Edward Cullen: A Thin Line Between Abusive Teenage Boyfriend and the Perfect Man

I heard your cries Shirley Tipsy and I have added a spoiler update to this post and will do the same to the future posts in this series. Thanks for the feedback!

[...] of the amusing blog How To Be A Customer.  If you missed her first post be sure to check out Edward Cullen: A Thin Line Between Abusive Teenage Boyfriend and the Perfect Man.  Again we want to warn you that there are spoilers in these posts so if you have not finished the [...]

[...] final post in this series.  If you didn’t catch the first two be sure to head over and read Edward Cullen: A Thin Line Between Abusive Teenage Boyfriend and the Perfect Man and Bella Swan: Human Heroine or Pathetic Wallowing [...]

I’m glad there are at least a few Twilighters out there that are trying to make some sort of a valid arguement against us Antis.

I don’t agree that Edward is simply over-protective. Context shouldn’t matter in such a situation. Stalking is still stalking. Not letting Bella make her own decisions is still being controlling.

It’s nice to see a valid response on the anti-side as well. Stalking is stalking, and acknowledged as such in Midnight Sun. However, all the ridiculous things we do when we’re in love can be seen as negative if the recipient is not interested. Bella was rather flattered by it. I can tell you of a number of my girlfriends who married or seriously dated the boys that “stalked” them…and of some who got restraining orders, it’s just a matter of perspective.

And I also acknowledged that Edward can be controlling, but that when he realized what he was doing, he backed off in every instance.

Lol, also it’s one of my favorite lines in Midnight Sun.

“Like a stalker. An obsessed stalker. An obsessed vampire stalker.”

Ah, Edward.

Hey there integellent Twilight fan!

The only other thing I have to say on the stalking: Bella was flattered. I don’t know, might just be me, but I am rather creeped out that she liked it. Oook Bella, you certainly don’t have any issues.

Hm, it does make it better that he backed off, but he still did those things. What did Bella do in that situation? I wouldn’t be happy if she instantly forgave him.

Interesting arguments! It’s nice to see a fan whose rebuttles are thought-out and don’t simply consist of defensive insults. I personally can’t stand Twilight, and I think Edward *is* abusive – because he doesn’t see Bella as an equal. He uses his strength and his belief in his own superiority to make her do what he wants, and whether or not he thinks that’s because it’s the ‘best’ thing for her, it remains a violation of her rights. And when he calmed down after whisking Bella away from James, it was only because Alice and Emmet made him calm down – he didn’t listen to a blessed word she said. I’m not saying there’s no valid reasons for his behavior. Bella’s a disaster waiting to happen. But that doesn’t mean he can completely circumvent her rights as an individual just because he has the ability to.

As for his lack of personality, I think one of the major problems I have with getting a handle on it is the fact that it’s a case of ‘tell’ and not ’show’. We’re told that Edward is kind, but he doesn’t *act* like a kind man. Heck, in Twilight he doesn’t act like much more than a sparkly statue who occasionally whisks Bella away and dazzles her with his striking good-looks. Granted, Midnight Sun gives some more insight to him, but isn’t it strange that Bella (who is in love with) doesn’t seem to have a similar insight? Whenever she thinks about him it is in remarkably superficial terms.

So, I respectfully disagree, but kudos to you for actually making a good argument.

Well, at least not all Twiligters are idiots. Are all the ones I talk to refuse to tell me why the books are so good. I’ve never even read the books, but by simply comparing arguements (Antis Vs. Twiligters) I ultimately decided to side with the antis. Enough about me. Your debate is impressive. I seriously hope this will inspire Twiligters to actually act smart. I hope you contuniue writing excellently!

Thank you for the kind words all.

@Bloofer Lady – She thinks to herself that she probably SHOULD be upset, but that she isn’t. Hell, I should be upset at a lot of things people in my life do, but if I was, I’d be one uptight mofo. I think it’s funny that people are all up in arms about the stalking thing, which saved Bella’s life I might add, and are a-okay with the fact that Edward IS a murderer. LOL. Stalking is much like sexual harassment – it is what it is, but there are different levels and it’s up to the recipient what is and is not acceptable. This life isn’t about black and white situations, and a book with the extreme fictional elements like this one – lines are even more blurred.

Bitowurd – I suppose the question would be, how is he mean? And I’d love to see you actually point out when he violated her will. Even when he wanted to whisk her away, she wasn’t opposed to the idea, she just wanted to make sure her father was safe first. And I don’t see how Alice and Emmett “made” him listen to her, but somehow Bella’s words meant nothing? After all, it was her plan they ended up going with. Okay, well, look at Eclipse, Edward was livid at Alice’s lack of vision when he finds out someone has been in Bella’s room but it’s BELLA’S reproach that makes him calm down and he immediately apologizes to both her and Alice. Context again people – if you want to see a monster, you can make a monster out of ANYONE. After all – we have all reacted poorly at some time in our lives, have we not? Stephenie Meyer’s has written that Edward’s fatal flaw is his over-protectiveness.

