Jefferson: Blog

I've been considering whether to ask this for a while now and I'm tired of stalling.

I am looking for a story. I have no idea who wrote it or what the title was. I've tried doing code searches for it but have had no luck.

The story is about a man who hires a woman to be his maid or cook or something and she has two daughters. You can probably guess how it goes from there. He ends up kind of dominating all three of them. If you happen to know the story, please send me a note. Thanks.

If you are behind on watching "Game of Thrones," read no further as there will be...



SPOILERS!



Consider yourself warned.



For those of you who don't watch "Game of Thrones," a not-so-quick explanation:

On Sunday, May the seventeenth's episode of the HBO show, a female character named Sansa Stark, (played brilliantly by a beautiful, young English actress named Sophie Turner) was pretty much forced into an arranged marriage with another character, a true psychopath, named Ramsey Bolton (played with a wonderful sense of utter glee by a Welsh actor named Iwan Rheon.) Watching these two characters meet and interact was painful enough in the last few episodes but in last night's episode, after the wedding, Ramsey took Sansa to their chambers and, by most definitions, raped her. Sansa never actually said "no", she didn't put up any kind of fight but the character was sweet, young, virginal and obviously, terrified. Ramsey, being the psychopath that he is, didn't care, he ripped off her clothes, bent her over the bed and took her.

Sunday night, Twitter and Facebook EXPLODED with people yelling, screaming and bitching about this scene. "Game of Thrones" is based on the "Game of Thrones" series of books by George R.R. Martin. The series is on number five of seven, nine, ten... The number of books keeps expanding. Anyway, the show has reached a point now where they are further along in the story than the books are. Over the course of the previous five years, the show has moved somewhat away from the books, making small changes here and there, editing out some stories, some characters that are in the books, never appear in the show. This is what happened with this scene.

In the books, Ramsey Bolton marries a different girl. A girl who barely appears in the books until her marriage to Ramsey. Honestly, I only read up to the third book (of five so far) before I quit so... I can't tell you what happened to Sansa in the books but she did NOT marry Ramsey Bolton and did not get raped by him.

There has been a massive outcry about this scene. One female Senator took to Twitter and said she was done with the show because she was so disgusted by this scene. Others have come out and said similar. Women's groups are yelling and screaming saying it was cruel and demeaning to women. The media is going on about it like a real woman was actually raped or something.

"Game of Thrones" is not a nice story, in the books or on the show. People die, often horribly and cruelly and on a pretty regular basis. Sansa and her younger sister saw their father beheaded in the very first season. At the end of last season, one man smashed another man's head with his bare hands. Murder, rape and incest are all common story lines on "Game of Thrones" So why is this one different? Why is there such an outcry about this one?

I gave a hint earlier in this post. I said Sansa was young, beautiful, sweet and virginal. Those last two words are the ones that are causing the outcry. Sansa Stark has been a main character on "Game of Thrones" since the very beginning of the show. Her family was the main focus of most of the first season. We have watched Sansa grow from a sweet little girl of fourteen or so into a beautiful young woman over the last five seasons. She has been horribly abused throughout all five seasons of the show.

She was engaged to another psychopath, King Joffrey, for a while. When that fell through Joffrey arranged for her to marry his uncle, Tyrion, a much-maligned dwarf. After Tyrion was falsely accused of murdering Joffrey, Tyrion, and his new bride, Sansa were both forced to flee for their very lives. Sansa was taken to her aunt, her deceased mother's sister, who was soon murdered by her new husband, Sansa's new uncle, who is the man who arranged for Sansa to marry Ramsey Bolton.

So Sansa has been abused. There is no doubt, no arguing that point. She has been forced to watch as one member of her family after another was murdered, disappeared or humiliated. Her rape by Ramsey Bolton was, without doubt, one of the worst things that has happened to the character, right up there with seeing her beloved father beheaded.

