tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9156334464585894857.post3898242301959229726..comments2023-10-25T05:30:54.507-04:00Comments on Oh Get A Grip!: How Obscenity Gave Me ComfortAshe Barkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03390519279886657608noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9156334464585894857.post-10322937029105537052016-11-02T18:51:02.639-04:002016-11-02T18:51:02.639-04:00"once you lose your virginity, you won't ..."once you lose your virginity, you won't stop until you've killed someone and wallowed in the blood" <br /><br />Ha! What a hilarious way to put that. And you're so right that this isn't how appetites generally work. It was only a few years ago that I started to realize that more fully and trust myself, rather than spend a lot of needless energy resisting things I didn't need to resist.<br /><br />I'm in the category of people with a lot of weird feelings around Catholicism, and I think you're right on both counts: there's a certain sexualized and violent energy around things related to the church, and it's also quite wrong to act violently toward other humans. I think blasphemy creates a special category of trespass that can have the erotic charge of all sorts of trespass.Annabeth Leonghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07455191827664110878noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9156334464585894857.post-72252495784211232662016-11-02T18:48:21.463-04:002016-11-02T18:48:21.463-04:00Good luck. Bataille writes beautifully, for sure, ...Good luck. Bataille writes beautifully, for sure, but I definitely feel uncomfortable as the story progresses. I really agree with you about the milk scene, though.Annabeth Leonghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07455191827664110878noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9156334464585894857.post-75207469045216914152016-11-02T18:47:42.092-04:002016-11-02T18:47:42.092-04:00Thanks, Sacchi! I think if people never went beyon...Thanks, Sacchi! I think if people never went beyond boundaries, it would make the pool of "acceptable" light ever smaller.Annabeth Leonghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07455191827664110878noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9156334464585894857.post-87609395233963699872016-10-24T19:34:37.524-04:002016-10-24T19:34:37.524-04:00Thanks for this thought-provoking post, Annabeth. ...Thanks for this thought-provoking post, Annabeth. I've always been taken aback by the implication in novels, movies, plays, operas, that sex is a slippery slope and that once you lose your virginity, you won't stop until you've killed someone and wallowed in the blood. This is not how other appetites work. (I like certain foods, so I eat them until I'm satisfied, then I stop.) Attacks on Catholic clergy (as in the Marquis de Sade's work) seem to carry a specific frisson for people raised in that faith -- I simply think of the murder of a priest or the rape of a nun (which happened here, years ago) as a vicious attack on a human being. If one wants to challenge religious orthodoxy, there are more effective ways to do it! In a sex-fearing culture, though, we all have to find out how to have sex lives without feeling crazy or damned. Jean Robertahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08805088081675965859noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9156334464585894857.post-52638346227483869862016-10-24T08:10:31.176-04:002016-10-24T08:10:31.176-04:00I've never read The Story of the Eye, but I ha...I've never read The Story of the Eye, but I have encountered a few erotic books that engendered the same weird combination of arousal and extreme discomfort, almost disgust, that you describe. And I have to say, I don't understand the appeal, but I can't deny it.<br /><br />The brief excerpt you quote is unbearably erotic, by the way. Despite hesitation about the later scenes you describe -- serious violence definitely turns me off -- I think I'll have to get a copy of this book.Lisabet Saraihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05162514190572269660noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9156334464585894857.post-27673880914843841442016-10-22T00:29:51.841-04:002016-10-22T00:29:51.841-04:00To me "obscene" does indicate going beyo...To me "obscene" does indicate going beyond some societally determined boundaries, and while those boundaries often seem unreasonably restrictive, you make a good point about finding one's own boundaries even when those are pretty far outside the ones professed (often hypocritically) by society.Sacchi Greenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10801164916418570059noreply@blogger.com