what is your opinion of teenage/children dating

[greekanilater]

what is your opinion of teenage/children dating? my opinion is yet to be properly formed so i am asking to inform my self on the thing i have yet to think of... but nonetheless i think it is stupid for teenagers and children to be dating, some of my friends are dating just for sex... well they used to be my friends... my other friends are dating for some unknown reason but it's obviously not going to be permanent. dating with out future obligations is pointless... plus we are not mature enough to realize that we should be waiting for our lives to be set up a little more before we take a chance to become apart of someone elses.

[GuidoHunter]

Originally Posted by greekanilater

my other friends are dating for some unknown reason but it's obviously not going to be permanent. dating with out future obligations is pointless... plus we are not mature enough to realize that we should be waiting for our lives to be set up a little more before we take a chance to become apart of someone elses.

Dating ultimately is searching out a potential spouse, and teenagers are certainly not mature enough to be doing that in a very realistic manner.

However, dating isn't the easiest and most intuitive thing in the world. Teenage dating is more just "practice" for when you really start to seriously consider permanent relationships.

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com

[devonin]

I was dating before my teens, I started having sex barely into my teens, and overall I find that while looking back, one almost always finds their early relationships (which at the time you are convinced are true and pure love) to be more than a little immature and silly.

Nevertheless, many young teens are perfectly capable of starting to form romantic relationships, and doing so in a relatively risk free environment (ie. free of binding ties like marriage, or especially stringent expectations from either side) is a valuable way to come to understand your own goals and desires for life.

Your claim that dating is pointless unless the intention is to wed is one that i strongly disagree with. If you only ever got into a relationship intending to marry that person, I really don't think you are apt to have especially successful relationships.

Rather than say that we aren't mature enough to decide to become a part of someone else's life, I would say that it is only through slowly involving yourself in the lives of others can you come to understand whose life you want to become a part of forever.

[greekanilater]

yes but what does practicing bad habits do? besides reinforcing the bad habits.

say if a kid never developed proper manners because he had only ever ate with the skills he learned from other kids, it would be a disaster... and very difficult for him to learn those skills. but if the kid learns from an adult he may be better behaved...

so what im saying is that to learn the skill you need, you first have to find someone with those skills.

[devonin]

So...kids shouldn't date or have relationships because parents can't be bothered to raise their kids to understand proper behavior?

[greekanilater]

well it not truly risk free, you can have a kid, you can get a disease, you can set the wrong things as prioity's.

[devonin]

Which is why I specified which risks I was referring to. However, you can practice safe sex that is exactly as safe at that age as it is any any future age.

[greekanilater]

well it may have been a poor example but what i meant is that is they learn those skills from someone that doesn't have those skill the will just be enforcing poor habits.

[GuidoHunter]

Originally Posted by greekanilater

yes but what does practicing bad habits do? besides reinforcing the bad habits.

It, uh, gives him the experience to understand that bad habits aren't fruitful and that he should reform his ways so that he develops good habits instead.

say if a kid never developed proper manners because he had only ever ate with the skills he learned from other kids, it would be a disaster... and very difficult for him to learn those skills. but if the kid learns from an adult he may be better behaved...

so what im saying is that to learn the skill you need, you first have to find someone with those skills.

Your analogy doesn't really work here because with dating there is ALWAYS a form of feedback (you can't date by yourself). The success or failure of the relationship is reflected in the actions and behavior of the partner. If you do something and totally screw up, the girl will leave you and you'll learn to never screw up like that again.

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com

[greekanilater]

well are teens and kids truly capable of making that kind of mature important decisions?

[GuidoHunter]

Originally Posted by greekanilater

well are teens and kids truly capable of making that kind of mature important decisions?

They don't have to. Teenage dating is a learning process, and I bet any teen that engages in it is not planning to marry his or her significant other.

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com

[ShAiOnEi]

Ok your turn greek make him prove his point yet another time...if you haven't figured him out yet. Also to contribute to this thread I think teen dating is ok as long as you know what you're getting into. Some good ways to make it work out is getting to know them before you start a relationship.

[dore]

Originally Posted by GuidoHunter

Teenage dating is more just "practice" for when you really start to seriously consider permanent relationships.

