Taylor Swift’s “Red” Reminds Us How Men Take Advantage of Young Women
I was turning eighteen, and he was thirty.
Last weekend, Taylor Swift rocked the world with her re-release of Red which included a (previously) never heard ten-minute version of what many fans consider to be her best song, “all too well.”
As I watched the short film and listened to the new lyrics, I realized that I had never realized how young Taylor was while dating Jake Gyllenhaal. There was almost a decade-long age gap between them, as she was twenty and he was nearly thirty.
To put it in perspective, Taylor couldn't even order alcohol when she was with Jake and his friends, a moment she highlights for viewers.
Shortly after watching the short film, a memory popped into my mind that I hadn’t revisited in years.
A thirty-year-old that I had known since I was a young child expressed romantic interest two days after my eighteenth birthday, and ultimately, we were intimate.
I always assumed older men pursuing young girls was a small-town thing. That was a naive belief, as my experience was not only “a small-town thing.” It is ultimately a predatory move that is all too…
