I was listening to the ‘50’s on 5’ music station on satellite radio and am blown away at how many of the songs have lyrics where adult men are hitting on young girls, “she was only sixteen”, etc. Over a period of about 2-3 hours, this was a common theme for every 1 in 5 songs.

First of all, do you think music lyrics are an accurate representation of cultural norms and acceptance?

If this was culturally acceptable 50-60 years ago for an adult to date/hit on an underage girl, I wonder if it was even more acceptable 100 years before that?

Given the drastic cultural changes between now and then, am I incorrect to 100% villainize Joseph Smith and other early prophets for their escapades with teenage girls.

What culturally accepted behaviors today will be looked down upon in 150 years?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/17/2017 11:04AM by jackman.

The average age for first marriage for U.S. women back in the mid-1800s was 23. This is from data that has been approved and endorsed by the NIH. Even out on the frontier it was only slightly lower -- in the range of 20-22. It was no more normal to consort with a young teen back then than it is today.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3002115/table/T1/



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/17/2017 06:19PM by summer.

It was NOT culturally acceptable 50-60 years ago for older married men to hit on 16 year olds. I’m assuming those songs are remembrances of teenage romance...NOT creepy middle-aged guys hitting on teens...and definitely not married men telling teens that God told them to fuck them.

jackman Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Given the drastic cultural changes between now and
> then, am I incorrect to 100% villainize Joseph
> Smith and other early prophets for their escapades
> with teenage girls.

Keep something very important in mind:

Smith was married to Emma. His affairs with teenage girls weren't "marriages," they were adulterous affairs with teenage girls where he used made-up claims of angels with swords threatening him in order to get them to have sex with him.

There's nothing at all wrong with 100% condemning Smith for using 'god' and 'angels' to get teenage girls to have sex with a married man. Nothing at all wrong.

Hie,
I agree with you. But what I am suggesting is that maybe the ages of the girls he married is not in itself a damning argument due to cultural norms at the time.
Yeah 14 is way to young but 16, maybe not so much.

OK.
As others have pointed out, the average age for girls marrying then wasn't significantly different from today. Though exceptions (marrying really young) were probably more common.
And were less frowned upon, perhaps, than today.

I suspect, though, if we dig through records, we'd find most instances of 16 year-old girls getting married weren't to men in their 30's and 40's -- that the men were younger, too. You know, like when Joseph and Emma got hitched :)

That goes for the 1950's as well, as this article points out nicely (though the girl in question was 13):

https://medium.com/cuepoint/ballad-of-the-13-year-old-bride-f909cbe1c6b4

"What culturally accepted behaviors today will be looked down upon in 150 years?"

All of them (with any luck).

Strange that so many mormons think mature men were hitting on teens. No. They didn't do it any more then than today.

Many of those songs were about young boys in love with young girls. I don't remember them singing about older men hooking up with teens.

As far as I'm concerned, it was never culturally acceptable.

My parents and grandparents (born in the 1900s, from very different backgrounds) would never have considered it acceptable.

Like Cheryl, I'd always thought those "she's sixteen, she's beautiful and she's mine" sort of things were supposed to be sung by at least "teen-oriented" artists. Was I wrong? Maybe in the UK, we got a suitably youthed-up version to make it less sick.

Tom in Paris

You can say these songs were written by teenage boys in love with teen age girls but they were not.

Johnny Burnette was 27 in 1961 when he released “You’re Sixteen, You’re Beautiful (And You’re Mine).

Ringo Star was 33 when he sang his remake of the song in 1973.
I would not condone my 16 year old daughter dating someone who was 27 or 33 years old.

By comparison Joseph Smith was around 28-30 years old when he married Fanny Alger.

While I don’t condone these teenage, polygamous relationships that Joseph Smith had, he was of the same age as many of these performing artists singing about teenage love and probably sleeping with teenagers. Although none of them were claiming to be commanded by an angel to do so. Yikes.

