good lord thank you thank you thank you for writing this, this whole goddamn debate has me tearing my hair out, it's just the whole standard-label double standard puritanical BS pushed to an absurd degree, likeeee
1. THIS IS NOT A NEW GENRE!! bodice rippers have existed for YEARSSSS, saying that women only read "spicy" (hate that phrase) books NOW is woefully ignorant
2. this is kind of a "what if the world was made of pudding" argument but let's say that the perceived predominant genre among women was science fiction novels with really long drawn out space battle scenes. if THAT were the case, women would still get criticized for liking lower literature, indulging in pointless action instead of Real Books.
3. what in god's name is a "fake book"?????
4. let's imagine an imaginary woman who spends her entire life reading erotic books constantly, no other genre, just indulging in the craziest steamiest novels you've ever heard of. OK what now. Who Cares. respectfully we do not complain about the men who never stray from Brandon Sanderson
and like I love romance novels but I don't read the steamier ones, just due to my own tastes, but I'll defend the hell outta them! cos every book has SOME kind of value in it! god, can't people just be glad that people are READING???
thank you for this comment!! I hate how romance has been treated these past few months on booktok especially. like you said, romance has alwayssss been around. women didn’t just start reading smut recently lmao like they’ve been doing this shit for centuries 😭and exactly, anything women dominated gets ridiculed constantly. I mean, kind of off topic but look at the university attendance rates. women have been predominantly going to university for a while now, and now men are saying university is “too easy” or “liberal” because a lot of women are now attending post- secondary school than ever before. it doesn’t matter what it is; if a lot of women do it, it’s not valuable anymore. god knows what “fake literature” means, according to these guys it’s romance 😒 you make so many good points lol. no one calls out men for reading/watching game of thrones which has a multitude of violent and graphic sex scenes. god forbid we call game of thrones a smut book tho 🤭🤭 people are never satisfied. I don’t like super spicy books either but I’m not gonna shit on people who read it.. like that’s so weird to me. if you don’t like it, don’t read it. people will like what they like.
The romance genre always has a bad representation, either we are a bunch of idiotic hopeless romantics or we are porn addicts. We are not!! I love romance for the plot, I like the spice on the basis that it is emotionally driven and charged with chemistry.
I’m beyond frustrated and disappointed when I saw Fourth Wing being referred as ‘dragon smut’. First of all, it sounds like monster romance, which is not. Secondly, the Empyrean series is not smut. It is extremely plot-driven to the point where I feel quite confused of the place names and character names. If it’s a smut, there would be loads of spicy scenes, but ‘Onyx Storm’ only has 4 spicy chapters and some of them only involves kissing.
As for dark romance, I read dark romance. I love them. I love the mafia elements as well as the more intense power dynamics in those characters. Yes, they are certainly darker than most romance books and include more sexually explicit content, some of which are controversial. But as a reader, I am completely aware that those are only fictional and therefore NOT REAL. I will never accept those behaviours in real life. So just to make clear, it’s not wrong to enjoy dark romance.
it’s so annoying and frustrating to see this discourse come up again in bookish spaces. romance as a genre has ridiculed for so long and it’s like, can it ever catch a break? I personally did not like Fourth Wing, but I definitely agree with you. there was barely any smut in the book and it is very plot driven, there’s a lot of action and fantasy elements that get lost because people label it as “porn” because of a couple smut scenes. like what are we doing?? why are we devaluing the book because of something that comes up maybe once or twice? you never get this sort of discourse with movies or tv shows that involve a sex scene. it’s ridiculous. dark romance especially gets a lot of flack for the content it usually includes and I think it’s so overly done. people will hate on a genre to get views and likes (like the youtube video that kallmekris made bashing booktok books including mostly romance and dark romance books) and it’s stupid. if someone doesn’t like a certain genre I think they probably shouldn’t read it instead of bashing it lol. but ty for your comment! I love romance books so much and I’m glad to see that others are defending it too.
