booktok, brainrot, and why it’s okay to be a hater

being a huge nerd means i care SO DEEPLY. about how people read books. but more importantly, i care about having access to those books. regardless of your stance on booktok books, you should be fighting against book bans. every day is an opportunity to think critically about literature, even now. especially now. analysis rocks! love u all!
💌: [e-mail]
timestamps:
0:00 intro
3:00 we have lost the plot. literally.
15:28 let people hate things!
30:06 a book is a loaded gun
register to vote! research your candidates! fight fascist alt-right censorship!
www.vote.org/
www.vote411.org/ballot
book ban resources:
www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks
ec.ala.org/donation/OIF-0600-...
pen.org/issue/free-the-books/
www.nypl.org/spotlight/books-...
pen.org/how-to-fight-book-ban...
uniteagainstbookbans.org/
book recs from social media: docs.google.com/document/d/1o...
articles
www.gq-magazine.co.uk/culture...
www.publishersweekly.com/pw/b...
madisonhuizinga.substack.com/...
www.nytimes.com/2022/07/01/bo...
lithub.com/booktok-is-good-ac...
www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-2...
www.nytimes.com/2023/08/09/sp...
www.vox.com/culture/23644772/...
www.besthealthmag.ca/article/...
www.rollingstone.com/culture/...
www.bupipedream.com/opinions/...
pagesunbound.wordpress.com/20...
bookriot.com/sexist-problem-i...
pagesunbound.wordpress.com/20...
www.bustle.com/entertainment/...
www.theguardian.com/commentis...
thebaffler.com/latest/dont-le...
www.teenvogue.com/story/lie-o...
www.vox.com/culture/2018/12/3...
www.vox.com/culture/2019/5/16...
www.evilfemale.blog/p/in-defe...
swim-press.co.uk/2023/01/15/a...
melaniestibbard.substack.com/...
www.thelance.ca/2022/11/17/th...
www.fridaythings.com/recent-p...
www.dissentmagazine.org/artic...
www.gandbmagazine.com/article...
hypercultureblog.com/f/the-po...
www.publishersweekly.com/pw/b...
www.publishersweekly.com/pw/b...
www.circana.com/intelligence/...
pen.org/report/book-bans-pres...
boingboing.net/2021/10/30/tex...
www.buzzfeednews.com/article/...
books:
Anti-intellectualism in American Life - Richard Hofstadter
Anti-Intellectualism in American Media - Dane Claussen
Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media - Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky
Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/p...
speaker clips:
• Author Richard Ford on...
• Jacqueline Woodson: Wh...
• Famous Writers on the ...
• The healing power of r...
• How books can open you...
• My Religion and My Ban...
• Banned Books Week: 13 ...
p.s. please ask me for book recs i have so many

[@alyote4905]

i want a booktok tiktoker whos obsessed with "spice" in books to be tricked into reading the entire 6 book Dune series

[@jessicamoore8903]

The spice must flow!

[@dreamerwav698]

i feel like their brains would melt if they didnt ingest the most cringe hetero smut in existence every twenty pages so unfrotuatnely i dont think theyd get through that or any normal book

[@fxlcontalon4281]

LISAN AL-GAIB!!

[@shrimpel3542]

HELP THIS GOT ME SO GOOD 💀

[@karawyss2069]

And it does get "spicy" as the series goes on! Book 5 is basically about "the genocidal dangers of good p**sy"

[@forcetruck3118]

“You can’t ‘I’m just girl’ your way out of everything. You pay taxes and vote. You’re not healing your inner child. You’re regressing into ignorance” My favorite quote !!

[@PlanetHertz]

willfully incompetent, blissfully ignorant.

[@qiff6667]

great quote

[@Iwannaeatlasagna]

69th like ​@@PlanetHertz

[@Iwannaeatlasagna]

69th like ​@@PlanetHertz

[@UnendingCoda]

Or let's grow up be adults and do well? No special treatment just do you and whatever manipulative therapy language use on yourself and your 6 foot 8 abusive husband or something.

[@Notllamalord]

“Does it have spice?” The booktok gooners say in unison

[@Pluto-cw2kh]

I'm pretty sure some of them will literally not touch books without smut in them.

[@SarahFletcher12]

Are you using that term in the way people might on reddit?? Cuz to be clear, I don't think most of those readers are using these books to actually get off to... It's probably more similar to how people who are adrenaline junkies like watching horror lol.

[@Pluto-cw2kh]

@@SarahFletcher12 I don't think most are getting off to it, but it clearly is mean to "rouse them with an a at the beginning."

[@BlueCoolOla]

@@Pluto-cw2kh And what exactly is wrong with that?

[@Pluto-cw2kh]

@@BlueCoolOla Nothings wrong with it, but I think people should read other things than only erotica.

[@dolliehouse]

honestly at this point all mainstream books have become so soulless i can find more well written pieces on ao3 😭

[@MantisSage]

I've already gone to the next step- Ao3 fics are feeling so same-y (tropes and pairings and bland stories and even similar writing styles) that I'm going back to the classics. The Illiad? Really good! (wish I'd gotten to read in HS)

[@nijohn12]

but the hunt is soo strenuous...like i am on there for hours looking for one good piece but I do like some of the little ones I find in between. But you're right. But I can see as mainstream hits that platform too it starts to even out and sometimes I want new characters. Tbh some of the original works on ao3 go hard.

[@dolliehouse]

@@nijohn12 i tend to just read the stuff made by writers i follow so i can expect well written work :3 trying to find new stuff can be horrid though T T

[@antaresic]

LITERALLY ! one of my favorite pieces of all time is on ao3 and that shit has over 900k words

[@injy9226]

​@@antaresicthat's more words that crime and punishment😭😭😭

[@sarahburke9254]

Sometimes books are jusy poorly written. People need to learn to accept that some of the books they like are of poor standard, but theres nothing wrong with enjoying it. A book being bad and a book being enjoyable are not mutually exclusive things, and someone critiquing a book you like is not a personal attack??

[@nootnewt9323]

I don’t even talk about media anymore. I was talking to a friend about it but some people can’t handle different opinions on things they like and it’s just weird.

[@sydneytaylor4285]

i loved the mortal instruments in high school- these books ARE poorly written and there ARE problematic things in there (cassie clare, are you good??), but I can still sit back in the nostalgia and enjoy them, while thinking critically of them. I would never move forward as an artist and my tastes would remain stagnant if I wasn’t able to do this.

[@teddiespicker]

agreed with the second sentence. one of my favourite books of all time is basically a pretty poorly written published self insert, and I can enjoy rereading it while recognising it’s flaws

[@QuinnArgo]

You're not wrong but I am inevitably *personally* attached to art that resonates with me. I'm one of the people to really enjoy HP Lovecraft for example, and I *do* know all about him, and I *do* know how his views manifest in the literature. But also I am really not interested in learning about where there might be subtle racisms in the Music of Erich Zann because the story means a lot to me, and recognizing its issues would feel like being personally hurt. It's fine to criticize something but I think it's impossible for people to not feel personally attacked because of it.

[@moodymoofin186]

Righttt, I like McDonald’s, and because someone tells me it’s not gourmet doesn’t mean I can’t like it. Sometimes people wanna read the McDonald’s of books lol 🤷‍♀️

[@laindarko3591]

I feel so vindicated after years of being told I'm no fun or take things too seriously just because I have critical thoughts about movies and books lol

[@girlsgokawaii]

The amount of times I've heard "it's not that deep" ffs like even if it's truly not let me enjoy analyzing media I consume. It fills me with rage atp

[@uonigiro]

@@girlsgokawaii like isn't the fun part about consuming media is analyzing it???

[@MoriMementa]

There's a certain subset of the anime and gaming fandoms who, often fueled by misogyny, constantly try to shout down any criticism of the mediums, particularly when the criticism comes from women. You see this in every passionate fandom; the second you suggest it isn't perfect, out come the epithets.

[@zkkitty2436]

@@MoriMementa I personally wouldn't even mind the epithets much if they were creative and interesting, yk? /j I agree, it's frustrating bc criticizing media doesn't necessarily mean you don't like it. Digging deep into media is the fun of it for me and I only recently learned not everyone experiences that

[@Dollibet]

it feels so condescending and misogynistic to be told that, like being told to "smile!" by a man you don't know 🤢 girls are supposed to be fun and cute and not serious!!! why are you being such a downer??? barf making women out to be jokes is how men get away with not taking us seriously when it actually is time to be serious.

[@ashercries]

As a fanfic reader, this discussion is so interesting to me. What I’ve really noticed is that a huge chunk of booktok people, didn’t have fanfic phases as teens or young adults. Bc it’s so clear to me that what they want, is just fanfic. The same tropes over and over again, large quantities of smut, and even sometimes questionable material are all easily found in fandom content/culture (at least the ones I’m in). And this gap has even negatively affected the fanfic community. Many booktok fans have begun to read fanfic (specifically dramione but other fandoms too) without knowing how the system runs, only for them to illegally bind and sell these fanfics. Resulting in said fanfics, all of which are insanely popular in that fandom, to be taken down off of sites like ao3. As much as I do thing that booktok can be positive in niches, as a whole, it’s causing problems for other reading communities. And don’t get me wrong, fanfic has its own problems for sure, but I think if most of the booktok people had fan fiction phases, booktok as a whole would prob look pretty different. (edit for clarity): obvi not ALL fanfic readers are into the things i talked about but even so, there ARE plenty who are. and also, fanfic and published books can talked about/criticized differently so im not sure how much that would really change anything. its still a very interesting thing ive noticed between the two :) another edit, really an update: some of the fics that were deleted are now back on ao3. im not sure when they were put back on, but it’s been a bit over a month since the whole situation went down. i’m glad the fics are back up, but the cause is still very much a problem within fandom communities. final edit: thank you all so much for 1k likes!! i’m so glad others are agreeing with me on this lol. have a great day

[@killme5630]

i had my booktok friends tell me that anime is cringe. like yeah, porn is more acceptable and normal, than a medium of story telling

[@dreamerwav698]

god its really awful that thats happening. not to be a hater or a gatekeeper but we need to hate on these people and gatekeep them from fandom. they have no knowledge of fandom etiquette or history. some of the worst fandoms are what i call 'intro fandoms' or the ones that are the first fandom that people join (generally young teenagers) and they often have a low barrier for entry that makes it incredibly oversaturated with a bunch of people who have no idea what theyre doing but by god are they going to be annoying about it. like, an intro fandom imo would be like dream smp (low barrier for entry, popular with young teenagers, very easy to take and interpret in any way they want) or most anime fandoms. a lot of smaller fandoms can generally avoid this oversaturation, though, like pathologic or anything thats particularly old (more than 20 years old, but probalby more than 50. looking at you star trek fans

[@rae_diant]

This especially comes out when you acknowledge a lot of the big popular books are just reskinned fanfiction. Excellent observation!

[@sara-yh6gy]

interestingly enough, it’s the same profile of women who are into these ridiculous books now, that would judge me as an early teen for reading fanfic. i remember making this observation myself (i was a writer on wattpad, many moons ago) and wondering how in the world that happened. the entire concept of poor writing was bunches of dialogue, with smut and poor plot lines is now what is piling sky high in women’s shelves??? the same ones who would call me weird for reading ??? it’s crazy to me

[@ashercries]

@@dreamerwav698 i know exactly what you mean!! people get into very large fandoms without knowing what to do, then somehow manage to mess things up (usually accidentally). i also try not to be a gatekeeper and stuff, but i always notice that people who say things like “tiktok ruined (insert fandom)” or “since the rise of (insert ship), the fandom just sucks now” are always younger teens. rarely do i see adults engaging in “discourse” these days. there really needs to be more widespread fandom education or else fandom as a whole will begin to fall apart i think :/ (i know that fandoms have always had problems, but they just seem to be so much more widespread right now) and no worries!! i really appreciate your response. i think about this convo all day every day so i appreciate the input a lot!!

