Get Off the 50 Shades-Bashing Wagon

Let me start by saying that I never finished the book, even though it was a book club selection, because I just couldn’t get through it, I found the writing that bad.

And I read the whole Twilight series so my expectations of decent reading material are pretty low.

Also? The main character really annoyed me. I consider myself a pretty strong assertive female, and the mouse-y type anti-heroine just wasn’t doing it for me.

That aside—I have been really bothered by the backlash on 50 Shades and I couldn’t quite place my finger on it until I came across this post on Facebook (because few things anger me more than a status update that I disagree with, amirite?)

My response is the last one, and that’s when it suddenly clicked for me.

Yes, the book is horrible in that it really shouldn’t be categorized as literature. But could all the bashing possibly be because somehow men feel threatened by women sexually expressing themselves?

If you want to talk about how bad the writing is in this book and focus on that as to why you’re bashing it, that’s like talking about Debbie Does Dallas and chastising why it isn’t nominated for an Oscar. Are you freaking kidding me? Because let me break it down for you—that movie isn’t about the acting.

And 50 Shades isn’t about the writing.

And if you want to talk about how 50 Shades is glorifying abusive relationships, are you really going to fail to highlight an entire pornography industry that is catered to men and is set up to demean women?

The premise of 50 Shades is that it has helped many women sexually express themselves and reinvigorate their relationships in the bedroom. Whereas there are countless studies and statistics as to how the pornography industry has ruined marriages because men are cyber-satisfying themselves rather than turning to their wives.

How can we bemoan a book that many women have turned to as a way to help express themselves sexually while condoning an entire industry that demeans women a much a greater extent?

Why is that okay?

Is it our fear of female sexuality? Our puritanical background? Misogyny at its finest?

Men have their $97 billion global industry, let women have their weekend of fun without demeaning it because it makes you uncomfortable.

#StopBashing50Shades

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