On the other hand, Brigham Young and other prophets were much older which just amps up the creepiness to a whole other level.

They were written by adults **for** teens and about teens because that is who bought records.

>>Ringo Star was 33 when he sang his remake of the song in 1973.

Ringo Starr had already been married to his first wife, Maureen Cox, for eight years when he remade that song. He and his then wife had three children by that time. I think it's safe to say that it was a business decision aimed at the teen market.

The Ringo Starr one was very tongue-in-cheek...

And there is no evidence that Smith "married Fanny Alger", although it seems very likely he had carnal knowledge of her, as the bible so beautifully says ;-)

If you are writing songs that are making you money and giving you a way to make money while doing something you enjoy--like making music instead of being a plumber or something----you are going to make songs that appeal to the audience that gets you paid.

Romance songs sell.

Agreed. I don't think those songs were written to convey the thought that it's acceptable for "older" men to be involved with teenage girls.

I think they were written to convey the infatuation and "love" that goes with teenage romance. Teenagers wanted music like that, so artists provided it.

Then write a song about how beautiful she is, how the sex is great and you are having fun and whatnot. There is no fiscal reason why you should have to mention that she's only 16, unless most adult males in that demographic are into dating girls who are barely 16. But that would then mean that it is culturally acceptable for an adult male to date a 16 year old.

Teens used their allowance to buy records and play these songs at malt shops and high school sock hops.

You are correct Cheryl,
And nobody back then gave it a second thought that a 27-33 year old artist is singing about how a 16 year old girl belongs to him.
If an adult musician wrote/performed an original song with lyrics like that today they would be labeled a pedophile and booted off the record label.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/17/2017 03:41PM by jackman.

People can write songs, stories, and books about anyone or any subject. That isn't the same as actually being the main character or subject of the piece.

Singing 1950s songs isn't the same as saying they are the same as actual history or scripture.

People who write children's literature can be any age.

People who write children's songs can be any age.

People who sing children's songs can be any age.

People of any age can write books about or for teens.

People who write or sing songs for teens or about teens can be any age.

It doesn't mean someone is a pervert if they create products for customers not like them.

I think, as you say, the point is that the person writing or performing the work is not necessarily speaking from their own point of view.

A writer can imagine characters that are not at all like themselves (as in Cheryl's example of adults writing books for teens or, of course, fictional killers or gangsters etc). Songwriters and performers sing about emotions and situations that are part of human life but not necessarily or exclusively their own. Everybody remembers their first love and how it felt. You could write a novel about it, putting imaginary people into that scenario, and perhaps incorporate your own observations and experiences and feelings as a youth but most often in fiction the character is not the author.

So, I think it's about point of view. Who is saying the words of the songs, as in, not the songwriter/performer about their own lives necessarily or always but any man or woman or youth and their love. Those enjoying the music and words can identify with the sentiments as youths or can recall their own fond memories of their younger selves.

It's like the singer is a narrator of a story, not that s/he is singing about his/her own life or thoughts or feelings or deeds. It's kind of from a collective point of view, about human feelings and experiences, not about that specific performer or writer referring only to their own life.

For example, Johnny Cash wasn't really a Boy Named Sue. Male and female performers can cover the same songs and apply the ideas to everybody as well as themselves. Does Rod Stewart really hang out in the rain? (Maybe so but not necessarily). Does exmo Tal's "She's So High" literally mean that his ideal is an unattainable Aphrodite or is it applicable to any man or woman who identifies with that sentiment?

And I'm taking it as a given that authors who write about serial killers wouldn't swat a fly or hang out at graveyards at midnight with a shovel.

So, most of it is allegory, or whatever.

However, our stories and music do reflect our culture, I agree with that. Just look at how you can often identify people's ages by the decade of the music they enjoy. And the language/slang words of their time. Their values and interests.

So I get the premise of the OP. But I think it's not that black and white. As I've said, it's more a point of view perspective - who the singer or writer is aiming their work at and for.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/17/2017 06:57PM by Nightingale.

