Not Quite 50 Thoughts on Fifty Shades of Gray (and why it's important for women, and in-turn, also great for men)

Pour yourself a glass of wine, or pop an ice cold beer and shoo the kids away -- this post is not child-friendly. Well obviously, we're going to be talking about Fifty Shades of Grey and everyone knows that means: S-E-X. Dirty, kinky, S-E-X.  And as usual, I'll probably use filthy language.

Earlier today, as I was perusing my facebook feed, I noticed a gentleman acquaintance had some pretty strong criticisms of FSG, and he was recommending people see a movie called "Secretary" instead. His criticisms were based around the "unbelievable and abusive/sick character of Christian Grey", and how he's not a real "Dominant". That the FSG enterprise is actually dangerous because it doesn't depict a "real" Dominant/Submissive relationship and that people (read: women) could get hurt by not understanding the proper rules and somehow finding themselves in relationships with abusive men that read the book or see the movie and want to take advantage of a woman's desires; that E.L. James clearly had no real working knowledge of a BDSM relationship and therefor her books should not be consulted by people seeking out such a relationship.
 
Like usual, I had something to say. . .

I wrote out a few paragraphs explaining why Fifty Shades of Grey was written in the first place, and how the resulting effect on thousands of women is a positive for womankind, no matter how "badly" the book reads. But when I went to click "post" I was informed he had deleted his original post. I don't know why he deleted it, but I had all this great stuff I'd said and no where to put it! I shared it with a good friend over private messaging and she asked me to blog it. . .  oh look! I do have somewhere to put it! Got your cocktail? You ready? 

You may or may not have heard that Fifty Shades of Grey was a Twilight fanfiction before it became it's own mega-selling, New York Times Bestseller: monster. It's true. It was. I know, I read it when Twilight fanfic was going hot n' juicy (excuse the pun) a few years ago, and back then it was called Master of the Universe with the nickname "50 Shades". Actually, FSG is not the ONLY Edward/Bella fanfic to have been published in the adult erotic fiction genre, just the most famous of them all -- to date. 

So in my post, that's now this blog, I told him that if you're wanting be angry at anyone for FSG and even it's resulting misdirection of BDSM-scene "rules", because it was written by a lady who had no actual prior practical knowledge of said-scene? Blame Stephanie Meyer, the woman who wrote Twilight! If it wasn't for her and her build-up of teenage angsty sex hormones between two virgins, over four books and thousands of fucking pages: and their final wedding night/honeymoon with a fade-to-black scene that made more than one woman throw that ridiculous and badly-written book "Breaking Dawn" against a wall. . . there would probably be no Fifty Shades of Grey! Yes, we all know that Breaking Dawn and the Twilight Series is a Young Adult genre, but c'mon now! You can't make us read so much ridiculous drama and angst and sexual frustration and Edward telling Bella over and over and over that she has to be a good little non-slutty-girlfriend and actually marry him if she wants the peen . . . and then give us NOTHING!?! You know when the movie has actually MORE SEX than the book? You got issues. Yep, it's Stephanie Meyer's flippin' fault! So if you want to blame anyone, blame HER!

Please, Edward, for the love of GOD, PLEASE DO ME!

But something magical happened when that crazy little fade-to-black scene in Breaking Dawn occurred. Thousands of grown women actually groaned in international unison over the worst case of female blue-balls the world had ever witnessed. . .  and then, as one could and should expect --  we women know how to take care of ourselves and each other -- and so we did: 

The world of Fan Fiction EXPLODED. Creative women with a wicked way with a pen wrote stories that filled the gaps, and colored the fade-to-black scene in beautiful, glorious and rightfully perverted: TECHNICOLOR! (Do you want to know what realllllllly happened on Isle Esme? Yeah I did, too. Go here and read for yourself! (warning:graphic sex) After you finish this blog, of course.) 

And if you're not familiar with the normal flow, the ebb and tide of fanfiction, let me briefly explain: It's not the same thing as going to a book store, or clicking "place order" on your computer, and having a book, one that's been finely edited by people paid to do it, and most importantly: finished, by the time you read it. Some fanfics are called "one shots", being just one chapter. Others take on the life of their own, and become not just one book, but enough words to fill two, three or even four books.  Hence the reason the FSG is a trilogy -- she had actually written all of that, week by week, releasing it to us Twiporn lovers one chapter at a time. It's a "slow burn" (another fanfic term, meaning the plot builds up slowly, over many chapters) of reading when you commit to reading a multi-chapter fanfic.  Part of the magic of the fanfiction slow burn of self-publishing is reading the comments, and suggestions, and the guesses of plot-twists and where it's all going, the criticisms . . . it's fun, like interactive reading. Who wouldn't love to talk to an author as you're reading their book chapter by chapter?

