I think GOT is in a completely different category than “Hunger Games”. “Hunger Games” is rated PG-13, it is a dystopian science fiction tale rich with political commentary, and frankly, it’s very realistic, except for the fact that it contains NO sexual violence at all.

All over this planet, 12 year olds are forced into war and violence. This long predated “Hunger Games”. In most parts of the world, 12 years old is almost adult. If you are unaware of that, you’ve been living a very sheltered life.

The world the show depicts is dangerous and brutal, a place where it’s very easy to be killed for what’s in your pocket or for no reason at all. It’s also a sexist patriarchy, in which women have to gain power by manipulating men (unless they have dragons) and a woman has to be an exceptional warrior to be treated as anything resembling an equal. I think it is a completely intentional choice to link the sexism with the high level of violence. Women are in general physically weaker than men, and a world where physical violence is omnipresent is never going to be a happy place for females. The widespread existence of sex workers, and the fact that they are sometimes treated callously, fits in with the totality of that world.

I do not think the especially brutal scenes were meant to be degrading to the sex worker characters but to show you that the males perpetrating the violence are monsters in a society that is often monstruous. I don’t think Joffrey torturing whores shows that the writers think whores are worthless; I think it is a really dramatic item in the accumulated evidence that Joffrey is a psychopath. I think Littlefinger’s sending Ros to be killed is not evidence of her worthlessness but that he is a ruthless, untrustworthy worm who would sell out his grandmother for a good enough price and cheerfully kills people who get in his way.

Yes, some of the male characters are using women as pawns to attack each other, because they are horrible people and the women don’t have the power to prevent it. That does not equate to the authors or producers making a statement that this is OK. The way the male characters treat women is meant to tell you something very meaningful about them. In the world of GOT, male characters who treat women with respect are generally depicted as honorable, and that is one of the things that contributes to their being honorable.

On to Shae and Tyrion. Shae is a complex character and Tyrion is the most complex character in the whole story. I think their story arc is meant to be seen as a horrible, ironic tragedy. The idea that his killing her demeans her or their relationship, or that the show is implying that it was “OK,” is SO completely wrong!

I have not read the books, so I can’t comment on that. But my interpretation is that Shae first saw Tyrion as only a client, but eventually came to have real affection for him, and possibly actually loved him. Unfortunately, she was delusional in thinking she could ever be anything but his secret and in dismissing the danger she was in. I think that’s inconsistent with the practical and intelligent woman she was supposed to be. I found myself screaming, “Take the money and go, you idiot! Varys is trying to save your goddamned life!” Making her act stupidly was the element of the plot that pissed me off, not her ultimate fate. Sibel Kekilli is a terrific actress, but no matter how she played this, Shae was going to look stupid. She played it as if Shae was acting out of jealousy and unable let go, which was probably the best choice she had.

There is no question in my mind whatsoever that Tyrion loved Shae, desperately. It is obvious in the dialogue and even more obvious in Peter Dinklage’s performance. He said hateful things to her because nothing else he tried was successful in getting her to leave and he knew Tywin was going to kill her to spite him. He didn’t believe a word of it and it devastated him to say it. If he wasn’t who he was he would have married her in a heartbeat.

I think the circumstances of Shae testifying against Tyrion are ambiguous. We are never told how it came about, but my reaction when I watched is that she probably had no choice to cooperate to save her own skin … but she was angry at Tyrion anyway and because of that twisted the knife more than she needed to. I didn’t immediately assume that she purposefully offered to betray him, but she didn’t have to be as spiteful as she was, and THAT was indeed a betrayal. Regardless of her motives, seeing her there was heartbreaking for Tyrion.

Was Shae in Tywin’s bed because she chose to be, either for monetary gain, to get back at Tyrion or both? Or did she really have little choice other than to cooperate with Tywin’s desire to hurt Tyrion as badly as he possibly could? It could be either or both. Regardless, they were both shocked and horrified to come face to face with each other.

