Nate Winchester

{Author’s note: Okay, I admit there is something Paolini and I have in common. We both like to rip off pay homage to things we enjoy. One of the things I enjoy are the ‘abridged’ series you can find drifting over the internet, particularly Yu Gi Oh and DragonballZ. Since Eragon doesn’t have a series at the moment (and let that thought keep you awake at night), I decided to ply my trade at doing a written abridgement of the books.}

“Wow, that was some battle wasn’t it?” gasped Stu as he surveyed the mountains of corpses.

“Hey look!” exclaimed the Evil Twins. “Some Urgals are getting away!”

“How dare they retreat! After them!” screamed Stu with great bloodlust.

So Stu, Evil Twins, Leader, and Murgoth go chasing after the Urgals, but then they are ambushed!

“Oh noes!” cried Stu. “Don’t they know we beat them? These guys aren’t playing fair at all.”

“Quit your whinin’ and help me!” screamed Leader as he and some red shirts were overwhelmed.

Stu tried to get there in time but was only in time to cradle the dying Leader in his arms. “No!” cried Stu. “You’re dying and Murgoth and the Evil Twins are missing. Why oh why am I such a screw up?”

“Because,” croaked Leader, “we must kick off the plot. Fear not Stu. I go to where the author cannot hurt me.”

And there was great mourning among all the good and decent characters that night.

———————————————

The next day, a lot of boring political stuff occurs, made doubly boring because everyone knows how it will end anyway: the hot warrior princess is now in charge. While the resistance feels a swelling of… pride, Stu makes a decision.

“Oh hot elf, Arya. Will you lead me to the elves so that I might become more awesome?” he begged.

Arya glared at him. “I sense a thinly veiled plot to stare at my ass for several days.”

Stu blushed. “Well… um… my back!” he cried out, falling to the ground, twitching. “Oh, I was wounded in battle and now am wracked with pains!”

“I’m still getting some chaperones,” said Arya.

———————————————

Meanwhile, in a different book, Roran comes back to find his dad dead, home destroyed, and baseball card collection stolen. If life didn’t suck enough, he then learns that the king’s soldiers are after him.

“Oh, so now the entire village will follow the path of Stu and become reluctant rebels,” said the Audience as they began flipping further into the book. “Let’s move on.”

———————————————

“Let’s go!” growled Stu’s dragon, Saphira. “Seems like we’ve been planning this trip for days.”

“But I don’t think the people realize how special I am,” whined Stu.

“Behold a gift for which we’ve never bestowed on a non-dwarf!” shouted the dwarf king, Drunky as he bestowed on Stu a gift that had never been given to a non-dwarf.

“We will now upend decades of effort, tradition, and procedure that you, who have been with us for only a week, might decide our governing leadership,” exclaimed the leader of the rebels.

“May we get a shot of you and the dragon for propaganda?” pleaded a journalist.

“…now we can leave,” beamed Stu.

“But we need you to finish all this,” said the rebels simultaneously.

Stu suddenly fell to the ground. “My back! I was wounded in battle and now am wracked with pains!”

“Oh dear,” said a little old lady.

———————————————

The next day the fellowship group departs and heads to the land of the elves. Along the way they stop at a dwarf town and involve themselves in more politics because C-SPAN is consistently the highest rated cable channel. All is going typically until Arya gets into an argument with a dwarf priest.

“Don’t you know religion is stupid?” she sneered.

“What? How dare you say that! Let me now play the stereotype religious person for your typical internet debate!” said the dwarf with great outrage.

“Atheism is so superior and wonderful. You can tell because the most beautiful and wonderful races practice it,” countered Arya.

“But why are you an atheist?” demanded the dwarf.

“Because the author is.”

“Isn’t he our god?” asked Stu. “And if there are no gods, where did true names come from? What’s your dominant theory for the origins of life or existence? Why are the scientific dwarves religious and the magical elves atheist? Shouldn’t it be the other way around?”

Arya laughed with the sound of water falling over cliché. “Silly Stu. You have so much to learn.”

Stu stared at her breasts, glass-eyed and slack-jawed.

A few days later the trio set out on the river to continue their journey. The dwarf looked at Stu and asked, “How about you help rowing?”

Stu suddenly collapsed on the boat. “My back! I was wounded in battle and now am wracked with pains!”

Arya rolled her eyes. “Fine, stupid, here, and I will do all the work.”

———————————————

After many more boring days, the trio finally reaches the elf land of Na Mewaytoolongden. The place is beautiful and pretty, filled with trees and flowers and happy animals.

“Wow, this place is really beautiful and pretty,” noted Stu.

“The beauty of this beautiful place warms even my cynical heart,” added the dwarf.

Stu then realized that Arya was staring at him.

“What is it?” he wondered.

“I thought you were about to use some cheesy pick-up line on me,” answered the hot elf babe.

“Oh! Well in that case—”

“Don’t!”

“Hullo there!” Stu looked up to see some more elves greeting them.

“Hi!” Stu waved back.

“Come, let us lead you into the beautiful and pretty land of the elves while we demonstrate how superior we are to you pitiful humans,” said the greeting party.

“Well it’s so obviously true, I can’t argue, disagree or complain about your racism!” expressed Stu with a stupid grin.

Later that evening they meet the queen and all other elves.

“Hey everybody!” said Stu.

“Wow! Your referencing of Simpsons make us recognize you as almost awesome as we are,” said all the elves in unison.

“Please, show me what I can do to be as awesome as you beautiful, wonderful elves,” Stu pleaded.

He heard a strange, yet familiar voice behind him. “Train, you must.”

TO BE CONTINUED

Comment [21]

The Twilight phenomenon is one that has passed me by, as my requirement for books is the same as movies: a minimum of 2 explosions, 3 weapon fights, and 1 hottie (decapitation may be substituted for any of the previous). But it is a cultural phenomenon nonetheless and while the Twilight movie wasn’t directed by Michael Bay (the greatest living director of our time) when Rifftrax announced they would be providing commentary on the movie I decided that at last I could experience the latest brick on the foundation of Western culture. Note that I haven’t read the original so most of this commentary will be just what I’ve gleaned from cultural osmosis.

The first issue is one that frequently plagues Hollywood: everyone is too beautiful. Bella is supposed to be cute, maybe even homely but in a very ordinary way. It is her scent and mojo that attract the god-like Edward. However, she is played by the quite attractive Kristen Stewart and is surrounded by “ordinary” people far more lovely than the average. The Cullens are said to be unearthly gorgeous but how can the audience tell without a contrast? Why is Bella so preferred (by everyone, not just Edward) over her outgoing, bubbly, buxom friend? As Mike points out, in any normal high school, Bella would be getting Jessica’s table scraps, not the other way around.

But what about the vampires? [Digression Warning!] The problem every fiction story dealing with vampires has had to face is why aren’t the vampires in charge? In I Am Legend the vampires are and the sole remaining human becomes their “boogeyman”, the monster that kills them during the day. In the Buffyverse, vampires are so self-absorbed and petty, that they can’t cohere enough to threaten the status quo. Indeed, some of the worst threats are vampires strong and charismatic enough that they unite a sizeable force of invincible blood-suckers. Supernatural has the vampire as an endangered species, hunted to near extinction by trained humans (now there’s an idea: a story in which an EPA bureaucrat tries to get vampires onto the endangered species list. Write it up and turn it in on Monday). In Twilight the vampires can only be killed by dismemberment and fire. Something which their demonstrated speed and strength make nearly impossible, so why aren’t they running the world? Edward mentions that everything about him functions as “lure” for humans. Why then hasn’t a vampire ascended to office in every country carried there by a fawning press and jubilant crowds? (idea for a movie: Obama is really a vampire – the cuddly kind – plot to be worked out later) What military or force could hope to stand up to a vampiric squad?

In fact, this isn’t a movie about vampires, but kryptonians. The entire story is little more than a fan fic answering the query: How does Superman love Lois? The desire for a normal life, the secret identity aspect, the enhanced powers all strive to make this movie little more than Smallville: the Motion Picture. And like Smallville, the movie has many intriguing premises in orbit of a boring, pedantic plot. For instance, Carlisle Cullen’s a vampire whose day job is doctoring. In a hospital. A place known for having many bodily fluids, one of which is blood. That’s not a bit player, that’s the premise for a hit TV show (just imagine if Gray’s Anatomy had vampires), yet he keeps getting shoved into the background, making us wish we could be watching him instead of the two principles.

However, this story is supposed to be a romance so perhaps I should be judging by romantic standards. Since there is no montage with the two of them (including a scene where Edward wins Bella a giant teddy bear at the fair) I gave the movie an F on romance as well. Much has been made about how stalkerish Edward is, but Bella comes off equally predatory. But the biggest shock is how conflicting the movie’s messages are. Edward comes to Bella’s father to formerly request the right to date her, after he has spent some time in her room. Warning to all guys: even if you’re doing nothing but talking, being in a girl’s room is inviting a death sentence from her father. At the end of the movie, the battle Bella endured is covered up with the excuse that she “fell down some stairs and out a window”. A cover story used so often by abusers that I laughed when it did not invite more scrutiny. True, Edward didn’t really abuse her, but that the family or community wasn’t suspicious of it makes one wonder if they are passive aggressively expressing their dislike of Bella. Again, another interesting premise is lost, where Bella tries to convince others that she is not, in fact, being abused despite their convictions (where they are correct that something is wrong, but incorrect about what it is).

So while this movie and book series may not be the affront to God and humanity that Kidz Bop or D:LT are, it nonetheless remains a sad, sobering lesson on wasted potential. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to get back to work on my fanfic where Sam & Dean hunt the Cullens right when Edward has fallen in love with Izzie while interning for Dr House. I’m right at the part where Batman arrives with John Conner…

Comment [21]

And now it’s time for another episode of Bad Author/Good Author.

Author- What is this?
Bob- Well you wrote ‘its cold outside’ and it should be ‘it’s’ with the apostrophe.
A- How dare you criticize me! Did you ever consider that by breaking the formational rules of grammar I was evoking in the readers a shattering of their preconceptions so that they might awaken to the deeper meanings of synergy underlining the perceived distortions inherent in reality?
B- Dude, this was supposed to be a children’s book about rabbits – rabbits that tech grammar.
A- Begone you stupid worm! When you have won half the awards and acclaim I have, then you may address me as such.

Author- What is this?
Bob- Your latest manuscript.
A- There’s only 3 marks on it.
B- Yes, I thought your prose most excellent and ready for print.
A- I have not improved this much from my first novel when you decorated my pages with red ink. This entire story was four hundred pages about a hamster running in his wheel. I wrote it just to see if you were paying attention!
B- And I thought it marvelously original.
A- It was crap and we both know it. Now do your job as an editor and give me some useful feedback or go fire yourself out of a cannon.

Cracked’s take on this.

Comment [9]

Hey, have you guys heard about this book series called the Twilight saga? It’s apparently really popular. So popular, they’ve already made two movies based on it and will soon release a third! Wow!

Of course, if you’re here you know about Twilight, but if you don’t, here’s a primer. So, with the sequel finally out on DVD and (more importantly) the Rifftrax crew releasing their commentary for it, I was able to enjoy this movie for myself. Still, what can I say about this movie that hasn’t already been said better by others? Well I’m going to divide this into 3 sections and rant (for too long) in them.

Acting

Among the grades I give to actors/actresses, there are two which are my most favorite. The first grade is where an actor treats their craft like a serious job. They work hard at what they do and bring such life to their roles that you just can’t get enough of watching them. They are “Michael Caine” grade. The Dark Knight is a movie full of Michael Caine grade actors (including the real Michael Caine). Other actors just plain have fun. Whether it’s crap or quality, they bring such joy to their roles that you can’t help but smile as each line delivered is like a wink to just you in the audience. They are “Reb Brown” grade. (need to know who he is?) Iron Man 1 was 100% Reb Browns.

In New Moon, I would give Charlie, Carlise and Dakota Fanning the Michael Caine grade. They do such a good job you wish they were just in their own movie about vampire buddy cops with their sassy secretary. Emmet, Aro and most of the wolf pack, meanwhile, seem quite aware they are in crap and are just having as much fun picking up their paycheck as they can. Some of the best Reb Brown grade acting I’ve seen in a long time. Then there’s Taylor Lautner who actually starts out as Reb Brown grade then shifts into Michael Cain grade later. Meanwhile, there’s poor Kristen Stewart. She has decent enough moments here and there, I don’t think her acting is at fault, it’s just the role itself does not have enough meat on it to sustain any movie.

I actually feel most sorry for Christopher Heyerdahl. Other than this magnificent work of literature, Mr Heyerdahl represents the first crossover between the Twilight saga and Supernatural. See, on the far superior show, Christopher played one of the most powerful demons ever: Alastair. Seriously, just watch him in this episode. During his scene in Twilight 2, I kept screaming at the screen, “Dammit man, you’ve fought angels! Just kick some ass already!”

But then it wouldn’t be Twilight if we didn’t waste the maximum potential every minute.

Relationships

So am I now some sort of team Jacob fangirl? No, I have no real care for who Bella picks, but is it too much to ask that the movie actually show us something of a relationship between her and Edward? And before anyone protests, I have a solid piece of evidence closing the debate once and for all:

Count how many times you see Bella really and truly smile while around Jacob then how many times she does so around Edward.

Guess which tally is 0.

Seriously, throughout this movie all you can think about is that Bella would have much happier 40 years with Jacob than an eternity with Edward. Really, what are she and Edward going to do when married? Screw each other and lay in meadows staring? I don’t care how in love you are, after a century that’s going to get boring. But in New Moon, we see a hint of what Bella’s and Jacob’s future could be:

“Well, Bella, we’ve raced across the country on motorcycles we built ourselves and climbed Mt Everest. What project should we start next?”
“We should see about getting some funds for it first,” said Bella chagrinly, shaking her empty purse for effect.
“What did you have in mind?”
“I take you down to the dog track…”

Canon

NOTHING IN THIS WORLD MAKES A DAMN BIT OF SENSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I said it before and I’ll say it again: why aren’t the vampires in charge. A big plot of this movie revolves around the vampires in charge (the Volturi) and their laws, such as: “Don’t be conspicuous.” And “Always look faaaabulous.” Why that first one? Why do these vampires care about remaining secret? Only the werewolves seem to be a threat and they seem to remain on their little corner of the world (seriously, why didn’t Jacob go with Bella, who was heading into the vamp den?).

You know what, fine. I’m making one up:

Meyerpires did rule the world once. But it was like the Beetles everywhere, all the time with them. Finally, they got so fed up with it they went into hiding. The Volturi dread the day meyerpires are exposed and their groupies return…

Bad movie! You’re not supposed to make me do that work for you.

I did laugh when Bella met the Volturi receptionist (a vampire fangirl). The scene plays out like this is sort of horrible, there’s something wrong here.

…EXCEPT IT’S EXACTLY THE SAME DEAL WITH BELLA.

Yes, for a moment in this movie, there were 2 Bellas on screen. You know, if it had been Jacob & Bella passing her, it would have been better. It would have given them increased motivation for wanting to fight the Volturi and reinforced how Bella made the right decision.

Only she doesn’t.

So the scene has no impact.

The scene with the tourists was spine-chilling though. Oh, except where our ‘heroes’ didn’t do anything.

You know what makes a hero? What a person does (in real life or fiction). What makes a true and noble hero is one that doesn’t give up, no matter what, no matter how effective. Superman, Batman and Spiderman are three of the greatest examples. Another one is from the movie Kung Fu Hustle. The protagonist has finally grown as a character; he’s not the failing crook he was at the beginning. In one scene, the biggest, baddest villain is beating up on this older couple of Good martial artists. Although he has no chance, the protagonist attacks, distracting the villain in order to let the other two escape. He promptly gets beaten – BADLY. Yet though he is literally pounded into the floor, he picks up this little piece of wood, and lightly taps the villain on the forehead with it. That is a hero.

In this movie we see Bella play at being a hero for one moment as Edward is getting thrown around the Volturi chamber. She can’t do anything to help him and Kristen really does play this scene as someone who is dying to do something, even though she can’t. Her pleading does save him though. Yet, all that serves to make the scene with the tourists even more enraging! Bella, Alice and Edward can’t really save the tourists, we know this, but do you see Bella put up even a fraction of the fight for them that she did for Edward? Do we see them being dragged out of the building kicking and screaming in protest? Do we see them make an effort to save even just one of the children that were in the group?

NO!

Which is why you’re not a hero Bella and neither are you Edward! Jacob, with everything he does in this movie, is ten times the hero the two of you put together are! And Charlie’s twice the hero that Jacob is.

Why couldn’t the movie been about him? GAH!

Comment [22]

(Sorry for the delay. I was hoping to do this in a vlog format, but the tech is not cooperating.)

Well it’s that time of year again. A new Twilight (TW) movie is out on DVD and the rifftrax guys have been kind enough to release their commentary of it the day of, so none of us sane people have to suffer one more minute of the movie escaping justice.

Unlike my other viewings, I do have to talk briefly about the rifftrax. As of this writing, all 3 Twilight movies sit in the top 10 riff downloads.

And this one is the best one yet in my humble opinion. However, make sure you have gotten the first two and watched them as the guys make a lot of call back jokes through the third one. (If you must pirate the pre-sync’d movies, please stop by and give the guys some $$$ so they can continue helping our sanity – I can’t support them on my own.) Don’t forget to not eat or drink anything unless your house is covered with saran wrap. (I was eating soup…)

And like my last review, I’ll pick out a favorite quote. Which is no contest: “God, the movie’s becoming self aware…”

So what can I say about the movie that hasn’t been said already? For one, the makeup was much improved this time around.

No, I didn’t become a woman for the new year. Being a long time sci-fi/fantasy geek, large spectacle and big screen effects don’t “wow” me that much any more (I blame the Star Wars prequels). Instead, I find myself noticing more the little things that draw you into a story, make it more believable.

In the previous two TW movies, you couldn’t believe any of the characters except for Alice and Charlie. No, I haven’t read the books and no, I didn’t have any preconceived notions about how the characters should look. What I’m saying is… an actor is someone who is supposed to convince you that they are someone else for a period of time. Even if that someone else is a completely new invention that has never been seen before. The more famous the actor, the more skill it takes for them to get the audience to forget about who they really are (Johnny Depp and James Earl Jones are two masters that come immediately to mind). However, even if the actor is an unknown, they can still fail, making the audience realize they’re watching someone play pretend there on screen. Sometimes, it’s not even the actor’s fault, but the makeup or the lighting or the directing or the writing that can keep the audience from accepting the fiction before them. Until now, I’d say the worst fault in the TW movies was the “pancake makeup” and some of the bad dye jobs (and of course the bad writing, but I don’t blame the movie makers for that) that kept us from accepting the actors roles. Here, it seems they finally got it fixed. The “vampires” look like walking statues, the werewolves ruddy and on the ordinary humans you can spot tiny flaws and blemishes that seem to stand out all the more when compared to the “perfect” supernatural creatures around them. It’s easy to tell at a glance who belongs to what group. It’s easier now to suspend your disbelief and pretend that the actors are really different people for two hours.

With all that said, what about the acting? This was truly the “movie of sidekicks” as all the secondary characters get more time as actual characters (though they STILL deny screentime to the TRUE star of the movie series: Charlie’s Mustache!). Jackson Rathbone does the most as Jasper, proving to the world that he could actually act if the poor guy can get a decent script for once (but then again, he gets to kiss Ashley Greene on screen so Twilight and The Last Airbender seem like a small price to pay). Here’s hoping Zombie Hamlet works out for him. But poor Bryce Dallas Howard. Don’t get me wrong, I love BDH, I’ll actually sit through the Village, Lady in the Water, T4 and Spidey3 purely because she’s in them. She can act as well as any starlet in Hollywood, but she cannot play a vampire. Her replacing Rachelle Lefevre as Victoria is the worst misstep of this movie. Rachelle could pull of the snarling and the cold menace that you would expect from a vampiric mastermind villain. For Bryce, it’s just out of her range.

Everyone else works out pretty well, though it seems sad that any combination of actors has more chemistry than the two main leads. Why? I’m not sure. Maybe part of it is my natural tendency to rebel against things being forced down my throat. Maybe it’s that so much of the movie is put toward telling us that Bella and Edward love each other, that the actors (and director, writers, etc.) don’t feel the need to put in a bit of extra work and show us that they love each other.

But oh… the writing… the ‘writing’…

I’ve matured enough (not a lot, but some) over the years that I don’t require near constant actions and explosions in my movies. Yes, I can find amusement in Transformers 2 but character and moral studies can hold just as much interest for me (which is why on my blog I praised Inception over and over again last year). So I should say that I don’t think this movie or its ideas were that bad. A real, serious examination of a person becoming a vampire could be very interesting. Oh wait, it was. Except here, in this universe, the “vampires” are so perfected that there’s no downside to this choice. To hear Edward or Rosalie complain about about their states make them sound like ungrateful, spoiled brats. Don’t they realize that the goal of almost every human society, culture and effort throughout history has been to obtain what they have?

And then, there at the end, we see the most blatant example of why Bella is a Mary Sue (and I’m spoiling this as a favor to everyone).

The big battle between Meyerpires is over. The Cullens have accepted Bree (played by the just adorable Jodelle Ferland) into their group under asylum. The Volturi show up, there’s some talking, then the Volturi up and kill Bree, while the ‘heroes’ do nothing! I hope you don’t find it indulgent that I quote myself a moment

You know what makes a hero? What a person does (in real life or fiction). What makes a true and noble hero is one that doesn’t give up, no matter what, no matter how effective.

Let’s think about this… the Cullens outnumber the Volturi present by themselves. They also have their werewolves allies around for a surprise bonus. There is no reason the Cullens could not have pwned the Volturi 8 ways to Sunday!

And you know what? That would have been interesting. Think about it: The Volturi go to kill Bree. The Cullens and wolves defend her and tear apart the Volturi present. Thus setting the stage for the next book/movie where the Volturi are enraged and use that incident as provocation to bring their wrath down upon the little town of Forks…

See? That’s an organic conflict, drawn naturally from the situation and characters (at least, it would be if the characters were heroic). But no, instead we have to have the conflict in the next book be all about Bella. We can’t even have a war be indirectly caused by her, she has to be the direct cause for it. That is textbook Mary Sueism: nothing in the story is allowed to not revolve around her.

And ultimately, that’s why the Twilight series keeps failing.

Comment [15]

(sorry for the delay everyone – been having catastrophic computer issues as well as some life incidents that have kept me away)

Ah Twilight… Truly you are the gift that keeps on giving.

I said in a podcast that this was going to be the best of the movies, and boy did it not disappoint. This is one of the most batshit insane films I’ve seen – and not in the fun “crazy for loco’s sake” sense like David Lynch or Grant Morrison. No, this was far worse: the insanity that is so close to normal, you just feel your mind slowly unraveling. Remember that: any time you want to do terror or insanity or whatever in your audience, going too over-the-top can often numb them to it all. Make it close to normal. As close to normal yet still “off” as you can will drive the audience down whatever road you’re aiming for.

Speaking of writing, it is said that it is always better to show instead of tell. Yet we find in this movie that all things must be in moderation. It. Shows. Every. Damn. Thing shy of Edward interfacing with Bella on their wedding night. Even something that is “told” on screen ends up becoming seen eventually. No, I’m not exaggerating. By the end of the month (wait… what’s the movie’s running time again?) you will be convinced that there are times when it’s really best to tell your audience something instead of showing them.

Let me also commend the movie makers for making one of the most controversial films in recent memory. There’s almost no way one can express an opinion on any scene without having your dinner party fracture into a Hunger Games-esque battle of social and political issues.

Have I gone mad? Have I suffered a perverse form of Stockholm Syndrome and fallen in love with Twilight? Yes and no, respectively. Explanations will not follow.

The movie starts out with Bella’s and Edward’s wedding and… again we see hints of a better plot. The Cullens are preparing a glade in the woods for the ceremony by carrying around huge tree trunks. Why aren’t these guys in construction? Forget the stock market, do you realize how profitable a meyerpire construction company would be? You wouldn’t have to pay insurance or regulation fees for the employees. Would rarely need to rent equipment (and that you do rent will more likely be the smaller, lower priced tools) and you’d be able to accomplish your tasks in two days (a week at most). Carlisle would have a waiting list of clients longer than the Western canon. WHY ARE THESE VAMPIRES SO BORING?

Then we get to the wedding… what’s this? As you may remember from the previous movie (though you are well within sanity to repress it) Bella made an EXPLICIT point about how people perceive and think about girls that get married right out of high school at 18. She has something of a point. But then why invite all of her high school friends to her wedding? Hell, they weren’t even friends, they were more like… associates. Is she that concerned about saving face or did she want her girlfriends to be there so she could declare, “I win, bitches!” Hey, there’s a few vampires at the wedding. Did she just toss her “friends” into danger there? Wow, Bella. That’s just… wow. Speaking of which: why don’t vampires want to eat Bella’s parents? I know kids won’t smell exactly like their parents, but if Bella is the most appetizing human to walk the earth in awhile, why don’t her folks smell just a bit more tempting than usual to other vamps? If Bella is like… peanut butter and chocolate to meyerpires; why isn’t Papa Swan like peanut butter and Mama Swan like chocolate to them? (both very appetizing and hard to resist)

Then again, why do meyerpires smell at all? They’re dead. Breathing was shown as being “optional” for them in the previous movie when the horde of newborns crossed the water – they should only have to draw in air to speak or to sniff the air. So if the Cullens and that other coven (forgot their names) are so intent on not eating people… why don’t they just not smell? Once, I almost did a fan fic of “midnight sun.” In there I was going to depict Edward realizing Bella was “silent” to him and thinking she was another vampire. In that fateful biology classroom, he took a sniff to confirm her identity… and she was human. Years he had spent without even the scent of those delicious, juicy humans… and that moment in the classroom almost drove him back into a feeding frenzy. (Yep, Bella doesn’t have any special scent, he was just saying that like every boyfriend tells their girl an exaggeration or two.)

Where was I…

Oh right. Well the wedding does give us one bright moment with the TRUE star of Twilight: Billy Burke’s Mustache! (Mr BBM itself) Behold how it defies the suckiness around it and rises above, challenging, demanding to have a co-staring role with Liam Neeson in Taken 2: Take Harder. But even the human attached to Mr BBM does an outstanding job with such a limited role, and to him goes the best moment of the movie:

Bella: Don’t let me fall, Dad.

Charlie: Never.

Yes, I cried manly tears at that. And laughed at his toast/warning to Edward. Man, just imagine the story we could have had had Charlie been included on the “secret” of meyerpires and werewolves. Especially with the two factions trying to maintain some peace at the wedding. Billy, may you and your awesome mustache of awesomeness get the future roles you deserve (just don’t team up with Bruce Campbell, this mortal realm can’t handle epicness of that magnitude).

So during the reception we have… open mic toasting? Seriously? WTF? Just… I don’t even… WTF? I followed Inception better than this!

Moving on, we go to the honeymoon where the couple plays chess and plays chess (one of those is a metaphor). This is one bit where everyone crying that Edward raped Bella baffles me. The whole deal is like a group that watches a bird fly into a window repeatedly, who then scold the window. Anyone with a modicum of common sense and has spent the time around Edward that Bella has should understand that he’s incredibly strong and know that he’s “hard as marble.” (metaphor?) Yet she still demands he do his husbandry duties towards her. If anything, she’s a lot more rapey towards him. Thank goodness he didn’t have to sleep, who knows what she would have done to him.

And after one night of lovemaking, Bella ends up pregnant (guess that’s what happens from centuries of blue balls).

Oh the baby. The baby…

I’ll say it: Renesme (Nesie) is the most interesting thing in the whole damn series. And this movie does win some kudos from me for feeding my favorite theory about the series. See, I agree with You Are Bella that Nesie is the antichrist. And in my mind, Jacob never imprinted; she just used her powers to make him think he did. In the movie, we actually see Jacob glance at his “imprintee” when she’s first born with… no result. But then, when he’s going to kill her, then seeing her causes him to imprint. Coincidence? Hmmm…

Oh, and the Volturi have a cameo in the credits. Guess it’s a good thing they didn’t come to the wedding and eat all of the classmates.

Rifftrax wise, this was funny enough to be weaponized. Those who have followed the guys religiously (I’m not the only one, right?) know that sometimes when the riffing target has long, dull segments, the guys will break into sort of audio sketches to fill time. (Good example: Avatar) Of course, sometimes this works great and sometimes it doesn’t. (Examples of both: Avatar) Believe it or not, that’s NEVER a problem here. This movie never stops providing fuel for riffing. Have the pause button handy so you can stop laughing long enough to hear the next joke.

Best line from them?

Man, a little vampire foreplay and her neck snapped like a celery stalk.

Oh, and they do their Volturi impressions through the end credits. The ENTIRE end credits.

I tell ya, if we ever do an Impish Convention, I’m definitely doing a Twilight riff marathon over one night.

I can’t wait for part 2, it’s gonna be epic…

Comment [4]

Recently, from John C Wright, I learned of this call for bloggers/reviewers from Mike Allen for a new short story collection titled Clockwork Phoenix 3. Then he actually sent me a copy!

Wait… really? Wow, this like… sort of makes me a “real” reviewer. Oh no – I’m going to be respectable soon! What can I do? Why I’ll post it on II to give SlyShy all the respectability so I can keep my “street kred”.

Because this is a review and an anthology, I thought I would address every story or two but try to keep them as spoiler free as possible. No, I won’t be sporking them unless the story is so atrocious it’s the only hope for my sanity.

Introduction

After the usual copyright, acknowledgments, table of contents, etc we get an introduction to this collection by Mike Allen himself. It’s in a style that, while formatted like prose, is nonetheless very poetic. That’s all I can really remember about it.

Not that there’s anything wrong about it, but it uses a very “technobabble” style and after the horrors of “Dragons: Lexicon Triumvirate” the first paragraph sent me into flashbacks. An hour later after the seizures and foaming stopped; I decided to skip on to the first story.

See? This is why we do what we do, people! Because bad writing spreads like a virus until you can’t even stomach good writers anymore! Still, I’ll give the intro a positive vote for Mike Allen NOT being Kenneth Eng.

1 – The Gospel of Nachash by Marie Brennan

The first story of this book is what we might call a ret con or historical fiction treatment of Genesis chapters 3 & 4. All in all… it’s not too bad; one’s enjoyment of the story does depend on your background knowledge of the base tale and your feelings toward it. The story is written in a style like a generic book of the Bible (in case the title didn’t clue you in) so your enjoyment/hatred toward that style should also factor into your consideration.

Ian Watson talked a bit about the challenge of writing prose of religious accounts at the end of his short story so I won’t bother recounting the principle arguments here. Since I myself write a lot of stories which take place in “the gaps of our knowledge” I rather enjoyed this tale though some parts of it might stir up intense feelings between the camps of predestination and free will. ¹ Then again, the best writing should spark discussion and thought, and this story does do that.

I’m going to rank this story as… highly enjoyable. Depending on your personal feelings and taste, this might downgrade to an enjoyable or mediocre rank but you could do a lot worse for a quick story fix.

_{If anyone would like to join me in discussing and/or reviewing this, let me know and we’ll see what we can do.}

_{1. And if any from those camps want to stir something up, please take it to the wonderful II message boards don’t slug it out in the comments.}

Comment [5]

In effort to maintain my sanity (and stave of chapter 5 of Twilight & Philosophy), I thought I would enjoy another 3 stories from Clockwork Pheonix 3. I just picked the next three in order, however one will notice that all 3 have a “star crossed lovers” commonality running between them. I don’t know if this is intentional but it did make me laugh in retrospect.

Tomorrow is Saint Valentine’s Day by Tori Truslow
The biggest part of this story is it’s format. It is a tale of a man that falls in love with a mermaid told through the style of a biographical essay. It’s not that bad of a style as the reader is immersed in another world which we are given glimpses of but never the full picture. One is warned of the ride we are in for when on the 2nd page there is a footnote to the story. A footnote! It reads:

Hamlet 1.1.118-9. How Shakespeare knew of the mer-people’s tidal migration to the moon remains a mystery, but these lines show that the Bard knew even more of Faery than we have given him credit for. Hamlet is not usually considered an elficological play, but in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Faeries C.C. Temple uncovers a wealth of hidden references and makes a compelling argument for Hamlet as a radically Faery-based text.

I dare say that part alone is worth the whole price of the book. I won’t spoil the rest but the impact of the story depends on how invested the reader gets. While I did find the world glimpsed of and the story format intriguing, I could never muster up much concern or care for the protagonists. I will grant that in a short story format it can be hard to create characters we love and appreciate, but this was a case of telling over showing. We are told that the main character is someone apparently so important to the world they merit a biographical essay but never really shown why we should care about them. I’ll give it points for creative effort and several moments like the one above that made me smile but over all this story just kind of left me cold.

Crow Voodoo by Georgina Bruce
This story I did not like. It’s not that I don’t mind challenging stories or head trips, but too many authors seem to think nowadays that you can be lazy and create mystery using obfuscation. Yes there is some hint of a proper story structure in here but there are so many meaningless tangents and randomized words laced throughout that it’s all drowned beyond sympathy. At the end there is an attempt for a shock ending but it can’t have any impact when you don’t give a damn about anyone involved. The reader is never given a good sense of what is metaphor and what is real until everything loses meaning. Such and such is going to die? Who cares! Dying probably means something else anyway. It’s also one of those very nihilistic stories but a failure at one. What usually makes literature horror work, or any horror, is the loss of something – something desirable. The world portrayed in this story is one so crappy, nothing has any impact. Who care is darkness or evil has a victory? As far as we can tell, it’s already won! In fact, death or oblivion seems like it’d be a step up for these people.

Hey, there’s a note in the back from the authors.

About the writing of her story in this volume, she
says “‘Crow Voodoo’ is mysterious. I had the first sentence
for a year, but no idea what it meant or what to do with it.
But it kept whispering to me, and one night I sat down to
write and found the story at my fingertips. Writing is not
usually like that, and most stories have to be built, shaped,
carved, forced, and coaxed into life. This one was waiting to
be found, its little heart already beating.”

My dear, you really should have polished it up a little more. Things found still need to be cleaned up and made presentable. So far, this is the worst one I’ve read in the book so far, and the only positive thing I have to say is that it makes the following story seem that much better.

