Seventeen would never cross my mind: consent, age gaps and predatory relationships.

This article does not reflect the opinions of the FeminUN student group, but of it respective authors.

When Demi Lovato said “Thought it was a teenage dream, a fantasy. But it was yours, it wasn't mine”, became an anthem on social networks (thousands of similar stories came to light; we could even talk about behavior patterns) and opened a new debate on: consent, breaches of age and those often predatory relationships that involve power dynamics around gender and age; and as a consequence, a little – or a lot – of feminism. So the purple glasses are necessary to analyze the debate because what makes "29" so shocking is the fact that thousands of girls have used the song as a kind of platform to tell their own story, revealing a social pattern of domination. and dangerous relationships. The American singer, actress and songwriter questions through her song "29" the relationship she had for six years with actor Wilmer Valderrama when she was 17 and 29. According to the single, for Demi at the time the relationship was normal However, looking back now that she is the age her ex was at the time, dating a 17-year-old would not be an option for her. She even wonders, "Far from innocent, what the f * ck's consent?" We will do the same.

Consent is a term that has begun to spread more intensely in recent years thanks to education against gender violence. According to Pérez, "consent appears as a "feminine" verb, inscribed in a social logic in which women demand themselves and are socially demanded to resist or concede" (2016). Which leads us to understand that consent is about a woman making the decision to give access or not to some action that she wants to perform. Although this term is not exclusive to women because any human being can give her consent, it is widely used within feminist literature. Similarly, to understand a little more how consent works, it is very important to be clear that in situations where people have a different age range, power is involved.

Considering the age difference between Demi and her ex-partner, it can be said that this relationship was built on unequal power dynamics. In fact, the Mexican psychologist Maynné Cortés argues that the distribution of power within a relationship can be determined by internal and external factors (Morales and Valenzuela, 2021), among the latter we find, who earns more money, the significant age difference , what each person does, among others. These factors create imbalance within the relationship and affect the entire bond. In this way, "the unequal distribution of the exercise of dominance power leads to relational asymmetry" (Bonino, s.f.), where men commonly remain in a position of superiority over women, who owe him obedience in exchange for protection. . The latter, because the younger woman in front of the older man is seen as a girl who needs to be cared for and protected. The supposed naivety and innocence of minor women in relationships such as Demi Lovato and Wilmer Valderrama, justifies the different forms of control exercised by men. Parallel to this, the dynamics that we observe within these links is characterized by the idea of ​​romantic love that allows an idealization process to be built where behaviors and attitudes related to gender violence are tolerated and justified (Blanco, 2014, cited in Delgado et al, 2019).

Age, as well as the context, are important indicators that define or establish our level of social and personal development; Therefore, age is much more than a number, however, what we mean when we speak of an unequal relationship, is not the number itself, but those experiences that are often (with exceptions) obtained from the time of life or of interaction with the world. Thus, 29 is also evidence of a cultural pattern of domination, in which the music and film industries set public examples: let us mention Leonardo Di Caprio, Jerry Seinfeld or Jake Gyllenhaal in All too well (Taylor's version, of course). When we speak of predatory attitudes or relationships, we refer precisely to that unequal power relationship in which a person obtains a certain advantage from their social or economic position, or from their "knowledge of life" over another who is vulnerable. Therefore, relationships with a difference in power can lead to predatory relationships, and it is appropriate to ask ourselves, then, how normalized are these relationships and behaviors? How do the industry's double standards not only allow, but idealize age-gap relationships? And to what extent is age no longer just a number? Because, when Demi Lovato said: “Thought it was a teenage dream, a fantasy. But it was yours, it wasn't mine”, thousands of kids felt it: the world needed to hear it.

Written by Laura Rada Solorzano, Lina Pérez Campo, Natalia Torres Díaz & Gabriela Cervantes Gamez.

References

Bonino, L. (s.f.). Micromachismos: La violencia invisible en la pareja. Federación de

sociedades españolas de terapia familiar. Dirección de la mujer de Valencia/España sobre

violencia de género.

http://adolescentesinviolenciadegenero.com/test/download/Micromachismos-violencia-

invisible-Bonino.pdf

Delgado, M., et al. (2019). Relaciones de género en la sociedad posmoderna:

Percepciones y actitudes de estudiantes jóvenes sobre las relaciones de poder en las parejas.

Revista de Sociología de la Educación (RASE). Vol. 12, n.o 1.

Morales, P., y Valenzuela, S. (2021). Los juegos de poder en las relaciones. La Tercera. https://www.latercera.com/paula/los-juegos-de-poder-en-las-relaciones/