What Women Want

I have mentioned several times that many believe that the melodrama and escapism are genres oriented towards women, I agree, but still remain confused on why it is such a negative thing. I found an blog post that I (sort of) agree with, it takes the side of women living vicariously through romantic melodramas. The blog post states that, "women who read these books live vicariously through the characters whose lives are nothing like theirs. They feel a sense of escapism when they read about women who have men lusting after them..." I agree that many people use melodramas as a mind-numbing escape, but this blog post made it seem like the women who read it are absolutely desperate to be loved like the characters they read about in their novels. I am almost positive that this is not always the case. I agree with the person who posted this blog post when they said that the, "...whole concept of women 'escaping' and becoming empowered through the act of reading romance novels sadly just reinforces gender stereotypes." This is a complete fact. Many believe that because mainly women are empowered by these types of novels that means that men aren't also. Not only women read these texts and feel empowered or are able to find an escape through reading them. I feel that this topic needs to be brought out and discussed in society a lot more.