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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Husband objects to me reading romance novels with sex scenes

157 replies

Utterlyincandescently · 27/04/2025 06:12

Firstly, I'm not reading the books for the sex scenes. I just like romance books and many of them happen to have a sex scene. I also read lots without sex scenes or "fade to black" scenes. Most of the time, I don't even know if the book has a sex scene, until I get to it, and then I skim over them because they're usually pretty cringe-worthy to read.

Anyway, my DH doesn't like them and gets in a huff when he sees me reading them. He thinks its adjacent to watching porn, which he doesn't do, and doesn't like the idea of me "lusting after fictional men"🙄. Imo, it's exactly the same as watching a movie, that happens to have a sex scene in, and we do that all the time.

I could just read romance without sex scenes, but that severely limits my choice. Sitting down with my coffee and reading my sappy books is honestly one of my favourite things to do and I'm reluctant to give it up. AIBU to want to continue reading my books?

OP posts:
Blobbitymacblob · 27/04/2025 08:41

This would make me very curious to hear his deeper thoughts about his sexuality and sexuality in general.

“porn addiction” is a very strong phase, and one that gets used in very problematic ways in certain fundamentalist religions as a way to control members. Is there a religious element at play here?

It strikes me as strange that he would equate reading words on a page from someone’s imagination to supporting an industry that actively damages people. We have a responsibility to be decent consumers, and minimise our harm. But having sexual curiosity, thoughts, feelings is a wonderful part of our shared humanity, and not something shameful.

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 08:43

He must really miss porn - to be so jealous and resentful that you might get one iota of fantasy or gratification from a tame romance novel.

CurlewKate · 27/04/2025 08:44

FeministUnderTheCatriarchy · 27/04/2025 08:40

Porn magazines with photos of real women is different than fictional books.

The exploitation of women in a patriarchal society when women's bodies are treated as a commodity is what a lot of us have an issue with on here.

Fiction harms no one. No one is trafficked, taken advantage of, feeling shame or regret, being pressured or in dangerous situations.

I also don't think women expect their men to be 6ft5 mafia bosses.
Whereas there is a huge problem with men expecting women to emulate and be like porn stars.
Hence the threads we see on here where men think anal and choking etc are "normal and just a part of sex".

Or the threads where they criticise OP's labia or sex positions.

I had a man once who told me to watch porn to learn how to moan in a sexy way.

So it's really not the same thing at all.

Yes. This.

BeatrizBoniface · 27/04/2025 08:46

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 08:43

He must really miss porn - to be so jealous and resentful that you might get one iota of fantasy or gratification from a tame romance novel.

Edited

Good point.

ThreePointOneFourOneFiveNine · 27/04/2025 08:46

I agree with your description of these books being like a film that happens to have a sec scene in it. He’s being unreasonable, but I understand he’s got issues. In your position, next time he gets huffy I’d be very firmly telling him that we’ve discussed this and he absolutely has to stop this nonsense because we are not having this conversation again. Put your foot down. It’s not okay for him to keep making an issue out of something completely harmless that you enjoy.

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 08:46

porn addiction” is a very strong phase

Yeah mostly it's totally misused.

Most often for men who've been caught using porn excessively and cheating using online sex workers via cams etc. to get their partners to stay and "support" them.

TheWisePlumDuck · 27/04/2025 08:53

That is incredibly insecure.

I watch K/C dramas. A LOT of them.

DH will wander in, ask if it's any good, and very occasionally eyeballs the screen and moans that the men are too pretty.

This is mumsnet, so I don't know what your DH is like 90% of the time. But this behaviour seems abusive and controlling, if you start to recognise this in other areas of your relationship I hope you can access help.

Also I'm willing to bet my house he watches porn, probably the worst most deviant kind. The militant 'I would NEVER do this' type that police others so rigidly are usually the worst offenders.

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 08:54

Firstly, I'm not reading the books for the sex scenes. I just like romance books and many of them happen to have a sex scenes.

I read romance and erotica novels for the sex scenes. Nothing else really.

My h doesn't get remotely involved in that and would never dream of commenting or criticising or trying to restrict me. He doesn't feel the need to own every aspect of my sexuality - including fantasies.