Please don’t misunderstand. I don’t want everyone to love these characters as much as I do. You don’t have to enjoy them. Just don’t…malign them needlessly, I guess. It’s a fictional world with circumstances you and I will never have to deal with. And Edward and Bella are NOT equals when it comes to strength…when they are, in Breaking Dawn, Edward treats Bella a LOT differently. He’s a LOT calmer.

@Brother Nade – read the books. Never listen to a word anyone says about what they think. If you dislike them – awesome, at least you’d be able to make that decision validly.

Incidentally, I asked my mother who is a essentially a doctor of psychology (essentially only because she has not yet defended her dissertation – which means she’s done all the work), and has read all four books what she thought of Edward as an abusive boyfriend.

She said, “If you look at any one element or situation of a person’s life you can label them as all sorts of things. Controlling behavior in extreme situations is normal – and an immortal being trying to protect a soft, breakable human from super-strong, virtually indestructible, mythical creatures seems to fall under the category of an extreme situation. If Edward was really a controlling asshole, he would have stopped her friendship with Mike (Hey, didn’t I say that?!) and would have never allowed Jacob near her. (I think I said that too!)

More often, she controls him. She doesn’t let him get her gifts as he wants to. She goes against what he wants when she goes to his family about becoming a vampire. She makes him apologize to Jacob in the tent. She pushes him further than his is comfortable when they’re kissing.”

I resent the implication that I see a monster in Edward because I want to. I have a soft-spot for redheads, I like pretty guys, and I’ve always been fond of vampires. When I read Twilight it was with the anticipation of enjoying it, not hating it.

Some actual instance of his defying her will, eh? Ok. I only have the first book on hand, but:

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asked, outraged. He was gripping a fistful of my jacket in one hand.

I was confused. “I’m going home.”

“Didn’t you hear me promise to take you safely home? Do you think I’m going to let you drive in your condition?” His voice was still indignant.

“What condition? And what about my truck?” I complained.

“I’ll have Alice drop it off after school.” He was towing me toward his car now, pulling me by my jacket. It was all I could do to keep from falling backward. He’d just drag me along anyway if I did.

- Page 103, Chapter Five of Twilight

There would probably be more if Bella actually had a spine, but most of the time she just does whatever he wants.

I apologize, I didn’t mean to offend you. I was more pointing out that if you take one small event, such as the one you quoted, and REALLY stare at it, you can blow it out of proportion. The moment you quoted is a lot more playful than menacing, and menacing is what ABUSIVE boyfriends are all about. Abusive and controlling are not light-hearted words, that’s all I’m saying.

I mean, look at it this way. If the above quoted passage is to be considered controlling…then I suppose his brothers “not letting” him bow out of his bachelor’s party is controlling? You see what I mean about blowing something out of proportion? It’s easy for any of us to do.

Yeah, but the thing is, since Edward is completely capable of forcing her into stuff against her will (quite easily) he’s got to be more aware of that than other people. My real problem isn’t that it doesn’t make sense, but that it isn’t addressed – which makes it seem like abusive behavior, because everyone is always excusing it and never confronting it with him. I think the story would be more interesting if faults like that were actually made to be issues, rather than being ignored or, conversely, simply taken out. Edward worries about hurting her – physically. But he’s never afraid that he might dominate her emotionally, or be too controlling.

But you’re right, you can blow anything out of proportion. I know that. Some people can’t read a story without seeing Mary-Sues and plotholes left and right, and that can get old after a while, I do acknowledge that. ^_^

That’s fair enough. Bella is rather besotted with the lad and doesn’t see his faults as easily. Edward, in my opinion, is hard enough on himself. The one time I do see him as controlling, when he stops her from seeing Jacob in Eclipse, he comes to the conclusion that he overreacted, apologizes and rescinds. Bella acknowledges and agrees that he’s made a mistake.

I suppose that’s enough for me because I don’t see abuse in his actions at all. Abuse is very simply too strong a word for me, because abusive boyfriends are menacing and damaging, and Edward is neither. In my opinion.

I’m happy to find that there are Twilight fans who can defend the book with intelligent and logical responses. It’s a refreshing change from the swearing and ad hominem that’s usually thrown at antis.