Your Name is Eve by Michael M. Jones
Maybe it was impacted by the previous story, but this one is my favorite so far. This is how you blur the line between metaphor and reality and draw the readers in and invest them in your work. This is another paranormal romance with a mystical male falling in love with a moral female, but I will say this is done a lot better than anything we torch on this site (I dare say even falconempress might like it). I really don’t want to say much about it less I spoil something and you should go into this one blind. The only complaint about it I would have would be it’s violation of one of the main rules I pointed out in my first article for II. Of course, this is a short story so I can’t really fault the author for using a bit of a crutch in the romance… but you can also see the cracks in the story where maybe if he worked a little harder he could have achieved a more epic worthy romance.

Still, even that I’ll grade on a curve because… well you’ll just have to read for yourself to find out, won’t you? (Also, be sure to read the author’s note on the story in the back after you have read the tale, it has one of the funniest punchlines I’ve seen in awhile.)

Next time: The pluses are currently in the lead over the minuses 3-1 but there’s 11 left as we head through another 3 stories. Will we find additional encouragement for getting this book… or more reasons to set it on fire?

Comment [14]

This is… actually kind of weird. The stories “Hell Friend” and “Braiding the Ghosts” have a lot in common. So much, that I would swear they were English writing assignments where the class was given a general outline and the authors had to put their own spin on it. Neither story is bad but I do wonder if Mike Allen (who we’d like to thank for stopping by here) was keeping the authors chained in his basement (as we all know all editors do) and gave them this challenge to overcome writer’s block. I just hope he’s remembering to keep them fed and clean as authors have a tendency to stink up a place.

Hell Friend by Gemma Files

One’s enjoyment of this story is dependent on their enjoyment and familiarity of Oriental culture (specifically that of the mainland). I’ve always been fascinated by other cultures (especially to help me develop some for my WiP) and had the fortune of working with a Chinese immigrant for a few months, so I quite enjoyed this story. There are two “twists” in the plot. One is rather obvious and the reader looks forward to watching how the details play out. The other is hidden only because it is not talked about at all. I mean… imagine the movie Citizen Kane, exactly as it is, except after revealing what “rosebud” is, the movie reveals that Kane was also Count Dracula. We’re at least told that there is a mystery about a particular character but nothing else, making the reveal at the end less shocking than confusing. In the notes the author does mention that this story is a sequel of sorts to her novella ‘The Narrow World’ so it appears that being a pre-existing fan helps one to have a full appreciation.

Now because this is II, I must quote 2 things. First up is from the story itself.

Didn’t matter, any of it: It was like Twilight, like Titanic, like High School Musical, 1, 2 and 3. He was Edward, she was Bella;

Then in the author’s notes she says about this story:

Other influences include vague musings about the sociological effects of Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series on modern-day teen girls

I don’t know if Gemma Files has hung around here before, but all I’ll say is this: once you’ve read the story, it’s really hard not to take the two above quotes with heavy irony. In fact, I dare say that they are 100% accurate. You imps know what I mean…

Braiding the Ghosts by C.S.E. Cooney

I’m giving this one a plus, but with an asterisk. If you’ve read my first article for here then you can guess what bugged me in this story. To use terms from Lewis’ The Four Loves, part of me is tired of always having ‘love’ in modern day art be Eros. If you want to surprise me, have someone do something out of charity or friendship or even pity. That’s what bugged me most about this story. It could have done something really great that I hadn’t seen in years (except when I’m rereading Tolkien or Lewis or Chesterton or MacDonald etc). There were a lot of fascinating directions this story could have gone. Instead… we got another paranormal romance. Not a bad story in the least (even falconempress could enjoy it), but it could have been so much more.

Surrogates by Cat Rambo

Cat Rambo? Seriously? Damn! I’m jealous of this author already for one of the most kickass names I’ve ever seen. What’s worse, there’s no notes at the end telling us whether this is a guy or girl or if they’ve done anything else… for all we know Mike got the most badass feline alive to write for him. Heck, I’m wondering if sansafro187 wrote for Clockwork Phoenix because that sounds like his pen name.

As for the story itself, I’m going to give it a minus, but with another asterisk. Why? Because I think the reader is supposed to hate the story. It’s kind of like grading 1984, aren’t you supposed to hate the plot and the characters and the ending etc etc? Isn’t that the goal of the story? I’m not sure what this story’s goal was, but it is the most debate-provoking tale I’ve seen in CP3 so far. I’ll even go so far as to say it’s a pretty good method for judging how compatible you are with someone. I find the story to be quite dystopian, but some might find it utopian, even hopeful. Obviously I wouldn’t enjoy spending much time around anyone like that. It is one of the best dating aids I’ve ever seen – break up with anyone who disagrees with you on this story, because – trust me – it won’t work out.

All in all, I’d say these 3 stories again recommend the collection. There will be a bit of a break as I steel myself for another round with Twilight & Philosophy but the CP3 reviews will continue (probably immediately as therapy).

Also, I have been remiss, here is the official site should anyone be interested in getting this collection (coming in July) or the earlier 2.

Comment [4]

With the release date rapidly approaching, I’ve decided to finish the reviews of CP3 immediately. As always, if you’re wanting to order this book or the previous 2, you can check out the official site.

Lucyna’s Gaze by Gregory Frost

It’s a holocaust tale with barely enough sci-fi added to get it into this collection. Which isn’t a bad thing, but should be considered a fair warning to any who can’t stand stories etc in those settings.

I am one who will defend tooth and nail for the idea that books themselves can be works of art and spacing, margins, etc should be considered as much a part of the story as the canvas and paint used are considered with other artworks. However, I will admit that the flavor and style of prose can get out of hand and part of it is in here as well. Sometimes, in efforts to make their story almost like poetry (which I have nothing against), authors overshoot their marks and make something nearly nonsensical. An example would be this story’s ending. I was musing less on the impact of it than on trying to figure out what it was saying in the first place. Was it metaphorical or literal or a little bit of both? Making things just a little bit clearer would have worked for the story’s benefit. Unless you want things to be confusing and figuring out “what happened” is part of the story’s point.

So unhappy subject matter plus obscuring ending, I’m giving this one a minus, but that also seems to be the author’s goal.

Eyes of Carven Emerald by Shweta Narayan

Here we have a “retcon” of Alexander the Great’s story in a steampunk world with an additional tale interwoven through it. That other tale? A steampunk version of the Lady or the Tiger. Both are pretty enjoyable, though I do encourage you to brush up on your history before reading (I know I need to to really enjoy it).

One caution. Being one of the Old Ones of the internet, I have gotten used to typos and misprints to the point that I can usually tease out a writer’s original intent without much effort, thus, I rarely count someone’s typos against them. However, on page 170 of the PDF I have, there was a big typo that made the segment nearly unreadable until I was able to figure it out.

All in all, I’ll give this one a plus. Apparently the story involves a clockwork bird that is a repeating fixture of Shweta Narayan, so fans of her will probably definitely need to seek out this tale.

Dragons of America by S.J. Hirons

This story… I wasn’t very happy with, and I’m a sucker for dragons. It reads like a poorly done political cartoon, so immediately your like or distaste of it will rest on your like or distaste of America. What makes this even worse is that it’s pretty much unnecessary.

The story proper takes place in a world with not only a different history from ours, but apparently a completely different geography. Almost everything else in the world has invented and original names, but for some reason, this one particular country (which is occupying the protagonist’s nation), has a name matching a country in ours, oh and seems to have a lot of the same “features” about it (“hamburgers, hot dogs, buttered popcorn and beer” says one passage). Why? Apparently for no more reason than to rail against the current USA policies, which just gets tiresome (especially if you’re already hearing complaints about it all the time). I won’t ramble on and on, but have I mentioned how much I hate politics? Big minus on this story.

Comment [8]

Now this was a pretty good round of stories.

Where Shadows go at Low Midnight by John Grant

This is a very… mediocre story. That’s not a mark against it – at least it wasn’t brain numbingly horrible – I just forgot about it until I consulted my notes. The story is written as a sort of metaphysical discussion of a world not quite our own (or is it?). All in all, a pretty cute, warm little tale that’s good for a few minutes of escape. I’d definitely give it a plus.

Lineage by Kenneth Schneyer

How does one define perfection? I usually say, it is something to which the slightest change results in ruin. “Lineage” is a perfect short story; one of the very few that I’ve read and I have a subscription to a magazine of short stories. Is it the best? No (there are some that are better) but it is one that utilizes and realizes the form of the short story. To add or take away anything would ruin it.

This is a story that also serves as an excellent demonstration of how to do things right. The story is mysterious and “unknown” but not confusing. Take note authors: you don’t have to spell everything out but you do need to at least hint that answers are out there. Really well done. A big plus and recommendation to anyone who wants to master the short story medium.

Murder in Metachronopolis by John C. Wright

Full Disclosure: I am a frequent reader of Mr Wright’s blog and have even corresponded with him a few times. This is also one of the longest stories in the collection.

The Man Who Folded Himself is a novel that plays out the full logical consequences of ‘flexible’ time travel. It’s a bit of a head trip and a must read if you enjoy time travel tales.

MiM can be described as parable proving time travel impossible and morally wrong. This is the first I’ve seen of a tale discussing the morality of time travel and for this, the story belongs with the aforementioned novel as a must read for time travel fans. The murder mystery proper is actually just a plot device, the central premise and drive being something different. The destination is predictable but Mr Wright seems to be counting on that, using the reader’s expectation to make the story’s journey quite fascinating.

This isn’t to say that the story is flawless. A couple of times John gets a little too enthusiastic in describing the details of the sci fi tech and world he’s painted. Of course the explanations are welcome but with a short story, space is precious. How something works isn’t as important in this format than what something does and any rules involving it. At least he does have a good sense of timing and never lets his explanations disrupt the story’s rhythm. I’d actually encourage John to expand the story into a thin novel (not a brick or airport book size) where he can really drown the reader in details and take us to that world.

In earlier reviews I mentioned that I felt I lacked the cultural comprehension to fully appreciate some stories. MiM is a story deeply steeped in classical Western culture. I couldn’t help but chuckle on almost every page at all the nods and references he’s hidden. But if you’re not very aware of Western tradition, you might enjoy this story as well – though it is still quite accessible for nearly everyone.

A big, big plus.

Finally, there’s an interesting note I must reproduce from the semi-appendix.

“Metachronopolis” shares some elements of setting with John’s story in the first Clockwork Phoenix volume, “Choosers of the Slain,” making it the first tale in our pages to expand on a previously introduced multiverse.

So if you enjoy this story well enough (and you should), you’ll now be sorely tempted to pick up the first Clockwork Phoenix. Well played Mike Allen. Well… played.

Get these collections here.

Comment [3]

You know… in retrospect I should have done this whole review series in a manner similar to one of my favorite books – giving each “tour” a grade, making references to management, etc. Oh well, live and learn. That’s why I’m not a professional reviewer. Besides, there will probably be other anthologies to criticize (assuming that tomorrow is not the day Jesus returns for His death cage match against Cthulhu as refereed by Bruce Campbell).

So with some ups and down, we come to the end of Clockwork Pheonix 3. All in all, a pretty good work. With the pluses heavily outweighing the minuses, the collection is looking like a worthwhile summer purchase for my fellow imps.

Unless one or both of these final stories is as bad as most of the stuff we usually read (publicly) here. And that won’t happen.

Right?

To Seek Her Fortune by Nicole Kornher-Stace.

Awhile back on the forums, we had a discussion on the Readers’ Manifesto wherein we complained about some authors getting a little too pretentious in their writings. While she isn’t as bad as Cormac McCarthy, Nicole provides many examples of everything I hate about most modern novels: More emphasis put on writing a “good sentence” rather than a good story.

But then I look in the appendix and see… well maybe this was the goal.

About “To Seek Her Fortune,” she rather puckishly elucidates, “This story is the result of my taking the timehonored tradition of expanding a short story into a novel and running it in reverse.

So now I wonder if the joke is on me. At any rate, your enjoyment of this story will largely be dependent on how much you enjoy a lot of prose to describe something simple. No it’s not purple prose – more like… indigo prose. It’s not quite as bad as the purple prose gold standard (Twilight) but… well when you read it, you’ll understand. I mean it takes 4 pages from story start to find out that this kid with the main character is her son (half that just to learn he’s in the scene).

The story is also very Tarantino-ish in it’s non-linearity so that could also impact your own enjoyment. I’ve never been a bit QT fan so on nearly every page this story left me cold. Definite minus for my tastes.

Fold by Tanith Lee

If you know much about the fantasy/sci fi lit world, you’ve probably heard about Tanith Lee. Quote: “She has written 77 novels, 14 collections, and almost 300 short stories, plus 4 radio plays”. Yeah, she’s done a bit of work. Tanith is one of those artists where I say, “I’m not a fan who has to read/watch/enjoy everything they’ve made, but if I hear something is by them, I’ll give it my time.”

“Fold” is written in a style similar to a story earlier in the book, “Tomorrow is St Valentine’s Day”. It’s charming but not too sugary. Hearwarming, but not quite a tear-jerker. It’s not really a story you can talk easily about without major spoilers so… I won’t. Let’s just say it’s a plus and a pretty good note to end the book on.

.

So all in all, what’s the final word? Because I’m compulsive and have to finish reading any story I start (unless it’s eyeball bleeding bad), anthologies are great for summer. I can enjoy a bit of escape before having to hit the beach or the roller coaster or whatever, without much interruption. I like to save more engrossing books for the winter, when you should be curled up with it under the blanket, the snow falling outside.

If you enjoy anthologies and need a sci-fi fix while you wait for Dr Who or Supernatural or any other favorite show to come back from reruns, grab this collection. It will be out soon.

Comment [2]

With the DVD release of New Moon today, I thought I’d get the imps around here to tell what they’ve learned from the Twilight saga and, indeed, how these lessons give us all great wisdom for living from day to day. Please enjoy the fruits of the labor from the Twilight Institute for Better Living.

Marquis De Carabas

Joel Schumacher foresaw the advent of Twilight and tried to tell the audience through the portrayal of Mr. Freeze. “Ice Man Cometh!” Nobody listened.

Sitting on a chair all day and screaming in your sleep is a perfectly normal way of coping.

Slack-jawed girls never say “No”.

Robert Rodriguez wanted to direct New Moon and change its name to “The Adventures of Wolfboy and Emogirls in 3-D”.

Peter Cullen is the only true awesome Cullen.

Kyllorac

The only way to perform a proper C-section is to gnaw through the pregnant woman’s uterus.

Giving birth is a dangerous business. Moreso if your baby is half-sparklepire.

When you’re a werewolf, being in love with a baby is not pedophilia; it’s imprinting.

NeuroticPlatypus

Stalkers get more girls than nice guys.

When your boyfriend leaves you, the best thing you can do is lie in the woods and wait to die.

Standing in the sun and sparkling in front of a crowd can get an immortal killed.

Whenever possible, go shirtless to show off your six pack.

Werewolves are surprisingly hairless in human form.

Even those without souls should practice abstinence.

Edward is a dirty old man, and Bella is jail-bait.

Forks is the most depressing place ever.

Giving up your soul is a fair price for immortality with your undead boyfriend.

Demon-spawn are legal so long as they’re only half-vampire.

Paper cuts are delicious.

Parents just don’t understand.

Jumping off cliffs is a fun after-school activity.

Cedric didn’t really die.

High school is awesome. You should totally spend your entire immortal life there.

Being around humans all the time is the best way to avoid eating them.

Vampires smell good, not like the rotting corpses they are.

Hard-as-diamond material can be completely pliable.

Venom is basically just like blood, which you still need when you’re undead.

Prom is such a drag.

If Edward ever leaves, Bella will need to be institutionalized.

Statues with bronze hair and topaz eyes are so hot.

Things that are creepy/illegal for normal guys to do are cute when Edward does them.

Every girl dreams of being compared to illegal drugs.

Beware of Tyler’s van.

There are fangirls, and they will kill you.

Bella is the best-smelling thing on the planet. Feel free to tell her so. It’s not rude or weird at all.

Friendly people are annoying. You should be as mean to them as possible, but even then, they will love you.

Phoenix girls are prettier than the ones in Forks.

Everything can be “said meaningfully”.

“Chagrin” is a word that can never be overused.

Books don’t need plots when they have hot people in them.

People should only read classics if they are the favorite books of characters in pop culture.

Bella is so special that even as a vampire, she has no desire to feast on human blood.

Abandoning your entire life for a guy you have a lust-based relationship with is the smart choice in life.

Diamonds are forever. That’s why vampires are immortal. They’re made of diamonds.

All werewolves are Native Americans.

Werewolves can turn into wolves whenever they feel like it and are in no way affected by a full moon.

sansafro187

Edward Cullen proves being attractive and unpleasant is a viable substitute to having a personality.

Don’t solve any of your own problems. Whine about them until good-looking monsters take care of them for you.

You’re only as old as you look.

WiseWillow

Sneaking into a girl’s bedroom to watch her sleep is perfectly fine. Reading the titles of the books on her shelf is not.

Spanman

Say “Yes” to serial stalkers!

RomanticVampireLover

Being “chattered at” is quite annoying. So much so, that it might cause you to drop a plate.

Vampires turn books from “boring” to “scintillating”.

Immortality has no repercussions whatsoever.

People who don’t want to be your friend are automatically in love with you.

Moldorm

The more someone ignores/insults/threatens you, the more they care.

Therefore, doing these things is the best way to make friends.

When you have an attractive character, you can never remind the readership too often.

Happiness is based on lust.

Women should never do anything, ever, without a man to supervise them.

Cold is hot.

lookingforme

Being able to cook automatically makes you mature.

Treating your friends like crap is guaranteed to make you popular.

Normal people are boring—monsters that want to suck your blood are much more attractive!

DWest88

Guys who are actually interested and caring suck compared to people who sit outside your window at night and watch you sleep.

Buttcrack Santa is the patron saint of Forks.

Manipulating your friends in order to get guys attention diverted is just fine and dandy, in fact doing so makes you a WONDERFUL person.

Comment [7]

My protege (who I’ve been training to continue my plans once the heroes defeat me) demonstrated how well my lessons have been and dragged me off to the latest Twilight movie. Unriffed.

…

A few hours later once the EMTs revived me, what are my thoughts?

There was a trailer for the Hobbit I hadn’t seen yet. The bliss of the geekasm from that sustained me through the first week of this film.

Other trailers included:

• Warm Bodies – a paranormal romance involving zombies. No really, apparently a zombie sees a blonde so beautiful that his heart starts beating and… he becomes less dead every day. And “their love” seems to spread to allow other zombies to become more alive. Though we still have to have zombies so there are a 2nd class of “even deader, more monstrous” zombies in this film. My prediction: either a large-scale flop or total guilty pleasure. It may have its charms.
• Oz – First time I saw this (a poster) I was ready to hate it. Yet each successive trailer I’ve seen seems to be trying its damndest to make me like it. This may be a surprising good flick.
• Mama – A commercial for a horror film in front of Twilight? It’s like they’re taunting we trollers.
• Now You See Me – What if Ocean’s Eleven and the Prestige had a baby? Might be a worth a rental.
• Catching Fire – The barest teaser trailer I’ve ever seen. Hunger Games 2 will be releasing.

Wasn’t there something else I was talking about…

Oh right! Well this is the funniest movie I’ve ever seen; and thrice intentionally! People like… emote in this movie (I think I even saw Kristen nearly do so). One can’t help but think that the reason everyone’s smiling in this film is that they’re thrilled the whole deal is finally over and they’re free. Really, it feels like everyone involved (in front of or behind the cameras) were just so tired of this saga they declared “screw it!” Scenery is chewed constantly. One is hard pressed to figure out if the SFX are intentionally done that way or if the budget just ran out. Know what? I’ll just have to do this as a text review. Let’s dive in.

So the movie starts with ramping credits.

Yes. The credits.

And the first… eighth of the movie. Not even 300 had ramping credits. Not even 300 had this much ramping. And credits play over constant shifting between red and white, and close ups of snow and things crystallizing from frost. The symbolism is so thick I could hear Kurt Wimmer screaming “tone it down, guys!”

After the credits, we slam STRAIGHT into one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard (and I can listen to Nickelback unironically). So Bella wakes up all meyerpirey and we get a lot of zoom ins and outs. A lot. Look, I know the filmmakers are trying to convey her new senses and it isn’t that bad of an effort but they drag it out WAY too long.

Bella meets Edward. They go hunting. Oh my goodness, the two of them are actually smiling at each other. I… I could almost believe they are in love. Where the hell was this in the previous movies? She senses a rock climber out… somewhere (seriously, the editing and perspective on this scene sucks). She climbs up the rock face in a comical manner before Eddy stops her and… then she saves some deer by eating a cougar.

Then we get the scene where Bella learns that Jacob imprinted on Nessie. Successfully intentionally funny scene #1. She comes very close to ripping his head off, or at least I believed she would more than I ever did of Edward (and its HIS daughter we’re talking about).

MONTAGE!

After a bit, we finally get to our REAL star, Billy Burke. The family is getting ready to say Bella’s dead and leave Forks so Jacob goes running off and tells daddy that Bella’s actually alive. He also reveals that he’s a werewolf in a stripping sequence that brings us to Intentionally Funny Scene #2. (I even squeed a little as now I can totally fan fic a story of him hunting with the Winchesters. He should play John’s brother with Jeffery Dean Morgan in a badass prequel series.)

Daddy Swan goes to Cullens’ house and his acting in the following scene just proves that he (and his mustache) is WAY too good for this series. Way, WAY too good. He really makes you believe that he is a loving father. Seriously, Billy, if anything I write ever gets made into a movie, I want you in it.

Then we get… MONTAGE!

Including a bit of Eddy and Belly screwing (I think it was here, may have been another montage). Any pretense of this movie NOT being porn evaporates around there.

At the end of which, Nessie gets spotted by someone who goes running off to tell the Volturi like a good little tattle tale. So with the actual, organic and emotionally touching conflict out of the way, we can now go on to the shoehorned conflict. There is some discussion, some planning all to set up…

MONTAGE!

This isn’t too bad as the guest stars playing the other meyerpires seem to have a challenge to see if any of them can outham Michael Sheen. There are two unintentionally (I think) horrifying scenes in this. First, Eddy and family visit the other vegetarians and bring Nessie. When she places her hand on the cheek of one of them and causes her to “understand”, the whole scene comes off as brainwashing, with Reneesmee drawing thralls to her will to protect her (and throughout the movie this impression doesn’t lessen). Second scene is when the Cullens recruit an old war buddy (like, Revolutionary) of Carlise’s to help out. In the middle of him attacking someone. And he insists on eating before he leaves. AND WE WATCH HIM DO SO! Seriously! When did this movie have vampires? And our “heroes” stand there and watch him eat this guy that, as far as any of us know, is completely innocent. To make it worse, the guy becomes one of the major secondary characters, NEVER MIND THAT HE MURDERED SOMEONE WITHOUT REGRET. This internet doesn’t make a big enough middle finger for how infuriated that scene made me.

There’s a training scene with Bella learning about her shield. It has Intentionally Funny Scene #3 in it as we get to watch Edward be shocked by some electric meyerpire. So there is something for the haters in this.

The movie spins its wheels awhile. There’s an Avatar meyerpire (controls the elements – and he’s done a voice in Legend of Korra so… meta?) and a literal “draco in leather pants” meyerpire. We get a Christmas scene with Charlie that’s actually touching and the passport scene with Jenkins. Is it just me, or does Wendell Pierce sound like he could be Morgan Freeman’s son? This movie does not DESERVE the talent it has.

Alright, I know what you are all wondering about: the showdown.

I’m not going to lie, Michael Sheen is almost worth the price of admission, and if they have a 2 hour featurette on the DVD of his outtakes, I will buy it. He doesn’t so much chew the scenery as ravage it. He almost seems to taunt the other actors with “go on, try and convince the audience I’m a threat!” Alas, his devouring angers the others who demand to have their own bite, so a fight breaks out. The funniest fight scene since Blazing Saddles. No, seriously. At one point, Eddy & Belly work together to do a flying spinning kick. During which, every named Volturi, Carlisle, Jasper, Seth, and Leah all die. Eddy nearly does, but he comes bursting out of the ground in a move so reminiscent of Superman, I nearly fell out of my chair laughing.

Until… SPOILER it’s revealed to all be a vision of Alice’s that Aro sees. END SPOILER

I know, big surprise right? There for a second, I almost thought the movie would actually have some ballz. But no, it all ends without a single punch thrown. Blah blah things wrap up and the movie closes on, I mean this literally, literally (I swear I am not making this up) on the last sentence of the book.

Then it proceeds to credit the ENTIRE saga. Again, not kidding.

And… that’s it. Feel free to post questions in the comments and I’ll answer them to the best of my recall but honestly, go see it for yourself. Definitely, the best comedy of the year. I’m not sure if the Rifftrax can make it any funnier.

(Hey… I notice City of Bones and the Host have trailers on IMDB. Oh Jabootu, truly you provide us a rich bounty.)

Comment [13]

I look at philosophy similar to how I look at my favorite show, Supernatural. Fun, but not really serious or practical (actually, SPN might be more practical than philosophy). After reading some religious texts and a few ancient philosophers, it seems to me that most philosophy is either not saying anything new or anything useful.

So it is with some amusement that I picked up Twilight & Philosophy at the bookstore. Yes, I am surprised this is larger than a pamphlet, but it is still quite small. At close to the same width and height as the novels proper softbacks, this book is about a tenth as thick as Twilight alone. This struck me as funny because, while searching for it, I came across a book I would much rather have: The Logic of Alice which is double the size of my edition of Alice in Wonderland by all three dimensions. I do believe this is further evidence that one can judge a book’s worth by how thick its commentary is.

Also, let me say that this is not a book written by the excellent John Granger. Although I don’t always agree with him, his commentaries on Harry Potter are one of the most well reasoned and thought provoking works I’ve read in a long time. His thoughts on Twilight are usually the most intelligent you’ll find. No, this is a part of a series that gave us such enlightening fare as the philosophy of the Daily Show, Metallica, and the Office. Nothing against any of those, but really, how deep can you go at the shallow end of the pool?

At least the book has Kristen and Rob on the cover instead of that stupid apple. Unless you’re very picky, there’s some eye candy for you.

And that’s everything I can say about the book without actually opening it. Abandon hope, ye who follow after. But part of me is looking forward to this. Will the book be daring enough to include some points from the antis? Will it go for the usual vapid, Hollywood-isk generic advice? This is going to be a bold experiment as I have not and will not be reading the book beforehand. Instead, I’ll read a section at a time and post my thoughts here, as soon as possible. Being prepared is for sissies. Let’s face this book with only our wits to save us, shall we?

Comment [12]

Freud once claimed that love and death mark the driving forces of human existence. Having fallen in love with the undead of Twilight, we might well say the same thing about this vampire tale.

Such begins the introduction titled “undead wisdom” (the plethora of jokes to be made from that title, I leave you to capable commentators). While I might disagree with Freud about a lot of things, I cannot argue with him on this. Much (if not most) of human art, culture and more cannot be understood without a context of death and love. As the authors go on to point out in the introduction, death is our ever-vigilant, ever-present foe. One which we are powerless against, save for one weapon: love. The Christian Bible itself could be summed up in one sentence as: “Love conquered death.”

Which brings us to the obvious question: What does any of this have to do with Twilight? 67.3% of this very website is devoted to disputing that there’s any love in Twilight. And save for that of taste and literature, death seems to be missing as well. Ok, ok – maybe the “vampires” are supposed to be dead. If we’re going to argue over semantics with a philosophy book, we’ll never make it past the first page before the zombie rise.

The Twilight books confront love and death, and so much more, in a way that facilitates a strange recognition – that the dead are indeed wise, and that they are sometimes wise in matters of the heart, even when that heart doesn’t beat.

I’m sorry, but no, the series does not “confront” anything more than carnal desire. And from what little I’ve read and absorbed from cultural osmosis, there’s not a wise being to be found in any of the books. In wanting to avoid eating humans, the Cullens live among them. That’s like a family of recovering alcoholics taking up jobs in a brewery. Hell, Carlise works in a hospital (a very bloody place). And the stupidity of Bella need not be repeated. If we’re making stuff up on the fly, let me tell you kids about the time I fought a clan of ninjas and how from that we can learn the importance of dental hygiene.

The following two paragraphs give some general overviews of Death & Love. Not much to argue about there and, if you’re reading this, I’m sure you’re familiar with the basics.

In the world of Twilight, death is not inevitable, and the purest form of love seems to have been found. …blah blah stuff about the human condition.
…
The Twilight saga is full of love and death, as well as a host of other topics central to the way we understand ourselves and navigate the world.

This part just bugs me. No, the purest form of love hasn’t been found and the saga is not full of love. It is full of Eros. Wait, I’m getting blank stares. Let me explain.

One of C.S. Lewis’ best and most philosophical works is the book, The Four Loves. In it he describes… well you can guess. The four loves he defines are affection (like parents to children), friendship, eros (romantics love, sex), and charity (perhaps best defined as: concern for others). Now, how many of the previous four are actually examined in the series? We see glimpses that Bella’s parents love her and she’s said to have friends, but are these really any more than informed attributes? Is the love between Bella and Edward ever anything but eros (whereas the truly most epic romances usually demonstrate all four loves between the two principles)?

This book aims to help you with just that, asking such questions as: What is the nature of love? Is death something to be feared? How should feminists react to Bella Swan? Is there a moral obligation to be vegetarian? What is it like to experience the world as a vampire? What does it mean to be a person? How free are we?

Wait… what’s that? Dare I hope? Dare I… believe that this book might accept, even address certain “anti” claims? Oh you are cunning bastards you are. Now I must read through to see where the authors dare tread.

Forks, Washington, is a small town; unfortunately, minds can be very small places, too. But philosophy has a way of opening up both…

I’m reminded of the bumper sticker, “Beware opening your mind too much less it falls out.” The principle being-

…It allows us to see what we hadn’t seen before and allows us to explore issues we might not otherwise explore. Only literature rivals philosophy in this capacity, making our examination of the Twilight saga the perfect place for literature and philosophy to meet.

-that you can be led into believing anything. And if you asked me, I’ll take literature (even bad literature) over philosophy. At least the former gives you some support for your suspending of disbelief. No offense philosophy fans, but let’s see if the rest of the book changes my mind.

Comment [8]

You Look Good Enough to Eat: Love, Madness, and the Food Analogy

Welcome to the first chapter of the first section of this book (the first commentator to guess what the 4 sections of this book are will win, High Praise ^{TM 1}). You know, all things considered, I didn’t hate this chapter.

No I haven’t snapped, broken by the madness. Especially compared with what’s coming, this wasn’t all bad. The chapter opens with recapping Edward’s near loss of control after smelling Bella. Ugh. I never understood why Edward smelled Bella in the first place. He’s ‘dead’. He doesn’t breathe. In fact, one would believe that if he wanted to maintain self control in a place that is the equivalent of a vampire buffet, he would make it a point not to inhale those mouth watering scents ². Still, I can’t fault the book for this because it does give us ‘antis’ an argument I can’t believe I never ran across.

“Sorry about the food analogy,” he says to Bella when, in his clumsy attempt to explain his boorish behavior toward her on the day they meet, he ends up comparing her to ice cream. Of course, for most of us this really would be no more than an analogy. …But there’s something a bit disingenuous about Edward calling his food reference an “analogy,” since he really did want to make a meal of Bella.

You know how nowadays you can’t go for like, literally five minutes without hearing someone literally use the word ‘literally’ in like, the most literally inappropriate manner? Yet here in Twilight we have an instance where something is truly literal, but Meyer passes it off as a metaphor. Gah!

So after a start talking about how base desires (eating & sex especially) are often used interchangeably, the chapter takes a left turn into discussing Plato’s argument that our base desires are useful, indeed they even have a place in our lives. He uses the metaphor of two horses pulling a chariot, one wild and the other tame. For modern audiences, I like to call this the ‘gas-brake’ principle. A car possesses a gas pedal and a brake pedal. In this same manner, we humans possess passion and reason. Just as you cannot adequately drive a car with just one of those pedals, so can you not live an adequate life without passion and reason both. Edward in his pre-Bella life lived mostly by reason. His life was stagnant. However, upon meeting her, it was like suddenly pressing the gas pedal on a stopped car, forcing it to jump and proceed forward. The lesson is a sound one, taught in many religions and philosophies. Without the brake of reason, we careen out of control, hurting ourselves and others. But without the gas of passion, we are stationary and aimless.

The moral of the chapter: don’t be like Edward. Don’t be frozen in your life, and if you do find something to be passionate about, find something more worthy of it than Bella. (at least, that’s how I read it)

_{1. Currently High Praise is worth nothing but self-esteem, although I reserve the right to suddenly give it a value at any time such as… perhaps a double-secret prize give-a-way.}

_{2. If I ever get motivated to write a fix fic for Twilight, I’d make a special note that Edward was drawn to Bella because she was actually quiet compared to the blaring thoughts he suffered with all day. Curious that she might be like him, he takes a sniff to determine what she is only to have all those delicious smells nearly overwhelm centuries of being “dry”.}

Comment [13]

Welcome back faithful reader. If you’re following this series, you know that not only did I not hate the last chapter, but even gave it some faint praise.

Your High Praise! challenge for this article is as follows: This chapter goes from page 25 to page 37. On what page was all of my goodwill consumed by an inferno of hate? ¹

So the chapter starts…

Edward Cullen is the kind of vampire you’d want your daughter to date, if she had to date a vampire. –pg 25

If my daughter was dating any vampire (even Angel who I am a fan of), I would kill him as soon as possible and dare any court to convict me. Setting that aside, I do have to give this article credit for pointing out something subtle that again proves the Twilight movie was superior to the book. In the movie, we only ever see Bella eat vegetarian foods. It’s a nice touch to give the two lovers something more in common than… um… nothing. It also gives us a bit of justification for Bella not hungering for blood when she becomes a newborn vampire in book 4 (oops, spoiler warning) – you know, other than her being perfect.

Now, let me take a moment to post a DISCLAIMER:
I have nothing against vegetarians (unlike Hippies) or anyone with any dietary restrictions. Whether for health, personal taste, or religious obligations, what you eat is your business.

But making it all about ethics…

A novel can’t tell you everything about characters’ lives, covering every bathroom break and trip to the drugstore. So I propose that one of the things left out of the Twilight books and the movie is that Edward and Bella took a night class at a college nestled in the pines on the outskirts of Forks. The class was called “The Ethics of Eating,” and I speculate the happy couple fit right in with all of the other pale, grungy students, if Edward was just a shade paler. In this class, they endeavored to articulate what the common principle is that leads to their diverging ways of practicing the ethic of vegetarianism. –pg 26

…In the interest of giving my opponent every possible advantage before I crush them, I will concede that such a scene would have been more entertaining than a lot of the book; especially if (as the essay posits later) the class knew what Edward was.

