Reading has become a strongly gendered lifestyle and supposed status marker.

Most of the books are indeed paltry entertainment - soapy and saccharine romances, formulaically transgressive erotica, fantasies about unlimited witchy powers, and perfect book boyfriends - but it's still a huge market.

Men moved to video games and chan culture. Which are a different kind of paltry entertainment.

It's curious how there was a shift from male dominated niches, like Lovecraftian fantasy and heroic fantasy, through the imperial sci-fi peak in the 50s to 70s, through the Hollywood-influenced 80s, then into slow decline from the 90s onwards.

With a few exceptions, a bold imagination became more of a liability than an asset.

This is a culture which has no idea where it's going and would prefer not to get there.