[@_jsy_]

"youre not healing your inner child, you are regressing into ignorance" what a great line

[@elephantshell3617]

“Book stylist” is one of the most dystopian terms I’ve ever heard in my life.

[@gyrosik8851]

To be honest having books only for aesthetic is much older phenomenon than you think, basically since they were more available to rich people

[@samachell]

@@gyrosik8851 okay so dystopia is an older phenomena than we'd think too. what's your point?

[@JoeticJustice]

As someone who has recently stepped out of my time chamber and into the world of modern bookreading… Yeah from an outside lens it does feel like I’m jumping ass-backwards into a broth of dystopia.

[@hiphiphoogray]

⁠@@samachellthat WAS their point. they were adding context, not disputing the original comment.

[@teddiespicker]

WHAT THE HELL DOES IT EVEN MEAN 😭😭

[@BeautifullyTragicxx]

I had to stop engaging with booktok when I got a tiktok of a girl proudly saying "Guys, if your girl says she's a bookworm ... she's just reading thousands of pages of smut." And I know it was a joke but. Bestie ... first of all, speak for yourself. Second, while women can, should, and do enjoy erotic literature, art, and films, there's something so strange and insidious about suggesting that all women read is porn. There's a subtle anti-intellectualism embraced there, that is also highly gendered. As someone who does enjoy reading smut, but also reads a broad range of other genres, I've never been able to quite articulate what about the joke feels so blatantly anti-feminist and unfair without just sounding like I am anti-erotica, or think that smut is anti-feminist (I do not think that to be clear). I think there is real value to be found in erotic writing, and reading smut can be a fun way to explore sexuality. But I cannot imagine someone saying "Ladies, if he tells you he's a film buff, just know he's actually just watching porn."

[@rizzobeloved]

This is so beautifully put. I also had to delete TikTok because I was descending into madness, screaming “how are y’all not seeing it???” The exponential rise of anti-intellectualism amongst young women on the app actually put me into such a deep depressive state that I knew I needed some kind of reset. I’m now doing meaningful work at my local libraries and that feels a lot more fulfilling and has put a bit more hope into me

[@GOD_NEON]

You can read smut and the classics and I really think people should have an open mind. For example I like avant-garde films and Fast and the Furious lmao

[@alicegam]

Great comment:)

[@delanybell5613]

Ah yes!! This perfectly summarized how I feel. I do enjoy erotic literature, but I stopped getting recommendations from booktok and started browsing by myself because it quickly descended into what felt like a completely uncritical craze for anything smut related. To the point where people were openly recommending (imo of course) terribly written romanticized smut of some of the most abusive situations and dynamics that I started feeling repulsed. Which is the opposite of why I read smut fiction (as someone trying to heal and work through sexual trauma). Moderation is key! If you enjoy smut, you should be interspersing other genres into your reading. Otherwise, it starts to look like an addiction. Pair that with this weird push towards anti-intellectualism and poor media literacy, and you get a recipe for very unhealthy ideas about love and sex.

[@sao-me1lt]

You hit all the nails on all the heads

[@conceptualizing]

i Realized recently that the reason why i am deeply upset by the words “its Not that deep” or the attitude that it comes as a result of is because Everything Is That Deep

[@conceptualizing]

what other way is there to Exist in the world than to Feel and Think and Think about why and how you think always

[@conceptualizing]

Uncritical consumption is the bane of my existence but on the other hand i fear tip-toeing the line between being Pretentious and elitist and being aware

[@electricfishfan7159]

My perspective is that it’s never pretentious to enjoy engaging deeply with things, having that be your preference. It’s the execution of communicating what you think afterwards that can be pretentious. So don’t worry about it :)

[@Unouna10]

​@@electricfishfan7159woah really well said!

[@CalinJohnson-jh7oh]

(5) 😊

[@purpsinbio]

i cannot thank u enough for this video!! i am genuinely tired of the "im just a girl" phenomenon. when i spoke up abt it and how i think women are perfectly capable of comprehending intellectual media someone accused me of internalised misogyny 😭

[@maria_____.]

This "trend" drives me insane. At what point does this whole "hehe girl math, I'm just a girl let me girlsplain it to you" that you're constantly regurgitating stops being a joke and becomes a part of your identity? There's nothing liberating about it, this is genuinely setting us decades back.

[@siobhanflanagan4339]

This trend used to be funny in my opinion at least but it’s gotten so sinister with the internet as per usual dragging it to extremes. I find no issue with poking fun at aspects of our society and how they affect you, sometimes all you do is laugh so you don’t cry. But now it’s repackaged misogyny.

[@electricfishfan7159]

Bruhhh. I swear to god if a woman has engaged with zero radical feminist material in the last year she should be banned from the words “pick me” and “internalized misogyny.”

[@sugarcut]

its so sad too because the song that they took the phrase from (just a girl by no doubt) is complaining about only being viewed as a girl. she wishes to go out and be herself but at the end of the day the world will see her first and foremost as a girl. tiktok took the song and turned it into the soundtrack of everything the song hates.

[@CalinJohnson-jh7oh]

Fr

[@Wagon_Lord]

"Let people enjoy things" I enjoy critical thinking and being a hater

[@soho6435]

lmao you're so real for this

[@elenaprodromou6658]

okay but like for actual someone disliking a thing doesn’t mean they’re saying you shouldn’t like it, i’m always shocked people are letting haters have that much power over their opinions lol

[@LordVader1094]

Yes. Critical thinking should not be discouraged. Being a hater leads to higher quality things being produced instead of endless corporatized slop.

[@AlphariusOmegon618]

"Oh it's not true I don't hate anybody, WELL YOU SHOULD! IT MAKES LIFE MORE FUN!"

[@lpstweetytv5242]

And I'm tired of pretending I don't 🙄

[@MoriMementa]

The Pro Golfer going "Touch her and die" was hilarious. My dude, you may have a mean swing but murder is still illegal. That only works in feudalistic fantasy novels.

[@justl1453]

“Bad Boy Golfer” hes. A. Golfer…

[@teddiespicker]

@@justl1453 right like golfers are the most boring people ever. rich, maybe, but still boring. I say this with a dad who’s into golfing btw.

[@methuselahhoneysuckass]

i’m crying😭

[@daddymememaster5432]

​@@justl1453Prime Tiger Woods could definitely rock my shit though not gonna lie

[@NoFeckingNamesLeft]

legality won’t un-kill you

[@finntracy3235]

""let people enjoy things"" are you so hell bent on getting external validation for everything you do that someone criticizing any of it is literally stopping you from doing things you want? do we not have free will anymore?

[@superhetoric]

that bit about worldviews requiring external sources of validation could apply for so much stuff embedded in our current culture. it's sad tbh

[@maveryriley]

Literally. It’s so stupid. Why does one person not enjoying the same things you like make you mad?

[@finntracy3235]

@@superhetoric and it’s not even just worldviews, this implication that someone having criticism for something you enjoy is halting you from enjoying things is so strange, where are we getting this idea that your enjoyment of something is literally stolen from you by the act of criticism

[@user-nr8px6gp2n]

i bet y'all talk about free will right until someone will start criticizing you and your hobbies

[@finntracy3235]

@@user-nr8px6gp2n i actually engage with critical thinking regardless of weather or not it has to do with criticism of me or my hobbies because im an adult who doesnt look for excuses to turn my brain off

[@hj-ct2qi]

One time on Instagram I criticized a recent film by a female director. I was immediately told in the comments ✨by a man✨ that my criticism was tantamount to betraying my own sex. That as a woman, I should be supporting women creators by default and being a good "sister" rather than "bringing other women down." I'm an art history PhD and engaging critically with visual media is literally all I have done for the past decade of my life, so being told to silence my intellectual expression and instead mindlessly clap like a seal for a terrible movie exclusively because it was headed up by a fellow woman was so condescending and infuriating. And that's only one example of the growing anti-intellectualism I have contended with in online spaces. This video is so important. Thank you for making it.

[@mollyherbert4803]

YES! Obviously, it is so important for the media-making world to be diverse but that doesn't mean that anything made by e.g. a woman should not be criticised if it is a valid criticism. Criticism is how things grow into better pieces of art and, at least I believe, that if the point made is not just a direct attack on the creator's sex or race or otherwise and is genuinely relevant to the piece of media being discussed then all opinions should be welcomed.

[@GangstarComputerGod]

Kind of how I’ve been told (as a woman with DECADES of feminist action including policy work) that penises are totally female and I shouldn’t be weirded out by them in my spaces. By men. Men telling women that women are the problem when they’re uncomfortable. We used to call that sexual harassment. The incels have won and their handmaidens are rolling out the red carpet for them.

[@baiaku.]

By a man it's the cherry on top 😂 I'm sorry you had to go through this, sistá.

[@lefantomelover]

was the movie barbie by chance? i loved it but im also a teenage girl so ik my opinion is invalid lmao

[@hj-ct2qi]

@@lefantomelover it was not Barbie...I really liked Barbie, too! It was actually Madame Web, awhile before it came out and only trailers were available. I was saying that it looked like absolute rubbish based on the trailers, and it turns out I was right, and I'm far from the only person who thinks so. It was critically panned. I think the existence of Barbie is a great example of why we shouldn't applaud female directors *just* because they are women. Greta Gerwig is a talented director period, regardless of her sex, and she can be critically assessed alongside the best men and women working in the industry today. And she's also proof that women directors can be held to just as high of a standard of quality as male directors.

[@whatareyousayinggirl]

The frustrating thing is that it's not even REALLY being a "hater", right. I just share my personal experiences with a text and yet somehow there is always a booktok girlie who will scream that I am being a hater, trying to cancel the author, or am being a bully. ACOTAR and Fourth Wing fans are some of the worst for this, and they're the loudest/largest groups within the booktok community. I hate that I can't even say "This book made me uncomfortable because xyz" without someone harassing me and dismissing my experience.

[@mikanchan322]

Exactlyyyyy. And this also happens when I talk about things I even feel neutral about. I love to dissect why something may or may not work but as soon as it isnt praise, even if its neutral analysis, Im seen as a hater ??

[@rizzobeloved]

@@mikanchan322emphasis!!! I thought ACOTAR was meh and I said “I don’t see what’s so special about it” and the fans were so mad. Like if it’s your favorite book, it would be very hard for a stranger on the internet to change that for you with their own opinions. We’re allowed to have different tastes and still coexist in the same space

[@asea1203]

I am part of an online book club, where you can post your book reviews. There are both negative and positive book reviews and the members are not hostile about the negative reviews. So, I posted a negative review of ACOTAR there, and almost got banned, lol. I didn't violate any community rules and my criticism was really mild compared to some other negative reviews. But the difference was, those negative reviews were of authors like Stephen King or Charles Dickens. But mine was of SJM, who is somehow sacred for some weird reason.

[@saraferguson1156]

Yeeeessssss. This all the way. ACOTAR/Fourth Wing fans can be the WORST. It’s one of the many reasons why I won’t read either of those series. I’ve read excerpts from both series as well as watched countless video essays/critiques on both as well, and the writing was IN MY OPINION 😂 subpar. It did nothing for me and just made me feel ick. There is one particular part in Fourth Wing where the main character describes the first time she sees the MMC/resident “hot guy” and it was so cringe that I ended my Fourth Wing journey then and there 😂 both authors/series are very overrated and I feel like if we didn’t have booktok there wouldn’t be near as much hype over them as there is.

