What puts the ‘guilt’ in guilty pleasure?
It’s 11:00 a.m., and I’m lounging on the couch. I feel like watching Bangtan Sonyeondan (BTS) Butter MV again. My fingers fly across the keyboard, typing out the name of the video on Youtube, yet I am only able to catch a brief minute of it before I notice my parents standing by my doorstep. I immediately close the tab with the video, a tinge of guilt residing in me.
I cannot believe they caught me watching a BTS music video. “What’s wrong with that though? It’s not a racy video you were watching. And they never said anything about BTS.”
I’m Eve, and BTS is the forbidden fruit on the tree with the devious snakes, grinning, tempting me to reach out and grab for it shamelessly, only to riddle me with nasty comments later. It’s embarrassing, guilty even when anyone catches me watching BTS videos, romantic dramas or reading romance books. So, I begin questioning myself if the adoration and comfort found through BTS is truly nothing but a guilty pleasure.
Hence, the first thing I do to confirm is to Google up ‘meaning of guilty pleasure’ and here’s what I find: A noun that refers to something - films and TV programmes, for example, that the viewer enjoys despite the popular negative view on them. Okay, but what really puts the ‘guilt’ in ‘guilty pleasure’?
Is it like how Google specifies, in which such elements are generally not held in high regard? No, possibly not, because both romance novels and romantic K-dramas have a huge fan base and are often in demand. Also, very few people on this planet wouldn’t have heard of BTS because that’s how popular the K-pop group is worldwide.
Could it be the stigma associated with these elements that makes me feel guilty for liking them? Possibly. A girl I “used to” be friends with often made it clear that she thought I was not a reader since I loved romance novels. During a conversation about my love for K-dramas and K-pop, my cousin told me “I can’t differentiate between any of the people you post about on Instagram. They all look the same.” It gets my nerves twitching, these negative assumptions … urgh! This, along with other so-called ‘guilty pleasures’ is probably the reason why I feel ashamed every now and then for enjoying them.
Or is it that people will find reasons to shame you for anything you like?
It reminded me of a discussion during my first year in Culture and Society class on how fandoms and patriarchy shape the success or failure of movies like Star Wars, which has a large fan base today capitalised by production studios. Yet, what irked me was how the majority criticised and judged the franchise harshly because its fandom flourished with women in its early stages.
Talk about finding reasons to shame you for anything you like.
Once again, bringing me back to the stigma that exists against romance novels, K-pop bands and K-dramas.
Is the stigma there because the fandom has more female fans, or does it exist for a legitimate, understandable reason? Am I forced to believe it’s the first because what reason could justify anyone shaming and ridiculing someone else to such an extent that they feel afraid to express that love in public? And over what? A genre of books, a category of music and a type of entertainment!
Personally, I believe in the ‘Live and Let Live’ philosophy of thinking quite ferociously. You don’t judge me for what I like, and I won’t judge you for what you like (excluding cannibalism, paedophilia). Yet, the minute I say this, there will be people lining up to oppose, misunderstand and twist my words just for the sake of opposition. To whom I have to say: I don’t have the patience, or the time, to deal with you. So, if someone prefers K-pop or romance novels or, really, anything that they like, let them. Don’t cringe and humiliate them for it - especially if they don’t rub it in your face all the time when you’ve clearly told them you aren’t interested, or if you’ve never given it a chance in the first place.
We’ve got enough sadness in the world without having to be shamed for the things that bring us joy and comfort, so it’s high time we realised that these ‘guilty pleasures’ aren’t guilty pleasures at all.
Instead, these are a sign of two things. First, if you come home at the end of a tiring day and your ‘guilty pleasure’ somehow makes you feel better, it’s about time you embraced it, and stopped feeling guilty for liking it. Secondly, and most importantly, the people around you who guilt trip you truly don’t deserve the time or effort you’re wasting by receiving their opinions. I think you should, in the most respectable connotation of the word, yeet them out of your life as soon as you possibly can, and as much as you possibly can. But, it doesn’t mean you can’t be with them, you still can. You can love them all you want, while loving all your guilty pleasures too, all without restraint.
And that has been me, Varsha, saying it as it is, out loud and as honest as I can be: Yes, I’m a sappy romantic who loves romance novels! Yes, I love laughing while watching BTS being dorks! Yes, I love listening to their music and letting it soothe me when I need it. And above all, I love the things I love without feeling guilty about them.
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