A 2020 study found that 28% of cases of girls who were sexually trafficked had an intellectual disability compared to the 1-3% of national prevalence. The more severe physical impairment and low cognitive abilities, the higher the risks.
Women with intellectual delays also face myriad personal and socio-environmental barriers in their sexual lives, such as difficulties with lack of sexual experience and negative sexual experiences with nondisabled individuals.
This sobering reality is the backdrop to one of the most critically lauded films of the year, Poor Things by Yorgos Lanthimos. Based on the novel by Alasdair Gray, Poor Things, earned 11 Oscar nominations and four wins, including Best Actress for Emma Stone..
The movie invites us to see Bella’s evolution as a tale of women’s emancipation and sexual liberation. But really, she is an experiment subjected to a sadistic chains of events, camouflaged by extravagant and colorful costumes.
Most film critics praised Poor Things for its “surreal humor,” “contagious fun,” or as “creatively uninhibited.” The film won a Golden Globe for Best Comedy or Musical, and Stone for Best Actress for her performance. But Lanthimos’ cinematographic fantasy of men purchasing a woman with impaired faculties for sex is neither original nor humorous.
Bella is not the female version of Frankenstein. Unlike Bella, he is not the constant object of male sexual desire and control.
Poor Things is yet another production of misogynists’ dream: to create, own, control, sexualize, infantilize, and commodify women at their pleasure. One of Hollywood’s favorite themes.
Source: Poor Things and Misogynistic Dreams: How Abusers Sexually Mistreat Disabled Women – Women’s eNews