[@HolyTeacup-bc9uc]

I've had luck with asking people to first define to me what they think a "hater" is. Usually backs them into a corner. Watch them fumble trying to define it without basically saying "Well just any disagreement is hating".

[@VarricsBianca]

I think people absolutely fail to understand that two things can be true at once. You can criticise something and still enjoy it. I criticised the HELL out of Fourth Wing even though I still enjoyed it. One of my favourite KZbinrs hated and criticised one of my fave series and even though I agreed with all her criticisms I still enjoyed the series!

[@whatareyousayinggirl]

This! And also, even if we do end up saying we disliked the book, that is *not* an attack on the author or their fans. I'm so confused why this is how critical discussions are interpreted

[@VarricsBianca]

@@whatareyousayinggirl the internet is where nuance goes to die unfortunately 🤣

[@demitwice]

yes! buffy the vampire slayer is my all time favorite show but i am the first person to criticize it when needed. i suppose people sometimes get embarassed of enjoying flawed media so they refuse to acknowledge that said media is flawed. it's okay to like books that aren't a masterpiece of modern writing, but you still should be critical

[@yasminechoerryscherry3701]

Exactly!! We can and have to be nuanced!! Liking things means seeing the great and the bad things about them. If we don't criticise art at all, that makes us passive consumers, and I don't think that's the point of reading. Artists need all types of feedback to improve

[@PaizuruInsanal]

​@@demitwice same but for me it's supernatural.

[@neptuneblu1922]

I hate that being dumb is part of being a girl, I love pink girly things, plushies, and all of that, but "girl math" "girl dinner" is just bad financial decisions and eating disorders repackaged with a little pink bow on top. I am not perfect but when I make a bad financial decision and go to my friend and say omg I'm actually so disappointed in myself, I don't want her to say it's girl math. Infantilization is just as bad when you do it to yourself. Come on girls we are better than this.

[@superhetoric]

yes, this is internalized misogyny on a wide scale being passed off as acceptable "jokes" to make. don't even get me started about the use of girl over woman. misogyny is hell

[@cryforhelp7270]

What I'm about to say might not totally have to do with your comment, as I'm not on Tiktok and haven't seen what this trend has devolved into and what harmful practices may be being promoted. I think "girl dinner" started because of the stress of having to be "On" all the time. Having to present yourself as always competent, always on top of it because if you don't then people will look at you like how you're looking at them right now. Sometimes it's okay to just chill out and be sloppy, we're not all 100% mature sophisticated people who eat what the doctor recommended. I think it's evolved into something silly, like all trends, but initially it felt like a "cut women some slack" thing. (What I've seen of girl dinner has been pizza delivery, junk food, and fast food essentially) In which, yeah, cut women some slack. They don't always have to be some representation of their gender, sometimes they're individuals who ARE just that stupid. We shouldn't weaponize or commodify our incompetence or bad habits, but acknowledging they exist isn't the crime.

[@blah914]

​@@cryforhelp7270yes, this. thank you!

[@quingariusgoochiii9548]

“We can begin the book confidently, knowing the enemies will turn into lovers and the fake dating will turn into real dating - all will be tied up with a neat bow” YA romance books are the reinvention of Hallmark Christmas movies, safe, digestible, and easily produced

[@saraferguson1156]

😤 it’s so frustrating when all you see are these same kinds of books. Like you read one of them and you really don’t need to read any other because it’s just the same recycled story with (slightly) different character names and settings. I want to read something that has substance and flips the happy ending on its head. I don’t want them to end up together just because that’s what’s expected. I want it to happen because the events that have transpired LED to that outcome. And if things happen to create an environment where it wouldn’t make sense for them to end up together, the outcome needs to reflect that.

[@summerchild_]

Haters are an important part of any ecosystem.

[@skinnyrat4277]

amen brother

[@newtonia-uo4889]

I hate _____ people

[@LimeyLassen]

I was just about to make an identical comment

[@1d10tcannotmakeusername]

Haters and gatekeepers are the immune system of a social group (such as a fandom). As above, so below. As within, so without.

[@dukinuki9123]

The absolute irony and audacity to pull Fahrenheit 451 off the shelves...

[@p0lyb1u5]

Literally brave new world

[@majonaisse3986]

Truly a "that sign can't stop me because I can't read" moment

[@azncisg]

Well, if you are a proponent of book banning, banning this book would seem like a good move

[@naveerarizwan5329]

tbh I didn't like it but i agree

[@Weirdguy38]

I think it’s also important to note that the desire to overconsume books instead of going to a library and checking them out kind of marks the death of a third place.

[@olive_olive.mp4305]

25:47 “You’re not “healing your inner child” - you’re regressing into ignorance.” I KNEW there was always something about the whole “I’m just a girl” trend that’s been going around that’s been bothering me, and this is it, thank you for putting it into words

[@yoshitheorbit1118]

On a sidenote: Gotta love how all these books are paraded as the ultimate thing by women for ALL women, when almost every single one of them is about and for american, white, skinny, young, and cis-heteronormative women, and they also perpetuate a lot of heteronormativity.

[@angelbaby2145]

And a lot of them have toxic relationships in some form, which isn't good for some women, especially those triggered by abuse or younger women and some girls who don't have much critical insight and will go 'I want that relationship'

[@chrono4998]

ah so that's why they're not for me

[@padlily2485]

you forgot to list higher-middle class and all the other isms

[@florencialopez5119]

They're actually pretty niche

[@mittag983]

Ah, now I know why they aren't for me as I'm a lesbian, non-american, non-white woman.

[@Lhlhlhlhlb]

A big issue i have with booktok and 'spice' is that lots of the smut they read involves 'barely legal' people of 16-18 years old. Thats messed up icl

[@katfujioka212]

Also abusive relationships, that somehow don't get recognised as abusive. It's downright concerning...

[@Lhlhlhlhlb]

@@katfujioka212 it really is very disturbing

[@briana845]

Another big issue is how grown adults criticize a ya book for not having spice. We all know what smut and spice is, why would you want children to read your fix of porn? If you caught them watching it they would be in trouble, the same should go for books too. I get YA is easy to consume, but YA isn’t for 20+ yr old grown adults. Go to new adult, somewhere where the market isn’t primarily for children and minors.

[@audiobooksforfree7857]

@@briana845 I’m 14 and I don’t wanna read kiddie porn. I just wanna read my dumb Lunar Chronicles in peace.

[@ProudPlatypus]

@@briana845Even casting aside the 20+ year olds, YA is trying to market to a very wide demographic, what is appropriate for, and how best to deal with a topic is very different between a 13 and a 17 year old, and then you get to the teen adults.

[@oddlyrealms]

as someone who read a lot of fanfiction way too early in life, I'm honestly so bored by the 'spicy' books that get hyped on tiktok. there are so many fanfiction on ao3 that a one more spicy and two have a better and more interesting plot than a lot of modern books.

[@gnomeconspiracy2122]

I never engaged with BookTok purely because of the grip thay Colleen Hoover has on the community. If someone is recommending those books, we clearly have extremely different standards for books we want to read and promote.

[@the_goddess_1859]

Colleen Hoover and SJM are truly my bane at this point.

[@blah914]

i stopped engaging bc of all the hatred for Coleen Hoover. ive read 1 book, and I probably wont read any more. it wasn't my cup of tea. But the overwhelming hatred isnt my cup of tea either. Her books are fine for what they are. like the Godzilla movie (have your pick) is fine for what it is. Most of the time you want good food but occasionally my soul craves McDonalds. just like occasionally my soul craves bad fanfiction, and shitty tv-shows. Critisism is fine, not liking something is fine, even hating something is fine, but the gleeful foam-at-the-mouth outpouring of hatred and personal attacks..... its unhinged.

[@foodslayer1588]

@@blah914 I believe that Colleen Hoover is just one of many women who are just feeding into the male gaze, it's not the effect of her books being some guilty pleasure to just read, her books effectively glorify unhinged topics that should not be in romance at all such as the romanticization of abuse and even some weird mention of jokes such as "we laugh at our son's balls." (it's an actual quote, I am not exaggerating). I think that people hating her has to do with the anger of a woman who understands well enough firsthand about abuse and such things profiting off such things and not being held accountable because of booktok girls who believe this to be peak-level romance and spicy books.

[@blah914]

@@foodslayer1588 yeah see, this is what i mean. why should she be "held accountable" for writing fiction? have u noticed that the only writers being "held accountable" for writing fiction are women? nobody does this dumbass shit to GRRMartin or Stephen King.

[@goliad42]

even tho i do call myself a hater (reclaimed! lol) i never really made peace with us being called that for voicing opinions that come from our deep enjoyment and valuing of literature (amongst other forms of art). being picky, mindful and critical of what we read is a form of appreciation. criticizing authors and publishers for pushing borderline algorithm-generated junk on us is a sign of love and protectiveness of the medium -- and we're the haters?

[@leam7685]

This!! Because we don't agree with most opinions regarding popular books, I am still hoping readers/consumers don't consider criticism as hate. One will never learn/grow from constructive criticisms if they always think about them as hate, after all. There is a clear line between critics and haters.

[@masapopovic9022]

Who gets to decide what "junk" is though? Art is subjective, you're haters because you take this stance of superiority about what is "good" art vs what is "junk". That only *you* know and understand what could possibly be good art and everyone else is just lesser or stupid for enjoying what *you* decided is "junk". Saying you're being "protective of the medium" is such nonsense. What are you protecting it from? People enjoying different things from you? The one and only purpose of art is expression and enjoyment. There's no rules and regulations, there shouldn't be. And yet people like you, the haters, come in and try to impose them forcefully on everyone for the sake of what? Upholding the "purity" of literature? Gimme a break

[@cathy4697]

@@masapopovic9022 Art isn't subjective, taste is. The Art is what it is, your subjective taste drives you towards or from it

[@LordVader1094]

This is the same for many fandoms. People who are passionate about works like Star Wars/Trek/Fallout etc get called toxic haters disparagingly, as if that energy to criticize doesn't come from genuine passion for the series.

[@LordVader1094]

@@masapopovic9022 People are literally stating opinions. That's who decides. General consensus of the time. Also, art isn't subjective.

[@spacegirlfriend42069]

Honestly i dont think smut being popular is a bad thing in and of itself. What is bad is the fact that the bulk of smut that skyrockets in popularity romanticizes abuse and falsely frames abuse as kink. Many readers of the most popular mainstream smut tend to be less familiar with actual kink communities. I honestly see this as bordering on a safety issue. Uninformed readers can read these books rampant with depictions of abuse and SA and believe thats just kink, and subsequently find themselves with an abuser who masks their abuse as such. Armie hammer masked his abuse as such and the women he harmed didnt realize at the time he was deceiving them. There is smut that doesnt blur that line of abuse written by people with experience in kink communities, but unfortunately it gets far less attention

[@lastseenontuesday6040]

oh i agree with this🫱🏻‍🫲🏿 i read 'real' literature and erotica and i will say i try to go for erotica that tries to show healthy sexual relationships. i cannot for the life of me romanticise criminal gangs amd trafficking lmao☠️

[@spacegirlfriend42069]

@lastseenontuesday6040 or stalking, soooo many of the popular smut has stalking framed as sexy 🙃🙃🙃

[@gjhslibraryrocks]

I think too I’m noticing a huge problem of straight up erotica being marketed as romance.