So this magic happened . . . and grown women read Twiporn, and wrote Twiporn, in amazing numbers, and exploded the world of fan fiction all because a Mormon wrote a teenage love story with all the feels and passions and excitement that most of us experienced in adolescence . . . and then cock-blocked us all so HARD that it's basically caused a sexual revolution amongst women.

Is Christopher Grey, an extremely wealthy, control-freak, 28-year-old who owns numerous companies and is a helicopter pilot by day, and a pervy guy (that has an extremely well-equipped BDSM dungeon in his home) who makes contracts with young, brown haired beauties to be utterly submissive and available to him at anytime, especially at night, because his real mother was a brown haired beauty of a crack whore who abused him, when he was then adopted by the Cullens Greys -- a believable character?

No more believable than the gorgeous, extremely strong, extremely wealthy, Volvo-driving, control-freak, 109-year-old virgin vampire that waited to find his mate to have sex, and makes her wait until their wedding night, refuses to drink the blood of humans, calls himself a vegetarian, and was adopted by the Cullen's. Oh and did I mention he fucking sparkles in the sun? Well that is whom Christian Grey is based on. Why would anyone expect him to be "believable"?

But let's go back to the most important point I made above: it's caused a sexual revolution amongst women.

This is my copy of Twilight, pretending to be Memoir of a Shark Fucker.

Right now. Today. It's still happening.

I came to the party fashionably late. I wasn't there since the beginning like some of my friends, but I was there as Fifty Shades was being written. Twiporn has kept me company when I was lonely. Helped me find myself when I thought I was lost. Helped me realize how oppressed and suppressed I was being treated, and reminded me that life is too damn short to be miserable or have bad sex. Entertained me through a lot of sleepless nights due to physical, chronic pain. I learned more than kinks, I learned about cave paintings in France, and impressive classical music conductors that aren't Mozart or Beethoven.

There was a time I would have been mortified to admitting I was reading Twilight. Much less Twiporn! But now I have to say I am proud . . . not because I want to advertise I like reading smut -- but because I was there when this revolution was in it's own breaking dawn (pun fully intended). I was there to see it all take shape into something bigger, to see the world change, and to watch women reclaim their sexuality. With every purchase of Fifty Shades of Grey, with every purchase of Wallbanger, with L.A.'s notorious kinky sex-shop, The Pleasure Chest, no longer being in dark paint and low lighting, to bright, and positive and heavily geared towards WOMEN. I was actually stoked to see entire lines of products geared towards fans of Fifty Shades (seriously, click that). Because it confirmed to me that what I believed to be true: is actually true. There is a sexual revolution occurring. 


 

At the time I snagged this photo, The Pleasure Chest was SOLD OUT of this kit!

Because THIS part of this whole creative-explosion of unbelievable male characters with utter-nutter control issues is: GOOD. No actually, it's great. Not because any woman wants an uber-control freak of a boyfriend/husband, sparkly or not. But because a LOT of women woke up, shook off the cobwebs we've been under in our "slut-shaming rape-culture" suggesting any woman that's raped and isn't a virgin must have deserved it. And even if they were a virgin they deserved it because you know, they have boobs and dare to look attractive and stuff. That we can't talk about our sexuality if we seriously want to be considered for equal pay for equal work. Because THIS SHIT happens when a woman is even considered a likely candidate for President of the United States. . . 

The 50's called, they want their misogynistic sign back!

