love letters - Jezebel

posts about #loveletters more →
"Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
"So It Has Come."
"I’m Sorry I Wasn't Honest About My Need For Non-Monogamy"
Is There Any Way To Write A Love Letter Without Sounding Ridiculous?
"Secrets" From Jennifer Love Hewitt's New Dating Book
Love Letters Are Dead; Breakup Letters Are Blooming
Dear Anne Hathaway: If You Don't Read Your Ex-Boyfriend's Indictment You Are Going To Hell
Kissing, Monogamy & The Future Of Makin' Babies
"I Went Home, Grabbed Some Spraypaint, Took The Train Back And Waited Until 4am To Climb The Scaffolding."

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lalie (apologetic mess)
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
Well, it's a good thing you're there to keep Tracey Emin in her place, isn't it, Miranda Sawyer? How else would she know that society disapproves of her decision to buck societal pressures on aging femininity?
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PhillyLass promoted this comment

PhillyLass
09/24/09

@lalie (apologetic mess): Seriously. And what is her objection to Emin broadening her horizons and learning something new? It's such a weirdass reason to criticize someone.
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maude_flanders
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
It's f*cked up to auction off something private like love letters no matter how old the sender was if the author doesn't consent, but I suppose that's obvious.

I guess he doesn't care if he looks like an asshole--they're letters from a famous person, and she wrote when was "jailbait", so that's doubly juicy.
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Hana Maru
09/24/09

@maude_flanders: He's a certifiable scumbag.
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Pizza!Pizza!Pizza!
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
'Rather than thinking, ‘I've got to get my breasts raised or get some Botox,' why not think, ‘I'm going to learn French'

I know I wrote this the other day, but if women put the brain power, not to mention funds, that they currently devote to anti-wrinkle creams and calorie counting towards learning another language or taking up another hobby they'd be freaking unstoppable.
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PhillyLass
09/24/09

@HeatherNumber1: A-fucking-men, sister. Amen.
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EinDC
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
If it's an auction, what's to stop her from buying them herself? I'll kick in a few bucks if she needs it.
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PhillyLass
09/24/09

@EinDC: I suppose the prospect of handing over her hard-earned cash to the douchebag who did her wrong is giving her pause.
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Plum-Pie
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
Oh Miranda Sawyer, when did you start taking yourself so seriously that you think it's appropriate to give careers advice to Tracey Emin?
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Edited by Plum-Pie at 09/24/09 12:56 PM Plum-Pie was starred Plum-Pie was unstarred

colormeroutine
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
I was wracking my brain for ways in which his selling those letters could be considered illegal, but couldn't come up with anything. Unfortunately. In the spirit of the age she was when she wrote them, I'd be happy to egg his car or TP his yard
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BlueJeans
09/24/09

@colormeroutine: Couldn't the letters be considered evidence that the dude committed a crime if they make explicit reference to the relationship and specific events? I mean, granted we have no idea what the content is like. But it's a thought?
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greengrey
09/24/09

@BlueJeans: Statute of limitations?
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lonewolfer: lusty trollop
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
I'm asking this question because I honestly struggle with my coming up with answer and I'd love some insight: At what age do we start making smart decisions for ourselves? Is a 14-year-old girl, for example, always taken advantage of in a sexual relationship if it's with someone older, or can she make decisions for herself? I know there are laws in place to protect them, and that's great, I'm just asking from a personal point of view, when is it OK to start making 'grownup' decisions for yourself?
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Porcelina
09/24/09

@lonewolfer: I dated a much older man when I was 15. He didn't want to at first, and he was very concerned about people thinking he was taking advantage of me. But I would NOT take no for an answer. :) I also graduated high school when I was 16. I will admit that I might have made some mistakes when I was younger, but dating him was not a mistake. We're still friends to this day, I am 24 now.