[@mfuentes4961]

THIS!👆🏽

[@nevisysbryd7450]

​@@gjhslibraryrocksTo some extent, there is no difference. Male arousal is primarily visual and thereby largely image or video of the act. Women's arousal is primarily connection and story/narrative. Romance stories appeal to the female gaze in the same way t&a and carnal acts appeal to the male gaze. Romance literature is softcore erotica to women.

[@2and1things]

I've always thought that the recent booktok trend in "spice-only" literature is the result of people having their Wattpad phase too late. Instead of getting it out of their system early on and having their taste develop from it, it is leaking onto the shelves and going from free to very very expensive. Obviously many fic authors write very well and have no trouble approaching controversial topics and heavy themes in their work, but as a whole it is a completely different ballpark. I'd be curious to see how booktok people would react to finding their niche on AO3 and if it would impact the kinds of books they buy irl

[@killme5630]

Srsly. As someone who had a nfsw phase at 11, i feel sooo embarrassed to look at my frnds, who are 20, buy books with 3rd grade smut writing. Like? Buying porn? Wasting money off of it while you can find better literature and writing written by a college student

[@the_goddess_1859]

This is one of the weirder takes that I've seen that I honestly agree with, because it's a VERY similar cast of behaviors and mindsets you would have seen in millennial and maybe some Z middle schoolers and high schoolers. Honestly, its a canon event that led to a lot of growth, especially for people who kept writing. Too many girls and women have missed this key like....event, and it shows. They didn't get an opportunity to get the crap out of their system.

[@the_goddess_1859]

I also think it's a form of maladaptive coping, at some point. Escapism for escapism's sake. Not wanting to deal with real ideas or topics or plots, wanting to give over utterly to fantastical nonsense where bland characters get everything they could want and be fulfilled in everything they need....even if the methods are worrying or counterintuitive. People don't seem to want to read to....read anymore. Escapism in reading is great, but it shouldn't be a maladaptive crutch that starts leading to degradation in behavior and judgement.

[@blah914]

​@@the_goddess_1859yes, but sometimes ppl are just exhausted and want some mcdonalds or order a pizza instead of cooking.its like rewatching a tvshow. books are the same. there is a reason ppl like book series like Jack Reacher and Bosch - reocurring characters in the same universe. on another note, I have noticed that the genres recieving the harshest critisism is romance, the readers and writers getting lambasted the most are female. the Jack Reacher books arent any type of masterpieces.... yet ppl get to read those in peace. GoT has more spice than ACOTAR, yet... nobody is having a go at GRRMartin for it, or mocking his readers for reading it. just a thought to keep in mind the deeper reasons why and what we critisise as well.

[@randomchannel323]

I don't like how reading is held up as this super intellectual activity when reading books is just entertainment like movies, video games, music and plays. It can be just as mindless and basic and all of the art forms can have stuff with meaning and other stuff that is just surface level

[@vaelia1203]

Yes it can be, what is being said it that it shouldn't be everything . Having a mindless read is not the problem, never taking on any thought provoking read is (and the one done only to perform as an intellectual in front of an audience just to prove that they can read "harder" books doesn't really count unless they really take away something from it).

[@Jade-yb5zz]

I used to be a “sometimes the curtains are just blue” girlie in high school. Then I majored in English in undergrad and followed up with a grad degree in English. I’m also known as a hater among my friends, but I strongly believe you can critique something while still loving it. You can have major issues with a thing and still love how it makes you feel, or stimulates you creatively. I think my favorite show is objectively bad, but I still would pick it over many shows I’d consider objectively good (not a book example, just the strongest one I have). I love books. Genuinely! But I also love to pick books apart. Despite my hater reputation, I give out a lot of 4 and 5 star ratings. It’s healthy to critique literature, and encourage others to read books before they form their own opinions of them.

[@Aa-dn1oq]

You know you didn't have to waste your entire young adult life to stop being a reductive illiterate

[@__tadpole__8195]

I honestly believe that you cannot claim you love something if you aren’t willing to critique it. You can love something’s flaws while still wanting to fix them. If you truly care about something, you will understand what is wrong with it.

[@daisysorbet]

@@__tadpole__8195 oh fully agree with this. i've seen fandoms that cannot wrap their heads around any criticism and get pissed when someone says "i love this [show/book/movie/etc] but i wish it had done (x) differently" especially when the piece of media seriously mishandled serious topics like racism, ableism, homophobia, etc. its not bashing to acknowledge faults, especially serious ones. i don't know if there's any media that's 100% perfect, and even if there was, someone would dislike part of it--and that's okay! but also i'm def the kind of person who criticizes everything i love because some of it is garbage lmao (love u @ both riverdale + glee. both are fun to watch but man if both don't fuck up a lot lmao, still doesnt always need to be shakespeare for me to enjoy it, y'know)

[@Athena908]

I will never forgive goddamn tumblr for “sometimes the curtains are just blue” into the world. What a way to set back our critical thinking abilities.

[@blah914]

​@@Athena908it predates tumblr.

[@wolf-gh2dz]

love this video. you articulated so many of my own issues with booktube and booktok. another thing: i greatly dislike how so many people in online book communities more and more treat books like a pretty decoration more than a piece of art to be enjoyed. if i were an author and i knew someone had just kept my book lying around on their shelves unread for years because the spine / cover looked pretty, i can't imagine how disheartening that would feel. "let people enjoy things" but what if *i* enjoy being a hater? what then? hater nation stay strong

[@cinnamiina]

YOUR LAST COUPLE OF SENTENCES TRULY TRULLLYYYYY HIT THE NAIL!

[@yoshitheorbit1118]

Personally, I would take the fact that someone bought a book I made because it looked pretty collecting dust on their shelf, as a worse insult than any negative review ever.

[@wolf-gh2dz]

@@yoshitheorbit1118 fr like at least the negative reviewer actually READ the book! and then thought about what worked and didn't work for them enough to leave a review, potentially giving me actually constructive criticism.

[@DebErelene]

As an author ... I'd just be happy to have people buy my books. As much as I want to connect with people through my writing, I also would love to make some money at it, so it wouldn't hurt to catch the attention of book collectors ... I might need to revisit my covers (don't tell my illustrator).

[@Agaricus_cuscus]

I am maybe missrepresenting your comment, but can't someone buy book because of the graphic design could be considered art too? Beautiful book cover and very well made design even on the inside, but maybe it doesn't look like a book you would enejoy. So would you consider this still an issue, if its outside of trendy suggestions and someone buy book, because it just look pretty similarly to poster or painting?

[@cRub3r]

As someone who generally feels exhausted by badfaith criticism and overwhelming negative critical response to -everything- in nerd culture, this video really gives me pause for thought about my role and intentions in being one of these "let people enjoy things" actors. It's almost certainly influenced by want/need for healthy and positive third spaces, but I also wonder if I'm becoming an agent for consumerism. Thanks for the wonderful video, its thoughts will stay with me a long time.

[@LordVader1094]

I'd have to say you may be. Consumerism latches onto the idea of "leave me alone, don't criticize, just let me CONSUME" rather than thinking critically about the art/product one is ingesting.

[@CarrotConsumer]

We're all agents of consumerism.

[@lemonywater2979]

​@@LordVader1094 I mean there's not really anything wrong with consuming something uncritically and enjoy it without analyzing it. I think the issue is more of this pathological need for external validation and taking criticism as a direct, personal attack.

[@lemonywater2979]

Also of course consuming isn't inherently bad but doing it excessively does a good amount of damage in the long run. Kind of like fast food or treats.

[@blah914]

im with you here, but i also feel that while critisism is good, bad-faith critisism as you call it is the most common one, and I'll add one to something that vexes me: its when the criticism critizises a book for not being something it was never meant to be. its like being mad the apple you bought isnt a chocolate. Books, like movies, can be enjoyable for what they are and what they were intended as. Ppl are far more forgiving of movies than they are books. Nobody is hating Godzilla because it doesn't have accurate representarion of the scientific community 🙄😂 its an action movie. like it or not, but let it be what it is: an action movie and dont be mad its not David Attenborough narrating the lives of giant gorillas. Books are the same.

[@jpickens189]

The anime community needs a video like this.

[@lampenfieber]

You're so right.

[@dorotheecc8986]

You can add the kpop stans to the list 😂

[@jpickens189]

@@dorotheecc8986 I don't think anyone is that brave.

[@rosetea7451]

if anyone made a video like this about the current state of anime they'd just be brushed off as a "tourist" nowadays, no matter how long they've watched it//have been present in that space.

[@moosesues8887]

🤫 the one piece agenda must continue lobotomy kaisen has to go on

[@este_fi]

"I think we ought to read only the kind of books that wound or stab us. If the book we're reading doesn't wake us up with a blow to the head, what are we reading for? So that it will make us happy, as you write? Good Lord, we would be happy precisely if we had no books, and the kind of books that make us happy are the kind we could write ourselves if we had to. But we need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us. That is my belief.” - Franz Kafka

[@turtleanton6539]

Deep

[@cito2820]

kafka the 🐐

[@nevisysbryd7450]

Few people would read at all, then.

[@florencialopez5119]

I fucking love Kafka (has only read the metamorphosis)

[@CraftingStudios1337]

​@@florencialopez5119Try In Der Strafkolonie (In the Penal Colony). It's very short and there's a few audiobook versions on KZbin too!

[@brittasperry]

This really properly explained why I feel so strange about the popular low-quality posts and recommendations on BookTok as well as how a lot of people consume things like TV shows, books, and movies these days 😭 Most are so black and white and I never see nuance, if I say I dislike something people will count it as an attack on their person or worse. You really nailed it in by bringing up anti-intellectualism in relation to BookTok and the other things mentioned. Instantly subscribed! Absolutely insane that you have less than 500 subscribers as I comment this, btw. I really thought you had at least 3k with how well done this video was.

[@YandereApologist]

I think you also added onto a thing I have been saying about the “morality of disliking things” I’ve been seeing in the internet spaces I’m in. I’ve noticed that you can’t even just dislike something, you have to have this grand moral reasoning for it. You have to identify the ways the media is problematic, you have to criticize it for promoting unhealthy relationships, etc. Without a moral reasoning, you’re more likely to be attacked for your opinion.

[@brittasperry]

@@YandereApologist Yes! Most of the time when I dislike something, there's a reason for it but people don't even give you the CHANCE to explain yourself because to them, the media they consume is ultimately better. We can still enjoy things and see flaws in it that might have other people label us as "disliking it."

[@kusawwwwww]

@@YandereApologist I’ve seen some success in just straight up introducing myself as “despicable, evil and trying to be as unethical as possible at all times” or some variation of such to other people. Dismissing morality entirely, upfront and as clearly as possible, seems to help a lot in getting people out of the mindset of “I have to like/hate things for a moral reason”.

[@scottbuck1572]

I find it SO funny that an entire community of people have molded their ENTIRE personalities around...... reading. You know one of the most commonly held skills on the entire planet.

[@the_goddess_1859]

It's becoming less common, honestly, which could be a reason why some media is disintegrating. The reading level of people in America alone has been dropping hard the past decade or so. I'm not sure about other countries, but here at least, it's becoming a problem

[@andy2641]

It can be a hobby. And those hobbies can have communities. Bold of you to attack someone’s character while knowing nothing about them.

[@blah914]

​@@andy2641😂 im an avid reader, but but lets be honest, ppl making a single thing their entire personality is pretty funny.

