 |
| Courtesy of Kimberly French/MCT |
I thought it was cute when my 10-year-old cousin asked if I was Team Edward or Team Jacob. I thought it was disturbing when my 23-year-old classmate could describe how every Cullen became a vampire but couldn’t name the presidential candidates.
I dove into the Twilight series, expecting the books that bridge the gap between elementary students and adult women would be a literary masterpiece. I thought wrong.
But to Stephanie Meyer’s credit, her work, much like George Bush’s re-election, made me laugh and cry.
Meyer’s real talent is her ability to trigger my gag reflex more than my dentist’s giant hairy fists.
I’m going to get the main criticisms out of the way. The Twilight series doesn’t have a plot. Unless “I love you but I’m leaving so I don’t kill you…wait I’m back. I can’t be with you, good bye. Just kidding,” is a plot. The vampires sparkle, they don’t have fangs and the deepest thought the main character has goes along the lines of, “Edward is so hot. I love him.”
I also believe I read the word “chagrin” about 8,043 times. Someone should take Meyer’s thesaurus away from her.
The only thing Meyer doesn’t fail at is corrupting the youth. According to CbsNews.com, the series’ popularity caused a new biting trend among kids and teens. People are now biting each other like vampires to show their love and devotion for one another. One high-schooler explained the biting phenomenon as a way to “belong to somebody, and mark their territory.” To bite someone is to own them.
Let’s ignore the psychologically disturbing part of the trend and skip to the medical issues; doctors are concerned about the spread of bacteria and potential health risks caused by these skin breaking bites.
Way to go, Meyer.
While we’re on the topic of medical issues, I’d like to define some sexual perversions Meyer appears to be familiar with.
Pedophilia (n.): an abnormal interest in children; the act or fantasy on the part of an adult of engaging in sexual activity with a child or children, according to The Medical Dictionary.
According to Twilight, Edward was turned in to a vampire in 1918 at the age of 17, making him 100-something years old when he takes interest in 17-year-old Bella Swan. Luckily, they happen to live in the state of Washington where the age of consent is 16. Not Arizona (where Myer lives) or Utah (where she went to school), but Washington, where, according to SexLaws.org, Edward is not a pervert.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say that any 100-something year old having a relationship with a teenager is pedophilia.
Necrophilia (n.): sexual attraction, contact with or erotic desire for dead bodies, according to The Medical Dictionary.
For those of you who live under a rock, Edward Cullen is a vampire.
Vampire (n): the reanimated body of a dead person believed to come from the grave and suck people’s blood, according to Merriam-Webster.com.
Bella wants Edward.
“Bella, would you please stop trying to take your clothes off?” – Edward Cullen (Eclipse).
Zoophilia (n.): the fantasy or act of engaging in sexual activity with animals, according to The Medical Dictionary.
“Of course you’d warm up faster if you took your clothes off.” – Jacob Black, the Werewolf, to Bella, a pathetic excuse for a human being (Eclipse).
Jacob tricks Bella in to kissing him, and she says, “I didn’t feel any anger at Jacob for tricking me. There wasn’t enough room in my body to contain anything besides the hatred I felt toward myself.”
I relate to Bella in a way. I kind of hate myself for spending time writing this.
Sadomasochism (n.): a form of perversion marked by enjoyment of cruelty and/or humiliation in its received or active and/or dispensed and passive forms, according to WebMD.com.
Edward (the sadist) has Bella (the masochist) wondering, “What was so great about mortality?” (New Moon).
After Edward leaves her so he doesn’t eat her, she constantly puts herself in harm’s way to hear his voice in her head. She says, “Edward had drawn many careful lines for our physical relationship, with the intent being to keep me alive. Though I respected the need for maintaining a safe distance between my skin and his razor-sharp, venom-coated teeth, I tended to forget about trivial things like that when he was kissing me,” (New Moon p.16).
At least Edward tries to set some boundaries:
“You really should stay away from me,” he warns Bella. “See you in class.”
Meyer (sadist) writes the series and I (masochist) read it.
Stalk (v.): if you stalk a person or wild animal, you follow them quietly in order to kill them, catch them or observe them carefully, according to English Collins Dictionary.
“ ‘You spied on me?’ But somehow I couldn’t infuse my voice with the proper outrage. I was flattered.” – Bella (Twilight).
Edward admits to watching Bella sleep at night, but Meyer teaches her young, impressionable readers that being stalked gives a sense of self-worth. It’s not creepy if he’s hot.
Am I the only person bothered by the fact Bella is Edward’s food?
Let’s put this in a new perspective. Let’s say Edward is a vegetarian, much like my friend. So he doesn’t drink human blood and my friend doesn’t eat meat. Edward loves Bella romantically, my friend doesn’t want to bring a cow home to meet his mom. Are we getting the picture? Bella is his FOOD.
I love cheeseburgers but I don’t want to have sex with one.
Meyer invented a whole new sexual perversion: Foodphilia.
My problems with the series goes further than Bedward’s “relationship.” Or the fact they’re in “love.”
Everyone knows true love is between a girl who smells good and a guy who’s hot.
Apparently at Brigham Young University, where Meyer got her English B.A., they forgot to teach her how to write well. At least if she graduated from the Derek Zoolander Center For Kids Who Can’t Read Good And Wanna Learn To Do Other Stuff Good Too, she would’ve learned that there’s more to life than being really, really, ridiculously good looking.
“I guess my brain will never work right. At least I’m pretty.” – Bella (Breaking Dawn). Initiate slow clap.
Maybe Edward can’t read Bella’s mind because she doesn’t have one.
“Many of the words they used were unfamiliar to me, and I figured I’d have to have a Y chromosome to really understand…” – Bella (New Moon)
The last person I want my little cousins influenced by is an obsessed, helpless, needy girl who can’t bear to live without a guy who’s no good for her.
At this point, I’m torn between team Tyler’s Van and team Shut the Hell Up.
