates.
March 3rd, 2010 at 6:35 am
I love your site, well thought off.