You and a dozen others who cite instances of marriage at 13 and 21 or whatever miss the point: those instances involved marriage. Especially when the grandparents and aunts and others being mentioned here got married, marriage was for keeps.
So, the young man and young woman were making a commitment with legal, financial, social consequences. They made the commitment publicly. If one was under the legal age for marriage, a judge had to sign off on it. That meant he could interrogate the couple, assess maturity etc.
This situation involves parents letting the young man get away with total lack of accountability—get’s his buzz and has no accountability. Parents who let their daughter be used—and that’s what it is, she is being used and nothing else,
should be hung (metaphorically, of course).
There is no comparison between this and the situations people are bringing up in the comments.
Do people really not see the difference?
I agree with you. They were letting this guy live in their home and “sleep” with their daughter. If they were letting her marry him that would be different. Although I wouldn’t approve of that either.
“You and a dozen others who cite instances of marriage at 13 and 21 or whatever miss the point: those instances involved marriage...”
That was my first thought.
No I think you missed the part of my comments where I said I would not condone or allow them having sex with me knowing about it. But if their urges became too strong I said let them marry. I'm 54 and there were several girls in my high school who were in fact married. Actually the allowed age to marry varies or did vary then widely state too state with Georgia I think being the lowest age Without parental permission.