A little science
The issue of gerontophilia as a mental health disorder has not yet been fully studied. Since this pathology is often not illegal (with the exception of the sadism of one of the partners or the seduction of minors), it does not have much social significance and is perceived in most cases as an eccentricity.
To clearly understand the nature of sexual deviant behavior and clarify the concept of “gerontophilia,” it is necessary to clarify the age of the partners and the reasons for the development of gerontophilia.
In modern psychiatry, age limits for determining the pathological condition in question are not clearly established. The German scientist Magnus Hirschfeld indicated in his works that the difference between partners should be at least 50 years. Otherwise, even sympathy between two elderly people could be regarded as gerontophilia.
The World Health Organization (WHO) classifies ages as follows:
- 44–60 years old - average age;
- 60–75 years old - old age;
- 75–90 years - old age;
- over 90 years old - long-livers.
Based on this, individuals who experience sexual attraction to people aged 75 years and older can be considered gerontophiles. However, if we consider the opinion of Magnus Hirschfeld, then attraction to older people is regarded as deviant behavior. For example, if the age difference is 50 years, one partner is 20 years old and the other is 70. Therefore, people who had a relationship with a partner who was 40 or 50 years old cannot belong to the group of gerontophiles.
To date, there are no specific statistical data on the prevalence and frequency of the described mental disorder. But if we consider that, according to the literature, there are from 5 to 10% of homosexuals in the world (one of the types of sexual deviant behavior), it is logical to assume that the number of gerontophiles will vary within these limits.
The use of sexual attraction to older people in art is noteworthy. For example, in 2013, a sensational film was released called “Gerontophilia” by Canadian director Bruce LaBruce.
Misconceptions of Youth
One of the reasons people distance themselves from aging is that they believe it is a process that happens in a short period of time. Until recently, a person was young, but today you meet him and realize that he has already grown old. This is a misconception that arises due to basic ignorance or misunderstanding of the aging process, which occurs gradually. Additionally, from a biological perspective, each part of the body ages at a different rate, meaning there is no single physical aging process.
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It is stupid and thoughtless to disrespect older people. Expressing such an attitude, we do not notice the amazing qualities that appear in people with age. Seventy-year-olds are just as unique as thirty-year-olds. Adults have wisdom, life experience and a formed worldview, which young people and even people of the older generation so often lack. Finally, older people do not remain in a constant state of “old age,” but are constantly changing—another fact that is difficult for anyone below middle age to accept.
Are relationships with older people always gerontophilia?
To answer this question it is necessary to return to the definition of deviation. Gerontophilia is an attraction to old people, regardless of gender, but not an interest in a specific person. This means that psychiatrists do not consider love for a specific person to be a deviation, even if he is much older.
Marriages or relationships with older people are often dictated by self-interest on the part of young partners. This is a fairly common occurrence among millionaires, for example, the creator of the Playboy empire and his young wife.
Gerontophiles experience sexual attraction in general only to old people and make no exceptions.
Numbers are more delicate
The negative meaning of words cannot be erased with an eraser. It is necessary to “pour new wine into old wineskins,” that is, to rehabilitate old concepts and fill them with new content. After all, in addition to illness and loneliness, old age also has its own values: spiritual depth, the art of communicating and valuing communication, the desire to give and take care of those who feel bad, memory of the past, the ability to unite families. All this should become a new content for the word “old age” and its derivatives. This topic was discussed at the IV National Conference “Society for All Ages”, held recently in Moscow.
When asked what to call the older generation so as not to be offensive, many conference participants came to a unanimous opinion - numbers are sometimes more neutral and delicate than words. Therefore, recently the politically correct formulation 50+, 60+, etc. has become popular in the media. However, the issue of addressing older people remains open.
