Tell Them You Love Me

Tell Them You Love Me is a documentary film that details the case against Anna Stubblefield, a Rutgers University professor convicted in 2015 of sexually abusing Derrick Johnson, a nonverbal cerebral palsy sufferer who she was allegedly supporting through facilitated communication. After struggling to find a distributor in the United States, it was eventually released through Netflix.

Description
The documentary film is described by Netflix as scandalous in that it explores "the controversial relationship between a professor and a nonverbal man that leads to a trial over race, disability and power." Writing for Tudum, Ingrid Ostby says that this film tells the story of a "relationship between a married White professor and a Black man with cerebral palsy sparks controversy when the man’s mother alleges that her son was incapable of consent — leading to a nationwide debate over power dynamics, disability, and race."

Production
Tell Them You Love Me takes place in Irvington and West Orange, New Jersey, and was directed by Nick August-Perna. It is rated TV-14.

Reception
The Guardian reported that the film is a "disturbing tale of a White female academic’s sexual abuse of a non-verbal Black man – and uses it to lay bare society’s prejudices", and that the film reveals "the way that facilitated communication ... can be misconstrued is just as striking as a study in White privilege and White female victimhood – where good intentions are consistently assumed of Stubblefield." The article concludes, "Beyond consent, disability and race there is space given to reflect upon the nature of language, the 'white saviour' complex, the purpose of justice and what constitutes unconditional love. Tell Them You Love Me might be a hard watch, but it is also a vital one."

The Daily Beast wrote that "though [Stubblefield] comes across as sincere, that’s not the same thing as innocent; considering everything, she seems to have deluded herself into believing a fiction because it let her feel good about liberating Derrick from his shortcomings." The article goes on to say that, "Following two years behind bars, Anna won an appeal due to the fact that the trial judge hadn’t allowed her to bring up anything related to facilitated communication. Nonetheless, as expert Howard Shane persuasively contends, that treatment remains questionable at best, and deceptive at worst ... it’s a method in which the caregiver’s subconscious projections lead to misinterpretations and manipulations. That’s perhaps the nicest way of saying that Tell Them You Love Me thinks facilitated communication reveals more about the facilitator than the patient."