Fifty Shades of Grey, both the book and the movie, hide an abusive relationship with erotica and misconstrue the accepted subculture of BDSM. (If you are unaware of BDSM, I encourage you to Wikipedia it, simply to educate yourself.) Before spending your money to see the movie, I would be aware of what the storyline and the characters are actually portraying rather than being ignorant to the blatant facts at hand. It is my job to show you that Christian Grey is an abuser to Anastasia Steele, so that you can make the choice of supporting this movie with all the facts laid out for you. Typical characteristics of an abusive relationship are a complete dominance of the partner, possessive tendencies, creating a feeling of isolation from the other aspects in the partner’s life, verbal or physical threats, and no respect for the partner’s wishes. All of these occur in Fifty Shades multiple times, along with other instances of physical and emotional abuse and dominance of Ana by Christian.
To summarize for the readers who have no knowledge of the storyline, Christian is portrayed as the dream guy of any girl who happens upon a very sexually naïve Ana. Christian coerces Ana into a BDSM contract of which Ana feels completely trapped in. Christian uses this as a weapon to keep Ana as his and keep her as his sexual servant: “you need to learn to manage my expectations”. She can’t even call a friend; otherwise she is “defying him.” In addition, the emotional abuse is blatant. In Chapter 11, Christian manipulates Ana’s emotions by at first making her feel guilty for not wanting to sign the contract, but then sends her flirty emails to make her happy. This switch in emotion and confusion about what the partner wants are key signs of an abusive relationship. These are just a handful of the many examples of an abusive relationship in Fifty Shades that author E.L. James attempts to try to conceal with erotica.
The erotica that he attempts to write through the subculture of BDSM involves dominance and roleplaying. Although Ana is intrigued and is free to enter into this subculture by her own decision, it misrepresents the subculture as abusive. It is absolutely necessary that there is consent by both members of the relationship in BDSM, but in the case of Fifty Shades, there are instances were Ana does not consent, which incorrectly portrays the erotica E.L. James is trying to write about in the first place. This lack of consent is further evidence for an abusive relationship.
I could rant on forever about the flaws in this book and movie, but I’ll end by saying that it is necessary to be aware of the abuse behind the erotica and to ponder why a book about such an abusive relationship made its way so largely into pop culture. Mugs like the one above should not be being produced because Christian Grey is not a romantic heartthrob, but rather a ruthless abuser who does not need to be glorified. Please consider these issues before you go see the movie on a girls’ night out.
Article inspired by:http://theramblingcurl.blogspot.com.au/2014/02/fifty-abusive-moments-in-…