Scene 1. In Which a Reasonable Ethic is Proposed (no it isn’t)

So the first part starts out:

Edward and Bella must have insisted that ending the life of any animal, of any species, is a serious matter. You can’t kill lightly, or for just any trivial reason, but a sufficiently serious reason can give you justification. –pg 26

Keep that in mind as we jump ahead a little.

Humans don’t come first in every conceivable case. To think so would have to involve the bias in favor of humans that [Peter] Singer [a leading ethicist and champion of animals] calls “speciesism.” –pg 29

Ok, here’s a question: Why is speciesism bad? Are we living in a world now where attaching “ism” to any word makes it ipso facto bad? (if we are, watch me use it) If you’ve actually studied life and biology, you quickly figure out that every freaking living thing practices speciesism. Speciesism is a good thing; it’s pretty much the only reason humans are now in as good a position as we are where we can contemplate idiocy like this.

On what basis do we make these value discriminations? It’s a matter of dispute, but one approach is to consider what different species (or their typical members) are capable of. –pg 29

What’s true is that in each of these categories, humans do have more extensive and nuanced abilities. Of course, there are things animals are better at, too. –pg 30

Last time I was in sociology (assuming things hadn’t changed by now) there was one factor considered universal to humans that was not shared by any animal: The ability to invent symbols and assign meaning to them. Seems to me these philosophers should study outside a little more.

The issue isn’t which to save first, a human or an animal, but whether a human can kill an animal, for trivial or serious reasons.

Here’s a question for you: why animals? You, reading this right now, unless you’re a vampire, you’ve just taken a breath. Do you know how many life forms you just killed by doing that? See, by some fortune (by Divine favor or blind luck is fortune either way) this 3rd rock from the sun is teeming with life in practically every corner (but San Pedro De Atacama, Chile apparently). Unless you’re one of those people that live in a hermetically sealed bubble, you’re killing millions, if not billions of living entities doing nothing. What? Microscopic life forms don’t count in our ethical considerations? That sounds a lot like sizeism to me. Or multicelluarism.

And also, where are the questions over killing plants for serious or trivial reasons? Plants are alive too! That sounds like cell wallism to me. Or chlorophyllism. How about mobilism (the discrimination toward life that is mobile)? Damn hippies.

Oh wait, they bring up Utilitarianism. Of which…

The prime directive… is to maximize the balance of happiness over misery, taking into account all individuals who can feel happiness or misery. Animals clearly count, since they can feel these emotions. –pg 28-29

Um… really? A lot of simpler life forms don’t really demonstrate any of these abilities. Do insects? Is it ok then to consume insects like many cultures? (Those of you munching on your chocolate-covered ants while reading this may continue to do so without guilt.) Many species of fish and other seafood demonstrate very little brain power, much less happiness or misery. Can we eat them? Again, how are you even defining “happiness” and “misery” for many animals? Are you so sure that paramecium your body just eliminated wasn’t screaming from mercy from its little nucleolus?

If Bella’s reason for eating venison were merely the pleasure of taste, the loss of the dear’s future pleasures would not be offset by what she gained. But if Edward’s reason for killing a deer is survival, then the loss of a deer’s future pleasures probably is offset by what he gains, since it seems probably that his life is packed with more pleasure than a deer’s. –pg 29

Yes… being immortal means you have infinite potential pleasure, which means you have a Utilitarian right to kill ANYTHING mortal.

Speaking of which, what if the deer is injured or old? They’re not going to live very long, so wouldn’t Bella’s pleasure then offset the deer’s maximum possible remaining pleasure? (Especially considering how much delicious meat you can get from one of those.) Just imagine Bella raising her hunting rifle then lowering it upon the above reflection… only to have a wolf pack (no not that one) suddenly pounce and devour the deer. Also, I will weigh the joy of bacon against a pig’s lifetime of happiness any day.

But Utilitarianism is a moral theory with a variety of serious problems.

Oh, well no kidding.

So let’s get back to the question about the deer’s rights: Do they magically switch on and off depending on a prospective hunter’s reasons for killing? …To have rights is merely for there to be limits on how you can be treated, due to your own nature. To have rights is not to be a mere thing, to be stepped on, chopped up, punched or pureed to the satisfaction of others. –pg 29

Hmm… I wonder if they’re going to explain why some life should have rights and others not.

To my mind [Immanuel] Kant [we can do literally anything to animals] and Tom Regan [the same respect is owed to every “subject of a life”] are both wrong. It’s more plausible that respect is the proper response to many things – sheer consciousness, intelligence, reflectiveness, the sense of self, artistic ability, athletic ability, the capacity for morality, to name a few. But some individuals have more respect-worthy traits than others. –pg 30

Well, actually speciesism is more plausible, but this isn’t that bad. Certainly, we wouldn’t want to eat dogs who are useful to us and demonstrate great capacity but fish and cows (nature’s ‘filler’) would be most eatable.

Bella may like the taste of venison, but is that a strong reason to end the life of a deer? Well, would it cost Bella any self-respect to forgo it? Would she feel diminished? I should think not. –pg 30

Actually… if Bella is not keeping up her protein, YES! Yes she would be diminished. Of course, there are a lot of animals out there in the world; would it be perhaps preferable to eat some but not others? The book doesn’t really go into this. Nor does it address the question of, what would happen if we bred the “respect-worthy” traits out of a food source (like cattle). Would it be ok to eat them then? Who cares? It’s on to…

Scene 2. In Which a Classmate Brings Up an Unpleasant Scenario

First, an observation about the Twilight series. Isn’t it convenient that Edward cannot survive without a blood meal but doesn’t specifically need to suck the blood of a human being? …Had the story been told that way, the books wouldn’t have been so successful, but they’d be awfully interesting, from an ethical point of view. –pg 31

No, they would be interesting PERIOD. A world ruled by the meyerpires, perhaps where criminals (as punishment) and the elderly are consumed. Those humans who demonstrate particular skill and usefulness are given immortality to continue working. Just imagine it! A world where Newton and Einstein were both vampires, continuing to work on unlocking the secrets of the universe…

Would an Edward who needs to consume human blood be able to defend the traditional vampire diet in terms of our rights being overridable? –pg 31

The following paragraph goes on way too long discussing the whole “vampires are immortal” (as if we need to go over it) and the next one talks about all the fantastic vampire abilities. Man, according to all these, vamps have every right to eat us as they are much more respect worthy than we are.

But this doesn’t sound right. –pg 31

Well no shit!

Surely it’s a far more problematic thing for a man-eating Edward to kill one of us than for a vegetarian Edward to eat a deer. Isn’t it? –pg 32

Well, I certainly think so, but then I’m just a knuckle-dragging speciesist. After all, many animals make efforts to defend themselves from us (as they should) so it’s perfectly logical for us to defend our own species from predators. You know… something we’ve been doing pretty much from the beginning.

Anyway, what follows is a long discussion on the “social contract” theory and talk about natural rights. Now, I will agree that there is something to the social contract idea, especially for someone like the Cullens. If they want to join human society, they have to play by human rules (not eating us). Of course, if the world was run by the meyerpires, this whole point would be sort of ruined since this time it’s the humans who must play by the meyerpire’s rules.

Well, in this section is this headache inducing passage:

As humans have natural rights even in the state of nature, it makes sense to think animals do, too. …At the very least, we must leave animals alone to live their lives, unless we have very good reasons to intrude and use an animal for our purposes. –pg 33

My dad used to tell me, “Never piss on the electric fence.” But what he’d say which was relevant to this article is: “Don’t expect a bull not to charge just because you’re a vegetarian.” The moral obviously being: “Life isn’t fair.” But then, why does a bull charge whether you are planning to eat him or not? Because animals are extremely territorial. They don’t “leave each other alone” to live their lives if their territories cross. If you try hanging out in the wild for very long, you’ll learn they’re not going to leave you alone either. Where do these “natural rights” come from anyway? Did you build a shelter? (the first goal of survival) You just disturbed some animal’s territory. Did you plant a crop or take some wild fruit to eat? You just took food that another animal could have eaten. Tell me, why is taking food from the deer somehow more merciful than actually eating the deer? (Especially since you’ve just condemned it to the slow, painful death of starvation, rather than the usually quicker murder.) And again, that’s just the obvious consequences we can see. There’s still countless other life that you’re intruding upon just by being alive.

The problem with all of this is that most ethics – Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, etc – are at least theoretically possible to live a life consistent with them. It might be very hard, but it is at least logically possible. These ethics are logically impossible. Until science invents a human that can run on chlorophyll (then hey, green-skinned babes!), and we all go move to the moon, sealed in sterile bubbles, you just can’t live by these ethics. Let’s face it: speciesism makes things a lot simpler and logical.

That’s even ignoring the fact that livestock might be better off in the first place. Seriously, what would a cow do in the wild? Eat, sleep, fuck, die. What does a cow do on a farm? Eat, sleep, fuck, die. The only difference is deaths in the wild are usually a lot more painful than those in a meat processing plant. And considering that the livestock get free medical treatment I’d say they’re a hell of a lot better off being interfered with. But oh, we’ll come back to this later in the book…

The chapter continues on to:

Scene 3. In Which Edward Says No to the Kosher Option

Some attentive student is bound to press Edward on this: “Who says you must kill animals for food? You can’t survive without a blood meal, but that doesn’t mean you need to kill animals. You could partially drain the blood of a couple of deer, and let them all survive!” –pg 34-35

Yeah, that student is an idiot. You see—

…The blood is necessary for his survival, but the killing is not; it’s really just a strong preference. –pg 35

Shut up author! You’re an idiot too! See, in Meyerworld, only partially drinking a human is how you change one, the venom alters them. What do you suppose would happen if a vamp only partially drunk a deer? (though vampiric deer would also improve the story) Also, do you know how much blood a human can lose and survive adequately? Do you know how much a deer can? And if you’ve ever noticed an animal dying, they tend to thrash around a lot. Which means if Edward just tried drinking a bit then letting it go, the thing would probably get itself killed fighting him during the process or breaking a leg (then dying from that anyway). Assuming he somehow got around all that Ed would have to make sure to bandage the deer, but then like all blood-sucking creatures, meyerpire venom MUST be an anti-coagulant which means the deer is going to bleed to death anyway. Shut up you hippie!

In the Twilight cosmos, bad things happen to partially drained animals. -pg 35

Oh.

Well I’m still counting this as a fail because it’s not just the freakin’ Twilight cosmos, it’s our cosmos as well!

Anyway, for a page there is talk about the Cullens visiting a Kosher butcher and buying blood off him from his work and… there’s not really much a talk there. The author assumes that meyerpires are really ‘fond’ of killing or something; that it’s very much a part of their culture. Killing animals is “central to [Ed’s] survival as the individual he is”. Well, I guess it’s a good thing killing humans isn’t a part of his culture. Anyway, the book speeds along to it’s haphazard conclusion:

Can we go on killing animals to provide the turkey that’s central for Thanksgiving, the hot dogs that are part of watching a baseball game, the lobster that makes a trip to Maine a trip to Maine? Can we kill just to perpetuate the lifestyle and the relationship to nature we’re accustomed to? Can we kill for any reason short of survival?

Hey, animals kill for reasons other than survival. And lobsters are pretty low on the brain-power scale, why can’t we eat them? They don’t seem to have many respect-worthy traits. How many plants died for your salad? How much life did you kill just while you were sleeping? Why is it wrong to kill 1 pig for bacon but not to harvest acres of wheat for bread? Why is ok for Edward to kill if it’s a part of his culture but Thanksgiving, ball games and Maine are apparently not ok to kill for even though they are a part of ours? Ball game hot dogs are essential to my survival as the individual I am! (see? the game’s easy to play)

We need to be wary of rationalizations that masquerade as deep, existential reasons, but it’s fair to say there are difficult questions here. Once it’s granted that ending a life is a serious matter, we do need to discuss what counts as a good enough reason. -pg 36

Yeah, even if that’s granted, we still have to figure out what life counts as a serious matter and what doesn’t, why your discrimination is ok but mine isn’t.

I have only a thousand words to say to this chapter:

_{1. Hint: It was not the very first or very last page of the chapter.}

_{TANGENT ALERT: William Briggs has done 2 recent blog posts on “What Philosophers Believe” here and here. It’s pretty entertaining and watch for me to start making references to them in these articles.}

Comment [19]

…

…

Remember the last chapter? Yeah… this is more of the same. In fact, for added fun, you should really read this before reading this article.

Now let me tangent a moment to clear up some misconceptions about myself. I love animals. When my family moved to the farm my parents still live at to this day, I was given a border collie by my grandparents and we’ve had one tending the territory ever since and we’ve loved them as much as any member of the family. Cats… horses… I’ve spent my life surrounded by animals and enjoyed every minute of it. Some might even call me a misanthrope, just because I have a “Team Gustave” ¹ t-shirt (and after driving for 5 minutes, I am ready to kill all humans).

So why does this bug me? I don’t know, maybe because it seems that a lot of animal rights activists have rarely been around actual animals. Seriously, can anyone name an animal rights philosopher (or whatever) from among primitive societies? Or Australia?

So anyway, this chapter begins with…

Edward Cullen is a loving husband, a brilliant musician, a devoted son, and a remarkable baseball player.

Cream Count: 127
Wait – wrong article series.

What are the criteria for personhood?

Well I think first we’d have to establish what a person is.

A person is simply a bearer of rights, someone worthy of respect.

Ummm… Well I guess you could go by that.

Being a human does not automatically make you a person. Sadly, society has often not treated women and minorities as persons. So being human has not always been used as part of the criteria for personhood.

Women are persons? Since when? Is this new? Surely someone wouldn’t have pointed this out by now! (Yes, I am being sarcastic.)

For instance, intelligent extraterrestrials could potentially be persons, and some animal rights advocates argue that animals are persons as well.

…
But you just said that the definitions of society are what eliminate humanity as a criterion of personhood. Therefore, if society deems animals not people, doesn’t that mean that they are not people? Are we discussing what is legally recognized as a person or what SHOULD be recognized as a person? Geez, it’s only the 2nd paragraph and my head is killing me.

What follows is another two paragraph discussion over how superior meyerpires are to humans – physically and mentally. Seriously people, who, reading this book, NEEDS THIS MUCH REVIEW ON TWILIGHT? Those 2 paragraphs would have been much better spent better laying the groundwork on the definition of “person”.

What is a Person (other than vampire food)?

Wait, you just said being human alone wasn’t enough to be a person. But vampire’s feed on humans so… argh! Continuity book. Continuity!

The Philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) argued that being a human was not enough to make you a person.

See? A person may or may not be vampire food. You invalidated your own subheading.

[contemporary philosopher Mary Anne] Warren argues that there are five qualities that would indicate whom we should treat with respect: (1) consciousness, (2) reasoning, (3) self-motivated activity, (4) the capacity to communicate, and (5) the presence of self-concepts. ¹

Hey look, there’s a foot note there. What’s in the footnotes for this chapter?

1. Mary Anne Warren, “On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion,” Monist 57:1, 43-61 (1973)

Look, I know abortion is one of those hot-button topics and I do NOT want to get into a discussion of it. Just leave all that aside for a moment. HOW CAN YOU NOT SEE THAT A GREAT NUMBER ARGUMENTS FOR ABORTION WOULD ALSO APPLY IN FAVOR OF MEYERPIRES EATING US? Seriously, here is the source cited above, just imagine Aro reading it in his cold voice as someone begs for their life. Of all the philosophers of all societies of all human history, you couldn’t find ONE better source to draw an argument from?

Warren doesn’t believe that a being must have all of these characteristics to be treated as a person, but at least a combination of several is necessary, usually involving numbers one and three.

Then why not just list 1 & 3? Microscopic life demonstrates some forms of communication (via chemicals) and self-motivated activity. Which means that – once again – you’re killing a lot of people just by being alive.

Anyway, there’s more biology bashing coming – always fighting words to me.

Twilight’s vampires meet all five criteria. To say that they are not persons simply because they are physically different from us amounts to arbitrary speciesism.

Still no proof that speciesism is wrong in and of itself. ‘To thine own kind be true’ is far less arbitrary than most standards, including those in this essay.

As [Tom] Regan [contemporary philosopher, see previous] mentions, almost any criterion, other than “they aren’t human,” is one that humans can lack. For example, many very young children are not intelligent at all; in fact, an adult gorilla may be smarter than a young child. Why is it that we have to treat the child with respect and not the gorilla?

I can’t put it any better than a plaque my mom has hanging in her house:
“When I see a new-born baby, I have two impulses – One is to kneel and thank the creator, the other is to stand and tip my hat in respect for what he might become.” –Credited to Abraham Lincoln
Of course, gorillas have never written anything like this so I guess that’s some points for them.

What Humans, Vampires, and Animals Have in Common

Onto a new section where we start discussing another [ugh] contemporary philosopher, Martha Nussbaum. She uses a capability definition:

In other words, if something has the capability to do something that doesn’t harm anyone else, why interfere with it?

Knowing how intelligent the readership of this site is, I’m sure several of you just screamed the butterfly effect. Are you sure it’s not doing any harm to anything else?

What follows is a discussion about capabilities ² and flourishing, which isn’t too bad. Until we get to…

For example, the capability life does not make something a person, but those who have it shouldn’t be denied it. If we used Nussbaum’s capabilities list as a way of determining how we should treat others, it is unlikely anything would be mistreated.

o_o
Newsflash: if everyone followed ANY morality (with extremely rare exceptions) 100% of the time perfectly, nothing would be mistreated either. The morality isn’t the problem: it’s the people following it.

Had Nussbaum’s capabilities list been followed, African Americans and others would not have been kept as slaves, and women would not have had to fight for the better part of a century to earn rights such as the vote.

“Do to others as you would be done by.” –The 2nd most important command of Christianity and Judaism, commonly known as the golden rule. Had that been followed all of the above probably wouldn’t have happened. And that’s just one religion/culture/ethical framework off the top of my head. High praise ³ goes to anyone who can cite other ethics, moralities, religions, etc that would have prevented the above mishaps. Only entries before 1993 (when Nussbaum published these capabilities) will be accepted – the older the better.

Moving on, there’s again a point that from this “capabilities” list animals should be treated well – I won’t repeat my point again, let’s go to:

If Animals Are Human Food, Are We Vampire Food?

Ummm… by definition: YES. That’s how nature – red in tooth and claw – works.

Rather than accept Nussbaum’s conclusion, you might simply ask, why not deny Edward personhood? After all, Edward is not human, and as noted earlier, he is very different. But why should difference matter? In many ways vampires are superior to humans. The very reasoning used to deny animals personhood would quickly work against us.

Hey! Call back to what I complained about earlier in this article. As for Edward’s personhood, let’s get Charlie’s input on this:

Thank you, Charlie.

[The Volturi] are smarter, they are capable of doing many things we can only dream about, and if they chose to herd us like cattle into pens for the slaughter, they could with ease (and do, in the case of some unfortunate tourists).

You know, it would have been better had this chapter and/or the previous one dealt more with human vampire relations rather than all this other stuf. In fact, had this chapter been “Are Humans People?” and written as if it was Carlise making the case to the Volturi, it would have actually been awesome.

So on what basis do we say humans deserve special treatment in the face of nonhumans who can do everything better?

The fact that we are human and it is the right of all life to defend itself against predators?

There is only one argument that counts us as persons to physically superior vampires: humans have souls.

No. Oh no.

How do you know you have [a soul]? How do you test for a soul?

NOW you want to start relying upon scientific testing? No, nadda, nein, negative – you don’t get to spit in the face of biology for three quarters of your essay and then suddenly start invoking it.

Vampires could argue that proof of their souls is in their superiority over humans. The vampire might argue that if humans had souls, God wouldn’t make them so easy to kill. (This is exactly the argument we often use against animals.)

I’m calling bullshit. Can anyone cite a source using this argument that wasn’t in jest? Also, there’s a big difference. Vampires can kill us with ease using nothing more than their natural bodies. Go try killing an animal without a single tool, just your bare hands. The only reason animals are so “easy” to kill now is because we have many millennia invested into the research and development of tools to help us do so. Even then the little bastards had to make it hard so finally we said, “Screw it, let’s just domesticate and breed a couple of beasts that won’t put up that much of a fight.” (though sometimes they still will)

Hmmm… vampires breeding humans like livestock – that would also have improved the Twilight series. Oh wait, that’s been done.

There’s another issue here, too. Let’s say we could prove that we do have souls. Why should this matter? After all, human beings have many features that make us unique, but that have no weight whatsoever when thinking about morality. …So what’s so great about this soul thing?

Hey, discussing what is a soul and its effects would have also been a better chapter than this. The first and obvious point would be an afterlife, so since meyerpires are immortal, we might say that the presence of a soul isn’t an issue for them. Historically, some said that creating, appreciating art and acting morally were effects of having a soul. But then Meyer had to make Edward perfect so even under a lot of these classical standards, he’s still a soulful being. Nowadays, we all know there’s only one standard of soul:

Anyway, the essay has more fluffiness, sweetness, we-need-to-be-nice-to-everything, so on and so on until we reach at last the final section:

Naughty Vampire! No People for You!

Ok, that headline made me laugh a bit. We again return to the idea of a moral community and vampire’s place in it.

This is different from the case of animals who cannot determine that they want to reject morality; they simply do not understand it. Animals are then objects of our moral treatment, though they couldn’t choose to participate fully in the moral community.

See first article linked.

Animals would thus have a limited kind of personhood. …But we also should not eat them by virtue of Nussbaum’s capabilities list, because animals can be persons whose capabilities we respect.

Insert your own rebuttal here. Still no respect for the rights of plants or microscopic life I notice.

Moral personhood may be judged only on a case-by-case basis. …We would reject, punish, or in the case of the Volturi, defend ourselves from those who choose to violate the personhood and capabilities of others.
The great irony, though, is this: If we choose to reject some individuals as nonpersons because of their willingness to harm others, we may find ourselves as only partial persons. Why? If by our accounts animals have a kind of limited personhood, then our treatment of them is analogous to the Volturi’s treatment of us. So if the Volturi should be punished or denied personhood because of their treatment of other persons then we should similarly be punished for our treatment of these other weaker animals-persons.

And yet there are numerous accounts of animal-persons mistreating other animal-persons. Can we then punish them with eating? (Like the question, would the Volturi be so bad if they only ate the worst criminals?) Cats, for example, are a bit notorious for playing with smaller creatures. Even dolphins have been accounted for cruelly murdering other animal-persons. Does that mean that it’s ok for us to eat cats and dolphins?

In the end Edward might be not only a person, but a better person than most humans. After all, he refrains from killing those who are weaker and less intelligent than he is, while humans gladly kill animals weaker with different intelligences.

Cream Count: 128

“Why did you go to that Goat Rocks place last weekend…to hunt? Charlie said it wasn’t a good place to hike, because of bears.”
He stared at me as if I was missing something very obvious.
“Bears?” I gasped, and he smirked. “You know, bears are not in season,” I added sternly, to hide my shock.
“If you read carefully, the laws only cover hunting with weapons,” he informed me.
He watched my face with enjoyment as that slowly sank in.
“Bears?” I repeated with difficulty.
“Grizzly is Emmett’s favorite.” His voice was still off-hand, but his eyes were scrutinizing my reaction. I tried to pull myself together.
“Hmmm,” I said, taking another bite of pizza as an excuse to look down. I chewed slowly, and then took a long drink of Coke without looking up.
“So,” I said after a moment, finally meeting his now-anxious gaze. “What’s your favorite?”
He raised an eyebrow and the corners of his mouth turned down in disapproval. “Mountain lion.” – Twilight , Chapter 10

_{1. Why do I have a morbid fascination toward that croc? What is up with him? Is there like an old crocodile legend that if you eat a thousand humans you grow wings and spit fire?}

_{2. The 10 items on Nussbaum’s capabilities list is as follows: 1. Life 2. Bodily health 3. Bodily integrity 4. Senses, imagination, and thought 5. Emotions 6. Practical reason 7. Affiliation 8. Other species 9. Play 10. Control over one’s environment
Yes, 99.999% of all life violates #8, and a large amount of life violates 5, 6, 7 and 9.}

_{3. High Praise Update: Spanman won the first round. Steph and Dan Locke both tried for the 2nd and it goes to Dan for being closest, Lucy Wannabe also won a bonus round so currently it’s a 4-way game.}

Comment [18]

Good news everybody! No philosophy today!

No it hasn’t been canceled on account of snow. No, chapter 4 of this book deals with “compassion”. Using older philosophers, the chapter reads as if compassion was like gravity: everyone understands it but nobody can define it. And just like gravity, a lot of terms and arguments are used that are only of interests to specialists in relevant fields. So let’s just skip over all that and pick on Twilight, of which there is more in this chapter than any other so far! ¹

Aro, leader of the Volturi, surrounds himself with these extra-powerful vampires, “collecting” them and their abilities.

As if Aro didn’t have enough unsavory jokes made about him…

So maybe it isn’t too farfetched that Carlisle’s super-compassion is what makes it possible for him to do something that no other vampire before him had been able to do.

Other than every main character in Meyer’s series is a freakin’ Sue, how do we know no other vampire tried the “vegan” lifestyle? After all, there is little (if any) history of vampires in the meyer’verse. Since Carlisle’s lifestyle wouldn’t lend itself to much reproduction, how would we know if any other meyerpire had tried? If they were later killed, there would be no record of their radical lifestyle.

Carlisle’s Theory of “Gifts”

Over mushroom ravioli, Edward relates to Bella Carlisle’s theory about vampiric gifts: “[W]e all bring something of our strongest human traits with us into the next life, where they are intensified—like our minds, and our senses.”

This is why I warn people to be wary of explaining mysticism in their works, because often the explanation turns out less satisfying and dumber than a wizard did it Ok, Edward was ‘sensitive’ to other people’s thoughts and he became a mind reader… not too bad. Alice with precognition? Or Jane hurting people with her mind? How do you even demonstrate something close to that in human life?

It’s an interesting theory, but is there any evidence that it’s true? Actually there is. …One of the first things that attracts Edward’s attention to Bella is that he cannot read her thoughts. Later on, in New Moon, she proves resistant to Jane’s pain whammy. Bella wonders if this just makes her a freak. It turns out that it does, but in a cool way.

Of course it does! She’s a Mary Sue! Again I start thinking about what could have been with this book series. Imagine if Bella was an evolution in response to meyerpires’ existence, the human species gaining methods to fight back against vampires, starting with their immense gifts. Or what if her null field was a double edged sword? Not only could she not be read, but Edward couldn’t read anyone she touched, or anybody if she touched him? Sure he’s probably be grateful for the peace and quiet, but what happens if they are attacked because he couldn’t “hear” the attacker coming?

Bella is a very private, shy person who hides her thoughts and feelings.

Or, is that all you needed to block out Edward? Be very private? This is another fault I frequently find in some of these works: something is shown as rare when it should be, if not common, at least not unheard of. Example: Harry Potter. (Spoiler) Harry is described as a boy who has achieved something nobody else ever has: survived a killing curse. We eventually learn that this was because of his mother’s sacrifice. Ok, nothing wrong with that… until you realize that we’re expected to believe that in the history of the killing curse, there has never been another mother/father/parent/whoever intent on protecting someone else even to the point of death. (END spoilers) In the century Edward’s “lived” he’s never run across anyone that was very private? That’s a bigger suspension of disbelief than vampires sparkling in the sun!

We clearly see Bella’s willingness to do anything she can to protect others at the end of Twilight, when she goes on a suicide mission in order to save Renee. She knows that trying to save Renee will probably get her killed, but she doesn’t let that deter her from walking right into James’s trap. If there is anything Bella can do to protect those she cares about, she will do it.

Yeah, same goes for Captain Kirk, what made him the Avatar of Awesome was that he used all of his wit and resources. Bella would probably be a bit more liked if she showed at least some intelligence and effort at foiling James’s trap before she sprang it.

Carlisle’s Super-Compassion

As a vampire doctor caring for humans, he’s [Carlisle] is like an alcoholic working as a bartender. It’s dangerous, but he’s really good at it, complete with an excellent bedside manner that puts patients at ease.

Which is why I’ve always said the books would have been much better had they been about him. Or at least funnier. “Scalpel” “Doctor? Why are you sucking the end of it?” “Hey, who’s in charge of this surgery?” Or in the past, he’d recommend 2 minutes of himself instead of leeches… Really the humor and drama right themselves.

In Midnight Sun, we get a possible glimpse into Carlisle’s head through Edward’s “gift.” ³

Oh goody! Footnote! Let’s flip to the back and…

Midnight Sun (partial draft) is the name of a manuscript that Stephenie Meyer began that explored the events of the original Twilight novel from the perspective of Edward (which included a number of scenes with the Cullens not found in the original novel). Unfortunately, some lowlife took an unfinished draft and posted it illegally (without the author’s permission) on the Internet. As a result, Meyer has abandoned work on the novel that would have been Midnight Sun due to this violation of her trust and rights. And so, we may never see things from Edward’s perspective. Meyer, after announcing her decision, made a partial draft of the manuscript available on her Web site (link). In referencing this work we acknowledge Meyer’s own statement that this was always a work in progress that she has been forced to make public by someone else’s inexcusable behavior. So, while this cannot be considered the official version of events, we take this draft in the spirit that Meyer offered it to her fans, as stated on her Web site: “I hope this fragment gives you further insight into Edward’s head and adds new dimension to the Twilight story.”

Ok, get the jokes about “greatest hero of all time stopping a great evil” out of the way…
Now then, this is an incident I am torn on. As an amateur author, I can understand Meyer’s annoyance. I have a WiP I have recruited a few editors to help me with and I would be very upset if one of them leaked any part of it after they promised not to. On the other hand, right now nobody would give a damn about any leaked manuscript from me, so you’d think Meyer could take some comfort that enough people care about her work to do something ethically questionable. (Minions are an important part of being an evil overlord after all.) On the other hand, whoever did the “inexcusable behavior” gave Meyer lots of free advertisement. Especially as a Mormon, I would think she knows the lesson about turning adversity into advantage (aka “Making lemonade from lemons”). Anyway, leaks and spoilers are a topic for the forums…

The Denali clan, who are also vegetarians, keep themselves largely removed from human affairs. Their decision not to feed on humans seems driven more by rational calculation than by the affection for humanity that Carlisle displays.

Wow, can we learn more about them? Seriously, what’s their thought process for “rationally calculating” not to feed on humans? They already seem the smartest meyerpires I’ve heard of (don’t be around humans and you won’t eat them). Just imagine if the story had been about one of the “vampire monks” who was dragged back to be among humans in order to do… something.

For a decade or so he [Edward] feeds on the blood of evil men, until he comes to the conclusion that Carlisle is right.

Really? Why couldn’t we hear about that Edward? And why is Carlisle right in this instance? Seems like eating bad people (and with his mind reading, Edward would always know, 100%, who was evil – he would never eat an innocent) would be pretty decent of vampires. I could see some arguments against it from a very… speciesist point of view, but not from the vampire’s point of view.

As far as we know, Carlisle has never drunk human blood. When he became a vampire, he was so distraught that he tried to kill himself a number of ways, including starvation, until he discovered he could survive on animal blood.

Hey, why didn’t starvation kill him? What happened when he starved? And congrats Bella, nice of you to take away Carlisle’s one uniqueness! Of course perfect little you also didn’t crave blood, argh – hatred… rising…

Is Compassion a Feeling?

This section is just a discussion on whether compassion can be defined as feeling or not. I mean, if you want to go into this, just read some Jesus, Buddha, Jonny Cash, or many, many others. I’m moving on to…

Compassion of a Saint?

Hey, some mention of Buddhism and the Dalai Lama. Yeah yeah, see above (both of these sections are really short).

Compassion, Caring, and the Cullen Family

His [Carlisle] mother died during his birth, and his father was an Anglican pastor more concerned with stamping out witchery and demons than with being a good dad.

Meanwhile, the kid down the street who did have a “good dad” was eaten by vampires at the age of 7.

More talk about how bad the Church was around that period of time (by Xenu I’m so tired of that cliché – remember, the actual facts and details of that era were as complicated as any other involving messy, imperfect humans).

So when Carlisle awoke to find himself one of his father’s reviled monsters, he was pretty upset.

But he didn’t use this opportunity to go hunt down real monsters, in line with his upbringing and worldview, he just decided to pout and hunt deer. Oh Twilight, you constantly invent new ways to underachieve.

After some more discussion about Carlisle did with his unlife (forget Midnight Sun, why doesn’t Meyer give us his story?), we move on to:

The Power of Connections

At the end of Breaking Dawn Garrett gives a rousing speech:

Garrett? The hero of the greatest video games of all time, the Thief series? _ No. Wish I was playing Thief, I keep having problems with finishing the third one and I heard their making a fourth. My instinct says it will suck but 2 was such an improvement on 1 that maybe 4 will continue to the trend of… oh wait, we’re talking about _Twilight.

I’ll do everyone a favor and not quote the sections reprinted from Breaking Dawn. Let’s just say they are not the inspiring speeches of Braveheart… Lord of the Rings…

Carlisle jokes that Renesmee’s power to project her thoughts into other people’s minds and inspire a desire to protect are a flip of both Bella’s and Edward’s gifts.

There’s a meta joke in there somewhere about the offspring of 2 Mary Sues. Seriously though, how can nobody see the problem with this? Renesmee can make people do what she wants? As a child? She’s going to be worse than spoiled. What’s going to keep her from becoming tyrant over the world?

We are drawn then to the conclusion that Carlisle’s gift is super-compassion, understood as the superhuman ability to form caring relationships with everyone, even strangers, and that is what enables him to live in the world in a way that no other vampire can.

And with that we end another chapter that I… actually liked. The philosophy isn’t too bad and it does cover the second best character from the Twilight saga (the best obviously being Charlie’s mustache). We’re now moving into the “New Moon” section and who knows, maybe this book won’t be that…

Chapter Five: Vampire-Dammerung: What can Twilight tell us about God?

_{1. And considering that all I know about the series comes from the movies, cultural osmosis and this site, I mishaps should be quite entertaining to those more knowledgeable.}

Comment [11]

Fair warning everyone: this one is… bad. I mean real bad. Falconempress has just been toppled as having read the worst thing on this site. She just had to read about the rape of an idiot girl, this is the rape of human intelligence, logic and reasoning. You don’t need brain bleach, because your brain will be beaten, broken, shattered, weeping and sobbing by the time we’re through. This chapter is so bad… just posting direct quotes from it makes me guilty of a war crime. And I will too. Before I amended or tweaked the quotes slightly to streamline things and make reading the original easier. Not. This. Time. This time I’m not going to edit quotes from this chapter at all. There will be no excuse that maybe – just maybe – I’m making it worse than it is.

