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Twilight Series - impact on kids

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Rhea

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god+dogGirl said:
We Christians should focus on the damage of the Twilight series.
Hang on! In Twilight, the main vampire character is totally against his girl becoming a vampire because it risks her eternal soul, moreover, he won't have a sexual relationship with the girl unless they are married because he does not want to make her sin that way, either. And then, when they do get married, and she gets pregnant (they didn't know she could), she refuses to have an abortion even though the pregnancy kills her.

The whole protagonist vampire group is "vegetarian" that is they will not kill humans.

It was one of the most chaste, anti-vampire books I've ever read.

I posted this new thread to hear the reasons God+Dog thought it was so much worse than Harry Potter for kids.

I guess I do understand, in a way. Potter is written with a different flavor - Good versus evil, but no emotional/sexual conflict really at all, so if it harms any audience it's going to be a younger one that is more easily corrected by the obvious fiction of the witchcraft part. The delineation of who is Good and who is Evil is clear by their actions, while the witchcraft part is clearly nonsense.

Whereas Twilight is making the reader discover whether someone can be born/made "evil" but refrain from the actions that made them evil. Sort of a "love the sinner hate the sin" treatment, and it covers in depth the conflict about sexuality among teens. So it may seem more dangerous to that audience.

But in the actual book, as I summarized above, no one has sex until they are married, and characters talk about why they feel this is important, even to the point of staying celibate for 110 years.

And in addition, the "good" vampires are all committed to NOT doing the thing that supposedly makes vampires bad; that is, killing humans. They call themselves "vegetarians" as a joke and actively try to turn other, less noble vampires toward their goal of goodness.

The two main vampire characters are Christians, and it is their very fear of God (as in, wanting to follow Yahweh's rules) that keeps them from doing anything to harm humans, including pre-marital sex. One line is (paraphrased) "I'm already lost in God's sight because I'm a vampire, the only virtue left I have to offer him is my purity and if there is any hope at all for me for heaven, I will not do more harm to my soul by disobeying this. And I'm absolutely not going to put your soul at risk by either making you a vampire or having sex with you outside of marriage."

The whole book is about restraint and hard choices and the narrow path, and how making these choices is the only chance to overcome the inherent evil of what they were made/born (i.e. vampires). There is discussion about whether God has mercy and whether it is worth trying to be good, even though you were made a vampire, just in case there is any forgiveness to be had, any chance at all, it is worth staying to the narrow path even in the face of your doubts.

It's really almost the perfect allegory to the inherent sin of man - "we are born sinful (vampires), but we do not have to be sinners (human killers) if we try hard enough (use animals to eat, and even though we are never "satisfied," we are not killing humans) and care enough about what is right (God's command to not kill humans)."

There's even a heavy heavy dose of respecting your parents and your parent's culture.

Meanwhile, the "werewolves" exist in the book as nature's (God's) unvolunteered army against the evil of the vampires. Their existence only manifests when vampires are present, and their only role is to protect humans from vampires.

I was actually surprised that I liked the books because I assumed they were shallow, stupid and loaded with teen raging hormone bad choices, romanticization of "bad guys" and shallow emotions.

But I heard from one of the moms at my daughter's sports that they were actually quite readable and so I got them out of the library. I was surprised to find how chaste they were and how loaded with purposeful good choices and discussion of values. They are still definitely a "teen" book in their straightforward plot, and I spent most of my time enjoying the author's use of first person narrative and the reliance on expository dialogue that it requires. Still, I was indeed surprised at how... wholesome they turned out to be.
 
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I didn't like the Twilight books near as much as the Potter books. Nor is Twilight anywhere near as positive in it's messages of consistently making the hard choices of "walking the walk", standing firm against evil, and self-sacrifice as the Potter books are.

(Whenever I see Christians who talk about how "evil" Harry Potter is, I know right away that they didn't actually read the books.)

Twilight...yes, for the question of sex, they do remain "pure" until they marry.

But, if one takes that whole question out of the picture, the "will they, won't they wait" question...what do we have left as far as strong moral example?

The "vegetarian" vampire...that's pretty much it.

The worst message in the book to my thinking is the message it sends to (mostly) young girls is that a guy is worth giving up your entire soul to....didn't like that part of it. But, my daughter didn't read the books, she watched the movies and she actually was on "team Jacob" side, so ultimately that aspect really didn't impact her all that much...not that she's particularly vulnerable to that point of view anyway. But, a lot of girls are, and that's not such a positive message in my book.