[@scottbuck1572]

@@andy2641 Tell me, is having a hobby a replacement for a personality? I dont think it is

[@andy2641]

@@scottbuck1572 You only assumed they base their entire personality off of it because you see them enjoying a hobby

[@faemurk]

people in the comments who zero in on the mention of “spice” and accusing you of demonizing it are just proving your point on anti-intellectualism bc you EXPLICITLY stated that that was not what you were saying.

[@buttsbrown2442]

I kinda feel it's a sunset of the commodification of "nerd" culture.

[@LordVader1094]

Now that's some profound truth in a few words.

[@_nnn_nnn_]

I mostly read ebooks or borrow books from my local library, so I don't own a lot of physical copies, only those that I really like and would reread at some point in the future. So when my friend, who is deeply submerged into the whole 'girly' tiktok thing, u know, the 'haha i'm so dumb and silly' part, saw my room, she said she was disappointed in me, because she thought I was better than trying to pretend to be smarter than I actually am by reading books. I literally was like: tf ur talking bout? Turns out she unironically thought that a true bookworm's room looks like a booktok filming area. She's still sure I'm a fake reader because I read books from my phone and don't want to spend absurd amounts of money on book hauls

[@_holy__ghost]

i gotta ask, how are you still friends with this person?

[@killme5630]

my friend, a booktok girlie, thinks ANIME is childish and cringe. imagine someone who reads for smut and unrealistic porn telling you a medium of storytelling is cringe.

[@just.a.ghost.01]

Literally! I read ebooks and library books and only buy physical books that I am 100% sure I will re-read so I can annotate it physically because I want to. Why buy books that you will never actually read? For aesthetic purposes? Whats the point of that?

[@soho6435]

same i use the library because books are expensive and take a lot of space lol

[@kijamu01]

I appreciate you cutting through the noise and going right for the throat: anti-intellectualism. its not just small things that make this uncomfortable, not single tropes. It is the attitude, it is the rhetoric and structure of the culture. It is tipping scales, not small details. Thank you for creating this

[@limitlesslizzie]

I'm currently a literature student and oh my god, I agree with nearly everything you've said. So many "booktok" books are shallow and plotless, or they're popular because those that read them are "intellectuals." I'm also a hater to the point that I deleted tiktok over a year ago to avoid the brainrot content. I don't even own that many books-- outside of class readings, I maybe buy 3 books a year. Being critical is what helps our brains grow and learn!

[@blah914]

being critical is not being a hater, but a lot of ppl pass off being a hater as just being ✨️critical✨️. i got off booktube ages ago because it was just getting excessive. engaging critically with literature is not the same as just.... spewing bile and launching personal attacks on authors. and unfortunately, thats what a lot of creators try to pass off as "just criticism".

[@blah914]

and on your "not reading a lot" i have a masters in history and literature, and another in script development & writing. the years it took before i have able to read for just pleasure and not have a running tab in my head w comments, is just plainly funny. that you manage to read 3 books in addition to your curriculum is impressive 😂❤️

[@Hiolori]

Can we talk about how bad A Little Life is? Reading it as a gay man was honestly upsetting at first and then i just kinda felt weird seeing all of the performative sadness people displayed when talking about the book. It’s a book that’s all about spectacle, using traumatic experiences like spicy scenes, like pron…

[@meganmadson8588]

i’ve never read it but i was considering for a while, and i found myself reconsidering when i saw a lot of people saying that it was basically just torture porn. like i’m sure there’s other merits to it, but a book eliciting emotion does not automatically mean it’s amazing

[@MossTunic]

​@@meganmadson8588someone i know read it & it is not worth reading at all & i don't say that lightly. it's just suffering pointlessly, there's no meaning to it or anything profound to take away. it is really truly disturbing with no payoff. i feel worse from just having heard the plot, i can't imagine digesting it undiluted. i really can't understand why it exists or how it's become so popular. i'm queer & yes i desire a broad range of experiences & stories being written, they dont have to be cutesy & benign. but this book isn't worthy of people's time.

[@ashleybaum6180]

I was literally going to comment about this! My coworker wanted me to read A Little Life to see what I thought, based on how popular it's been in media. Personally, I thought that it justified the ending, that if you experience these things in any capacity, it's fine to end everything. And that shouldn't be a message? Your life is your life to do with what you please. But if a reader has faced any of those horrific traumas in their life, it doesn't give them any hope. And giving someone tools to work through and overcome trauma doesn't belittle the events that have happened. The main character was continually isolated throughout the book and with all of the trauma (seemingly for the sake of trauma as you mentioned) it felt like if a reader connected with Jude in any sense, it will isolate them, too.

[@skiuhjan]

i haven’t read it but there’s a great article on vulture (“the hanya yanagihara principle” by andrea long chu) that shares the same sentiment as your comment

[@beaniebean4885]

👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾 preach

[@itseggnog2077]

"Let people enjoy things" should only be used as a defense in cases where someone is aware of valid criticisms of a media but is shamed for enjoying it. Enjoying something and criticizing something aren't opposite ends of a spectrum, they can be used in tandem. It's frustrating because there are valid points to both sides of the "Let people enjoy things" debate. Sometimes people take criticism against the things they enjoy as a personal criticism, and sometimes people can't keep their critiques of media from becoming a personal attack.

[@melodysafo5437]

Someone finally said it!

[@blah914]

exactly this! esp the ppl who cant keep their critisism from becoming personal attacks!

[@GamerOver0110]

Careful, I heard that when you read too many books you become a worm

[@dreamweaver4183]

I love how this is a video about haters and CinemaSins is the entire suggested

[@Deej210]

I remember a few years ago during the pandemic when I said somewhere online that the quality of the books you read matters, and the flack I caught for daring to say that mindless consumption isn't a good thing, was truly disheartening.

[@asudebirtane8243]

Absolutely, people think that the act of reading itself is enough to develop oneself however if it was truly like that then we could just read receipts instead? I'm not saying everything we are reading should be quality but it's not gonna hurt if we can diversify the stuff we are reading

[@aaxjgaaovhahkaaoajxkqacuo8569]

THE FACT THAT THERE IS LITERAL ABUSE ROMANTICIZED IN LOTS OF BOOKTOK BOOKS IS CRAZY

[@ilpensatore1462]

And probably the same people who read this type of book would whole heartedly say stuff like "You are reading Lolita? Isn't that the pedophile book, eww"

[@cezrcasttle]

@@ilpensatore1462 pretty par for the course at this point that people who don't want you to read about child abuse in some critical format are likely in support of it. I don't give a fuck anymore, if you are going to tell me to not read a piece that is against sexual predation because you wish to project, you are complicit and should be virtually ignored in all opinion

[@jamabo0]

@@ilpensatore1462is it not the pedophile book?? 💀

[@Dycehart]

ContraPoints has a lengthy essay on Twilight and "romantisized abuse" in women's literature that you might enjoy if you enjoyed this video.

[@cathy4697]

We might one of these days as a society address the fact that you can absolutely have a porn addiction via other forms of media other than just videos. e.g, via books. Its wrapped up in a more acceptable format so we often overlook it and just base any criticisms of it as being a snob, as per the pinned comment

[@fisticuffs12]

porn addiction is not a diagnosable disorder. according to psychologists it doesn't really exist, it's more shame about sexuality than a behavioural issue

[@STARFRUlT]

i haven’t finished the video yet, but im very concerned about adults on booktok making mature books so easily accessible to children (i saw a vid of a lady who put an explicit book in the kids section or something) or gifting mature books to their own children/young nieces/nephews. i hope one day someone will get them to stop because that is extremely inappropriate.

[@jegaevi7371]

I usually separate my reading into "for growth" and "for fun". I am very selective about the growth category. However, the fun category can include literally whatever. I usually get disappointed by the quality of these books, but every now and then I find something enjoyable and well done.

[@kia-er2po]

I do that too! The fun books are usually more in contrast but the growth books really leave an impression on me. Even if they take me several months to finish

[@Lysa-wx8qp]

while i agree with most of your points, i do love popcorn books because, as an engineering student, that’s all i have the brain capacity for these days (i don’t mean the ones full of smut or specifically booktok books, just ones i can turn my brain off and just read easily)

[@YandereApologist]

Sometimes you gotta relax from heavier reading with some tasty brain rot book candy. It’s like eating, keep a good balanced diet of something that’ll help you grow but also you deserve a little RomCom, as a treat.

[@camiller6526]

Yes I agree, a good escapism book is so Nice when you just wanna relax

[@Lovefortea448]

Popcorn entertainment, especially in literature, should co-exist with the more analytical/"deeper" ones. There just needs to be a balance.

[@Lysa-wx8qp]

@@Lovefortea448 totally agree!

[@once.upon.a.time.]

Whenever I read a book that makes me cry or feel grieved for having finished it, I always read some children's literature next. Like a chaser lol

[@SandB]

I've been an unknowing anti intellectualist for like the past 3 yrs, because simplifying complexity just feels natural. Like one of those antivax parents who read an article and thinks they're on equal grounds with a trained scientist. It's appealing to think we can all be equal intellectually if the material is digested enough. This video is making me rethink a lot

[@pofficial3345]

I'm glad it did. Because trust me, it's hard to find the good stuff, but there's nothing more satisfying than knowing why the fiction you love is so good

[@LordVader1094]

I think in general there's a massive strain of anti intellectualism in society. Nobody wants to admit that they know less than someone else, so they want to act like everything when condensed can be understood the same by everyone, and every opinion is equally valid.

[@the_goddess_1859]

That's really cool and brave of you to admit and see in yourself. I hope you find more good resources to nourish you further!

[@the_goddess_1859]

​@@LordVader1094 It's also become so shameful to admit you don't know everything. It becomes a gotcha, or means you've been defeated, or means the other person is right, when in reality it only means the person may not be equipped with the vocabulary or further expertise to really drive home anything they're trying to say: What they're saying could have tons of value, they're just struggling to communicate it well. And people, instead of seeing it that way, or whatever, then take that and run with it with glee. It's very aggravating.

[@morbidcorvid]

Hey man, this is the first video of yours thats popped up on my recommended and I just want to say that your argument is so necessary in this really odd world we have around us today. I'm currently rotting in a British high school and am absolutely sick of the act of reading, of analysing and of critical thinking being seen as unecessary, outdated and a chore. It's because of this that I've gone from devouring books like theres no tomorrow to being stagnant, and unmotivated to keep going; something I'm trying to rectify slowly but surely. So, in short: Thanks for making this video, Thanks for being a hater. Fuck book bans. (im gonna go read a book now lol)

[@xXAzureIrisXx]

It genuinely hurts me the amount of anti-intellectualism propaganda there is about the unimportance of English/Literature classes. The fact that someone can genuinely believe that someone labored over their writing for years, editing and rewriting until it's finally just right only for their words to be hallow, filler, and meaningless is intentionally ignorant. Or, that someone can dedicate a portion of their life to crafting and writing a story and completely remove all their personal feelings, opinions, experiences, and aspirations from it. Writing has always been regarded as a meticulous form of communication, and the best way to organize, represent and disseminate your ideas with minimal misrepresentation because of its specificity. You should always question and investigate the intent behind any form of calculated writing, imagery, or form of communication, which is part of the purpose of these English/Lit classes!!!

[@Aa-dn1oq]

It is 100% possible for someone to dedicate their life to something and still end up completely incompetent. For reference, Neil Breen

[@spicekai4486]

​@@Aa-dn1oq incompetence isn't the question- though it's a question of whether we should even look for substance in the first place.

