this post was submitted on 17 Sep 2025
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When did we as a society give up on the "½ X +7" minimum dating age formula?
When we decided to mind our own business and stop moralizing other people’s relationships based on our personal feelings.
Exactly, this "rule" is really just equivalent to other forms of snake oil there is. It is baseless and completely made up.
Found Leo's account.
Seriously though why so hostile about this? Of course it's made up, it's a general rule of thumb, and it describes whether people are likely to look at a couple and say, "ew".
One day I mentionned this rule while having a dinner with friends. One of them was a woman I met fir the first time.
It turned out his husband was way older than this rule allowed when they met. And now that the rule is fine, she didn’t felt bad about her husband.
Seriously, I felt so shitty. Let people loves who they love without discrimination as long as this is consensual between adults.
That's because it's all based on assumptions and projected morals. Commonly treated as a ultimate truth not as a "rule of thumb" as it is destined to be - hostility is built in this "rule".
In general, this rule essentially dictates the ethics of independent people. Because of this there is no description, it's a requirement to say "ew".
It matches experiences, if you read the other replies.
I don't quite agree with the replies. The statement "it matches experiences" is baseless as stated in my other reply.
In general, experience ≠ age. This is because experience is influenced by various physical factors such as opportunities, learning environments, etc. Not exactly by age.
What's interesting is this rule apparently originated from the early 1900s.
https://lemmy.zip/comment/21531881
Ah, so "half your age plus seven" wasn't the low end, it was the target.
That certainly re-frames things.
Just FYI, this rule falls apart after a certain age (in the 60s or 70s).
That's not the only thing that falls apart in your seventies, eyyyy
This reminder me for some reason of how my grandfather cheated on his wife a few years ago and had a heart attack during sex. He's like 80 or so.
When you have heart procedures/ surgery, they tell you, "no sex for 6 weeks with your spouse, 8 weeks with anyone else." Theres science backing up the extra strain/excitement of having sex with someone else
But honey, the doctor said I could have sex with other women if I waited 8 weeks after the surgery, so it's not cheating!
Gotta look after your ticker if you're going to stay active at that age. Condolences and/or congrats to his wife though.
Condolences indeed, he's still alive.
Sigh, ain’t that the truth.
I mean, once you're both above 30 who fucking cares
After that age, the older party is essentially a lottery ticket
laughs in Medicaid
Nah I think it holds up. Bill Belichick, 73, was in the news for dating a 24 year old and it's not only creepy and gross, but also like she's taking advantage of him by inserting herself into his interviews.
If he were dating a 43 year old, I don't think anyone would be nearly as concerned.
Duh. Who cares how much older one grampa is from another
Probably about the time that we decided that a certain age means you're an adult and can, in fact, make decisions for yourself
Wow that actually makes sense.
But then again, I’m born 1994, there’s not so many I can actually date. I have like 1990 - 1998 available, and they must be an only child or have siblings within that age as well, otherwise the interests are not overlapping enough to spend time together: those younger are TikTok addicted, those older are Facebook-relicts. I’m in limbo where I know all of that but don’t like anything.
Edit: to those who downvoted, why?
Just for a little context, the minimum age being ((your age / 2)+7) is meant to be "this is the minimum age of someone you can date without it being creepy" (i believe it originated from the TV show how i met your mother)
If you were born in 1994 you are either 30 or 31. Let's call it 30 for easy math.
30/2 = 15 15+7=22
So anyone who is 22 or older fits the minimum age concept, which is anyone born in approx 2002/2003 or earlier. If you decided to include that, the extra 4-5 years does increase the dating pool quite a bit.
I'm not telling you who to date, just giving a little context to the math since that's what was brought up in the original comment.
Edit: Lots of folks chiming in with some really good insight about the history of the math. Thank you all for that!
Although the historical accounts seem to be math for the "ideal age" in a (probably female) partner and not "minimum age before it's creepy" as it was presented in HIMYM, it's really interesting to see how that equation has been used for over 100 years!
Although the provenance of the rule is unclear, it is sometimes said to have originated in France.[81] The rule appears in John Fox Jr.'s 1903 novel The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come,[84] in American newspapers in 1931 attributed to Maurice Chevalier,[85] and in The Autobiography of Malcolm X, attributed to Elijah Muhammad.[86]
In many early sources, the rule was primarily presented as a formula to calculate the ideal age of a female partner at the beginning of a heterosexual relationship. Frederick Locker-Lampson's Patchwork from 1879 states the opinion "A wife should be half the age of her husband with seven years added."[87] Max O'Rell's Her Royal Highness Woman from 1901 gives the rule in the format "A man should marry a woman half his age, plus seven."[88]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_disparity_in_sexual_relationships
See I didn't know that was the origin. I like it better as an outside boundary.
That's really interesting, thanks for sharing!
No one knows the true origin of the idea but there's a number of examples that predate how I met your mother by over a hundred years.
The first published example is Max O'Rell in Her Royal Highness, Woman: And His Majesty—Cupid from 1901
Interesting, though this sounds like it's not supposed to be the minimum age, but the ideal age.
Interesting stuff thanks for adding. I added an edit to address. Appreciate you chiming in
It had to be a thing before how I met your mother, I remember it being a thing during school in the 80-90’s
Totally fair, lots of folks have chimed in about it. Really interesting to see it's over 100 years old (although more focused on ideal partner, not avoiding being creepy)
Invert this rule to get the maximum age you can date (defined as the person whose minimum age is your current age):
min age = (your age / 2) + 7 max age = (your age * 2) - 14
If you're 30, then you can reasonably date people between 22 and 46. So the other guy can add even more years before 1990.
Also, for the maximum age they are the younger one. So assuming age is 30, substract 7 and multiply the outcome by 2, maximum date age is 46...
Because of this part:
You’re being very assuming with people and that’s why the downvotes.
Not every person will be “TikTok addicted” or “Facebook-relicts”, you’re just assuming they are which is only affecting your own chances finding someone.
Try just getting to know someone first before you start assuming about their interests or what they do.
Who says you have to spend time with your SO’s siblings for any great length of time? Parties and holidays you can get through, but it’s not like you’re going to go live with the family.
You and your SO should both have your own friends and hobbies (in addition to joint friends/hobbies). I’m not trying to crap on having a relationship with your SO’s family, just that it’s not mandatory.
I feel like removing these two arbitrary requirements would vastly increase your dating pool. I get that people are looking for traits in a potential partner (doesn’t smoke / drinks / poly / not-poly / uses Arch) but the ones you’ve picked are just self limiting
The clumsy portmanteau of facebook and derelicts if I had to guess. That one is just dreadful. Go with Facebougoise or something, The Faceborg maybe (I actually like that one), something like that.