GoCougar??

There is a link at the bottom of the page (here at Ageless) that says "Do you prefer dating younger men?". I clicked it and it brought me to something called "GoCougar.com".

:eek::confused:

Yes, that's a site that is owned by the new owners of this site. Jody and I told the new site owner admin about how the term "cougar" is found to be offensive by many of our OW. He said they have owned goCougar for just under a year, and apparently it was already named that when they purchased the site. At least that's what I gathered from the conversation. He said that he would remove the name "goCougar" from the link bottom of the page. But, yes, it is the goCougar site that people would reach if they click that link.

I saw that link a couple weeks ago, then it was gone for a while. Now it's back. I guess they shuffle the links from time to time. To me, it's highly offensive. GoAwayCougar!! Can anything be done to eradicate the link, not merely rename it?

:rolleyes::paperbag::aaaaaaack: Sorry, i am not a cougar, not on here seeking young meat:aaaaaaack: They should be ashamed putting that on there.

I echo everybody's sentiment. We are fighting to banish the cougar image and here we have it. :mad:

I agree. From what I am told this GoCougar site is more of "let's hookup for sex" kind of site. I wonder if they have a link on there, referring people over here? Gosh I hope NOT.

I think the new owners of Ageless need to show some class and drop that link, they're stepping on the toes of all the ladies here, bad taste folks. No class at all.

Well, I doubt that they will agree to remove the link, but I will draw the owner's attention to this thread so he can see everyone's concerns. As I said, we already made him aware of how you all feel.

I did go ahead and register at goCougar just to see if they advertise agelesslove there and I did not find any link to ageless on that site, nor in the forum that is also housed within that site.

It actually looks like a very respectful dating site. The forums don't look like they are used much there.

I did see this note at the bottom of the page:

Cougars: Traditionally the word cougar has had a negative connotation but over the past 5 years the meaning of cougar has changed to represent older women who are strong and independant. Mature women who know what they want and are not afraid to get it. If you want to date cougars, date younger men, or date older women then go cougar is the site for you. Dating older men, dating younger women and dating cougars has never been easier.

I have actually seen media stories that indicate the same (that the term cougar is moving away from a negative connotation). I don't know about you all, but I don't like being compared with a prey animal.

Anyway, as I said, I'll draw his attention to this thread in case he wants to provide any additional comments. I know that based on my previous discussions with him, he did not want to offend anyone here.

I think we should give them a break on this, for they are new and to be honest, that term seems to be used more frequently in the UK and Canada than over here (as didn't it originate in Canada?) and seems to have a less negative connotation than it does here. PLUS our trusty mod, Kat, seems to have fixed the problem! :bgrin2:

I agree, Linda. Every indication I've received from the new owner is that he really does care what people here think about the issue. And, I agree with you that we should cut them some slack. While I don't like to be called the term myself, it does seem that times are changing.

I think we should give them a break on this, for they are new and to be honest, that term seems to be used more frequently in the UK and Canada than over here (as didn't it originate in Canada?) and seems to have a less negative connotation than it does here. PLUS our trusty mod, Kat, seems to have fixed the problem! :bgrin2:

The connotation here in Vancouver (the term is said to have originated from either Edmonton or Vancouver, and I've lived in both cities) is, if anything, WORSE than in the US... here it can just be a plain insult to mean ugly older woman. Horrible! In fact, the woman doesn't even necessarily have to be chasing a younger dude. She might just be enjoying herself at a bar -- BAM! She's slammed with that label meaning she's horribly unattractive. I've seen it over and over.

I'm sure the owner of goCougar did not mean any offense. I just really really really really really hate that label.

I do, too. :( And, as I said, I think it was already called that when they purchased it. So, maybe they didn't see a need to change the name.

British English is another language from American English, and their culture is different too. In Britain it's probably an acceptable term.



No 'Cougar' is not an acceptable term here either! It is considered pretty insulting..........

It is used to describe those strange 40+ women that haunt pubs and clubs, wearing too much 'slap' (make-up), dressed in short skirts with miles of cleavage spilling everywhere, who make all the other punters cringe when they drape themselves all over some poor unfortunate guy.

It's fine to be called a cougar if you are one - but every older woman with a younger mate is NOT a cougar!! Especially here!!

Age Gap Relationships and Cougar hookups are two very different things!!

A bicycle and a Ferrari both have wheels, but would you call a Ferrari a bike??

I'm sorry, but the whole cougar stereotype is exactly the type of view society already places on us and any association with the name supports that stereotype.

