It really does affect women when they're fed these sorts of stories from birth, though. When I was a young girl, I remember the majority of girls I knew really buying into this shit because it's all that was available for them to read, and everyone treated it like it was a true and normal narrative.
Maybe because the adults know that it's fantasy and assume the children do for some bizarre reason, or because everyone is still bitterly obsessed with the "girls love bad boys" stereotype and don't actually want to disagree with these novels, but nobody ever interrupted the "lessons" they were getting from these crappily written shitshows.
In fact, I had the extreme displeasure of watching those girls line up to shame rape victims for trying to break up with their rapists, because "he's a hurt bad boy" and "she's a bitch who's breaking his heart".
They then tried to throw themselves at said rapist. We're all very lucky he'd turned incel at that point and wouldn't date again because "girls are all sluts and bitches".
You can say "it's your problem", but when it's brainwashing kids this effectively, it's society's problem.
I have to be honest. I read that and thought, " i cant really say thats a very good case being made"
It may sounds kinda asssholy and im sorry if it does. Dont mean it like that.
i just thought that because, well, i dont know exactly what "reading material" those kids had available. But it shouldnt matter? You say a lot of kids you knew bought into it because thats all they had to read. This should be, one can assume, that its all you had to read as well.
And YOU didnt end up like that.
I mean....come on. Cant we just admit that MAYBE a majority of those girls who were shaming the rape victims....are just bitches themselves? And it had very little, if anything, to do with reading stuff?
Again most of this genres popular reading material isnt propoganda promoting abuse. It would have to be pretty hardcore to actually "brainwash" anyone and you'd have to almost deliberately surround kids SINCE YOUNG to that sort of material to begin with.
I see no situation in which any of what you said would happen normally. I find it interesting you use the word "fed" too.
Like im sorry but it just sounds like you lived in a shitty place where the adults almost certainly and deliberately "fed" their younger generation with propaganda supporting, or at the very least actively normalizing, true abusive behaviour.
as i said in another previous post, MOST OF THE FUCKING POPULAR WORKS FROM THIS GENRE ARE HARMLESS.
They dont show shit like unjustifiably hitting a woman--or man even. Or straight up holding her down and raping her. Or saying all that stuff can be forgiven because of some dark past the male lead went through.
let me ask: Is THAT the kind of stuff you had available to read? Seriously?
Because if it is then what IM talking about and what YOU'RE talking about seem like two very different things.
Even if its not actively promoting that stuff, if its openly flaunting/displaying it then what the fuck is up with the adults where you lived letting kids read that sort of shit? And how young we even talking about? Cuz past 16, unless they been reading those serious sort of novels--novels different from the ones im speaking of, the ones OP spoke sbout being popular right now-- since they were children, they have no excuse. They could only blame their shitty nature in those cases. Cuz at that age if you havent been exposed since childhood to only those sort of novels, well you already have a solid worldview by then. Which means you cant just blame the books.
Anyway. That stuff dont have any....like, real place in a discussion talking about mere fads about bad boy alpha male fantasies or neglect play
No. What you imply is that some seriously messed up reading material had been fed to your companions since they were young. And that is just something else entirely.
I mean its either that or all those girls who did the shaming were just shitty people.
Honestly, I'm going to have to switch sides here, or at least not camp solely on the side of "there's nothing wrong with it, it's just a kink," since there are studies that have linked aggressive behavior to violent literature and music. Generally, when I see topics like this, I think of how it's been proven time and time again via scientific studies that video games don't cause violence. I just jump to the conclusion that it's moral panic. They just make me think of how people thought Dungeons and Dragons was causing people to turn into satanists. But according to studies, literature (but primarily music)
can and
does cause an increase in violent behavior. I would think that it's safe to assume if
violent literature has been linked to violent thoughts and behaviors, then literature that promotes unhealthy relationships does normalize and encourage it even if that is not the author's intent. It's not like a book has to say "Yes, reader, this behavior is perfectly acceptable and you should do it in real life" for people to be subconsciously influenced by it. You can even know that something is wrong at a conscious level but still be influenced toward it at a subconscious level. Enough exposure toward something can do that to the mind. I can easily think of many examples of this that are prevalent in the modern internet... but things would get political and probably very toxic if I actually used those examples.
Just look at how effective gaslighting is, and I'm afraid that I was getting too close to gaslighting by jumping to my previous conclusion.
So, I agree that children with developing minds and worldviews should not read these stories without first being given positive examples instead. At the very least, they should be taught that the content of such books are not healthy nor acceptable in the real world. However, I don't have a problem with people writing these stories while intending for them to serve as a fantasy targeted at mature adults who understand that it is strictly fantasy.
I would also say that the problem isn't actually separating reality from fiction at all despite that originally being my main point. As
one of the studies that supports video games not causing violence describes, reality testing begins at age 3 and children can generally separate fiction and reality completely by the age of 12 unless they are "experiencing a significant psychosis or intellectual disability." It's more an issue of what effect overexposure to violent fiction has on people and how they react to situations.
At the same time, I can only find one study solidly claiming that violent books encourage violent behavior (and no studies saying the opposite), and there are numerous studies in far more detail supporting that violent video games have absolutely zero effect on violent behavior. So, if the study was right about violent books and music causing increased violent reactions in people, how are violent video games safe from this?
In other words, nothing is black and white like usual, but I don't believe in putting the blame on the creators of such content. I would rather put blame on how people are educated. We should be providing people with a greater balance and promoting stronger critical thinking skills. Unfortunately, that's something that nobody in charge has any interest in doing.
The people who are most affected by these issues are usually going to be the ones who are the most biased, and they're the ones who are generally worth listening to the most when it comes to matters like this.
Look i will always say there isnt anything wrong with whatever sick kink a person wants to write or read about, but yes there needs to be a certain age limit.
How low or high the limit should be is arbitrary.
But I feel anyone past 16 should already have a rather strict view on the world by that point. That they wont be likely to grow and mature or change very much after that. They can, but its unlikely there will be anything that changes the foundation of who they are and what they believe in without true brainwashing tactics being used.
And either they read without being brainwashed into thinking all that is normal or they are already pretty perverse themselves and any behavior they make after reading is on they themselves, not the book.
We have to understand that situations of a wave of popularity in books that have relatively harmless versions of "neglect play" type of stuff or cold bad-boy stereotypes....and situations of books with harder, more realistic forms of abuse being dipictsed as forgivable or even just openly displayed...are simply two different animals entirely.
We are having a discussion on the first. Not the second.
The first just needs you to understand the difference between fantasy and reality. Have that and you''re golden. You can blame no one but yourself for any rash behaviour after reading them. Because they simply arent made to at all have that kind of effect. Its just you who is a dick if you use that as an excuse to shift blame from your own shittiness.
Get exposed to the first kind of books even at a young age and at most you get hard on earlier than you should or just not see the appeal.
The second type tho? Those type of works arent being presented as fetishes. Or fantasies.
And certainly shouldnt be made available to anyone younger than 16.
Lets just be clear that we have come to a topic wholly different from the original. The kind of books we are now talking about simply arent the kind we see being so popular on like wattpad or whatever.
Lets not confuse fetishes, however sick snd disgusting, with more grounded depictions of cruelty. With brainwashing and the normalization of said depictions since childhood.
