Fifty Shades of Grey Launch Trailer Now Most Watched in History

[BeerTent]

[...]

Something more surreal, that wouldn't happen in real life, I don't really think it's right to publish abuse and call it sexy.

To be fair, some men and far more women find it very sexy, abuse or not. It didn't get popular just because the bad writing is funny.

I get that, and I understand that everyone has their kinks and quirks, but abuse is abuse. It would be different if the topic of BDSM in the book was properly addressed and followed, but from what I've heard, and the small bit I've read, this is not the case. The story could have been significantly changed to include what most people find sexy, and it could have been informative as to what following BDSM actually entails, instead of... Well... Kidnapping and coercing someone ill-informed to sign a contract. If anyone in real life asks you to sign a contract in regards to a sexual relationship, BDSM or not, run like hell.

Call me biased if you will, but I've seen it on both sides of the coin. Even when it's the person you wholeheartedly abhor getting abused, you still just... I dunno. Wanna right it somehow.

 

[Vault101]

Couldn't agree with this more.

The only thing I can think of is that it had just enough weirdness that it got pushed slightly into the mainstream, which resulted in people who haven't been exposed to erotica going all gaga over it since it was something they had never seen. Then add on all the parody's since it's badly written. I don't know though. Doesn't make any sense to me.
.

yeah I guess there are a lot of women out there who a.) didn't know erotica was a thing and b.) were too embarrased to explore it, but once it got pushed into the mainstream all of sudden it was a thing...

 

[Blow_Pop]

[...]

Something more surreal, that wouldn't happen in real life, I don't really think it's right to publish abuse and call it sexy.

To be fair, some men and far more women find it very sexy, abuse or not. It didn't get popular just because the bad writing is funny.

I get that, and I understand that everyone has their kinks and quirks, but abuse is abuse. It would be different if the topic of BDSM in the book was properly addressed and followed, but from what I've heard, and the small bit I've read, this is not the case. The story could have been significantly changed to include what most people find sexy, and it could have been informative as to what following BDSM actually entails, instead of... Well... Kidnapping and coercing someone ill-informed to sign a contract. If anyone in real life asks you to sign a contract in regards to a sexual relationship, BDSM or not, run like hell.

Call me biased if you will, but I've seen it on both sides of the coin. Even when it's the person you wholeheartedly abhor getting abused, you still just... I dunno. Wanna right it somehow.

Not to mention stalking them too to make them think you actually care about them

 

[Godhead]

The only reason anyone read this book was for the turgid and dull sex scenes, that in all likelihood they won't be able to show in their entirety on screen in a major film release.

I've not read the books, but I'm reliably informed that they're absolutely terrible. The only way this film could be of interest to me is if they go for the NC17 rating, which of course they won't because it's box office poison. It'll never be better than this, anyway.

I see your Gilbert Gottfried, and I raise you Charles Dance.

I'm bringing in Takei. Checkmate.

 

[80sboy]

So....They made Secretary again?

There's a difference, Secretary was about a sexually reserved and frustrated man learning to open up to women through s&m shit. This movie is about a sexually reserved and frustrated good girl moaning at the camera for two hours straight, expressing all the moaning the majority of middle class female audiences want to do in this situation, to what they think is experiencing sexual liberation. But really what it is is women's desire to go back to the old archaic formula of how relationships should work. Man being dominant, woman bending over to get a good spanking for being such a bad bad girl for wishing for equality.

I don't know that's my interpretation lol.

 

[Strazdas]

most watched with 100 million views? are you joking? Gangnam style [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZkp7q19f0] has 2,055,502,333 views.

 

[Jadak]

most watched with 100 million views? are you joking? Gangnam style [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZkp7q19f0] has 2,055,502,333 views.

Maybe you missed the part that specified "launch videos". As in, specifically trailers for movies and stuff.

Still no idea if it's accurate or not, but they did at least specify a category.

 

[Strazdas]

most watched with 100 million views? are you joking? Gangnam style [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZkp7q19f0] has 2,055,502,333 views.

Maybe you missed the part that specified "launch videos". As in, specifically trailers for movies and stuff.

Still no idea if it's accurate or not, but they did at least specify a category.

erm, look at the title of the article?

 

[Lieju]

Crap, I watched it too, out of morbid curiosity.

Makes me question if there's some good Twilight fan fiction out there...

A lot, actually. Twilight actually has many interesting ideas about it that are completely forgotten or disgarded.
Also many people have written reconstructions that show just how weird and creepy the books were.

And even with the erotic fanfiction, well, I think it makes the books less creepy (as long as the sex is consensual), because the books go on about 'love' when it's nothing more than lust since they have no real reasons to like one another, apart from being hot.

