Quote From: poetmomFirst of all, nothing is being forced on anyone.....these guidelines have been worked out WITH their input, and they are happy with the way things are handled. Secondly, they can "like" someone at any age, and are always open about that.........they can also talk to those people on the phone, or have them here at the house, with a group of other teens, or go to someone else's house, or to a movie, or dinner, etc, IN A GROUP. So they all have very active, full lives that don't include one on one dating........and in our town, they are more the norm than the exception, so they don't feel left out of things. at all.
It is what you are used to I think. If the parrents would decide on their 14th birthday from now on these are the rules the teen will rebel. But if they are led into this they will not rebel as long as they are taken serious in their feelings which in this case they are. (we talked about this a long time ago, eh? :D )
And it has to do with the social standards of the people around them, here for instance no one lives by these rules so if one family made up these rules the children would find them restrictive because all of their friends do have the oppertunity to date without (many) restrictions.