Causes of gerontophilia
Modern textbooks on psychiatry list the following reasons for the development of gerontophilia:
- pathological attraction is the result of the idealization of adults by children. From childhood, a child deifies those who are older. Children strive to imitate the adults they like, seek affection and in return give compliments themselves;
- deviant behavior may be the result of the molestation of young children or adolescents by older people;
- fear of unsuccessful relationships with a partner of the same age. Some young people, because of such fears, do not even try to establish contact with their peers;
- lack of sexual satisfaction with peers. Men have a weak erection, the inability to perform sexual intercourse, girls have a weak orgasm or its absence;
Gerontophiles experience attraction and sexual satisfaction only with older people.
- unsuccessful sexual experience with peers. Rough sex, rapid ejaculation or the insatiability of boys make girls pay attention to older men;
- sadistic-masochistic tendencies. In these cases, some people take pleasure in humiliating defenseless old people. Others are excited by the thought of belonging to older people;
- Single-parent families and poor relationships with parents can contribute to the development of gerontophilia in a child. In the first case, Sigmund Freud described the Oedipus complex, when a boy hates his father and loves his mother. Carl Jung described the Electra complex, when a girl hates her mother and loves her father. Scientists believe that people who were deprived of parental love in childhood or grew up without one of their parents in adulthood try to compensate for the lack of attention and find partners much older than themselves. Most often, this behavior occurs in girls, especially those with an infantile character. Girls try to replace their father with an older partner, and boys seek maternal participation.
Treatment of gerontophilia
It should be noted that no one specifically registers persons with this pathology. Only those who have sadistic tendencies and/or have broken the law, as well as victims of sexual violence by older people, are included.
In other cases, patients can independently contact a psychoanalyst about depression, interest only in older people, or a sexologist about disturbances in the intimate sphere.
In addition to various psychological methods of influence, antidepressants and, in some cases, other groups of drugs are prescribed.
Psychiatrists indicate that most often complete recovery occurs, and in some cases the effect lasts only during drug therapy. Obviously, the reason for the positive outcomes lies in the complete elimination of the Oedipus complex. A supporter of this explanation was Sigmund Freud, who believed that the root of all mental disorders on sexual grounds lies precisely in it.
Psychological portrait of a gerontophile
The person with the deviant sexual behavior in question is a girl or boy of an infantile nature, withdrawn into himself, from an incomplete family or from a family in which scandals constantly occurred; a person unadapted to life and overcoming difficulties.
In childhood, such people fall in love with educators, teachers, and a little later with teachers of universities, technical schools, and bosses.
Another group of gerontophiles already in childhood shows sadistic tendencies and tortures animals, and then begins to offend weak children at school and universities. In relationships with older people, they experience sexual satisfaction from bullying, suppression of the partner’s will, as well as from his defenselessness and physical suffering.
Individuals with a masochistic streak consider themselves inferior and are constantly looking for ways to humiliate themselves. In childhood, such people ask them to punish them for the slightest offense. They may engage in self-torture - cutting themselves with a knife or burning closed areas of the skin with an iron. They like to experience pain. As they get older, they develop a taste for mental suffering. In connection with older people, they experience pleasure from the thought of belonging to an old and infirm partner. They believe that they are unworthy of the best, and thus punish themselves.
Most often they do not communicate with peers, or contacts are very difficult. When trying to date young people, the relationship usually does not reach sexual intimacy or ends after the first intercourse.
As a rule, gerontophiles have few or no friends. Infantilism forces them to seek contacts with people much older than themselves. Thus, the boy or girl “calms down” and lives off the life experience of another (older) person.
People of all the above types choose exclusively elderly and senile people as their sexual partners. Over time, only the personalities of partners can change, but not their age category.
Reasons Why Some Men Love Older Women
A group of scientists from Colorado studied the relationships between mature men and young girls and came to the conclusion that the reasons for such unions have more than just a material basis. "Evening Moscow", in turn, asked the question - what motivates young people who prefer to date older women? An expert on family and marriage issues, Valentina Zakotsola, helped to understand the situation
— Valentina, you have been helping people find their mates for many years. Do men often contact you to find a woman 5, 10, 20 years older than themselves?