Also, this chapter had the most footnotes… if you curve the grade a bit. Chapter 1 has 29 footnotes. 11 of those are “Ibid” (meaning “this is taken from the previous source listed”), meaning most of those footnotes are just referencing the sources the author used (indeed, all the footnotes are just books and papers except for 1). This chapter has 24 footnotes. 9 of those are books and references. The rest are just further ramblings from the author, yeah it gets thick.

SlyShy give me strength… this almost did me in. But this is the pinnacle people! This is what we’ve been fighting against!

Vampires are typically creatures of moral darkness who turn good people into bloodthirsty, cold-blooded killers like themselves. ¹

The footnote goes on to bring up the exceptions we’re all familiar with. Except Angel did do that before. Also, they don’t always turn “good” people (a frequent narrative motif is a vampire making a bad criminal even worse). We’ve just begun and we’re already seeing the confusion of capacity and action.

Consider the Count in the 1931 film Dracula, played by Bela Lugosi (Bella Swan’s namesake); such vampires seem particularly fond of mesmerizing innocent young women before feeding upon them. ²

WARNING: Do not be eating or drinking anything before you read the following footnote.

2. Bella Swan is the heroine of the Twilight series. Besides the association her name draws with horror movie star Bela Lugosi, the name more literally means “beautiful” as, for example, in the phrase a “southern belle.” We suppose one might also say that the name suggests that Bella is someone who resonates when struck by the blows of life.

0_o I have nothing to add. I can’t remember the last time I saw someone take the most circuitous route around the most obvious point. It’s like wanting to go to Alaska without entering Canada so you drive through Texas. That right there tells you all you need to know about how this is going to go.

After a bit more on vamps, we go to:

In fact, the very existence of vampires raises an ancient philosophical question: Why would God—who is supposed to be all-good, all-powerful, and all-knowing—allow the existence of such despicable creatures?

Um… vampires don’t exist.

Certainly, God could annihilate every vampire in existence.

Why would He need to? Vampires don’t exist.

Or God could have prevented vampires form coming into existence in the first place by neutralizing the magic, or spiritual power, or infection, or venom, or mutation, or whatever it is upon which their existence depends. But for some reason God—if there is a God—does not rid the world of evil and, at least in fiction, of vampires.

VAMPIRES – DON’T – EXIST! Does this mean God is real and loves us? (I’ve always believed that beer and chocolate were proof that God loved us and wanted us to be happy.) Also, here’s a radical thought: authors are the god of their fictional world (in a very literal and meta sense). A better question would be, why does STEPHANIE MEYER allow vampires to exist.

Why, more generally, God does not (or cannot) eliminate evil from the world has long been a topic of sharp debate among philosophers. Technically, philosophers have, since the eighteenth century, called this issue the problem of “theodicy.” Those philosophers who wish to defend God against charges of negligence, impotence, or nonexistence have produced a variety of answers to the questions theodicy poses. Unfortunately, as we’ll see in our discussion of Twilight, these answers are unsatisfactory. But thankfully Twilight advances a distinctive answer of its own.

THIS – BOOK – IS – FICTIONAL! The answer is that “god” (Meyer) wanted to make an easy buck and didn’t know anything about vampires. You may as well ask what this book series answers about Darwinian Evolution for all the relevance it has.

The authors proceed to define what the word “twilight” means before going to:

The nineteenth-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) played on just this ambiguity in his book Gotzen-Dammerung, translated as Twilight of the Idols (1889), a title that we like to imagine Stephanie Meyer herself plays on. ³

Yeah, Stephanie Meyer, a MORMON, really was thinking of Nietzsche when she wrote this. This article has simultaneously too much research and not enough. Oh, and the footnote? Brings up that Nietzsche’s title was drawn from Wagner. Did I mention that you should have brought some airsickness bags before reading?

The ambiguity of twilight points to a response—if not a proper solution—that the Twilight narrative poses to the problem of theodicy. Twilight‘s solution might briefly be described in this way: Good and evil are ambiguous terms, not as fixed or as clear as convention portrays. Good can become evil, and evil, good; it’s largely within the power of both humans and vampires to determine the moral compasses of their own lives.

Um… yeah, that’s kind of the summary definition of free will, which I’m pretty sure Meyer subscribes to since she’s a mormon.

The story positions human beings and vampires as good in acts of self-overcoming, overcoming their nature, their social standing, and the traditional ways good and evil are configured (at least with regard to vampires).

Go pick a Pauline letter out of the Bible at random; you’ll pretty much get the above lesson much better phrased.

It’s up to young people like Bella and Edward Cullen to determine whether they are in the dawn or dusk of their lives. In other words, dawn does not break, it must be broken.

Wait… what? Why young people? Once you get past 30 you’re no longer able to make any determination about your life? And how exactly is anyone going to make dawn break (other than running east)? That doesn’t make any sense.

What does this say about God? Not much that’s terribly favorable. If God or a god does exist in the world of Twilight, it must be a diety who either is not all-powerful (and therefore cannot prevent the evil of the world) or has abandoned the world, leaving people to fend for themselves.

Twilight does have a god! It’s STEPHANIE MEYER! This is an objective fact, we can see and verify this right now. And yes, I’ll agree that you can learn a lot about her from the book series, like Bella and Edward are her chosen ones and the very rocks of the world must cry out their praise.

The good news of Twilight is that, at least in the case of Bella and Edward, young people are up to the task.

What’s this obsession with youth? Also, of course they are! Their god (Meyer) created the entire world specifically for them. The entire series is one giant catering to these two characters, that’s what being a Sue is all about! [Rargh!]

Let’s turn now to consider some of the answers philosophers have advanced to the problem of theodicy, and see how Twilight fits their models.

Since you’re not factoring in Meyer or the fact that both main characters are Sues, we can already see that this is a loaded attempt that is doomed to reach an incorrect conclusion. Garbage in – garbage out.

Evil’s Not a Problem, Because Evil Doesn’t Exist

Mary baker Eddy (1821-1910), the founder of the Christian Science movement, maintained that evil is, in a fundamental way, not real.

Yep, we’re going to reference one sect of Christianity but not the one Meyer belongs to.

What follows is a long section of Augustine and some other philosophers, the ultimate point being the belief that there is no such thing as “evil” in and of itself, but that evil only exists as a corruption of “good”. Or rather, that would be the point but since the authors don’t bother with what the idea actually means, why should we?

A corollary to this point has been picked up by various philosophers: In the case of immoral human conduct, evil indicates a lack of human being. Those who behave immorally are those who have become degraded humans, less than fully human. As people like to say, those who are evil, act like animals.

Actually, you just confused two points from two different worldviews right there. In the pagan world (especially the Greco-Roman one), it was considered nobler to be less like the beasts. However, in Judeo-Christian viewpoints, the above is NOT a corollary. Not everything animals do are considered bad (Genesis 1 even says that what they do is good in the eyes of God). If you look up what is considered the 7 deadly sins, you’ll notice that envy and greed are not something animals are capable of, as well as the one considered the most deadly of all: pride. Which makes this even funnier when you look back and see that of the philosophers the authors listed earlier as promoting this view – Plato, Plotinus, Augustine, Spinoza, Leibniz – not everyone would have the above corollary in their viewpoint. Philosophical FAIL.

In Twilight, then, we should ask whether the vampires, or really anyone who is configured as evil, is depicted as subhuman or like a nonhuman animal.

That only applies under some of the philosophies listed in this chapter, not all of them! Hey, here’s a hint idiots: how often is Satan depicted as subhuman or animal like? That alone should give you a warning sign that you’re going in a very wrong direction here.

Oh, but after some proofs of how vampires (and some in particular in Twilight) behave, we get…

So at first blush it’s easy to conclude that the Twilight series conforms to this philosophical tradition, depicting evil in animal-like, nonhuman ways.

But then, on the other hand, the Cullens’ coven hardly seems evil, even though they are in certain ways animal-like. And of course we need to consider the Quileutes. The Quileute wolves are definitely related to nonhumans; they run through the forest and devour raw flesh. But they’re not depicted as evil—quite the contrary.

ARGH! Even under the philosophical traditions you brought up earlier, not everything animals do is depicted as evil! (otherwise, everyone’s evil because we – you know – breathe like animals do) Maybe the Gnostic philosophies and a few others, but not the ones you listed earlier! You started from a very broad tradition, latched onto one subset of that tradition, then just jumped right from it to a completely different tradition only tangently related to any you started out with! Dammit did you even think while writing this?

The example of Jacob Black’s people, then, as well as the virtuous Cullens, dashes the evil-as-privation-of-being model, and it doesn’t explain how things work in Twilight. Therefore, let us continue.

It doesn’t explain anything because you derailed your own essay with a non-sequitur! If you had any intro to logic classes, I hope you failed them else you had a gibbering monkey as a teacher.

Evil’s Not a Problem, Because Evil Indicates Ignorance

Let me do you a favor and just give you the 3 most important sentences out of this opening paragraph you’ll need to know later.

So for Socrates and Plato, at least, no one does evil knowingly, and all apparently evil acts are mistakes about what’s good. … That sort of ignorance affects people’s self-knowledge. Consequently, people who don’t really know goodness do not and cannot truly know themselves.

I don’t even subscribe to this philosophy and I’m already feeling sorry for what the authors are about to do to it.

Again, at first it does seem plausible that in Twilight the good are knowledgeable while the evil are ignorant.

Um, I’m pretty sure Socrates’ and Plato’s point was referencing knowledge of morality. The above phrasing makes it sound like nuclear physicists are morally better people than simple farmers, even if the former are working on a doomsday device.

And Carlisle Cullen (not to mention Edward) is repeatedly shown to be a man of great knowledge and taste. Carlisle is cultured, he is a doctor (which in Latin literally means “learned”), and by all accounts, he is good.

I repeat: moral knowledge was the point, not raw knowledge. Man this is getting stupid, can we get a brief flash of something somewhat clever?

Moreover, the apple on the cover of Twilight calls forth not only the forbidden temptations of the Garden of Eden but the path to sin and evil. ⁹

9. There was, of course, a second tree in the Garden of Eden, a tree of life. Could the apple on the cover also (or instead) refer to the vampire’s promise of eternal life?

I think you mean there was a second famous tree in the Garden, Genesis records that Eden was full of trees and plants. Otherwise, an actually interesting premise. Fun fact: I was talking with a Jewish associate and according to original translations and tradition; the fruit of the tree was more like a fig than an apple.

Anyway, you can probably guess what follows (James and Victoria must know stuff, but Bella’s mom and dad don’t, etc etc).

So in Twilight it’s neither the case that the good are consistently knowledgeable nor the case that the evil are consistently ignorant.

Yeah, except that wasn’t the point! You really believe Socrates and Plato were such dunder-heads that they didn’t once stop and think, “Hey, under this standard, the wickedest things in the world are babies and children”? Think maybe something was misread there?

As it is in Twilight, so it often is in our world: The good are ignorant and the evil are in the know (and vice versa). Moreover, so far as God is concerned, these theories don’t really resolve the question of theodicy.

Yep, the authors themselves just admitted that the previous section was…
ENTIRELY POINTLESS.

Evil’s Not a Problem, Because It’s the Necessary Cost of Good

Yep, now we’re getting into the section based upon a duality worldview. The idea being: Since you can’t have up without down, left without right, then you can’t have good without evil. Augustine is mentioned again [ugh] as well as a sentence that anyone who’s just stepped foot inside a church before should facepalm at:

More radically, if the existence of evil is the price of knowing goodness, wouldn’t it be better for humans never to acquire that knowledge, to remain in the same ignorant bliss that characterized Adam and Eve before they bit the fruit of moral knowledge?

Duh, that’s kind of the point of the tragedy of the first 3 chapters of Genesis.

Wouldn’t it be possible for everyone to understand what evil is without anyone actually doing evil things?

Possible? Yes, we could all not do bad stuff right now, even though most of us know about bad stuff. Now if you mean, should it be impossible for anyone to do evil, the real question become: how could you build a world with that? How do you create a place where someone thinks, “I could pick up this rock and bash the idiots’ heads in” while making it impossible for anyone to do so? If you run the thought exercise honestly, it won’t be very long before you realize you’re in a world far more absurd and silly than Wonderland.

Following is some examples and back and forth wondering, by now you should have red alerts going off in your head as you realize that the authors are setting themselves up to take a left turn at Albuquerque. Let’s jump ahead to:

The necessity of evil for certain goods is one dimension of what Leibniz meant when he advanced the seemingly silly idea that ours is the best of all possible worlds.

Ah, there it is. Leibniz’s (and other philosopher’s) point is that this is the best of all possible worlds depending on the goal of the design. What do I mean? Say I have a sledgehammer. Is it the best possible sledgehammer there is? If my goal is to break something, then it may very well be. If, however, my goal is to take a shower and get clean, the sledgehammer’s design is useless to me. You can’t have any discussion on whether this is the “best” of possible worlds without first ascertaining what the point or goal of the possibilities are. And it takes most of the page before the authors get to it.

From a God’s-eye point of view, according to this account, considering the creation as a whole, it is a better balance to have a world with both goods, and the evils those goods require, than to have no world at all.

Or…

Defenders of God’s goodness cite free will as the principal good that requires evil. Free will is heralded by God’s defenders to be such an important capacity that it’s worth accepting all of the evil it often makes possible. And, of course, free will gets God off the hook, since it’s people who exercise their freedom badly who are to blame for evil.

Yay! A sensible point! Except that it only applies to the deity of Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Not really applicable toward many pagan pantheons or Hinduism or Buddhism. And those with a modicum of common sense (obviously not the authors), would point out that theodicy seems to be an attempt to get humans off the hook. One of the seven deadly sins is “sloth”. I’m just saying.

Living in a town called Forks, which symbolizes the many forks in the road of life Bella encounters, Bella’s story is very much one of choices.

That line just made me laugh so hard. Isn’t it cute how the authors keep assuming Meyer put way more thought into her work than she did?

Anyway, we all know the story enough to fill in all the examples that follow.

But would free choice really be impossible without evil outcomes?

Um… yes!

One can find going to an ice cream shop and choosing among many good flavors extremely satisfying, even without the possibility that one of them might be poison.

But the question is, how would you prevent poisoning? Not to mention obesity, diabetes, rotten teeth and ice cream headaches that can result from the ice cream alone. Again, we must ask, how in the world could you create a ‘free’ world where nobody can get themselves sick from ice cream? Also, what does this have to do with theodicy in Twilight?

Then the authors literally propose that it would be a better world without free will.

And would it really be so awful if every choice were determined, say, by chemical processes of nervous systems? People would still experience everything they do now—including the feeling that they’re making their own choices.

Well if your goal is to create a world with true freedom, not an illusion of freedom, YES it would be awful! That’s the exact opposite of the previous supposition.

Guess what! Fyodor Dostoevsky gets mentioned next! Let’s skip over him to:

Similarly, one can’t defensibly hold that the existence of murdering, bloodsucking vampires is a good thing because it makes possible an intense romantic relationship between two teenagers.

Except that’s exactly what Meyer was going for!

It’s possible that from what Spinoza called the “view from eternity,” the whole looks “good.” But from the perspective of the individual who suffers evil (a perspective that must count if individuals are to be respected as beings of moral worth) God’s eye is irrelevant—and actually, not even all that good. ¹⁴

Evil, Transcendence, and Natural Goodness

Wait… what? You just discounted the last answer to theodicy because… you didn’t like it, not based on anything drawn from the Twilight series. You used reality to discount something in a fictional book! It’d be like trying to determine what power allows Sauron to shapeshift and saying, “well nothing in reality shapeshifts so he must be unable to.” Follow the rules of your own essay! Head… hurting…

Anyway, we all know that the Quileute Native Americans have supernatural origins but the vampires have none. The next two paragraphs mention this and a better in depth discussion on the folklore of vampires, which is far more than you’ll ever get out of the Twilight series. So there’s one good paragraph out of this whole trainwreck.

The Volturi, on the other hand, are from Italy, and that in itself connects them to the Catholic Church—a representative of old-school ideas about God, good, and evil.

…I have nothing to add.

As they enforce traditional vampire law, it makes sense to see the Volturi as representatives of tradition. But the Cullens are deviants from (and even rebels against) the old codes.

What? No they’re not! Let’s look at the vampire laws drawn from the Twilight wiki.
1) Existence of vampires must be kept a secret. –Followed by the Cullens.
2) No child vampires are to be created. –Again, followed by the Cullens. There might be some debate about Nessie but it’s not like she was deliberate.
3) Alliances or friendships with werewolves are strictly forbidden. –Followed by the Cullens until book 3. And from what I know of it, this rule was only broken in order to maintain the first and more important rule. So calling the Cullens rebels over this hardly seems appropriate.
4) No lying to the Volturi. –As far as I know, the Cullens never violated this.
5) No hunting in Volterra. –Again, followed by the Cullens.
Wow! What rebels! They… generally follow the laws of their kind. Ward Cleaver was a better rebel.

Traditional relationship of the good to the evil, the human to the vampire, and God to the world, don’t apply to them. They have spurned religion, both light and dark.

[the they and them above mean the Cullens]
The traditional relationship between good and evil is for each to try and annihilate the other. If you want to argue that the Cullens don’t do anything about wicked vampires (which they don’t until Bella’s involved), yeah I guess they don’t have a traditional relationship, I’d call them rather heartless and evil myself. And what does God have to do with any of that? Where is religion in any of this? Now you’re just pulling stuff out of your ass.

In New Moon the Cullens clash with the Volturi on the basis of Bella’s and Edward’s choices, and the fruit of those choices, because they no longer adhere to the old code. Bella, Edward, and the Cullens prevail, suggesting that the heroes of this story have transcended the traditions, the customs, and the idea of a Christian God.

WHAT? ‘Thou shall not murder’ is one of the oldest commands in the Bible. How is the Cullens following this ancient order transcending God? Doing exactly what He wants and asks is transcending Him? All this based just upon the fact that the Volturi live in Italy? But the Cullens all live in the United States (and most of them are from there), a heavily protestant country so why aren’t they representing the triumph of Protestantism over Catholicism? Carlisle was from England, associating him with the Anglican Church, so maybe this is really Anglicanism triumphing over Catholicism? The premise is so shoddy, the conclusion does not follow; you could get a thousand possible conclusions from it. YOU – ARE – AN – IDIOT!

They live through the darkness of a new moon (the opposite of a fully lighted full moon) and enter a new Breaking Dawn of their own creation, not the creation of God or nature.

Almost done… almost done… must breathe…

Bella’s choice of Edward over Jacob indicates her choice of a path to happiness different from that offered by tradition, God, and nature.

I just thought I’d throw that in there to see if I could get team Jacob to go beat some sense into these authors. What makes that even funnier is how many say Bella choosing Edward was very much traditional… oh, and in accordance to her god’s will.

God is often associated with the natural order as presupposed creator of that order. So by the traditional account, to become good is to act in accordance with one’s nature and to perfect one’s nature (and in doing so, conform to God’s design). But what makes Edward and the Cullens good is that they deny their nature as vampires. ¹⁹

No, the entire point rests upon the question of what is a meyerpire and how were they created. They are not a self-existent entity like a duck or a tree or a person, they have to have humans in order to breed, and every meyerpire was once human. They are, in essence, the principle of corruption made manifest. They’re not denying their nature as vampires but “reverting” to their original nature as humans. They seem quite in line with Meyer’s design.

Footnote!

19. Along these lines, the story of Bella and Edward’s romance has been interpreted as a morality tale about sexual abstinence and restraint. But we’d like to argue that Twilight is not only about self-denial and self-restraint or even altruism; it’s also and more deeply about self-transformation.

Yeah… except Bella can’t transform into a vampire on her own. So sure it’s “more deeply” about that, if you don’t even read the damn books.

In a later footnote, they even drag Blade into this. Sorry, seems my tears are threatening to short out my keyboard. The authors ramble on (and on and on and…) for awhile with their deluded theory, I won’t subject you to it, let’s just say, no mention is ever made of Meyer. Let’s close out with their final footnote (#24) which has so much hilarity, I must ask that you not eat or drink anything while reading it.

24. The Twilight saga has often been criticized as sexist. It describes the journey of, yes, a strong-willed young woman who gets what she wants.

What follows is a lot of examples, which you’re familiar with if you’ve read much here on II or seen Mark reads Twilight on the web.

It’s a fairly persuasive criticism in our view—so far as it goes. But we’d like to point out that there’s something more to Bella’s story. Her story, like Edward’s, despite its flaws, is a tale of a new generation that critically turns its back on the old ways and realizes the possibilities of self-transcendence by establishing new values through the power of their own choices.

Yep, this entire essay has more or less been one giant worship of youth. And of course, they have to ignore Carlisle, the “older” vampire who conceptualized the “new” way and who transformed Edward. Funny how, without him, everybody would have “self-transcended” jack-shit. But as we noted earlier, one thing we can be assured is that the authors did not bother reading the story.

I can say Twilight may not tell me much about God, but it does convince me there is a Satan, and he’s an asshole.

Comment [19]

Some might have wondered if this series was going on, but like Lovecraft, if you still have your sanity, it means it’s not over. Our last effort was pretty horrifying, what will this one entail?

Actually the next two chapters are so dull and… sensible we’ll do both at one time.

6: To bite or not to bite: Twilight, Immortality and the meaning of life

This essay is easily summed up here (plus Asahel is more entertaining). But one can find a few decent quotes like…

Though it seems to men that they live by care for themselves, in truth it is love by which they live. -Leo Tolstoy

There is a lot of discussion on how human we can be and be immortal, but this has also been discussed before in Tolkien’s various Middle Earth sagas (especially the Silmarillion) where the Elves’ immortality is contrasted with Man’s mortality – and how both of them become jealous of the other. Considering this site, I assume everyone’s already read all of that, so I won’t bore you further. Let’s move on…

7: Mind Reading and Morality: the moral hazards of being Edward

Oh yeah, THIS should be interesting.

Well actually there’s not a lot to object to in this chapter either. You can see the morality of mind reading examined when I finish the sequel to Nagasaki Moon in 2033 (going by my usual writing rate). Still, there are a few things that are debatable. Let’s go on a long rant about them shall we?

While Edward once saw some merit in directing his monstrous appetite toward violent criminals and thereby contributing to the overall happiness of society, he ultimately admits that taking a human life is inherently a serious matter and vigilante justice is morally dubious at best – especially when one desires to feed off the blood of the guilty.

Question: why? It fascinates me that “vigilantism is dubious” is assumed, not proven or analyzed like other statements in this chapter. So let’s make up for it!

Those of us who have studied criminal law, legal theory, etc (hi falconempress) will recognize an old argument. Why is vigilantism wrong? Why are they courts of the state to be preferred over it? If we look back through history and across nations, we find that nearly every human society considers it a worse injustice to hang an innocent man than to let a guilty one go free. The reasons for this are vast and varied, but since they could take up another essay, let’s just assume it is true. As such, since humans are fallible, allowing one or more to dispense punishment, makes it very likely that an innocent man would be hanged. Therefore courts of law with procedures are set up with the aim of reducing fallibility. In theory, through the courts we should always ensure that the guilty are hanged while the innocent walk free.

What does all this have to do with Edward?

HE – IS – INFALLIBLE.

Edward – can – read – minds. Unless he chooses to ignore his own gift, he will always have a 100% success rate at catching the guilty and avoiding the innocent. (though I’m sure there’s a great crime to be written about a mind reader getting fooled…) Thus what makes vigilante justice wrong for 99.9999% of society, wouldn’t apply to Edward. If anything he’ll probably have a greater success rate than most courts. Upon reflection, Edward being a vigilante is not morally dubious.

But… here’s where we find ourselves again running into the elephant in the room: Meyer’s religion. (Yes later in this chapter they’ll bring up God and souls but in a very generic way and not related to this point.) Here we find that Meyer’s religious views give us a fuller picture. While I’m not up on all of LDS theology, I’m pretty sure that – like other Christians – they believe in redemption. Now what is the moral position of Edward’s vigilantism? To a Christian, even if he encounters a confirmed, 100% guilty party, killing them ruins the opportunity for them to repent and redeem their souls. Without providing priests for a last rites or final confession (hmmm… a vampire priest… whoever uses this idea, I just ask for a little acknowledgment in your best seller), Edward’s vigilantism is a much bigger deal to the believer. (And considering that Edward’s god/author is a Christian… well, we could go all day with that meta discussion.)

What is so harmful about lack of privacy? Privacy and autonomy are directly connected to human well-being.

Then again… (and I say this as someone who highly values his own privacy), being social creatures, there is some argument that privacy and autonomy might not be that important to humans, if not counter to our well-being. Then again, it might have to do with the society and culture around us. As pointed out by JP Holding here

Malina and Neyrey note that “in group-oriented cultures such as the ancient Mediterranean, we must remember that people continually mind each other’s business.” [183] Privacy was unknown and unexpected. On the one hand, neighbors exerted “constant vigilance” over others; on the other hand, those watched were constantly concerned for appearances, and the associated rewards of honor or sanctions of shame that came with the results.

There’s more out there but I won’t bog this down further. Suffice to say, privacy and autonomy are arguably a rather recent invention of Western societies. Does that make Westerners better off than others? Like a lot of things, depends on your standards and definitions. Who knows, in one of those group-oriented cultures, Edward might have been very popular for his gift, not just his looks.

Therefore, to the degree that Edward’s mind reading is involuntary, he cannot be obligated to avoid using it. While this factor mitigates some of his responsibility, it is clear that there are many times when his invasion of others’ privacy is both deliberate and unjustified.

Yep – further proof of just how much Edward is a Sue. The concept of involuntary mind reading opens many narrative possibilities and difficulties. Does this ever come up with Sparkly? Nope. He never has trouble tuning minds out, hearing something he doesn’t want to (how many awesome points would the stories have been if we had a scene of Edward suddenly begging for brain bleach when he heard what someone was planning for a fan fic?), getting things confused, biting his tongue… In the end, it’s just another missed opportunity.

Despite Bella’s adoring evaluation of Edward’s morality, we have demonstrated that he remains a morally flawed person.

So it looks like we have 2 anti-essays in a row…

In the end, it is the very combination of Edward’s moral imperfections along with his moral aspirations that make his story so attractive, intriguing, and compelling.

Ah. Well we’ll still give this book +2 respect pending the judges ruling on that last one.

So it seems this book is getting a lot easier. Any day now we’ll be all be able to look back on this exercise and…

Chapter 8: Love & Authority Among Wolves

…
No.
Oh no….

Comment [19]

It’s humorous how the first few chapters of this book correspond to a handy guide. Level 1: Like chapter 1, a pretty good, sensible essay. Level 5: Like chapter 5, pure insanity that causes Greece tremors from all the bodies spinning in their graves. This chapter was almost level 4, bad but not too bad but by the end…

Oh, and again I’m sorry for how long this will be, I’ll be quoting a lot from the source just to give everyone the full context and head off any claims of misrepresentation.

So the essay starts out recapping the basics of meyer’s werewolves – especially as it relates to the alpha’s control of the pack and imprinting.

As these questions suggest, the Twilight books raise a number of issues about free will. Most of us think we have free will, in that what we do is up to us.

Oh great. Discussions of free will never end well.
_{(Sometimes you even get fan fics)}

Well what follows is a lot of examples from Twilight about the book’s general opinion of free will (Alice alone seems to prove its favor) contrasting with the wolves. I think we can all agree that the wolves got shafted in the twilight saga.

Maybe there’s a better way to understand free will. … Many philosophers have concluded that what a person does in a given situation depends on the beliefs and desires that person has.

Well no duh – no decision made by anyone takes place in a vacuum. Just because beliefs and desires play a role in our decision doesn’t mean that we don’t decide. Heck, most of what a person does in a given situation will depend on what that person is capable of. If you stand at a fork in the road, you can’t choose to just fly straight up unless your alien from a dead world who gains powers from the yellow sun.

What follows is a discussion of how people might make a decision, along with one of the funniest lines I’ve read in awhile:

So she [Bella] has good reasons for acquiring the desire to become a vampire. It’s not just out of the blue.

Of course it’s not! Nothing is “just out of the blue” because humans can’t make decisions that don’t exist. No one reading this article can have the desire to be a snigglewrik because I just made up that word and it has no meaning. No decision is made in a vacuum.

So perhaps the lesson we should learn from all this is that nobody really has free will. Some philosophers have thought that this is true, and that free will is just an illusion.

I can’t put a reply any better than John C Wright did

A reader, or perhaps the Tin Woodman of Oz, once again has a few questions about the distinction between final cause and mechanical cause, mind and brain, and why I am programmed to act as if I have free will.

Unfortunately, instead of calling tech support to simply have me rebooted, he insists on using symbols called words to appeal to my sense of reason and my integrity as a philosopher in order to let myself be persuaded that his metaphysical reasoning has that non-physical and non-empirical quality called coherence or logic. His soul intuits no irony in this.

Well actually, I have to give the author some credit, they don’t stay on this train of thought. Instead we get:

Contemporary philosopher Harry Frankfurt provides one of the most compelling versions of this theory. Frankfurt’s idea is that most of us have conflicting desires. We endorse some of these desires, and we don’t endorse others. We want our behavior to be caused by those desires we endorse, rather than by those desires that we don’t approve of. We’re free to the extent that our behavior is caused by the desires that we endorse.

Knowledgeable readers probably noticed that this isn’t just an idea from Mr Frankfurt, Paul the apostle made a very similar point over two thousand years ago in one of his letters (actually, several of his letters). However, there is a difference between “being free” and “free will”. What do I mean? Well look at this line a little later:

To be free is to have your behavior governed by those desires you endorse, or want to be motivated by.

Fair enough, but here’s the million dollar question: how do you sort your desires? What is it that “endorses” some desires but not others? Notice that the author uses the phrase “want to be motivated”, implying that this is another desire, but that’s nonsense – circular reasoning. You endorse some desires because you have a desire for them? Well what’s endorsing that desire that’s sorting the others? In order to sort or put something in an order you must have some measure or concept that’s separate from the items being sorted. i.e. if you’re putting a bunch of files in alphabetical order, the alphabet is not one of those files – it is its own separate concept.

This is really the moment where whatever ground the essay was gaining is lost. The author has stumbled across what is free will: that which orders your desires. Yet he/she glosses over it, and proceeds to keep running in the wrong direction. As we see from here…

The question, though, is whether their [the wolf pack’s] behavior is governed by desires they endorse or by desires they reject. Or to put it another way, could the wolves resist the desires caused by imprinting (as the Cullens resist the desire for blood), in case these desires conflict with something that they value more highly?

No, that’s slavery vs freedom. The question of whether they have free will or not is answered by whether the order of their desires is determined by themselves or by another force.

Meyer doesn’t quite give us enough evidence to fully answer these questions, but there are clues. The first clue comes from Sam. Sam is the kind of person who values his commitments and loyalties highly, and he doesn’t want to hurt Leah. But none of this makes any difference. Once he imprints on Emily, he is bound to hurt Lean, no matter what his other values or commitments are. So perhaps the imprinting governs his behavior, even though the behavior conflicts with his other values.

There’s a polygamy joke/comment buried here somewhere but I’m not touching it.

The situation is more complicated than this, however. Sam has other commitments that he continues to respect. He’s committed to the well-being of the pack, and he’s committed to ensuring the well-being of the humans that he’s sworn to protect. And he doesn’t seem to have a problem balancing these commitments against the desires caused by his imprinting on Emily.

Yeah, except those desires don’t conflict with his feelings for Emily. Being with another woman does. Heck, depending on how you define “pack” (especially as ‘family’ or ‘tribe’), his responsibility to it overlaps with his imprinting on Emily.

Fighting vampires is dangerous work. Any harm to Sam would no doubt cause Emily great suffering. Nonetheless, Sam doesn’t seem to have any trouble putting his obligations to pack and human community first. He is not so compelled by his attraction to Emily that he is incapable of fulfilling his other responsibilities.

You know, I’m pretty sure vampires are a threat to Emily like everyone else. This whole attempt to create a conflict where none exists is insanity. What if not hunting a vampire would cause Emily a lot of guilt once it killed someone and she realized that she kept at home the one person able to prevent it? These are not responsibilities that conflict with his commitment to Emily like being with Leah would – unless there was a scene where Emily explicitly begs and pleads with Sam not to “go hunting”.

Imprinting doesn’t just produce new desires; it also produces new values.

Another line to keep in mind as it all starts to build for a spectacular crash…

(we’re skipping a reference to Martin Luther now because… [sob])

So what happened when he [Sam] imprinted? His desire not to hurt Leah became less important than his desire to be with Emily. He wasn’t a slave to his new desire, because to be a slave to a desire is to have to satisfy it, even if satisfying it costs you things that you value more. … But Sam is not a slave to his desire, because although he does not relish hurting Leah, his desire not to hurt her becomes less important to him than his desire to be with Emily.

WARNING: LONG RANT APPROACHING. WARNING: LONG RANT APPROACHING

(I’ve marked a spot you can skip down to if so inclined)

Ok, remember what we said before, about how the author stumbled upon what is free will by accident? That ‘it’ might be defined as that which orders your desires. So, while Sam might not be a “slave” to his desires, does he still have free will? The obvious answer is NO! He did not choose the order of his desires, they were ordered without his input via “imprinting”.

And here’s what makes this even worse: most of the complaints about imprinting (at least that I’ve found so far) are strictly on behalf of the females. What I’ve found just in searching:

Cleolinda here

I feel really sorry for Quil’s imprintee. She’ll never have any chance of a life of her own, because it’s predetermined that she’ll marry someone almost twenty years older than her. And in the meantime, he’ll be her “older brother”? I’m sorry, but ew.

Here

And then we check in with Quil and Claire—you know, the teenage werewolf who imprinted on the two-year-old. “Imprinting,” for those of you just joining us, is a love-at-first-sight thing where a wolf guy (or girl, I suppose, given Leah’s presence in the pack) sees someone for the first time and that someone instantly becomes the center of his (or her) universe. As Jacob painstakingly explains to Bella in New Moon, it’s not (necessarily) a sexual thing: whatever Claire needs—a brother, a friend, a lover—Quil will be that for her, because “that kind of love and devotion is hard to resist.” Read: Claire has absolutely no choice in this at all, and is going to end up with a guy she’s practically been raised with (by?).

and here

Imprinting
It’s kind of a love-at-first-sight thing for werewolves—once they see their soulmate for the first time, that person becomes “the center of their universe” absolutely. It’s controversial in the books, besides the obvious reason (the person imprinted on gets no choice at all in the matter, and it is explained that “it’s hard to resist that kind of love and devotion,” so—hope you like being stuck with some random werewolf guy!), because teenage Quil imprints on a two-year-old, and Jacob… well.

