i think the term "GUILTY PLEASURE" should be killed dead. i mean....why should any pleasure be guilty? for real?
what are we, catholic??
BEAT ME.
In portuguese (brazilian portuguese at least), we don't have an exactly counter part of 'guilty pleasures' in our language. A literal translation would be "prazeres culposos", but I never saw anyone saying or using that. The closest we have is, indeed, a very catholic expression: prazeres proibĂdos (forbidden pleasures, literally).
But for me, the sense of a pleasure being something guilty is either because it contradicts with your cultural backgrounds, your taste in general for something, or mostly because that matter is indeed of a questionable taste/quality - and you know that. For example: Tank Girl, the movie - I know it is rubbish, but I cannot not like that film. I could say the same about Little Boots, but because I don't like club/electronic pop music in general, but I cannot not fall in love every time I hear to Victoria's voice and be indifferent to her melodies. However, I consider her one of my guilty pleasures because most of my friends listen to rock , blues and folk , and so do I.
I'm not sure if I agree that the term should be dead, because it is a simple way for saying you just like something because you just like that. At least here, when you say you like something that goes off your ordinary taste you will probably need to justify yourself. So saying "ah, it is my guilty pleasure" people will just stop annoying you.
But regarded the "guilty" part, yes, I agree that pleasures should be guilty free, but is hard specially living in a catholic country like mine, where the catholic guilty will be haunting you every now and then.
Cheers, all!