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I think the mistake a lot of people make is assuming that literature vs trash reading has to be an either/or proposition. That is, they make judgments about 'people who read romances' (for instance) because they assume that if such people read these books, those are the only books they read. That simply isn't true (at least, in my experience). My mother reads a ton of 'literary' stuff, but also has a fondness for Jodi Picoult and Nora Roberts. She used to buy these pulpy romance novels every year before she went to Florida because they were long enough that she could take only one with her and it would last her the whole week! If you are going into the store with that as your specific shopping criteria, you're going to exclude a lot of stuff you might otherwise read. But buying those books didn't mean she didn't read a lot of more 'edifying' stuff too.
I guess it just baffles me why someone should care what another person reads. I personally hated the Shopaholic books---could barely get past the first chapter of book 1 and finally gave up after 50 pages---but my sister loved them, and judging by how many they sold, many others loved them too. Is this a judgment on my sister as a person? No. Does it mean she is disqualified from reading 'better' stuff now that she has spoiled her mind with this? Of course not. Does it mean she is incapable of reading or enjoying great literature? No again. It just means that she felt like reading those books, she enjoyed them, then she moved on and read something else. Why should anyone else care about that?
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