Nestled in the picturesque Lake District of northwest England, the Damson Dene Hotel seems, at first glance, like the typical English countryside hotel. But its bedside tables contain a shocking secret. Instead of the traditional bedside Gideon Bible placed at arm’s reach, its forty rooms each contain a copy of E.L. James’ bestselling erotic novel Fifty Shades of Grey .
Jonathan Denby, owner of the hotel, told NBC News he felt that in a secular society, it was “wholly inappropriate” to put a religious book in someone’s bedroom. He confessed the novel wasn’t his first choice of replacement. In fact, he hasn’t even read it. “I was thinking originally of putting in a book by Ayn Rand — Atlas Shrugged was my first thought,” he said, but “because everybody is reading Fifty Shades of Grey , we thought it would be a hospitable thing to do, to have this available for our guests, especially if some of them were a little bit shy about buying it because of its reputation.”
Fifty Shades of Grey traces the relationship between a business magnate and a young college graduate, featuring explicit depictions of bondage and submissive acts. Since the Damson Dene’s dirty little secret has emerged, the hotel has received dozens of angry emails — not from Britons, but from Americans — demanding that the Bibles be restored beside the beds.
Unsurprisingly, the move has also attracted the ire of local parish priest Rev. Michael Woodcock, who told the Westmorland Gazette, “It is a great shame that Bibles have been removed from rooms and very inappropriate to have been replaced by an explicit erotic novel.” He added, “The Bible remains a source of comfort and inspiration that many people do find helpful.”
However, Wayne Bartholomew, manager of the hotel has been quick to point out that, “The Gideon Bible is full of references to sex and violence, although it’s written using more formal language, so James’s book is easier to read.”
Ironically, the previous owners of the hotel were a Methodist group, who were responsible for first putting the Bibles in bedrooms.
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Another version by Illustration Exchange, 8/8/2012:
Modern Culture In Shades of Grey
A British hotel owner is replacing bedside copies of the Gideon Bible with copies of the best-selling “soft” porn novel FIFTY SHADES OF GREY.
“Tonight” said the hotel’s owner Jonathan Denby, “millions of women will be curling up in bed with a good book and you can bet your life it won’t be the Bible. More likely than not it will be Fifty Shades of Grey. I haven’t read the book yet – I’m not in the target audience – but I’m told it’s a ripping good yarn and everyone who’s in the target audience loves it. This made me wonder about the sense of providing a book, the Gideon Bible which no one reads, and many dislike, in the bedside cabinet of our hotel bedrooms, instead of a book which everyone wants to read, such as Fifty Shades of Grey.”
Denby said he didn’t make the switch for any religious of philosophical reasons. He just thought it was time for a change and to give his patrons a more appealing option. He cited a recent NBC online poll “which drew nearly 32,000 responses to the question ‘Which book would you be more likely to pick up in your hotel room?’ As of Thursday, 42 percent said Fifty Shades of Grey and 37 percent said the Bible, with the rest expressing no preference.”
Denby says he hasn’t all together given up on the Bible. He will keep a copy available at the front desk for guests who request it.
FIFTY SHADES OF GREY wasn’t Denby’s first choice to replace the Bible. “I was thinking originally of putting in a book by Ayn Rand — Atlas Shrugged was my first thought,” Denby told NBC News.
How appropriate, though, was his choice of the best-selling FIFTY SHADES? Indeed, GREY is the shade which best describes our Post-Christian culture as it moves increasingly away from its Judeo-Christian heritage toward ultimate moral relativism.
“All a man’s ways seem right to him, but the LORD weighs the heart” (Proverbs 21:2). “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death” (Proverbs 14:12, cf. Proverbs 16:25).
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Source: “British hotel replaces Bibles with soft-porn ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’” by Nancy Trejos, USA Today, Jul 26, 2012