"Half your age plus seven" rule for immortals.

Just wanted to get some opinions on this, as it's an interesting topic, relevant to my story, that I rarely see discussed. And by that I mean I've seen plenty of people talk about how they don't feel a 100 year old vampire dating an 18 year old human is appropriate, but I haven't seen much talk about what would be appropriate. Very little discussion of where exactly the line should be drawn. The old "Never date someone younger than half your age plus seven" rule kind of breaks down once you get to characters that have lived for several centuries and could potentially live for a couple dozen more, and I'm trying to work out what my immortal societies would actually decide for themselves is acceptable, creepy, or criminal.

 

I don't think chronological age would matter nearly as much as the age at which the vampire was turned, and his emotional age (we are talking about male vampire, female human, right?). So I think it would depend on whether getting bit freezes emotional development (as many personality disorders do, and vampirism acts as an excellent proxy for some of them). If he looks and acts within the range of 16-25 or so, assuming it's a girl meets edgy rebel vampire bad boy trope, then it would work. His chronological age is an irrelevant abstraction.

 

Well, not specifically, that was just a random example I gave of a relationship a lot of people find creepy. What I was talking about was more just generally the concept of immortal characters more than a century old dating younger people, and how young we'd feel would be too young if these people were real.

 

Here's my two cents...

I feel like when it comes to dealing with immortals, the rules are a bit blurred. As long as the age matches up the human standards and the persons legally an adult (18+). In reality, no one will be able to do anything about it, but it won't stop them from judging that person. There's always going to be people like that around.

As a reader, I do get in those moods when I'm easily frustrated when young people jump into a relationship, say they are in love, and have only been together a short time.
Also those plots where the one person's older and pushes the love interest away because they're just getting their lives together, going to school, a job something like that and don't want to screw up the relationship. The other person holds it against them up to the point until they meet up again and rekindle what they had.

Que the eyeroll. Still teenagers or barely into their twenties. No longer under the thumb of parents/guardians, they can no long dictate their lives. No longer have to go to school if you don't want too. Why not live a little? Why be so quick to strap themselves down when they have no idea what there is out there to be offered? young people are led more by emotion vs logic anyways. (or may just be me who jumps into situations way to quickly)

That's what gets me.
Maybe that's fine for some people though. Its up to that person what they want to do and maybe its meant to be but you never know.

Back to immortals. I think since most live for so long that age no longer means anything to them. Of course I think appearance plays a part. old looking guy with a young looking girl will have people concerned. Most immortals won't appear to age so how's a person to know they are a 100 years old if nothings been said? As long as appearance won't give them away, I don't think people would care.

Oh and life expectancy and the time period your story is set in would play a part in age difference.

Though I do kind of get wierded out in those situations where the immortal's keeps their distance and watches the girl grow up. Then the day she's legally of age they all of a sudden pop in and make themselves known.
"Hey, there, I've been watching you a very long time, lets finally get together" Is that not a tad creepy?

I like to see the characters have a choice or at least a way out even if they don't take it. There has to be some development going on and not jumping straight into a relationship. There can't be a scene where the girl finds out and is weird about it and then a few scenes later its totally fine and the clothes come off.

Maybe what I'm trying to say. As long as the older love interest is not taking advance of the younger, more emotional, love interest, then the age shouldn't matter.

Did my rambling help at all?

 

I think it's the same whatever the dynamics—if the apparent seeming age and the personality of the vampire (mental/emotional age) seem appropriate to that of the human, it won't seem creepy. But if the vampire, while looking the same age as the human, is clearly more mature, that could be done in such a way as to raise some hackles. But I think it's also important what kind of story it is. Since you mention vampire/human dating it seems to be romance, or to include a romance anyway, but it's also important whether the vampires are bloodsucking remorseless monsters (who maybe can imitate human empathy etc, again paralleling certain personality disorders) or if they're misunderstood people with hearts of gold who just got a bad rap, or somewhere in between.

 

This was turned on its head brilliantly in Let the Right One In (and the American version Let Me In). The one who garners sympathy seems to be a young girl but is really immortal and centuries old (and not really even female but a castrated boy), and the middle aged man she lives with is human and fell in love with her when he was a young boy. He aged out of the relationship and now she needs to replace him. She must do this every 50 years or so. After he passed a certain age he needed to pretend to be her father or guardian, and before that they must have had a very hard time finding a place to live. Who rents to a pair of children?