Mark of Mark reads Twilight fame

In the eighth chapter of Eclipse, we find out that Jacob’s friend Quil imprints on a two-year old. Two. TWO. We’re still not told what imprinting actually is, but it’s still reminiscent of rape.

I’m still confused as to what the actual process is and I have a feeling so does Meyer, but I’ve got a much clearer picture: it’s like brain rape.

No, seriously. It’s a mental connection the male makes on a female without her consent. And that’s the real key here: consent. At no point does the female ever really get a say on this. Once the male werewolf imprints, he’s dedicated for life. (It’s almost like a biological validation of stalking, isn’t it? Oh, Meyer!)

And remember! She doesn’t get a choice about any of this. Right? Does Claire get a choice, Jacob?

The problem, of course, is that this process, again, removes the female choice.

Now, I am NOT defending imprinting in any way, it sucks on so many levels we’ll need to rent the LHC to measure it all, but let’s take a moment to examine what the books actually say about imprinting. From eclipse (apparently):

“It’s not like that; you’ve got it all wrong,” Jacob defended his friend, suddenly vehement. “I’ve seen what it’s like, through his eyes. There’s nothing romantic about it at all, not for Quil, not now.” He took a deep breath, frustrated. “It’s so hard to describe. It’s not like love at first sight, really. It’s more like . . . gravity moves. When you see her, suddenly it’s not the earth holding you here anymore. She does. And nothing matters more than her. And you would do anything for her, be anything for her. . . . You become whatever she needs you to be, whether that’s a protector, or a lover, or a friend, or a brother.”

Notice that Jacob says it will be hard for the imprintee to reject the imprinter, but it’s not impossible. The twilight wiki points this out as well that rejection is unlikely, but could happen.

Now let’s all look at the elephant in the room: what is impossible? The imprinter rejecting the imprintee. In a humorous post, cleolinda pointed out that it seemed like Meyer was setting up another love triangle at the end of Breaking Dawn. So let’s run with this thought a moment…

Six and a half years later, Nessie has been “raised” by the bestest father figure ever: Jacob. One day, while they’re out, she runs into Nahuel. The two half-breeds hit it off so well, that Nessie finds herself falling in love with Nahuel, so much that she needs an older brother to keep her grounded, give her relationship advice and keep her from making any stupid mistakes. Who fills that role? Jacob! During all this, does Jacob get to go out and find some pretty she-wolf to have a relationship with? Nope – he’s with Nessie. Even if she’s dating someone else, he’ll be whatever she needs. Heck, per the text, we can easily imagine Jacob standing guard outside Nessie’s and Nahuel’s honeymoon suite as a bodyguard if that’s what she needs. Whatever she needs Jacob cannot say no to. And this isn’t his choice either. He didn’t decide to be this devoted to Nessie, it happened involuntarily.

There’s a word for that… What’s it called…

Right. SLAVERY.

Meyer writes a book series where Native American men are ENSLAVED by people and all anyone complains about is how it affects the women? WTF??? (high praise to any commentator who finds another article that points out the misandry of this whole deal)

ENDING RANT

But oh, let’s see what the essay almost ends with (there’s a small section after this one but it’s just a bunch of “what ifs”). Sorry for this, but I have to post the whole thing.

A Final Worry

There’s one final worry: this sort of change in values brought about by imprinting might itself seem to conflict with free will. Usually, when people change their minds about something, they have had an opportunity to reflect on the change. They’ve had a chance to endorse or reject the new idea or value, depending on how it fits in with or conflicts with other things they believe. But this is precisely what doesn’t happen in the case of imprinting. The change in values just happens, out of the blue. And it seems this should be a violation of one’s free will. If someone implanted a chip in your brain that made you care about things that you totally hadn’t cared about before, you would think that your free will had been violated. And this doesn’t seem all that far from what happens in the case of imprinting.

But such a scenario isn’t as clear-cut as it initially appears, even in the human case. Bella’s immediate response to her pregnancy is to become concerned with her child’s well-being. She’s unwilling to do anything that might endanger the child, even at the risk of her own life. She’s even willing to do things (like drink blood) that would have been repellent to her in her earlier life. This change is also from out of the blue. Bella hasn’t reflected on it, or had the chance to reject or endorse it. Yet this doesn’t seem to involve any violation of free will. We can agree with Carlisle that the only violation of free will here would be the attempt to make Bella give up the child. To do so would be to try and make her act against what are now her deepest values and commitments, even though she hasn’t really chosen them.

First of all, I’m pretty sure if you were to ask Bella (as well as most people), she would tell you that she would be very protective of her children, even if she doesn’t have any at the moment. It’s nigh impossible that this change is “out of the blue”, what’s change is that a previous theoretical desire (that of offspring, which is common to most people) become actualized – became real. How can she become concerned with her child’s well-being if she doesn’t have a child?

Second, as I pointed out earlier, imprinting ultimately amounts to slavery. Do you notice what the author above concluded? Yep, they justified slavery, as – long – as – the – slaves – like – it.

_{please send drinks to:
Smiths Grove Sanitarium
488 Halloween Lane – room 12
Not Real, CA 60066}

Well now we are halfway done with this book. Next up, we enter the eclipse essays and… well let’s just say that falconempress and I have almost karmic timing…

Comment [16]

This is, by far, the single worst chapter of the book. The others weren’t that bad, I’ve learned my lesson.

It’s like someone did a personal study to find out all the things I hate most (politics, stupidity, hypocrisy, politics, etc) and compile them into a single, concentrated form. I mean you hear the stories about the radical (read as: idiot) feminists, the ones that are so over the top that you think they can’t possibly be true – you know: strawmen – but then you actually find one.

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this is one of the most elaborate practical jokes I’ve ever seen but no, it really isn’t. So to head off any claims that I’m making fun of a strawman, or being unfair or misogynist or any of the other thousand “wolf” excuses, I am going to reproduce the entire chapter, I’ll even be able to use a lot of the author’s own arguments against her own essay.

Oh, and I got falconempress (FE) and the drunk fox (DF) to help me (NW) out.

DF: Hello!

FE: [waves]
Hello!

FE: I honestly wonder when I will start regretting this. What is the title?

Bella Swan and Sarah Palin: All the Old Myths Are Not True.

FE: Hm. Excuse me for a second.

FE: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

DF: Well that was fast!

NW: She almost beat my scream record there.

FE: Frail nerves. A remainder from my Assling Grey sporks.

Having It All
The four volumes of Twilight support a coherent narrative of development and transformation, from a classic situation of a young girl in love with a wonderful older man, into a mature relationship of full equality.

FE: Something about the phrase “wonderful older man” makes me think about one of those old guys sitting in a park, playing chess all day and spouting wisdom at anyone who decides to join the game. And then buys them a cup of cocoa.

NW: So far all I can agree with is that Twilight does indeed cover four volumes. (Midnight Sun, the Bree story, all of these I don’t count as they’re just the same with different wrapping paper.)

Thus at the outset, Edward Cullen, who was born in 1901, far exceeds the contemporary high school student and mortal, Bella Swan, in mental and physical talents.

NW: But that would be true of anything Bella dated, from Mike to a sea sponge named Bob.

DF: Team Bob FTW!

FE: But if he indeed does exceed any contemporary high school student and mortal, then why does he still go to high school? In my book “exceeding” means passing a certain point, outgrowing it, so to speak. Him infinitely repeating high school seems to signify that he has not exceeded it at all.

He is also more beautiful than she. By the end of the fourth volume, however, Bella, as a newborn vampire, is physically stronger than Edward, just as mentally acute, and at least as beautiful.

NW: So… Bella becomes stronger than Edward, but their relationship becomes one of “full equality”? We’re just now out of the first paragraph and she’s shot her thesis in the foot.

DF: They’re not equal unless the woman is better. So sayeth the author.

FE: Also if she is not equally hot. Because superficial beauty is so much more important than being able to have an actual conversation with the person by the time they are fifty and you are lying in your bed in silence, quietly chewing the pillow in frustration.

From Bella’s point of view, Edward changes from an exalted all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful demigod, to a devoted lover and husband, whom she is able to protect with her own special gift of psychic shielding. Edward admires and supports every stage of Bella’s coming into her own powers, and is even able to accept the love of both Bella and their daughter for Jacob Black, the werewolf/“shape-shifter,” whom Edward earlier despised.

DF: He wasn’t all-knowing; if nothing else, he couldn’t read Bella’s mind. Granted, there wasn’t really much to read, but he still didn’t know that.

FE: She used the word demigod. This cannot end well.

NW: Wait! There’s a set up for discussions on werewolf imprinting…

Edward is very much the new sensitive and caring man to Bella’s new able, powerful, and courageous woman. He is even a so-called vegetarian vampire who kills animals for their blood instead of preying on humans.

NW: Awww drat. No imprinting talk.

DF: Oh, good, no imprinting talk.

NW: I was being sarcastic.

DF: Well I wasn’t, so there.

FE: And apparently, “creepy, obsessively controlling stalker” equals “caring husband” these days.

NW: So what you’re saying is that I need to stalk you (either of you) to prove my worth as husband material?

DF & FE: *NO!*

Every Western ideal of romantic love and the contemporary success of heterosexual women is thereby fulfilled for the heroine of Twilight: She marries the vampire she loves and thereby joins a rich, cultured, and loving extended family, after which she skips through pregnancy in a couple of months, becomes a vampire to save her life, and attains the powers of a superheroine. Talk about “what women want!”

DF: I TOTES WANT TO BECOME A VAMPIRE! ESPECIALLY AFTER HAVING TO HAVE MY DEMONSPAWN BABY RIPPED OUT OF ME BECAUSE IT WAS KILLING ME FROM THE INSIDE!
So fantastic!

FE: OMG THAT IS TOTALLY ALL THAT I WANT FROM LIFE TOO! HIGH FIVES!

If escape fiction as riveting as Twilight is really about our own mundane life and times – which I assume it is – then its fantastical elements may pinpoint exactly what young women aspire to in “having it all.” (Or else, Twilight is a sublime send-up of the notion of having it all, although the author gives no indication of that.)

DF: Because that would have made it worth reading.

All of the Myths are True
The most fantastical element of the Twilight quartet is not so much its content, which the reader accepts as a basic premise, but Bella’s frequent pronouncement that all of the old myths are true. This self-reflexive incantation deftly connects the world of vampires and werewolves to everyday life, making it easy for the reader to vicariously live the story as her own mundane, mortal self.

NW: Yes, that’s what Tolkien had to do to get Lord of the Rings to connect to readers. /sarc Such a statement isn’t an “incantation” to connect worlds, it’s world building shorthand, plain and simple. This sheer inability to just grasp simple concepts is going to plague the author throughout.

FE: Aw, come on. Admit that you needed to see Legolas deal with his issues of self – identity and sexuality to really buy into the premise.

DF: Also, just because she says it, doesn’t make it so. We’ve seen vampires and werewolves shapeshifters that are remarkably werewolf-like for creatures who have nothing to do with them. True werewolves are alluded to, but never seen. So if all of the old myths are true, where are the alicantos, the wendigos, the salmon of wisdom, and all those myths? We don’t ever hear a word about them! Heck, if those are too obscure for you, how about where are the dragons? XP

And so, the genre of children’s fairy tales is thereby harnessed to the desires, yearnings, and aspirations of women in the early twenty-first century.

NW: ARGH! First of all, the “old myths” were not for children! Especially those nasty ones involving blood sucking and shape shifting.

DF: Sure they were, Nate! Kids love those!

NW: Well… true we they do. But considering they only became “kiddiefied” in the most recent century or two… There’s just so – much – wrong in that ONE SENTENCE.
I take it back! I wasn’t sarcastic. I really wish we were going over imprinting again!

For although the Twilight series is categorized as reading for young adults, Stephenie Meyer has reported getting fan mail from women in their thirties – and they in turn may be the “scouts” for their older sisters, mothers, and grandmothers.

FE: Twilight – now spreading the creepiness to all demographic groups!

NW: What… what does that even mean? And is it really an issue for something to have broad base appeal? Adults can’t enjoy Dr Seuss without it having some kind of ‘meaning’?

DF: Dr. Seuss doesn’t have meaning?! MY LIFE IS A LIE!

Consider Sarah Palin

NW: NO!

FE: Oh Jesus Christ.

NW: ;_; Well, there goes any effort to make this essay timeless.

If I were a conspiracy theorist,

NW: Oh she’ll demonstrate about the intellect and capacity of the craziest conspiracy theorist.

FE: Pssh! Don’t insult the conspiracy theorists.

I would suggest that Bella softened up many young white women for Sarah Palin, because the series has already sold millions when Palin began to campaign with presidential candidate John McCain in fall 2008.

NW: 1) “Young white women”? You just said earlier that women in their thirties and up expressed appreciation of the saga. I cannot find any hard data on the twilight saga’s fanbase, only this anecdotal article from the examiner, much less that it trends only in one racial direction.
2) Correlation does not equal causation, and these two “timings” doesn’t even qualify for correlation! (The first book was released in 2005, the last book published in early August of 2008 (Sarah Palin was governor in Dec of 2006 and VP nominee at the end of August 2008.) You could pick any books that had sold millions and link it by this “logic”. (I say the Very Hungry Caterpillar caused all those votes for McCain-Palin – maybe Captain Underpants.)

DF: A cunning plot indeed… sage nod

NW: 3) As the author points out later, Obama/Biden got several million votes themselves. How do we know Twilight didn’t “prep” people for them rather than McCain/Palin? Where’s the surveys documenting the predominant leanings of Twilight fans? Of anti-fans? (See? I know a lot here complain about how much linkage I do in my articles but that’s because I like to see something substantiated in making a claim.)

FE: Bad political analogy is bad, but worse yet is bad political analogy without any foundations. What exactly is the connection between the two? How are the two related? Why is this even here?

However, at this writing, Bella seems to have greater staying power than Sarah Palin, insofar as Palin’s team lost and Bella has been reincarnated in the movies.

NW: That’s going to be true of nearly ANY fictional character vs a real one. Hell, Shakespeare has more staying power than most of the English royalty if you go by pop-culture memory. Oh, and nobody tell the author about Sarah’s TV deal with fox news. Or her speaking engagements.

DF: Can we mention the book to her?

We should remember, though, that Palin retreated to Alaska, where she remained governor of an energy-rich state until she announced her resignation in July 2009. So in the long term, her assault on reality may turn out to be just as triumphant as Bella’s.

NW: The phrase “assault on reality” is going to be very funny later. And… why should we remember that Palin “retreated” to Alaska after the election? I’m pretty sure 99% of all candidates go HOME after failing an election.

DF: Just as I suspected! Further proof that politicians are cowards!

FE: I’m sorry, I am still baffled by this. The supposed similarities drawn between Palin and Bella are so random and forced I could take any two persons and make a similar connection.

NW: Prove it!

FE: Erm – Hitler had a dog named Blondie. The dog died. This, of course, is highly reminiscent of the band Blondie who, while past its zenith of fame and recognition, was added to the hall of Rock and Roll fame. Therefore, even those the two share a staggering number of similarities, the band has managed to overcome its troubles with aging much better than the dog which is not going to be immortalized in the Hall of Rock and Roll Fame because he was, in fact, a dog and is now long dead.

There. that was about 90% more thought than the author put into this “essay”.

NW: Hmmm… that definitely warrants further research. Here, have a professorship!

A Lesson for Serious Feminists

NW: A contradiction in terms! rimshot
No really, by the end of this, you’ll be convinced that there’s nothing “serious” anywhere near here.

Self-styled serious feminists have much to learn from these two mass heroines, who can only be dismissed if one ignores the yearnings of existing women.

NW: Well yes, existence is usually a requirement for yearnings. You can’t really be called serious if you have concerns about non-existent people/things now can you?

DF: I wouldn’t put it past the author.

FE: Based on the rhetoric the author is using here – do you think she is bitter much?

DF: Yes. Yes I do. Also pretentious.

NW: So a typical woman? […] Ow! Ow! I take it back!

The Twilight books have sold twenty million copies and the first movie grossed $150 million in less than a month. Fifty million people voted for McCain-Palin, a number that was roughly half of the electorate, despite Barack Obama’s landslide in the electoral college and an additional three million votes. ¹ Both Bella and Palin offer clues about how the dreams of contemporary young women are historically innocent to the point of complete ignorance.

NW: Really, miss “children’s fairy tales”? The phrase “historically innocent to the point of complete ignorance” is also one to watch for.

FE: So? Those are just numbers. If they provide any clues it is that people nowadays will go for just about anything if the packaging is nice enough.

Indeed, the absence of history in both trajectories is perhaps the most striking fact about them. For example, in the Twilight quartet, Jacob Black, the Native American shape-shifting character, lives in LaPush, Washington, which is the name of a real place, where the Quileute tribe has lived for at least eight hundred years. But nowhere in the Twilight publicity were these real people acknowledged, and so far as I know, no attempt has been made to recognize the literary license taken with their identities.

NW: Just to prove I’m a fair guy, I will admit, that is a legitimate point.

Similarly, in Palin’s acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, Palin generously referred to the North Slope of Alaska as a source of still-untapped natural resources, in a manner that suggested she was completely oblivious of the effects of further drilling on natural habitats, ancestral indigenous lands, or global warming.

NW: This? This ONE speech by her is enough to label Palin as “historically innocent to the point of complete ignorance”? That’s just… insane. But also we can see that the author is just plain ignorant herself. From one, just ONE article, we can already see:
1) “In the rhetorical wars between those who favor drilling the 1002 and those who don’t, the caribou issue raises conflicting claims.”
2) “But north of the mountains, many Inupiat Eskimos in Kaktovik on Barter Island favor onshore oil leasing for the economic opportunities it might bring them—especially if oil is found on their coastal land.”
And as for global warming, not only is that still being debated, but historical knowledge – well there’s still talk on it, namely we’re trying to figure out how much we do know about the history.
Hmmm… looks like the author here is completely oblivious to many things.

It is difficult to avoid the judgment that both Bella and Palin are American primitives, if not savages. Consider the picture of Palin (well circulated online during the fall of 2008) kneeling with one of her young daughters, behind a moose she had just shot. ²

FE: What? How is that considered “primitive”? Does the author have any idea what purpose does licensed hunting serve? That it is mostly about selecting out the weak and deformed members of the population in order to improve the bloodline of the entire given group of animals? How is that “primitive”?

NW: You know, I wonder if Palin & Jr (or whoever it was) were Native Americans hunting in a ritual, would she be as critical… (notice that in the previous linked article, one of the NA tribes do hunt caribou – does that make them “American primitives, if not savages”?)
Not to mention that hunting has always been a traditionally “male” environment. Where’s the praise or recognition that – at last – women can participate too? (Remember: Smith & Wesson, Winchester, Colt – they are some of the giants of true feminism and making everyone equal.)

Their expressions are cheerful and matter-of-fact. This picture is uncannily reminiscent of a scene from the last Twilight novel, when Bella, with her young daughter nearby, is interrupted while drinking the blood of a moose. (It should go without saying that when Bella becomes a vampire, she adopts the so-called vegetarian practices of her husband and family.)

NW: Once again, let’s look at some of those troublesome facts. Here’s a compare contrast between google searches for “breaking dawn” and “sarah palin moose”. Notice how the book PRECEDES Palin. The announcement for Breaking Dawn’s release date was in February of ’08, which means Meyer had to have the book finished or nearly so before then. For this… whole deal to make any sense, Meyer has to have the most freaky psychic powers.

FE: So is moose the connection between them? Somebody just please explain because I apparently lack the capacity to notice it myself.

Ordinary women identify with Bella and Palin. Bella’s mind is very accessible, because most of the events in the four novels are presented in the first person by her.

NW: She’s also a blank slate deliberately made indistinct and “average” to better allow reader projection onto the character. Her “mind” (using the term loosely) has almost nothing to do with it.

FE: But in that respect, Bella an Palin are not really that different. Bella is a blank slate created as such in order for the reader to project themselves against her vacuous presence. Palin is, as John Cleese had put it, a parrot with no actual in-depth understanding of major issues or any real opinions on them, used solely to project those told to her by others and repeat what they think. Ah! Connection! I have finally found thee! Oh, the glee!

NW: Wait… I think the above applies to every politician.

DF: …John Cleese hates every politician?

NW: He truly is a wise man.

Less is known about Palin’s inner life, but her fans have no trouble in identifying with her, based primarily, it would seem, on her successful heterosexuality and working-class background.

NW: “Successful heterosexuality”? You mean… motherhood?

FE: Yeah, what does that phrase even mean? That she never so much as fantasized about being with a woman? How can a sexual orientation be considered “successful” or “unsuccessful?”

DF: Did…did the author ever learn how to write clearly and concisely? I mean, granted, I’m still learning that particular skill, but I’m not trying to sound intellectual, either.

In these current female versions of Horatio Alger, successful upward social mobility is a broad prize, not unlike the imagined joy of winning the lottery. What is important to multitudes is being able to identify with where the heroine starts out. The prizes she gets need not be either earned or deserved.

NW: And you base this upon… what? Need I also point out that existence itself is a prize that cannot be earned or deserved by anyone?

It is sufficient if those who identify with her would value the same prizes. On this note, while critics who never liked Palin to begin with might make much of the hypocrisy involved in her $150,000-plus makeover, it is unlikely to perturb supporters, who may themselves have developed similar aspirations from watching early twenty-first-century makeover shows on television.

NW: What hypocrisy? How is her wardrobe proven to be hypocritical? Shall we really start totaling up the costs of other presidential candidates? Further irony? CNN anchor Campbell Brown noted that there is a double standard of appearance for male public figures v female public figures – yet here we have a “feminist” perpetuating that double standard. Is it ok or preferable for public figures to wear nice things or not?

What, you may ask, is the feminist point of all this?

DF: Obviously, this one person is the expert on that!

FE: Oh this is gonna be good.

NW: Forget feminist, I’m looking for ANY point by now.

bq.The point is that serious scholarly feminists seem not to be aware that these three things are very important to a majority of young American women: practicing heterosexuality in the form of fulfilled romantic love and fertility;

NW: Well that’s going to be very important to a majority of women EVERYWHERE. It’s called natural selection (while Newton may be the most dangerous son of a bitch in space, Darwin’s the most dangerous one on Earth). If you don’t breed, you’re not a majority for very long, that’s just math.

looking good according to the prevailing beauty norms of consumer culture;

NW: The fact that she says this right after the previous point about “romantic love and fertility” is just so “historically innocent to the point of complete ignorance”. If one is interested in finding a mating partner, they are going to try and “look good” according to the desires OF THE PARTNER THEY SEEK. And the “consumer culture” doesn’t define beauty, it reacts to it because the norms of beauty are encoded into our very genes (with some limited variation depending upon the time and settings of course). I’ll bet anyone $10 this author failed biology – if she even took it.

and attaining power in the world as it is, rather than the world as it should be.

NW: Wait. waitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwait-

DF: What already?!

NW: Remember the phrase the author used earlier? “assault on reality”?

DF: …Yes?

NW: “The world as it is” – may I remind you – is a good definition of R-E-A-L-I-T-Y.
“The world as it should be” is a D-R-E-A-M or an ideal.
The author criticizes Palin for dealing with the world as it is while earlier claiming that she was assaulting reality? Lady, by YOUR OWN WORDS, you are the one assaulting reality.

DF: And now I know!

NW: That’s half the battle right there.

The good news is that these values and aspirations do not appear or feel like the psychic attitudes of an oppressed and exploited gender. The bad news is that this idealized configuration is not accessible to all members of the female mass, almost by definition: The chances of the majority of female teenagers finding true love with vampires, or of becoming governors of a state after they are beauty queens, are next to zero.

DF: Actually, in the case of the vampire one, the chances would be zero, because VAMPIRES DON’T EXIST.

NW: And how many feminist idealized configurations are accessible to all members of the female mass? How many get to be feminist study professors? Hell, by this logic, Hilliary Clinton is bad news to feminists because not every member of the female mass can be a senator of New York, or Secretary of State, or…
What’s even funnier? Men have been dealing with this F-O-R-E-V-E-R. What’s the chance of the majority of male teenagers becoming king of Gondor, finding true love with elves, blowing up the Death Star, or of becoming president? Next to zero I’m sure.

FE: My head hurts.

DF: That’s normal in these situations. ><

The question is whether feminists ought to further distance themselves from existing women by repudiating idealized heterosexuality, objectified beauty,

NW: I repeat: Natural Selection. How exactly are you going to have feminism, if you don’t have more women being born? Without “idealized heterosexuality”, your movement ends in 100 years.

and male-identified power for women; or if they should make a more conscientious attempt to at least bridge their culture gap with the masses.

NW: What the hell does “male-identified power for women” even mean? I’m pretty sure having your hand on the button of a thousand nuclear bombs is power regardless of who identifies it.

Who Are the Real Elitists?

DF: The first two guesses don’t count.

Contemporary feminists are not alone in their elitist doctrinal purity.

NW: No, there’s a lot of groups that have issues with elitist doctrinal purity.

FE: Again – bitter much?

As philosopher Richar Rorty (1931-2007) pointed out, there is a persistent and unacknowledged problem with how class is dealt with in higher education. He wrote:

It seems to me that the regulative idea that we heirs of the Enlightenment, we Socratists, most frequently use to criticize the conduct of various conversational partners is that of “needing education in order to outgrow their primitive fear, hatreds, and superstitions.” …[S]tudents who enter as bigoted, homophobic, religious fundamentalists will leave college with views more like our own… The fundamentalist parents of our fundamentalist students think that the entire “American liberal establishment” is engaged in a conspiracy. The parents have a point. Their point is that we liberal teachers no more feel in a symmetrical communication situation when we talk with bigots than do kindergarten teachers talking with their students… we do not consider the possibility of reformulating our own practices of justification so as to give more weight to the authority of the Christian scriptures. Instead, we do our best to convince these students of the benefits of secularization. We assign first-person accounts of growing up homosexual to our homophobic students for the same reasons the German schoolteachers in the postwar period assigned The Diary of Anne Frank. You have to be educated in order to be… a participant in our conversation… So we are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist religious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than discussable. We are not so inclusivist as to tolerate intolerance such as yours. ³

DF: So in other words, the answer to your question is still you.

NW: …
Let me get this straight.
This person, just argued for the eradication of the culture and worldview of an entire people.
Some of this sounds familiar…
“When an opponent says, ‘I will not come over to your side,’ I calmly say, ‘Your child belongs to us already… You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing but this new community” -Hitler
Yes, Rorty’s quote is pretty much an unintentional summary of this book:

There, now you don’t have to read it.
I mean, it’s not often you get to see someone declare war on an entire culture in the name of ‘tolerance’.

“We are not so inclusivist as to tolerate intolerance such as yours” could be rephrased by many intellectual feminists as: “We are not so pro-woman as to tolerate the values of women such as you.”

FE: Or, in layman’s terms: NO U

NW: Funny how well that phrase can apply to the author.
In fact, I’m going to start using it any time I hear a woman talking.

DF: Hey…

NW: Shut up girl! I’m not so pro-woman as to tolerate the values of women such as you!

DF: Well I’m not so pro-… … …Your face is stupid!

And more specifically, we might add that contrary to what some in the mass media proclaimed, Palin is no more a real feminist than Bella is a real vegetarian. Behind such harsh rhetoric is a concern not for words but for what they stand for.

DF: STOP MAKING WORDS NOT MEAN ANYTHING.

NW: What words stand for is what they mean. I have a novel idea, let’s talk about what reality means and whether you have a concern for it or not.

Vegetarianism stands for not eating animals, and feminism stands for the interests of women and not merely their sexual or gendered identities.

NW: umm… if you take away the sex and gender of women… aren’t you no longer left with women?

DF: SHUT UP, MAN. I’M NOT SO PRO – wait.

NW: ^_

That is, since most of us already do not eat human flesh, it is a strange appropriation of the practice of those who already do not eat animal flesh to use the term “vegetarianism” as a positive label for those who abstain only from human flesh.

DF: But vampires don’t eat human or animal flesh; they drink blood.

NW: I almost hate to say this but… the author is right – for the wrong reasons. Yes, most of US PEOPLE do not eat humans, but most vampires (the ‘them’ referred to) do. Not to mention that from everything we know, vampires MUST eat something living, there’s no other choices for them other than animal or human (except for Duckula).

DF: And Bunnicula!

And insofar as feminists, who have mostly been women, have fought long and hard for recognition of a right to choose abortion, as well as for recognition of the value of natural environments, it is a strange appropriation of feminism to contract its meaning to gender alone, so that it can be applied to someone who is militantly prolife and aggressively exploitative of nature.

NW: Environmentalism is feminist?

DF: Sure, why not?

NW: But the environment affects everyone! We all have a stake in taking care of it. That’s not feminism, that’s humanism.

FE: Hello again, pointless and groundless connections! I missed you so much! Oh wait, no I didn’t.

The interests of women consist of social goals that would benefit large numbers of women in more or less equal ways.

NW: Remember this a moment, we’ll come back to it.

DF: Well what if I don’t want to?

The error of the Bella and Palin fans is less in the content of their aspirations but in the inherent elitism of those aspirations. How many vampires could the Pacific Northwest support without a significant decrease in the human, if not the animal, population? And as posed, how many women can be beauty queens, mothers of five, and governors of states, while running for vice president and possibly president after that, not to mention also modeling new wardrobes that consist hundreds of thousands of dollars? The point is that the lifestyles of Bella and Palin are not sustainable on a mass level.

NW: 1) I repeat: what about Hillary Clinton’s career? How much did her wardrobe cost? I guess her lifestyle isn’t sustainable on a mass level? Does that mean she’s not ‘feminist’? (whatever that means)
2) I can’t believe I have to point this out, but how sustainable is abortion on a mass scale? Would it involve a “significant decrease in the human… population” if a large number of women engaged in it?
3) Finally, men HAVE BEEN DEALING WITH THIS FOR LIKE… EVER! So, if the above is reasoning that such is not feminist, then guys being in charge, books like LotR, HP, etc etc means that it’s not patriarchal. Thus, there’s never been such a thing as the patriarchy. Good news gals! You were never repressed!

The contradiction inherent in their mass admiration is that all of their fans because they want what they have, cannot all have what they have.

NW: Man, that puts a whole new light on Chuck Norris. =(

Rorty is mistaken if he is implying that the important difference between American fundamentalists and the college professors who educate their children is the content of their ideas or how they justify them. The important difference would have to lie in their life values, insofar as those values structure how they live and enable others to live the same way. Or in other words, do American Christian fundamentalists have sustainable lifestyles, capable of including multitudes on an egalitarian basis?

NW: But… neither would your lifestyle. Man, I don’t even have to work to disprove you.

DF: I love the false dichotomy here; anybody who doesn’t agree with the author’s views is a Christian fundamentalist, onoes!

Their homophobia and strong prolife positions alone would seem to exclude the well-being of a significant number of their very own children.

NW: Wait! How can being prolife exclude the well being of children? Children have to kind of exist in order to have any sort of being. Oh, and remember how “anti Christian” the author was earlier? So if we can take being “anti” something inflicts harm on someone, take a tally of the number of gays in the population, then the number of Christians, and do a number crunch on which “anti” position will do the most numerical harm.
Not that I wish harm on anyone, I just find it funny that this author complains about 1 wrong, then proceeds to do that same wrong on a larger scale!

So how can intellectual feminists bridge their gap from those young women who aspire to have what Bella and Palin are presented as having? First, I think it important to engage those mass views and ideals that are strongly opposed to one’s own and try to analyze what is important and pleasurable about them to those who hold them (the compassionate move).

NW: My method? Mocking yours.

DF: HEY! That’s MY method!

NW: My method also includes stealing.

Second, I think it’s necessary to distinguish between views and ideals that are salient only for individuals in independent, exceptional, and possibly isolated ways, and views and ideals that within them include the well-being of multitudes (the Kantian move).

NW: Like your whole idea on abortion? That’s not exactly works well for the multitude.

Third, I think it’s necessary to ask individuals to consider how their views and ideals are realized in their own lives and what practical steps it is possible for them to take to attain their ideals (the pragmatic move).

NW: You first.

DF: Also, as I recall, isn’t it considered bad to use first-person pronouns in an essay like this one?

FE: Yes, it is. But then again, this is a book of essays which talk about different philosophical and political aspects of Twilight. I think we should all be grateful the pages are not covered in glitter, pictures of Robert Pattison and the word “Squeeee!” at the end of every paragraph.

DF: Fair point.

NW: Wait a second…
[several issues of teen beat and a pair of scissors later]
Yes! It does improve this book!

A Lesson for Feminists

FE: Or, in other words: “I am so much better than youuu! Listen to meee!”

The most telling lesson of Sarah Palin’s success for feminists is that gender inclusivity alone at this point barely registers as a political goal.

NW: Then it seems you should dump the title “feminists”, then.

DF: And yet said title will remain, for some reason.

NW: Why don’t we just call it “leftism” or whatever already?

DF: Feminism sounds better, especially from a PR standpoint.

FE: And you can put the “feminism” label on anything. Like environmentalist movements and agendas. Because shut up.

DF: Yeah, why do you hate women? :P

NW: On the plus side, now none of my complaints here can be labeled as misogynist, because gender and sex have nothing to do with it!

What does and should register is group interests that political candidates and officials represent and seek to further. Until scholarly feminists succeed in broadly explaining to women what their common interests as women are, everything that they have worked for is vulnerable to being stifled by having its label “borrowed” by those who serve goals that are not in the common interests of women.

NW: You honestly think it’s up to you to tell women what they want? How does that make you any different from the idiot males I can find around the internet making the same point?

The lesson for feminists in Stephenie Meyer’s success is that young women do want it all, and unless these young women are painstakingly taught that all the old myths are not true, they will all too willingly suspend their disbelief and escape into a fantasy in which eating animals is vegetarianism and endless death is endless life.

NW: WHAT? What is “endless death”? What about this mythological group you’re referring to that makes it endless death? Especially since earlier you yourself labeled them proLIFE.

Having It All in Real Life
The idea that women can have it all has already pass into myth by compressing the components of “all” in the the lives of exceptional individuals, all at once.

