TW: emotional abuse, abusive relationship, rape culture
Shonda Rhimes makes
excellent television. She creates fascinating characters and gives them
horrifying, heart-wrenching obstacles to face and overcome. She is an
undisputed queen of scarring her fan base emotionally. Part of that comes from
her innate ability to weave the most intricately tragic stories that we can't
stop watching no matter how much she hurts us. However, another part of it
comes from her unwavering devotion to developing unhealthy relationships on her
shows.
As an avid viewer of
all four of the patented TGIT shows (Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal, How
To Get Away With Murder, and most recently, The Catch), I get a
front seat to the consent issues and red flags that run rampant in those
relationships. Consider her first epic project, Grey’s Anatomy, the
medical drama that is now entering its 13th season. It is the
product of an absolutely brilliant, finger-on-the-pulse (pun intended)
mis-en-scene. All the ingredients combine perfectly to bring us a show that is
smart, funny, sexy, and emotionally draining. But the reason that the sexy and
the emotionally draining go hand-in-hand is a testament to how ingrained rape
culture is in this world.
As positive as the
characters and speeches in Shondaland can be for feminism, the shows are still
guilty of perpetuating rape culture. I am not blaming Shonda Rhimes for this.
It is impossible to hold one person accountable for an entire cultural mindset
and institutionalized power dynamics. The issue I take with her work is merely
that she is a television genius who manufactures pop culture phenomena on the
regular by utilizing, rather than challenging, a very specific and very
rape-friendly formula.
Anyone who has watched
both Grey's Anatomy and Scandal must recognize the similarities in the structure of their
two main romances: the MerDer (Meredith Grey and Derek Shepherd) and Olitz
(Olivia Pope and Fitz Grant) relationships, respectively. An unhappily married
man has fallen out of love with his wife- an extremely ambitious, accomplished,
and badass woman who was with him from his humble beginnings- and proceeds to
fall head-over-heels with a younger, up-and-coming force of nature with daddy
issues, mommy issues, and walls up to guard her against intimacy. But the married
man is enchanted now. He is too enchanted by her to respect the walls, his
wife, or the repeated rejections from our heroine. They end up in a tumultuous
and devastating relationship on which the ratings depend, and we all eat it up.
We have been conditioned to accept it over centuries of reinforcing the idea
that love means stopping at nothing until you get a “yes,” and that when a
woman's string of “no”s finally gives way to a tired, tearful “yes” that she is
saying it of her own free will, and not because she’s just been worn down.
Fortunately, I have
encountered plenty of critical Shondaland viewers who see through this in both
of the aforementioned relationships. These viewers don't think Grey's
Anatomy's Derek Shepherd is as McDreamy as the writers do. They call Scandal’s
Fitzgerald “Fuck Boy” Grant's manipulative antics abuse. This is even
occasionally acknowledged in-universe, albeit very rarely. Meredith actually
tells Derek that he is sexually harassing her in episode 1x02 “The First Cut Is
the Deepest,” which is refreshing even though it shouldn’t have to be. Similarly,
Olivia confronts Fitz about the way he abuses his power as President to tip the
scales in their relationship in episode 2x03 “Hunting Season” when she says “I
am not yours; I don’t show up places because you want me.”
These moments of
recognition might have something to do with the fact that those characters are
men. It is easier for us to identify a man abusing a woman than it is for us to
identify a woman abusing a man or another woman. That bias is a result of the
gender binary that we are conditioned to believe exists. We view men as
physically strong and emotionally repressed and women as physically weak and
nurturing. This perception of masculinity makes men the perfect abusers because
they can hurt people and they are also insensitive to the pain they cause. So
what happens when we, who generally accept the abuse we recognize from a man
directed at a woman, see abuse coming from a woman and directed at another
woman? Well, judging by the fan reactions to the lesbian couple on Grey’s
Anatomy, I’d say that we don’t even know it’s occurring. I speak now of
Shondaland's most persistent same-sex relationship: Calzona, the partnership of
bisexual Callie Torres and lesbian Arizona Robbins.
