Is Christian Grey a Sex Addict?
Unless you’ve been living under a rock you’ve likely heard about the new adult fiction trilogy that’s currently sweeping the nation, called “Fifty Shades” by E.L. James. Briefly, the series is about the relationship between an innocent recent college grad, Anastasia Steele, and billionaire playboy, Christian Grey. When Anastasia meets Christian she is a sheltered virgin. Christian not only takes her virginity, but introduces her to a world most of us have only heard rumors about – bondage and discipline.
Before Anastasia, Christian lived in his life believing sex was about possession and pain, not love. However, at least for Christian, it was always about pleasure. As the tale progresses and Anastasia becomes tormented between her love for Christian and her reluctance to adapt completely to his sexual proclivities, we watch Christian learn how to compromise his need for truly kinky sex in order to get his girl.
Like the “Sookie Stackhouse” character in HBO’s True Blood as well as Harry Potter, in the “Harry Potter” series that preceded it, “Fifty Shades” may have something to teach the more straight-laced among us about letting lose and truly thinking outside the box. But, what’s the message here? Is E.L. James offering a glimpse into the life of someone suffering from a mental disorder, such as sex addiction, or is she, instead, teaching us that sex outside the missionary position can still be considered “healthy”?
Let’s face it; if Sookie and Harry were real people and you ran into them on the street, you would likely give them both a wide berth. One thinks she has been blessed with the ability to read other people’s thoughts and spends her days cavorting with really good-looking dead people. The other believes that he is more or less immortal and can be found hanging out with giants and trolls. Both exhibit signs of hallucinations and delusions of grander, bordering on schizophrenia. But, if Christian Grey (along with his leather and handcuffs) lived next door to you, would you think of him as mentally ill?
Given the cautionary tales of Tiger Woods, Anthony Weiner, and all the other cheating husbands who have made headlines in recent years, Americans now seem to believe that any guy who likes sex, has multiple sex partners or engages in “deviant” behavior (such as tweeting a picture of his weenie), must be a sex addict. And while it is very human to reach for a readily understood label when encountering behavior that may be unfamiliar or uncomfortable, sexual addiction is actually a very real and debilitating illness-not a term to lightly be tossed about. Unfortunately, when the term “sex Addict” is consistently used to describe any kind of unconventional or problem sexual behavior that hits the media, it’s use dilutes the seriousness of that very real issue. Now don’t get me wrong, both Tiger and Mr. Weiner may well be sex addicts- who knows? But in reality, relatively few people really have the disease and it takes more than a few weeks in rehab to recover from it.
Christian Grey is not a sex addict. But he does like a type of sex that is outside both the mainstream and the comfort level of the majority of Americans. That is not to say that he doesn’t have problems – he is seeing a therapist after all. But those problems have more to do with his childhood than his sexual appetites.
The problem with labels is that they are based on the thinking of beings that are still evolving, both intellectually and morally. Twenty or thirty years ago homosexuality was considered a deviant behavior. Now, most of us consider it just another type of “normal”. Nearly all cultures view what is considered to be normal and healthy through a lens of culture, history, religion and law. Unhealthy or problem behavior (sexual addiction included) causes the individual, their family and community- some sort of mental, physical or social problem. And this is how Christian Grey of Fifty Shades fame- avoids the label sex addict and stays just this side of “normal”. His sexual appetites may be in the minority but he is healthy (both physically and, arguably, mentally), wildly successful in business, and can even quickly modulate his behavior to conform to the wishes of those most important to him. Perhaps our world and busy lives would become just a bit less stressful and far more entertaining if all of us were willing to add just one or two of his “Fifty Shades” in our own lives.