There's something that has been bugging me, and I'm dying to get it off my chest, but have nowhere but here to do so. I'm a romance author, and I absolutely HATE the fact that "romance" is a genre that includes everything from sweet love stories to straight up written porn. I absolutely hate the existence of erotica. I hate that nowadays, if you call books like that "trashy," you're burned at the stakes as a sexist. I hate that people have fully embraced their "right" to like whatever they like, and that includes reading porn completely unabashedly with zero guilt attached. This makes me sick and it makes me sad, and sometimes it is just incredibly hard to be a part of this world. Recently someone online said that some romance novels can be trashy, and he was attacked for it. I defended the statement, and of course now I'm being attacked for it as well, with people condemning me for being such a traitor as a romance reader and writer. But literally all I said is that SOME romance novels can be trashy.... apparently that's sexist and horrible, and means I hate romance and want to alienate romance readers. *sigh* I'm just exhausted sometimes. It's freaking exhausting living in this world of instant outrage and cancel culture, especially as a writer, when my ultimate career dream would be to work from home writing books. It's terrifying to hinge that dream on a culture of people who are now putting me on their "never read" list simply for acknowledging that some romance novels can be trashy. Imagine what they would say if I said what I REALLY think, which is that all erotica is trashy, and I don't like or support any of it, and I don't like that when I say I'm a romance author I feel like people might assume that means I write smut, and I have to clarify, because they're somehow considered the same genre. I'm just tired and had to get that off my chest among people who might understand. I feel like so many of my views are becoming cancelable offenses nowadays, and it makes me feel like I have to just silence myself completely if I ever want to succeed as an author. But I hate that, and as I'm sure some of you are well aware of, I'm not the kind of person to stay silent when I feel strongly about something. I wish I was better at just keeping crap to myself sometimes, but I just feel like a sell-out when I do. Anyway, thanks for listening, whoever reads this.
What if the opposite is true? What if there are plenty of others just like you? What if they feel the same and want to read something good and wholesome? Even if the loud ones trash you, wouldn't that be like a signal of virtue for those who know better? I hear you though. It's a lot to put on the line.
The problem is the culture of feminism in the romance genre. Even people who only read sweet romance and don't read steamy stuff might be mad about anyone ever saying anything negative about anything women like. My solution for now is to just delete social media and not share my opinions publicly. Which is dumb, but sometimes that's just what you have to do.
i like chicklit like Sophie Kinsella, i used to read "romance" online, u look in that category and most of them are erotica, and addicted as i am i enjoyed it very much, i knew it wasn't okay though.. now am fed up with online read, most of them are mere porn, no boundaries from bdsm to group sex i've done my fair share of exploration, among a list of 100titles, mayb only one or two is "plain romance" recently, i've read The Hating Game by Sally Thorne..
I am confused. You're saying you don't like cancel culture but at the same time you hate people's right to read erotica? Maybe I don't understand what cancel culture means.
I'd say the "billionaire vampire with a six pack falls in love with a village girl" books which seem to dominate fiction and women buy by the millions are just as bad or even trashier than written porn.
The days of cancel culture are numbered. The shriller things get, the closer the end is. Did you read about the anti-cancel-culture open letter sent to a prominent magazine the other week? Even lefty personalities signed it (and then started in-fighting and backpedalling once they saw the other signatories). As a writer, you should focus your energy on getting your vision on paper, and then finding ways to let people read it who want to read it. That's it. Every keystroke wasted on online or real-life arguments over taste, morality, politics, or the direction taken by culture is sapping your creative energy. Put some blinkers on and stop engaging in situations that you know drain you. /steps down from soapbox. xD
I read a lot (A WHOLE LOT) of fantasy and science fiction novels and I start to cringe so hard my face turns inside out when I read the inevitable "sex thats written to seem as crude and trashy as possible" scene that seems to happen in a lot of these kinds of books. Its almost like, at some point, writers of these genres decided "straightforward romance is too unrealistic, so I'm gonna do something thats basically the opposite, and make all the sex either borderline pornographic or otherwise seedy and grungy", and the problem is, now so many people do it that its no longer effective and comes across as being cliche as hell, just as cliched as the cliche its trying to avoid! This isnt to say you cant have graphic sex scenes in a story, I have no inherent issue with them. A sex scene/romance scene can be very graphic and still be romantic and sensual as opposed to dirty and crude. My issue is too many books seem to be the latter and not the former. I would prefer some sort of balance.
I am still confused. What exactly is the issue with people liking dirty and crude sex scenes in literature? Why take something away from people that they enjoy?
That's cool Cass! It sucks that you are being attacked by people like that though. Stay determined though. Just write what you like and try not to let the negative opinions of others affect you.
I dont think OP is saying the issue is with people liking this kind of content, the issue stems from receiving unjustified and irrational backlash when voicing opinions that go against the consensus, to such an extent that it makes her not want to voice her opinion on the matter at all because of the over the top response that will occur because of it. The internet allows people to be needlessly vitriolic and harsh for no reason, completely going off based on basically nothing, and I think this is what OP is talking about. She didn't say anything over the top, she didn't say people who like trashy erotica are idiots, or they need to fuck off, or anything like that. She merely voiced an opinion that went against the hivemind of wherever she said what she said. I see this happen all over the internet, and its sadly not a small minority of people who act like this. Internet anonymity gives people free reign to treat each other like shit and screech at each other like raging chimpanzees.
How can you not see the difference between 'I personally don't like written pornography' and 'I hate people's right to read written pornography'?
This is a tough issue for me. As a creative writer, I have written some fetish erotica stuff and posted on different msg boards and gotten real great acclaim for it. It kept me writing and I was able to indulge in not only my creative side but also explore different fantasies on the page and live them vicariously through my writing... but Ive been struggling with my commitment to NoFap. Is continuing to do this writing a relapse? I don't know if there is a clear answer. Its an indulgence of fantasy but at the same time I consider it an act of creativity. I'd be very interested in hearing others feedback to help me unpack this.
Try writing something non-erotic? I would say that writing erotic fiction is completely antithetical to the person you aim to be by breaking this addiction: even if you're not actively PMOing, you are actively engaging in the porn community. At best, it's a lack of commitment, at worst, I think you could consider engaging in this behaviour a relapse.
Your right. I do write other stuff. I am currently writing a sort of sci-fi fantasy novel thats a bit like John Carptener meets Lovecraft. But at the same time there is a part of me that was poured into those stories. I think what you are saying is best, the energy and life force I put into the fetish writing can at some point be transmuted into another form. But there is a bit of a sadness too as i realize I need to say goodbye to peices of me that were expressed in those tales. Thanks for commenting.
There is a clear difference between those two statements, but OP didn't specifically say either of them. What OP actually said was "I hate that people have fully embraced their "right" to like whatever they like," and while that is a provocative statement, in this context, to me, she clearly means that she hates that people lump traditional romance stories in with straight up hardcore erotica, the rest of her statements further back up that this is her viewpoint. There is a difference between saying you hate peoples right to do something and saying you hate that people are embracing a thing you dont like, OP said the latter, not the former.
I see your point but the implications of both statements are the same. 'I hate that people have the right to watch porn' and 'I hate that people enjoy watching porn' is two ways of criticising people for doing something they obviously like doing. Saying you personally don't like something is not the same as criticising other people for liking it.
The implication may be similar, but I think in the context of what OP is trying to say she isnt necessarily criticising people who read porn as a whole, just criticising a certain subset of those people who think that trashy porn novels are equivalent to traditional romance and attack people who dont agree with them. Probably worth waiting for OP to comment so she can clarify to you exactly what she meant.