Another message is that vampirism is bad ("I'm already lost in God's sight because I'm a vampire...") and yet, it is the ultimate goal that everyone (well everyone but those on team Jacob) is seeking for Bella.

To stick with Edward's conviction that becoming a vampire is to lose one's soul, then the sum total of the book is that it's good to lose one's soul for "true love".

It was this aspect of the stories that made me truly to consider not allowing my daughter to watch the movies...a step that I'm careful about, I don't like to censor her choices lightly. I ultimately decided to let her watch them with me right beside her, and I have to say that even she sees through it all and realizes that, waiting for sex aside, Bella's choices leave a lot to be desired.

I had to laugh when we were watching the part about Bella's retreat from life when Edward leaves her in whichever one that he does...Viola's response was "Get a grip...sheesh.":biggrin

I don't know...Harry Potter, putting your life on the line in order to help others, even those who will never know what you did; Twilight, abandoning your eternal soul for a guy who twinkles in the sunlight...:chin

Harry Potter trumps Twilight in my opinion.
 
I don't have time for my full rant. That will come later. But I'm going to cite two examples of why I HATE Twilight.

- Remember that bit in New Moon in which Bella and Edward sat there while the Voltouri were killing HUNDREDS of, I think, Italians?? And they didn't once step up or intervene? Noooo as long as precious Bella is okay, who cares about the people being murdered???

-Have we all forgotten that Jacob falls in love with a newborn baby in this series?? That it actually ENCOURAGES pedophilia as long as you're drawn to them?? (I forget the term they use but I don't think it matters) And that Quil is dating a TWO YEAR OLD as well? Sure, you say, they won't date them until they're older, but what the heck is that supposed to be teaching us?? That being sexually attracted to little kids is okay? What kind of message is that???

Again, I don't have time to post my full rant, I need to reread some of the books and blogs on the subject so I don't sound like an idiot for getting facts wrong.
 
God+Dog, But they are NOT sexually attracted to the babies. They are very very clear on that, as I recall. VERY. There's dialogue on it showing that the "love" is practically parental, "I will do anything for this baby", and they are indignant that someone suggests they are looking at the child with anything else in mind. So I don't see that message being sent, I think she handled that very clearly in the reply to those who asked Quil if it was gross to be bonded to a toddler. (Kind of like people calling me "sick" for nursing my baby - "hey, I'm just feeding my kid, you're the one thinking about sex - who's the sicko?"). There is absolutely *NO* encouragement of pedophelia present in the book from what I remember, it's about a protective love that is not sexual in any way.

The killing by the volturi while the "good" vampires were leaving the building was awful. I kept expecting the author to weave in some sort of plot or even hint at future book plot of trying to stop it. It also seemed completely stupid, to me, like no one would notice hundreds of people disappearing again and again at the same tourist site? Hello? She probably expected us to think, "there was nothing they could do at that time, there were only three of them versus the whole Volturi Clan, so they did the only thing they could at the time... Plus the idiot vampire-tourists were eagerly trying to embrace the romantic notion of exciting vampires, so how can you stop them?" But I wasn't able to buy that without some storyline promise of addressing it in the future, and that never happened. In a way that happens in a lot of books, the hero is too weak to stop the killing of the really bad guy, but this one seemed so wholesale that it was hard to fit into that mold.

And don't worry about having some facts wrong, I think we could discuss them out here - and I don't have any of the books to re-read, so I can only say "I think" and "As I recall" myself, anyway.

Handy, You're right, it did bother me, the idea that giving up your whole earthly life on something you don't understand fully is a good idea. I liked very much that the author had the vampire fight back against that both by leaving her in the earlier book and trying to talk her out of it in the later ones. And I kept expecting some conversation about waiting AT LEAST until she was more mature - 20s, 30s? before making such a permanent decision. She tried half-heartedly, but allowed it to become 18yo versus 70yo and that extreme was easy for the girl to reject. But 30yo would have been a stronger argument and provided needed perspective. Even though the author tried to tie that up by making the decision ultimately a reaction to her dying in childbirth, it was a conversation that should have happened. And on that count, I'd be talking with my daughter, too, about how 18yo is definitely NOT the pinnacle of beauty or wisdom or life's riches. I agree that's a serious flaw in the author's obvious efforts to keep the messages positive.
 