— Half of the men do not voice age restrictions at all. About 40 percent are looking for younger girls, 10 percent prefer to build relationships with girls their own age. Of course, as you can see, many people want to date young people. But if five years ago the vast majority of men in search dreamed of young, slender models, today for many of them the bar has moved, for example, from 25 years to 35–38.
— For what reasons do guys choose older women? Are such unions often concluded “of convenience”?
“There are also those who want to improve their social status at the expense of an adult, self-sufficient woman.” But I will say that in our time it is no longer so common to enter into alliances for the sake of profit. Now people have begun to feel each other to a greater extent, to focus on making it comfortable, cozy, so that a person has a “close” energy... And based on this, build relationships. Of course, the material basis is also important for many, since we live in a material world. But the main reasons lie in the field of psychology. We all come from childhood. If, for example, a young man’s mother was 10–15 years older than his father, this is normal and acceptable for him, and he can build his personal life according to the same rules.
— So, such men are looking for a mother in a woman?
- Yes. Or they are simply looking for a strong, self-sufficient partner. Although now many young girls themselves build and develop businesses and earn money. Nowadays young people are great, we meet very strong personalities, and this makes us happy.
- Maybe the fact is that an adult woman has more experience - in all areas...
- Yes, this also plays a role. Next to such a man, he develops. And then there are young guys who are much older than their age inside - they’re like uncles, grandfathers. I have a friend, the son of an oligarch, he is 28 years old. So in his communication he behaves like a 45-year-old man - so constructive, serious, mature. Even his clothing style is far from youthful. And he needs a woman for the family, a homely one, maybe even older. He wants to build a family model in the likeness of his parents. Almost everyone has a family model, and there should be one. If it is not there, a “skew” often occurs in one direction or another, and a person looks for different options.
— I wonder what age difference is optimal? At what point will this relationship definitely have no future? If a woman is 20, 30, 40 years older?
- You see, I cannot answer this question, and no one can, because we are not gods. Who knows whether people will succeed or not? I know a couple: she is 39, he is 23. His mother was also older than his father. This couple had a child, everything is fine with them. It's all individual. You can’t just say, “This relationship is doomed.” In no case. Look, for example, how harmoniously Pugachev and Galkin built their relationship - as far as we can see. They are happy, they raise their children in love. Alla Borisovna has a lot of life experience, which she shares with Maxim, and she, in turn, needs young energy. In such relationships, people use each other - in the good sense of the word. And everyone chooses for themselves what is comfortable for them.
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We convey warm greetings to you, dear subscribers! Just two years ago, the most common phrases from people I met on the street were: “I was at your concert or I’m going to a concert and saw you on TV.” Now: “I look at your Instagram and go to your concert!” And this is great: communication channels change, but the connection remains! There are already 6,000,000 of us, which is the same number as the highest-rated episodes of my television program “Best of All!” Thank you for your interest!
Publication from Maxim Galkin (@maxgalkinru) July 11, 2022 at 2:50 PDT
- Maybe this is partly PR...
— Maybe, but if we’re not talking about stars, but about those who live a simpler life, now many women look gorgeous at 45. And among 30-year-olds there are unkempt “mochi aunts” who “eat away” their problems... It all depends on the girl’s inner mood. The worst thing is when there is no goal, no development... For many men, inner strength, intelligence, and a woman’s interest in the world are much more important than age; when there is something to talk about and something to do together. Yes, at least run a joint business.
— Here is the first lady of France, 24 years older than her husband (Emmanuel Macron is 41 years old, Brigitte Macron is 66 years old). ... How can this marriage be explained?
- This needs to be understood in their personal life, in childhood, in upbringing, why this happened. I don’t know the biography of Macron and his wife so deeply, so I don’t presume to judge. But this only emphasizes and shows that the cases are different from one another.
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