The two met when
Arizona was introduced in season 5. They had a child together and got married
in season 7, but they broke up and finalized their divorce in season 11. Even
now, as Grey’s embarks upon its 13th season,
the fans have clung to Calzona during their six seasons of on-again-off again
romance. They have clung to this couple so ferociously, in fact, that some of
them went so far as to send Samantha Sloyan, who portrays Callie's current love
interest, Penny, real life hate mail via Twitter. In their devotion to Calzona,
these fans seem content to overlook how emotionally abusive Arizona is.
As a bisexual Latina,
I strongly identify with Callie. I idolize her. She is vulnerable and fierce
and unapologetic and always the first to grant forgiveness to those who have
wronged her. She dances in her underwear and inspires me to be a goddess, as
she proclaims to be. So perhaps I am biased and overprotective of this idol
when it comes to her love interests, but I have never liked Arizona for her.
I've never trusted her. I felt that way since season 5 and, as much as I wanted
to enjoy the lesbian couple I was given, Arizona kept justifying my distrust.
But it’s not a personal opinion when I say that she is an abusive partner.
Arizona is emotionally
manipulative. Her most effective tactic is using guilt to make Callie feel bad
about herself and about the level of commitment that she puts into their
relationship. One of the main points she uses to make Callie feel guilty is to
attack and belittle Callie's identity as a bisexual woman. This might seem like
a non-issue to anyone who is monosexual (only attracted to one gender) but it's
actually a devastating form of abuse.
When we were
introduced to Callie in season 2, we assumed she was straight. She had not come
out to anyone yet, namely because she hadn't even come out to herself. She
pursued loveable fuck up, George O'Malley, as he continuously allowed his
friends to get in the way of their relationship. Then things got too intense
too soon in season 3 when he hastily proposed marriage to her while grieving the
death of his father. Their impulsive decision to get married caught up with
them when George soon cheated on her with Izzie and his infidelity destroyed
Callie’s self-esteem, sense of self-worth, and even her ability to manage her
new promotion to Chief Resident.
After their divorce,
Callie established a friendship with- and promptly fumbled through a confusing
crush on- Cardio attending Erica Hahn through the second half of season 4.
Their relationship awkwardly blossomed through the beginning of season 5,
helping them both realize how completely not straight they truly are. But
almost immediately after it started, Erica brutally abandoned the relationship
when Callie revealed that her attraction to women does not negate her
attraction to men. It was there in season 5, shortly after Erica's harsh
departure, that Arizona approached the heartbroken Callie Torres in the
bathroom of Joe's bar with a sudden kiss and the promise of a new love
interest.
For many viewers this
was an exciting new development. For queer women in particular it meant we were
getting a new Sapphic pairing that would actually be canon. We are usually
accustomed to reading into things that never flourish- overanalyzing certain
dialogue and what we swear we're not imagining because look at that longing
glance again!- between canonically straight female characters. This moment had
such a strong impact on viewers that many of them still celebrate and hope for
Calzona even a full season-and-a-half after their divorce. The celebration was
short-lived for me, however. As their relationship progressed, I quickly found
that I could not tolerate Arizona and the condescending way she consistently
treats Callie, all because of her bisexual identity. Throughout the course
of their relationship, Arizona's biphobia and reliance on bisexual stereotypes
stand out, not just as fear or disgust of Callie's sexuality, but as a tool
that Arizona utilizes to enact emotional and psychological abuse.
1. Not Gay Enough
After the initial
Calzona kiss in the bar bathroom in 5x14 “Beat Your Heart Out,” Callie spends
an entire episode freaking out about it to her BFF Mark and then finally gets
the courage to pursue this new love interest. In doing so, she explains to
Arizona that Erica was the first and only woman she had experience with.
Arizona's response to this is to turn her down. And that’s fine. It is
perfectly within her rights to turn Callie down, even though she was the one
who initiated it. She just changed her mind. That's not the problem.
The problem is in the
way she turns her down. When Arizona backtracks upon finding out that Callie
had only ever been with Erica before, she talks down to her, playing some
patronizing elite elder queer bullshit to belittle Callie’s queer experience.
“I work in Peds,
I spend my entire day around newborns so I try not to in my personal life.”
As a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community, I am insulted by this behaviour. It’s not an inaccurate presentation; intra-community hierarchy is very real and very disrespectful. But to see this come from the mouth of someone who we are supposed to like, and to see it directed at someone who had just gotten her heart broken for not being “gay enough” in her first gay relationship, is a problem. And it’s a problem that I don’t think was ever adequately fixed on the show.
