Polish film 365 Days has become something of an unlikely sensation on Netflix. The film is known for more or less two things: being extraordinarily kinky and also extraordinarily bad. And yet it’s also been among the streamer’s most-watched titles in both the U.S. and the U.K. in recent weeks—a sensation as strange as it is depressing, given how heavily Netflix has been promoting worthy work from Black creators amid Black Lives Matter protests.
Either way, at least one person has gone on record as being less than pleased with this development: Duffy, who revealed earlier this year that she has survived both rape and kidnapping, wrote an open letter to Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, condemning 365 Days for glamorizing rape and “eroticising” abduction.
Duffy first revealed in February that years before, she had been drugged, raped, and held captive. In April she shared further details. “It was my birthday, I was drugged at a restaurant, I was drugged then for four weeks and travelled to a foreign country,” she wrote at the time. She said at the time she did not feel safe approaching the police; “I felt if anything went wrong, I would be dead, and he would have killed me. I could not risk being mishandled or it being all over the news during my danger,” she wrote.
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Now, she wrote at the time, she wishes to be “freed.”
“I mourned wishing I had been dealt another hand, but it happened, and I have come to terms with it.”
In her letter to Hastings, obtained in full by Deadline, the Welsh singer called the choice to carry the film—and to label it as erotica—“irresponsible.”
“It grieves me that Netflix provides a platform for such ‘cinema’, that eroticises kidnapping and distorts sexual violence and trafficking as a ‘sexy’ movie,” Duffy wrote. “I just can’t imagine how Netflix could overlook how careless, insensitive, and dangerous this is.” You can read the address in full below:
Dear Reed,
Recently I wrote publicly about an ordeal I was subject to. I was drugged, kidnapped, trafficked and raped. I released a statement of my personal account, which you may find online in further detail on http://www.duffywords.com.
Today, I really don’t know what to think, say, or do, other than to reach out and explain to you in this letter how irresponsible it was of Netflix to broadcast the film ‘365 Days’. I don’t want to be in this position to have to write to you, but the virtue of my suffering obliges me to do so, because of a violent experience that I endured of the kind that you have chosen to present as ‘adult erotica’.
‘365 Days’ glamorizes the brutal reality of sex trafficking, kidnapping and rape. This should not be anyone’s idea of entertainment, nor should it be described as such, or be commercialized in this manner.
I write these words (ones I cannot believe I am writing in 2020, with so much hope and progress gained in recent years), as an estimated 25 million people are currently trafficked around the world, not to mention the untold amounts of people uncounted. Please take a moment to stop and pause, and think about that number, equivalent to almost half the population of England. And of those trafficked annually, no less than 80% are women and girls, and 50% of them are minors.
It grieves me that Netflix provides a platform for such ‘cinema’, that eroticises kidnapping and distorts sexual violence and trafficking as a “sexy” movie. I just can’t imagine how Netflix could overlook how careless, insensitive, and dangerous this is. It has even prompted some young women, recently, to jovially ask Michele Morrone, the lead actor in the film, to kidnap them.
We all know Netflix would not host material glamorizing pedophilia, racism, homophobia, genocide, or any other crimes against humanity. The world would rightly rise up and scream. Tragically, victims of trafficking and kidnapping are unseen, and yet in ‘365 Days’ their suffering is made into a “erotic drama”, as described by Netflix.
And so, I am compelled to speak on their behalf, and to ask you to right this wrong; to commit the resources of Netflix, and the skills of its talented film-makers, to producing and broadcasting content that portrays the truth of the harsh and desperate reality of what ‘365 Days’ has sought to turn into a work of casual entertainment.
I calm myself to explain to you here – when I was trafficked and raped, I was lucky to come away with my life, but far too many have not been so lucky. And now I have to witness these tragedies, and my tragedy, eroticised and demeaned. Where can one turn? But to have to address you in writing.
To anyone who may exclaim ‘it is just a movie’, it is not ‘just’, when it has great influence to distort a subject which is widely undiscussed, such as sex trafficking and kidnapping, by making the subject erotic.
And because ‘365 Days’ has proved enormously popular, I also address this letter to viewers directly. I encourage the millions who have enjoyed the movie to reflect on the reality of kidnapping and trafficking, of force and sexual exploitation, and of an experience that is the polar opposite of the glossy fantasy depicted in ‘365 Days’.
As we approach World day against trafficking in persons on 30th July, I encourage Netflix and everyone who has watched ‘365 Days’ to learn more about human trafficking by visiting https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/what-is-human-trafficking.html and to pledge to make a difference to organizations such as: catwinternational.org, hopeforjustice.org, polarisproject.org, antislavery.org, stopthetraffik.org, unseenuk.org, notforsalecampaign.org, ijm.org, a21.org and madeforthem.org.
If all of you at Netflix take nothing from this open letter but these final words, I will be content. You have not realized how ‘365 Days’ has brought great hurt to those who have endured the pains and horrors that this film glamorizes, for entertainment and for dollars. What I and others who know these injustices need is the exact opposite – a narrative of truth, hope, and to be given a voice.
When we know better, let us do better, Duffy.
