slaves, tell me about 50 Shades of Grey

agreed, but there's a nice little blind where I don't have to see the people I work with looking at standard porn and all day long they're walking around with their noses in 50 Shades

yeah, i don't see anything particularly objectionable about this book, its audience or its success. as a "phenomenon" it's strange and a bit surprising, but no more so than any other internet enabled pile-on.

plus people like porn

Thanks for the insight

and for the sarcasm

I know it's not the same thing, but: I read all of the Twilight books. And hated them. My best friend was read them too...and while she mostly hated them, there was something about that world that she kind of liked...and she ended up joining an online community for Twilight fans, started reading all kinds of horrible fanfic, and made a few online friends. It didn't change her intrinisically except this was now a thing she liked, that she talked about with other people who liked it too. She was still the same person I was friends with before. You know? People can absorb themselves in really crappy things and not be horrible people for it.

It's a Twinkie. You're not eating it because of its nutritional benefits. I'm sure half the people who read the dumb book know how bad it is. I don't know that we should assume that we're the only ones who know better.

Sorry I'm journalling now, I'll shut up

Still really thrilled that estela mentioned me.

No, that's a good point. I doubt very many people think that 50 Shades is good, but they read it, nevertheless. I'm only turned off by its cultural ubiquity – I find its popularity mildly distasteful in the same way I'd find public Penthouse oogling distasteful. That probably marks me as a prude, and so be it.

i wasn't being snide towards you, i hope you know, i'm just enthralled by the all terrible similes in this book. xp

I doubt very many people think that 50 Shades is good

Now, see, I've seen multiple people on my FB timeline post that they do indeed find it "good" and, in some cases, "the best book they've ever read", unironically. Those people are out there. And, y'know, I don't begrudge my friends for liking what they like, but if one of them told me, in complete sincerity, that this was the "best book they'd ever read" - well, I'd have some thinking to do about how much I'd ever trust them again wrt to book/music/film recommendations.

I know it's not the same thing, but: I read all of the Twilight books. And hated them.

It IS the same thing, and I read those books, too, and I hated them, and so did p much everyone I knew, even though we all read them because lol publishing and being in the children's lit world and etc.

They also gave me outsider rage b/c of a lot of things, but majorly because of the reinforcement of mainstream/safe/approved values (in the original case a lot of sexual mores and religiously based conservative ideas) in the guise of giving you an "out" from those exact values. It's a bait & switch, and to me a really offensive one, profiting financially from an other, a forbidden world or bunch of ideas that might result in actual change if they were shared with any honesty, which they won't be, and also the profit of strengthening the stranglehold of the mainstream position because consumers of the media think they've glimpsed an "outside" and now they know what's there, when really they were just shown another scene painting.

I'm not putting this very well.

kinky fuckery for dummies

laurel I hear you loud and clear and you are v much OTM imho

why do you guys read things you hate? idgi

wait, I thought the point of these books being shit wasnt really about the validity or otherwise of the sexual dynamics, but THE TERRIBLE GODAWFUL INSANELY CHILDISH WRITING SKILL ON DISPLAY.

Well, I'm not going to read this one, but I had other reasons for reason the other series.

*for reading

lol shakey, surely you among all ilxors know the ego-gratifying qualities of hate

I mean from what I have read on this thread, I couldnt get turned on by this book even if it described my perfect fantasy, because the minute I got to an "ack" or "cripes" or "icecream dropped in my belly icecream" I'd be laughing too hard.

it's also kinda lol that so many people (especially dudes) are really getting high and mighty about how women have been flocking to some crude and artless erotica because, y'know, we're over here watching porn that has serious cinematic merit

Yeah tbh I couldnt care less about people finding the book a kinky read, for that reason. I *do* care about a completely not-edited, shitty fanfiction book getting published and selling like this because I hate fanfiction and the fanfic scene and want to set it all on fire.

