I want a scholar to give me some deep, long-form piece on the relationship between the rise in mainstream popularity of dark romance and whatever is going on with tiktok and Luigi. They can say there is no relationship! But I want to see the analysis. - ThreadSky

bakerdphd.bsky.social • 155 days ago

I want a scholar to give me some deep, long-form piece on the relationship between the rise in mainstream popularity of dark romance and whatever is going on with tiktok and Luigi. They can say there is no relationship! But I want to see the analysis.

Comments

burnrbbr.bsky.social•154 days ago

To enjoy with a glass of wine:

(imo this youtuber is a public scholar in her own right—she left a philosophy phd for video essays, and now publishes 1-2 well-researched videos a year)

ebonyteach.bsky.social•155 days ago

How long have you got?

Signed, Your Acafan Friend 😂

No, seriously, all of us who study fan cultures are like 🙋🏾‍♀️

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

I would pay money to read this so allllll the time in the world

ebonyteach.bsky.social•155 days ago

In a nutshell:
1) Digital age encourages/facilitates parasocial relationships.
2) Recent entertainment incl. true crime has focused on antiheroes (although this goes back to Milton & before).
3) 20+ years of online fan comms "woobify" antagonists who do terrible things.
We live in the Antihero Age.

ebonyteach.bsky.social•155 days ago

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01639625.2019.1596453

ebonyteach.bsky.social•155 days ago

...and wait, this is fascinating (but some of us have theorized this very thing, casually, since 2015-2016; we remember when 4chan was founded): https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/13548565231174587

ebonyteach.bsky.social•154 days ago

and IIRC, 4chan was founded in like '02 or '03, we were like WTF is this?

sioflynn.bsky.social•154 days ago

Oh wow is this ringing bells

yvonnezlam.bsky.social•154 days ago

📌

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Oooo adding this to my reading list, thank you!

ebonyteach.bsky.social•155 days ago

No worries! Trump/Musk, etc. fans can definitely be explained by the rise of fan cultures and parasociality. We're two generations deep now.

I should've known our goose was cooked when the girlies started shipping Sauron (the literal devil) after Rings of Power came out. Big "I Can Fix Him" energy!

mragsac.com•154 days ago

Oh wow! 🤯 Thank you for bringing this to my timeline—definitely giving it a pin for reading later 📌

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

The antihero age, intriguing as that would align with the dark romance push. I think a lot about the Joker movie love as well.

ebonyteach.bsky.social•154 days ago

Oh, definitely... Luigi is a murderer, and everyone knows his motives. And we just saw a bunch of folks say in response "welp, he had a point."

(Me? I feel all murder is bad, by bullet and by spreadsheet.)

Anyway... a gray antihero? Telegenic?! He just perp walked himself into the history books!

francinehibiscus.bsky.social•154 days ago

I feel like such an old woman; to me he is a trifling fool!

drtoriespy.bsky.social•154 days ago

So if we're talking about the Joker as antihero in the context of Luigi, we also have to talk about the Joker + Harley Quinn romance, which is a relationship putting mental illness on a pedestal, which also plays into the romanticization of mental illness we've seen in the last 5-10 years.

drtoriespy.bsky.social•154 days ago

Not saying Luigi is mentally ill, just saying that culturally, relationships with partners that are maybe not great partners are on center stage now. The obsession with Joker and HQ is really problematic, but it's interpreted as romantic by many people

nurseferatu.bsky.social•154 days ago

Folk stories, written and oral, going as far back as human memory and writing feature antiheroes and tricksters very prominently. As well as the complaints of elders that the new technologies ruined the modern youth ;-)

jonbecker.bsky.social•155 days ago

I need you two to record this conversation.

caitesq.bsky.social•155 days ago

The women I work with are really into dark romantasy. They keep giving me titles to try.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Which is wild because romantasy just feels, to me, like a different form of paranormal romance. But yes, people are loving it.

