The Moral of the Story

It snuck up on us before we new what was happening. It has swept girls and women of all ages across the world, and it is even worse than Hannah Montana.

The vampire fad has reached dangerous levels. Toxic even.

Of course, many people will call this a gross over-exaggeration, many of them being fad-followers themselves. But it is natural to defend something that has brought you enjoyment. That’s easy to understand. It’s a personal thing.

But this vampire trend is one of the only things I cannot seem to wrap my head around. I genuinely can’t understand the appeal. From what I understand, vampires are undead immortal daemons that feed of the blood of living beings. What could possible be attractive about that is beyond me, but I guess its normal for people to have fetishes. And I can accept that.

After all, vampires have been in literature, film and television for many years. It is not necessarily a “new” idea. There is the classic “Dracula” and popular TV show “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” as well as movies like “Van Helsing” are just a few.
My real beef however, is with something a bit more recent.

The “Twilight” series, written by Stephanie Meyer, takes the fascination with vampires and targets it primarily at young women, girls to be more accurate.

The whole premise of “Twilight” is this: girl meets boy, boy is dangerous blood thirsty vampire who wants to kill her, boy and girl fall in love anyway.

How… Romantic?

Girls and guys, if you were in main character Bella’s situation, would you really stick around because the two of you have “chemistry?” I tend to put my survival above hot boys. Like I said, personal preference.

But “Twilight” is full of much more than harmless teenage angst. The characters and story are teaching some scary lessons to readers, again, mostly young girls. John Scott Lewinski at bspcn.com believes there are twenty such unfortunate lessons.

“When a boy leaves you, going into shock, losing all your friends and enduring night terrors are completely acceptable occurrences,” or “Young women should make no effort to improve their social skills or emotional state. Instead, they should seek out potential mates that share their morose deficiencies and emotional illnesses,” or even “When making or watching a major feature film, you should gleefully embrace the 20 minutes of plot it provides in between extended segments of vacant-eyed silence and self-indulgent, moaning banter,” are just a few he brings up.

Other life lessons found on the list include lying to your parents, keeping life-threatening secrets, using men to fix things, using men in general, and car theft.

Not exactly your wholesome fairytale.

In fact, the relationship between the two main characters, Edward and Bella, is far from wholesome. Despite their abstinence, much to Bella’s displeasure, the two cannot seem to keep the steam at bay. Even though he won’t sleep with her, again – very unhappy Bella, he has no problem with sneaking into her room in the middle of the night to watch her sleep, a habit he picks up before even introducing himself.

Ok, maybe steamy is the wrong word.

But it is easy to see there is something wrong with the way Edward treats Bella. There are many signs therapists use to diagnose abusive relationships, and they say that if your partner is showing even one of the signs a red flag should be going up.

According to the National Domestic Violence hotline, some signs to look for include, but are certainly not limited to: “looks or acts in ways that scare you, threatens to commit suicide, isolates you from friends or family, friends or family warn you stay away but you have trouble leaving, and reckless driving.”

It is hard to imagine why anyone would want to be with someone like that. When listed so plainly, it is also hard to imagine how it is not more obvious.

This is what a reviewer said on Meyer’s website about the first book.

“Imagine seeing a guy, more handsome than any you’ve ever seen, and not being able to tear you eyes away from him. Imagine that the force of your mutual chemistry feels like electricity. I promise you that every girl will want to be Isabella Swan.”

Because who wouldn’t want to be Bella? She is celebrated as a great female heroine in literature. And why not? She’s obedient, she’s quiet, she cooks, she shops, she cleans and she stays out of her father’s way, who prefers sitting on the couch, drinking a beer and cleaning his gun.

And the one earth shattering thing she does is fall in love with a dangerous vampire? Some heroine.

So aside from perpetuating exaggerated ideas of gender roles (did I mention Meyer was Mormon?) “Twilight” is not only teaching its readers to accept, and even celebrate these kinds of relationships, but they are also getting skewed ideas of what a good relationship is. It simultaneously conditions them to live with abuse while making them believe they are in a fairytale.

Also that it is cool and romantic to sacrifice everything, including your own life, to be with someone who may end up killing you anyway. Who need friends or a healthy social life when you can have eternal, undead love?

Here’s a clue that most well adjusted young adults are aware of, including myself: no person, human or not, will ever measure up to the characters we read about in fairytales. There are plenty of hot and spicy relationships out there that do not involve major blood loss.

There is no doubt “Twilight” has served it’s purpose as a Young Adult novel. But perhaps we should be taking a closer look at some of the trends young people are following.

Sex is natural, but abuse, lies and murder are not. We deserve better.