NW: Or stuff like this passes into myths because of limited time and resources.

DF: No! Time and scarcity of resourses are constructs of the patriarchy!

FE:

DF: SEE?!

NW: Man, I had no idea we poor men were so repressed all these years.

In that mode, many young women are now vicariously having it all, although it is likely that the nature of what they are identifying with owes its magnetic cathexsis for them to an underlying fear that they might not have anything.

NW: How is this feminist? Men deal with that too – we have to make choices and pick trade offs. It’s just life. DEAL – WITH – IT and stop assaulting reality.

In reality, in the United States, women still lack universal child care, not to mention universal health care. Those who work outside their homes – the majority – still take on a second shift in domestic and family work. Women are disproportionately subject to domestic violence as well as violence by acquaintances and strangers.

DF: No they’re not!

NW: I repeat: a lot of those things affect men too. Stop being so sexist, author.

Half of all marriages end in divorce, and economic hard times will doubtless intensify the feminization of poverty.

NW: First of all, the idea that “half of all marriages end in divorce” is a sort of statistical trick, it’s not actually true the way people read it. Second of all, the latest economic hard times we’ve been experiencing have been predominately affecting men. DO – SOME – RESEARCH!

But also in reality, women now live much richer and longer lives than they ever did, and their potential remains untapped. Over the course of their long lives,

FE: Yes, your husband may beat you and you are so poor the rats under your floor have a higher standard of living than you, but you will get to enjoy it longer! Hooray!

NW: That’s why gun ownership should be encouraged. Shoot that abusive bastard!

they may indeed come to have it all, and more, but at different times. For example, if they choose to have children and significant careers, the intensity brought to each of these projects might vary over the decades of a much longer mortal life than enjoyed by poor Bella, who feels pressured to marry, die, and become a vampire herself before she is nineteen, so that she will not look too much older than Edward, who will be seventeen for eternity.

DF: Actually, I’m pretty sure Bella was pressuring EVERYBODY ELSE IN THE BOOKS.

FE: Yes she was. I think somebody should write an essay about how Bella is becoming this domineering dictator, manipulating everyone into doing what she wants, twisting the world around her and people in it into a realization of her own dreams and fantasies. They are the victims here, not Bella.

NW: I think the YAB series deals with that.

(thanks to the girls for helping out, now if you don’t mind, we’re going to go drink this out of our memory)

Comment [47]

I’m back everyone!

It was touch and go there for awhile but at last I’ve been released from the hospital. It took some convincing, but at last the doctors realized that my doomsday weapons weren’t a result of misanthropy… but just an unbridled lust for power.

And the genetic abominations are an effort to cope with my crippling loneliness.

I do hope the Drunk Fox and Falconempress are ok. They’ve stopped returning my calls, but they at least send me Molotov cocktails and kamikaze raptor bombs (the birds, not dinos). It’s nice to know the ladies still care.

So thanks to Asahel for helping me through this one, he’s been returned to his family safely, as I promised…

Vampire Love: the Second Sex Negotiates the Twenty-First Century

This chapter started in a moment of parental panic. My thirteen-year-old daughter, who habitually reads very thick books of dubious character, was unusually insistent in her pleas to be allowed to attend the midnight release party for the last volume in some book series she was reading.

I had to accept that, in the words our new president used to acknowledge Sarah Palin on the campaign trail, vampire love was a “phenomenon.” What did it mean that millions of girls were fantasizing about men who could barely repress the desire to kill them? In 2008?

When I opened the first novel, Twilight, my impression was that I had gone back in time. The female protagonist struck me as a representative of the idealized womanhood of my mother’s generation transposed into twenty-first-century circumstances.

Comment [27]

“At last… peace…”

MR WINCHESTER

“What? Who’s there?”

IT IS I – THE GENERIC OMNIPOTENT DUDE

“Hey Dude! You here to take me to the afterlife?”

NO – YOU ARE ALREADY HERE

“I… thought there would be more harps.”

THIS ISN’T HEAVEN

“Why here, then?”

MOST RELIGIONS LOOK DOWN ON KILLING ALL PEOPLE

“But they deserved it! Did you see the book they created?”

YES – THAT’S WHY YOU’RE ONLY IN PURGATORY – YOU CAN STILL REACH PARADISE

“How? What must I do?”

FINISH IT

“Oh goddammit.”

NOT HELPING

“Sorry. This is cruel and unusual punishment, you know?”

WE’RE FOND OF THAT IN THE AFTERLIFE – IRONY TOO

“Oh all right, what’s this chapter about?

Edward Cullen and Bella Swan: Byronic…

Oh this should be interesting. I remember having a talk with Asahel where we discussed Byronic vs. anti heroes and who should more properly be classified into which category and-

…and feminist heroes… or not

“Son of a…
…
There’s no way I can do this alone!”

VERY WELL.. YOU WILL HAVE HELP – FROM ONE WHO LAUGHED AT OTHERS’ SUFFERING…

swenson: Yeah. And I’m not too happy about it, either.
(sigh) I suppose it can’t be all that bad.

NW: In all honesty… no, it isn’t that bad (if we define “that bad” to be “previous two chapters of this book”). I even find a bit of an imp-like quality to this author. Consider this footnote:

19. A heretofore unrealized unifying trait of Byronic heroes: intense eyes. I’ll take that Genius Grant now, MacArthur Foundation.

NW: Plus she refrences Cleolinda Jones. And it’s hard to hate on someone who references Cleolinda Jones.
…
Hard but not impossible.

So most of this essay is just establishing the basics and providing sources (again, a good way to win my approval).

Stephenie Meyer, who earned a B.A. in English from Brigham Young University, named Edward after the characters of Edward Ferrars in Jane Austen’s (1775-1817) Sense and Sensibillity and Edward Rochester in Charlotte Brontë‘s (1816-1855) Jane Eyre – both Byronic heroes.

sw: …that’s it, I’m done.

NO YOU ARE NOT

sw: Let me tell you a little story. Once, a very long time ago, I read Twilight. I quickly learned the folly of my actions, but while the memory of those books was still fresh in my mind, I happened to read Sense and Sensibility for the first time. I loved it, of course, as I love all of Jane Austen’s work, but the entire time, every time I read Edward’s name, all I could think about was that sparkly stalker. That was the first day I truly hated Twilight. All this time, I thought it was just a coincidence. So to find out that was Smeyer’s intention all along… RAAARGH! It’s infuriating!

NW: The afterlife really does love its cool and unusual punishments.

You’re Only Young Once, but You Can Be Byronic Forever

The Byronic hero is defined by the Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms as a “boldly defiant but bitterly self-tormenting outcast, proudly contemptuous of social norms but suffering from some unnamed sin.”² He’s intelligent, passionate, and usually above-average in almost every way (including good looks), but also tormented, mysterious, unpredictable, and scornful of authority.

NW: Now that we’re on the same page for the definition.

Childe Harlod’s Pilgrimage is most often cited as the chief example of [Lord] Byron’s [the term’s namesake] eponymous hero, and it’s not hard to see why, given these lines from the poem:

Whilone in Albion’s isle there dwelt a youth
Who ne in Virtue’s ways did take delight,
But spent his days in riot most uncouth,
And vexed with mirth the drowsy ear of Night.
Ah me! In sooth he was a shameless wight,
Few earthly things found favor in his sight
Save concubines and carnal companie,
And flaunting wassailers of high and low degree.
…
Yet oftimes in his maddest mirthful mood
Strange pangs would flash along Childe Harold’s brow,
As if the Memory of some deadly feud
Or disappointed passion lurked below:
But this none knew, nor haply cared to know;
For his was not that open, artless soul
That feels relief by bidding sorrow flow;
Nor sought he friend to counsel or condole,
Whate’er this grief mote be, which he could not control.

Hmm. Does that sound like anyone we know?

sw: Honestly? No, not really. Aside from the smitten by grief thing, it doesn’t sound anything like Edward at all. “Concubines and carnal companie” don’t really sound like the 117-year-old virgin who goes to high school and acts a perfect gentleman (despite the whole stalking thing). And when it comes down to it, he’s actually pretty open about what his grief is, happily explaining everything to the first sympathetic teenage girl to wander by. So if this is your criteria for a Byronic hero… Edward fails. Miserably.

NW: Which we should all be grateful for. Why? Because who’s the #1 Byronic hero of today? BATMAN! And the less Bruce is sullied by Edward – the happier we all are.

sw: [shudder] Agreed.

Why Byronic Heroes Make Bad Bosses

NW: Shouldn’t that be obvious? Well just in case it isn’t, the author starts using one of the earliest examples: Edward Rochester from Jane Eyre.

sw: But the author needs to make up her mind. She keeps contradicting or repeating herself, obviously just to take up more space. For example, she writes that Jane Eyre…

…has long been understood as a revolutionary character in literature, a game-changer, a prototype for the sort of hero we would call “feminist” today.

sw: All very straightforward, until the next line.

Or would we?

sw: So… she’s not really a feminist hero?

Today, we want our feminist heroes to be tough, gun-packing, no-nonsense types or even career women with shoe and weight obsessions,

sw: (we do?)

but probably not a prim, perfectly collected young woman for whom a bonnet was a must-have.

sw: OK, so I don’t really agree with you, but I can see your side of…

But we’d be wrong.

sw: MAKE UP YOUR MIND, WOMAN! Is Jane a feminist hero or isn’t she? And what does this have to do with Twilight? And most importantly, if you’re going to go with the traditional interpretation and say she actually is a feminist hero, what was the point of this digression in the first place?!

sw: (to make a long story short, yes, the author does conclude Jane is a feminist hero. Still don’t see the point of taking two pages to say that, though.)

NW: I’ll rant about “what is a feminist” hero later (it will come) but this line bugged me:

Jane eventually discovers Rochester’s nastly little secret (every good Byronic hero has at leastone), and tells him, in no uncertain Victorian terms, to shove it. ⁹ … Cold, huh? What kind of sweet, innocent girl is Jane anyway to run off like that? Aren’t nice girls supposed to stand by their man, longing for them à la Bella Swan in New Moon? Not this girl.

NW: Actually that strikes me as the difference between a nice person and a good person. Nice people avoid hurting other’s feelings. Good people do what is right regardless of the outcome. And in a lot of old stories, the outcome is very much a consideration. Especially back in very poor times when people (women especially) had to work hard to survive. A woman leaving her husband could find herself in very dire financial straits. Just saying that we should be slow to judge people until we’ve had to weigh costs & benefits like they have had to.

Jane can be understood as a feminist character for her determination to stick to her moral guns (no matter what nonsense some man tries to sell her), … If only Bella were as wise. Jane knows that staying with Rochester would mean compromising her deeply held principles of morality…

NW: If only Bella had morals – period. At least, from what I’ve read about the books and seen the movies, I’m not sure Bella has any morals beyond the modern day pop shallowness of: “like, don’t be mean”. Any kind of moral depth to Bella would have been an improvement.

NW: So anyway, the essay continues with some more descriptions of Jane (who sounds awesome) including…

These [previously quoted] statements show that while Jane is proud of her education, her foremost goal is to be self-supporting and independent. Bella shares some of these qualities as well, like not wanting Charlie, her father, to purchase a car for her when she first arrives in Forks, and flying to Washington on her own to live with Charlie and then back to Arizona when being pursued by James. Even her interest in Edward suggests Bella’s intent on becoming independent, if not self-supported.

NW: …Nah. Not yet.

Finally, like all feminist heroes worth their salt, Jane Eyre is intensely loyal to her friends, as is Bella (Jacob – need I say more?).

sw: Bella? Loyal to her friends? You mean like her high school friends, all of which are mentioned about once every hundred pages and are immediately abandoned as soon as Bella gets her sparkly man? The friends Bella never turns to when she’s feeling suicidal over Edward leaving her? The friends who are scarcely even mentioned at her wedding? Bella is the least loyal friend in the entire books. Sure, she’s good friends with Jacob, but only with Jacob, and probably only stays loyal to him all the way to the end because he, like Edward, isn’t an ordinary human. The only remotely friendly act I can think of in all four books is when Bella goes shopping with Angela and Jessica… before she starts dating Edward. She also invites people to go with her to a movie in New Moon, but again, it’s when Edward isn’t around. Worst. Friend. Ever.

NW: And we’re including Dr House in that friend list!

But what does it all have to do with the Twilight saga? You’ve seen the superficial parallels to Edward and Bella. Let’s see how those two crazy kids from Forks really measure up to these timeless characters.

NW: They won’t be timeless except in the manner that “Manos” is timeless.

The Byronic Hero: Now Available in Marble-like, Sparkly Perfection

sw: Say what you like about the rest of the chapter, I do love that section heading. It sounds like something I would say.

…Does [Edward] fit the mold of the Byronic hero?

We learned earlier in this chapter that Byronic heroes are not without their good qualities. …Byronic heroes are brave, as Edward shows when he saves Bella from the car crash. ¹⁸

NW: Is it really bravery when you’re indestructible?

But Byronic heroes are dangerous, too – so dangerous that they like to come right out and tell you how dangerous they are.

NW: I don’t know if it’s intentional, but that made me laugh.

And since no Byronic hero is without his terrible, dreadful secret, Edward Cullen has a big one: [he’s a vampire].

NW: The problem is, pop culture (and Meyer) has so diluted the horror of being a vampire that actually being one doesn’t have the terribleness or dreadfulness attached to it that it might have had in earlier eras. But the author does get around to admitting that Edward’s secret is softened by his vegetarianism so props for that.

sw: Also, does it really count as a “terrible, dreadful secret” if it’s spoiled on the back of the book?

So clearly we have a somewhat flawed (to say the least) hero in Edward without even getting into his control-freak tendencies where Bella is concerned. ²⁶

NW: That footnote? Goes to an article on Jezebel.com. But I don’t feel like promoting them. So I’ll promote das_Mervin instead who deserves the linkage much more (plus she points out in these things that the guys are screwed screwed just as much as the girls).

Can You Still Be a Feminist If You Become a Bloodsucking Vampire for Your Husband?

Bella is a puzzle for feminists. On one hand, we have a hero who is literate, is independent, and goes after what she wants, just like our friend, Jane.

NW: Almost there…

These [previously listed examples] seem like reasonable arguments for Bella being a fierce and fabulous feminist hero, a model of steely determination, stolid independence…

NW: Getting closer…

Unlike Jane Eyre, Bella does not share the spoils of fortune with her friends and family; Edward becomes all that matters.

NW: I post this, just to tease Swenson. But let’s see how this essay concludes…

But that doesn’t cross Bella and Edward’s minds. The ending they find is truly a fairy tale, not because it seems happily ever after but because it lacks cause and effect, moral responsibility, and real relationships. And if that’s Stephenie Meyer’s idea of a fairy-tale ending, maybe we’d all better make sure that we take the Twilight saga for what it is: a fairy tale, no more worthy of emulation than Sleeping Beauty. The test? Ask yourself if Sleeping Beauty is a role model. I’m guessing the answer is no.

NW: (uh – I thought there was nothing there of Sleeping Beauty to emulate. Things happen to her beyond her control – like all of us.)

sw: Yeah, you can’t really compare the two. Sleeping Beauty is a victim of circumstance who is incapable of doing anything because she’s cursed to sleep for a hundred years. Yes, she’s a passive character, but she can’t help it. Bella, on the other hand, has the opportunity to be an active character, but she instead chooses to be passive, unlike many other fairy tale princesses (like Cinderella, who at least does something).

NW: Hear, hear!

Well, then, is Bella a feminist hero? Maybe we can answer that with another question: Will vampires ever get over their taste for blood? ³²

sw: You know, despite the shaky beginning, this wasn’t as bad as it could be. The author of this chapter actually seemed pretty reasonable, and I don’t entirely disagree with her conclusion. No, Bella isn’t a feminist hero, and it’s silly to try to say she is.

NW: Yeah, so this essay wasn’t as bad as the others but…

WARNING! WARNING! Reviewer has reached critical mass!

NW: The term “independent” kept bothering me. Why? Because every time I see it, it brings to mind the trope about the lone wolf. But think about it a moment: how many heroes are independent? Let’s see here… off the top my head at the end of the film/book/story…
Raiders of the Lost Ark: Indiana Jones is captured and tied up. Needs God to come and save his ass.
Star Wars: Luke Skywalker is just about to be shot down. Needs a friend to come save him and a ghost to tell him what to do.
Empire Strikes Back: Luke actually tries being independent and gets multilated as well as nearly dying. Needs his friends to save him.
Return of the Jedi: Luke gets his ass fried, needs daddy to save him.
Lord of the Rings: Frodo needs Sam & Gollum’s help.
Highlander: The very point of the last fight is that the ties Connor has forged with the world aid him over the loner, “independent” Kurgan.

sw: Inception, where Cobb needs his entire team to work together to escape limbo.
Independence Day, where the two main characters need each other’s expertise to defeat the alien.
Aladdin, Aladdin needs Jasmine and the Genie (not to mention Abu and the carpet) to turn Jafar into a genie… and the list goes on.

NW: The Bible? Almost everybody needs God’s help.
Mythology? No one’s independent in those, it’s just the person (or sometimes their mom) that the gods favor.
It’s a very, very common character arc for the “independent” hero to learn that they actually need other people (including my two most favorite Pixar movies: The Incredibles and Up). How many times can you name where the heroes win because they are nakama and the villains don’t? (hint: I just linked you a cheat sheet)

And yet if you were to gender flip any of these great and iconic heroes, they then wouldn’t be considered feminist.

Does that seem wrong to anyone else?

Of course, some would say that it’s a principle of being needy or useless – which I can sympathize. I hate needy and useless people in real life and don’t care to read them in fiction. But then the term for that is “useful”, not “independent”.

And what more accurate term is there for Bella and Edward, but “useless”?

Comment [11]

No jokes. No narrative. Just walk away. I’m warning you…

Undead Patriarchy and the Possibility of Love

Here we go again…

There are lots of reasons to distrust Edward Cullen when we first meet him. …He seems to be a (stereo)typical man in every respect: he has trouble controlling his urges, he’s rude, and he always thinks he knows best.

No, I’m sorry, but these are not features typical of men. They are features typical of HUMANS, period. I’ve known just as many females the above would apply to as I’ve known males (I’ve thankfully known better people in the general so the above description describes fewer humans in my experience on the whole).

Even his initial attraction to Bella Swan seems to be marked by a desire for control. Think about it: Edward doesn’t have access to Bella’s thoughts, so he doesn’t immediately have the same advantage over her that he does with others. She thus refuses (albeit unintentionally) to fall under his power. But this fact seems to make her all the more enticing to Edward, a control freak par excellence: since he doesn’t automatically have access to her mind, he longs to find out about her – and thereby to master her.

Yep, the basic human drive of curiosity is all about control. There’s no such thing as a simple desire for knowledge.

You know what’s the most fun part about this? This essay will never once bring up Alice Cullen. You remember: the vampire with the power of precognition. It would seem that having the power to predict the consequences of people’s choices infallibly gives one just as much (if not more) control over people than reading their mind.

Oh! And Alice just happens to be a girl. Just something to keep in mind and laugh at as we go through this.

Under patriarchy, men don’t have the best track record, to put it mildly. A patriarchy is a society, like ours, characterized by structures that support male dominance.

No, humans don’t have the best track record – doesn’t matter if men or women are in charge, we always find a way to screw it up. Also, what makes you so sure our society is a patriarchal one? Yeah, the essay will never, ever bother providing even the most basic proof of this assumption. For them, it is an axiom.

Equality in opposite-sex relationships is difficult to achieve.

Is it easy to achieve in same-sex relationships? Or any relationship in general? The obvious answer is no. Why? Because people aren’t equal. Some Most of you, reading this right now, are probably taller than me, better looking than me, and 100% of every one of you reading this right now know more about some topic out there than I do. The only people that are ever “equal” are newborn identical twins (natural clones) and the longer they live, the less equal they become.

And if anyone wants to protest “that’s not what they meant by equality” then my reply is to pick a better, more precise term. Or do what statisticians and scientists are instructed to do from day 1: define – your – terms.

We’re socialized to think of human relations in terms of the strong and weak; winners and losers; protectors and the protected. ¹

Are we? Really? Well no, the answer is far more complex than that and just starting on involves grasping the concept of the monkeysphere. Namely, the first step is to realize that all higher primates divide their social awareness in two major categories, what we might call “personal” (the people you actually know) and the “general” (everyone else who are beyond your capacity to know).

As a result, when faced with controlling and overbearing behavior from partners and boyfriends, women and girls (including Bella) often interpret that behavior as caring and romantic. Likewise, men and boys (including Edward) often interpret their female counterparts as irrational and silly. ² Feminists argue that, if unchecked, this lack of equality undermines trust, honest, and ultimately, love.

This is what pisses me off so much about feminists and their counterparts, the PUAs/MRAa. A tendency to attach a trait to “the other side” when every sane observer would note that the trait is universal to humanity. There are plenty of controlling, overbearing women and irrational, silly men. Of course, if either side is ever faced with this fact, they play it off with a variant of the “No True Scotsman” fallacy by claiming that such and such male just has more feminine features than normal or such and such female is supporting the patriarchy (or whatever the excuse of the month is). No, most flaws (if not all) are universal, stop trying to place blame on someone other than yourself.

Further irony? The “view of men” that women are “irrational and silly” seems to be dismissed as absurd and never given another second thought. The view that men are “controlling and overbearing”, however, will be accepted as fact and form the backbone of this essay. Do I have to point out the double standard at work here?

These patterns of domination and subordination continue in our society, even though most girls today are raised to become women who see themselves as individuals with an equal social status.

Most people realize that if you try a solution and the problem persists, one must either try a new solution, or reexamine the problem.

Recognizing oneself as an equal individual, sadly, is not the same as understanding oneself as an equal member of a heterosexual relationship (or any other relationship, for that matter).

Yay! Finally we have some acknowledgement that there’s more than romance in the world.

And there’s little help around for understanding how to have an equal relationship. Indeed, we might even wonder, with Andrea Dworkin, whether or not there can be equal heterosexual relations. ³

No, since no two people can be equal, there can never be ANY equal relationship of any kind. What’s to be done? We’re given no clue. Not only is the question never examined, but the possibility of all relationships being unequal is dropped and instead we spend the rest of the essay focused on heterosexual romantic ones. Why? Probably because these authors (and there were two) know that if they start asking those questions, this whole house of cards is going to fall apart.

Surprising as it sounds, this lack of guidance is why we need the Twilight saga. We need to see Edward learn to be a better person and less of a stereotypical man. In Forks, Washington, we find both the pitfalls of patriarchy and the possibility of a love that recognizes the necessity of equality.

I’m going to replace 2 words in one of the above sentences for a for a fun effort to see if anyone else can spot the issue:
“We need to see Bella learn to be a better person and less of a stereotypical woman.”
I guess the original is less offensive because only guys need character growth or something.

The Control Issues of Edward Cullen

…Edward can be very controlling. Feminists for some time have recognized controlling relationships as one consequence of patriarchy.

Really? Even a relationship where the woman is the controlling one is a result of patriarchy? One wonders what would be the relational consequences of matriarchy. Assuming anything bad would happen since we all know women are so perfect or something.

A system that promotes male domination also encourages men to fear the ways in which their domination may be diminished. As a result, men attempt to control situations in which they feel most vulnerable.

Wrong, that’s ALL – PEOPLE – PERIOD. You’re really going to sit here and tell me with a straight face that women don’t also seek to control situations where they feel most vulnerable? If so, than you’re an unobservant idiot.

Not surprisingly, Edward’s control issues most often stem from his fear for Bella’s safety – just those situations that would take her away from him.

Yep, all those parents who want their children to be alive – it’s all about control. It couldn’t be that someone (perhaps even Edward) actually likes someone else, enjoys their company and misses them when their not around.

As someone who’s actually lost friends, family and… I find this so fucking offensive. Being away from people you care about is a painful status – we are social creatures. And once you’ve experienced even a temporary missing, you understand fully the fear of death and losing someone permanently. After that, the only sensible reaction is to fear for someone’s safety – it’s called CARING about people and has nothing to do with control you bastards.

Of course there’s sane and insane reactions to this concern for your fellow human being, and while some of these reactions might be controlling not every one of them is controlling.

Apparently Bella has no choice in the matter, and Edward intends to “protect” her by controlling where she goes and whom she sees. And it gets worse.
[examples]

I’ll admit that Edward does go off the deep end of the concern scale mentioned above. But I am annoyed they put “protect” in quotes as if all of Edward’s efforts were a waste of time or even counterproductive. Were they? Did Edward have a right and just goal that he aimed for with questionable ends or was his goal wrong altogether? I thought a principle of philosophy was to avoid assuming unproven postulates.

Controlling behavior may be the result of patriarchy, but it also reinforces it. The more Edward feels the need to protect Bella, the more he views her as weak and vulnerable. Moreover, his view of her is not simply in terms of her physical weakness, but it also applies to his assessment of her decision-making capacity. Perhaps no example illustrates this point as well as Bella’s and Edward’s ongoing argument about whether she will become a vampire. Edward continually dismisses Bella’s request as irrational, uninformed, and hasty. Or consider in New Moon when Edward decides to leave Bella. He does so not because he’s tired of pretending to be something he’s not, but rather, as he later explains to her, “I only left you in the first place because I wanted you to have a chance at a normal, happy, human life. I could see what I was doing to you – keeping you constantly on the edge of danger, taking you away from the world you belonged in, risking your life every moment I was with you.” ⁶

Edward’s explanation may sound self-sacrificing, but Bella doesn’t want a “normal, happy, human life,” and she didn’t want Edward to leave. How many times does Bella beg Edward to stay with her? How often does she ask him to changer her? In fact, a “normal, happy, human life” increasingly becomes Bella’s worst-case scenario. Why does Edward consistently think that he knows better than Bella regarding what is in her best interest? It can’t be Bella’s track record with decision-making. …[examples]… So what is it? Could it be, just maybe – Edward thinks he knows better than Bella because he’s a man?

Did you see it? Maybe not. So let me spell it out.

Bella, can not become a vampire on her own. No matter how much she wills, no matter how much she hopes, she won’t wake up one morning undead. She needs someone else to help her out with this. Here, we see vampirism moves from a metaphor about sex to a rather literal example. It takes two to breed for them as it does for us.

See it yet?

Edward has to also give something for Bella to become a vampire. It’s a… what’s the term I’m thinking of…

Oh right. Consent.

So reread that page again. Edward – refusing to give his consent – is “controlling” Bella.

Yes, this feminist essay just went very rapey.

Don’t believe me? Let’s do a replace on just a name & word in just a sentence or two.

“Perhaps no example illustrates this point as well as Bella’s and Edward’s ongoing argument about whether [they will have sex]. Bella continually dismisses Edward’s request as irrational, uninformed, and hasty. …Edward … didn’t want Bella to leave. How many times does Edward beg Bella to stay with [him]? How often does [he] ask [her] to [fuck]?”

Oh wait, in the book that exactly happens, except it’s Bella begging & pressuring Edward. I guess “no” doesn’t always mean “no”? Somewhere along the way, I thought feminists were all about consent and not raping. Apparently not. Now we can see that every time a girl turns down a guy’s propositions, it’s all about control and “reinforcing the patriarchy” (remember they said that about Edward right beforehand).

And you want to know why I take this so personally? My review of the Scott Pilgrim movie on my blog brought down the wrath of a few feminists for a day or two (go do a search if you’re curious). They said I was “blaming the victim” just because I had cautioned women about putting themselves in risky situations. If offering common sense & self defense wisdom (passed down by generations) is “blaming the victim” then what the hell is this bit? “Guilting the victim”?

Finally, you want to get really meta? Who’s the only other member of the Cullens who is as opposed to Bella becoming a vampire as Edward? Rosalie. A girl in the story who literally raped.

Congratulations Twilight & Philosophy, you finally got me to see Edward as a protagonist.

Bella’s Mixed Reactions

Feminists highlight two reactions to this kind of controlling behavior. On the one hand, women and girls resent being controlled and resort to clandestine behavior such as lying, sneaking around, and their own brand of manipulation.

What? Girls can be controlling too? WHO WOULD HAVE GUESSED.

Edward’s Progress

Patriarchal societies support inequality between men and women: Men are strong and rational; women are weak and silly.

Are you saying this is fact or as a presumed view of “patriarchal societies”? Why do you even mean by “strength”? Physical strength? Well yes, via biology men on average are stronger than women on average – its inarguable science. Do you mean other forms of strength? Like emotional or social or something else? In which case, I say women on average tend to be stronger than men on average (this is more open to debate at the moment since we don’t have adequate measures of such things). Men and women are no more “equal” than any two random people are “equal”. They are equal in a legalistic, ideal sense, not any reality-based sense. Why? Well it’s not society…

Moreover, the tendency to interpret controlling behavior as romantic and the inclination to escape it by lying and manipulating means that it is often difficult to overcome.

Of course it’s difficult to overcome. It’s not society it is BIOLOGY. As shown here, women (again: this is on average, there will always be outliers and aberrations) find dominance to be arousing while men (on average) find submission arousing. If you want to change this, then first step is going to be to change the building blocks of the people. Of course, since arousal is going to be necessary for breeding, the selective breeding needed to accomplish this change is going to be most challenging. Regardless of the moral or ethical considerations of such an effort.

Then there’s the very paradox of, are your efforts to change the one with controlling behavior also an attempt at control? See what I mean when I say “everyone is guilty”?

The tragedy is that controlling behavior doesn’t signify love; instead, it creates a barrier to it. Control requires both men and women to lie and manipulate their partners, but such behavior is at odds with love because it’s an obstacle to respect and trust.

To use one of my favorite quotes from South Park: “They’re right, but for the wrong reasons.” Love is never that simple – and yet it is simpler. Why do you think there are so many books, plays, movies, and so much, much more devoted to the question and riddle?

In his decision to trust Bella’s judgment, Edward decides to treat her as a person with the ability to make sound decisions; he decides to treat her as an equal. …Structures of dominance are not thrown off in one day or by one decision. …Nonetheless, he gets better. He learns to negotiate with her when they disagree.

Once again, the authors gloss over a much more importance issue and I suspect they did it because they have such a blind spot for “the woman” (Bella) and irrational rapey standards for “the man” (Edward). And that is: what if negotiation is impossible?

Think back to the big question that really set me off: Bella becoming a meyerpire. This is a binary decision. There are only 2 choice: she either is, or isn’t. There’s no way (that we know of) for her to be a half-breed and because of the time comparisons there is not any way she can spend half her life human and half of it meyerpire. There is no possible compromise on this debate: either Bella gets what she wants (and changes) or Edward gets what he wants (and she doesn’t). The only 3rd option to this debate is to dissolve the relationship.

Thus we see one issue with the concept of equality in the politics of relationships. In this dilemma, if we assume that both parties want the relationship to be preserved, then there’s only one other possible solution: someone must have a deciding vote. Exactly who has the deciding vote is a question with wide-ranging answers (and according to both of my parents – it’s the other person – my family is one giant bundle of lulz). Trust me, if you are in a romantic relationship that is starting to get serious, save yourself a lot of trouble make sure you and the other person both agree on who has that deciding vote. (And gals, this is why you should always date gamers – because we give the deciding vote to the dice.)

Talked into Love

This emerging equality intensifies Bella and Edward’s already intense intimacy. Freed from the need to lie and manipulate each other, they are ever more able to talk honestly about their fears, their expectations, and their desires. Such honesty is the first step in the process of love, as hooks suggests: It signals trust and respect, and thus a break with patriarchy and control. ¹² Score one for Bella and Edward.

The second step in the process of love, hooks tells us, is communication. ¹³

Funny, I could swear that nobody would be more honest or communicating than two telepaths.

But despite the importance of communication, we’re rarely given examples in the media or in fiction of lovers who communicate with each other. Romantic comedies are not awash in communicative honesty, and even the classics seem to underemphasize how important open communication is to the work of love (we’re talking about you, Shakespeare!). Romeo and Juliet have very little to say to each other, except how much they’re in love – which is rather amazing, given that they know absolutely nothing about one another.

Well no shit! Romeo & Juliet is a tragedy. The only “example” it is to give is examples of what not to do. The entire play is a cautionary tale about letting irrationality & passion go too far. Not just between Romeo & Juliet but between their families as well. (Is Hamlet a cautionary tale about letting rationality & reason go too far? Hmmm…)

Through these examples we’re led to believe that it’s possible to love someone without really talking to him or her – without really knowing the person at all. We’re led to believe that a physical attraction or fate is all we need in order to love. We’re even led to believe that knowledge of our partner would make love less compelling, less romantic.

Duh – popular culture and society has completely divorced the use of the mind/reason in love instead emphasizing the heart/passion role in love exclusively. The tension of human nature’s balance between head & heart is the only other topic that’s more numerous and universal among humanity than love. It’s a topic that entire books have been written about, and you’re going to gloss over it in this one paragraph?

There’s a bit of a wrap up after this but screw it. I’m done with this chapter.

Comment [26]

Guess who’s back!

Besides Paolini.

Yeah, sorry for the delay everyone. The doctors say I was in some sort of… Twilight-induced waking coma or something. I was hallucinating that I blew up the world or something. At any rate, I’m (mostly) all better now and ready to do another chapter, one that will finish up the eclipse section and take us into the Breaking Dawn part of the book.

It’s like… topical or something.

Also a warning: I’m going to be including a LOT of links and references in this (even moreso than usual). You’ll probably start seeing why, but I’ll do my best to sum up the links so one doesn’t have to divert from my “brilliance” until done.

So what’s this chapter called?

The “Real” Danger: Fact vs Fiction for the Girl Audience

Hmmm… confession time: In college, I got a minor in criminology. This… actually looks of some interest. So apologies in advance if I geek out on you too much.

The newspaper headline screams: “Eighteen-Year-Old Slain by Husband after Giving Birth.” As you continue to reading, you learn that the young wman was brainwashed by a strange, blood-drinking cult who call themselves a “family,” though none of the members were actually related.

Ok, I gotta admit. This alternate interpretation of the Twilight “saga” (which goes on for awhile) is pretty cool and well done. Kudos to the author on it.

Sounds torturous and sick, doesn’t it? But in fact, this is the basis of a tween-teen literary phenomenon called the Twilight saga. Painted with the romantic, fictitious flourish of author Stephenie Meyer’s pen, what in reality would be a horrific account of violence against women, all too familiar in today’s media, becomes a dangerously romanticized fantasy for a primarily young female audience.

