How Fifty Shades portrays an abusive relationship and tries to pass it off as BDSM: The Serious Stuff

Fifty Shades of Grey book cover

Fifty Shades of Grey, the book that has corrupted the poor sweet middle aged women of our innocent country. This raunchy novella is being made into a movie and is premiering in the UK on valentines day. Disgraceful. Think of the children.

I kid, I kid, there is nothing wrong with sex or enjoying healthy sexual things. The problem with Fifty Shades is that it romanticises an abusive relationship.

This book is notorious for containing frequent and descriptive sexual scenes. These are said to be BDSM. For those of you who don’t know, BDSM is about bondage, discipline, dominance, submission, sadism and masochism. It is safe, sane and completely consensual, which the relationship in Fifty Shades is not.

In the book, a relationship develops between Anastasia (Ana) Steele and Christian Grey. This relationship is supposed to portray a BDSM relationship, but it does not. Instead, this relationship revolves around domestic and sexual abuse.

From the get-go, we can tell that there is little to no emotion in their ‘relationship’. Steele is a virgin with no sexual experience and Grey approaches her with an ultimatum; to sign a contract or leave. This is an emotionless and cold, which is exactly the opposite of what BDSM is supposed to be. After agreeing, Grey manipulates Steele’s virginity to push her boundaries, making it seem like his violent and abusive acts are okay. He also gets annoyed with her being upset after sex, which ignores aftercare, an essential part of BDSM.

There are many examples of sexual abuse in the book. Grey uses alcohol to sway Steele’s judgement and consent. He also ignores her when she uses a safe word, which an extreme act against laws of BDSM and is also ignoring her retraction of consent. Both of these examples are, by law, rape. He also admits at one point that he feels ‘the need to hurt her’.

Unfortunately, there is clear domestic abuse. Steele hides things from Grey out of fear of his anger. He becomes jealous and easily aggressive. There is even a part where Steele fears for her safely. Experts have matched her behaviour to behaviours of abused women, in accordance with the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention’s descriptions of partner violence.

Perhaps the worst thing about Fifty Shades, is the way that this relationship is romanticised and fetishized by the writer. This is incredibly dangerous, as it shows that the way Grey acts in the novel is okay, when it’s actually extremely abusive. 1 in 5 women will experience domestic abuse in their lifetime, so making it seem ‘sexy’ and ‘fun’ is so wrong.

Fifty Shades Entertainment Magazine Promo

BDSM is all about safety and aftercare, the relationship in this book is not. People defend this book because Steele enjoys the sex, continues the relationship and they eventually get married. However Anastasia Steele is not a real person, she does not have her own emotions or make her own judgements or choices. She is manipulated by the author to ignore Grey’s abuse and love him, so that they can have a happy ending. In real life, this is unlikely to happen.

Sex is not the problem here, sex is fine and healthy and should not be demonised in any sense. The problem is that people are going to read the book or see the movie and think those sort of relationships are okay, or healthy, even though they really not.

Please do not go and see Fifty Shades of Grey. Instead spread the word and discourage people from it. Just do not fund the author or the movie producers in any way. Raise awareness and do not let it influence people who don’t know better.