There was one thing that was pretty insulting right at the beginning of your essay:
“And then there are those haters out there whose hate of Twilight is irrational and just plain wrong. Seriously, reading through some of these gives me the impression that these people have watched one too many Dateline specials and are judging the characters of this wonderful series based on single actions, completely and totally disregarding the context of these actions. This gives me the impression that either they haven’t actually read the book or they totally misunderstood it – which is impressive given that it’s a relativly simple read”

I’m not sure if you meant it or not, but you say that antis are irrational and that the people who don’t like the book didn’t read it or misunderstood it.
I read all four books and I understood everything in them, besides the things that couldn’t be explained because of the plot holes. I judge Edward based on his actions because that is how he presents himself. The context doesn’t matter if the action is wrong.

As for Edward’s personality, we don’t get a very good idea of what that is from Bella. She more or less goes on and on about his looks and inserts vague terms about his kindnest and intelligence. All we know about Edward is that he likes to play the piano and stalk Bella. He constantly underestimates Bella and other humans, which leaves us to believe that he thinks that he’s better than they are. This is a man who supposedly knows more about the human mind then anyone else, but he has no knowledge of human behavior; it doesn’t make his look very smart.

There was something that I feel you might have misunderstood:

“He mentions briefly that in his human life he had been eager to turn 18 so he could fight in World War I. Though misguided, it takes a certain amount of valor, courage and want for justice to be a soldier.”
During World War 1, war was romanticized. They were told that they would go off to war and that they would come back heroes. It wasn’t about bravery or justice in WW1 because neither side really knew what they were fighting for. (sorry for the history rant, I just studied it recently)

Then we get to the abuse. Yes, it is abuse and no matter how you try to rationalize it, it will always stay abuse. Edward stalks Bella and though his reasons were not to catch sight of her changing, it was still a bit perverse. Stalking is a sign of obsession, usually it’s sexual obsession. There is no love in it. His controls her to keep her safe, that’s an argument you can probably here from many abusive spouses. Edward has decided that Bella cannot take care of herself and that he is the one that needs to do that for her. It doesn’t matter that she is human and he is a vampire, Bella had taken care of herself long before he was in the picture, but each time he rescues her she becomes more dependent on him. He becomes less controlling over her once he is more or less sure that she won’t run off with Jacob, not because he respects her.

And as for Edward letting up of the over-protectiveness once Bella becomes a vampire, that really doesn’t make sense. Edward should be protective of Bella reguardless of her species because that’s how his personality is shown.

You brought up quite a few good points, but most of them are just rationalizations of the very bad things that are glorified in Twilight.
Sorry for the amazingly long post. I just like to be thorough.

I can completely understand, though I don’t agree. I think we label right and wrong too quickly in this society, which again draws back to the whole Dateline issue. We all think we’re experts. Essentially, what it comes down to, is what is to one of us acceptable is not to others of us. If Bella doesn’t mind him “stalking” her, then I see no problem with it – this goes for all of my friends. Again, there are MANY things my friends put up with from their significant others that I never would, but there are many things I would put up with that they never would.

I certainly don’t agree with the fact that context doesn’t make something less wrong, but again, my world is very gray, where as many people’s opinions on this matter is more black and white. It’s just not how I see the world, and so I’m able to let things like that go and just ENJOY a book.

Your points about WWI are not incorrect – but also not unlike what I said. Regardless of whether he would have understood what he was fighting for – the willingness to fight for a belief, however naive, is courageous.

And as for my slight, there ARE some anti-twilighters who don’t understand the book, that is very clear, but that doesn’t mean that it’s everyone, and certainly not you. Your reasoning is intelligent, and while I think there are things you missed (which is only reasonable – you ARE going to miss things when you only read through a book once – I AM better qualified at this opinion because I HAVE read these books – studied them if you will – repeatedly), your opinions are logical and your own.

Oh, another thing about Edward – he does consider himself above humans – because he is. All vampires are. They are superior in strength and mind. We are their FOOD. The Cullens have a respect for human life – but that doesn’t mean that they don’t know where the humans are on the totem pole. On top of this Edward IS an arrogant know-it-all. I never said he was perfect.

However, he is also kind (and yes it’s possible to be kind AND arrogant), caring and over-protective. This you can get from Bella’s perspective, which is, admittedly, very, very biased. Edward is also compassionate – he does revere human life after all, and, for instance, he does make a concerted effort to save the newborn vampire Bree’s life in Eclipse. He gives credit where credit is due – for instance, genuinely liking Jacob despite the fact that, by all rights, he should hate the boy, and liking Seth – who he mentions has an unbelievably pure, kind mind. That says something about the level of his arrogance, in my opinion.

But no, I don’t think the lad is perfect by any means. I’m not one of those twilighters that dreams of him day and night and wishes he was real. Honestly, he’s TOO over protective for me, TOO gentle with Bella. I like a man who’s a little more of an asshole. LOL, though not too much. Give me Rhett Butler any day. He wasn’t afraid to hurt Scarlett’s feelings when she was being a bitch, but he loved her intensely.