I know I can't speak for all girls, I just know that in my own experience, I knew exactly what I was doing.
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Princess Leela
09/24/09

@lonewolfer: It's a good question, and I don't think there is an easy answer. As far as the law, it really comes down to the needs/benefits of the individual vs. society, doesn't it? Never thought of it this way before, but it occurs to me that statutory rape laws are basically what economists like to call a "second best solution." We can't know that ALL 14-year-old girls aren't capable of making safe, wise, adult-level decisions about sex, or that they can't choose an older partner without being manipulated. But we've concluded as a society that most of them probably aren't and can't. Hence the law. It'll restrict some people who don't need it, but such is the world we live in; individuals don't exist in a vacuum. Same for any adult activity on which we put an age limit: driving, drinking alcohol, voting, serving in the military. There are always going to be young people who'd be capable of handling these responsibilities before they're legally allowed to. But we've reached a collective decision that a high number of them wouldn't be -- too high a number to make it beneficial to society overall.

But all that said, I guess the answer to YOUR question simply is that it's different for everyone. Good parenting helps a lot. So does good schooling. And some of it just comes down to our own individual quirks.
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Edited by Princess Leela at 09/24/09 1:09 PM Princess Leela was starred Princess Leela was unstarred

cantankasaurus rex
09/24/09

@lonewolfer: like Porcelina, i was also romantically involved with a much older man as a teenager. it began when i was 16 and we eventually slept together when i was 17. i loved him and to this day have no regrets. but my mother found out and made both of our lives a living hell, going on about how it was statutory rape. thankfully, in my state, the age of consent was 16, but it still ended up with her taking him to court to try and get a restraining order....

thus, from my perspective, i know there 15, 16 year olds mature enough to make the decision to consent to a sexual relationship and its a healthy decision for them. and i think that statutory rape laws are almost more harmful then they are worth. if its not consensual, its rape. if it is consensual, even if the girl/boy is 14 (which is my fairly arbitrary minimum age for consent), then its not rape. i know these laws are ostensibly to protect the younger party, but in the vast majority of cases that are prosecuted, its simple the parents of the young person using a technicality to control their child's sexual choices.
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colormeroutine
09/24/09

@cantankasaurus rex: I'm sure there are plenty of cases like yours, but I still think that the number of people that young capable of making that decision is pretty low comparatively. Granted, there are plenty of people over 18 who are complete idiots about these things as well, in an ideal world there'd be some kind of test you could administer to determine when you get to consent for yourself (I'm only half-joking) but I still think that telling those kids they have to wait a little longer to screw their older boyfriends/girlfriends is less of a rights violation than telling the rest of them that we won't protect them. And how does physical maturity play into the whole thing? I was a damn smart 13 year old, but I hadn't even gotten a period yet and looked approximately 9, could I have really "consented" to something my body was completely not ready for?
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clevernamehere
09/24/09

@lonewolfer: Consent laws are arbitrary, but there aren't really 14 year olds who are as capable of making decisions as 30 year olds. The parts of the brain that predict repercussions are the last part of the brain to develop and they keep developing until about 21.

I don't think every teenager who gets with someone older is exploited, but I'm really uncomfortable with the idea of adult men being worn down by young girls. The adult still has greater responsibility.
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aureliajones
09/24/09

@lonewolfer: All I know is that I stongly believe that the man I first had sex with when I was 14 (he was 19) was taking advantage of me. I hate him now, and I regret my decision to be with him. If I had had a parent who cared, or was even ever home, and a home without drug-addicted sisters, I wouldn't have done it. But that's just my story, I cannot speak for the rest.
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cantankasaurus rex
09/24/09

@colormeroutine: I guess what gets me about it is that most statutory rape laws have some sort of clause that says that, well, if the older person is within 4-5 years of the younger person's age, then its not considered statutory rape. so its not that in the eyes of the law that a 14 year old can't consent to a sexual relationship, but that the government (or her parents who want to press charges) get to decide/limit who she can consent to. its just strikes me as a case where everyone knows whats best for a woman (or young woman) except herself :-/
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frugal
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
Like Tracy, we all have Eminies in ex-boyfriends.
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NefariousNewt a.k.a. General Awesomesauce promoted this comment frugal was starred frugal was unstarred

NefariousNewt
09/24/09

@frugal: And because they are ex's, you never have to see Eminies.
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NefariousNewt
09/24/09

In reply to "Wild Woman" Tracey Emin On Art, Kids, & Statutory Rape
Ex-boyfriend == jackass.
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sewradical
09/01/09

In reply to "So It Has Come."
My grandparent's were pen pals during WWII. They never met but there was a "pen friend" program at my grandmother's school. He proposed before they met.

