One Love is a story about Paige and her abusive boyfriend Chase, based on the real-life situation of Yeardley Love with her abusive boyfriend. Now, why do abusive relationships occur? If both sides love each other in the relationship, theoretically, abuse should never occur. Unfortunately, not everything follows its theory. Abusive relationships can occur due to insecurity, a false belief that they have the right to abuse, the “satisfactory” feeling of dominance, and/or it not being true love for both sides in the first place. As for Chase, any one of those is possible and applicable.
Chase first met Paige through a nice, small deed; just picking up her books when he saw her drop them. The fact that they started dating just because of that one thing can be a sign that Paige could be overthinking the act and accepting his request to be in a relationship may have been too quick of a decision. However, Chase noticed this and continued this throughout their relationship; repeatedly doing small, nice deeds to compensate for the abuse he does. These deeds make the abuse seem “okay” or unintentional, and Chase was able to sneak his abuse past both friend groups, making them appear “playful” or “not serious” with the nice little things he does after, like buying her coffee. Chase had so much control over Paige’s life and feelings and stalked her on top of that. He wanted her to just himself and literally no one else. When Paige realized this and ended the relationship, he decided that if he couldn’t have her, that no one can, and ended her life.
The harsh ending made the video very powerful and emotional. Seeing how obvious Chase’s abuse to us due to a different perspective makes it feel as if we could have prevented the death of Paige. I watched One Love with my own girlfriend right next to me, and although it was somewhat awkward and and uncomfortable at the time, we grew closer quickly after our talk about it, so I thank the foundation for hosting it.
https://vimeo.com/138235461