No-one can, and no-one should.

I was prompted with a search for Evangeline Lily on his computer once and playfully ribbed him about it after. I approve - EL is a beautiful woman with a nice vibe and is also very age appropriate.

He once tucked a David Gandy (whom he knows I think is masculine perfection) box from underwear he bought with his picture on it into my side of the bed for a laugh.

This controlling, "you are not allowed a fantasy, even in your head" shit is not remotely healthy, well adjusted behaviour.

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 08:58

But this behaviour seems abusive and controlling, if you start to recognise this in other areas of your relationship I hope you can access help.

This.

It's not the behaviour of someone who's well adjusted.

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 09:03

I think he thinks I'm reading it for the same reasons people watch porn so it makes him uncomfortable because of his issues.

Even if you were, it's not the same as porn.

Also "because of his issues".

What does that mean?

He has a history of excess porn use and has stopped, so he somehow gets to police and control his partner's use of any material that is remotely erotic/romantic??

You don't have a background of porn "addiction" so why do you need to go cold turkey on everything that could include the slightest fantasy?

(Which is completely unrealistic anyway).

Rainbow1901 · 27/04/2025 09:05

It seems a bit random that from reading a few excerpts from one time over your shoulder that your DH assumes that all your reading matter contains in his mind imaginary rampant sex scenes.
You have no idea until you actually read a book what will be written about. I read all kinds of books and unless I've read it before have no idea of the content that will unfold while I'm reading it.
Your DH needs realise that you are reading fiction - it is creative writing not real life.

Grammarnut · 27/04/2025 09:07

That's controlling. He has no right to censor what you read. Keep reading what you like!
(My ex used to strenously object to Georgette Heyer romances because he thought reading should not be escapist - or feminist, he refused to buy me a book I wanted for Christmas (shan't say what, shows him as very ignorant) because he thought it was feminist thus 'and not suitable'. Men who do this do other things to control women, so perhaps you need to look at other things he does?)

LakieLady · 27/04/2025 09:09

Fucking hell, it seems that there's no end to the variety of ways by which men seek to control what women do.

What an utter arse he is.

In the sidebar on my screen it only shows "husband objects to me reading..." and I thought the thread was going to be him complaining about the OP having the light on when he was trying to sleep, not her choice of novel.

I was going to suggest getting a head torch, now my suggestion is couple's counselling or divorce!

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 09:11

TwelveBlueSocks · 27/04/2025 08:17

OP, It sounds as though it is maybe hard for him to have those books in the house while he is realistically still fighting an addiction. It's like if he had been previously an alcoholic and you were sipping a vodka on the couch. I think that probably would make it much harder for him to stay strong and resist doing it himself.

Lol.

You think he's worried he's going to sneakily read the tame sex scenes in the romance novels and have a wank and descend into hard core porn addiction again?

This forum never fails to bring the laughs.

So that's why he wants the op to stop testing them?

Not for the reasons he's told her.

pictoosh · 27/04/2025 09:15

So...HE had a porn addiction which means YOU are not allowed to read books?

It's his problem and he's out of line trying to make it yours. He can't expect to impose his very specific values onto your very ordinary pastime. Do one.

MummaMummaMumma · 27/04/2025 09:15

Woah absolutely nothing to do with him.
Also, if you DID want to watch pron yourself, again not his business!
Very insecure and controlling.

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 09:28

*reading them

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 09:45

pictoosh · 27/04/2025 09:15

So...HE had a porn addiction which means YOU are not allowed to read books?

It's his problem and he's out of line trying to make it yours. He can't expect to impose his very specific values onto your very ordinary pastime. Do one.

This.

He's the one trying to maintain no porn use.

He's the one with a history of porn "addiction".

He doesn't get to project his issues onto you, or anyone else.

You're not even reading romances for erotica but even if you were...so fucking what!

People are allowed to have fantasies.

If he has an issue, then he needs to get psychological help.

Not complain about his wife reading some tame romance novels.

StrawberryDream24 · 27/04/2025 09:48

At best he's like one of those people on a diet who try to restrict other people's food, even though they are not and have no need to be on a diet.

