Why is it that most women like romance, and most men like action?

[Legendofgenii]

I like them both together. Usually with a fantasy or historical setting. I do read other things, but that’s like my comfort food I guess.

Extra points if the story features magic and isn’t set on Earth.

[Kura]

Because those are the groups that it's heavily marketed to.

In truth there are fans of both genres in any gender.

All my sisters love action, shonen and cool things, while my brother (cis and completely straight) unapologetically loves romance and cute stuff. This is not a rare thing either, you can find plenty of people that love the genres despite not being marketed to because they're not the target audience.

[SpavVy]

I'm a cis woman and I've always preferred toys, shows, and activities that were marketed towards men/boys and I don't think that's uncommon at all. I enjoy things like dark fantasy and science which I tend to put into my own art/writing.

I've had a few instances where my readers found out that I'm actually a girl and were genuinely shocked, some had even mentioned that what I'm doing isn't all that common which I'd like to think isn't true 🤨 I've also seen plenty of men who preferred the romance genre.

[crimson_mystery_cake]

It’s because wimen amirite??

[crimson_mystery_cake]

Fellas you know what I’m talking about

[euphisa]

Heck im more of a tomboy. I dislike romance (tho i luv light BL, like china censored kind of BL)
I like action. I watched lots of shounen anime

[GumshoeComix]

most guys i've met like slice of life cause its relaxing / has parts of teenage years they missed out on and (if straight) cause it has cute girls
and girls I know like shounen for similar reasons because "hot boys"

I tend to like more one off dramas or flavor of the month shows
things I know won't last long cause I have the attention span of a flea.
but everybody tastes vary I think it doesn't depend on your gender more on how you were raised.

[rajillustration]

I think also the genre romance and genre action movies and books have their own weird fantasy rules that make a barrier for entry to new viewers. If you're an outside looking in you're gonna be so freakin confused as to how illogical it is and it may just take you right out of the story. So, as a girl who wasn't raised around girl stuff (I have all brothers) I don't like most romance movies. Some are all right, but I usaully like the older movies with older plotlines like Jane Austen, that don't have the weird modern romance fantasies that to me just don't make sense and aren't as fun to watch (like I made my bro watch "While you were Sleeping" with me because I knew he'd hate it and he was like "so are all romance movies full of pathalogical liars???" and it was like "yes, welcome to romance movies where nothing makes sense, half of these people should probably be arrested").

Instead I like action movies, becuase that's the type of fantasy I prefer and the fantasy that I have a nostalgic feel for. Thing is, if I show an action movie to a freind that doesn't like action movie, I know they're not going to love the long choreography of all the fights and will probably be like "OK you can't just shoot an arrow, grab it in mid-air, and then stab a guy in the throat with it." And these fantasy rules in both action and romance are just never explained at any point to viewers that are new to it. If you grow up with it--you never think it's weird, but youknow...it's kind of weird.

So to me it's not as much a girl vs guy thing as far as the chemical makeup of our brains go, I think it's more about what you were exposed to when you were younger, and if you have ever learned to enjoy those unspoken fantasy rules of both types of movies/books

[Mallory]

I just remember a story told by someone who had a job fixing people's e-readers... He said A LOT of dudes (like, WAY more than anyone would expect) dropped off broken e-readers that, once fixed, were found to be jammed to the tits with romance titles, mixed in with the usual Clive Cussler/Tom Clancy shlock. Presumably the appeal of the e-reader for these men is that no one would ever see what they were reading.

So... I think the division is way more blurry than it seems. The most popular action franchises of the last couple decades could not have gotten as popular as they were without a voracious and gigantic female fanbase. I think it's more socially-acceptable for women to admit to liking action than for men to admit liking romance, so it may seem skewed, but... yeah. I doubt it's as clear-cut. Even if the studios try to doctor the numbers. (Anyone remember Young Justice getting cancelled for appealing too much to women?)

[Farwin]

I'm a woman but I actually prefer what you say the men like and thats what my webcomic revolves around. I do like romance too but I don't like most of it because it's slice of life teenage drama and I don't give two poos about it. If I go for romance, it better be like artsy horror or fairly mature (I'm almost 30)

BL is nicer because male characters tend to be written better than female characters and it's the unfortunate truth. Female characters usually don't have the same sense of urgency as their male counterparts and it honestly makes male characters more engaging.