Everyone in our LGBTQ+
community has found their way here through their own unique experiences. Some
of us know from an early age. Some of us have to try things out for years-
decades!- before we have our realizations. Some of us are constantly shifting
and changing the labels we use to identify ourselves. And all of it is okay.
Every single one of those experiences is valid. Arizona calling a grown woman
“a baby” because she only dated men until her 30s is offensive. It's smug,
ignorant, biphobic, and I would even argue that it’s sexist because she is
infantilizing Callie and defining her based on her sexual history.
2. Deceitful
Much to my
displeasure, Callie and Arizona eventually start dating in the second half of
season 5. When Callie’s father comes to town to kick the living shit out of
cheating ex-son-in-law George, she introduces Arizona as “the person I’m seeing
now.” Papa Torres is furious. He disowns Callie. He disinherits her and leads
the rest of the family to stop speaking to her, only to come back in 6x05
“Invasion” with the family priest in order to “pray away the gay.”
This is serious
business. In a country where conversion therapy and straight camps are a
harrowing reality, Callie’s father bringing in a priest to make his daughter
straight is an extremely serious storyline to portray. Callie, who has already
been emotionally and financially cut off by her family at this point, turns to
her girlfriend for support during this surprise homophobic intervention, and
Arizona defends Callie’s father. She offers no sympathy and then delivers
another haughty elder queer speech to justify his homophobia.
ARIZONA: He
hasn’t done anything here. You’re the one who changed the game.
CALLIE: You didn’t
expect a little understanding when you came out to your parents?
ARIZONA: I never had
boyfriends. Ever. I had a poster on my wall of Cindy Crawford and I wasn’t just
looking at her mole. It wasn’t news to my mom when I brought home somebody
named Joanne. But you? You dated men your whole life. You loved men. You even
married one. You wanna talk about 30 years of a relationship? He’s been
consistent for 30 years. And all of a sudden, you’re a whole new girl. So cut
him some slack.
Arizona is literally saying that it’s Callie’s
own fault that her father is being homophobic. She is saying that it’s okay for
her father to bring a priest to stage a traumatic intervention, because in his hetero-normative
view, Callie is a straight woman and he has a right to be shocked and disgusted
by her queerness.
Furthermore, Arizona
is driving the point home by describing how superior she is at being gay.
Everyone knew that Arizona was gay from a young age. They could just tell,
unlike with Callie who doesn’t fit into the community as easily. Arizona didn’t
face any issues with her family not accepting her and now she is telling Callie
that this is how coming out is supposed to work, that the level of acceptance
you receive is dependent on how you conform to ideas about sexuality, not on
your family being decent human beings or anything. Arizona is saying that her
family supported her coming out because she never deceived them by bringing
home boyfriends. She is suggesting that she deserved acceptance because she was
consistent, while Callie deserves the homophobia she’s facing from her family
because her path was more complicated and it’s her own fault for not knowing
sooner. Arizona is belittling Callie’s experience as a queer woman once again,
simply because she didn’t grow up knowing that about herself.
Callie’s father
assumed that because Callie liked men that she would only ever like men. Not
only was he wrong to assume that but he is outrageously wrong as a parent to
allow this new information to affect how he treats her. Yet, Arizona tells
Callie that his reaction is okay. She makes Callie out to be the unreasonable
one. “Give him room to be a little shocked,” she says, as if it’s even his
business at all who Callie is sleeping with! Arizona is literally choosing
allegiance to a homophobe over a bisexual woman, specifically, the bisexual
woman she is dating. She is even blaming the homophobia on the bisexual woman
rather than on the homophobe.
3. Confused
Despite Arizona’s
tendency to invalidate Callie’s sexuality, they continue dating to the point
where Callie starts thinking about having children with her. When Callie brings
the idea up casually, Arizona is adamant about not wanting children. This makes
Callie nervous about the relationship and she realizes that they have to
confront this issue if they want to have a future together. When she tries to
have a serious talk about having children, Arizona immediately asks if the talk
will be a confession that Callie is cheating on her with Mark.
