E.L. James published the latest installment of her Fifty Shades series, Grey, June 18, and it's unsurprisingly as salacious as the rest of the series.
It's full of whipping and thrusting – the usual – but one detail in particular has caught people's attention: "peeled gingerroot inserted in her ass."
This book is the worst. I'm so sorry. #Grey
Spicy.
The general consensus on Twitter over G in the A seems to be "WTF?"
A PEELED ginger root where??? EL James has just gone too far! Has she lost the fucking plot??? #Grey… https://t.co/yTa8T8FCff
I’ll never eat peeled ginger root again. 😶
Re: Grey - PEELED GINGER?! Really? Like, who thinks that up? You're in the kitchen, making a stir fry, and light bulb!! C'mere, honey!
Why does it need to be "peeled?"
Why is the gingerroot peeled? Is he using the peel to make a cordial? People aren't focusing on the ginger enough https://t.co/0aQCGr8JPA
Will it burn?
@TomChivers A QUESTION FOR SCIENCE: would it burn if you put a peeled fist of ginger up your butthole
But wait, E.L James is not off her rocker after all. Inserting peeled ginger into the anus is a well-established BDSM practice.
"You peel a knob of ginger and pop it up your bum-hole, so rather than tying someone to a rack in BDSM, you reach for your spice rack," sex expert Alix Fox told BuzzFeed.
"It's traditionally called 'figging'. You don't need to leave it there for very long because the oils in the ginger seep out and create a burning tingling sensation that some people find pleasurable," she added.
Embarrassing Bodies presenter Christian Jessen told BuzzFeed that this isn't a practice for the faint-hearted, however.
"If there's any tearing or damage on the anus then you could get some really extreme irritation," he said.
He added, though, that this is in no way a harmful practice. "There are far worse things to stick up your bottom," he said. "Chili is another alternative that might be a bit more extreme, so you could say this is a gateway into the harder stuff. Start with ginger."
Fox recommends that this pursuit be approached with extreme caution: "If you discover that you’re not into it, then you’re quite literally in the shit via your shitter."
"You can't get rid of the sensation for quite a long time. Washing won't work – it's an essential oil, so the sensation will linger."
So now you know.