Philosophy Now Forum

It was noticed that a woman was reading the erotic novel 50 Shades of Grey in Starbucks.

As technology has progressed, I have harboured concerns about the ease of which people could then be using their laptops and smartphones to access material which might not be fit for viewing in public so I asked my source how could they tell what she was reading? He replied that it was easy - she was reading the paperback version, not an electronic version e.g. Kindle. D'oh .

So here it is, back to basics with my concerns about technology removed:
- a woman openly reading a book known to have sexual content
- the book is a best seller and is openly discussed in the media so it is easier to recognise by the general public
- it is the paperback version, not disguised by a book cover
- in a busy public place, in an out of town mall Starbucks
- it was not a Starbucks located within a book shop
- mothers with small children in prams sit nearby, generally sipping hot coffee and eating cake
- older children are also present, as it is during the school summer holiday period
- other male and female adults are present also, who, like my source, may feel uncomfortable in this situation
- no staff or other person present approached the woman to ask her to put the book away

Has popular culture in the U.K. came so far that openly reading erotic fiction in public is now deemed acceptable behaviour?

If you substituted 'man' in the sentence 'a woman openly reading a book known to have sexual content', would he has been asked to stop reading? Would it make your view on the situation any different?

Or am I being naive and it is no different from the traditional 'bodice rippers' romance novels and popular modern romance novels with adult content?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifty_Shades_of_Grey

should have cracked the whip...

-Imp

Impenitent wrote:should have cracked the whip...

-Imp

He doesn't get allowed to take it out with him

We see men and women reading books with horrific levels of violence in them all the time. Should that be forbidden?
Is it OK to think horny thoughts in public, as long as I don't start growling?

Thundril wrote:We see men and women reading books with horrific levels of violence in them all the time. Should that be forbidden?
Is it OK to think horny thoughts in public, as long as I don't start growling?

That is a fair point. I would not expect someone suddenly raise their eyes from a violent book and start to violently lash out. Nor have I known that to happen.

Time for me to be disillusioned with urban myths again, this time the one that men think about sex every six seconds.
Generally I prefer not to know about others' horny thoughts, especially in public so I appreciate when growling is kept to a minimum, especially if the growler is sitting next to me on the Tube - even more so if the growler is admiring Page 3 of a tabloid at the time (yes, I have fun memories of working in London) or nowadays, 50 Shades of Grey .

Taking it further and banning horny thoughts in public is venturing into mind control territory, very 1984 .

I've re-read this post and realised I didn't take the first paragraph to its natural conclusion - do I then think that women reading erotic books in public would result in (a) men being subjected to inappropriate behaviour by horny women reading the book in public and also (b) women being subjected to similar inappropriate behaviour when they are reading the book in public. Honestly? In this lad/ladette culture? Yes, probably .

If women can't read fifty shades of grey in Starbucks, they'll have to sneak into a hotel to read it now that it has replaced the bBible. Where there is a will, there's a way.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/ ... story.html

Nick_A wrote:If women can't read fifty shades of grey in Starbucks, they'll have to sneak into a hotel to read it now that it has replaced the bBible. Where there is a will, there's a way.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/ ... story.html

What a calculated marketing ploy, hats off to him! And to also casually make mention that his original thought to replace the Gideon Bible with Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged too. Not having read Ayn Rand nor 50 Shades myself but from what I can gather from my friends Google and Wiki, the content of each is very different, so it seems a strange move to choose one over the other - but perhaps he has found parallels between them? Or should it have been The Great Gatsby, to contrast and compare the use of the colour grey in both?

Nick_A wrote:it (50 Shades) has replaced the bBible.

Ouch, poor John Lennon.

I see no problem about this. It's not like she's touching herself or flashing pictures in the open. So what? There is more porn in advertisement than you'll find on the cover of that book. No worries here ^^