There's a lot going on in there, and age-appropriateness is just one piece of the puzzle. In fact, the creep factor is an important part of the story, it provides the reason they must live in secrecy, which gave it all a mysterious dark ambience.

 

It's not romance, just to clarify. It just has relationships in it, both as part of the story and in the background.

Yep, thanks! Still looking forward to seeing other opinions though!

 

im watching a korean drama where the goblin is hundreds of years old and was in his 30s when he died. his true love starts out as a 17-18 year old high school student in today's time period. critics didnt like that.
He never tried anything with her or was even interested in her romantically until she was older, but he was sort of her guardian angel type of thing (whenever she was in trouble, he'd come... or whenever she summoned him, he'd pop up. so he was more curious as to why it was possible for her to summon him, and then eventually, once he realized how crappy her life was, he took an interest in that) while she was still in high school and started living with him. she was living in a "Harry Potter" situation... abusive relatives and what not, so he let her live with him.
Critics were saying that he groomed her and all of that.
but then I was thinking, would critics be less critical if the guy had APPEARED to be around her age? like, he'd still be a few hundred years old... so that wouldnt have changed....

It didnt make me feel uncomfortable and there were no real red flags for me.

IDK, i agree with the others in saying that when it comes to immortals, its kinda blurred... and as long as nothing "happens" between them until the younger is of legal age?

I havent come across an immortal/mortal relationship that made me uncomfortable. so i dont have anything to compare it to....

 

The more powerful stories tend to step outside of what's culturally appropriate and give us a mirror through which to explore these ideas. Many people are under the sway of cultural correctness and refuse to engage with anything outside of that safe boundary.

 

I have a WIP set in a sci-fi setting, where people who reach a certain biological age can have a treatment, that re-sets their biological age back to 20-25 years. The main protagonist is a 400+ years old man and one of the subplots is his romantic relationship with a woman who is REALLY ~30 years old. His boss has a harsh opinion of this affair because of the large age difference (even if they look the same age). At the moment I do not know exactly how I will pull this off, but I'm sure they will have a lot of problems and interesting talks.

 

It'd depend if you pull it off to make me understand what about the younger human the older vampire finds attractive.

I'm reminded of 'The Gentle Giants of Ganymede' (James P. Hogan) and its sequels, where a race of giant beings has conquered death but given it up as bad job when they ceased to dream. There was no innovation, because they knew all the reasons why something can't work. They stagnated as a culture. So when they realised, they pulled the plug and let aging in again. But they remained this ancient race that has a lot of knowledge, all of which Earth hasn't; so when they visit Earth the culture clash could have been severe... if they didn't see Earth's people as magnificent for their determination and zest for living but which the Giants don't have as a race. I totally understood why the Giants felt 'comfortable' with Earth's relatively young people, even though the history of our planet is horrible sometimes.

 

Oh my god, that is one of my favorite shows. Never really thought about the age difference, probably because it is korean. Although I found the female lead mature for her age (I know, I know... That's a "line" but I'm serious) and him as ageless.

Also, I've never seen complaints about immortal types and humans. Well, except for Twilight but I think it was because those characters were awkward.

 

Inappropriateness does not necessarily rise only from age, but also from social status / influence / superiority. The worst cases we hear about with regards to the topic are abuse from situations of power imbalance (religious leaders, teachers, parents, etc.).

Following this logic you can conclude similar situations for various cases of immortality. Two similar-looking immortals meeting - one thirty the other six hundred old - may be completely normal. At the same time, I think a vampire society would find childe/sire relationships (sire being the one who turned the childe and is introducing them to the vampire world) highly inappropriate.

Food for thought?

 

Yes, that has occurred to me, that my characters would feel that immortals who can make others immortal shouldn't be getting into sexual relationships with their "progeny". Makes me wonder if there would be exceptions for pre-established couples if the immortal one is the only one around who can turn the other.

...Long story short, there are four magical tiers of increasing rarity in the human and immortal population: gamma (60%), beta (30%), alpha (9%) and cambion (1%). Immortals with the ability to "turn" can only turn those of a lesser tier of magical blood than themselves. This has obvious consequences with social status and perception of worth, but it also means there's generally only one, maybe two people per clan who can turn an alpha human into an immortal.