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Bella cheats on Edward with JACOB after he proposes! So she forces him to propose to her... then runs back to Jacob??? After basically making it clear she wants him as only a friend?? Yeah, girls, mess around with as many guys as you want, it won't come back to bite you at all!!

Bella also seems okay that this whole entire war is happening because of her. Oh, she at first tries to say she's not worth it, but it lasts a few seconds and then she's just okay with it.

And let's not forget Bella's male dependency. In New Moon, Edward breaks it off with her and leaves her. Okay. So she starts playing around with Jacob and then discovers that when she's in danger, she "sees" Edward. So she starts going out of her way to put herself in danger just to see him!!! Yeah, girls, if your boyfriend breaks up with you, just endanger yourself. You may be DEAD but... that'll teach him!!

And, of course, there's Edward's STALKING!! Okay he breaks into her house to watch her sleep. Not romantic at all, by the way!! When he breaks up with her, he breaks into her house AGAIN to remove all evidence that he was ever there. He steals her engine or something so she can't leave... or was it her CD player... or maybe it's both, I forget, but that's stealing AND invasion of privacy!! And also, AGAINST HER WISHES, he pretty much imprisons her, forcing her to stay put like a child in time-out. And THIS is the guy that girls want as boyfriends?? What a creeper!!

Oh yes, and let's not forget Edward's suicide attempt. At this point, I don't even remember why he tries it, just that it's to do with "not having Bella."

So we're left with a girl risking her life so she can "see" her ex-boyfriend, a girl cheating on this guy AFTER HE COMMITS, a stalking, creepy boyfriend, and a suicide attempt because of failed love?? This isn't good!!

Not only that, but from an writer's standpoint, Stephenie Meyer FAILS in that she introduces interesting back stories for the characters... then never brings them up again!! Why write it in the first place?? It's the most interesting part of the series and you never mention them again??

And I don't care if it's bonding or anything like that. Jacob decides that the BABY is his soul mate at first sight. That's. Still. CREEPY.
 
G&DGirl, I'm sort of with you on the whole Twilight thing. I just simply didn't see the books as being all that romantic and I too thought the whole "imprinting" thing was just creepy. As was Edward's "stalking" of Bella. Probably some girls would find the hero's romantic "watching over" his lady as she sleeps dreamy...I just thought, "ummmm, NO."

As far as Meyer's convoluted explanations that the imprinting isn't a form of pedophilia, she doesn't quite make it work...at least not for me. Not when there are still plenty of fundamental Mormon's for whom the idea of marrying a very young girl to a much older man is considered OK. Perhaps it's a limitation of Meyer's writing that I wasn't willing enough to suspend disbelief in order for the plot trick to work.

In the end, if one doesn't take the books too seriously, the first two books were entertaining enough, but the last two fall very short in the execution of the plot twists the first two set up. In fact, it sort of reminds me a lot of Twin Peaks...a strong start of something quite out of the ordinary...but dwindles into a mish-mash of illogical conclusions and unresolved plots.

Meyers isn't the writer that Rawlings is, nor are the Twilight books going to be the classics that the Potter books will be in 50 years.
 
Meyers isn't the writer that Rawlings is, nor are the Twilight books going to be the classics that the Potter books will be in 50 years.

I do agree with this. Meyers is much more "fluff" and can't withstand the scrutiny of plot consistency. Maybe that's part of why I consider it more harmless, because as Handy says suspending disbelief is not so easy to do because of the lack of depth. That can be a failing of a first person narrative, although, as far as romances go, Maria Snyder's "Study" series works a lot better on plot development by first person narrative. But I doubt the type of Christian here would like that story since it involves a magical society pitted against a secular one.

Though I do think Dog+God is reading much more into Twilight than I read. The "cheating on Jacob" was a last-ditch ploy to prevent him from hari-kari into battle. But yeah, I'll buy the eyeroll at the "Can't Have Bella then... noble death!" angle.

I've never really bought the idea that unrequited love was worth dying over ala Romeo and Juliet or West Side Story. But it seems to be a popular theme.
 
