Netflix show ‘365 days’ called out for glamourizing sex trafficking, rape and kidnapping

Duffy has accused Netflix of “glamourizing the brutal reality of sex trafficking, kidnapping and rape”.

The 36-year-old singer has written an open letter to streaming service, accusing Netflix of being “irresponsible” for broadcasting the film ‘365 Days’, which tells the story of a woman who is imprisoned by a man who gives her a year to fall in love with him.

Duffy wrote the letter after revealing earlier this year that she’d previously been drugged, kidnapped, and raped.

In a letter addressed to Netflix’s CEO Reed Hastings, she said: “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’ glamourizes 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.”

The film has proven to be a huge hit with Netflix viewers, but Duffy has accused the streaming service of behaving in a “careless, insensitive, and dangerous” manner.

She continued: “It grieves me that Netflix provides a platform for such ‘cinema’, that eroticizes 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 an ‘erotic drama’, as described by Netflix.”

Duffy hopes people who’ve watched the film will ultimately reflect on the “reality of kidnapping and trafficking, of force and sexual exploitation”.

She wrote: “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.