They were 16 and 19 and were together 60 years. They died within months of each other. My grandmother died first, after a long and protracted illness. My grandfather was perfectly healthy and had a heart attack out of the blue. I have all of their letters and they are beautiful -my favorite is the letter he sent when my grandmother's house was bombed. It's so sad but it's when you can first tell how much they loved each other. When I find a guy who can express himself like that...

We found them under my grandfather's bed when he died, along with their wedding album, a pressed flower (from her bouquet, we think) and the first picture she ever sent him.
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EkaterinaBallerina
09/01/09

In reply to "So It Has Come."
My father is one of five children (now four, my aunt died in the late 1970s). When he and his siblings went off to college and started to have lives of their own, my grandfather decided to find a way to keep all of them in touch. So when he retired he bought himself a typewriter and every week wrote a letter detailing the week's events, be it what he and my grandmother had done or what he'd heard from one of his kids. All of us got it and it was our way of staying in touch despite the distance (I grew up in MD, I had an uncle in the foreign service, an uncle in the midwest, another in upstate NY and my grandparents lived in Eastern CT) He started them before all of the grandkids are born and we have several binders full of correspondences from nearly two decades. I used to love reading the ones from around the time I was born.

After he died in 2000, I took the typewriter and my uncle migrated the letters to a website and now a blog. I like reading it when it's updated, but I still this day miss reading those letters and seeing my grandfather's note at the bottom of every one: "Have a great week! Love!!!"
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LuvEwan
09/01/09

In reply to "So It Has Come."
I want to receive a letter like James Joyce would send his wife. Bow chica wow wow.
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Mary McCarthyite
09/01/09

@LuvEwan: I know what you're referring to! His unforgettable nickname for her, yes?
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notwhoyouthoughtiwas
09/01/09

@Mary McCarthyite: I have no idea! Please share, because now I'm dying of curiosity.
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Mary McCarthyite promoted this comment

Mary McCarthyite
09/02/09

@notwhoyouthoughtiwas: I PM'd you...
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Casquivana
09/01/09

In reply to "So It Has Come."
I love letters. Old letters. My mother and I keep all of my grandma's letters as well as the ones she kept from her own father, sisters and grandparents. Is really eerie and touching to read them, not only because you can connect it to such specific moments in history, but also because it makes you feel close to the people who through family anecdotes have become part of your vocabulary, and you can finally put a voice to the stories and characters that populate your family's history (my mother couldn't stop crying after we found a letter written to my grandma by one of her older sons, a brother my mom never met as he died shortly after her birth. It was the last letter he wrote to his mother after going back home to her to die, and I guess it was really weird and moving for her to see his words and what he had to said in his own perspective, not just from the stories her mother told about him). I've thought about compiling them all and make copies, like a book, for my cousins and their kids, but I'm afraid some of them they might take it the wrong way and think I'm simply being a smug bitch who wants to rub in their face my closeness to our grandma (she lived with us). I still haven't dismissed the idea though. I think is important for people to know things from the past, particularly connected to the lives lead by those close to us, because I believe in breaking patterns and learning through the lives of those who came before you. Sometimes, the answer might be found in those connections.
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Ailatan
09/01/09

@Casquivana: Do it! I wish I had something like that from my grandparents.

Don't mind what the cousins say, people will always criticise
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funnyface
09/01/09

In reply to "So It Has Come."
My grandmother keeps threatening to throw out the letters she and my Pops wrote to each other during WWII. I'm not sure HOW much I have to holler to convince her I want them, but I want them.
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Flackette Goes Retro
09/01/09

In reply to "So It Has Come."
Something tells me future generations will not find the same kind of inspiration in our text messages.
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