Shae draws a knife because an angry man who has good reason to be really pissed off at her walked into the room with a crossbow and she doesn’t have any other options, not because she WANTS to kill Tyrion. It’s obvious he didn’t come there to kill her, because he had no idea she was there. But if you were her would you take the chance that he won’t? If she interprets his intentions wrong she’s dead. If she yells for Tywin, she’s also dead because Tyrion will have to shut her up. If she does nothing and lets it play out, Tywin will probably kill her either for doing nothing or to spite Tyrion. She’s fucked and they both know it, and as soon as she pulls the knife she has doomed at least one of them to die.

At first Tyrion doesn’t know what the hell he is going to do, but once Shae pulls out the knife he knows he has to kill her, both to keep her from killing him and to keep her from warning his father of his presence. He is also really angry, and seeing her in his father’s bed feels in his gut like the biggest betrayal possible. She may have been coerced but he hardly has the time to think it through intellectually. It adds to the white-hot ball of rage inside him that made him pick up the crossbow in the first place. His anger makes it more possible to kill her, but he does it because he has to.

That scene is horrible and heartbreaking, one of the most emotionally wrenching things I’ve seen in a long time. If you think Tyrion kills Shae with little thought or remorse, I think you are blinded by your ideology.

Does Tyrion walk in there intending to kill Tywin? I think he does, but if Shae hadn’t been there, and Tywin hadn’t disparaged her, he might not have been able to go through with it. Tywin’s using someone he really loved against him, twisting one of the few truly joyful things in his life into something nasty, sealed the deal. Tyrion doesn’t tell Tywin he is sorry because he doesn’t want to give him that satisfaction, not because he feels no remorse.

And now I’ll get off my soapbox.

The producers of game of thrones are fucked up. PERIOD.
There were so many things that I couldn’t believe I was seeng I lost count. Never mind the incest, children killing children, lots of children playing roles involving sexual violence.

In season one there is a scene where Kalisi (sp?) and a slave girl (dear to her heart of course) are talking about dragons- and the queen wants to know how the slave happens to know so much about dragons. The slave girl smiles and says “men talk when they are happy” she goes on to explain how she was nine when her mother sold her to the ‘pleasure house’, to which the queen appears shocked, however the slave girl LAUGHS and with a huge smile assures the queen: “oh Kalisi! I wouldn’t service men for another three years!” PHEW. At least she was twelve when she started fucking in the ‘pleasure house’. It almost comes off as the punch line of a sick joke.

Then there’s the kiddie porn. We have parents getting arrested for taking innocent photos of their kids in bubble baths, but HBO can present what amounts to kiddie porn during an episode of game of thrones. The scene opens with a view of what seems to be the backyard of the brothel. We see whores and their naked babies bathing. The producers presented a fully naked frontal shot of a little boy about 2 or 3 years old. Camera pans upwards and we now see the brothel owner looking out of the window down towards the whores and babies. His look gives us the distinct feeling that he is viewing ‘his property’. Camera now pans with him into the room where we find him coaching two of his whores in the fine art of ‘faking it’ to clients. Because we all know that whores ‘fake it’. During this part of the scene we also get to see a simulated pussy fisting between the two women. I don’t know about YOU, but my mind doesn’t like naked babies edited directly into a scene with adult sexual content. They damn well knew exactly what they were doing.

NO NO NO. I have to ask myself how many people watched this scene and didn’t blink. Hollyweird is renown for its pedophiles. If they simply used bad judgment in editing, I must seriously question the mind set of who wrote, filmed, produced and edited that scene.

Game of thrones is garbage of the lowest order. The really sad thing is how many kids watch this show. When I did research regarding what parents thought about this show, I found that lots of kids were reviewing it. Ages 13 on up. Some admitted their parents did not know they were watching. Seasons one and two featured numerous episodes with children killing, being killed, or killing each other. With shows like this, hunger games, etc., no I’m not surprised to see cases on the rise involving 12 year olds killing each other.

Shows like this don’t help us. Not as sex workers or or as human beings.

P.S. MUCH LOVE

Still, it’s disturbing how much violence against women the producers added that wasn’t even in the book. I really would have liked to see the strong, independent madam of the brothel instead of littlefinger.