***Trigger/content warning regarding discussions of abusive relationships, abuse/manipulation tactics, and survivors being silenced
Idk if this'll make complete sense and I'm gonna be repetitive because I'm tired, BUT...
I really wish people would pause their reactionary responses to media they view as problematic to THINK for a moment, that maybe (more like oftentimes) the specific problematic elements you VIEW as unsightly or inherently immoral to depict in pieces of art or writing are, factually, AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL ELEMENTS from a survivor's REAL LIFE.
The buzzwords of "romanticization, sexualization, fetishization, normalization" that angry people throw around in debates, almost talking about these things like abstract/distant concepts that could hypothetically cause scary monumentally harmful shifts in social culture/morality/reality via art and writing, are actually real manipulation/abuse tactics (am I using the right phrasing here?) that so many survivors have dealt with at the hands of calculating abusers. It seems obvious to me that the missing piece in a lot of these debates is that people simply don't want to acknowledge the truth that a lot of REAL abusive relationships DO INCLUDE the abuser manipulating their victim(s) to romanticize, sexualize, fetishize, and normalize the abuse they inflict. It's simply, unfortunately, and horrifyingly a fact of life. This is especially true when the victim is a young child, who is impressionable and naive to the world, being influenced and molded by a predatory adult to be more abusable and accessible for their destructive desires, sometimes expertly manipulating them with those previously mentioned tactics for a very long time.
People of all ages who have been through the horrors of abuse, children and teens and adults alike, deserve safe spaces to process these super conflicting, confusing, and contradictory experiences of abuse. Being manipulated by predators to think/feel/act this way is NOT THE VICTIM'S FAULT, and processing the factual ways they were manipulated via art and writing does NOT mean a victim's morality has changed. They're not viewing or creating things through these contextual lenses for nefarious purposes to infect the morality of the masses. It means they are trying to heal, move on, reduce personal triggers with desensitization, and/or extensively analyze the raw truth of what happened so they can prepare/learn in case someone tries to abuse them again. That's only a small handful of valid reasons why a survivor would want to depict upsetting autobiographical abuse in art and writing that seemingly paints it as "good".
It boggles my mind how people talk the talk but don't walk the walk. They say "let's talk about abuse and listen to survivors" then cover their own eyes and ears when the abuse is too uncomfortable, too dark, too raw, too REAL. Yeah, you might be uncomfy hearing/seeing a depiction or romanticized/sexualized/fetishized/normalized abuse, but how do you think the survivor feels after they escaped? How do you think they feel carrying around the lingering weight, the traumatic remnants of being shaped unwillingly by a skilled abuser who made them feel like it was consensual and desired and normal? It's a fucked up reality to deal with and process. This RELATEABLE type of abuse story is NOT some random event that magically pops into existence with a nebulous beginning. There is intention, steps, effort, time, and energy put into morphing these contexts by predators who want to keep their victims hooked, close, needy, and trapped. Reflecting and depicting such contexts is NECESSARY and PRODUCTIVE so people can know the true realities of HOW abuse continues to happen with these tactics. Treating disturbing abuse content that seemingly makes it look "good" as a horrible thing that should never exist, extends to treating SURVIVORS themselves, their abuse stories, and the ways trauma has impacted them are too horrible, too disturbing, too uncomfortable, TOO MUCH to fully acknowledge the existence of. Putting an analytical microscope to the WHOLE TRUTH of many abuse stories makes it TOO REAL and TOO CLOSE for some people's comfort. People act as if these contexts don't happen often, like all the trending buzzwords are not common realities embedded in many abusive relationships, which makes these contexts seem distanced enough that it could never happen to THEM that way. If they treat the TOO Fucked Up Bad Survivors like freaks for depicting truthful recounts of abuse stories, they can stay in their little bubble free from the horrors of what real people have gone through. Cuz their comfort is treated as more important than survivors processing, healing, or transgressively educating.