Wait – “all too familiar in today’s media”? What about all the violence done to men in the media? Of course, I’m not complaining because I realize that media is so violent because otherwise it’s very boring and only grandparents seem to enjoy really boring media.

And what exactly is confronting the female audience of Meyer’s Twilight? Current statistics on violence against women in the United States and elsewhere tell a truly horrifying story – they also suggest that putting foward this kind of fiction is dangerous.

The rest of this paragraph goes onto set up the argument the author will be making in this essay, all I’ll point out is that I don’t disagree about the statistics (sort of), I’m just so cynical that I don’t really find them horrifying.

Just the Facts, Ma’am

Who will the female audience really find when looking for Edward, after separating the fact from the fiction? I guarantee, it will not be a handsome, rich vampire looking for a soul mate.

Well… no, because vampires don’t exist. Also, there’s an old joke (engineers know it well) called “pick two”. Here’s a good example of the principle:

Yes, one could substitute Edward for Batman up there (but who would want to), but the commonalities are the same: the only guy one is going to find to fit all the criteria is in fiction. People are flawed, and if you don’t want to live your life alone, you’re going to have to figure out which flaw you can live with.

In fact, he will be a possessive, dangerously violent stalker – the same man who perpetuates statistics like these every year in the United States:

• 85 percent of women who are stalked know their stalker; 76 percent of women killed by intimate partners were also stalked by their intimate partners. ¹
• According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women, the most recent Stalking Victimization Report shows that in a twelve-month period an estimated 3.4 million women age eighteen or older are victims of stalking; only 60 percent report victimization to police. ²

There are even more hard-to-believe statistics regarding the pandemic known as violence against women (VAW).

Wait a second here. Pandemic? That first footnote up there links to the National Center for Victims of Crime statistics. Which is one of the 2 sources of crime stats criminologists use in the US, the other being the FBI Uniform Crime Report. The exact pros and cons of the two studies deserve a much more detailed essay, but suffice to say, one of the reasons these two data sets are used is…

Hang on a second, it’s not! The other study is the National Crime Victimization Survey run by the department of justice.

Why use this NCVC website? I better check it’s documentation.

…

Weird, it has footnotes.

Hmm… first source:

bq.Bureau of Justice Statistics, “Criminal Victimization, 2009,” (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2010), 1, http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/cv09.pdf (accessed November 3, 2010).

Why yes that IS the National crime victims survey.

Wait, I see another footnote…

Federal Bureau of Investigation, “Crime in the United States, 2009: Expanded Homicide Data,” (Washington, DC: GPO, 2010), calculated from Tables 2 and 10, http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2009 (accessed October 18, 2010).

Any time someone pulls information from an intermediary instead of a first-run source, it gets very suspicious… Why? Because it makes it a lot easier for these intermediaries to “cook the numbers” to get the results desired. For example, to be sure we’re comparing apples to apples, let’s take another look at these “hard-to-believe statistics regarding the pandemic” for the year 2009 in context.

Murders victims:
Males- 10,496
Females- 3,122

Or page 15 of the NCVS for All Personal Crimes:
Males- 3,127,470
Females- 2,273,320

Murder Circumstances:
Total circumstances where the victim was a stranger to the perpetrator: 1,676.
Total circumstances where the victim had SOME kind of relationship to the perpetrator: 5,974.
Unknown relationships between victim and perpetrator: 5,986.
(to find these numbers, I totaled stranger & unknown and subtracted from total gathered)

Yes, it’s an old fact known to criminologists, that if you’re going to die, it will probably be at the hands of someone that knows you (and if you’ve had very many family dinners, you start to realize why). Look at the graph, if you’re going to die by a stranger, it’s more likely during a robbery or “other argument” than anything else. And if violence against women is a pandemic, what the hell does one call violence against men? Epidemic? This is why you always double check stats, people. Because anything pulled out of context and looked at up close can appear horrifying. If not an outright lie.

Speaking of which, remember that bit about “3.4 million women age eighteen or older are victims of stalking”? Here’s what the site she is using as a source says:

During a one-year period, 3.4 million people ages 18 or older in the United States were stalked.

Hmmm… people, would imply more than just women. Well let’s go to the source it is using, The US Dept of Justice (again). And you know what? They list number of victims in Table 4.
Male stalking victims: 888,680.
Female stalking victims: 2,531,770.

Yes, the author LIED when she said 3.4 million women were stalked – nearly a 3rd of that number were actually men!

Of course, even one person stalked is one too many, but there’s no need to make things seem worse than they really are.

Now getting back to the essay…

The World Health Organization (WHO) completed a ten-country study and found that 71 percent of women reported physical or sexual violence by a husband or intimate partner, noting that violence against women is a “major public health problem and violation of human rights,” and that “violence by an intimate partner is one of the most common forms of violence against women.” ³

You know… I’m not trusting this essay any more. Let’s see what it actually says from the source she lists.

A WHO multi-country study found that between 15–71% of women reported experiencing physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner at some point in their lives.

BETWEEN 15 and 71%? That’s a bit of a huge range, don’t ya think?

between 15% of women in Japan and 70% of women in Ethiopia and Peru reported physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner;

While I certainly hope things improve for the gals in Ethiopia and Peru, things seem pretty good in Japan. But wasn’t this essay talking about the US?

What’s its data? What was the methodology?

Oh wait, as can be seen on the summary page, of the 10 countries studied, the United States was NOT included.

Which becomes even funnier when after mentioning the WHO, the essay goes on to give the USDOJ’s definition of stalking, which you can pull up here. The upshot of it all? (which the essay leaves off)

The most common type of stalking behavior victims experienced was unwanted phone calls and messages

OMG! I’m being stalked by the American Red Cross!

Seriously, if that’s the worst that most victims have to deal with… it’s something of an improvement for society. Won’t stop the chapter’s doom and gloom, though.

Edward Cullen is guilty of at least three of the above criteria; it doesn’t matter that Bella Swan may like such attentions – that only speaks to Bella’s naivete and lack of experience.

Yeah, that’s largely true. Except I do want to point out that one of the most important reoccurring words in the definitions of stalking is “unwanted”. And with that…

But I can’t argue against the essay’s insistence that Bella is a victim. Of what though…

In 2005, the year Twilight was first published, 1,181 women were murdered in the United States by an intimate partner – an average of three women per day. Young women like Bella are disproportionately the victims of domestic violence.

These “scary stats” are fretted over for a bit here. I merely want to point out that in this section, no source for any of these stats is provided. Given this author’s previous track record with statistics… it gets hard to believe any of it.

But I like statistics (sometimes) so in the interest of fighting depression, here’s what I found about 2005.

If she’s talking about intimate partner, I assume it’s a total of wife + girlfriend, though that total is only 1,055 leaving 126 victims unaccounted for.

Meanwhile The male equivalent comes out 287, meaning an average of 0.78ths of a man is killed each day. (What’s up with the disparity between sons and daughters? guys, have you thanked your parents for not killing you today?) And, for those curious, the circumstances of the murders in 2005? 117 are listed under “romantic triangle”. So it doesn’t quite seem like “young women like Bella” are really “disproportionately the victims”. (this is why it’s always stressed to define your terms in these things)

When you factor in how Meyer’s books have influenced millions of female tweens and teens, we may theorize if not an increase, certainly not a lessening of such VAW statistics as the girl audience grows up and pursues the “man of their dreams,” shaped in part by the fantasized image of Edward. Still not convinced? There’s more.

Spoiler warning: No, not exactly. At no point coming up does the author go over how Twilight (a book, that is not required reading for anyone) is influencing women which are voluntarily picking it up. Me thinks we’re having a confusion over cause and effect here.

We know that Bella has bruises all over her body after her first sexual encounter with Edward. We also know that because of her relationship with Edward, Bella’s life is constantly threatened, resulting in other cuts, bruises, even broken bones.

Am I the only one who remembers Edward trying to leave her? Who kept warning her that being with him could cause injury? And she kept pursuing him anyway. Let’s be honest, Bella wasn’t just “asking for it”, she was actively demanding it. I mean, Ashley Greene Alice is hot and all, but if I find that she’s hard as marble upon say… holding her hand, I should be able to put two and two together and realize that being with her is going to cause some uncomfortable injuries for me.

The Department of Justice defines psychological abuse as fear and intimidation by threatening physical harm to self or partner, children or partner’s friends and family, as well as forcing isolation from family, friends, work, and/or school. If we were to be honest readers not taken in by the romance, isn’t that what happens to Bella? Doesn’t she begin to fell isolated from her family and friends? In fact, her relationship with Edward requires Bella to die in order to live with Edward. In other words, Bella has to completely change who she is, where she lives, and who her friends are. She changes her plans for college and isolates herself from her family.

Damn, this essay is turning me into a defender of this series. Please, correct me if I’m wrong, but in the movies Bella is the one who isolates herself, often against Edward’s wishes. (As far as my understanding of the books, only the engine episode strikes me as somewhat psych abuse – or maybe I should say, not self-inflicted psych abuse.) And that’s not even getting into whether Bella is psychologically abusing Edward. I’ll leave that debate for other imps since this essay is already long.

Yes, in Bella’s imagination death is to be transformative, binding her to Edward forever. But in reality, death is not like that. It’s irreparable, permanent.

Look essay: if you’re not going to respect us, why should we respect you?

What follows is a bit economic abuse, which we’ll pass over for now. Instead let’s go back to emotional abuse (which sounds like another form of psychological abuse).

Even Edward’s attempt to commit suicide fits the definition of emotional abuse and is part of the overall violence against Bella…

Uh… need I point out that Edward’s suicide attempt was when he thought Bella was dead? (irreparable, permanent dead) How can Edward emotionally abuse someone he’s convinced is not alive? Oh wait, I forgot: it was all kicked off because Bella made a suicide attempt first. And what about all those times she’s shoving her blood in his face, even after she knows he doesn’t like the temptation? If anything, it comes off that she’s the one emotionally abusing him (these two deserve each other). At some point, one gets the feeling that there’s no room here for male domestic violence victims. Well let me just say that it doesn’t matter whether the victim is man, woman or Dalek – domestic violence isn’t cool.

Bella and “Generation Me”

Ok, I can’t fault the essay here, and generally agree with it here about how “GenMe also has an increased tendency toward narcissism, an intriguing and pertinent connection to Twilight‘s Bella.” This section, talking about how my generation (yes, I’d be one of these) is a little too focused on themselves and how this has encouraged the culture of divorce (which isn’t helping kids any). Heck, it even makes up for the previous section:

Even after the almost fatal episode with James, Bella continues to choose what psychologists might term a “toxic relationship” with Edward because it is something she desires. … When she learns that Edward has been watching her sleep at night and following her around in secret, she is flattered – Edward’s actions feed in to Bella’s GenMe narcissistic tendencies and focus. And that kind of vulnerability is the problem with narcissism. … Of course, one’s specialness is not all that matters, and that is where reality hits GenMe hard in the face.

Wow, I mean… I went from disagreeing strongly to agreeing strongly in one essay. I’m getting mood whiplash here. Maybe… maybe this will all turn out a great essay on the whole and-

Enter Jean Baudrillard’s ideas on the dangers of simulating reality.

Oh. Here’s where I feel obligated to bring up Confused Matthew’s rant on the Matrix sequels where he brings up and rails against Baudrillard and his book that’s referenced in this essay. I think he’s largely right on the guy, though apparently this essay will pick up and run with the one good idea Baudrillard has had.

To sum up: people have become so immersed in pop culture, they have trouble telling the difference between fiction and reality. Which I’ll largely agree with, except that it’s not exactly society’s fault. If I may quote Susan Walsh a moment:

What triggers dopamine? Risk. One researcher said that women can’t help but crave “an erotic edge of danger,” and it’s the word danger that holds the key to understanding sexual attraction. When women (and men) take risks, they feel a rush of adrenaline, which produces lust, and a rush of dopamine, which produces attraction. This would explain why even imprisoned convicts have women writing to them, and why no girl can resist a guy in a band or on a motorcycle.

(and yes, this also explains why guys do really boneheaded things now and then) Sometimes it’s just society giving us what we want. But society can still play a role in our lives. Best summed up with:

Still, the essay isn’t completely done…

New Moon Rising?

The questions that surround the Twilight phenomenon often focus on whether or not Bella is a feminist hero: Is she being assertive and going after what she wants, or is she submissive to the greater power of an older man, a predator by all counts? Why Bella should choose Jacob Black, or why Edward is the better choice. Such questions, though, are irrelevant without first understanding what is behind the Twilight concept.

Oh. Never mind, maybe we’ll get an examination here into the biology of people, mate selection and how we should deal with our pasts going into the future…

Before we can look at Bella as an individual, we must study where she comes from, how the whole of society helped to shape the individual – and since Bella is a fictional character created by the real Stephanie Meyer, it makes sense to follow the social attitudes that shaped Meyer’s own individuality.

After all the previous pages, we’re just NOW getting to a more interesting topic with only 2 and a quarter pages left? The very debate of individual actions and the influence of society (aka, the choices of individuals in that society in the aggregate) upon those actions could fill an entire book. Example, here’s a post where Gerp observes that in romance novels over the years, the women have become increasingly realistic while the men, less so; more hyper masculine (need we bring up Drake?). Look, I’ve seen the romance section in book stores. You can’t tell me that out of the thousands around, it’s society’s fault for the books women vote for with their dollars. Marketing can play a role, but there’s FAR too many examples of things that were heavily marketed, and still failed for it to have sole blame. It’s hard to accept I know, but sometimes things are just a person’s own damn fault.

Meyer created the quintessential female fantasy in Edward, a “boy” who is really older and much more mature than he looks; who loves Bella for who she is and not what she looks like; who wants to sleep with Bella but not in a sexual way; who is protective and very, very rich, with a loving, supportive family who totally accept Bella, regardless of the clear educational and economic differences. Really, what’s not to like?

You know, this has inspired me to invent a new law, but I’m going to need help refining it. It appears that one can tell a lot about a person by which features of Edward they say attract women to him. Here, the author emphasizes what some call Edward’s more “beta” traits. “Here is an example of someone emphasizing Edward’s “alpha” traits. And here’s someone saying it’s a bit of both. For myself? I think it’s that Edward has been created broadly enough that he has something which can appeal to almost anY woman. Just interested in looks? He’s got that. Looking for a provider? He’s incredibly rich. Enjoy the bad boys? He can’t even touch you without injuring you. Yet he also lacks the flaws that every man possessing even the desired characteristics would have. Good looking? Normally surrounded by girls falling all over him – except Edward doesn’t care about them (probably because he can read minds and the echo is painful). Rich? Won’t be available very much since you’re out working and earning money – unless you’re Edward who has kind of “inherited” his wealth and doesn’t have to put in any effort. Bad boys tend to be abusive, but Edward really makes an effort not to. In fact, that’s the high praise challenge this essay: try to find some feature that attracts women (it has to be realistic now, something you yourself or someone you know likes in guys) which Edward wouldn’t fulfill.

In any world other than the fantastical one created by Meyer, Edward would be jailed.

I can’t help but wonder how that would help. Really, what jail could hold Edward?

Bella’s police chief father would have issued a restraining order against Edward.

And I think that would probably do even less good against a Meyerpire.

Edward even follows the psychology of abusers, with periods of blissful happiness followed by periods of severe abuse. He has to be cruel to Bella so that she understands what he needs her to understand; he has to make a suicide attempt when he believes Bella has moved on; he can’t help the bruises he inflicts on Bella during their first sexual encounter; he has to kill Bella after she has the baby in order to save her.

Hey wait a second! Dammit essay, you’re making me defend this crap series and it’s pissing me off. But if I can take a minute to pay tribute to the always lovey das_mervin and her series hate it for the right reasons, if you’re going to criticize something, TRY to be accurate about it.

• Edward tries suicide when he thinks Bellas has moved on IN DEATH. He thought she was dead. Of all the times where Edward could legitimately be accused of being an abuser, this isn’t one of them.
• As well as the sex thing. From what I understand, the books describe his skin and body as statue like. For those bad at physics: if you run to a park and try having sex with some marble or bronze or other hard substance statue, it doesn’t make the statue an abuser if you get bruised. It’s your own fault for being a dumbass!
• Also, the anti-christ baby was killing her before Edward did anything. Again, not one of the many times you can label Ed an abuser. The baby maybe – but not Ed.

In the context of Meyer’s world, Edward’s otherwise illegal and immoral actions are justified, but the female audience exposed to this fantasy needs to understand that in reality, Edward is not the ideal boyfriend lover. In fact, Jacob is.

Um. What?

[long glowing description of Jacob]
Girls, that is the kind of person you need to find! Looking for Edward will only lead to black eyes, rape, torture, and possibly even death.

Yeah, of the audience and literature.

Take it from a real-life Bella who found a “real” Edward – you don’t want that. You want respect, support, friendship – all of which adds up to true love. Luckily, my Edward didn’t succeed in his attempt to kill me, and I was able to find my Jacob.

Oh.

Um.

Damn, now I feel bad. You know this is one of those things that should maybe be disclosed up front. Also, it’s kind of a cheap shot to start off with stats and making the essay seem all academic and suddenly making it all personal right at the end. Then it becomes even harder to take critism and editing without them feeling like a personal attack. And it’s a shame because I think a personal testimony here would have worked better than the essay we got.

Still, the author does make one point that I can agree with 110%.

Earning the specialness you take for granted is more fulfilling than you can image.

So it’s not all bad. And with this, we wrap up the eclipse section. Tune in soon as we begin down the path of Breaking Dawn.

Comment [22]

Here we are in the final leg of this book – the Breaking Dawn section and four more essays remaining. Surely it can’t get any worse…

Twilight like some of the best examples of vampire fiction, both celebrates and critiques the creature upon which it focuses.

lolwut? No really, where did the Twilight “saga” critiqued meyerpires?

It’s easy to see what’s wrong with bloodsuckers, but what makes them so appealing? The answer is simple: wish Fulfillment. Human desire is the basis for the vampire mystique. While vampires remain horrific by virtue of their transgressive acts, we nonetheless desire to be like them. By why is that? As we’ll see, existential philosophy offers an explanation for our fascination with vampires and suggests that it is a love we may want to bury.

[gasp] A chapter with… with actual philosophy?

Hang on, I need to lie down a moment.

…

Whew, for a minute I was panicking. Yeah turns out this chapter isn’t that bad. Sorry to disappoint everyone.

Continuing on:

An Undying Wish

The existential philosopher Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) argued that humans fear death more than anything else. Although other things can inspire fear, nothing arouses it like our mortality. Indeed, Heidegger suggested that most commonplace fears derive from, and are psychological substitutes for, our fear of death.

It’s a frequent cliche nowadays that public speaking is actually feared more than death yet this chapter never does address or mention that. Which is funny because following the above is a long proof about us fearing death, which… I don’t think needs much proof. If you’re capable of reading this chapter, I’m willing to bet that you are quite aware of the human condition and the universal fear of death. An examination of how public speaking fits in with death would have been more interesting.

Although she [Bella] is happy to have escaped a violent death, she despairs because Edward’s rescue is temporary. In rescuing her, he damns her to eventual death.

Well… that’s true of every rescue ever. If anything, it was her parents who damned her to eventual death by birthing her. All Edward (and anyone else who saves her) does is postpone the inevitable. And that’s all anyone can do any day at any time. I find it pretty insulting to say that our firemen or EMTs or doctors “damn” anyone.

Bella cries, “I’m going to die… every minute of the day I get closer.” Although Edward and Jacob Black try to convince Bella that death is natural, she states, “I was… eager to trade mortality for immortality.” She asks, “What [is] so great about mortality?” and regrets that Eddward is wedded to an idea “as stupid as leaving [her] human.” She describes transformation into a vampire positively—even religiously—as a “conversion that [will] set [her] free from [her] mortality.”

This is… kind of weird. On the one hand, I’m no fan of death (except in Bill & Ted 2, he’s cool there) but it’s not like immortality isn’t without costs as well. Even meyerpires. It’s one of life’s greatest paradoxes that while death is the enemy and our greatest foe, we might need it on this side of its veil. After all, what if the most evil of us couldn’t die? (just one example) It is for good reason that the lands of immortals are often shown as nations of saints.

So what then? We all seek to be free of mortality, but what horrors might we become if we obtain physical perfection before moral and spiritual perfection? That’s a question I wish this chapter would answer. As das_mervin has pointed out, Bella is far from even a morally decent person (well, we are told she is, but not shown) yet she is granted immortality regardless. Does this parable show that flawed man should not be immortal? Or the opposite?

Although our own mortality tends to be of greatest concern, we suffer the mortality of others, too. … This desire to extend immortality to others is also illustrated in Twilight. Carlisle Cullen creates the members of his family not only for companionship, but also to save them from the “horrible… waste” of premature death.

Now that could be an interesting story. I always laugh in New Moon [movie] when the bad meyerpire calls Bella the “pet” of the Cullens. So what if the Cullens had pets before Bella? (or what if some of the family were a “pet” to Carlisle prior to adoption?) The dynamics could be very interesting.

So after this we go into a long segment on aging and how meyerpirism also fights that, and I will give the essayist credit for recognizing that youth has become a fetish a lot more in recent society than it was historically which… has its pros and cons. Let’s skip all that to return to our lulz-worthy TW:

Because Bella seeks a long-term relationship with an immortal vampire, she expresses more concern over aging than most teens. She states that “age is a touch subject,” and when she discovers that Edward, his family, and Jacob are exempt from aging, she screams furiously, “ ‘Not… again? Is that a joke?’ … Tears – tears of rage – filled my eyes… ‘Am I the only one who has to get old? I get older every stinking day! … Damn it! What kind of world is this? Where’s the justice?’ “

Justice? JUSTICE? Next time someone asks me why I hate Bella so, this is the quote I’m using! I mean… what does this have to do with justice??? To quote a far, FAR better writer:

Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them?

What does one’s life have to do with justice at all? No child, one minute old, has done a thing to earn its existence and in the world of Twilight what has anyone done to “earn” their meyerpire status? That word – that concept – has no bearing here. This is an apt demonstration on how skewed is some peoples’ concept of what they are “owed”. I’ve watched far, FAR better men and women than Bella die way too soon. Men and women that contributed far more to improving the world than she did in her hypothetical world. Where’s your justice then, bitch? Can I tear the years from you and give them to those more deserving? No! So don’t you DARE mention the word “justice” in regards to your pathetic life ever again!

(it’s a good thing I never read the books, I probably would have set them on fire at that point)

… Where was I?

Unbreakable

Mortality and aging are not the only problems that people have with embodiment. Bodies have other “weaknesse[s]” that we seek to overcome. Although our bodies are possessed of many wonderful abilities, they are also vulnerable. We suffer extremes of cold and heat. We are easily injured. Minor falls can break bones. Simple accidents can cause injuries that demand emergency care. Our susceptibility to injury compels a desire for the superhuman bodies that vampires possess.

It’s ironic because those vulnerabilities are usually necessary for the “wonderful abilities” our bodies have. Suffering is how our bodies tell us something is wrong and we need to fix ourselves or our surroundings. Let’s assume for a minute that we didn’t suffer extreme cold/heat because they didn’t affect us. How then would we appreciate a cold creek around our feet or savor the warm touch of a lover? Being able to sense the good means that we must also sense the bad else the bad would be fatal.

And falls are injurious not because of our bodies, but because of that harsh mistress, gravity (a force of nature I don’t think we’d want to do without).

How many of us would give up many of the joys and pleasures of life to gain the “benefits” that many immunities and invulnerabilities would grant us? After all, if meyerpires were completely scientifically accurate, they would be as unmoving as the statues they are as hard as.

These anxieties make it easy to sympathize with Bella, the charming, yet comically clumsy teen.

Wait – Charming? REALLY? Has this author read the books? Or watched the movies?

Vampires are appealing not simply because of their indestructibility, but also because of their special powers. Like the superheros from Marvel Comics, the vampires in Twilight are possessed of superhuman strength and speed.

Wait – hold on. Marvel comics? Don’t get me wrong, I like Marvel, but look at all the references to invulnerability and strength and speed. All that and you don’t think about or mention Superman? The FIRST superhero and mainstay of DC comics who “standardized” the idea of superheroes being invulnerable, strong, and fast? What the hell – What the actual hell?

Oh and don’t forget how, in addition to all their super-special-awesome abilities, the vampires are pretty:

Perhaps nothing is emphasized more consistently in the Twilight saga than Edward’s physical appeal.

My fellow imps, I present you with my nominee for understatement of the year.

Vampires feed our thirst to be special in another way. Sartre and his fellow existentialists agreed that a major cause of human anxiety is our lack of necessity. We see concern over meaning in Twilight when Bella denies that she possesses any special abilities and scoffs at the notion that she could be the object of undying love. Regardless, she captures Edward’s heart, commanding his affection so powerfully that, like Romeo, he declares that he will not live without her. In addition, she ends up being a central figure in an epic battle and the unsuspecting savior of the vampires from the Volturi. Bella expresses our own latent wish to escape anonymity and ascend to a state of supreme significance.

Interesting, I think they’re onto something there. Just imagine how immensely popular a religion would be if it made the above a core principle and promise. It would probably spread worldwide.

Though Heidegger argued that we normally take comfort in others, Sartre was alert to the potential that our relationships have to arouse anxiety. … We don’t know who represents a threat because we do not know what others are thinking. Philosophers call this the problem of other minds. While people can tell us what they are thinking, they don’t always do this. We don’t like this! Vampires, though, can read minds. The vampires in the Twilight saga derive additional appeal from this ability.

Uh… I haven’t read the series and even I know Ed’s the only one who can do this, it’s not a species-wide feature. (by the way, would anyone else be interested in seeing how I would write Midnight Sun?)

Although they are subject to some limitations, they are all able to see into the minds of others, with one exception: Bella. … Bella and the vampires articulate an understandable wish with respect to others. More often than not, we would like to be able to know what others are thinking; however, we do not want them to be able to do the same.

IT’S. JUST. EDWARD! that reads minds. Oh and that right there? That’s why true equality in this life is nothing but a pipe dream for the foreseeable generations. We all love the idea of everyone else being equal, but we? We want to be exceptional (and yes I’m very much including myself there, I’m probably more guilty of it than any of you). It takes a LOT of self-discipline to willingly give up an advantage that benefits you that you may be equal to others. I certainly don’t do it nearly as often as I should. (Heh, that would have made the series interesting. Just imagine: Carlisle has a plot to turn every human on earth into a meyerpire, not only making everyone equal, but then also forcing all vampires to become “vegetarians”. The Volturi want to stop him.) Even the essay ends up agreeing in a roundabout way:

Vampires personify the desire to ascend to “another plane of being” where we are no longer affected by “constant concern” for other people. Others are reduced to means, indeed, to meals. Vampires do not have to curb their impulses to gain social acceptance. Instead, they embody our desire for “absolute freedom,” our wish to be “master of the situation,” “to get hold of [another person] and reduce [him] to being subject… to my freedom.”

Actually I’m pretty sure meyerpires do have to curb their appetite to gain social acceptance. Even if they don’t want to fit in with other humans, the Volturi will pitch a fit if meyerpires go on a buffet-rampage (for some reason). The big difference is that meyerpires don’t need social acceptance like we do.

The rest of this essay is actually pretty good and I don’t find many faults with it, although I think the author’s attempted proof of Meyer’s negativity towards her chosen people is stretching things:

As in classic works of vampire fiction, she uses gothic imagery, negative characterization, and graphic violence to cast suspicion on her shining subjects. From the onset, Forks is described in ominous terms. From the word itself, which alludes both to a flesh-piercing eating utensil and a point at which a precipitous choice must be made, Forks is presented negatively as an irrevocably gloomy place affected with “omnipresent shade.”

Of which I note, 1) It’s official people. “Gothic” no longer has any meaning. And 2) I’m pretty sure das_mervin has proven that all the negative characterization in Meyer’s novels are unintended.

Otherwise the rest of the essay is almost a comical effort to talk about religion and theology without actually mentioning religion or theology. There’s not much Twilight lulz, so we’ll end this journey here. (I might continue discussion of this one on my blog but they’re too boring for here.)

Man at this rate, the home stretch of this book might be easy going. What’s the next chapter?

Bella’s Vampire Semiotics

Oh that’s going to be fun!

.

.

Oh! I’m also announcing a “big” prize. At the end of this series (3 more essays to go), one lucky commenter can win the copy of T&P I’ve been working on (complete with all of my notes on the pages, and damages suffered when I threw the book across the room). The only rule is that certain imps (who’s user handles begin with ‘S’ – you know who you are) won’t be eligible since they’ve already got other goodies from me already. Otherwise my decision is completely arbitrary. One can run back and comment on earlier entries right up until I announce a winner. Sucking up to the judge isn’t sanctioned, but it is encouraged.

Yell at me or the authors [6]

Entering the home stretch with BD part 2 coming out soon.

First of all, I noticed fewer comments last article. I’m guessing many took my promise of this book as a threat. So… I guess I’ll send it to whoever comments the LEAST on these. Oh yes, I know who you are. Especially you, Jason. And Sara, I’ll find you too.

Anyway, to speed things up, let’s look at two chapters at once.

15. Bella’s Vampire Semiotics

This chapter discusses the principles of semiotics and uses incidents in Twilight as teaching examples of these principles.

It’s… it is actual philosophy and using a subject matter for actual teaching. I… I don’t know what to do; this is good! How did the editors let this slip by? Really, here’s the close of the chapter:

[Charles] Peirce would never want us to accept his theory blindly – he would want us to test it.

So try it out. Test it. I provided three examples here from Twilight. … But there are three other books. Take a scene where Bella is discovering or learning and try to determine whether it fits the pattern of icons, index, and symbol.

See? Ok yes, it is annoying that this essay is taken exclusively from the first book and yet they decided to stick it in the “Breaking Dawn” section but… they don’t ram anything down our throats. They don’t even really endorse or praise Twilight, instead just using a commonly recognized feature of our culture to give us a frame of reference for the philosophy taught. It’s the standard by which all of these pop culture and philosophy books should be judged. I’m going into critic limbo! My world is adrift! I’m lost! Confused! Help! I I need something to criticize!

Bella considers the using cold medicine as a sedative to be a wanton misuse of drugs. By contrast, Peirce regularly used morphine, ether, opium, and cocaine (all legal at the time) to combat his various mental conditions, such as manic-depressive disorder. … Throughout his life, Peirce had a difficult time conforming to conventional morality; and during the stuffy Victorian age, his reputation for “immorality” got him into trouble time and again.

Ah, there we go. It’s a minor nitpick but how stuffy could the Victorian age be when they had more legal drugs than we do now? That… seems like a weird juxtaposition.

Imagine it: if the whole book had been up to this essay’s standards, I would have ended up recommending it.

16. Space, Time and Vampire Ontology

Now THIS chapter… this chapter… It shows what happens when you stretch a premise too far and try to make a square peg fit into a round hole. It’s primarily focused on Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason and its contribution to ontology, the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of being or existence. Fair enough, I even found the explanation of a priori vs. a posteriori knowledge useful. Off to a good start. Then we get things like…

Staying out of the sun is a self-imposed limitation (although one that’s enforced by the Volturi). It isn’t an ontological limitation. Thus, the vampires in Twilight are much more atemporal beings than Dracula-vampires. Could the absence of external time restraints explain their ageless quality?

Alright class, who noticed what the author forgot?

One at a time please.

…

Vampires. Have. To feed.

Which means, that vampires are very much still ontologically temporal, they have external time restraints. How do you miss something this basic?

Not only time but space is practically irrelevant for the vampires in Twilight. Supernatural speed enables vampires to traverse great distances very quickly. Because they don’t need to breathe, they are excellent swimmers. And their incredible strength allows them to jump over (or move) any obstacle in their way. As a human, Bella is limited in terms of space; it takes her a long time to travel great distances by foot. Edward, by contrast, is able to travel short distances in the blink of an eye. … External space is compressed to the point of irrelevance.

Oh, by missing lots of basic facts. So if external space is irrelevant, then would there be any concern for Alice to reach Italy in time to save Edward in New Moon? Wouldn’t it be pointless to “lure the tracker away” in the climax of Twilight? This doesn’t make any sense. Heck, light is so fast it’s near instantaneous on earth, but that doesn’t make space “irrelevant” to light. On the contrary, the greater distances of space are what prove that light is confined to the laws of space like anything else. Including vampires! Now you might say that the speed of vampires give them a wider personal space than normal humans, but not that external space is irrelevant.

Alice’s ability to see the future is bound up with space and time. When Alice sees a possible future event, two things are occurring. First, she is seeing a future event in the present, which means she is experiencing the future as overlapping with the present. Time is being collapsed such that the time period between present and future is eliminated.

No more than seeing a video of another land on my TV “collapses” space and overlaps my living room with Iraq. Or that watching historical footage eliminates the time period between present and past. For all we know (and how much they’re explained), Alice sees the future the same way we see the past: via some sort of medium. If the future and present were overlapping/collapsing, then when the future event arrives that Alice “saw” she should “freeze up” and/or act out the same actions she did previously as her past & future selves “sync” for a moment. (trust me, I got a degree at Trek U) (Although that would have been funny if, during the fight with James, she suddenly had to start drawing the dance studio she earlier sketched.) Again, there is a fine line between seeing something and experiencing it. We’re told very clearly that Alice sees the future, not that she experiences it.

And yes, the author wants to bring up Edward & Aro and make the same claims about their powers, that they collapse space and time. However the conclusion:

Since the past, present, and future are meaningless in the face of eternity, and space does not present an obstacle, we have a good clue here for understanding vampire ontology: they do not exist in space and time in the same way that we do.

Except… the vampires aren’t all alike. If time is meaningless, the Alice shouldn’t be the only one to see the future. If space is meaningless, then Edward shouldn’t be described as the “fastest” Cullen. They wouldn’t need to eat. Vampires do occupy space and time like everything else! THIS IS A BAD WAY TO TEACH ONTOLOGY!

Know what’s a good way? TV Tropes.

Then…

But perhaps the problems that Bella encounters because of the dangers vampires like James and Victoria pose are just manifestations of a deeper problem – namely, the conflict between Bella’s imposition of Kantian space and time with Edward’s suspension of it.

Yep, they bring the pregnancy into this.

Once Bella becomes pregnant, however, the conflict between Edward’s suspending Kantian world and Bella’s world is no longer superficial. Her pregnancy creates a direct physical, biological, and ontological conflict between the world of humans and the world of vampires, threatening her life. If Bella has the child, she will likely die. Sadly, humans and vampires appear incompatible, at least at first.