I AM in love with Robert Pattinson though. It takes a certain kind of man to go on the Tonight Show, sit next to the likes of the GORGEOUS Heidi Klum and mention his bathing habits. LOL. Anyway, he’s delicious.

I will give you credit of the fact that you bothered to use proper grammar, unlike most obsessed fans at the moment. However, I’d like to make on thing clear. Stalking is stalking. Abuse is abuse. If anything, I feel a logical explanation would be that after all these years, Edward has found someone he can control and put dominance over, whether he actually knows it or not. Watching you in your sleep and reading your mind? Not cool. Removing the motor from your truck so you can’t see a friend? Uncalled for. I think most Twilight fans look at abuse as only physical. There is such a thing such as mental and control abuse, ‘ya know.

More on the subject of your actual essay, you don’t use any pieces from the story to defend your answers. You ask the reader, “Why did he do this?”, “Why did he do that?”, well, I don’t know. Would you like to explain it for me? Granted, I only skimmed through this, but you really need to use actual examples from the text and perhaps other evidence and material. Something this essay lacked indeed. If you can’t properly defend an argument, don’t write one. This is a 7th grade writing skill, not hard or complicated at all.

And lastly, there is no “propaganda”. Twilight anti’s simply are expressing their opinions. They have a right to do that. They don’t plan to destroy all things Twilight(though trust us, some of us relish the idea), but we are sick and tired of empty debates. Like I said above, you have good, valid points, now defend them like an argument writer should! If not, then you’ve wasted your time. No one but fans of the series will properly acknowledge this. I apologize, but it’s the simple truth.

@Renster Yes, I use proper grammar – unlike most people ANYWHERE on the web.

I find it vaguely amusing that you mention that you don’t see me point out examples in the novels to support my claims but you also say you only skimmed my article. I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and call it a difference in style. I’m not prone to taking direct sections of a novel and printing them verbatim. I refer, throughout all my posts, to parts of the novels assuming that anyone who’s gotten to this post has read them. After all, this is a blog post, not a thesis! (Though I’m 110% certain I could write an entire thesis paper on the subject) The length of the post was getting damn near unreadability in blog terms as it was.

That being said – let’s get on to the defense. First – I still find it rather humorous that anyone thinks Edward has control over Bella or dominates her. Certainly there are incidents, and we’ll get to those, but perhaps his biggest aggravation is that she doesn’t listen to him. Hardly ever. Examples? Twilight – all of it. Edward is quite convinced, through the first 2 books specifically, that he is the worst thing possible for Bella. How many times does he tell her to leave him, that she should run away, that she should not talk to him, that they shouldn’t even be friends? Now, how many times does she heed that very real warning of danger – 0.

New Moon – Edward is obviously dead set against Bella becoming a vampire at the end. Yes, despite the fact that he has her controlled and dominated, she goes to his family and gets them in on it. You understand the control that was taken away from him at that point, entirely. Up until that point it was his decision whether he would condemn her to life as a vampire. None of the others would have acted against him if Bella had chosen to go behind his back. When she goes to his family she gains Carlisle’s promise – against Edward’s wishes. He could have stopped this meeting from happening. He is strong enough. But he never would.

I’ll get back to Eclipse in a moment.

Now, I’m well aware that there is mental abuse and there is physical abuse. I’m going to sidetrack the argument on stalking is stalking – I don’t believe in black and white. Instead let me pose this question. If stalking is stalking, is murder, murder?

Edward is not human. As a vampire – his base reactions are different, far more instinctual, animal, than human. I bring this up because it is mentioned that Edward has killed humans before. Most all the Cullens have. Yet I don’t see it being brought up time and time again as this stalking issue has been. Why is that? It seems to me that if we’re going to worry about qualities you wouldn’t want in a human boyfriend, I’d start with the fact that I probably wouldn’t want a boyfriend whose main food source, naturally, is running through my veins.

When we read fiction, hopefully, we open our minds to a different world than the one we live in. Obviously, if one is able to accept the existence of vampires in our fictional world, and the fact that – despite the blood on his hands – Edward is a good-guy vampire, why on earth would we stop there?

While, in humans, stalking is unhealthy typically because the stalker seeks to gain sexual excitement (watching someone sleep and getting off the voyeurism) or because they seek to control (like the people who are so sure their significant other is going behind their back that they follow them everywhere). Edward’s motivations are no where near this.

Let us look at things from a vampire’s perspective, shall we? First there is the consideration of vampire devotion – very much stronger, and again more primal, than human devotion. Think about the tie just between family. Alice tells Bella that if Emmett and Jasper are there when Edward is killed, they will fight. There is no doubt in this – it is a base reaction. They would have fought though it would have meant their deaths. Certainly, humans can and have reacted in kind, but it is not primal – that is to say, instinctual; natural. In some ways, humans are much more rational than vampires in that light – or more subject to fears and the like, whichever way you want to look at it. Tanya and Katrina illustrate this quite memorably when they watch their sister be killed. If they had attacked the Volturi, it would have ignited a battle that would have ended most of the gathered vampire’s lives, but that did not matter in the instant they reacted; they could not think of such things.