This question comes
out of nowhere. Callie has been committed to the relationship and has even
endured being ostracized and cut off by her family because of it. Arizona is
the one who has resisted moving forward on numerous occasions but, because
Callie is bisexual, her loyalty is always questionable. Even when the
accusation comes completely out of left field, Arizona feels that she has every
right to worry about Callie’s monogamy.
“Are you one of those
fake lesbians just having a vacation in Lesbian Land?”
First of all, the term “fake lesbian” is
completely offensive. Sexuality is a fluid, ever-evolving thing. It lives on a
vast spectrum of experiences and identities. Not all women who get involved
with other women identify as lesbians. “Fake lesbian” is a term that holds no
actual meaning. All it does is erase other totally valid identities a woman who
dates women might claim, such as bisexual, pansexual, and asexual, to name a
few.
Secondly, Callie
determined that she isn’t a lesbian before Arizona was even introduced on the
show. She had not used the term “bisexual” to describe herself yet, which is a
major flaw with the way queer characters are portrayed in the media in general,
but she did declare in season 5 that she is interested in both men and women.
She even got dumped by Erica because of it. Arizona knew this getting into the
relationship. So to now accuse her of lying about her sexuality when she has
only ever been completely upfront about it reinforces the harmful stereotype
that bisexual people are greedy and unfaithful. Arizona isn't just paranoid
that Callie is cheating on her. Her specific fear is that Callie is cheating on
her with a man, suggesting that a lesbian could cheat on her with another woman
and Arizona would not hold it against her in the same way. This is an
irrational fear uniquely reserved for bisexual people and is 100% biphobia.
Thirdly, back in 5x16
“An Honest Mistake” when Arizona decided to turn Callie down because she wasn't
a seasoned lesbian, she said that this would be a new and exciting time for
Callie. On the surface, this might have seemed like Arizona was encouraging
Callie to experiment with more women (just not her). However, given her panic
in season 6 and how quickly she assumes Callie would cheat on her with a man,
this adds another layer to that initial scene when she turned Callie down. In
that scene, Arizona acted on her underlying fear that Callie was not serious
about pursuing this. Callie just got out of a relationship that helped her
realize things about herself and her sexuality that is not terribly easy to
navigate at any age. But it was an experience and an identity that Callie was
fully claiming. Arizona's implications dismiss Callie's sense of self. She was
basically talking over Callie and making the decision for her based on
preconceived notions she holds about bisexual people being confused about what
we want.
4. Hypersexual
After a short story
arc of Callie trying to make it work with Arizona despite her desperate desire
to have a baby, they break up. Note: their break up was entirely due to their
different feelings about having kids. That's what it was about. Nothing else.
But because Callie has been insecure about her bisexuality ever since she first
discovered it, and Arizona has done nothing but reinforce that insecurity,
Callie lets it fester. When she finally confronts Arizona about it after the
break up, Arizona wastes no time turning it around to lay the blame on Callie's
bisexuality.
CALLIE: When are you
gonna forgive me for not being a good enough lesbian for you?
ARIZONA: When you do
something to convince me that you’re falling in love with me and not with being
in love. When you do something to convince me that I’m different than George
O’Malley, Erica Hahn, Mark Sloan, or that girl at the coffee cart. I mean, you
have a huge heart and I love that about you, but I don’t trust you. Why would
I?
Arizona is holding Callie's romantic history
against her. Callie has had three sexual relationships in the four years before
Arizona. She was committed to George from season 2 until their divorce in
season 4, she explored her feelings for Erica in the beginning of season 5, and
she had casual sex with Mark when she wasn't in an exclusive relationship. This
is a pretty unspectacular record. Arizona's prejudice against bisexual women
hypersexualizes Callie in an attempt to minimize and invalidate Callie's feelings.
This is especially harmful because, in addition to being bisexual, Callie is a
Latina.
People of the Latinx
community are fetishized for this hypersexual stereotype. This is why “Latina”
is its own porn category. The hot, easy Latina caricature is something
that every Latina contends with. Arizona is being insensitive to Callie's
identity while also using it against her to justify her own paranoia. All this
after a break up that was supposed to be about having kids. Arizona accuses
Callie of being untrustworthy, but she isn't exactly honest about her feelings
and motivations. She said they were breaking up because she didn't want to
stand in the way of Callie having children. This made her seem like a martyr,
making a sacrifice for Callie's happiness. But the second Callie tries to
address the biphobia, Arizona implies that her “oversexed” bisexuality was the
real problem in their relationship.