I really appreciate this post because I also think people have taken away from what was an ACTUAL issue into just another thing to shame women for. Back when this whole thing started I remember it was only for those people who read solely smut books (not romance, just smut) and were advertising it like nothing and encouraging people to read it (including children) and didn't read anything outside of smut and at times even criticised people who read things that didn't have smut. The main issue with these people were that they promoted and encouraged smut books that were very toxic and labelled as 'dark romance' when in reality it was just dark and no romance. Now, I say read whatever you want, but to promote such things to young girls, that's damaging. I myself was influenced to read Haunting Adeline and NO ONE told me about the SA scenes which by the way are justified as CNC (THEY WERENT CNC!!!). But now people have took that narrative and started applying it to any girl who enjoys romance which is COMPLETELY wrong. Romance books literally use spicy scene as a plot point rather than to cause arousal. Smut books are MADE to get someone off. Most dark romances are written FOR the pleasures of the reader. It's literally the same difference that's between a porn movie and a romance movie. A romance movie might have a sex scene or two but it won't be as explicit and will be done as a plot point ot in relation to the story. Porn movies are PORN. They don't have a plot. And I also agree that if you only read smut books and 'dark' romance that's basically just smut and nothing else that you're a porn addict. Because if you NEED a movie and book to have explicit sex scenes then that's...odd. And if you don't read books that don't have spice scene just because they don't have spice scenes then you're weird. But to spin that issue and use that as ANOTHER reason to hate on women is INSANE and it's been pissed me off aswell. Romance books with spice scenes is very different from a smut book having a little romance. I loved this piece and it's very well written, tysm for writing it. ♡
omg I swear I could write a whole post on haunting adeline alone. you’re 100% right it’s NOT cnc 😭 and people like to say it is while literally ignoring that the first “c” is “consent”…. which was like, never given in that book. and the fact that it’s been marketed towards young girls as well is so harmful. and that people say it’s just “dark romance” noooo it’s a horror is what it is. a man stalking a woman, not leaving her alone, raping her with a weapon??? and not allowing her any agency??? it’s ridiculous. and people actually say that zade is the ideal book bf like wdym… anyway I could go on lol I hate that book. and you’re right. romance gets such a bad rep and i’ve seen so many unfortunate comments calling romance readers such derogatory things and porn addicts and such. thank you for your comment, I love seeing your insight 🤍
LITERALLY!!! Like I've read CNC and this is NOT that. And yes it's advertised as romance and now young girls think this is normal. Like you're literally making girls think abuse and rape is NORMAL. BE FUCKUNG FR. I'm the biggest zade meadows and haunting adeline hater and I could talk about it all day because of hoe harmful it is. And ofc thank YOU for writing this I hope more people understand this. ♡
Interesting post, I suppose there is a fine line between erotica and porn. There is a great Facebook group called the, "Booksmacked And Naughty Gang." They love spicy books, and I love their phrase, "don't yuck somebody else's yum."
There is also Rule 34.
"Rule 34 is an internet concept meaning that if something exists in real life, or is made up, there will be a pornographic depiction of it. This includes cartoons, celebrities, and objects, and in some cases, these depictions go well beyond usual themes found in mainstream pornography."
As a self-published author I am working with Anthropomorphic equine characters at the moment, which are just an extension of my Centaur and Centauride characters.
good lord thank you thank you thank you for writing this, this whole goddamn debate has me tearing my hair out, it's just the whole standard-label double standard puritanical BS pushed to an absurd degree, likeeee
1. THIS IS NOT A NEW GENRE!! bodice rippers have existed for YEARSSSS, saying that women only read "spicy" (hate that phrase) books NOW is woefully ignorant
2. this is kind of a "what if the world was made of pudding" argument but let's say that the perceived predominant genre among women was science fiction novels with really long drawn out space battle scenes. if THAT were the case, women would still get criticized for liking lower literature, indulging in pointless action instead of Real Books.
3. what in god's name is a "fake book"?????
4. let's imagine an imaginary woman who spends her entire life reading erotic books constantly, no other genre, just indulging in the craziest steamiest novels you've ever heard of. OK what now. Who Cares. respectfully we do not complain about the men who never stray from Brandon Sanderson
and like I love romance novels but I don't read the steamier ones, just due to my own tastes, but I'll defend the hell outta them! cos every book has SOME kind of value in it! god, can't people just be glad that people are READING???
thank you for this comment!! I hate how romance has been treated these past few months on booktok especially. like you said, romance has alwayssss been around. women didn’t just start reading smut recently lmao like they’ve been doing this shit for centuries 😭and exactly, anything women dominated gets ridiculed constantly. I mean, kind of off topic but look at the university attendance rates. women have been predominantly going to university for a while now, and now men are saying university is “too easy” or “liberal” because a lot of women are now attending post- secondary school than ever before. it doesn’t matter what it is; if a lot of women do it, it’s not valuable anymore. god knows what “fake literature” means, according to these guys it’s romance 😒 you make so many good points lol. no one calls out men for reading/watching game of thrones which has a multitude of violent and graphic sex scenes. god forbid we call game of thrones a smut book tho 🤭🤭 people are never satisfied. I don’t like super spicy books either but I’m not gonna shit on people who read it.. like that’s so weird to me. if you don’t like it, don’t read it. people will like what they like.
The romance genre always has a bad representation, either we are a bunch of idiotic hopeless romantics or we are porn addicts. We are not!! I love romance for the plot, I like the spice on the basis that it is emotionally driven and charged with chemistry.
I’m beyond frustrated and disappointed when I saw Fourth Wing being referred as ‘dragon smut’. First of all, it sounds like monster romance, which is not. Secondly, the Empyrean series is not smut. It is extremely plot-driven to the point where I feel quite confused of the place names and character names. If it’s a smut, there would be loads of spicy scenes, but ‘Onyx Storm’ only has 4 spicy chapters and some of them only involves kissing.
