Eminem and Rihanna recently released a video to their song "Love the Way You Lie." The video portrays a violative relationship played by Megan Fox and Dominique Monaghan. The characters vacillate between yelling and punching each other and kissing and caressing. Rihanna and Eminem tell the characters' story while a house burns as a backdrop.
The video seems to avoid making commentary on ending abuse. Rather, it simply states the complicated nature of love and physical pain in abusive relationships. Megan Fox donated her salary for the video to an organization seeking to end domestic violence.
Even though the video seeks to display an artistic interpretation of violent relationship, I am concerned that the video glamorizes violence, sex, and love as symbiotic interrelationships. So often narratives in film, television, and music videos show men aggressively and even violently forcing themselves on women. At first the woman resists and attempt to dissuade the man, and then at some point she gives into the man and an passionate love scene ensues.
This narrative greatly concerns me because it makes a woman's "no" negotiable. It is depicted that the woman is turned on by the man who is either physically or verbally aggressive with her. What are the implications of this for women's lives? How does this effect women in abusive relationships? Does this tell her she should stay in the relationship because love can be shown through violence?
Sometimes the narrative does not show violence, but it does depict a man who is very persistent with a woman who resists his advances at first. I watched the film "The Last Song" recently. In that narrative, the love story ensues from a teenage guy who continues to pursue a young woman who repeatedly tells him she is uninterested. He wears down her resolve slowly and their first kiss happens after an argument. While she is telling him her annoyances, he grabs her face and begins kissing her. She gives in and appears to have wanted his advance.
The two narrative examples--the music video and the movie--both depict similar trends in entertainment. They show women resisting a man and then giving into him. They make "no" not to mean "no." This depicts a dangerous misconception that could have severe implications for men and women. Men are taught that a woman's will is negotiable and women are taught that romance occurs out of a dynamic of male strength and female weakness.