But there have been other rapes on the show. There have been gruesome murders. Why is this one so special?

It's because we, the fans, have watched Sansa grow. We love Sansa. We don't want to see horrible things happen to her. Back in the first season, when she and her sister watched their father get beheaded, Sansa was "wallpaper" on the show. We barely knew her. Now, four seasons later, we all LOVE Sansa Stark. We want to see her get her happy ending and the producers of the show don't seem to be cooperating.

This is why the hypocrisy. This is why people are yelling and screaming about THIS scene but not any of the other horrible, gruesome, gross, disgusting, often painful-to-watch scenes that have been put on the screen before us over the last five seasons of "Game of Thrones."

Did the scene upset me? Absolutely. I'm the guy who quit watching "Rescue 911" with Bill Shatner back in the day because they showed stories of young girls being kidnapped, raped and abused which upset me. So yes, I hated to see a character I like be abused in this way. But ladies and gentlemen, it's Fiction!!!! Sophie Turner, the actress, was NOT harmed in the making of this episode. She has come out, publicly, and said she LOVED filming the scene. She wants her character to grow up, to become a full-fledged person, to grow stronger, smarter. She wants her character to grow and on "Game of Thrones" part of growing up, is finding out that horrible things happen to people.

I fully expect that Sansa will not only seek, and hopefully get, vengeance for what Ramsey did to her in Sunday's episode, but I expect she will also avenge the deaths of her mother and older brother, who died at the hands of her new father-in-law.

What happened to Sansa was horrible. But this show has been full of horrible things happening to people. It's fiction, ladies and gentlemen. It's not real. It's not even BASED on Reality. If you watch "Game of Thrones", if you sit down and think about it, honestly, Sansa's rape fits the story, perfectly.

If you don't like it, don't watch, but yelling and screaming about THIS scene and not all of the other horrible scenes, it's just hypocrisy.

I know I don't post a lot of stories here anymore. I know I don't update my blog very often. That's mostly because I don't have anything to say and those things I want to say, just get me in trouble so I remain quiet.

I read all the author blogs posted here. I read them everyday. I don't know why. Tradition, I guess. Been doing it for a while. Started way, way back. Anyway, what don't I understand? I don't understand why authors are telling what happens in the newest chapters of their stories in their blogs.

"Tonight, Carol saves Nancy from Paul's evil clutches. Meanwhile Tony and Harry finally come to blows but who are they fighting over, Mary or Louise? Also, see how little Timmy reacts to what he saw last chapter."

If people are reading your story, they don't NEED to read what's going to happen in your blog. They come to read your story, not your blog. If they're NOT reading your story, they still don't want to read about it in your blog. If someone is not yet reading your story, but plans to, well... spoilers!!!!

Why tell what happens in your new chapter in your blog? What possible benefit is there to it?

Just curious. I just don't understand.

Merry Christmas and a Happy Holidays (for those who don't celebrate Christmas).

I hope everyone has a great holiday season and a wonderful, and safe, new year.

I see that Lazeez has made it possible to put links to Facebook or Twitter on the top of my profile page. You won't see me doing this. I had a Myspace page once. I had a Facebook page. For a very short time, I even had a Twitter account. I have deleted all of them. They're all gone and I won't be putting one up anytime soon. THIS, this blog, is the closest thing I do to "Social media." I think Facebook and Twitter are, as a rule, a poor idea for most people. I can see it coming, you're going to post something on Facebook or Twitter and ten years from now, you're going to lose a job because of something you said on Twitter or Facebook, yesterday. I won't do it. I have a cell phone and I have an e-mail account, two of them actually, a G-mail account I use for family and friends and an SOL e-mail account I use on SOL and other places I post my stories. If they can't get me on the phone or e-mail, I probably don't need to know about it. :)

I want to encourage EVERYONE in the United States, if it hasn't gotten to be too late, to go out and vote today. I don't care who you vote for, Just VOTE!

Thanks.