Well, we generally didn't have a choice. through the lens of back then would they deem it predatory? obviously not, but we also used to consider slavery acceptable, and as recently as ... today, there's a state in the US that views spousal rape as requiring a specific above-and-beyond level of force to be considered, you know, rape, (and as recently as 2003, about half of the states still had some sort of marital immunity re: rape in their laws).
just because people used to be ok with a thing doesn't mean the thing isn't fucked