We already have a hard enough time getting people to take our relationships seriously.

Seeing anything "cougar" related to this site demeans us and sets us back. :(

I do hope the owners will reconsider the link.

Probably they are using AL's PR rank and search engine power to get traffic to the other site.

This site is Ageless Love not Ageless Hookup.

Cougar = hookup.

... strange 40+ women that haunt pubs and clubs, wearing too much 'slap' (make-up), dressed in short skirts with miles of cleavage spilling everywhere, who make all the other punters cringe when they drape themselves all over some poor unfortunate guy ...

:bgrin2:

http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h51/gp_fillmore/Laughingnoteeth-2.jpg

I absolutely detest that term. :mad0136: Around here, if you're over 25 and single you're called a cougar in the most demeaning way. I get extremely irate at people who call me that even if they say they're just "teasing". I don't care. Don't ever call me that.

I agree with whiterose - I am not a prey animal. A very short giraffe perhaps, but most definitely not something/one hunting for something.

rant rant rant rant :rant:

I absolutely detest that term. :mad0136: Around here, if you're over 25 and single you're called a cougar in the most demeaning way. I get extremely irate at people who call me that even if they say they're just "teasing". I don't care. Don't ever call me that.

I agree with whiterose - I am not a prey animal. A very short giraffe perhaps, but most definitely not something/one hunting for something.

rant rant rant rant :rant:

WELL SAID!
Honestly this is extremely demeaning. I don't go out dressing naughty looking for some *HOT MEATY BOYS* can't they request a domain name change on it????

Well, at least the link was renamed to say "Do you prefer dating younger men?"

Now, at least, it doesn't SAY "Go Cougar" anymore.

Some advice to the new owner:

That link should say "Do you prefer dating older women?" because that's who usually comes here by mistake - Younger men looking for cougars, not the other way around! :yes: I think you'd get more clickthrough traffic if it said that. Just FYI.

I think being connected to a site like that might be a final straw for me. If I was on a site that fosters connections between different races, and someone bought the site and put a link to a racist site, I would either leave or become a strong activist faster than you could blink.

I don't know why anyone would idly sit by and think that this is ok. They are using the gravitas of AL to get traffic to a site that demeans our relationships.

Thank you, no!

Actually, I detest the term "cougar" also. Perhaps they will change the name of the site. I've checked out GoCougar.com and it seems like a decent website for dating.

Well, here's my take on it...don't bash me over the head with it though.

I don't like the term cougar either; however.....

That site has been around for quite a while, and the owners of this site just purchased that site a little over a year ago...name intact, already registered with the search engines and such...already with quite a few members.

I wouldn't want them changing the name of this site when they bought it....btw. The members at that site seem fine with the name, and I guess that's what matters.

Now if the name of this site was changed to something like that...I would be really upset. But if the members there like the name and enjoy the site, more power to them I guess.

It doesn't affect me any, you know?

True jo however I am worried it will bring demeaning things to this forum..lord knows we have to fight in real life to stand our ground with our relationship and what we believe in.

They call the younger guys cubs...eekkk I am not dating a cub I am dating a man

It's not what they do there, Jo, it's what it might bring HERE.

What if the new owner happened to own a porn site advertising younger guys banging older broads and linked it here?

Sure, it's not that bad, but it's the image that comes to mind when you think "Go Cougar."

Just because the site was established and named before the new owners bought it doesn't make it appropriate to link to Ageless.

All of the network is dating sites - we are not.

I guess it's OK to link from Ageless to those sites to give that traffic we get here for dating somewhere to go, but I hope they don't link to us.

And because those terms "dating" and "younger" and "older" are on our pages and we rank higher in the search engines, Ageless will come up in the search results for them.

Again, we may get unwanted traffic of people looking for hookups. We already have things like women posting in Relationship Support getting hit on by younger men who don't even bother to read the posts to see that she is already in love and in pain because of her situation!

I'm just saying - it's great that the owner is leaving Ageless the way it is, but he should consider whether or not linking very different sites is appropriate for the membership.

It just lacks sensitivity to the fact that not all age gap relationships are the same. Just because we are older than our SO's DOESN'T make us cougars.

Of course, they also link to their "Hair & Beauty" site, but at least that could be relevant to the Ageless membership.

Kristin, in an earlier post, I said that I went to that site and registered and confirmed that they are not linking to ageless. Not on the dating site, nor in the forum that is within that site. I could find nothing there that linked to this site. I don't know if that will always be the case, but that's not the case right now.

