So every time I’ve logged into Facebook recently, this ad keeps popping up:
I do like handsome men! I do like men a few years older than me! (Emphasis on: a FEW.)
It’s just that … I’m 47. Only 47. I’m still years from qualifying for the senior meal at Denny’s or Bob Evans. And yet, I’m being hit up on behalf of “Mature American Men,” aka dudes old enough to be my dad.
This is all academic since I’m not on the market. But if I were, and if I went for guys younger than me, I’d instantly be branded a cougar. Evidently, the men my age are supposed to pair off with women 15 years younger. What’s left is the contingent at the Senior Citizen Center. Should I be suddenly single, I’d better spiff up my pinochle skills.
I would love to know if men in my general age group are targeted similarly. “Meet sexy senior women – hot grannies!” Sure, that’s a niche market. I doubt it’s advertised on Facebook. I think you have to go looking for it.
What say you, men between 37 and 57?
Patron cat of Kittywampus (1985-2001)
Even since I was in my 20s I’ve been attracted to older women. That attraction never ebbed but now I’m 50. I guess that means in order to fulfill my fantasy I’ll need to meet a 65 year old woman. Come on Facebook advertising, do your stuff!
I never get any of those ads directed at me. I think it’s because I always enter my date of birth as being January 1, 1901, and I guess the 110 year old male demographic doesn’t have any dating ads aimed at it. Hmm, ageism, anybody?
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-Badtux the Snarky Penguin
I took my gender and marital status off my profile because I was constantly getting ads for ridiculous baby stuff including something for cleaning baby’s nose. I don’t actually have any children yet.
But that was nothing compared to the terrible ads I saw when I was listed as an engaged female, most of which offered ways to lose weight for the big day in the most insulting way possible.
Never paid attention to these ads on Facebook until just now. Just checked and I have “Herbal hair growth remedy”, “11 steps to get out of debt”, a webpage ad for records searches, mattresseses and dentistry. So my profile is for a paranoid, indebted, balding man with bad teeth that spends too much time in bed. Not a bad match!!!
There was an ad for the complete “Red Dwarf!!!!! No hot women though.
Keith, do less us know if you *ever* get ads promising you a date with a mature woman!
Badtux: Don’t you think speciesism is also a factor? After all, there aren’t many penguins online, and human females tend to dismiss penguins as cute but not sexy.
Jess: Right after I posted this, the “mature men” ad disappeared, only to be replaced with an ad for a facelift! No matter what stage we’re at, we clearly don’t measure up.
Hydraargyrum: If those ads had any sense, you’d be getting lots of garden porn. And I would be getting ads for mattresses, given my known slug-a-bed tendencies.
I’m not sure I even want to know what the “Red Dwarf” is.
“Red Dwarf”!!!! Only one of the funniest comedies of all time!!!!
My custom facebook ads make me laugh so hard. I have “drumming” on my lists of interests. I frequently get drum-related ads right beside ads for substance abuse treatment. Because in the eyes of facebook, drums = Keith Moon.
Btw, that guy in “your” ad is the youngest-looking senior I think I’ve ever seen.
In the eyes of Sungold, drums = Keith Moon, too.
Maybe I should put Keith Moon directly on my FB page. I’d rather get drug treatment ads than ones for facelifts.
It could be worse: facebook thinks I’m a devout Christian longing to be a step-mom, and is always trying to lure me to sites where I can meet hot single Christian dads.
Tell me if I’m too snarky tonight, Holly … but at least they aren’t trying to lure you into plural wifehood with the FLDS. (Gotta wonder if the FLDS has a presence on FB?)
I’m guessing your hot single Christian dads are at least in our general age range?
Can’t speak about Facebook, and I’m only 26 myself.
But on OkCupid I was rarely presented with women older than myself as matches. I had to change my “acceptable match age range” to be heavily stilted in the older direction (e.g. minimum only 1 year younger than me, and maximum ten years older than me) to get it to present me with a balanced number of older matches. If I gave a symmetric age range I would constantly be getting matches younger than myself. Which I’m not against per se, but… it was annoying.
Although I suspect in the case of OkCupid this isn’t due to tampering on their part, but is rather because women tend to specify minimum ages near their own (similar to how men tend to specify maximum ages near their own).
Interesting how the system is slanted. And I’ll bet you’re right that it’s at least largely due to the ranges women specify. I don’t think OKCupid has a policy of trying to match older men with younger women.