How Male Songwriters Shaped Our Unrealistic Ideas of Romance and Love

Why are so many of us confused about love? Why do our relationships so often feel like they don't match the “romantic ideal” we grew up believing in? The answer might surprise you: it isn't just Hollywood movies or fairy tales, it's also the music.

For the last 100 years, men have written the overwhelming majority of love songs in English and Spanish. Those songs have defined what “romance” and “true love” should look like. The problem? They were written almost entirely through a male lens. That means the soundtrack of our lives has been teaching us one-sided lessons about love, and those lessons still echo today.

The Power of Songs to Shape Beliefs

Music is more than background noise. Songs are emotional lessons we carry for life. They play at weddings, funerals, parties, and in movies. Because they're short, catchy, and emotional, they work like tiny pieces of propaganda, shaping our beliefs without us noticing.

And for the last century, when it comes to romance, the storytellers have been mostly men.

What Male Songwriters Teach About Love

Patterns in male-written romantic songs:

• Love as possession: “You are mine,” “I can't live without you.”
• Idealized women: Perfect, angelic, unreachable.
• Suffering equals love: Drinking, crying, begging, proving devotion.
• Forever or nothing: Love is eternal, or it isn't real.

Repeated millions of times, these messages became the default script for how society thinks about romance.

What Female Songwriters Add to the Story

When women write about romance, the themes shift dramatically:

• Partnership, not ownership
• Imperfection and growth, love changes, and that's okay
• Agency in heartbreak, choosing independence, leaving bad love
• Romance as self-discovery, love is a journey, not just a destination

Think Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Gloria Estefan, Taylor Swift, Shakira, Adele, Natalia Lafourcade. Their songs show love as real life, not just fantasy.

The Propaganda Effect

Because men wrote the majority of songs, both genders absorbed the male version of love:

• Men learned they must chase, suffer, and prove their devotion.
• Women learned their role was to be the prize, the muse, or the forgiving angel.

This created unrealistic expectations, pressure, and frustration when real relationships didn't match the soundtrack.

What If Women Had Written 80% of the Songs Instead of Men?

Imagine an alternate history:

• Love seen as partnership, not possession
• Relationships understood as growth, not failure when they end
• Breakups framed as strength and choice, not just male heartbreak
• Men free from performing romance as proof of masculinity
• Women raised seeing themselves as storytellers, not silent muses

Society's entire understanding of love and equality might have matured decades earlier.

What's The The Bottom Line Scott?

Male songwriters aren't villains, they simply wrote from their own perspective. But because their perspective dominated, it became one-sided propaganda.

The result? Generations of men and women confused about what romance really is.

Now, with more women writing hit songs, the balance is shifting. But it's worth asking:

How much of what we believe about “true love” is genuine and how much is just the echo of a male songwriter's fantasy?

About the Author

Scott Oliver is a British writer and former Royal Marines Commando who has lived abroad since 1985. Over the last 66 years, he’s called twelve countries home, including twenty-five years in Spanish-speaking nations such as Spain, Costa Rica, and Guatemala. He has also lived in Sierra Leone, Ghana, Nigeria, Liberia, Cyprus, the USA, Grand Cayman and now lives in Mauritius.

A warrior by nature, Scott is living with prostate cancer and writing from the front lines. He speaks directly to men about health, masculinity, freedom, and strength, physically, mentally, emotionally, and sexually. His views are proudly independent: he questions conventional medicine, challenges destructive treatments, and tells the truth most men never hear.

Scott Oliver is an officially accredited member of the National Writers Union (NWU) and the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), the world’s largest organization of professional journalists. He spent ten years on Wall Street and another decade as an offshore wealth manager, specializing in globally diversified, multi-currency hedge fund portfolios. He is the author of What If Cancer’s Best Defense Is Free? — Sleep as a Defense Against Cancer: A Former Royal Marines Commando’s 4,000-Hour Research Roadmap, where he reveals how sleep repairs DNA, restores immunity, and strengthens your fight against cancer. He’s also the author of books on offshore investing and Costa Rica real estate and has written thousands of articles in English and Spanish on living abroad with courage, clarity, and conviction.

You can always contact Scott Oliver here with your questions and suggestions.

Expert Resources Used To Research and Write This Article: 

1. USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative – Inclusion in the Recording Studio 2023 Report: https://assets.uscannenberg.org/docs/aii-inclusion-recording-studio-20240130.pdf
2. Pitchfork – Women Underrepresented in Popular Music, New Study Finds: https://pitchfork.com/news/women-underrepresented-in-popular-music-new-study-finds
3. USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative – Inclusion in the Recording Studio 2020 Report: https://assets.uscannenberg.org/docs/aii-inclusion-recording-studio-20200117.pdf
4. EDM.com – New Study Highlights Lack of Representation in the Music Industry: https://edm.com/industry/lack-of-representation-music-industry-study
5. MusicPromotion.club – Women in Music Industry: Gender Disparity in Music: https://musicpromotion.club/blog/women-in-music-industry-gender-disparity-in-music