The site owner contacted me this morning and said that they are going to discuss it at their management meeting tomorrow and he will then come and post a note on the thread.

I just checked it out, too and it doesn't appear to link back to us.

If nothing else, we now have a place we can send people looking for hookups!! YAY!!

Sorry Kat, I missed your post but went & checked myself & posted the above message.

It doesn't need to be a direct link, though, to drive traffic here.

Time will tell, but it doesn't seem like it'll be a bad thing - before we weren't allowed to post links to other sites to direct hook-up people to - now we do!

And no matter whether that link was there or not, we'd still get that kind of traffic because we rank so high in the search engines for certain terms.

Hey that's ok. I just didn't know if you had seen that I had checked it out.

Search google for "older women" and GoCougar is #1 and Ageless is, thankfully, further down the page.

Search "cougar" and Ageless isn't even in the results.

This is GOOD ladies! :yes:

Sites like GoCougar keep "cougar hunters" AWAY from our site!!

True, true.

I think if y'all have a problem with the name of that site or it being linked here, you should probably send the new owner a PM. I believe his title here is theadmin.

I hear y'all, there just isn't much I can do, and I don't know all the details. :o

As we seem to be having a frank and honest exchange of opinions, we feel it is appropriate to make our position perfectly clear.

You all seem to be hung up on the term "Cougar", which in this community obviously has very negative connotations. However, goCougar (GC) has never been an American owned site and therefore we don't understand the constant attack on the GC name. Why you are forcing your personal feelings and culture upon us and the members of GC is beyond our comprehension.

Strangely enough at least 80% of our members are American and we've never had a single complaint about the name of the site. This issue has only arisen on AL.

At this point we would like to quote the number one guiding principle on GC, one which is enforced vigorously by our support staff:

"This website is primarily for mature women seeking relationships with younger men and vice versa. We expect members to treat each other with the utmost respect. Anyone found abusing this policy will have their account terminated immediately."

Now onto AgelessLove (AL). We have no intention of redirecting traffic to AL as there is no benefit to us. GC has its own recently launched forum and it's growing fast. GC membership is doubling annually and is already much larger than AL.

We acquired AL in order to highlight the existence of GC and provide an additional source of traffic. It is entirely up to AL members & visitors to decide whether they want to visit/join GC. Furthermore, there are many visitors to AL that never become members or are simply looking for dating sites, etc. This is where GC and the soon to be launched AgelessDating.com will come into play.

Out of respect, we have not interfered with any operational aspect of AL, but respect is a two way street!

We have a rule about bashing other sites on this site, which is why you won't see any of the sites we have had problems with in the past mentioned by name on this forum.

Contrary to what I have read on other forums...we just don't discuss other forums negatively here. That will definitely continue to be the case.

We DO have a lot of members come to this site looking for a dating site, a place to meet people for dating, and I think the other two sites will be provided additional traffic from this site, and that is a good thing for people whose needs/wants are not met by this site, and vice versa.

Just as a side note, we had YM sign up recently looking for an older woman to date.

I directed him to GoCougar.com. It was nice to have a place to send him other than him hanging around here hitting on women already in relationships.

To theAdmin:

Please just take into consideration that many women on this forum come here seeking support because their relationship with their YM isn't taken seriously and/or is forbidden because of the connection with the "Cougar" stereotype. People think our relationships are just for sex and that the women are somehow "weird" for wanting to be with their younger man. We have also encountered prejudice against our relationships because people think that we are some predatory creature "hunting" young men to heva sex with - their view of "cougar."

Women seeking "dating" a YM for sex or a casual relationship - "Cougars" - just aren't what we are here. It IS what many seem to be seeking on GoCougar.com. Therefore, they ARE Cougars and obviously wouldn't have a problem with the name.

It's nothing against you or your members - it's just that people in long-term, serious relationships don't want people to assume that just because they are with younger men that they are "cougars" and that their relationships aren't serious and don't deserve respect.

It'd be like having a website for younger woman called "Golddiggers.com" or "Sugardaddy.com".Some women would be cool with being called a golddigger or calling their husband a sugar daddy and some are happy to be in that kind of relationship, but most women who are truly in love with their older husbands probably would be offended by being called that or associated with that term.

I hope that explains more why your gocougar members are OK with the term and we are not. We are just two very different kind of relationships and we are NOT cougars.

It's OK though, because now we have a place to send wayward cougars and cougar hunters that accidentally find their way here.