I just feel like it's an insult to my intelligence. Where Rowling provided a solid, well written story, Meyer provides... I'm not sure I'm allowed to use the first word that came to my mind so I'll just say junk. It's like trying to enjoy The Garbage Pail Kids Movie or Bio-Dome. It's so BAD that it isn't entertaining, it's just insulting. I realize that's an opinion, but the Twilight craze makes me scared for the many boyfriends who are wonderful and yet aren't "beautiful" enough. And it pretty much says that a woman needs a man to survive. One of the many, MANY reasons I hate Bella.

And don't get me wrong, I love "bad" stuff if it's funny. Troll 2, a famous "bad" movie, was incredibly entertaining because I could suspend disbelief enough to enjoy the unintentional comedy in it. Actually, that's one reason I kind of enjoyed the movie of Twilight. It's just AWFUL and because of that, it's hilarious.

The book Twilight falls under the so bad it's... bad category.
 
I just realized that my last post was off topic, this isn't a review.

A friend of mine from FB put it best: "I don't see many children using wands and fighting off evil wizards, but I do see plenty of girls forming co-dependent, dysfunctional relationships with dangerous men."

And that's the impact Twilight has on kids. Dangerous.

And here's something gross: Edward is cold. He doesn't have body heat. He's DEAD. How is that attractive? It grosses me out, it's a step away from necrophilia.
 
LOL. I love the rant. And I can see what you mean on your points, even though I don't go as far in my reaction.

It *is* fluff, I will agree to that, but it's not the worst fluff I've read or seen, IMHO. You made me call up to my husband (who is tucking in the kids who are currently quite frightened because I just played "A Christmas Carol" with George C. Scott for them) and ask "what was that irredeemably horrid movie we watched the other day?" It was "2 Weeks Notice" with Sandra Bullock and Hugh Grant. Compared to that, Meyers had depth and exquisite character development!

I do think the movies were pretty bad compared to the books. As is often the case, you can't include the nuance when you do a film of a long book, and that book needed every bit of nuance it had. So I wasn't terribly impressed with the movies.

But I wasn't insulted reading it; it was within its genre and by those measures it entertained if you didn't try too hard to make things seem real. And as I say, I thought it was interesting watching how she had to be creative within the structure of the first person narrative - it's a tight confine to create such a foreign world.

Kinda like with Star Wars or Indiana Jones you can enjoy, it's fluff, but when you think about it the plot and the setting don't really hold together. (My son *JUST* realized that Han Solo and Indiana Jones are the same actor. "Wow, He got Oldâ„¢ for the Jones movies!" And that was the first one, LOL!)
 
I think the story would be okay if Edward had a personality and Bella wasn't so annoying.

Personally, I thought the romance between Buffy and Angel from Buffy the Vampire Slayer was a lot more interesting. Angel had a soul. Buffy was human and the Slayer so she had the job of slaying vampires. That created a lot of tension between the two that made me really interested to see how it ended up. It had a tragic sort of ending because they realized they could never be together no matter how badly they wanted to. That's how to write a human/vampire romance in my opinion. The characters were interesting and it left you wondering how it would end up.

If you like that kind of story, then fine. But I think it's pretty dangerous considering what it's driving its fans to do. Like date creepy older men.
 
And it pretty much says that a woman needs a man to survive.

On the other hand, can you even do Earth-Shattering Soul-Bonding True-Love-Foreverâ„¢ without that?

So far my kids aren't interested in that kind of storyline as a realistic look at something to acquire - no Princesses or Super Guys for them - they are more interested in genuine bonding, and would probably take these stories for what they are. Or maybe they'll just skip them, I dunno.

I try like mad to "pre-read" as much as I can, but I'm unable to keep up!
 
I've read all the books and watched the movies that have been released to date...probably won't watch the "Breaking Dawn" movie.

One thing I'll say is that the movies do play up to the "fluff" aspect and are funny, sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally...

:lol I cracked up at one scene where Jacob in wolf form was looking around on the side of a cliff...I honestly can't remember why...but my daughter pipes up with "Raggy?" (Scooby Doo reference). The dad cleaning the gun and snapping it shut when Edward drops by was also pretty funny too.

But, yes, G&D, I share your rant on the whole idea of "If-I-Can't-Have-My-Dangerous-True-Love-Life-Is-Not-Worth-Living" theme that is undercurrent in the whole series. But, as Rhea points out...it's sorta central to the whole :heartROMANCE:heart theme anyway...which is why I've never been all that big into romance.