That is family. Now, the bond between mated vampires is much, much stronger than even that. Edward describes this to Jacob in Eclipse. He tells him that when they become vampires, they become like living stone – frozen not only in body but also in personality. When change happens – as it happens when a vampire finds his or her mate – it is permanent. The title of Midnight Sun comes from Edward’s change. As he watches Bella sleep, and realizes that he loves her in this everlasting way, he describes his life as an unchanging Midnight. Suddenly, impossibly, the sun is rising in the middle of his midnight. It is this way for Carlisle and Esme, Emmett and Rosalie, Alice and Jasper…even James and Victoria. It is what prompts Victoria to obsessively come after Bella – going to desperate extremes to take Edward’s love from him.

Think about the power of this mindset, and then think of Edward. But Edward is unique in that the love of his existence is distractingly mortal. We are very, very breakable. This is what obsesses Edward about Bella. This is why he goes to extremes to protect her. And, probably least worrisome, this is why he is much more comfortable when he can see her safe. To me, it’s not the same mindset at all, and even if I did see the world in black and white – I would still see his actions as merely a part of his vampiric nature. Though, if it helps, he knows that what he’s doing is wrong. He is disgusted with himself the first time he goes to her room. But he’s also disgusted with himself for not being able to leave her alone in the first place – since he is putting her life at risk when he’s even in the same room with her. How strange that I don’t see this argument being made amongst the Anti-Twilight crowd, if we’re going to nit-pick something as utterly unimportant as his stalking.

Okay, so let’s get back to the controlling issue. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – if Edward was a controlling, abusive person, he would have prevented Bella from her friendship with Mike Newton too. Controlling, abusive boyfriends don’t limit their control and abuse to dangerous creatures that can kill their significant others. Edward hates Mike Newton (and the feeling is returned). Throughout the entire series, even up to their wedding, he knows the boy is interested in his girl, and it irritates him, to put it mildly. Yet Mike and Angela are really the only humans Bella knows that stick out as true friends. Edward never interferes in Bella’s relationship with Mike. Ever.

Now the Jacob issue. Remember, Edward lives in a mythical world, and in this mythical world, werewolves are his natural enemy. Not only this but werewolves ARE dangerous. This is strictly fact. We need not point further than Emily to verify that Edward is right to worry. I agree that Edward disabling her truck wasn’t cool – but he did do it PURELY with her safety in mind. Bella doesn’t exactly help him keep her safe from his world – he’s well aware of that. Is it an overreaction? Certainly.

You have to remember that Edward’s entire world was flipped and thrown into chaos when Bella entered his life. The series takes place over the course of LESS than 2 years. Even by human standards, a change in lifestyle is a challenge to get used to. Can you imagine what this must be like for an immortal?

Yes, Edward is prone to overreaction and panic, but he is reasonable and a quick learner. When he realizes that what he is doing is over the line, Edward backs off. He tells Bella that he will trust her judgment on whether Jake is safe, and he keeps to that for the rest of the series. Is he still jealous? Oh, monumentally so. But he doesn’t ever prevent her from seeing him after that. Like any GOOD fictional character – Edward is far from perfect. He makes mistakes, and he learns from them.

As a final point in fact, and I’ve said this before too, you can tell Edward’s intentions on the whole controlling issue by the way he acts when Bella is indestructible. He never overreacts after that. He never worries about it again. It isn’t difficult for him to let her go even when he knows she’s doing SOMETHING she’s purposefully keeping from him – as when she goes on her excursions to visit Jay in Breaking Dawn. Remember how he reacted to even the slightest of malicious intentions from any other immortal towards Bella – James in the field, Jane in Volterra? Much hissing ensued, to say the least. Yet when Kate shocks Bella in defense he only grimaces, and he’s downright cavalier about Jane’s attempted attacks in Breaking Dawn. Obviously – he doesn’t have to worry anymore (Bella muses that he’ll have to take up a new hobby in the beginning of Breaking Dawn, lol). It IS only fear for her safety that drove him to such extremes in the first place.

If you doubt it, answer me this – name one time Edward even attempted to control her when her life wasn’t in danger, whether in actuality or by perception (“Werewolves constitute a risk”).

As for the use of the word propaganda, it was merely an attempt at humor by exaggeration. Like most writers, I don’t argue to convince, merely to put another idea out there. And I certainly don’t write to be acknowledged.

And you thought I was kidding when I said I could write a thesis. Jeez.

