10 August 10
Glorifying Domestic Violence, or Showing Domestic Violence in a New Light
This is the video with Eminem and Rhianna for the song “Love the Way It Burns” which demonstrates domestic violence. I’d avoided listening to the song for weeks. I have a love/hate relationship with Eminem. I enjoy a lot of his music, but then I hate some of it so much that it makes my stomach turn. I had read so many other blog posts about how other feminists online thought that this song and the video glorified Domestic Violence (DV). As someone who spent a good portion of my junior high years living attached to a DV shelter while my mother worked for it (after leaving an abusive relationship herself), I have a view on DV that hasn’t sat right with so much of what I’ve read, studied, learned about DV over the years.
I chalked up a lot of it class issues. Since so much of what I’ve read has been written by academics, I just assumed that because we’d been poor at the time, that’s why our experiences were different. I started reading the previously mentioned blog posts about how Eminem was taking advantage of Rhianna’s name and publicized abuse to make money, to glorify violent relationships, to further victimize women who are already being victimized. And it took me a while to have the courage to listen to the song or watch the video.
Then a few days ago when I saw it on Flip Flopping Joy, I figured I’d avoided it long enough and should probably watch it. And if you’ve read blog posts or articles or essays or editorials vilifying the video, I highly encourage you to read bfp’s words and to read the words of her commenters.
After reading her post, I felt that my conflicted feelings were safe in that space, I felt safe enough to comment on her site, whereas I didn’t and don’t feel safe commenting on the site of feminists who have complained about the song and video.
And then I read this post, guest-written, over at Pigtail Pals and as I read the words of Melissa D., I began to realize how I felt about this video. And how I am still conflicted, but hopeful after coming to this realization.
I think the vast majority of the people in a relationship that resembles the one we see about in this video, that we hear described in the song, DO NOT consider themselves in an abusive relationship. Whereas the number of people who have studied domestic violence, escaped an abusive relationship, watched a loved one suffer in an abusive relationship will see the abuse immediately and react to that with fury. Abuse should cause a fury reaction. And I think this is how the vast majority of the feminist blog-osphere is reacting, and I’m okay with that reaction, because I agree that abuse is wrong.
But I don’t think this song and this video glorifies abuse. Not entirely at least. Here’s what we know about Rhianna’s abusive relationship with Chris Brown. They had an argument. He says she slapped him. Whether you wanted to or not, you likely saw the images of Rhianna’s bruised and bloody face after he hit her. She didn’t leave him at first. And then she did.
It took the realization that, as a role model, her decisions could influence other victims of domestic abuse to return to their abusers to finally persuade her to stay away from Brown, she told Diane Sawyer on “Good Morning America” Thursday.
Those are the bare and simplified facts. And you know what? I bet Rhianna and Chris didn’t think they were in an abusive relationship. I bet their relationship mirrored that of the couple in the video. I bet it just seemed scary, intense, passionate, overwhelming, heart-breaking, needy, and at times violent. But I don’t think Rhianna ever felt like a victim of domestic violence until after the publicity around the incident that caused her to finally leave him. I doubt it was the first time he’d hit her. And I doubt it was the first time she’d slapped him. But that doesn’t keep it from being abusive, nor does it keep it from being wrong, nor does it keep it from causing widespread fury that the abuse occurred.
But, her leaving Chris and her talking about it publicly was probably watched by a lot of people who never watch Domestic Violence PSA’s or Lifetime movies about abuse, or read about patriarchal underlying causes. I bet there are a lot of women who saw Rhianna leave Chris and were rooting her on. And I bet, and I hope that many of those women who rooted Rhianna on for leaving Chris watch this video, hear this song, and see their relationship mirrored in this video and recognize that passion for the abuse that it is.
I see that recognition in the commenters at Flip Flopping Joy and I see that pattern in the words of Melissa D. And, as I think about it, I see and have seen this pattern in other relationships I’ve known about. Most of which involved couples who were very middle-class, who came from “good” backgrounds. I think of the friend who said she wished her boyfriend WOULD hit her, cause then she could justify leaving him. But because he only broke things when he was angry, she found herself continuing to go back to him, even though he threatened to hit her regularly. I think of the couple where he cheated and she ignored it until she couldn’t and then she attacked him and he took it and it created a pattern where he would abuse her trust, abuse her emotionally, abuse her mentally until she would blow up and attack him physically. And you know what both of these women said when we talked about this? “If it wasn’t for how amazing things are when we make up, I might be tempted to leave.”
But despite this hope, I still feel conflicted. I still believe that low self-esteem for all children (not just girls, because I firmly believe that boys and men who bully women suffer from very low self-esteem) makes abuse more common, especially abuse within romantic relationships. And I fear that the young men who idolize Eminem, who feel that he speaks for them and speaks to them, will see this video and feel their relationship style, their anger, their rage is justified. So while I don’t think this video or song glorifies Domestic Violence, nor glorifies abusive relationships, and while I hope that young women will see themselves reflected in Rhianna, I fear that young men will see themselves reflected in Eminem and cheer while continuing these patterns.
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