...to ask MN-ers NOT to join in this glorification of domestic abuse? (contains spoilers)

[Floundering]

Fifty Shades of Shite

Can't believe the naivety and abuse deniers on here and amongst my friends.

DV campaigners such as Womens Aid & National Centre for Domestic Violence are urging people not to see this film.

It is not "just a piece of fun" it normalises abusive, controlling relationships as sexy, and it really bothers me so many women are colluding in supporting such crap that could hurt other more vulnerable women.

The BDSM community are frothing too as if done properly between 2 consenting adults with lots of planning, mutual respect and lots of affection and downtime after it can, for some, apparently be mindblowing. ( doesn't lift my skirt but respect those who do enjoy) this is not portrayed safely in this film.

experienced adults.. hadn't identified the rape/abuse scenes in the book for what they were, how easy will this be?

Yes 100x to the fact that the BDSM marketing is a red herring. Go all the way back to the first page and you'll see one of the first posts defending the books said something like "you obviously don't understand bdsm!!"

When is the average person exposed to BDSM enough to know what its all about? Thats a genuine question, I'm from the age of the internet and I was well aware when I was a teenager through my own research because I wanted an explanation for my feelings. Does the average person with no interest just blindly follow whoever talks about it first? I don't know, but that could explain to an extent the utter lack of knowledge on safe practices which have always been paramount in any dealings i've had with "real" kinksters.

Rape was covered in sex education at high school, but not the type we are seeing rearing its ugly head today. To that extent I believe for every victim who comes forward to say that they have been in a similar situation to the Ched Evans case, there will be 3 other women who will not come forward as they genuinely don't know/ believe that they have been raped. And this is a huge problem, because until all women believe it, how can we stop men (especially young men) from stopping it? I think many women still think of rape in the terms of strangers and dark parks at night.

I'm not sure I answered the question, it definitely needs thought.

In the book be never says his tastes are normal in fact he says the opposite and that he is unique to to group with bdsm is wrong. The boathouse if I remember she had consented to his world and know fully what he was likely. At the end of the day it is fiction

house yes I think it is seen as normal.

www.theguardian.com/society/2015/feb/11/teenage-girls-coerced-sex-survey

Definitely. On MN "oh he's not jealous/ possessive, he's just showing how much he loves me" is a cliche, in real life I hear it all the time and its soooo wrong!!

People do change thought it is possible granted you can't change someone they have to change by themselves.

house there are also women who don't even ask the question whether it's rape, it's more like "I don't like it when ..." and they are describing something that is rape.

The whole "you'll like it eventually" message is very dangerous.

The French have give it a 12 certificate it glorifY's nothing

And I still don't understand why a fantasy about committing rape = great, let's role play, whereas a fantasy about committing child abuse (or similar) = seek help and counselling.

There is a difference.
Rape fantasy isn't actually fantasising about being raped (having sex against your wishes). It is a fantasy about being out of control, being wanted so much you are taken, the desire being so strong that it has to happen. It only has that genuine excitement with a consenting partner where the ground rules have been agreed and the role play and boundaries have been discussed. There is no overlap into real life. Calling it rape fantasy probably isn't an accurate description of it, but I can't think of a better title to give it.

Child abuse is never acceptable in any form. There are no ways of pretending to enact child abuse that are safe, consenting and acceptable. There are people who dress up as children and there are adult babies, but they are obviously adults. People who do that, don't actually want to abuse children and I don't believe they are doing it to avoid abusing children. They want the care and vulnerability of an adult/child relationship, but with a consenting adult.

Someone who genuinely fantasises about rape or child abuse, should probably seek help.

And I think there is some confusion over the term "role-play"
We don't role-play as such. We don't play a different person to ourselves or enact a particular situation. But I do sometimes pretend by saying 'no' or objecting, when I actually mean, 'yes carry on, I'm just going to make you work harder for it' or 'use a bit more force'. If I want him to stop, then I can say 'stop', and he does (without fail). There is complete trust. I personally don't consider that to be role-play, but there is an element of pretence so some people would say that it was.

Lots of people don't understand what consent actually is.

Exactly, and the reactions to this book make it more difficult to understand, also showing that many people still don't understand, thus perpetuating the misconceptions.
It is important that someone does call what happens in the book for what it is.

Saying 'it's fiction' doesn't change the underlying messages. Fictional media has a massive impact on people's worldview and repeated studies have shown that people are more likely to absorb and agree with messages presented as fiction at first than if presented as nonfiction.

The fact that two of the most popular couples being promoted this Valentines Day are both very unhealthy abusive relationships, this one and the Joker/Harley Quinn one (which was also originally rated as 12+ -- in a cartoon for kids) and are being promoted and sold as 'love' and 'romantic' and something to aspire to says a lot about how the media and cultural systems that make and back it still approves of and wants to sell these unequal, power dominated worldviews from the young up.

People are going on as though this is the one and only film/book in the world.
Even if people were stupid enough to think it is not a fiction but an instruction manual on how to have a relationship, there are a gazillion other films and books out there which portray a more conventional relationship to balance it out.

There was a thread on MN a week or so ago from a man who was trying to get his wife to re-engage with him intimately. He described how he liked to be adventurous and do things that had worked "with other women" and was disappointed that his wife didn't go for them, or wasn't prepared to try them to see if she liked them, or if he DID try them out on her she didn't have the "right" reaction.

He got blasted for it (rightly) because he shouldn't have expected that what worked on one woman would work on every woman (and because he didn't willingly accept that she was different in her needs, he wanted her to want what he did and like what he did, because other women apparently did)

Mismatched sex requirements, obviously - but I can see where Maryz and others are coming from because it IS possible that there are men who hear/read that some women enjoy the idea of rape/rape fantasies and then think that would apply to most women. Not ALL men are going to do that of course - but there would be a proportion of men who would think that. And that's the scary bit.

I get that thumbwitch but what about in reverse that women who read things or watch thing or hear from celebrities that men like something up their bums and then think all men like it. It is not just men that can generalise like that it happens the other way. I bought a board game for my husband and I to play and a lot of the cards say under the female section to put a finger up his arse or something else like but plug or lick. The male section of these involve hardly no to no anal play on the woman. It works both ways

It's not the same in reverse though. Men are socialised to feel entitled to sex from women the way they want it and women are socialised to accommodate men. That doesn't mean every person is like that but it does affect people generally.

But "in reverse" is not what's under discussion here. What IS under discussion here is the portrayal of an abusive relationship (man abusing woman) under the guise of a romantic love story, with BDSM involvement.
Women can't rape men, men can rape women. Men see "some women enjoy being forced/ rape fantasies" and SOME of them will think that applies to more women than it does.
That is scary because some men will then act that out on other women, because it's what they've learnt from a book/film/the internet.

If I saw that some men liked a finger up their arse, I would ASK my DH first if he liked that (he doesn't), not just have a go. BUt rape fantasies don't really work like that, do they? As the point is that there is not meant to be any consent. Decent men will ask first of course; arrogant ones won't, they'll just have a go.

And really, the last thing any of us need (who are not into rape fantasies) is to have reinforced the idea that "no doesn't really mean no" - we've (women collectively) been struggling to make it plain that "No MEANS no!" not "if you keep going I might change my mind".

Women can rape men and to b say that men can't be raped by women is very offence. I realise the reverse is not on debate but we only ever talk about domestic abuse a nd sexual abuse in the terms of women are the victim and men the guilty

No one is debating that no means no that would only change of discussedbat length before hand and agreed by both parties

Great post, Wine.

It's not offensive, it's legally the case. Women can't rape men. They can sexually assault them but they can't rape them. Only other men can rape men.

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