Fifty Shades of Masochism

Fifty Shades of Masochism

Masochism:

1.     The deriving of sexual gratification from being physically or emotionally abused.

2.     The deriving of pleasure from being humiliated or mistreated, either by another or by oneself.

(www.thefreedictionary.com)

I was recently at my monthly Crisis Response Advocate meeting, and we were talking about the continuing education we are all required to complete for the year. (For those who don’t know, as CRAs we answer a 24/7 sexual assault crisis line, including meeting someone at the hospital after they have been sexually assaulted) One of my fellow volunteers jokingly asked if she could count reading Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James as continuing education hours. “It’s full of sex, rape, power, everything!” she said, a little too excitedly for me. Hearing an advocate peer say that made me even more curious about the whole Fifty Shades of Grey phenomenon. When a book becomes that crazily popular, I am usually skeptical of it (except for The Hunger Games… those are actually pretty good), but especially with the erotic nature of the Fifty Shades of Grey series, I was super skeptical. So I thought I’d do a little research online and see what it was all about. Below is the excerpt I found and base this blog entry on (excerpt from http://darhkportal.com/2012/04/frisky-friday-fifty-shades-of-grey-excerpt-with-giveaway/).

“Oh dear, Anastasia, you moved," [Christian said]. "What am I going to do to you?” I’m panting loudly. All I can concentrate on is his voice and his touch. Nothing else is real. Nothing else matters, nothing else registers on my radar. His fingers slip into my panties, and I’m rewarded with his unguarded sharp intake of air.   “Oh, baby,” he murmurs and he pushes two fingers inside me.     I gasp.

“Ready for me so soon,” he says. He moves his fingers tantalizingly slowly, in, out, and I push against him, tilting my hips up.

“You are a greedy girl,” he scolds softly, and his thumb circles my clitoris and then presses down.

I groan loudly as my body bucks beneath his expert fingers. He reaches up and pushes the t-shirt over my head so I can see him as I blink in the soft light of my sidelight. I long to touch him.

“I want to touch you,” I breathe.

“I know,” he murmurs. He leans down and kisses me, his fingers still moving rhythmically inside me, his thumb circling and pressing. His other hand scoops my hair off my head and holds my head in place. His tongue mirrors the actions of his fingers, claiming me. My legs begin to stiffen as I push against his hand. He gentles his hand, so I’m brought back from the brink. He does this again and again. It’s so frustrating… Oh please, Christian, I scream in my head

“This is your punishment, so close and yet so far. Is this nice?” he breathes in my ear. I whimper, exhausted, pulling against my restraint. I’m helpless, lost in an erotic torment.

“Please,” I beg, and he finally takes pity on me.

“How shall I fuck you, Anastasia?”

Oh… my body starts to quiver. He stills again.    “Please.”

“What do you want, Anastasia?”

“You… now,” I cry.

“Shall I fuck you this way, or this way, or this way? There’s an endless choice,” he breathes against my lips. He withdraws his hand and reaches over to the bedside table for a foil packet. He kneels up between my legs, and very slowly he pulls my panties off, staring down at me, his eyes gleaming. He puts on the condom. I watch fascinated, mesmerized.

“How nice is this?” he says as he strokes himself.

“I meant it as a joke,” I whimper. Please fuck me, Christian.    He raises his eyebrows as his hand moves up and down his impressive length.

“A joke?” His voice is menacingly soft.

“Yes. Please, Christian,” I beseech him.

“Are you laughing now?”

“No,” I mewl.

I am just one ball of sexual, tense, need. He stares down at me for a moment, measuring my need, then he grabs me suddenly and flips me over. It takes me by surprise, and because my hands are tied, I have to support myself on my elbows. He pushes both my knees up the bed so my behind is in the air, and he slaps me hard. Before I can react, he plunges inside me. I cry out – from the slap and from his sudden assault, and I come instantly again and again, falling apart beneath him as he continues to slam deliciously into me. He doesn’t stop. I’m spent. I can’t take this… and he pounds on and on and on… then I’m building again… surely not… no…   “Come on, Anastasia, again,” he growls through clenched teeth, and unbelievably, my body responds, convulsing around him as I climax anew, calling out his name. I shatter again into tiny fragments, and Christian stills, finally letting go, silently finding his release. He collapses on top of me, breathing hard.   “How nice was that?” he asks through his gritted teeth.    Oh my.

I lie panting and spent on the bed, eyes closed as he slowly pulls out of me. He rises immediately and dresses. When he’s fully clothed, he climbs back on the bed and gently undoes his tie and pulls my t-shirt off. I flex my fingers and rub my wrists, smiling at the woven pattern imprinted on my wrists from the tie. I re-adjust my bra as he pulls the duvet and quilt over me. I stare up at him completely dazed, and he smirks down at me.

“That was really nice,” I whisper, smiling coyly.

Mind you, this is all I’ve read of the book. I don’t know the characters or the entire context of their relationships with one another. However Wikipedia is a pretty great resource for the synopsis of the book (which is where I gathered all of the following quotes). I’ve gathered that Christian Grey is the boss of the main character, Ana. Before Grey will engage in a relationship with Ana, he plans to have her sign two contracts: one is a non-disclosure agreement forbidding her from discussing anything they do together, and the other is a contract of “dominance and submission” which also states that “there will be no romantic relationship, only a sexual one.” The contract “even forbids Ana from touching Grey or making eye contact with him.”

The relationship between Grey and Ana is one characterized by BDSM…

BD: Bondage and Discipline

DS: Domination and Submission

SM: Sadism and Masochism

…..equaling BDSM.

Of course a relationship based on beating and bonding can’t be all sunshine and rainbows, and the tension between Ana and Grey “eventually comes to a head after Ana asks Grey to punish her in order to show her how extreme a BDSM relationship with him could be… Grey fulfills Ana’s request, beating her with a belt.”

To be honest I’m quite bothered by this book being so crazy popular. I’m bothered that my fellow Crisis Response Advocates not only read these books, but also enjoyed them and joked about them being a guilty pleasure. I’m not trying to argue that Ana was being raped, because from what I can gather she was a willing participant in these sexual activities with Grey. Whether or not she was coerced and brainwashed is another story (interestingly, she was a virgin before her first sexual encounter and contract signing with Grey).

What really bothers me is this: most of the women I know (yes this is a generalization) are, or strive to be, independent and successful; they long deeply to know themselves and to love themselves; they want to find someone (or perhaps multiple someones) to be connected on a deep level, to share in that sexual experience together and to be empowered by it (sex is a pretty empowering thing…. I’ll do a blog post on that later).

I’m not trying to just shut down anyone who reads and enjoys this book series. However, I feel that it is so important for both men and women to be filling their minds with stories that build us up, that bring us closer together and help us understand one another, helping us see each other as real human beings and not just genitalia and hormones and a means to getting off.

 And yet…. Here are the housewives, young professional women, and moms of America, reading a book about some handsome powerful asshole who thinks it’s okay to use a woman just for sex, and a woman who is not only okay with that but who longs for more. More physical abuse, more humiliation, more spanking, more blindfolding…… When does this end? What about her soul? What about who she is? What about Grey’s sexual objectification or her? What about Ana’s sexual objectification of herself? As women we seem to be fighting for equality and fairness, but when it comes down to it do we just want to be spanked and told what to do?