yeah the mainstreaming of it is in and of itself pretty noteworthy and awful, just saying

we're over here watching porn that has serious cinematic merit

I only watch it for the interviews

amazing angles iirc

Yeah see I think if people want erotica there is already A HUGE AMOUNT of it out there (and lots of it is awesome!) and likewise if they want power-play or BDSM or to experiment with pain in certain contexts or w/e there is a lot of ground already broken for them by people who had to go outside mainstream thought and/or media and/or boundaries to create it or legitimize it or whatever. But the fandom around THESE books doesn't cognitively lead to discovering the real material, it just shoves junk food in the part of the self that was starting to have some ideas about maybe looking for something different.

If I dig down a couple more layers of logical complication, I think that is basically evil--boring, banal evil, redirecting people away from wanting anything they're not already being offered for someone else's profit.

some dude, it's the mainstream, bookstore-display, talkshow popularity & acceptance that's remarkable, not its shoddy sexiness per se.

p.s. i'll have you know i have downloaded some very artful porn in my time, thanks a bunch

the solution is obv to rid the world of soccer

soccer and hfcs

But the fandom around THESE books doesn't cognitively lead to discovering the real material, it just shoves junk food in the part of the self that was starting to have some ideas about maybe looking for something different.

If I dig down a couple more layers of logical complication, I think that is basically evil--boring, banal evil, redirecting people away from wanting anything they're not already being offered for someone else's profit.

― how did I get here? why am I in the whiskey aisle? this is all so (Laurel), Tuesday, May 29, 2012 3:26 PM (6 minutes ago)

eh, i see it as the sale of junk food to people who really, really like and want junk food. somebody's just managed to find a good way to inject some "racy" kink-sex into the equation. i imagine that if this book were different in any appreciable way, it'd be a good deal less popular. most books are a good deal less popular, after all, and it's not like there isn't other, more genuinely subversive erotica available out there.

Well, yes, there is that. Which is the best argument for pretty much dropping people who are really into junk food imo.

i keep trying to say this but idk if it really matters: the phenomenon of the books' sudden popularity is more complicated than it looks.

the media meta-analysis is "what is with this bdsm stuff being so huge now?!" but that's not really accurate. this is not "actual bdsm" emerging into barnes&noble, it's slash fiction

i'm sort of waiting for a salon article about for-real bdsm ppl rolling their eyes or getting huffy at all this, if it hasn't already been written.

It's the Pachelbel's Canon in D of erotica

ha that's great

the mainstream is the worst

the "debeers diamond song"

more like the taco bell canon mirit

cannot tell you how much i love pachelbel's canon in D

Which is the best argument for pretty much dropping people who are really into junk food imo.

let them have junk

Canon in Deeznuts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZn__5dT7qw

if ilx had avatars, i think 1:00-1:05 would be a popular choice.

SPLASH fiction

could SPLASH be the new *plop*

I'm half expecting this to be revealed as James Frey's latest project. Maybe this writer shouldn't write again, but she should be put in charge of the romance segment of a major publisher. However it happened, she felt, desired, and ultimately put her finger on the product that the pro's hadn't felt for her yet. Her solution was to give away the merchandise, build the interest, step 3, and then make a cover without a photo Photoshopped to look like a painting that resembled the cover of a romance book in the traditional sense.

My store has been setting record sales, but to Hunger Games fans. We don't have a good hand-sale for the next. We're weeks away. It's been fun, I'm drunk at the moment. I can't get it up anymore. When they ask for it, I always tell them they're already soaking in it.

I'm half expected the last post to be revealed as E. L. James's latest project.

Guys, I was standing next to this burly/fat mid 30s slightly smelly hispanic dude on the subway this morning, and I glimpsed, over his shoulder, on his iphone, a page of text with the word "jeez" and further down the word "Christian."

I find the entire concept of "subversive erotica" baffling

cumminists

stop right there

From each according to his ability, to each according to his need ...

the man said stop right there