drtoriespy.bsky.social•155 days ago

Def that, and also the cultural instantiation of YA revolution dystopia. They fantasize about themselves as the messiah/protagonist/martyr of the revolution novels they read as teens, and that character has a partner. Romancing Luigi is a step to ascendence as the main character of the revolution

jenreadsromance.bsky.social•154 days ago

more of pop culture take, but I remember thinking this was pretty well done. https://www.vice.com/en/article/dark-romance-booktok/

jenreadsromance.bsky.social•154 days ago

i remember reading this and thinking, "well i have never in my life felt this way" and probably this is why this subgenre largely doesn't work for me, or when it does I'm getting something else out of it.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•154 days ago

This is the exact type of thing I was looking for thank you! Getting a fresh cup of tea so I can read it.

yoursinegritude.bsky.social•154 days ago

Well that’s I lot. This is not your Grandmothers Harlequin romance novel that you snuck and read. These books sound frightening. Thanks for posting the article. Hopefully 🤞🏽 folks stay safe out there and limit this kind of think to the intellectual exercise of reading, not experiencing it live.

riginalzen.bsky.social•154 days ago

Whew.. I’m glad to be in a place in my life where that doesn’t sound appealing at all. 😳😂

bakerdphd.bsky.social•154 days ago

I am so excited to read this

https://bsky.app/profile/jenreadsromance.bsky.social/post/3ldpfx23lrk2y

drladydemerald.bsky.social•154 days ago

*adds to read tomorrow list*

prettyinpink290.bsky.social•154 days ago

Lemme check this out!

prettyinpink290.bsky.social•154 days ago

All I'm going to say is their bias was showing by saying dark romance is mostly white, when what they should have said is popular TT DRs are mostly white, but also calling KU a "seething jungle" when MANY Black women authors self-pub dark romance there...😬

prettyinpink290.bsky.social•154 days ago

Also interesting that the author stated trad-pub would want to steer clear of KU but failed to realize how many of the most popular dark romance and dark romantasy books started in KU by self-pubbed authors.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•154 days ago

I think it's the first piece I've read to test dark romance as real books which was interesting. And yea, I think the podcast ep did a better job of engaging with the reality that a chunk of books now start self pub and then get picked up for traditional pub.

prettyinpink290.bsky.social•154 days ago

I wish the article had engaged with DR authors, not just readers, but that's probably a different story altogether.

whyisthat.bsky.social•155 days ago

Oops. Sorry. I'll shut the door. You are looking for a scholar, not a stab at an answer. It could have been feasible though .... 🤷🏼‍♀️

marcellograz.bsky.social•154 days ago

Dropping in just to remind y'all that his surname is funnier to us Italians :P

jmsantiago.bsky.social•155 days ago

This isn’t new. Women swooned over Ted Bundy,who was a measurably worse criminal than this guy.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

I know that

jmsantiago.bsky.social•155 days ago

Sorry. My apologies. I slipped & became one of those obnoxious followers. I’ll see myself out now.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

It's cool. But yes, I'm more curious about how this bubbles up in our present moment given that the past is not necessarily required to repeat itself.

mostlybree.kitrocha.com•155 days ago

My first gut response was "that violence was way too targeted at the powerful to be DARK romance fodder" and honestly I am afraid my in depth genre analysis might attract the feds

ebonyteach.bsky.social•154 days ago

I would LOVE to read your analysis though!

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Oh but see now I really want to read your thoughts on this! We need an anonymous forum for these insights.

mostlybree.kitrocha.com•155 days ago

I have a lot of them as someone who got Tor to publish a very mainstream romance about a former assassin who was abused by a futuristic medical supercorp and took her righteous revenge. 🤣🤣🤣

maxsahin.bsky.social•155 days ago

I’m a behavioral scientist with some research into fandom and subcultures and a LOT of research on behavior on the Internet. I am also concerned my take may attract FBI attention lol.

mostlybree.kitrocha.com•155 days ago

LISTEN! LOL I've been writing right on the edge of dark romance since before dark romance popped up around us and started stealing our cover branding, and I have watched the people who like these books for a LONG TIME.