 

I think the "prestige of position" applies more there than "avoidance of inappropriateness". For example, I expect Cambions would hold themselves much higher than everyone else in society & their clans and would not mingle/engage with "lessers".

 

Oh yes, make no mistake, plenty of immortal cultures are like that to be sure. There's a lot to be said about the history of immortal society and how expendable the lower-blood members have historically been considered, especially among "turning" species where they can be easily and swiftly replaced, whereas cambions are extremely precious and valuable since the only way to make a new cambion immortal is for a cambion to have a child with either another cambion of the race or a human cambion.

And that's how they behave within their own species. That's to say nothing of the bigotry that has historically happened between species and how even to this day many clans are monoracial, and often the ones that allow other races often do it only out of grudging pragmatism for the fact that they need a variety of skills in order to survive and remain a secret in the modern world. The main characters' clan is probably one of the most progressive ones out there for having gotten vampires and lycans to join forces for more than 300 years.

 

I pretty much only read fantasy, and immortals abound in fantasy. I'm pretty active on goodreads, and I have noticed that many, many people really do not like it when there is a significant age difference, especially when the mortal is a female and 25 or under. As others have mentioned, it's particularly uncool if they were like a parental figure or watched them grow up. I think that so long as the mortal is in their 30s+, you're gold. Otherwise, you're gonna raise some hackles. There isn't really an equation to follow. If it was a 30-year-old woman and a 1000-year-old whoever, people won't really care so much, but if it were an 18-year-old girl and an immortal vampire changed at even 16, frozen there physically but happens to be 60 currently, people will lose it. Physical age characteristics don't matter. They don't give it a lot of thought. It's a knee-jerk reaction. You might be able to get around it if the immortal doesn't reach sexual maturity until they are like bla bla years old, but ehhh...

 

Fire Emblem gets railed a lot for objectifying 10 year olds because 'oh no, she's a dragon who's actually 10K years old'
Adding a few zeroes doesn't 'fix' the issue for some people, and to that I say F* em and write what's appropriate to your story.
Just be cautious and make sure the 'rules' of the world allow for that sort of relationship to believable. Also make sure the characters spend believable time together before jumping in like other posters have said.

 

And as far as inappropriate relationships go, there's a very good chance that necrophilia and/or bestiality could be added to any accusations of gerontophilia. So, yeah...

 

If I find a 20-something ghost in my apartment and fall in love with her--even if she's from the middle ages--that's fine. For vampires, ghouls, whatever, I think you would apply the half-your-age-plus-seven rule their age at the time of their death.

Usually.

Spoiler: Spoilers for the book Carmilla. Do not click unless you don't care about reading the book or have already done so.

Carmilla is a 150-year old vampire who stalks and terrorizes Laura, the protagonist, as a child. (Carmilla was 18 when she died.) When Laura grows up, Carmilla comes back and induces Laura to fall in love with her. Carmilla wants to murder Laura so she can have her forever, but Laura doesn't even know what's happening.

Everything together makes this terrifying. It's a horror story, not a romance. I won't tell you how it ends.

Nevermind the murder - this is somewhat inappropriate since Carmilla, as an adult, knew Laura when she was a child.

 

Age is a side product of what's actually the issue: power and free will. An 18 year old dating a 100 year old vampire who's sophisticated and basically Dracula is unsettling because of the obvious power situation: he has all of it. 100 year old vampire who was turned as a teenager and still acts like a teenager doesn't have the same kind of power over the teenage girl, so it's less creepy. The same is true if you completely remove age, having the power overwhelmingly on one side of a relationship is not a healthy relationship.

 

I suppose it depends on how you're trying to portray it and as long as you can expect how their relationship will be perceived it should be fine to write whatever is appropriate for your story.
Personally... in one of my earlier planned novels, I had a pair of immortals with a peculiar bond and on/off romance that is hinted at being part of their lives one-two hundred years before, while the story itself is placed in modern times when she would be around 4,000 and him only 400. However, a big point in my novel is not to gloss over how awful their bond is, in fact most of it centers on his disdain for her, for many reasons including the power imbalance.

I think the problem most people have is when unhealthy relationships, or what is considered "creepy," is glorified or normalized by the writer.

 

Did you perhaps mean "disdain"? Distain is a verb. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/distain

 

Ah yes. Solid catch thanks, it was more of a misspelling.