[@bunnywavyxx9524]

@@spicekai4486 This drab argument has gone on forever. People can read for pleasure and enjoyment as they want, books are not intended for knowledge all the time. And, you can't keep some kind of knowledge, improvement, or substance out of a book, even if it's learning that the book was garbage. Just reading a book, regardless of its quality, helps you articulate better. As long as novels exist, then some translation of knowledge will as well (with the obvious predicament of censorship). You forget non-fiction novels are their whole other umbrella. This was the same argument brought up when people began writing fantasy and romance. I don't presume you ONLY read non-fiction?

[@spicekai4486]

@@bunnywavyxx9524 i literally only said "substance" and didn't give any indication that I only seek knowledge. I read fiction. Your arguing with me is weird. We should look for SOMETHING and ask for it with books. If you think literally any combination of words on a page is enriching, then cool. It's just as valid to ask things of your books as it is to consume them like popcorn.

[@LordVader1094]

@@bunnywavyxx9524 Literally you just kinda made up an argument in your head to go against instead of something they actually said lmao

[@valentinah3601]

As an avid fanfic reader I am in no position to criticize anyone’s reading taste but I do feel the need to point out that the way these books are marketed is the same as tag systems used within fandoms which I find awfully opportunistic. It just feels like this piece of internet culture was taken from tumblr and ao3, both platforms well known to be unprofitable and run by writers incentivized solely by their own passion for books and its characters, and it has been adopted as a marketing tool for publishing companies to push their sells which is stupidly ironic

[@Anindeterminateamountofbees]

No exactly!!! The easily consumable, predictable romance stories with the broad tropes and the same set of predetermined phrases used in marketing is exactly like fanfiction!!! I’m an avid fic reader as well but it’s such a weird way to market and write a real book. Fanfiction functions that way because you already know the characters, settings and themes and that doesn’t work for a real book unless it’s so generic that you do feel like you already know the characters (like you’ve already read one or more books with characters that are very similar)

[@wandastandish]

I feel like if you cannot take/listen to criticism about the media you consume theres a bigger issue. Loved your vid btw

[@fathimaameen]

This video really put a bunch of things I've been feeling/thinking for a while into words. I really think people need to separate not letting people enjoy things" from being critical of the content you consume and not just blindly agreeing with everything said online/elsewhere. Thanks for wording this so well! Also I'm OBSESSED with your editing style!!

[@julienne152]

I will be chewing on this for a while... I really appreciated the book banning section as I am working on a book resume project for a class right now. It is horrifying to see how many books that center around the experiences of black people and queer people are being challenged and deemed unsuitable for children. Sadly I have learned that book banning extends beyond schools and libraries, but also to prisons. For example, Octavia Butler's Kindred has been banned in many prisons. I agree with you that seeing this sort of thing only reaffirms the fact that we need to be encouraging and protecting reading for people at all ages and in all stations

[@guidedexplosiveprojectileg9943]

Do you think they will start banning religious literature?

[@cloverazar5315]

Well, since we’re talking about smut as a bad thing here - I’m a lesbian woman and I’ve read some of the “queer kid lit” that everyone is so upset is being removed… And it’s adult subject matter. So if you think the prevalence of smut in TikTok and romance in general is detrimental to reader wellbeing, one could say the same thing about books with age inappropriate material, even if it features “queer” characters. ( I also don’t care that term; it’s a slur ffs)

[@actualgoblin]

​@@cloverazar5315 I mean... ive seen books banned for featuring a character who is gender nonconforming or identifies as trans, or for having a totally sanitized depiction of a gay couple there's definitely a double standard there its a difficult subject because yes, there are LGBT books that kids shouldnt be reading but also, not everything LGBT related is smut

[@fairsaa7975]

​@@cloverazar5315I mean, for you it's a slur, but it's quite literally in the title for a school of thought, so that's not so universal. And while you might have a point about YA novels with smut in being banned, it's no excuse for books like Beloved to be targeted.

[@jupitersnoot4915]

No? The people who are banning books are the same people who read religious stuff because they ARE religious. They're not gonna ban the bible because they like the bible. They will ban everything they don't like purely because they don't like it. ​@@guidedexplosiveprojectileg9943

[@seymagurbuz2066]

As a newbie in booktok creator space, who is also an anti-consumerist when it comes to books...I FELT THIS VIDEO. Even though it's been only a month since I've started creating content, I already feel inferior to all the other famous creators who have those shiny bookshelves with dozens of books. It is a pressure to keep up with for sure.

[@moony-_-.]

I grew up going to the library for books because my family could not afford to buy me every book I wanted to read and Im forever grateful for it! seeing the massive overconsumption of books has led me to turn to the Library even more than I did when I was younger I don't know why more people don't utilize their public libraries it's not only beneficial for their pockets but also their communities since most if not all public city libraries are non-profits, it so disappointing I feel like if half of booktok put more emphasis on visiting their local libraries for a book this overconsumption issue maybe wouldn't be as bad as it is now or maybe that's just my wishful thinking overall im just patiently waiting for the day public libraries get all the praise they deserve!

[@blah914]

buying books, and reading books are two separate hobbies 👀 dont be seduced into buying stuff u dont really want to appease an aestethic. Using libraries is both good for you and good for society. if no one uses a library, they lose funding. Authors get paid for their books being borrowed at the library. i have to admit, sometimes I borrow books i have read before bc I know the author and want to support them, or if theyre small time and new. new authors in my country grt up to 30% of their income from being borrowed at libraries! naturally i deliver it back immediatey if there is a waiting list. its literally just a tap on my ipad to borrow an ebook, it cost me nothing, but now ive supported both local community and local authors also, to be perfectly frank, i cant afford to buy everything i read. books have gotten really expensive in the last few years. dont feel bad about being real about that.

[@WhiteTulip2002]

I am a lifelong reader and I have a deep affection for physical books. It causes me pain to watch somebody marking up books as heavily as these influencers do. Also when you think about it for a bit, they’re treating the book as though it’s a series of individual lines that don’t have a meaning as an irreducible unified whole, but as little bites to be singled out and underlined. I’m sure there are books like that but generally speaking, especially in fiction, a good line is part of a greater context and cutting it out like that takes something away from it. It just doesn’t sit right with me

[@ldjkfg]

its interesting to see this kind of perspective from someone who is critical within another "community" online, as bizarre as it is that there is a reading "community" or whatever. i read mostly nonfiction books and i don't bother to critique them publicly or online or what have you. however i have written about manga and anime for years. there are a billion readymade excuses people use to write off and disengage from critical opinions they disagree with. from assuming that "rating based on enjoyment," and being critical are mutually exclusive; to saying things like "if you don't like it, why are you watching it?" or repeating "art is subjective" purely as a reminder that your opinion is JUST your opinion, and other people have theirs, i.e. no one needs to acknowledge or discuss each other's opinions. rather than acknowledging subjectivity as an encouragement to develop one's own critical interpretation of a text. it's ironic how much rhetoric there is about everyone being free to do or think what they want, and how art is in the eye of the beholder, and yet, if you have a negative opinion or critical take, especially of something popular and well liked, there must be something wrong with you. you're pretentious, posturing; you don't know how to enjoy yourself, you're spending your time foolishly (which of course means you're stupid, which means, why would anyone listen to your criticism?). there's nothing people seem to fear MORE than other peoples' literally harmless opinions

[@vila777_]

i wish this comment was pinned, you got it point blank

[@hoot10]

"I don't want to say the F word... but..." me: !!!! "... this is a critical element of fascism." me: phew

[@MrsSurrealista]

The funny thing is, romance as a woman-centered genre can be incredibly rich, profound and thought provoking (think Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Anna Karenina, Pride and Prejudice). I will forever be a hater, as someone who grew up poor & ended up on one of the best universities by brains only.

[@BlueCoolOla]

Is this not just "not like other girls" flavor of misogyny?

[@drebugsita]

I'm guessing by "hater" you mean someone engages in critical analysis of the text, right?

[@obligatory-handle]

Anna Karenina is not a romance novel 💀 Just because there is romance in it doesn't mean it's genre is romance

[@bunnywavyxx9524]

Wuthering Heights is NOT a romance. That is a highly dysfunctional toxic relationship, and.. Pride and Prejudice is okay. The romance is quite minor, her sisters are one-dimensional especially Kitty. You just dropped a few classics then said "this is REAL romance." LOL you do not read historical romance at all do you? Carmilla and Doctor Thorne has more intimacy than the 2 ones you listed and in the former, shes a soulless vampire.

[@MrsSurrealista]

@@obligatory-handle just because it’s not smut doesn’t mean it’s not romance. The novel is literally about the contrast between too couples.

[@Pazliacci]

to quote Anita Sarkeesian: “It's both possible, *and even necessary*, to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of its more problematic or pernicious aspects.” way too often do I go to criticism an element in a piece of media someone shared with me, and they get ANGRY at me for criticizing it and daring to say a thing they like has problematic elements... its not my fault that your love for a thing is ruined by it having problematic elements that were always there, and if you truly do love this piece of media, you should be able to look at the good and the bad, and critically engage with both, and still love it... but instead they want to ENJOY a piece of media, but also IGNORE the shitty elements, a privilege most people don't have.

[@under_a_newleaf]

just wanted to say that your editing is really great. love the sense of humour. and also, thanks for making this video!

[@helenross3037]

i think that one thing about booktok which is completely changing the way people interact with books is the interaction with authors *before* a book has been published, and to such a greater degree than ever previously. I'm not Roland Barthes' biggest stan but it's so odd for a writer to be able to build such a large audience without having published a single word. If people love the plot as an abstract idea, or enjoy interacting with the characters before their story arc has been completed, it totally changes the writing process because the authors begin to modify their writing based on audience rather than the novel preceding its fanbase. Additionally, never before has a reading community already liked an author *before* reading their work. When I listen to a Taylor Swift album, my brain is predisposed to like it because I know I like Taylor Swift. If an unknown artist produced that same exact album, I would approach it a lot more curiously and want to decide whether I liked it or not. In the same way, I approach a Chimamanda novel knowing I'm probably going to like it (although ofc that can mean readers are let down) but would pick up a debut book without many preconceived notions. By growing such large platforms of followers *before* publication, I don't think social media debut authors are treated as critically/curiously as any group of debut authors before now. Not necessarily a bad thing, and it's more financially viable to write for a year if you also have a social media income stream, but realistically it took a long time for people to 'realise' that lightlark wasn't very good, because the first few thousand people talking about it approached the book assuming they were going to love it. (apologies if you go on to say this in your video, i'm only a couple minutes in but my adhd brain can't wait to finish the video in order to chip in!)

[@elephantshell3617]

I feel a lot of the things you mentioned in this comment. I feel like a lot of booktok authors also use borderline manipulation tactics to dissuade people from leaving truly critical reviews. “I’m just a single mom living my dream! A 3 star on my book will tank my recommendations! Why would you say such mean things about something I worked so hard on? How can I pay my bills this month if you don’t buy my latest edition?” I’ve had to unfollow most of the indie authors I follow on booktok because they felt less like writers and more like influencers and had a sort of vapid blandness you get when you’re overly manicured to seem relatable.

[@fawn2911]

chimamanda is a terf

[@LordVader1094]

@@elephantshell3617 "they felt less like writers and more like influencers" That's likely exactly what they are. Influencers who build a following and plug their merch (a subpar book) purely to increase their revenue and portfolio.

[@touchgrass7129]

roland? the guy from funny library game?(i have terminal brainrot)

[@helenross3037]

@@touchgrass7129 ooh wait what game do you mean 👀 Roland barthes in a game?