So them just going 'hey, I really want to bone you' is at least honest.

 

[Lieju]

I can explain it perfectly. It fits into the trope of woman fixing man and winding up in a "perfect" relationship at the end. If you've never watched a rom com, watch one of those and you'll see exactly why it's so popular. Read the romance books too. It's all similar shit. Though, some of it is more humourous than others. At least to me. But people eat it up because this is how "romance" is "suppose" to work.

Don't forget about her being a 'pure' virgin who is coerced into things so she remains 'pure'.
No, she can't possibly go into bdsm out of her own will, informed and because she wants to, she has to be forced by a man so she can try 'naughty' things.

Fucking bullshit.
(And depressingly common in 'romance' fiction aimed at women where women can't go actively looking for sex so it must be the man raping her, or the very least initiating everything.)

But even so, stuff like this has existed before, better written and more kinky stuff. It's just one of those 'in the right time in the right place' kinda things I suppose.

 

[Verlander]

I have no interest in this film, it's S&M lite, but the ignorance and pathetic reactions on this forum repulse me. Disappointed, although not altogether surprised.

 

[Lieju]

I have no interest in this film, it's S&M lite, but the ignorance and pathetic reactions on this forum repulse me. Disappointed, although not altogether surprised.

SM =/= abuse.

One of the frustrating things about Fifty Shades is its depiction of BDSM. Which is abuse masquerading as erotica.

It would be different if it was presented as a rape-fantasy, or an unhealthy relationship, but it's not.
It's presented and marketed as a realistic depiction of BDSM which is very harmful, considering how the public tends to have a very shaky image of what it is to begin with.

(not even mentioning the disgusting views the book has on female sexuality)

 

[Cowabungaa]

the ignorance and pathetic reactions on this forum repulse me

Do elaborate. From what I gathered from a friend who was into S&M, the books are indeed anything but a proper representation of S&M and if anything they promote unhealthy sexual relationships. This, I would say, being a very worrying thing considering 50 Shades' popularity. So I wonder what you're talking about.

 

[Verlander]

the ignorance and pathetic reactions on this forum repulse me

Do elaborate. From what I gathered from a friend who was S&M, the books are indeed anything but a proper representation of S&M and if anything they promote unhealthy sexual relationships. This, I would say, being a very worrying thing considering 50 Shades' popularity. So I wonder what you're talking about.

Was S&M? Never mind.

The books are poorly written, but they no more promote abuse than Fast and Furious promotes hit and run driving.

People on here are now of the mind that the kinds of relationship as written about are abusive (or if they don't believe that, they're still promoting that mentality), and many others are dismissing it as "bored housewife fodder" or "most expensive porno made!". Dislike the material all you want (I know I don't like it), but I find it disgusting that a) Something that is in the interests of so-called "bored housewives" is suddenly a less valid creation than supposedly what excited working husbands would like, b) That erotica, however good, is relegated to lowest common denominator value by default, and c) That referring to something as porn is a derogatory insult.

 

[Cowabungaa]

The books are poorly written, but they no more promote abuse than Fast and Furious promotes hit and run driving.

Woops, fixed that little thing. I'm quite tired, so I'm not exactly typing well.

You make some valid points, and yes I personally wouldn't go so far as most of these people and get all derogatory about it. I can get behind the idea that the rhetoric against the whole 50 Shades spiel isn't good.

However, the above analogy doesn't really work. 50 Shades of Grey depicts itself as honest to goodness S&M. To make the analogy work the Fast and Furious should say that its depicting, say, Formula 1 or another properly regulated, legal way of racing. That what it shows is equal to that. But it isn't.

And that's what 50 Shades of Grey is doing, it's abusive rape fantasy that's depicted as honest S&M. But it isn't, and that leads to lots of wrong expectations in the 'bored housewives' (a term I don't really like either, but if anything it says more about what's wrong with our family systems instead of the housewives themselves) who are looking to spice up their love life. And that, in the end, could lead to quite some problems for them.

Of course, 50 Shades is not even nearly unique in this. It's its popularity that's making it draw all the attention. Like what Twilight did to lots of teenage girls and their expectations of how relationships work. And like Twilight, 50 Shades of Grey is another symptom of our societal failing in sexual education and what makes a sexual relationships a healthy one. People like this Grey character or Edward Cullen are poisonous, dangerous creeps who shouldn't be so idolized as they sadly are.

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

I clicked the video out of curiosity and made it a whole minute before really feeling the need to stop it. That guy has a total serial killer vibe going on. I hope some savvy video editor will recut the trailer to look like a horror film.