"In Love with a Laurel"

"I'm Mesmerized with a Mia Maid"

"Those Beehives Drive Me Crazy"

Yes, very popular tunes for older men.

Surely, it's "Those Beehives Make Me Buzz" ;-)

wrong place, sorry.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/18/2017 03:56AM by Soft Machine.

Songs written for teens about teen love, a period that can be very special. I start my romance novel with characters in their mid-teens. It's actually very challenging!

The unspecified subject here, of course, is Roy Moore. I'm still agnostic about the veracity of the claims on him, and don't want to hijack the thread into partisan politics. But we're talking about the 1970s, when then sexual revolution of the 1960s had penetrated (pun intended, BYU-B!) mainstream society and culture. Meanwhile, the "advance troops" of the sexual revolution were working to normalize homosexuality and all sorts of sex as long as it was "a meaningful relationship." Yes, that was the operative cliche of the time. They were morally turbulant times, and I have no idea how things were played out in Alabama. This was the period when NAMBLA (North American Man-Boy Love Association) was proudly marching in gay pride parades all over the country.

Fun fact: NAMBLA was founded in a Unitarian Church in Copley Square, Boston.

I don't think it was socially acceptable for older men to be hitting on young girls but some of the most famous rock and roll stars certain had issues with underage girls .. Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, later Jimmy Page ... there is quite a list. Part of the problem was young girls making themselves available in hordes I guess.

...for after concert sex.

It would be a rare rock band that hasn't indulged in groupies.

Well she was just 17 if you know what I mean. Seems to be about maybe an early 20's guy meeting a 17 year old . I could be wrong but the "just" word seems like an age difference thing . But they were just dancing anyway .Or not.

Yep, " I saw her standing there" was or seemed just about dancing. Their targeted audience in their early years ,was teens, so they sang lyrics that the mainly girl fans could relate to.
I got the 45 by Ringo Starr on my 16th BD, " You're 16"; I thought it creepy too, but I figured he was singing it in a teenage boy's point of view.
I think the Dr Hook song was written in a teenage boy's point of view too. It sounds creepy though to hear s guy in his 30s or so sing it though

Which Dr Hook song? "I Saw Her Standing There" was one of the first songs written by Lennon and McCartney for the Beatles. They may well have been teenagers when they wrote it.

"She was just 17, if you know what I mean..."
The Beatles "I Saw Her Standing There"

Hmmm - most requested at the Stake Dance?

She was too young to fall in love
and I was too dumb to know

-Dr Hook and the Medicine Show

To the OP. I think your point is that older men, in all times, and in all cultures, often hit on younger and much younger women.

I think that's true and it will always be true.

Does it give Joseph Smith any sort of a pass?

No!!

Powerful men have and will use that power to get what they want.

Decent people try to protect weaker people like teenagers.

That's why we have statutory rape laws.

Look up the lyrics to Grateful Dead's "Mexicali Blues" song. It always freaked me out. It's about an American guy in Mexico doing shady things because he can. The little Mexican girl he's happy to take advantage of is "just 14."

"And It's three days ride from Bakersfield,
And I don't know why I came.
I guess I came to keep from payin' dues.
So, instead, I've got a bottle and a girl who's just fourteen,
And a damned good case of the Mexicali Blues. Yeh!"

Not sure where this fits in with the OP's post, but I wanted to share...

I think it's safe to say that 'high school breasts' are best, when viewed from the perspective of a rutting male. But "rutting male" is a phrase that does suggest that second, third and fourth best are still in the running, or, as they say, up for grabs.

Does this mean every woman who sang a cover of Girl from Ipanema is a lesbian?

As it relates to Mormonism:
https://weirdalma.bandcamp.com/track/youre-several-months-shy-of-fifteen

"Ivory and Ivory," "Taperback Rider," worth checking out.

When I was 16, I was creeped out by any guy 20 and over showing an interest in me.