Can you say ghey? Twilight is the verbal vomitus of chicks who never get dates on the weekend due to facial scarring and unrealistic stereotypes of what “men” should be. Do you really need to kill the vampires by making them effeminate stereotypes devoid of terror and repulsion? Why not emasculate mummies or werewolves. Leave them alone dang you!!!!!

@Herman I find it humorous that you ask do we really need to kill vampires by making them etc, etc, etc. Because my comment to you is, comments like yours are the verbal diarrhea of 12 year olds who wish girls thought they were cool and have an unrealistic stereotype of what “vampires” should be.

Open your mind a little sweetheart. If you want terror and monsters in your vampires – cool, there’s a WORLD of books for you. I happen to be one of those people who can accept my vampires with terror, as monsters – or as the gentle creatures like the Cullens, since Twilight isn’t about blood and guts, but it is a LOVE story.

I mean. give me a break, it’s a different genre. It’s like going to a romantic comedy and expecting to see Bruce Willis throwing a car at a helicopter.

Hmmm….so you just can’t have a romantic story(love story) that encompasses the usual boy meets girl, boy makes girl angry, boy and girl live happliy ever after set in the usual setting. No, you have to disembowel a classic monster theme(and by monster I mean gory, bloody, revolting) and turn it into barbieland replete with ken the vampire and barbie the anorexic golddigger.

Opening ones mind has nothing to do with twilight. Vampires that sparkle, OMG how feminine! When you remove the fangs and ghey up killing machines, it leaves one to wonder what’s next? Are werewolves going to become spineless decorative pieces? Are aliens going to have transitive feminine moments and wax on poetical about the female form and all it’s glories?

Have you insipid romantic stories set in the dull and mindless universe of the now and not defile a time honored monster that deserves a far more brutal depication(30 days of night anyone?)

Breaking genres? Come on! They don’t make romantic zombie films for a reason. It was never meant to be. It cannot be done well nor would anyone want to do it. Same with vampires. You can have you barbie dolls and we will have the vampires.

Lol, ironically enough, the werewolves are next. I can’t wait for New Moon!

Out of curiosity, you do know that ghey is not a real word, right?

Anyway, have fun with fiction. I find that putting fiction, particularly fictional characters, to a specific rubric in order to enjoy them is…well…boring. But I suppose that’s just my Barbie-girl mentality.

Oh, also, I am TOTALLY going to write a romantic zombie film one day. That’s a good challenge I think. Ah, dreams.

Anyway, if you ever see a romantic zombie film on the market, you can rest assured you inspired it. Thanks Herman!

Technically, ghey is a slang word but is officially recognized in most up to date slang dictionaries: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ghey. Please for the love of god do not effeminate zombies. Limp wristed vampires are bad enough, do we really need the undead to pursue literature degrees and fake english accents?

Fiction can be interesting if done well which the twilight retch is far afield from. Romance novels are a dime a dozen nowadays and throwing the vampire theme into it does little to separate them from any tawdry paperback pulp(never mind the homoerotic overtones).

Although it would be far more interesting if you just dumped the vampire aura and went straight into BDSM. What more says love than whips and chains? You would attract far more men to your cult of Adonis and it would translate better on the silver screen(just think underworld without the werewolves and only the female deathdealers in latex).

Twilight-ified werewolves? Lon Chaney will be turning in his grave. You should be thankful Bela Lugosi is not still alive as He would undoubtably kill everyone associated with both the book and the movie for the sake of dignity.

I love the idea of officially recognized slang.

As a lover and writer of fiction, I maintain the right to write and enjoy anything I want.

Look, as Agent Mulder says, there are many different types of vampires. (that’s a nod to all my X-Philes out there, rest assured Twilight is not the only addiction I have) Sure, if you want to limit yourself to the Bela Lugosi variety, you’re most welcome to. But Bela Lugosi wasn’t even the original vampire! I mean, you are aware that vampire myths exist across the globe – and they don’t all suck blood or hunt people?

I’ve read romance novels and the draw here is just simple fantasy. The difference between Twilight and most romance novels is that Twilight is much better written. Now, let me put in here that Twilight is NOT the most well written book in the world. It’s not deep OR complex. And it IS entirely fantasy – happily ever after etc, so I can see your point where it fills the normal romance novel gap. For me – just because it’s not deep doesn’t mean it’s not good…or enjoyable. Stephenie does a wonderful job with character development. I love Edward and Bella and all the Cullens….and okay, I even have a soft spot for Jacob.

And for the record – I’d probably enjoy your BDSM book as well. You see what eclectic taste can do for you? I mean, come on kid – just because I love Twilight doesn’t prevent me from loving “good” books.

Twilight, the movie, will NEVER make my top 25 films … but that doesn’t stop me from enjoying it (13 times and counting in theaters). Twilight the book series does make my top 10 books of all time though.