Does anyone else see how the above is self-contradicting? 1) If humans and meyerpires are incompatible, then pregnancy shouldn’t have resulted at all. 2) pregnancy is very temporal, there is a beginning, middle and end. A lot of human cultural metaphors about time involve birth. Heck, some additional proof of vampire atemporality would be that female vampires don’t get pregnant. If Edward does not exist in time as humans do, then his sperm cannot induce pregnancy because it’s impossible for them to “intersect” the egg. 3) For the baby to grow at all she must occupy time, the speed of her growth does not negate the fact that she grows (any more than that a mayfly’s life span is a day means they are outside time).

How did I end up knowing more about Twilight than these fans? What is wrong with me?? While I take my meds, let’s close out the chapter:

As we have seen, if the ontology of vampires involves the suspension of Kantian space and time, humans are at a significant disadvantage. And it turns out Bella was right to insist on becoming a vampire!

Yes, the author just praised Bella’s decision because it makes Bella better. That’s just… No, 2 more chapters to go, let’s just move on.

Comment [19]

So you’ve started on the next great American novel ™, have your plots, characters and research primed and ready; there’s just one thing missing…

An epic romance!

But how do you write one?

Step 1 – NO SEX. No I’m not some prude. No, this also isn’t a long dissertation on the role of sex and biological urges in the role of cultures, rituals and more (there are three too many books on that already). My rule on this is for a simple reason: it’s a crutch. While cheating in your writing is ok (no, not talking about plagiarism), crutches are to be avoided at all cost as they will weaken you as a writer and cheapen your story. Too many use sheet wrestling as a way of saying “look these two are in love” without any further effort. A protagonist needs more motivation for journeys and sacrifices than just nookie. Keep the double-backed beast out of your story will force you to actually develop the relationship between the characters and build more between them than hormones.

Step 2 – RESEARCH. “But Nate” cried the Internet, “love is a universal human experience. Surely I don’t need to do research!” Gravity is a universal human experience too, but that doesn’t make you Newton. And while romances won’t be as difficult as physics, you still need to do some legwork. Here’s how:
• People watch. Find some place where crowds gather and study each stage of romance. Listen to your family and friends (for once). Each couple will have their own idiosyncrasies and patterns which will help you make your fictional couple more real. (note: this website is not responsible for any stalking charges)
• Read philosophy. Not hard to find good books on this subject. I highly recommend C.S. Lewis’ The Four Loves, but make sure whatever you read you get an original source. These books lose their effect just reading synopsis.
• Read romances that you enjoy and want your couple to emulate. Try to see what makes these other romances work.
• Avoid Romeo & Juliet. This play is a tragedy, a cautionary tale, it is not a romance. Note how much of the couples’ problems could have been solved with 5 seconds of patience. What did they have in common? If they outlived the play, they’d have been divorced inside of three years. Poor Bill Shakespeare will never be able to stop haunting this world if people keep misusing this play.

Step 3 – Decide the STAGE the couple is in. Not all love is the same, in the manner that while all people have childhoods, a kid is not like an adult. Bad writers experience only the first, intense passions of a relationship and then assume that all stages of it must be like that. No! A couple on their three month anniversary is not going to be like the couple on their thirtieth anniversary. The former will be nervous, hesitant, constantly questioning what the other person is thinking. The latter will be comfortable, confident and be able to finish each other’s sentences. No stage is preferable or better than any other, just a part of the collage of life.

Repeat Step 2 – Your research has helped you get an idea where you want your couple’s relationship to be, after deciding where to begin the journey, return to step two and do deeper research on the stage you selected in three.

Step 4 – Give them something in COMMON. Opposites attract is an exception to the rule, and even if they attract, they don’t persevere. Your couple needs to have some common interests, personalities, and likes/dislikes. No, they shouldn’t be exact clones of each other (unless that’s the point of your story). Here’s where step one really comes into play. Humans have this annoying trait called intellect. Eventually, the sex of a relationship will pause at least (if not become boring) and couples have to resort to stimulating their minds as much (or more) as their genitals. If they don’t have something to talk about, the relationship will break apart. Of course, this step is a lot easier if you have fully developed and fleshed out characters. Relying on just a common situation and/or enemy to be the glue of a relationship will cause it to fail once the situation or enemy is resolved. These events are good for sparking a fire; the rest is fuel to keep it burn ing.

Step 5 – CHALLENGES. Probably the easiest step and one you had in mind before you begun step one. However, by now you should have the relationship fleshed out enough that that we can understand why one protagonist is willing to overcome every obstacle for the other. Example: “A girl that likes Transformers? Curse you Galbatorix! How am I ever going to find that again? I will defeat you!”

From step five onward is the icing of the romantic cake. The in-jokes, the dates, yes even the lust can slowly be layered into your story. But without the above foundation, your epic romance will instead be the punch-line.

Write well…

Comment [24]

I was having a discussion on writing with a friend of mine who studies psychology and therapy and he told me something profound about characterization:

“Everybody’s always rational.”

I know your first instinct is to protest this claim but upon reflection, you will see (as I did) that it is quite true, and should always be kept in mind when writing a character.

Let’s define terms first: “rational” in this case we’ll use to refer to a person’s thought process and logic. “Reasonable” we’ll use to refer to the facts of reality. Thus we say, a person is always rational, if not always reasonable.

A thought experiment: Imagine that you are given enough evidence to convince yourself that aliens exist. You also find out that they are attempting to take over the world through a subtle, mental enslaving process. If, all of the above is real, what is your response? Covering your head with tin foil suddenly seems like a good idea. This is what we mean by a person is always rational. Objectively, there might be no aliens at all and thus, the person is being unreasonable.

When writing, you should always keep these two factors in mind: what is the data set of reality, and what is the data set any character is acting on. The first sign of a Mary-Sue^TM is someone’s whose data set is always in tune with the reality of the story. Which almost never happens in real life (no matter how much we fancy that it does). Our brain is constantly receiving more information than it can process, so there’s always something we’re missing in the thinking process. This doesn’t mean your characters have to be constantly wrong either; instead they should have a mix, even some lucky breaks (where they reach the right answer with the wrong solution).

Even a person who’s “crazy” is rational from the data set they are operating with. Having a character just do whatever the plot requires and then justifying it with the excuse “He’s crazy!” is the worst of lazy writing. So what if he’s crazy? Why did he do what he did? Does he believe the squirrels are plotting against him? Is the voice of one or more gods commanding him? Does he believe the target killed his father, even though it’s all a misunderstanding?

You don’t have to spell out every justification, but do spend some effort showing the reader the thinking process. Or make it clear enough in your work that the reader can put themselves in the character’s shoes and see the logic from that perspective. This is the most important and fundamental aspect of real, living characters.

May you write well…

Comment [15]

The discussion on my last Writing Tips article (addressing rationale) descended into an area I should have foreseen: villains. How do villains fit into the rational vs. reasonable debate*?

When considering how a character is rational, keep in mind that this includes the character’s perception of themselves. As much as we like to think otherwise, we’re scarcely aware of who we truly are. There are many factors for this. To others we appear as jerks but inside our own perceptions, we know that we are having a bad day, or everyone else is mistreating us, or we’re not being as bad as we could, etc etc. Therefore, with villains, they too will be as blind to their own actions as any other person. In fact, one of the hallmarks of true villains is high self-delusions. Thus, you almost never hear a bad guy refer to themselves as evil, whereas the introspective heroes will experience angst upon self-reflection. (Example: Paul from the Bible calls himself the chief of sinners, but Satan never does.)

With the basics established, how are villains created? How are great villains created?

Step 1: Make a goal. Bob down the street, working 9-5 and reading the paper every night is not a villain. What separates him from Lex Luthor? The latter has a goal, something he is working toward. A great villain will have a goal which is understandable, even laudable, and all of their actions are efforts to obtain this goal.

Step 2: Give them a motivation. Sure your villain has a goal, but why? Do they believe they’re doing the world a favor? In honor of a particular person? A great villain will have altruistic motivations. The line separating them from the hero, or any of us, is only the width of a hair.

Step 3: Decide the methods. What makes anyone evil? (Nobody just goes around kicking puppies.) The context of their methods. Cutting someone is wrong if against their wishes, but add consent, medical training, and a life-threatening disease, and that same action becomes noble, laudable even. A great villain uses methods that inspire debate, especially if anyone might.

Bonus Points: The hero and the villain actually have the same goal, but are opposed in methods. Example: In Lord of the Rings, Sauron and Aragorn ultimately have the same goal (to unite/rule Middle-Earth) but Sauron wants to accomplish this by abolishing free will.

You’ll notice I avoided any mention of a tragic past. That’s because the tragic past is more of a crutch every day. Who needs to flesh out their villain or add depth to them when a bad day explains it all?

See how everyone’s fallen asleep? Now you know what separates the great writers, from the hacks.

*As always, this is for serious writing. Comedy, parodies and other humorous writings don’t need to heed these efforts. However, staying aware of the basics will serve to improve your humor.

Comment [14]

Today for discussion, let’s talk about an important aspect of any story—that of reinforcement. What is it? Fred of slacktivist described it in the negative as the “unreliable narrator.” When you’re building the verisimilitude of your story, reinforcement is the cornerstone.

Every fictional story – even those set in modern day – do a bit of world-building: from the modern-day tales which are building the world of complete strangers (their lifestyles, family, etc) to high fantasy which build whole universes from scratch. Reinforcement is what brings your worlds to life from simple words. It is any part of the story that strengthens a premise.

So how does it work? Let’s use an example. The premise is: a mob (the Godfather kind) that controls a town. Sure, as a writer you say this is the situation, but why should the reader believe you? Because you reinforce the premise by having small reminders about it: a person pauses in conversation for a quick glance, a small time crook turns up dead for no real reason. Throughout the story, incidents and plot points should occur in a slightly different way than they would without the premise you’re enforcing. Of course, there is proper and poor enforcing as well. Rule one is subtlety. You should avoid explicitly stating the premise beyond its introduction or in exceptional cases. Failure at subtlety can also backfire. Keep telling the reader the Mob’s in control (rather than showing) and the reader will start rebelling, and focusing more on your failures to demonstrate the Mob’s power instead of accepting it. However, if you’re not sure about how well you are reinforcing, then go ahead and overdo it because it’s always easier to trim than to add.

Finally, never forget how your premise affects your characters. In our Mob example, the protagonist(s) should get attacked, threatened, harassed and so forth if they are doing anything which is not approved. Any plans they make will have to take the Mob (and its reaction) into account and so forth.

Until next time, may write well…

Comment [14]

Today is definition day, as I go into more details about two terms I’ve used recently in my articles.

Cheat – As an author, you are god of the world of your story. It is your duty to create said world and present it to your readers. In theory, you should make it as real as possible: every page should be filled with the weather for that day and location, the history, geography and cultures of the area, the genetics and full history of every ancestor of each character in your scenes. Of course, you could spend from now to the heat death of the universe on world building and have only a fraction of the detail a real, true world needs. Cheats are methods we authors use to fill in these details so we can share our stories with the world in a timely fashion, thus why cheats are ok, even necessary tools of the author. Examples include using someone you know to fill in the holes of a character. It is no coincidence that Angela, based on Paolini’s sister, is one of the more interesting and near-real character in his Inheritance cycle. Some scholars have theorized that Treebeard from Lord of the Rings was drawn from Tolkien’s friend, C.S. Lewis. The same goes with using cultures you are familiar with to give more life to imagined ones (just be careful about clichés here – such as Scotland/Ireland culture as the model for Dwarves).

Crutches – “But Nate!” I hear you say, “Isn’t everything above a crutch?” Nope. Cheats are a way for authors to work around the reality of our finite lives and knowledge. Crutches are the refuge of lazy, hack writers who don’t want to put in the effort that you, as an author, have agreed to do for the reader as binding as any employment contract. Take one of my first articles where I mentioned the crutch of sex within romances. You may not be able to create Tengwar 2.0, but every story will have created interaction in it so there’s no excuse not to put the work into those interactions. You may not be able to tell us the organ structure of your big bad, but you owe the readers an understanding of his/her motivations. Does that mean you can never use any crutch in a story ever? Nope, there are two exceptions:
1. As side details. Any side characters or tangent to the main story are acceptable places to use crutches. A minor villain can be just evil or crazy if need be. Of course, making even the most minor opponent a rich and fully fleshed out character will enhance your story, but use a crutch on them won’t harm it either (not harm it like using one on your main villain).
2. Self-awareness and extra effort. If you’re at least aware that you’re using a crutch in a story, then you can put in the extra effort to overcome it. Does your epic romance start off with them getting off? You’re still going to need those relationship building scenes that every other romance has. Why then did I say you’ll have to put in extra effort? Because as the work goes on and you grow weary of story weaving, the temptation will become very strong to rely on the crutches. Why bother with that eighth romantic scene? They did it already so everyone knows they’re willing to fight/die for each other (then shouldn’t whores have dozens of heroes taking stupid risks every day?). As long as you are aware of the crutch and work to overcome it, you might end up with a good story after all.

Good writing to you…

P.S. In all of this, I only used some of my favorite examples of cheats and crutches but since there are obviously more, how do you tell them apart? A good rule of thumb is the measure of research. If something will require a high amount of highly specialized research (double points for college degree), then getting around it will involve a cheat. If something is fundamental to the story and can be researched with a few hours of interviews or people watching, then getting around it involves crutches. Or you can just imagine that you’re explaining this shortcut to me. If you hear in your head me saying, “That’s no excuse!” then you need to get some medicine for hearing voices.

Comment [7]

Greetings! Thank you for purchasing one of Home Depot’s DIY villain kits. With the parts included and these easy instructions, you too will soon have your own villain wrecking havoc and giving your protagonists an all around bad day. (Please be sure to read these instructions thoroughly before assembling your villain. This kit is intended for villains only and should be used for every antagonist, particularly those of the “force of nature” variety. See our catalog for a full listing of these including the Storm™, a Bad Day™, Godzilla™ and Jason Voorhees™)

First remove everything from the packaging and use the part list on page ii to confirm that you are not missing anything. While it may be tempting to go straight for the decals and plot frames, you must first assemble the foundational pieces [shown in diagram A7] labeled M1 and M2.

Part M1, the ‘motivation’ is comprised of the two smaller parts [shown in diagram 8G] labeled W1 and W2. 1. W1 is ‘why’. Why is your villain doing what they are doing? Why are they choosing this course of action over any other? 2. W2 is ‘what’. What is your villain’s ultimate goal? What do they hope to accomplish? Note that when these two parts are put together, the stronger will aid the weaker. While your villain’s reason for his/her actions may be unremarkable, an impressive and awe-inspiring goal will still hold reader interest. Likewise, an unoriginal, boring goal can be fascinating if it has a deep, rich reasoning behind it.

By now you’ve noticed that part M2, ‘method’, has the greatest variety of this kit. With this, you need to determine how the villain is going to accomplish his/her goals and what is within character for them. Example: The most straightforward approach involves sacrificing puppies. If your villain is an avid dog lover, then this approach would be grossly out of character for them and should be avoided. However, if he/she has no restraint toward cuteness, then it would be out of character for them to avoid the most expeditious path. Also be sure that the villain’s methods fit in with your world-system (don’t laugh, you’d be surprised how many calls customer service gets when someone tried adding an a-bomb to their pre-industrial story and then was surprised when the whole thing collapsed).

Once you have assembled the two central components of villainy, you should review your work before going to decoration and decals. Unlike parts W1 and W2, the weakest of the M1/M2 pair will weaken and undercut the whole villain. Who can respect any villain – even one with the greatest motivations of all time – that uses pitiful methods? A villain that almost seem designed to give the heroes a sporting chance. You don’t want readers screaming “I could do better!” Conversely, what do the most cruel and diabolical methods matter, if readers are constantly trying to figure out why the villain is going to all this trouble in the first place (particularly if the method involved seems better suited for a better legitimate task than an evil one)?

While we can’t promise that every villain assembled with this kit will be a Darth Vader or Sauron, we can promise that following these instructions will aid you in keeping readers’ interest and joy.

*Special Note: if you are attempting a humorous or a parody of a villain, please turn these instructions upside-down.

Comment [6]

If you haven’t before, watch this:

Admittedly, HiSHE is one of my favorite sites. (Their ending for Superman 1 makes me cry with laughter every time.) However this is a not uncommon complaint about Lord of the Rings [LOTR]. And that is a good question. Is the nonuse of eagles to drop the Ring off an oversight/loose end? (It’s not a plothole.) Some think it’s just something Tolkien forgot, but I don’t think it is. Let’s take a moment to run through the thought process and maybe learn something we can use in the future…

Scene: Everybody’s at the council of Elrond, talking about what they should do with the Ring. Practically every proposal is being brought up and discussed. At last, it seems that the only solution is a daring infiltration of the enemy’s territory to destroy the weapon. “But wait!” cries everybody. “What about the eagles? Fly Frodo and Co in, drop off the Ring, fly out.”

Ah but there’s one problem. Remember what happened before this scene? The Nazgul were washed away by a raging river in trying to catch Frodo. It’s even mentioned that now they have lost their horses, and must be given new steeds upon to ride. Thus, the first and biggest objection to this plan: the Nine Riders/Ringwraiths/Nazgul were in the air at this time as well! Some might say the eagles can handle them, but remember that this is all 9 of them, including the Witch-King (who totally pwned Gandalf). Are there even 9 or more giant eagles for this mission? Would they be able to stand up to the might of all 9 riders (with their king) in a fight? Smart money (especially if they are carrying passengers) is no. If the free peoples try to move the Ring by air, Sauron has it in a few days, everyone is screwed anyway.

But now we have a new problem: the characters didn’t know that the Nazgul were flying. So imagine you’re Tolkien a moment (assuming you’re not all the time anyway). You’ve gone over every solution but one. However, the flaw with that one last solution is unknown to any of the characters at this time. Logically, if it was brought up, everyone would agree and go flying straight into a victory for evil. Really, the only option is to let that solution slide and hope it doesn’t enter the reader’s mind. So what have we learned from this? If you’re working on a rough draft of a story and run into this problem, what are your choices:

1) Finagle things around so that your characters end up with the knowledge needed to prevent this catastrophe. (can be very complicated, only recommended if it requires the most minor changes)
2) Remove the offending plot device and adjust other parts of the story as needed. (recommended if the plot device is minor enough – couldn’t the eagles have been cut out of LOTR?)
3) Let it slide and try slip past this part of the story without bringing the problem up, hope nobody notices. (easier solution – however will fail if you achieve good popularity and/or a legacy)

Now let’s resume the fun part. What other ways may have the LOTR eagle plan failed?

*We sometimes lose sight of it, flying in jets that go mach 1+, but with living creatures that won’t break the sound barrier at cruising speeds, it will still take several days to go from Rivendale to Mordor/Gondor. Not as long as by foot or horseback, but still long enough that Sauron (the eye that never blinks or sleeps) should see them coming.

*1 word: archers. It’d be like trying to fly into Berlin Germany with anti-aircraft guns going off as well as dogfighting. You have only one plane with only one bomb and that bomb has to hit a precise target. If the plane is shot down or the bomb misses, game over. (At this point are you still betting on the good guys?)

*If we assume that the top of Mount Doom is open (it was in the movie but I’m not sure in the story, any scholars able to clear that up for me?), then Frodo and Co have the new problem of inertia. If the eagles are flying along at a good speed and Frodo drops the Ring, that bit of jewelry is going to continue forward as well as down. How would he or any of his friends know about this and calculate out when he needs to drop it in order to hit the mountain (no practice runs)?

**Don’t forget that the size of the target will also be in play. If the eagles fly low enough that a “hit” is guaranteed, they will probably be vulnerable to archers stationed at Mt Doom’s peak. Fly out of arrow range, and the target gets much much smaller and harder to hit.

*Don’t forget the platform inside Mount Doom. Even if Frodo manages to drop the Ring into the mountain, it might still get caught on the walkway above the lava.

*Finally (though I’m sure I’m missing some), the Ring’s power grows the closer it gets to its birthplace and/or lord. Eagles move into the Mordor zipcode, no telling who (maybe even the eagles) is corrupted and puts on the Ring (as Frodo did at the end).

So as you can see, the idea of using the eagles to get the Ring to Mordor is actually the worst idea of any of them, and would have only accomplished a quicker victory for Sauron.

Until next time, stay safe from the Nazgul.

Comment [30]

Today we’re going to talk about 3 faults of narrative that are closely related but distinct, and how to avoid them. These are ones that reviewers often get mixed up. By examining each one in detail, hopefully you too will be able to tell them apart and recognize them in your own writing (as well as the proper steps to take care of them).

Since everyone likes to bring up story “plot holes”, we’ll save those for last and examine two faults that are often confused as plot holes.

First up, what I like to call the loose end. A loose end is not a fault in the plot per se, but is a plot thread that has vanished with no resolution. No, it is not a thread that has a poor, disappointing, or nonsensical resolution—the key to being a “loose end” is that no resolution exist. This is the chief fault of Michael Bay films. See: Transformers. At one point during the film, the magical McGuffin box brings to life several human machines (part of a car, a Mountain Dew vending machine and an Xbox). Well what happens to all these newborn Transformers? The movie never tells us. You should also note that loose ends only apply to side plots; the main plot can never be a loose end. Instead, a central plot left unresolved is a cliffhanger, or a Bolivian Army Ending, or plain shit. Remember: loose ends are side plots which are never resolved.

Next up: the asspull. At first glance, this may appear to be a plot hole—it’s a moment that seems to come from nowhere. However, upon reflection you can kind of see where it came from and the path the plot took to get there. The problems are often a result of timing. Examples abound, but my favorite has to be:
The “summers’ blood” that closed the rift between dimensions in The Gift. After spending much time establishing Dawn (Buffy’s sister by way of energy ball) as being the single, special, only creature who can open or close the door between dimensions, at the last minute, faced with imminent apocalypse, Buffy decided her blood would probably work just as well.
If you’re going to suddenly introduce magic into your sci-fi story (or visa versa) – or add psychic ability to anything – put in a little extra effort to clue the reader in that such mixing is allowed.

Finally, we finish with, the true plot hole. Defined generally as “things happening without a logical reason”, I think a better description is from Ken: “a viewer is forced to construct (or attempt to construct) an elaborate framework of suppositions in order to cover over some hole in a film’s plot”. That’s the key difference between a plot hole in respect for the audience: how complicated of a supposition does the reader have to create? Sure, you may have put hints and clues as to how X occurred. But if the reader is going to have to assume a great deal to reach X, then you have a plot hole. By far the best example remains Jurassic Park 2: The Lost World when the ship runs into the dock with a dead crew. The suppositions the viewer has to create (T-Rex escaped then went back in, Raptors sneaked on board and then drowned, etc) to explain the scene pushes it straight into plot hole territory. So if you’re ever in doubt over whether you have a plot hole or not, sit down and make a list of all the stuff the reader has to assume to get there (ignoring the most basic common sense, such as: people breathe). If your list runs very long (say… over 3), then you have a plot hole.

Comment [8]

Now, I’ve talked about plot holes before, so what’s left to say? Another clarification for something I had forgotten, one that is often also confused by critics and fans of fiction: the difference between character motivation and plot holes. What’s the difference? Well, character motivation can never be a plot hole. Let’s use an example.

Take the movie Next, which inspired this post (note: I do not advise watching this without the rifftrax). There is no reason given for why the villains are after Nic Cage (assuming they don’t want their money back for Wickerman). However, this is just a mystery, an unknown, not an actual plot hole. The actual plot hole comes from the lack of explanation of how the bad guys know about Cage’s ability to see the future in the first place. They are setting a bomb off in Los Angeles—how did they know a 2nd rate Las Vegas magician was legit?

So what are the cures? Remember that plot holes arise from what actually happens (i.e. A gun on a deserted island). If you have good friends/editors, try for overexplaining what happens (because it’s easier to cut than add)—make sure everyone can follow from point A to B.

With motivations, you have to be sure your audience can follow the emotional journey. But if someone tells you “this motivation is a plot hole”, now you know that it technically isn’t, it’s an irregularity. Try adding more clues to the the character’s potential change. Or show a life-changing event dramatic enough to warrant the change.

Comment [4]

This article was birthed by a repeated observation of many modern cultural works to fall into the same flaw again and again. I haven’t come up with a catch name for it (or found the tvtropes label) yet, so the commentator who helps me figure out what to call this will win… High Praise! (and/or I’ll give them some ‘reputation’ on the II forums – whichever is worth less)

While Asahel and I were settling in to watch a movie a weekend or two ago, we saw a trailer for a movie called I Love You Man. Time for a game! I’ll give you an over view of the movie’s plot, you see if you can spot the flaw.

Protagonist (Prot) has proposed to his girl and is going to get married. During the preparation, Prot realizes that his friends are all girls and he doesn’t have any ‘buddies’ he can ask to be his best man. After talking with his father and brother over dinner, he decides he’s going to have to learn to be “one of the guys™” and find a best man before the wedding. Hilarity ensues.

If you thought the flaw was ‘who is this film marketed to’, well you get half points. I’ll give you time to think about it while we look at the Spider-man travesty arc, ‘One More Day’. For those who don’t know the plot is:

Prot’s 90+ year old aunt/adoptive mom gets shot. He sells his marriage with a hot redhead to Satan in order to save his aunt’s life. Hilarity ensues.

What do these two plots have in common? They both suffer from a criminal plot flaw that has a staggeringly easy solution.

With I Love You Man, the problem is that Prot is in need of a best man and he has a brother. For those who might be too young to know better, it’s traditional for your brother to be your best man (unless you’re a girl). How do you fix it? Remove the brother from the movie. But then who then does Prot go to to talk about ‘man-dates’ and ‘making-friends’? His father! (since it is a rarity and not traditional for the groom’s father to be a best man)

What was the solution to OMD? Have Mary Jane (the hot, redhead wife) be the one that was shot! Then the decision to sell their marriage to save her life is compelling, sensible and better writing.

So what can you (hopefully a better writer) do to prevent yourself from making an easily fixed mistake in your work? There are the usual techniques of thinking, using common sense and having good editors that you listen to, but I want to go into detail on a method of recycling.

One of the demarcations of good and poor writers is how well they recycle any part of the story. A poor writer will invent a whole new character and then dispose of them after they’ve served their purpose. Example: The protagonists run into a mysterious figure who says: “Hello sir. The plot is in that direction. Good-bye forever.” A great writer will not add anything new to the story unless he/she absolutely has to. Example: The protagonists run into a mysterious figure who says, “Hello there. The plot is in that direction – but I’m really the villain/main henchmen in disguise, leading you astray! See you in the final act.” This is also good for avoiding character glut. Don’t be afraid to have someone fill multiple roles (as long as it’s within character). The same goes for events, artifacts, pretty much any facet of the plot (ex: the Ring from LotR).

If you look for solutions among what you’ve already done, you’ll reduce the chance of having an easily preventable flaw in your story.

Homework: Compare any number of the Harry Potter series with an equal number of the Inheritance crime and compare how well or poor each author uses this technique.

Comment [15]

Inspired by the Hogwarts Professor I’ve decided to give everyone the secret to writing a classic. John Granger said,

The three quick but fail-proof tests of an English fiction ‘classic’ or ‘great book’ according to C. S. Lewis are “Does it make you better, wiser, and happier?’ with the necessary follow-up ‘Do you like it?’ (because if you don’t like it, the book’s no good). Those are grand tests on a personal and subjective level (and perhaps that is the only one that matters).

So how can you hope to write a tale that will thrive through the test of time?

There is only one secret to it.

Don’t.

Lewis himself was fond of reminding us that there’s a place for everything and everything has its place. What does that mean? Just an encouragement to prioritize properly: put your family ahead of your job; value your friends more than popularity – as seen on the Disney Channel or Lifetime at any moment. So when writing, what is your priority?

Tell a good story.

That’s it. How can I be sure?

Name a movie you saw last year. Now name any movie that was nominated for an Oscar. The correct answers were “The Dark Knight” and “uhhhh…”. Unless you’re a movie nerd, can you name any of the films nominated for an Oscar in the last two years? Four? Once upon a time, the Oscars were given to truly great and memorable films (see: Rocky) and those films are still remembered and appreciated today. Now, the Oscar nominees are a category all to themselves and we have a genre of movie we call “oscar bait”, a genre of movies quickly forgotten because they are pretentious, overblown, boring, etc. and nobody wants to watch them. And people want to enjoy classics, hence why they endure. (Yes, this means that Shakespeare was the summer blockbuster of his time—that’s why people keep reading his material.)

Concentrating on making your writing “classical” is the wrong priority and doomed to failure. Even though you might enjoy temporary success (Paolini), it won’t endure (Paolini) and you’ll never be beloved enough.

Write the best story you can and a story you want to read (after all, if you don’t want to read it, why should anyone else?). As Lewis once said to Tolkien, “If they won’t write the kinds of books we want to read, we shall have to write them ourselves.”

P.S. I know Hemingway is a debatable exception to this rule. But if you think you’re Hemingway and able to get around this…well you’re not.

P.S.S. For reading on the friendships and rivalry between Tolkien & Lewis.

Comment [18]

(For this issue of WT, I almost wrote: “See: Dragons: The Lexicon, Do: NOT THAT” but I’ll assume that if you’re here reading these, you already know better.)

Today, let’s talk about using politics in writing. And how you shouldn’t. Ever. (Unless you’re writing a nonfiction book on politics.) Let’s look at some examples on why.

Go to any discount bin at a bookstore, and what genre usually has the most books for dirt cheap? Pull out some old comics and reread them. Which makes you laugh the most? Political cartoons from any year before now or Calvin & Hobbes?

Take comic books. Look at the big two: Superman and Batman. If you were to move them to any other culture, how would they stand? Quite well in fact (and they usually do). How about Green Arrow? Green Arrow is a raging liberal. It’s a part of his character. But you can’t transplant him as well as you could with Batman/Superman. Why? Because Superman and Batman are characters that go beyond boundaries; characters that touch a universal part of all humanity. Green Arrow, however, is so tied to America that he can never truly cross the borders. His rants about how angry he is at someone driving an SUV won’t make a lot of sense in China or Zimbabwe.

Here, therefore, is the problem with putting politics into fictional writing: it limits it. Nothing dates a work faster (not disco, big hair, or Seinfeld) than politics. Already, I can hear you formulating objections, so let’s get to those.

First of all, there is such a thing as ‘universal politics’: politics which, no matter where you are or what government you’re under, will apply. Everyone understands struggling for freedom, being the underdog in a fight and injustice. Those topics are evergreen and will always be a part of being human. A story about a government bailout of businesses isn’t.

Second: Politics can also be included if the system is unique to your story. If they are laid out and explained so that any reader can comprehend them with minimum background knowledge, that is acceptable.

Third, politics that reference a large span of history can also be used. The negligible details of a system are never remembered, only the important features (such as the system itself). Remember that time filters all. What is important enough to be remembered is timeless, and thus including it avoids dating your work. Never forget, however, that the closer you are to the present, the more pointlessness there is to filter out of your source.

Why avoid politics in your writing? Because writing is an art, and the best art transcends boundaries: distance, culture, or time. Using petty politics limits your work to a specific culture, country, and time. It doesn’t matter whether you are liberal, conservative, communist, anarchist, whatever; if you let your political views seep too much into your writings, you shackle them to the past and condemn them to be forgotten.

I know it may seem otherwise, that nothing in the world is more important than this vote and you must comment on it; but governments fade, while art is forever.

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This post was inspired by DC comics epic failure: Final Crisis. Now I am primarily a DC fan (though I do enjoy Marvel at times) and Grant Morrison drew me into comics with his quite excellent JLA run. How then can I say that their latest works is a failure? Because Morrison and DC have forgotten one of the most important rules of mysteries.

The audience has to care.

Of course that’s true of any story (fiction or non) so what makes mysteries different?

Mysteries are about keeping key information away from the audience until the final moment (the “reveal”) if ever. This is accomplished by either leaving the info out all together or hiding it in unassuming disguises (the “clues”). The former is easy, the latter is much harder to accomplish without spoiling the reveal ahead of schedule. Thus, many lazy writers use obfuscation to create mystery. But like Jim Doom says :

The fact that I don’t know what the mystery is doesn’t make me more intrigued.

Does this mean you can never have a vague mystery? No! But imagine your mystery is like a scene in a movie. A scene can open or begin completely blurred and out of focus. However, some shape and definition has to come into focus or the audience quickly grows bored. Parts of the scene can still remain blurry, but the audience has to have something to latch onto.

What do I mean the audience needs to latch onto something? How is it done? Like most techniques, this can be broken down into some basic components:

1. The audience needs to know what question(s) is being asked. This doesn’t mean it has to be the right question, but you have to give them an anchor to hold onto. Imagine watching a cop show where the police are investigating a crime without ever telling you what the crime is. Is it a murder? Robbery? Kidnapping? Public nudity? Without this crucial info, you are left distant and uninvolved in the proceedings, less interested in what’s going on than in trying to figure out why anybody’s doing anything. This is Final Crisis’ biggest failing. Instead of being involved in the story, we’re left asking “What’s going on? Why should we care?” Though the book started off with a mystery we could latch onto (Who killed Orion?), more bewildering threads were tossed at us till we were no longer able to hold onto the anchors in the story and were drowning in questions. Now instead of following the mystery, the audience is left asking “What is going on?”
2. There needs to be clear stakes if the mystery isn’t solved and the audience needs to know them. There are many things which are primal and instinctual to your audience, thus why murder mysteries hold such strong and enduring appeal: justice may be subverted and the murderer may escape. This is another failure of Final Crisis. We the audience can’t be drawn into the mystery because we have trouble understanding what will happen if things go unsolved. We’re given a hint that the world might end but since that’s a normal Tuesday in comics the emotional ‘punch’ that stake has is greatly reduced. We no longer care that the world might end (that’s been the case for how many decades?) we have to know how it’s going to end.

This doesn’t mean that you can’t do weird, world changing mysteries in your stories, but you have to start with those two. Think about the X-files. They didn’t launch right away into the government conspiracy but gave you a tangible mystery (part 1. What happened to Mulder’s sister? part 2. He will never find peace). Then as the series unfolded, that anchor was used to lead you into a deeper and greater mystery (part 1. What’s the deal with aliens? part 2. They will doom humanity to extinction or slavery.).

Build your world first and draw the audience into it. Once they are comfortable, begin the deeper, more fascinating mysteries. Don’t be lazy and tell your audience nothing in an effort to keep the reveal in the dark. Once they understand the rules of that world, they will be more intrigued by your mysteries within it, and you will have a successful story.

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