5. Unfaithful
Swept up in the
aftermath of the shooter who targeted their hospital in the season 6 finale, Calzona
gets back together. Arizona decides that having children is worth it as long as
she has them with Callie, saying “I can't live without you and our ten kids.”
However, while they were broken up, Arizona applied for a research grant that
would send her to Malawi for three years. It turns out she won the grant.
Callie chooses to go to Malawi with her but they break up again when Arizona
decides that Callie isn't enthusiastic enough to come with her. She abandons
Callie in the airport because she has no tact or ability to compromise.
Heartbroken, Callie
turns to Mark for emotional support and rebound sex. One night, a tearful
Arizona returns to Callie's doorstep with a speech about how she left the grant
research behind because she was miserable in Malawi without her. Callie closes
the door on her. After repeated attempts to get back with her- including
camping outside the apartment as well as buying out Callie's subletters (which
is actually by-the-book stalker behaviour)- Callie tells her that she wants
nothing to do with her. Arizona ignores this.
At the end of 7x12
“Start Me Up,” an episode that begins with Callie detailing exactly why she
doesn't want to get back together (which goes over stubborn Arizona's head),
Callie explains that she is pregnant with Mark's baby. Arizona's reaction to
this, beginning in 7x13 “Don't Deceive Me (Please Don't Go)” and lasting
through the entirety of Callie's pregnancy, is horrific and possessive. She
starts by giving Callie a guilt trip about sleeping with a man while she was
single and free to do so.
“I’m mad that you
slept with someone else. And I know that we were broken up, but you slept with
someone else. And I’m even madder that that person has a penis. And I know that
you are bisexual, I know that.”
She is upset that Callie had sex with someone
else after she abandoned Callie in an airport. That is sort of understandable.
Even though Arizona was the one who just walked away for what was supposed to
be three years and ended the relationship without trying to work on the issue.
She was apparently torn up about her selfish and thoughtless decision and
didn't expect Callie to move on so quickly. But ultimately, that's just tough
shit.
You don't get to cut
someone out of your life and then expect them to still be right where you left
them when you try to muscle your way back in. You don't get to break someone's
heart and then get mad at them for rebounding. And you especially don't get to
get mad that the person they slept with has different genitalia than you. This
anger is Arizona being frustrated that she couldn't control Callie and police
her sexuality. She is blaming her anger that Callie chose to do this on
Callie's bisexuality instead of the fact that she just wants to contain
Callie's sexuality. It's none of her business who Callie had sex with when they
were broken up, so long as Callie is upfront about any STIs she might be
passing on. Arizona has no reason whatsoever to be upset that Callie's partner
has a penis, and it is actually biphobic, as well as transmisogynistic, of her
to make an issue of it.
6. Greedy
Over the next few
episodes, Arizona comes to accept the pregnancy and Callie's invitation to be
involved in it. But Arizona doesn't know how to be in a relationship with
Callie without controlling Callie. Her first order of business is to move
Callie's things back in from Mark's apartment without asking Callie if she
wants this. Then, when Callie tries to stop her, she tells Callie that they are
back together rather than having a conversation with her about what that means.
She gives this disturbing speech that is meant to be romantic but is actually
just terrifying and abusive- which I think audiences would recognize if a man
had made the same speech.
“You don't get to tell
me that we're not together. We are together. Because I love you and you love me
and none of the rest of it matters. We are together. And if you ever sleep with
anyone else again, I will kick the crap out of you. Now you sit your ass back
down there because that's my baby in there and I don't want anything happening
to my baby!”
This is not a cute declaration of someone in
love, it's a threat. The problem is that people don't see it as a threat when a
tiny blonde lesbian is saying it. But it is abuse. She is telling Callie that
she no longer has a choice, and making her feel like that's really true by
promising physical violence if she disobeys. It doesn't matter that Arizona
would probably never actually lay a finger on Callie, or that she might have
simply meant it as a figure of speech; putting that threat out there is
psychologically abusive.