[@its_Aurelia_]

I’ve read too many books I thought were YA and ended up having tons of smut… shocked me every time 😭

[@sadsadtearsofaclown859]

Ppl always conflate the two 😭

[@randomstuffs8045]

I stand by my statement that shatter me (atleast the last couple books) were explicit not young adult

[@Dycehart]

This is an issue with publishers. Authors don't decide which category their books are placed in.

[@blah914]

well, there is an "adult" in that YA category 🤷‍♀️ its young adult, teen.

[@marsman4554]

This was such a thought-provoking essay. I loved every minute of it, and I'm going to try to get back into reading more. I haven't been able to find the energy nor time to do so, but you've encouraged me to get back into it

[@jessicobra7]

these video essays are so good its so nice to see a new creator this good aaaa

[@alishanotalihsha]

ok getting asked for book recommendations! i put the social media recs document in the description, but here are a handful of my all-timers (check content warnings): gone girl by gillian flynn anything by ada limon but especially bright dead things know my name by chanel miller educated by tara westover little women by louisa may alcott slouching towards bethlehem by joan didion life on mars by tracy k. smith the anthropocene reviewed by john green the great gatsby by f. scott fitzgerald sweetdark by savannah brown and then there were none by agatha christie the stand by stephen king american sonnets for my past and future assassin by terrence hayes pachinko by min jin lee american primitive by mary oliver

[@craneraevsky8030]

And Then There Were None was AMAZING! My mom and I just finished it and it's probably one of the best mysteries we have ever read.

[@lilacfields]

oh you’re so real 🙏🏽😭😭😭

[@cloverazar5315]

This list includes a man who stole his wife’s intellectual property and gaslit her for years (Fitzgerald), and a man who wrote explicit sexual content featuring minors (Stephen King).

[@Iovesight]

I just have to know if you ever read any books like A Thousand Splendid Suns (historical fiction that incorporates life in the time of war and political unrest, also similar to The Kite Runner or The Stationery Shop--I have not read these two but have heard of the relation) or All My Rage (this one is sort of just realistic fiction, very YA in my opinion, and addresses broken family dynamics and societal issues--I really hope I got that accurately). I personally really enjoyed these books and I feel like I tend to stick to similar books. Since I want to try reading some of your recs, I just wanted to know if you have any thoughts about these that I often think about! Haha I just realized I may be an avid YA book reader.. but I'll still ask about these 😥

[@artthenecromancer404]

@@cloverazar5315 and?

[@jcc195]

not to be that guy who posts quotations under youtube videos, but this one is truly apt: "have I not reason to hate and to despise myself? Indeed I do; and chiefly for not having hated and despised the world enough." -william hazlitt

[@owent.2306]

God I'm so grateful to the KZbin algorithm gods for putting this in my recommended. This whole Booktok thing has been bothering my for a while; seeing what it's doing to young readers is painful to me as someone who is both very frustrated by anti-intellectualism but also desperate to see people going to libraries and bookstores again. You put everything I've been thinking into words, and you did it astutely and civilly. Great video!

[@strandy4256]

I just have to just say, this is one of the best videos I have ever watch, this idea of being critical of the things we consume is so incredible important. And the way you have been able to articulate it is amazing. I’m having a hard time articulated in just one comment, but thank you for putting this out, it has help me have a better understanding of something that I believe to so true, why it’s so important to be critical. That it’s not a bad thing to want better, thought provoking aspects in the media that we consume.

[@annaluizab.365]

This video was released with such a great timing because yesterday a secretary of education of a state in the country i live (brazil) has ordered the removal of a highly critically acclaimed book about racism chosen by a pannel of educators to be taught in high schools called O Avesso da Pele [or The Dark Side of Skin, as it was translated to the US] by Jeferson Tenório. The Secretary of Education of Paraná simply ordered all school in the state to turn in all copies available by THIS friday, even though THEY HAVE NO AUTHORITY TO DO THAT, AT ALL. The reason i’m telling you all of this is because book bans are unheard of here because making books publicly available is also a fairly new practice (we’re not exactly known for well-kept public libraries) and it makes me worried to see this project (which hasn’t even reached the region i live yet) getting sabotaged in its baby steps and privatizing the enormous amount of reflection, growth, understanding, companionship and empathy from so many other teenagers like myself. I hate it and i want it to stop. All of this to recommend you to read The Dark Side of Skin (never read the translation myself but its translator has such a good precedent I can’t help but trust her) because i’d love to hear your thoughts on it! P.s: i’m almost scared to ask but would you happen to have any recommendations of a short literary fiction book for me, please 🥺

[@demitwice]

eu não sabia que isso tava acontecendo no paraná, assustador que essa coisa de banir os livros tá tão presente no brasil também. :(

[@annaluizab.365]

@@demitwicee a secretária da educação de Goiás acabou de fazer a mesma coisa ☹️

[@kimwicks5540]

Tudo que acontece nos eua o Brasil segue no rastro... Por isso sempre fico muito preocupada quando vejo esse tipos de política crescendo por lá. Triste demais :(

[@zeltzamer4010]

I’m not her but The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh.

[@crystalfairy912]

Thank you for this. I have a sister who is super invested in BookTok, especially the works of Sarah J Maas. I tried reading A Court of Thorns and Roses since she liked it so much. I couldn’t finish it after learning that 1) the romance changes in the sequel and 2) the new main love interest does some pretty horrible stuff to the main female character in the first book. She tells me he did it for her safety and that people can change, even encouraged me to read the chapter of him explaining himself. I did and returned it to her saying “cool motive, still SA.” She thought I was saying her beloved books just suck and wouldn’t hear anything else I had to say since I didn’t want to read any more of it. It’s tricky because I understand wanting to hear input from someone who read the entire work first. But why is it so controversial of me to question why a woman would choose someone who twisted her broken arm before agreeing to heal her, drugged her/forced her to drink, and made her give him lap dances while touching her. How is fated mates and “I wanted you to feel even anger over feeling nothing, but also show off to the guy you were seeing who I happen to hate” make any of that okay? And the sequel, A Court of Mist and Fury, happens to be a banned book for sexual content. So AITA for saying this series actually has a lot of toxic implications to someone who won’t listen because I didn’t finish the first book?

[@yogeybogeybear3542]

Also feyra is a ho3 with no agency beyond the two inviting incidents of that first book, she is an object and the worst critics of female entertainment are proven correct by her popularity since she is a manosphere meme. ACOTR is what u would get if a cynical author binged Jordan Peterson content and went “how can I make maximum appeal now?”

[@thynottea]

the relationship is incredibly unbalanced and toxic but many sjm readers don't clock it because the author constantly shoves down your throat that rhysand "cares" about feyre's autonomy - at least until she becomes pregnant and even though he knows her body cannot handle their baby and she is at severe risk of dying at child birth, he proceeds not to tell her and tells all his friends not to tell her. incredibly awful and poorly written male lead who supposedly cares about feminism lmao

[@terranceorwhatever60]

The way ur sister sees that as okay shows that the writer shouldnt write books that contain complex relationships and should just let someone else, that actually knows how to write taboo subjects thats are actually atleast seen as taboo by the narrator, write it

[@kusawwwwww]

“Fated romance” is a blight on the genre, I think. Fated tropes are an extremely easy, lazy way to excuse any and all levels of behavior on the parts of the involved characters because it doesn’t matter how awful or abusive or generally horrible they are for each other, it’s ~*~*fated*~*~ and therefore they’re soulmates and it’s twu wuv forever and ever no matter what. Like I understand why it’s a fantasy for that exact reason, but personally I find it to be piss poor writing. Totally grinds my gears. We wouldn’t accept a soldier who commits egregious war crimes because he’s ~*~*fated*~*~ to be emperor, or a businessman who exploits their employees because they’re ~*~*fated*~*~ to be a CEO, like… “God said it’s okay, so it’s infallible” is some childish logic. I don’t mind toxic romance as a theme in and of itself, but when the story is like “well they’re fated mates, so everything they do is totally okay actually and no permanent consequences will ever come of it” god it’s so fucking stupid it makes me want to take a flamethrower to something.

[@biib6318]

As a younger sister, I thought I'd say if my sister did this to me I'd be kinda upset, not because of the criticisms themselves but because I'd feel like I was getting shut down when sharing my interests, maybe its just me because I dont talk about my interests often with my sister so when I do I'm really looking for her reaction. The criticisms are good and valid but I would suggest offering her alternatives that you enjoy, so that she doesnt just feel judged. If possible, maybe have them also be romance? Something that she can enjoy and see a better example of the genre. English isnt my first language sorry if I misunderstood your comment.

[@Shelf_improvement]

Thank you! I often feel deprived because I don't adore most books I read the way most booktubers and booktockers do. I quit making videos partly because I felt like such a curmudgeon all the time, but now I'm considering diving in again. Subscribed.

[@NovemberIGSnow]

I watched the whole thing and agree with the core thesis. It is healthy to consume multiple kinds of media, to challenge yourself, and not just seek out the easy patterns you're used to. However, one thing I think was underaddressed is how there's a growing culture of puritanism on several platforms. It was talked about partly during the section about book bans, but I think there's more to it than just systemic oppression. Part of what creates the response "let people enjoy things" is that for years we've seen more people harass others for enjoying certain things. So to avoid this kind of harassment, people started disavowing media so they don't seem like they endorse everything in it. But this is exhausting to do, and if you do it wrong, then you invite harassment anyways. And when people get fed up with having to constantly address every single criticism of what they enjoy, "let people enjoy things" becomes a defence against this kind of harassment. People are sick of having to be seen as "not problematic", so instead they just embrace "problematic media", because it's a lot harder to be hurt for something you openly admit to to. I also think if we want to talk about people "regressing into ignorance" and wanting to avoid growing up, then we need to talk about what is pressuring people into that kind of thinking. Rent is absurd right now. Healthcare doesn't exist. Food prices have skyrocketed. Higher education is impossible to afford. Wages are stagnant. And there's no such thing as a third place anymore. Work, home, and the internet, are all that seem to exist. So the internet becomes people's third place. We look at the past and see that it wasn't nearly this difficult for our parents. We're playing on hard mode. Not to say that past generations didn't have their own troubles, but people born in the 90s and later have now gone through multiple recessions right out of college, a criminally mishandled global pandemic (which has robbed huge swaths of children of their literacy), and we live with levels of inequality beyond that of even the gilded age. Why are people adverse to growing up and being an adult? Because the world won't let them. There's no social safety nets, so we can't take risks. We have no money so we can't own property. And everything is manufactured to prevent us from maintaining and fixing it ourselves. Again, people aren't becoming adults because the world won't let them.

[@DOOR2Dusk..]

I personally think that something as the sentence "reading should be..." should not be said with a tone of objective truth. I can enjoy and analyse Notes from the underground and then on a Friday night be bored and pick up an Ali Hazelwood and have the time of my life. The act of reading is such a subjective thing (like every form of art) that just saying that because it was "meant to be like this" or "it's like this because..." is kinda of reductive and limited. Although i also look at the side of over-consumerism and toxic positivity with a skeptical eye, and believe that we should stay critical of all things, not just reading, i also believe that sometimes we forget that it's just words on a page. What the reader makes of it, is their choice, be it pure entertainement or new provoking thoughts, or shit, both. I have read a lot of trashy romance books that i knew were probably "objectively worse" than Crime and punishment, and that i rated 1 stars at the end of my reading, does that mean i wasn't having fun reading them? Hell no, then why would I have read them? So why should i judge someone who reads only those books because they read only for fun and nothing else? However i do agree that both appreciation and critique should be accepted in every form of art, and that the authors of this books were aware that by putting out their writing they would get feedback on their work, be it good or bad. So yeah, be critical of everything, but don't think that how you do things is inheretely the only way it can be done. Especially in art.