NSA Brad is over there begging me not to make him call me in.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Both of y'all protect yourselves! Satisfying my curiosity ain't worth it!

maxsahin.bsky.social•155 days ago

I jest mostly. I can’t download TIKTok to take a look specifically, but in general, it’s about power and control. Most folks are terrified rn. Dark romance (and horror media in general) is a place people go to wrestle with fears in a safe environment, in their terms. It’s a place we process and

redderbeanpaste.bsky.social•155 days ago

Most of the time mafia romance has very toothless politics iirc

cvbell.bsky.social•155 days ago

From what I’ve seen that tracks but my reading in that lane is pretty shallow. That said, one thing that might be consistent is the sense that the conventional moral system isn’t worth adhering to.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Plus, I don't know that the people making fan cam videos are pushing for deep political engagement. Some may be! But I wouldn't be shocked if the depth of political engagement in dark romance books aligns with the tiktok love.

mostlybree.kitrocha.com•155 days ago

I think THIS is the take. LOL Because I was immediately like "no, Robin Hood is the wrong trope for dark romance, those heroes are intrinsically selfish and the point is for the heroine to become an exception to their violence"

and the fan cams are like "lol murder guy hot"

cvbell.bsky.social•155 days ago

This is a very good point.

redderbeanpaste.bsky.social•155 days ago

Like the fantasized idea of ‘he could fix my life ‘

mostlybree.kitrocha.com•155 days ago

I think who is writing them is usually the interesting part. People who have never been overly victimized by law enforcement definitely have a different take on lawlessness than people whose communities have a FRAUGHT HISTORY

redderbeanpaste.bsky.social•155 days ago

I’m reading everett’s the trees right now and the fact that the two cops know everyone Black in the town hates cops

While maintaining the humor of the overall book 👀

yoursinegritude.bsky.social•154 days ago

taggin in @cwalworth.bsky.social to see what you big brain 🧠 thinks About these types of novels the kids are into.

itsafronomics.bsky.social•155 days ago

Is this like people falling in love dahmer or whatever?

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Dark romance? Lots of varieties but typically there's some really, well, dark stuff in them. Murder is a frequent one. I don't generally read the super dark stuff like Haunting Adeline. But like I enjoyed Butcher & Blackbird which is about 2 serial killers falling in love.

itsafronomics.bsky.social•155 days ago

Ah I see

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Definitely not for everyone and a wide range in quality but it feels like that genre having a moment (I mean those books are sold in places like target!) aligns with the fan cams I've seen

bakerdphd.bsky.social•154 days ago

Here's a good overview

https://www.vice.com/en/article/dark-romance-booktok/

drdendere.bsky.social•155 days ago

I think it’s mostly people being upset about healthcare. My parallel is when folks in African countries I study celebrate coup leaders. No one wants a coup or army leaders but they hate the dictators more.

adrianaherrera.bsky.social•154 days ago

I’m a trauma therapist and also a romance author and have some theories! And would also love an in depth analysis of this.

neillewisjr.bsky.social•155 days ago

I'll go a step further: I want Tressie to write this piece.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Oo whee I wish!

alexfreidus.bsky.social•155 days ago

tagging in @fatedmates.net

bakerdphd.bsky.social•155 days ago

Haha they actually just quoted it!

alexfreidus.bsky.social•154 days ago

LOL because they know they're not scholars (right, Jen and Sarah?). But still, the speculative conversation would be fascinating.

bakerdphd.bsky.social•154 days ago

Haha I mainly said scholars because I know who follows me and it isn't generally romance authors

poisonpatti.bsky.social•155 days ago

I get it! I also wonder/worry about whether there is a connection between "walking dead' entertainment and our currently polarized society. Gimme some mork and Mindy and Muppet Show!

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