As for dark romance, I read dark romance. I love them. I love the mafia elements as well as the more intense power dynamics in those characters. Yes, they are certainly darker than most romance books and include more sexually explicit content, some of which are controversial. But as a reader, I am completely aware that those are only fictional and therefore NOT REAL. I will never accept those behaviours in real life. So just to make clear, it’s not wrong to enjoy dark romance.
it’s so annoying and frustrating to see this discourse come up again in bookish spaces. romance as a genre has ridiculed for so long and it’s like, can it ever catch a break? I personally did not like Fourth Wing, but I definitely agree with you. there was barely any smut in the book and it is very plot driven, there’s a lot of action and fantasy elements that get lost because people label it as “porn” because of a couple smut scenes. like what are we doing?? why are we devaluing the book because of something that comes up maybe once or twice? you never get this sort of discourse with movies or tv shows that involve a sex scene. it’s ridiculous. dark romance especially gets a lot of flack for the content it usually includes and I think it’s so overly done. people will hate on a genre to get views and likes (like the youtube video that kallmekris made bashing booktok books including mostly romance and dark romance books) and it’s stupid. if someone doesn’t like a certain genre I think they probably shouldn’t read it instead of bashing it lol. but ty for your comment! I love romance books so much and I’m glad to see that others are defending it too.
Absolutely! Defending the romance genre to death💗📖
‼️‼️‼️
🤭🤍🤍
I really appreciate this post because I also think people have taken away from what was an ACTUAL issue into just another thing to shame women for. Back when this whole thing started I remember it was only for those people who read solely smut books (not romance, just smut) and were advertising it like nothing and encouraging people to read it (including children) and didn't read anything outside of smut and at times even criticised people who read things that didn't have smut. The main issue with these people were that they promoted and encouraged smut books that were very toxic and labelled as 'dark romance' when in reality it was just dark and no romance. Now, I say read whatever you want, but to promote such things to young girls, that's damaging. I myself was influenced to read Haunting Adeline and NO ONE told me about the SA scenes which by the way are justified as CNC (THEY WERENT CNC!!!). But now people have took that narrative and started applying it to any girl who enjoys romance which is COMPLETELY wrong. Romance books literally use spicy scene as a plot point rather than to cause arousal. Smut books are MADE to get someone off. Most dark romances are written FOR the pleasures of the reader. It's literally the same difference that's between a porn movie and a romance movie. A romance movie might have a sex scene or two but it won't be as explicit and will be done as a plot point ot in relation to the story. Porn movies are PORN. They don't have a plot. And I also agree that if you only read smut books and 'dark' romance that's basically just smut and nothing else that you're a porn addict. Because if you NEED a movie and book to have explicit sex scenes then that's...odd. And if you don't read books that don't have spice scene just because they don't have spice scenes then you're weird. But to spin that issue and use that as ANOTHER reason to hate on women is INSANE and it's been pissed me off aswell. Romance books with spice scenes is very different from a smut book having a little romance. I loved this piece and it's very well written, tysm for writing it. ♡
omg I swear I could write a whole post on haunting adeline alone. you’re 100% right it’s NOT cnc 😭 and people like to say it is while literally ignoring that the first “c” is “consent”…. which was like, never given in that book. and the fact that it’s been marketed towards young girls as well is so harmful. and that people say it’s just “dark romance” noooo it’s a horror is what it is. a man stalking a woman, not leaving her alone, raping her with a weapon??? and not allowing her any agency??? it’s ridiculous. and people actually say that zade is the ideal book bf like wdym… anyway I could go on lol I hate that book. and you’re right. romance gets such a bad rep and i’ve seen so many unfortunate comments calling romance readers such derogatory things and porn addicts and such. thank you for your comment, I love seeing your insight 🤍
LITERALLY!!! Like I've read CNC and this is NOT that. And yes it's advertised as romance and now young girls think this is normal. Like you're literally making girls think abuse and rape is NORMAL. BE FUCKUNG FR. I'm the biggest zade meadows and haunting adeline hater and I could talk about it all day because of hoe harmful it is. And ofc thank YOU for writing this I hope more people understand this. ♡
romance they could never make me hate u.
so real
Interesting post, I suppose there is a fine line between erotica and porn. There is a great Facebook group called the, "Booksmacked And Naughty Gang." They love spicy books, and I love their phrase, "don't yuck somebody else's yum."
There is also Rule 34.
"Rule 34 is an internet concept meaning that if something exists in real life, or is made up, there will be a pornographic depiction of it. This includes cartoons, celebrities, and objects, and in some cases, these depictions go well beyond usual themes found in mainstream pornography."
As a self-published author I am working with Anthropomorphic equine characters at the moment, which are just an extension of my Centaur and Centauride characters.