I prefer my love stories to come with a bit more spunk and conflict between the main characters. Barbara Michaels (aka Elizabeth Peters) does it well, as does Georgette Heyer. Michaels/Peters protagonist Amelia Peabody is far more apt to bonk Emerson on the head with her parasol than she is to swoon into his arms or pine at his being away.

And yes, Bella is about as boring as they come...

As for vampires themselves...I'll always love Christopher Lee.
 
I think the story would be okay if Edward had a personality

That's what I meant about the limitations of the first person narrative. The writer has to work very hard to create his personality without any of his own thoughts or opinions except through dialogue. Though she certainly did better with Jacob than with Edward, but that may because Jacob had a family culture to enrich his character.

and Bella wasn't so annoying.

Well, she did love her dad. I liked that part. And she liked her old truck. (Is that all I can say on her behalf? Uh-oh!)
 
Yeah. If those two things are all you can say about Bella's positive traits... you've proven my point. :biggrin

Well Edward had no personality because by the time they got married, they still barely knew each other. If they loved each other enough to get married, don't you think that, through Bella, we'd know more about Edward? No, apparently not, we're just treated to creepy staring.

But if there's one thing I like about Twilight, it's how easy it is to make fun of it. Some of the fan art for the Anti-Twilight facebook pages are absolutely hilarious. And Dan Bergstein's Blogging Twilight series on Spark Life was highly enjoyable, pulling apart everything stupid about the series and making jokes about it that didn't seem forced. It sort of put the reader's perspective in there with a comedic twist. So I'm glad for Twilight because it's turned itself into some seriously funny comedy.
 
Yeah. If those two things are all you can say about Bella's positive traits... you've proven my point. :biggrin

I was kidding, mostly.

I just don't react to it as strongly as you do. I don't think it is stupid as you do. S'Okay, different strokes for different folks.

Well Edward had no personality because by the time they got married, they still barely knew each other.

I thought it was just a flaw in the writing... It's not that we know he's boring - we know he speaks several languages, knows a lot of science and plays quite a few instruments, for example - it's that the conversations are always about Bela, so we only know about him from tiny snippets. We know practically nothing. Not that he's dull, that he's unknown. I think Meyers could have had a lot of interest in making him more of a character than just a pretty boy. Even if she went further with the "he's just pretty because it's a predator feature" it could have been richer.


So I'm glad for Twilight because it's turned itself into some seriously funny comedy.

Many books can do that for us!
I don't find it quite so open to mocking - that much further than a lot of others. But I'm entertained by your obvious enjoyment of that, so - bonus all around. :)
 
This is why I like the anti-Twilight fan art:

65717_103570943043390_100001714535818_24839_4447327_n.jpg


I laugh every time. The only things more open to mocking are The Room, Troll 2, Plan Nine from Outer Space, and Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, to list a few. As for bad books, Twilight isn't the worst one I've ever read or even the worst written book I've ever read. The title of WORST BOOK EVER I SERIOUSLY HATE EVERY SECOND AND THIS BOOK IS EVIL EVIL EEEEEEEVVVVVVVIIIIIILLLLLL belongs to The Catcher in the Rye.
 
Hunh, well it's been more than 30 years since I read that, but it struck me as just a glimpse into a troubled teen boy's head. And not too terribly troubled, just confused and rudderless.

Lord of the Flies - very disturbing to me. The depths of meanness really made me uncomfortable. My brain would be a nicer place without that ever having visited there.

Alright, and "Left Behind" could only be used as toilet paper while reading Twilight. The writing was just painful!
 
Yeah I remember getting out of reading Lord of the Flies in HS. We were going to then we spent too much time on Frankenstein so we had to cut it out of the curriculum.

But Catcher... what a HORRIBLE, offensive, insulting, annoying, disgusting, and all around TERRIBLE excuse for a novel. I usually oppose burning books but if I could go back in time and burn JD Salinger's manuscripts, I'd do it.

So yeah, if you read that piece of literary SCUM and then read Twilight... Twilight will seem really REALLY good. Read Harry Potter after that and you'll be like "OMG THE AWESOMENESS IS OVERWHELMING!!!"

I guess the same effect would be gained from watching the Twilight movies after watching The Garbage Pail Kids Movie, which is, in my and MANY others' opinion, the worst movie ever made. Again, I'd burn the script.
 
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