Find Me Serenity

Let’s talk about being nice to one another. Today on Twitter EL James and her publicity team thought it wise to do a Q&A. As you can probably imagine it did not go well. With many lobbing such questions at the author as “Which do you hate more, women or the English language?” and “What is the minimum distance you have to stay away from Stephenie Meyer at all times?” For those reading this who are not aware, EL James highly popular best-selling novel “Fifty Shades of Grey” and its sequels have been universally panned as detrimental to both the writing world and the world of BDSM, as well as being consistently marked as plagiarized directly from Stephenie Meyer’s “Twilight Saga.” In truth, I lean more on the side of those who insist Fifty Shades is way too similar to Twilight. But that’s probably why I was able to read it, despite how much it hurt me to do so. I have no idea about the world of BDSM but I do know that reading the books made me want to apologize to the English language. There is no love lost when it comes to Meyer’s Twilight either, by the way. But why is it necessary to throw so much hate at two women who did nothing but create something that became popular despite the people who panned it? As a writer myself, this behavior terrifies me. There are days when I want to quit writing for fear that IF I ever find myself in the category of “published writer” I will find also myself in the shoes of these women. Because who’s to say my writing is any better than either of theirs? Instead of tearing each other down for, being writers, being published, being popular, or liking these books, writers, worlds, why don’t we just move on? If you don’t like “Fifty Shades of Grey” don’t read it. If you don’t like “Twilight” don’t read it. If you have so much hate in your heart you feel the need to say something, write something better, don’t attack people and their fandom. We have forgotten what it is to be human. We have forgotten what it is to treat others as human. We are so entitled to our opinions we spout nonsense having never even read the things we’re railing against. Let’s just stop it. Stop the hate. #lovewins