Cultural guilt and pleasure has
become very entwined. We watch/read/listen to something, we like it and then we
feel bad about that. The television show Glee is one of the things that
has given me the most pleasure and entertainment over the last few years. Yet
society makes me feel guilty for enjoying it because it is a musical for girls that
had a lot of original mass popularity. Like everyone, I have internalized
social norms about who I should be and what I should like and if I do not
something is wrong with me. I should love Guardians of The Galaxy, The Dark
Knight Trilogy and Tarantino films but I do not. I should not love Glee,
Titanic and The original Spider-man Trilogy but I do. This makes me
question my worth and makes me feel insecure about what I like.
At one time or another, every
aspect of our culture has been condemned as unworthy, spiritually harmful or
even morally detrimental, yet the all survive. That shows everything has their
good aspects. A lot of the media that is considered a “guilty pleasure”
are things that young girls would enjoy. Pop music, young adult novels,
chick-flicks. Our culture demeans women, especially young ones, and their likes,
which needs to change. Often, “guilty pleasures” have mass appeal and many deem
things with mass appeal as less cool.
Glee was popular and critically acclaimed at the beginning. Sure, Glee is
not the most well made show on television but it had made a difference in
people. One fan said, “It would completely devastate me if Glee were cancelled anytime soon. It’s given me a lot. It’s given
me friends that care about me and gotten me through a lot of hard things the
last few years… at the end of the day, it’s changed my life more than most
people have.” It had millions viewers at the beginning,
chart-topping albums, sold out tours, dozens of Emmy nomination, two Emmy wins
for best television series but most important, it also makes people happy and
teaches them good messages.
We are told what we should like.
If we do not, people will think we are not as sophisticated or cool. I was
looking at a magazine with best and worst lists of 2014 and for the most part I
agreed but there was an album on the worst list that I loved. It made me feel
Insecure about liking it.
In Glee there is an episode
that talks about “guilty pleasures”. The characters felt ashamed for liking
things ranging from The Spice Girls to Facts Of Life to Mamma
Mia. Throughout the episode, the characters realized that they had the same
“guilty pleasures”. They all become more honest with each other and their
feelings. Instead of hiding them back away, they decide to enjoy them proudly.
I think we should do the same.
Shonda Rhimes said that calling
something a guilty pleasure is “like saying the show is a piece of crap but I
can’t stop watching it. To me, that’s what a guilty pleasure is... I think it’s
a very insulting thing to say about someone’s show. Calling a show a ‘guilty
pleasure’ is like saying ‘I’m embarrassed to say I watch it but I can’t stop.’
That’s not a compliment.” You can probably still say that some media is “guilty
pleasure”. For example many reality shows. But if it is entertaining and people
are enjoying it they must be doing something right.
The title “guilty pleasure” does
not just assign worth to movies, music, etc. but also to the person who likes
them without guilt. It is essentially saying there is something inherently
wrong about liking it. It creates “hierarchy of who and what is important. It
puts our own preferences above others as more worthwhile and categorizes those
who genuinely enjoy things we think should be guilt-worthy as less-than.” We
should not feel guilty about what we love because someone told us it is not
sophisticated, smart, cool or well done. Why not stop the idea that some media
is more enlightening than others? We should “acknowledge the wide spectrum of
pleasures that media can offer us and do not immediately insist that these
pleasures must also be sorted into a moral hierarchy.“ We all deserve to feel
good and to enjoy the things we like without regret or feeling less about
ourselves. Glee, or anything else, is not something anyone should feel
guilty about liking.
“The next time you feel you have
to defend something about yourself, ask yourself, why am I feeling I must
defend this?... Do not feel you must say anything. Be who you are.” -Orin
