Cougar: Formal Or Informal Meaning?

What's your first thought when you see or hear the word cougar?

My first thought when I saw it at @mariannewest's last freewrite post as a new prompt was the above question. Does Marianne's prompt was about the formal or informal meaning of the word cougar?

^{_{Image Source: Own derivative work with photos from Wikimedia; credits to Varavour for Emmanuel_et_Brigitte_Macron_(cropped), used under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license; and from Pixabay; credits to skeeze for cougar-puma, used under the CC0 Creative Commons license.}}

What's the difference?

Cougar: Formally

Cougar is an animal, a big wild cat also known as puma, panther or mountain lion. Its natural habitat is the American continent, a wide area from Canada in the north to the Andes in South America, and therefore this terrestrial mammal is the broadest wild animal in that part of the world.

^{_{Photo from Pixabay. Credits to IanZA for puma, used under the CC0 Creative Commons license.}}

Cougar is a reclusive animal that mainly avoids people but as a very territorial animal might be highly dangerous or even fatal if humans enter its territory.

For food, this carnivorous animal hunts a wide variety of prey but primarily big animals like wild horses or deer. Its hunting strategy doesn't rely on speed or strength but more on sit-and-wait trapping tactics mostly from some hidden position, and that's why cougar prefers rocky areas or terrains with dense underbrushes. This hunting strategy puts the cougar into the category of ambush predators.

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Cougar: Informally

In this informal sense, Wikipedia defines cougar as a

"slang for a woman who seeks sexual activity with significantly younger men."

This not at all flattering slang term (although I don't see why but I assume it owes to its alleged Vancouver origins where) has been used as a humiliating and criticizing remark for older women who would go to bars seeking men and at the end of the night going home with whoever has been left.

However, today in overall this slang term popularly defines a woman in her 40s or older who dates eight years or more younger man. Not rarely they are characterized as some pathetic and desperate predators.

One of the most popular or at least, these days, widely known such woman is Brigitte Trogneux-Macron, wife of French president Emmanuel Macron.

^{_{Image Source: Photo from Wikimedia. Credits to Varavour for Emmanuel_et_Brigitte_Macron_(cropped), used under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.}}

Some other women also known as celebrity cougars are:

Demi Moore because of her former relationship with 15 years younger Ashton Kutcher and after the split with him for her another relationship with even younger (19 years) Harry Morton.

^{_{Image Source: Photo from flickr. Credits to Ash90291 for Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher, used under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.}}

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Jennifer Lopez who after divorcing her third husband Marc Anthony started to date her 18 years younger backing dancer Casper Smart.

^{_{Image Source: Photo from Wikimedia. Credits to Kimsaka for Jennifer Lopez at GLAAD Media Awards (cropped), used under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.}}

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Unavoidable Dynasty star Joan Collins because of her previous marriage with 14 years younger Peter Holm as well as for her current marriage with 32 years younger Percy Gibson.

^{_{Image Source: Photo from Wikimedia. Credits to Frantogian for Joan Collins - Monte-Carlo Television Festival, used under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license.}}

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The following woman a rare few would even recall putting in the cougar category. It's Anna Mae Bullock the queen of rock 'n' roll to the world known as Tina Turner. Her, by now, six years long marriage and 34 years long relationship with Erwin Bach make her my personal and probably the only favorite among above-listed woman cougars.

^{_{Image Source: Photo from flickr. Credits to [Herry Lawford for Tina Turner Concert, used under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.}}

Because of her, I would gladly join the women fighting against above-mentioned cougar stereotypes as I believe most women cougars are only confident and successful mature women that just prefer more active and more adventurous men (who are most often younger ones) than narrow-minded, boring, inactive and unromantic men of their own age.

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Posted on Tuesday, January 8, 2019

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Inspired by @mariannewest's "Day 444 : 5 Minute Freewrite: Monday - Prompt: cougar"

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