Oh, and by the way, the word ROMANCE does not automatically make characters effeminate.

Take Rhett Butler for example – jesus christ can we get more manly? Rhett is, hands down, the best leading romantic male in the history of film thus far. I love Edward Cullen, I adore the boy, but I’d take Rhett over Edward any day.

Rhett “Mr west hollywood” Butler manly? Sure in a “deep in the closet” fashion. That would explain why he picks women that are bound to reject him(more interested probably in the field hands).

There has yet to be in a romantic film, caricature, character that is not overly effeminate. GG Allen would never be considered romantic nor Fredrick Nietzsche yet they can be held without much effort as being “manly”(well Nietzsche’s words anyways, he was pretty frail in person).

It is wunderbar that you have range with regards to the cinematic and literary smut you choose to peruse. That hardly discounts the horrid nature of romantic novels, twilight in particular.

How is it possible to watch twilight 13 times and not suffer permanent brain damage? It is enough to make me want to vomit in my mouth the minute some says that emasculating title let alone suffer through actually watching the dreadful thing.

Granted even if I was woman, that would be the last film I would want to see. There are far better romantic slop n drop films out there(silk, wanted, the dark knight, cloverfield).

As for character development, I hope all the protagonists die in a huge fire. Surely that is something they can put in for all the boyfriends who were dragged semi-conscious into a totem castration fest. Oh and the main female lead seriously needs to gain 30 pounds or she will probably die soon if she isn’t already dead and they haven’t publicized it yet.

Surely, if you think any leading man in a romance is effeminate, I would question your security in your masculinity. A penis doesn’t prevent you from feeling love or being able to ENJOY a good romance. The owner of this blog is proof positive of that. Personally, I think anyone who considers any type of “softer” feeling as not manly is not a man. Definitely a turn-off, and I’m fairly certain that I’m not the only woman to think that.

I’m not entirely sure who this Fredrick Nietzche is that you speak of. Friedrich Nietzsche is one of my heroes and I think he’d make a wonderful leading man for a romance. I mean – who wouldn’t appreciate a man with a gift for words, a deep appreciation of the arts, and an abhorrence of the church? Also, I suspect that the beauty of his words probably sounded all the sweeter when whispered in the ear of his lovers. For instance:

“Love is not consolation. It is light. ”

My vagina doesn’t prevent me from enjoying the essence of “manly” cinema. Fight Club is one of my favorite films, top 5 point of fact. I’ve also been known to enjoy films like all the Die Hards. I can only feel sorry that your penis seems to inhibit you from enjoying a delicious story. I’m not even talking about Twilight, there are better romances out there. Take into consideration my favorite film of all time: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It’s brilliant, devious, and no-holds-barred honest about the nature of human love. AND, they quote our friend Nietzsche!

Twilight is an indulgence. It is a beautiful fantasy. I’ve seen the movie so many times because it is unbelievably wonderful to see things I’ve only imagined played out in front of my eyes. Plus, my goodness, can Robert Pattinson BE any hotter? Seriously.

I find it curious how you can judge a movie so thoroughly without having seen it. Doesn’t this seem unwise to you?

Lol – the Cullens can only be killed in a huge fire so I suppose your wish is … appropriate? And as for Kristen, I think the girl is beautiful, though skinny. Personally, if I was attracted to women, I’d want someone with a little more meat myself, but there’s nothing wrong with her. And I know for certain fact she’s not dead. She was just photographed a couple days ago! Lol.

PS – really? First of all… Cloverfield and Wanted – two of the crappiest movies well…EVER – should NEVER be in the same list as The Dark Knight (which is, perhaps, the closest to a perfect film as has ever existed). And none of them could be considered romances.

Hmmm…The Dark Knight being the closet to a perfect film as has ever existed? Have you seen films prior to 2008? I hardly doubt that would make even the top 100 of films released in the last 40 years or so(apocalypse now, taxi driver, the deer hunter, 2001 a space odyssey to name a few of films that would make that list). If you want to argue that it is the one of the better of the horrible films of this year only, maybe then but beyond that, I hardly doubt it.

Secondly, even in cloverfield(which was not a crappy film but I suppose if you are into sci-fi hating then that would be for you), there is the romance element(he goes back for the leading lady when the city is going to the dogs). The dark knight had batman and that old anorexic girl hinting at something that fizzes out when she gets blown to smithereens(granted that part was the best…where the heroine gets obliterated. That is something new and refreshing). Those elements should be the maximum amount of “tenderness” allowed in action films.

Huh..strange you bring genitalia into the mix although there is no mention in prior entries. Guess that is your thing. It is not so much that you like to watch male-centric films that entail violence and dismemberment (good for you :.>). Those films have their short-comings as well like a plot for the most part. The inherent problem is that there are so many stock romantic films out there, you could fill pretty much the entire universe with them.