[@DOOR2Dusk..]

Good video btw :) (sorry for the English, it's not my native language)

[@user-xr7ci8tf3e]

That’s a good way to put it. A lot of the TV I watch is “trash”, and some of it is thought-provoking and well made, and I enjoy watching both

[@lajourdanne]

Completely agree. I think it’s also counter productive to say “reading should be…” and then advocate for the prevention of book bans. Books bans are a result of people putting their own personal biases about literature and the purpose of reading onto other people…

[@alicegam]

Sorry, long comment ahead:) I understand what you mean with your comment, and I think you’re definitely right with the assessment that you don’t really know what someone’s reading life is like just because you know they’ve read several pop romantasy books. In general, the statement “reading should be…” is as strange as saying “watching KZbin should be…” or “watching movies should be…” or “listening to music should be…” etc etc… However I’m also trying to come up with a counter argument:) I think Alisha’s video and criticism of the popularity of simple fantasy books still has some grounds, even though we can’t know for certain who reads them and how much and whether they read anything else. (And reading is obviously not the only way to engage with critical ideas and be fighting to make a positive impact in the world - maybe someone does that in their jobs or volunteering day to day. Can we blame them for not reading?). Where Alisha does have grounds for her argument is with facts about how popular these books have gotten….maybe if we were to look at statistics and see that romantasy books were being bought at stores and borrowed from libraries much more than other books, that can give us more objective sense of if it’s a worthwhile discussion to be having. Maybe you read both Ali Hazelwood and Dostoyevsky in equal part, but if we were to have some numbers about how people are reading literature significantly less than popular fiction, do you think Alisha’s video and argument are worth being made and discussed? If the majority of books that are being read are simple fantasy stories that conform to the status quo and don’t present any challenging ideas, should we care? (Im asking genuinely! :) cuz I think so, but maybe you disagree) I do agree that declaring an objective purpose of reading is definitely very difficult to defend and maybe we should stay away from making such claims, but I feel like Alisha’s argument is not coming from an objective stance but rather trying to say ‘hey, if you value empathy, thoughtfulness, open mindedness, learning, and democracy, then there is good reason to be critical of popular books (and all media we consume) because it is vital for us to be challenged by the things we read and be challenged by others perspectives”. And she is also saying that not valuing these things can have dire consequences, so if you don’t value them, then here are reasons for it. It’s a difficult argument to make! Because she’s essentially having to argue that we need to care about challenging ourselves by learning if we care about other people and making the world less of a horrible place - but lots of people don’t care at all, and even those of us that do, it’s hard to accept that our caring has to have significant effort behind it. (And it gets back to the earlier part of my comment, the fact that lots of people do plenty of things in their day to day life that support their values, so it’s a hard judgement to make!) Sorry for the long comment, kudos to anyone who actually read it xD

[@19Rena96]

​@@alicegam Reading doesn't have to challenge your world view tho. You can do that with other media (documentaries, interviews, etc.) and still read only wholesome fluff and "dumb" books purely for entertainment value. Reading serves as escapism for many because the world is shitty enough on it's own and i don't need it in the books i consume as well. I don't like smut and tend to avoid spicy books and i definitely would appreciate it if authors/publishers would make it more obvious if it has some or not. And (removable) recomended age group stickers to protect younger teens from unhealthy despictions of relationships and graphic s*x scenes would be a great addition as well.

[@sre_kay9544]

this is an amazing video!! so well researched and articulated. i loved that you mentioned the “girlsplaining” trend and major world events explained “for the girlies”. i get irrationally angry when i see shit like that because it’s so demonizing to us as AFAB people. critical thinking is becoming more and more inaccessible as education becomes inaccessible. once again this was amazing!!

[@phoenixfritzinger9185]

Like it was funny when it was like explaining the rules of Football and then it could have just stayed a “not so serious little jokey-joke” but the then that creator thought that she was doing a legitimate service to the world by “educating the girliepops about the important issues” (typing that made me barf a little) and started trying to do stuff like comparing the Israel Palestine conflict to “you can’t sit with us.”

[@kidawesomeness123]

Is critical thinking becoming inaccessible or is using the contemporary colloquialisms and lingo making information MORE accessible?

[@brownlesbo]

not just afabs lol transfems get this shit too but yeah I agree

[@beelzebub6414]

​@@kidawesomeness123 its literally just misogynistic

[@kidawesomeness123]

@@beelzebub6414i dont wanna assume but i sense youre saying that because the women mentioned arent conforming to the usual standard of academic or advanced speech which is lowk elitist but i also want to point out that people can glean knowledge from satire as well. So i dont why you would say a girl dressing in pink and speaking casually about political topics is misogyny but wont put words in ur mouth

[@EmptyKingdoms]

You know what is the (Kantian) definition of critique/criticism? To be able to outline the limits of something. It is _essential_ to any and every form of actual growth (there exists fake growth, or, simply put, things that seem like growth, but do not bring any real change). One who does not take in (well-done) criticism will never change.

[@michaelortega6618]

really, really fantastic video. i've long been a booktok hater and think this video perfectly summarizes my issues with it, but it also challenged me to look at my own reading habits and my opinions about booktok books; i really feel like this video essay has shifted my mindset

[@camiller6526]

Your opinion resonates so much with me, I must say, I don't always read the most complex and groundbreaking books but I will almost always have something to say about a book, concerning the writing, the pace, the characters, the plot etc even I love a book I can critique it and when I don't like, I can explain why. Reading """simple""" books is not an excuse to not have an opinion. I don't consider myself as a big critique and can struggle with classics (i'm french and french classics can be soo challenging) but I cannot stop myself to notice some writing choices, characters development etc

[@leighpeters1110]

As someone who also reads almost constantly and who also LOVES my local library (the 1 near my house the librarians know my name, and the 1 near school the librarians will lol) I love this video!!!! Also, I have become a lot more selective as I've grown older since I now know what I like and don't, and it really is fun to be a hater

[@guidedexplosiveprojectileg9943]

My library is a 10 minute something drive away, so I cant walk there, what joy.

[@rizzobeloved]

@@guidedexplosiveprojectileg9943 same here!

[@lilacfields]

@@guidedexplosiveprojectileg9943my library being a 10 minute drive, over an hour walk 😭

[@saraferguson1156]

“It really is fun to be a hater” 💯 ❤

[@giulioscanferlato9693]

This didn't feel like a video essay, but a lecture. Amazing work.

[@barisharslan6997]

One of the best video essays I've watched recently, put together so many of my thoughts so eloquently and backed up by examples. Thank you for this

[@Natmitch08]

Ironically I’ve been telling all my friends this is my year to be more of a hater. I’ve been reading more books lately , but genuinely trying to challenge the different types of genres that I’m reading. I really like the point that you made talking about how these young adult books are advertised with a lot of smut in them and I agree that that could be really harmful especially if that’s the only thing you read. And you definitely change my perspective on the over consumption of books especially on TikTok because I used to think that it wasn’t a bad thing because I genuinely think authors should get paid more for their work but I understand how we should be pushing books that are quality and of substance behind them. Because if we don’t, then that just pushes more authors like Coleen Hoover lol instead of the ones who are extremely talented and deserve that spotlight . This video was amazing Thank you! - new subscriber

[@silhouette_chr]

ive always had this vague reasoning as to why im always a hater and this video has put it all into words so eloquently... thank you, i even feel like ive learned even more from this video too. this has been very enlightening.

[@embodyingmysticalmac]

Not gonna lie, one of the biggest struggles when looking for something with a bit of spice is the fact that so much of what’s recommended just isn’t written well and the books in that space that are don’t get the appropriate amount of love.

[@Aa-dn1oq]

If you are searching out books purely for their erotic contents you can just read/watch porn

[@ivannav3832]

this is genuinely one of the best video essays on this topic i have ever seen on this app. i loved this so much to the point where i feel the need to comment on the vid to express this, something i don’t usually do on youtube videos. but this was so beautifully and wonderfully made! the way you hit the mark on the head for every single issue that infuriates me was extremely validating, and the fact that you addressed the important and real factors at play like consumerism, capitalism, and fascism all contributing to the rise of anti-intellectualism-which i had yet to see any other commentary/video essay youtuber talk about-immediately signaled to me that, well, to put it simply, YOU REAL AF. i can really see how much love you have for books and reading from the way you talked about all this, and to see another person possess that same immense gratitude and passion for books and stories that i have too, made me clap and quietly cheer to myself the whole time. everything was so well articulated and put together!!! and the finale of this video struck a chord so deeply within me, the part where you included clips of people talking about the importance of books, to the point where i began to cry uncontrollably because it’s just all so true. it was so moving. specifically when that one woman said, “i know i shall never feel alone or powerless again,” it got to me because it was so universally relatable. that last montage was so illustrative of the power of books, and the way in which they represent humanity as a whole. in a way, with this video you’ve achieved what books and stories can do: illicit strong emotions from the reader and make someone feel seen. so i truly want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for making this ;-; ❤️ sincerely, a fellow proud hater (hating makes us human!)

[@keldoe1351]

It is truly depressing how awful the YA genre is. Seems like half of the “readers” I meet are just reading cookie cutter romances geared towards 13 year olds and refuse to read anything else

[@MagnoliaPixie]

I really appreciate you making this video. I’m an English teacher and I’m constantly trying to add more books in our school library. It frustrates me how so many novels are marketed for young adults plus don’t have proper age ratings. I find this very disturbing and irresponsible. I’m not complaining that I have to do more effort to research the texts if they are safe for kids/teens or not, I’m just disappointed that this is our current reality. Additionally, as someone who is sometimes misunderstood as a “hater” I also appreciate your advocacy for criticism.

[@vicefaun2316]

your video is fabulous and inspired me to want to read more so that i may be more eloquent- i’m glad to see this kind of video because literature REQUIRES critical analysis.. that’s kind of a huge part of it

[@polaridia9542]

this video is one of the more profound and important video essays i've seen in a long time. cant wait to see what else you put out!

[@SharonStoppable]

YO I'M READING THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA RIGHT NOW!!! I'm at Prince Caspian (I'm reading in chronological order, rather than publication order, though I did in fact start at The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe since it was the one my mom tried reading to me as a kid.) It's SO good. I love how joyful they are, how the characters go through such emotional transformations and learn and become better versions of themselves. It's amazing.

[@lolasaj5052]

It's my fav book series ever

[@IrrelevantClassicist]

Narnia is so amazing!!!

[@alfalldoot6715]

Narnia is very good

[@pastelpillbug]

I haven’t read them besides The Lion, Witch, and Wardrobe but I got to see plays of the Horse and His Boy and Prince Caspian :)

[@Matoelukka]

Read them with my siblings a couple years ago, they're awesome:)

[@hopereadstheroom]

so you’re telling me my dislike of BookTok has in fact been intellectual this whole time…..😌 in all seriousness, THANK YOU FOR THIS. you expressed so many of my opinions/issues with BookTok, as well as other recent pop culture. and i particularly like your points about thoughtfully critiquing something and still being able to enjoy the thing. bring back NUANCE!!!

[@zoie507]

This video was incredible and i appreciate you making it so much, I don't use tiktok and hardly use social media in general, but the attitudes you discussed are rampant among our age group. Towards the end of the video, when you were showing some of the books that have been banned, I spotted the book that changed my life as a young teen, "I'll Give You The Sun" by Jandy Nelson. I teared up a bit to think of all of the kids who might be missing out on formative experiences with literature because of adults with (non-constructive) hate in their hearts.