stovetop and scandal

(spoiler alert: discussion of scenes from last night's "scandal." if you're a fan of the show and you haven't watched the episode yet, please govern yourself accordingly.)
(trigger warning: discussion of rape/sexual violence)

but first, let's talk about this stovetop commercial i saw last night while watching "scandal."




as soon as the ad finished airing, i tweeted something along the lines of "gee, cultural differences much?" if stovetop = thanksgiving, then i've never had a proper thanksgiving, then. hell, i never even had stovetop until i was well into my 20s. my family played it pretty traditional (read: southern/soul food) when it comes to thanksgiving dinner. yeah, there was turkey, and veggies, and cranberry sauce (s/o to everyone else who grew up with that canned cranberry sauce that you'd slice based on the ridges the can left behind), and there was dressing.

dressing: cooked outside the bird. stuffing: cooked inside the bird. we always had dressing. not stuffing, and certainly not stuffing from a box.

this is not me disparaging stovetop, mind you. i was at a potluck brunch last weekend and someone made a casserole that used stovetop and shredded potatoes and meat and cheese and other so-bad-for-you-it's-good ingredients, and it was delicious. my point is that stovetop, or whoever's in charge of their ad campaign, seems to be a bit tone-deaf on this one. there are plenty of folks who had different thanksgiving traditions - and plenty of folks who don't have thanksgiving traditions at all - and to imply that their holiday celebration or lack thereof hinges on the presence of stovetop just seems wrong, somehow.

and speaking of wrongness (remember those spoiler and trigger warnings i opened this post with? they're coming into play now) - let's talk about last night's episode of "scandal." specifically, let's talk about the scene where mellie gets raped by her father-in-law. let's talk about the fact that there was no warning at the beginning of the episode telling viewers that some of the imagery might be more graphic and upsetting than usual. let's talk about the fact that a fair number of sexual assault/abuse survivors, myself included, watch and enjoy "scandal" on a weekly basis. remember when i was all excited about kerry washington tweeted me? i wear my gladiator badge proudly, as anyone who's subjected to my twitter stream on thursday nights can attest.

but this? this scene was too much, and i know i'm not alone on this b/c my twitter feed is still talking about it 24 hours later. i'm not even going to get into the "hey, let's explain this character's backstory by having them suffer some serious trauma" storytelling trope, b/c there are others who can, have, and will explore that way better than i'm able to.

do networks still have standards and practices departments? are primetime shows exempt from any sort of parental advisory or other warning labels? i don't claim to know what would have been an appropriate warning for this episode, but i really feel like we needed one. we needed to be prepared. we needed to know that this scene might leave us curled up in the fetal position, and that it might bring back memories that we've worked hard to address and deal with in such a way that we can go about our daily lives w/o erupting into all of the feelings, and that maybe, just maybe, one of our favorite shows wouldn't sucker-punch us in this way. we watch "scandal." we're used to shonda and her fellow writers embracing all kinds of crazy. it's part of the show's appeal.

being subjected to a depiction of rape is not appealing. reading comments after the show about how mellie set herself up to be raped and other victim-blaming bullshit is not appealing. finding yourself visibly shaking and drinking all of the wine in an attempt to get yourself under control after a rape scene is not appealing. feeling like shonda and the writers had no concern for your emotional well-being and just sprung the scene on you with no warning like "hahaha let's make our predominately female audience squirm with all of the discomfort" is not appealing.

what's appealing is trying to create a space for yourself where you know you won't be mistreated or disrespected, where your friends and family care about you and support you, where you can, even if it's for the briefest of seconds, not think about the rape/sexual assault/sexual abuse/violence you endured. that's appealing. you watch a frothy drama and you connect with some of the characters and you join a whole family of fellow fans and that's appealing. you watch and you talk and you tweet and you read fan sites and that appeals to you. you settle in on thursday nights (or friday mornings, or whenever you're able) and you watch and you are entertained and then a character gets raped and you did not predict that in all of your discussions about the various plot twists and no one warned you and you are left sitting on the couch practically in tears b/c the one thing you didn't want to think about for at least that hour has now returned to the front of your mind and that is not appealing. at all.

i don't expect a resolution. i don't even expect an apology. what i do want, not only for myself but for all of us survivors and allies who had our hearts broken all over again by this scene, is to regain our ability to create and maintain safe spaces for ourselves. to be surrounded by people who care about and support us. to continue giving voice to the fact that we are here and we'll be damned if we're gonna give up on ourselves. to keep believing and knowing that we are worth every moment of fighting that we've done and will do for ourselves. that's appealing.