But it seems like there's a worse crazy controlling, possessive "you're not allowed a thought in your head about even a fictional man" aspect to it as well.

VikingsandDragons · 27/04/2025 10:04

The primary purpose of porn is to excite sexual arousal. The primary purpose of a fiction book is entertainment. Even one with graphic sex scenes, those scenes are part of the wider plot, and in most books will be one or wo scenes, something the book has built up to over the previous 300 pages, or less than 5%, maybe 10% of the text and that's not even true for something we commonly associate as being a sex focused book like 50 Shades of Grey. More time is devoted to the emotions and problems associated with the sex, than the sex itself.

While it might not be true for erotic fiction, for romance novels, romantasy, 'chick lit' etc is not typically used for arousal, the sex scenes are part of the greater plot and usually fairly realistic in terms of how someone in real life might build up to intimacy, having no sex scenes in books or years or yearning, prolonged eye contact and hand brushing isn't reality for most contemporary relationships and it would be jarring if books were written like our sense of chastity was still 200 years in the past.

Coupled with the fact that everyone who reads that book will experience the scene differently. If I asked everyone reading this to picture a old, slightly crumbling castle in an open space none of you would have an identical image. Some people won't even have an image, just a vague outline or see the words in their mind. The description has been used as a prompt for your own imagination, some of you may have pictured a different state of decay, different size or age of the castle, different features such as gardens, a moat, how many windows, details such as a courtyard, farm animals, horses, plants, trees, maybe your castle has a wood store or a blacksmith, maybe it's under attack or has archers stationed on it, characters in the castle scene or maybe it's completely ruinous and abandoned and so on and it's the same for every scene in a book.

I really don't think we can object to sexual images created in our own imagination, even if there is an external prompt such as a line in a song or a scene in a book on this basis. Even considering a film with a sex scene vs a porno in the same way, one has sex as an element of plot, a natural progression of the character interaction and development, sure it might be arousing for some people, but they're also unlikely to be playing Pretty Woman over and over again to get their rocks off, and the other doesn't have a secondary purpose like plot or education, it's just for arousal and is being used only for a sexual crutch.

Others have already covered also that there's no exploitation of women from written fiction, you know no one has been trafficked or has had their image put online against their will but I do think it's an important point in the arguement.

Utterlyincandescently · 27/04/2025 10:13

Thanks everyone. Will update later, after we've talked.

For those questioning the porn addiction, from what he has told me, he was obsessively and compulsively watching porn at all hours of the day, even when not horny or masturbating. Just constantly having it playing in the background too so imo, it was/is an addiction for him.

OP posts:
HangingOver · 27/04/2025 10:15

My gob is smacked. He has serious issues.

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 27/04/2025 10:16

How does he know? Most romance books have very neutral covers (I write romantic fiction), they don't have half naked men on the front. And you absolutely can't tell the contents from the cover - some have lots of sex, some don't have any, some have just a little bit of sex suggested.

So unless he's reading them too or you're reading aloud, how does he know?

Utterlyincandescently · 27/04/2025 10:20

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 27/04/2025 10:16

How does he know? Most romance books have very neutral covers (I write romantic fiction), they don't have half naked men on the front. And you absolutely can't tell the contents from the cover - some have lots of sex, some don't have any, some have just a little bit of sex suggested.

So unless he's reading them too or you're reading aloud, how does he know?

I've answered this a couple of times upthread. He read a scene over my shoulder once and he now asks sometimes when I'm reading.

OP posts:
Lurkingandlearning · 27/04/2025 10:22

Utterlyincandescently · 27/04/2025 07:33

Yes, I completely agree. I think he thinks I'm reading it for the same reasons people watch porn so it makes him uncomfortable because of his issues.

And yes, it does get me in the mood but I don't think he's noticed that! Going to have another chat with him later. Definitely not going to stop reading my books.

I don’t understand this. How can he think you are using the book the same way as people use porn if you aren’t holding the book in on hand and wanking with the other?

As he is a recovering porn addict it sounds more like he is one of those tedious ex smokers / drinkers who use piously lecturing others to boost their resolve.