Arizona continues to
exercise this over-bearing control over Callie when she starts telling her what
she’s allowed to eat and drink during the pregnancy, disregarding the research
Callie had done, and robbing her of autonomy. She also constantly complains
about and berates Mark, who is not only the father of their child but Callie’s
best friend. Alienating a partner from their friends is a major aspect in an
abusive relationship. An abuser wants to be the sole person on whom their
partner depends, so they are frustrated when their partner can turn to other
people for comfort and support. Arizona resents Mark. She sees him as
competition, so the fact that he wants to be involved in his child’s life
throws a wrench into her plans.
In 7x16 “Not
Responsible” Arizona makes herself out to be a victim, as though including Mark
in this pregnancy is some hardship that she is valiantly enduring. She whines
about having to consider his feelings as a co-parent of their child. But she
doesn’t stop there. As always, she takes special time out to call Callie a
greedy bisexual for not pushing Mark out.
“Okay can we just be honest about the fact
that this is some kind of bi dream come true? I mean, you get the woman that
you love and you get the guy best friend who’s a great lay and then you get a
baby. I mean, you get it all. And me? This is not my dream. My dream doesn’t
look like this.”
Because it was Callie’s dream to be abandoned
in an airport and then listen to you continuously vilify her best friend for an
unplanned pregnancy that you don’t have to be a part of? I think not. Arizona
insisted on being involved in this situation but she won’t stop bullying Callie
about the circumstances that got them all there.
7. Indecisive
Arizona’s fury goes
into maximum overdrive when Mark throws Callie a perfect baby shower. Even when
Callie arranged to spend a romantic weekend at a bed and breakfast with her,
Arizona loses her temper when Callie texts with Mark during the car ride. She
snatches the phone out of Callie’s hands and throws it into the back seat. This
is not playful or sweet. This is controlling. This is abusive.
When Callie tries to
assert herself and make the decision to talk to her friend if she wants to,
Arizona criticizes Callie and Mark’s friendship as well as Callie's identity.
“He gets most of you:
the straight you, the Catholic you, the girl who loves baby showers. I just
get, you know, the gay you- which is really only about 20 minutes a night, and
not even since you just feel too fat to even let me touch you anymore.”
First off, Arizona is trying to make Callie
feel guilty for being bisexual, once again, because that’s what Arizona does
best. Secondly, she is dividing up Callie’s bisexual identity into a straight
portion and a gay portion without Callie’s permission, implying that
bisexuality is a mix of heterosexuality and homosexuality and not its own
category. This is not only an inaccurate portrayal of the bisexual experience,
it is actually harmful. It serves to exclude bisexual people from both the
queer community as well as the heterosexual mainstream by making us feel like
halves of incomplete wholes that don’t fit in anywhere. Thirdly, she is
sexualizing Callie’s identity without her permission. By stating that Callie’s
“gay part” is confined to the sex that they have, she is suggesting that Callie
stops being queer when they are not having sex at a given moment. This also
serves to exclude her from the queer community.
Callie is fed up with
the shtick at this point, though, and actually begins to stand up for herself.
As Callie argues that she has spent this entire pregnancy trying to make sure
that everyone involved is happy, Arizona quickly realizes that she needs something
more than her standard guilt trip to get her way. Annoyed by Arizona’s
inability to be happy despite her best efforts, Callie asks what she can do to
fix it- because Arizona has done so much to make Callie feel like it’s her
fault when things go wrong that Callie’s instinct is always to take on the
responsibility of patching things up by herself. This is the moment Arizona
chooses to propose marriage.
Arizona does not ask
Callie if she will marry her, the proposal is an ultimatum. Marrying Arizona is
not them taking the next step in their relationship; it is another hoop for
Callie to jump through to prove her loyalty to Arizona. This is a bad reason to
get married. You marry someone because you want to make a commitment to spend
the rest of your lives working together to make each other happy, you don’t
marry someone because you want to have the upper hand over their best friend.
And Callie knew that this was the wrong time and the wrong way for Arizona to
propose, which is why she didn’t give an answer.
