There are no doubt lots of things about parenting I don't understand, but here's
one of them. It should be remembered that most of my opinions about the parenting
of teen-agers derive from being on the other side (that is, I have been a teen but
haven't been a parent). I've seen this situation several times, with differing
details.
So imagine you have a daughter, late high-school-aged.
You've just found out she's sleeping with a girlfriend.
What
confuses me is that in every single case I've seen, the parent's primary reaction
(whether favorable or not) is to the word "girlfriend" rather than the words
"sleeping with". I mean, if I'd had a nice Jewish boy whose family my parents know
(in other words, the most appropriate date possible, in their eyes) sleeping over
when I was that age or even when I was in college, I think my parents would have
hit the roof. (I may be wrong, but I doubt it.) I know this isn't true of all
parents; my college boyfriend's parents didn't seem to mind me staying over.
Has this changed? Are more parents just comfortable with the idea of
their late-teen kid having sex? I guess I tend to think that if I were a parent, I
might be comfortable in the abstract with the idea, if I thought my daughter were
ready to make her own decision, but not necessarily with it happening in my house,
especially while I was there. Or maybe even that would be OK as long as I didn't
have to think about the details much (in other words, about the same attitude I
have toward the idea of my parents having sex). I just don't
know.
But it still strikes me as odd that no one (in the several
cases I've read) ever seems to worry whether their daughter is old enough to have
sex at all whether with a guy or girl. Maybe it's just easier because with a girl
they don't have to work about pregnancy at all, AIDS is much less likely, and
another girl is less likely to be able to overpower their daughter. Maybe the
shock factor, for those that disapprove, is enough to overcome anything else.
Maybe I'm just hopelessly out of touch and can't know without actually being a
parent. Maybe I'd even encourage it, in order to not have my kid sneaking around
behind my back.
Maybe it's a good thing I don't have to worry about
these things.