>> And to be honest, not all romances are bad and
>>trashy.
>
> Also true. I've had limited experience with
>romance novels, but I do understand that some of
>them are at least of acceptable quality. And a
>lot of others are junk. Just like any other
>genre. It does seem, however, that the romance
>genre tends to attract a higher percentage of
>junk work due to the manner in which they are
>churned out and the purpose for which they are
>used, and that bothers me even more than their
>usual moral character. I can't stand artistic
>ignorance. I hate it when I see people enjoying
>-- and therefore supporting -- brainless works of
>any medium (television being the biggest but
>hardly the only offender). I do think those who
>.are artistically ignorant are the worse for it,
>but I concede that the fact that it bothers *me*
>is my own problem.

It's hard for me to really make these sort of judgements, because it seems like whenever I find something that I assume nobody could ever think was "good", I find at least one person shouting the praises of that thing. You and I just had a conversation about this, in a way, when we discussed _The Evil Dead_. I can't possibly understand what anyone could see in that movie, and yet there are tons of people (and not just weird, kooky people, but "respectable" people in the film industry) who consider it a good, if not great movie. I read web pages that praise the pacing and the camera work on the movie, and I think "So what? Who cares about that one cool tracking shot--the whole plot stank and the acting was horrid!" So even if I see something "brainless" like a Harlequin romance, I have trouble finding fault in the people who read them because I know they must be seeing something in there that I just can't see, or don't appreciate.


>
> But Ghost's post seemed to be looking more for
>advice on human relations than artistic
>criticism, hence why I responded as I did.

Well, I thought you ended up sounding too much like Dear Abby there for a bit, but I sort of missed the question of morality in there, so I responded differently than I might have otherwise.

As far as I'm concerned, the only thing you can do if you disagree on moral grounds with something someone does is explain to them how you feel and try to discover why they do what they do. If you're just not working from a common set of morals, you may never see eye to eye anyway--it may just be a lost cause. If we're talking about a friend, then it shouldn't be too big of a bone of contention between the two of you. If we're talking about a significant other, then you may need to talk things out and find out where the two of you stand on the things that are important to you.

In the end, I always try to live by the motto "live and let live."