[mima_sighs]

When I grew up, I was reading the classics and I read whatever was available so I never got into the stereotypes when it comes to book genres. I'm mainly into action / sci-fi / horror. I never really got into fantasy because the names and stuff just irritated me and I don't have the patience to figure out how the hell everyone's names are pronounced. (But I have read a few)

For romance, I mainly read BL or LGBTQ+ Romance. CisHet doesn't appeal to me unless it's good writing, mainly it's cause I'm tired of the saturation of it and I want more representation of different kinds of love. (whether it's healthy / unproblematic / unhealthy / problematic)

[darthmongoose]

BL is nicer because male characters tend to be written better than female characters and it's the unfortunate truth. Female characters usually don't have the same sense of urgency as their male counterparts and it honestly makes male characters more engaging.

Respectfully, I'm not sure I agree with this. I think that while there are stories in which female characters are written poorly, particularly those written by cis men, an awful lot of women who say things like "male characters are just better written" actually have a lot of internalised misogyny they don't want to admit to and actually find male characters easier to relate to having been trained by society to have a low opinion of or to feel competitive towards other women and female characters. It may be worth asking yourself when reading if the male characters emotions truly are more urgent, or if you have been taught to instinctively feel that the concerns and emotions of women are inherently fluffy and trivial compared to men's?

As a female creator who mostly makes stories about female characters, it's often very frustrating to deal with how audiences are generally biased in favour of the male characters, even when the female ones are actually more complex. Male characters always get a lot more leeway and forgiveness from the audience for making bad decisions or doing bad things, for example.

[jensrichard77]

or action things that do get attention from a female audience get cancelled, like Young Justice did.

Say what??? I’m confused now?
I see myself as a stereotyped masculine male man and I have no idea that Young Justice was aimed for girls???
Guess it is all about how well done you feel the story and characters are, just as I might have watched more My Little Pony episodes than my daughter!

Better hide in a closet now.

[jensrichard77]

I like to bring up this series from Netflix

This story made me feel and care and cheer for the lead female character. I wasn't just watching her, I was her, all the way. I have no idea of what they did right to make me enjoy that show as much I did. Even her main rusian opponents that are clearly target for a male man like me, she is the one I felt the most.

Just like Ripley from Aliens and Sarah O'Connor in T2
(I know, they are the few we always bring up, but the good female characters are out there, you just have to look for them)

[mima_sighs]

I thought that Young Justice was cancelled because it had a larger female audience and that wasn't what the toy-merch company wanted because female audiences are less likely(?) to buy action toys aimed towards a young male demographic so they cancelled it cause merch wasn't selling.

[Darth_Biomech]

Same reason as to why blue is a "boy" color and pink is a "girl" color.

[darthmongoose]

Say what??? I’m confused now?I see myself as a stereotyped masculine male man and I have no idea that Young Justice was aimed for girls???Guess it is all about how well done you feel the story and characters are, just as I might have watched more My Little Pony episodes than my daughter!

Better hide in a closet now.

Oh no, it wasn't aimed at girls, that was the problem! Young Justice was pitched as a show "for boys" because it's about superheroes and targeted marketing and toy sale tie-ins are an important part of the kids animation industry. The shareholders wanted it to have a mostly male audience and to sell lots of toys of the male characters, and so long as it did that, they didn't mind if it had some female characters or whatever.
BUT what happened was that the show, with its great characterisation including many complex and interesting female characters ended up with a significant proportion of the audience, particularly those active in the fandom, being female!

Instead of celebrating that they had this large audience that was surprisingly broad, the shareholders were annoyed because the more segregated the audience, the more you can focus the merchandise to cater specifically to the "pink toys section" or the "blue toys section". They didn't WANT the show to have a big female audience because they thought that was bad for making money, so they just went and cancelled it.

[mima_sighs]

You aptly described the Young Justice scenario better than I did haha

[sushy00]

I don't relate to this at all. I like action way more than romance. And I am a woman. Not a very feminine one though.

[Fedriz_Marini]

As a man, I must say, While I do love action, I'm a sucker for romance, especially when it comes to healthy relationships, or even true, innocent and genuine ones, especially childhood one.