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com

The thread should have ended there. Dating in middle/high school is either about practicing for future, possibly long-term relationships, or about the guy wanting to get laid.

[greekanilater]

that is my point. why are they dating... i want to know the reasons behind it.

[Engler]

For a second there, I thought you were talking about teenagers dating children.

[greekanilater]

why do teens date? for fun? for love? do the even understand true love? please tell me i really want to understand their mind set

[GuidoHunter]

Originally Posted by greekanilater

that is my point. why are they dating... i want to know the reasons behind it.

Originally Posted by dore

Dating in middle/high school is either about practicing for future, possibly long-term relationships, or about the guy wanting to get laid.

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com

[Relambrien]

EDIT: This is several posts late due to having taken a very long time to write up.

Originally Posted by greenkanilater

yes but what does practicing bad habits do? besides reinforcing the bad habits.

say if a kid never developed proper manners because he had only ever ate with the skills he learned from other kids, it would be a disaster... and very difficult for him to learn those skills. but if the kid learns from an adult he may be better behaved...

so what im saying is that to learn the skill you need, you first have to find someone with those skills.

I don't even know where you pulled this out from. Seriously, I don't have a clue how this relates to the original topic. Where did "bad habits" appear anywhere in the previous responses?

...Oh, I think I see. When devonin said that "while looking back, one almost always finds their early relationships (which at the time you are convinced are true and pure love) to be more than a little immature and silly," you took this to mean something about how bad habits are developed in early relationships.

What, may I ask, are these "bad habits" you're talking about? Maybe you mean that dating early leads to bad habits because you haven't learned how to date yet? That would make sense with your statement that "to learn the skill you need, you first have to find someone with those skills." If you assume that the "skill" is dating, then I think I understand what you're saying.

So let me summarize what I -think- you're trying to say.

Children shouldn't be dating because they have no experience with dating, and with no experience, will develop bad habits which will affect relationships later in life. Also, children may make mistakes which could greatly affect them in the long run.

Does that sound like what you're trying to say? I'm going to assume it does, and respond to that. I can't believe it's taken this long just to figure out -what- I'm responding to...

Anyway, as with anything else, you have to start somewhere. Dating is no exception. You can't expect to know everything there is to know or do everything right when you've never done something before. The point to teenage dating is, as has been said, more or less an introduction to what relationships will be like later. You gain valuable experience that can be used to your advantage in the future, in a way that doesn't involve anything particularly binding.

Also, you said something about sex and diseases to help support your argument that children should not be dating. That's like saying, "I set my house on fire because I left oil by the fireplace. Down with fireplaces!" Just because a couple people do something with an item (or in the case of dating, a process) that totally screws them over doesn't mean the item (or process) needs to be made unavailable for everyone else.

At this point, I'm just going to post this as-is and see how many other posts have been made while I typed this, so I can respond to those.

EDIT: Wow, there were a lot of posts. So let's get started.

Well, first off, this makes things a lot simpler for everyone:

Originally Posted by greenkanilater

why do teens date? for fun? for love? do the even understand true love? please tell me i really want to understand their mind set

As a teen myself, this question is pretty easy to answer. Your teenage years are the first years when you begin to feel serious attraction towards others. At times, this attraction can become so powerful that you begin to struggle between going about your daily life and dealing with the attraction. Dating is an outlet for this attraction that turns it into happiness instead of struggle. By dating, you can satisfy your attraction by being with the object of your affection, thus eliminating the struggle and turning that time together into something positive. I don't expect many teens think, "Hmm, I think I'll go on a date to practice for later in life." That's just one of the main effects of dating, the cause of which is a desire to have your attraction acknowledged and accepted by the other person.

Of course, as the teen gets older he or she gets used to the feelings of attraction, which then weaken considerably to the point where they don't really cause a feeling of struggle. It's sort of like tolerance to drugs; after repeated exposure, the effects lessen. At this point, dating is mainly just for fun or something to do with someone you like. The novelty wears off.

At least, that's how it is on the male side. I don't have a clue what it's like on the female side, so don't ask me.

[greekanilater]

but this what im trying to understand cant we have any mature reasons?

[GuidoHunter]

Originally Posted by greekanilater

but this what im trying to understand cant we have any mature reasons?

Are you even reading the words we're putting on your screen?

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com