Not giving an answer,
however, means that Arizona does not have Callie’s full cooperation. An abusive
partner cannot stand resistance like this. It means that they are not in
control. Arizona resorts to intimidation. Even though she is driving the car with
her pregnant girlfriend in the passenger’s seat- the pregnant girlfriend who
just took her seatbelt off to retrieve the phone that Arizona had ripped from
her hands and thrown into the back seat- Arizona takes her eyes off the road to
stare Callie down. Instead of giving Callie time to think about the proposal,
she pressures her into making a rushed decision. The only thing that interrupts
the stare down is the car crash that Arizona’s reckless driving gets them into.
Callie flies through the windshield on impact, resulting in a few major
injuries and the premature delivery of their baby, and not once does Callie
ever blame Arizona for endangering their lives.
Allow me to reiterate
that: Callie never blames Arizona for crashing their car when she deliberately
took her eyes off the road for an extended time. Even when Arizona is the only
person responsible for it, Callie does not bear her any ill will for this. In
fact, she agrees to marry her by the end of the next episode. Isn't this akin
to Stockholm syndrome? Hasn't Arizona been teaching Callie since the beginning
that anything but complete submission will be met with emotional, and now
physical, pain? Their entire relationship thus far has been an ongoing pattern
of Arizona punishing Callie with verbal abuse whenever her expectations are not
met.
* * *
Since her
introduction, Arizona's expectations have included such biphobic and
unrealistic standards as wanting Callie to fully renounce her attraction to
men, wanting Callie to agree that her bisexuality makes her untrustworthy, and
wanting to treat Callie's best friend like an absentee sperm donor. All of
these expectations go against Callie's sense of self. That's what abusers do;
they attack their victim's sense of self. They undermine their victims' ability
to trust themselves. Whether she's been doing it with malicious intent or not,
Arizona has been working on that ever since she learned that Callie was not
exclusively attracted to women. When Callie challenged Arizona's expectations
of what a woman who dates women could be, she panicked and allowed her biphobia
to get the best of her. But rather than reevaluate her preconceived notions
about bisexual women, she continued to lash out at Callie.
Arizona Robbins meets
an overwhelming number of emotional abuse criteria. From demeaning and
disregarding Callie's feelings and opinions, to trying to controlling what
Callie does, to blaming Callie for things that are not her fault- and usually
not even bad things- Arizona's behaviour shows signs of emotional abuse. So why
are Calzona fans not outraged? Well, as I previously mentioned, we have a huge
societal problem with reading toxic behaviour, since it has been so heavily
romanticized. Furthermore, our ability to differentiate between what is healthy
and what is unhealthy becomes even less acute when a woman is in question, due
to hetero-normativity and conventional gender roles. Yet, there is another
reason for the fans' dedication to this terrible relationship: it is the only
lasting LGBTQ+ relationship on the show.
Even in
Shondaland, a beacon for diversity in media representation, with its colorblind
casting and inclusion of well-defined and realistic LGBTQ+
characters, the heterosexual relationships still dominate. On Grey's
Anatomy in particular, the patients come from all walks of life, but
they are not regular characters. The surgeons are the only main characters, and
the only canonically LGBTQ+ surgeons who have lasted more than a couple of
seasons are Callie and Arizona. But most other prime time shows didn't even
have that when Calzona first came into existence in 2009. With straight
couples everywhere, LGBTQ+ viewers are forced to cling to whatever we get. In
season 5 we got Calzona. It wasn't perfect but it was ours. Even as its
imperfections turned to clinically recognized signs of abuse, many of us held
on tight. For what else was there for us to claim?
Calzona's success is
unsurprising. With its adherence to a very specific mold wherein respecting
another person's boundaries is merely a suggestion, the Calzona relationship
fits right in. Verbal abuse from the tiny blonde lesbian's mouth goes
undetected because we have a hard time viewing women as abusers. Alternatives
are far and few between because most other shows are afraid to portray LGBTQ+
characters and relationships. The societal problems that allowed Calzona to
gain popularity are not entirely Shondaland's fault. It is their fault for
writing a character like Arizona Robbins and never setting up the consequences
that will cause her to learn from her abusive behaviour and change, but this
stems from the fact that our society fails to set up those consequences in real
life. There's a reason that Shonda Rhimes' career is flourishing: she knows
the formulas that work and how to capitalize on those formulas in her
writing.
