Conservative commentator Allie Beth Stuckey warned Christian women that the novel, “It Ends With Us,” is “emotional porn” and encouraged people to stay away from the new movie based on the popular book by Colleen Hoover.
“Whether it’s intentional or not,” said Stuckey, “when you are writing these hot and heavy romantic scenes with a woman and her abuser, you are almost glorifying the abuse. Because women, unfortunately, still get attached to that abusive character.”
‘It Ends With Us’ Draws Mixed Reactions
“It Ends With Us” is a bestselling romance novel published in 2016 by Colleen Hoover that portrays a woman in an abusive relationship, one which Hoover has said is based on that of her own parents.
The movie, starring Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni, Jenny Slate, and Brandon Sklenar, released in the U.S. on Aug. 9 and has grossed over $204 million worldwide as of this writing. The story follows Lily Bloom (Lively), who ends up in an abusive relationship with Ryle Kincaid (Baldoni) and later reconnects with her childhood sweetheart (Sklenar).
Stuckey, who has read the book but not seen the movie, warned her followers away from Hoover’s content. “Women eat up Colleen Hoover books,” said Stuckey. The novel was “super easy to read,” but, Stuckey said, “I had to skip over so many parts. Why? Because [it was] so sexually explicit. It is pornography. It is sexual pornography, and it is also emotional pornography.”
“Can we just say this?” Stuckey asked. “Can we just realize that just because something is fiction, just because you are reading something, does not mean it is ok to consume?”
Women who are struggling with “escapism, with fantasy, with lust…do not need to be reading these books,” and there is no need for women who don’t have these struggles to expose themselves to temptation, she said. Given books like “It Ends With Us,” Stuckey believes it makes sense that women are having thoughts about “sex and promiscuity” as well as being compelled by “this girl boss, god-of-self world that women occupy, this self-empowerment, this self savior complex.”
As the movie’s title suggests, the story is about ending a generational cycle of abuse, and “in general, I think that that is a good message,” said Stuckey. “Of course, I want women to escape their abuser. Of course I want women to be with a guy who is strong in the right way.”
It could be that the book and movie will help some women escape abusive relationships. “That is a good thing,” she said, “but I still would never encourage a woman to consume this kind of content.”