 

[Verlander]

The books are poorly written, but they no more promote abuse than Fast and Furious promotes hit and run driving.

You make some valid points, and yes I personally wouldn't go so far as most of these people and get all derogatory about it. I can get behind the idea that the rhetoric against the whole 50 Shades spiel isn't good.

However, the above analogy doesn't really work. 50 Shades of Grey depicts itself as honest to goodness S&M. To make the analogy work the Fast and Furious should say that its depicting, say, Formula 1 or another properly regulated, legal way of racing. That what it shows is equal to that. But it isn't.

And that's what 50 Shades of Grey is doing, it's abusive rape fantasy that's depicted as honest S&M. But it isn't, and that leads to lots of wrong expectations in the 'bored housewives' (a term I don't really like either, but if anything it says more about what's wrong with our family systems instead of the housewives themselves) who are looking to spice up their love life.

The problem with that logic is that rape fantasy exists, and is potentially more common than we'd think (as if anyone would do a proper study on it though, sadly). I doubt that there are (m)any women out there who are reading it and thinking "This bit where he totally belittles her, that's what I want to recreate", but rather they want the twisted romance, the sex, and the danger.

It's a matter of perspective, which is harder to appreciate when the material is badly written. Earlier in this thread someone defended Secretary as a film on BDSM, but change perspective and it's the story of a man with power taking advantage of a mentally unstable woman by playing mind games with her. Power is represented differently in both books/films, but neither is inaccurate. We also have to appreciate that those reading the books come from different backgrounds and experiences too - I think that a lot of the people doing the criticising were privileged in that they were introduced personally directly into the scene, or were confident enough to choose it. Many of the wider readership, however, won't have had that experience. They may recovering from real abuse, they may be happily married, they may be bored, they may be queer, they may be happy in everything but the bedroom. If they are turned on by the actions in the book, they'll like it, and if they're repulsed they won't. I don't think anyone's reading it and being converted to accept rape into their lives.

My best guess is that people are self conscious about their own engagement with BDSM, and don't like it so trivialised. They may be self conscious or have even suffered a form of discrimination from previous lovers or friends. Of course those guys won't be happy, but the book wasn't really written for them. For my money, the worst bit about the book is this imaginary "Christian Grey" character, who's young, handsome and impossible rich. It's just stupid.

 

[StarStruckStrumpets]

I find it interesting that the "social justice for all!" crowd are backing a very particular notion of theirs.

"You can have all the equality you want, so long as it doesn't offend me."

I haven't read the books, but clearly the sales figures determine that there is an audience for this kind of relationship to be explored or even enjoyed in a form of media. Why then, is it that everyone is talking about how this will "normalise" abusive relationships and ruin the position of women in our culture?

Fucking hell guys, you can't have it both ways. Some women get off on this shit. Leave them be, let them have their turn-ons. How is embracing a turn-on oppressive? You must all be sex-negative feminists.

 

[Cowabungaa]

le snip

I suppose you make a point. Yes, 50 Shades fills a need. However, I'd argue that this need itself is, in a way, a bad thing. It shows that in our society something is very wrong in how we go about sex and sexual relationships. 50 Shades, in that regard, is just another symptom. Women want to have sex without shame, that's the real fantasy behind books like 50 Shades. And of course, they deserve that. The fact that a fantasy that glorifies such bad behavior is needed to fulfill that desire to have sex without shame is, in a way, quite sad. It shows that despite a century of active feminism we still have a lot of work to do.

I do agree that Christian Grey is indeed the worst bit of the book, but not just for his idealized looks and wealth as such but for his creepy, abusive behavior. At one point he apparently even rapes the main character (by apparently forcing sex while she's under influence) and the fact that the book doesn't present this as a bad thing, doesn't show his behavior for what it is is what makes the book a bad thing.

Filling a need as such is not a bad thing, but filling this need by presenting abusive behavior, both sexually and romantically, as a fetish is not the way to go about it and not something I can get behind from a moral point of view. Grey is a terrible, terrible person and should be outed as such.

And yes, a proper, widespread study on our sexual relationships is something we could really use.

How is embracing a turn-on oppressive?

Simply put, 50 Shades' Christian Grey is another symptom of rape culture. That's where the backlash against this comes from.

 

[Jadak]

most watched with 100 million views? are you joking? Gangnam style [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZkp7q19f0] has 2,055,502,333 views.

Maybe you missed the part that specified "launch videos". As in, specifically trailers for movies and stuff.

Still no idea if it's accurate or not, but they did at least specify a category.

erm, look at the title of the article?

Yes? And both the title of the thread and the article specify what it's actually talking about.