Yeah, I think sometimes it can be frustrating for some fans to hear people say "And men watch us too!" like that somehow makes soaps legit. But, I also get the feeling that there was less of a stigma and the Nixon soaps on ABC (and GH soon as well) helped with that. Dan Wakefield talks about this a lot in his 1976 All Her Children. In his own words, he says to admit to having any knowledge of soap operas as a guy when he was a kid was like being caught in public masturbating (I swear, that was his analogy.) So he was surprised to see that soaps, and especially AMC (his focus) had such a high viewership on college campuses where, at least he says, they often were watched in common rooms with as many male students as female students, and he interviews a few male students who seem surprised that they should be seen as a :"female thing."
That said, when I became a closet AMC and then soap fan in 1991 as an 11-12 year old, I felt it was something you shouldn't tell other people about. But I'm not sure if that was a gender thing--I had grown up being told that intelligent people didn't watch soaps.
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EricMontreal22 ·
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