Nick's Random Gibberish (26) : Book Shaming

Nick's Random Gibberish is a weekly post here at Nick's Book Blog where I, Nick, will talk about random topics from personal posts to discussion posts.

Hi everyone!

Today I wanted to talk a little bit about the topic of book shaming. It's a topic that enrages me when I see it or experience it, so I thought it would be a good idea to highlight the various ways that book shaming occurs. To begin, book shaming is basically shaming someone for the books that they read or for simply reading. I personally have experienced this in two ways which I'm going to discuss in this post.  

I think the most obvious book shaming occurs in the form of people thinking that it's weird when you're an adult reading YA books. When I got into YA myself, I was a teenager, so I didn't completely understand how frustrating it is for someone to make snarky comments such as ,"You read YA? Aren't you a little too old for that? Aren't those books really juvenile?", until a few years ago. I'm someone who takes my e-reader/books everywhere I go, so when I'm on a break at work and I'm reading, people will ask me what book I'm reading and I'll obviously answer honestly because I'm not embarrassed by what I enjoy, and sometimes I will get these dumb questions or comments that makes me want to slap the person asking them. I think it's especially annoying if it's coming from someone who has never even read the genre and who associates everything YA with the Twilight movies. I already have huge issues with people who actually shame those people who enjoyed the Twilight books and the movies, and at the same time, I wish people would know their material before they speak out their mind or form an opinion on a thriving genre such as YA. I can't express how irritating and ignorant I find comments like these and there are times I have felt like lashing out (and if you know me at all in real life, I'm not someone who lashes out at people). I just don't get the book shaming at all. I mean YA books have taught me so much and continue to do so. These books have so many strong messages and I have personally experienced many things through these books that I never would have in real life I weren't a reader. I like to think of adults reading YA being similar with grown men and women playing video games. Somehow, older men/women playing video games aren't as shamed as adult YA readers even though technically video games were initially aimed towards younger fan bases. So if that's acceptable in society, why can't adults reading YA be as acceptable? Why does it have to be shocking that adults are a huge market for YA books? 

You may not realize it, but book shaming occurs very frequently within the book community itself. By that I mean, shaming someone for enjoying a book that perhaps the person disliked. It saddens me when this happens because I thought book lovers in general were more open-minded and not as ignorant. The most blatant example that I can think about is the Fifty Shades books. Listen, I have absolutely no interest in those books, but it makes me mad when people judge those readers who enjoyed the books, labeling them as "middle aged women in heat who have no self respect and are the epitome of anti-feminists". Here's the thing, people are allowed to read whatever the heck they want but it doesn't mean that because they enjoyed the Fifty Shades books that they are endorsing abuse or that they want to be abused. Nereyda at Mostly YA Book Obsessed had this great post about how the themes an author writes in a book doesn't necessarily represent the author's beliefs. I think the same applies to readers and what they enjoy in books. Just because a reader enjoys reading books with babies doesn't mean that they want babies in real life. Just because they enjoyed a book that had cheating in them doesn't mean that they want to be a cheater in real life. Some people do realize that there's a difference between fiction and real life. I find comments such as "I don't understand how people tolerate this or that in books" just as damaging as openly shaming a reader for their tastes. Comments like these are an attack against a person's personal tastes. You may not like the themes in books. That's totally your call, but remember that there are readers out there who do enjoy reading these themes. I think it's really important when you're writing a negative review or making a comment to think hard about what you're saying because you may be inadvertently judging other readers for what they enjoy in books. 

Ultimately, I would really like to see that second kind of book shaming go away first because as book lovers, I feel like we should be more understanding about the fact that different people have different tastes. Eventually, I would like to see the prejudice against adult YA readers also completely disappear. I'm not sure how realistic that is however.

What are your thoughts on book shaming? Have you ever been a victim of book shaming?
Share your thoughts in the comments below!