   
We've been told we should be ashamed, consistently and we've been hiding our sexuality for far too long. So when at first Stephanie Meyer cock-blocked us, we got together, and we created, and we talked, and we perved-the-hell-out all over each other. We laughed, we connived, we conceived of every perversion we could think of in chat rooms and message boards and blogs. We shared so much -- not just the pervy, but the sexy, and the longings and desires and needs and wants. And hurts, and abuses and neglects. We had women donating to charities to help other women and in return they received whole entire chapters and/or outtakes from their favorite Twiporn stories. Married women returned to their marital beds with renewed vigor, and sadly some of them met very unwilling partners when they got there. But I'm happy to report that most husbands were awfully damn grateful their wives drank the Twilight/Twiporn kool-aid and wanted to read MORE. And to write more. And to desire even more at home. Women strove not only to really enjoy sex again, but had the courage to look into adventurous, or downright kinky, things that they might have long-been curious about, but were too terrified to even think about doing UNTIL the whole Twiporn revolution. We talked about sex in ways women hadn't done since the 70's or 80's. That's not just GREAT, that's HUGE. And even women who didn't drink the Twilight kool-aid, and didn't turn their iPhones and Blackberries into their own personal porn-hubs and literary peepshows -- well they heard whispers at work, and in mom's groups, and saw the morning news shows -- Fifty Shades of Grey was being published, and boy-O are you ladies, you corporate women working your asses off day and night and are still not being paid the same amount as your male co-workers. You housewives. You preschool teachers. You cat-ladies and cancer patients. You amputees and Little People. You service women far from home. You ladies who never even considered reading Twilight or weren't aware that there was an entire underground world of women saying "YES!" to sex. Yes, YOU, all of you: LADIES! Are you in for a TREAT!

Are these books well written? No. That's not the POINT. So what if they're a bit off? MOST women can understand the difference between real-life and fiction. And if they're going out and adventuring, they'll soon learn the rules and know their own limits. We sure the hell don't need men to tell us what those are. 

As for men with bad intentions or creepy personalities taking advantage of the situation?  Let's face it: when isn't there at least one bad amongst the good? There will consistently be cads that take advantage of situations, no matter what the situation is. But if one sparkly vampire cock-blocker of a book caused a world-wide sexual revolution amongst women? Go ladies! Get your sexy on! And if you want to adventure into the real world of BDSM? Read some actual books about proper rules/etiquette/limits . . . Wild Side Sex: The Book of Kink by Midori is a great start, especially involving emotional/trust issues one must address before involving themselves in the BDSM scene -- and I highly suggest that if you are new to the BDSM world, you DO read something more than Fifty Shades of Grey. FSG is fiction. The real scene, and the real-life emotions and trust-issues behind such play should be thoroughly explored before introducing your own heart, soul, mind and trust, least of all: your body to such play. Not to mention that of a partner you love. My friend was correct -- there are right ways and wrong ways to go about this. There is no Christian Grey out there to sweep you off your feet and chain you to a wall (I know, I'm so sorry ladies, but have you seen the official trailer for the Fifty Shades movie? SWOON!), and there is no vampire that's going to come along and sweep you into his shiny new Volvo and drive you off into the sunset where he'll sparkle all pretty for you . . . but there is a lot of ourselves to discover, to be loved, and cherished and enjoyed: and to be joyfully explored with a trusted partner.

Oh haiii you pervy ladies! You know I'd love to spank you, if only I were real . . .

Have fun with that! All of THAT! ENJOY YOURSELF!

 
And my most sincere thanks to Stephanie Meyer for inadvertently causing the revolution, and to E.L. James and all the other hard-working, fast-writing and talented ladies of fan fiction -- you fabulous pervs -- for picking up the reigns Stephanie dropped and leading all of us into a sexuality we can loudly and proudly proclaim as our own.


ADDITIONAL INFORMATION FOR THE CURIOUS:
For fun and crazy and totally perverted Twiporn fan fiction, I suggest MasenVixen and Stranger than Fiction at https://www.fanfiction.net/s/5634545/1/Stranger-Than-Fiction

Anything by Savage7289 https://www.fanfiction.net/u/2229847/Savage7289 ESPECIALLY Hide and Drink -- that fanfic had me from paragraph one! I mean seriously, a vampire acting like a vampire and kidnapping the one whose blood sings to him so he can drink her blood as he pleases? Yes please! 

And this one, this fic owns me and she hasn't updated in like TWO YEARS and I would appreciate any and all help from any new "fans" to pester this poor lady to please, for the love of all things vampire and actually interesting story line: FINISH THIS STORY!! (psssst she has a twitter account, go nag her!) The writer is Emmanuelle Nathan and the story is "This Buried Life". https://www.fanfiction.net/u/2077469/Emmanuelle-Nathan

I have more, of course, so drop me a comment if you want me to suggest any you might like!