This is not to say there are not actual romatic films out there that are not good(ok wanted sucked and was not a romantic film). Just there are so few of them that can appeal to a wide audience(for the life of me, I cannot think one..coincidence? I think not!). Twilight in particular does not broach that dearth whatsoever. Sure I have not seen the film nor really do I need to. It is so formulaic that it would be a waste of money to do so.

Nietzsche has had some interesting thoughts on romance and women in general and it is quite odd that he would be your hero all things considered. Of course you left out GG Allen since no one in their right mind would be able to pull anything romantic out of his rotting corpse.

Fight club for the record was not the greatest of all films. It was worth watching the first time but not all that great afterwords. A better film would have been cipher. Which didn’t make a lot of money but was a good film.

Fantasy is fine and all but when you delve into the realm of vampires, you have to tread a fine line to keep the legacy intact. Granted, you appear to want pansies with fangs who have GQ bodies and smell like perfume. Granted I am sure there is some sort of adult film out there that would fill that role for you.

Being effeminate as a man is pretty much a death knell to your intelligence. It really has nothing to do with the package(Believe me mine is intact). Most positive values of men are the exact opposite of that which is determined to be romantic. Since one most then kow-tow to the vagarious whims of the one deemed to be amorous.

If you want to release a book/movie that deals in fantasy then go knock yourself out and believe me there are plenty already(do elves, fairies, or something equally feckless). Just take care when you venture into territory that has been covered already quite well by movies/books that are dignified and revered.

And for the record, the girl in twilight needs to gain at least 40 pounds or so to be not be qualified as a concentration camp survivor. “I don’t want none unless you got buns hun” sir mix a lot.

And yes…eternal sunshine of the spotless mind was a good film. Not because it was a pseudo-romance film but because of it’s artistic direction. The main character would have been better without the leading female character and to think anything else would be absurd. Granted though Kate winslet is very attractive. The nature of human love is general misery and to portrait it any differently is a slight against reality!

I’ve read your post and all i have to say is that there is nothing original about these characters. Its like they took corey feldman and mixed him with a anne rice novel. Edward seems nothing short of a teenage boy with extreme narcissism. Even giving into the concept that he can read everyone’s mind (which has been done many times by many different tellers, the boy still yearns for what is not allowed to him. It seems to me that, rather than having respect for someone, he simple stalks – stares down – and generally acts creepy toward the female lead in the story.

Obviously that extra 100 years of existence didn’t do much for his maturity. Maybe if his father hadn’t held his ear to the stove he’d be more of an adult. Wait, that was corey feldman, not robert pattison, sorry. The two look so much alike.

Secondly, saying that a “vegetarian vampire” is a matter of character doesn’t provide any sort of insight as to how. I mean, Anne Rice pulled this trick off years ago in her novels, and Louis was still a emo kid in a sewer until he got his head out of his ass. It was like watching a sad episode of teenage mutant ninja turtles. “Oh, this bleak sewer reflects the bleakness of my black immortal heart! ohh tasty tasty master splinter!” Sorry, “Vegetarian” Vampires don’t really make me go “Wow, how considerate of others.” or “Oh my, such a nice blood sucker, he only goes after bambi and thumper!”.

I’m all for too each there own, but i’m not for recognizing something that is merely a dressed up harlequin novel as “Great Literature or Film”. When you have contenders like Say Anything, Better Off Dead(one of the funniest movies to have ever existed), High Fidelity, or even a classic like Casa Blanca. The love story here is shallow, and completely based off a snobby girl who finds some creepy stalker guy and develops a soft spot for him.

For real depth these two would definitely have to be more compassionate to others than oneself. They seem far too self absorbed and too oblivious to be realistic, even by an extreme stretch of imagination.

I agree with Herman Goering, that Frau Wafer Thin, needs to gain about 15 lbs, or she going to get carried off in a breeze and then they have to find some new anorexic girl to be the star of this series.

Oh, and one more thing, cloverfield was a good film, even though it was Half Life meets Godzilla. Wanted was good, and if you want to start criticizing others for their inability to suspend disbelief, even if it is a severe violation of the laws of physics and motion.

Also, one last thing, the whole pushing someone you love away to protect thing was done much better in film and written form in the Spider-Man series.

@Herr You make the assumption that I said Twilight was the best film/book ever. I think I said specifically that I didn’t think either. In fact, I did a search of my blog post to see where it is I said “great literature” and I came up with 0. Hmm.

Twilight is NOT great literature. It’s a romance. It’s a fantasy. It’s…fluff. Believe me, no one was more surprised than I was when this book swept me off my feet. But it has been a beautiful experience none the less. Twilight never claims to be anything but a romance. I usually hate romance novels because they are poorly written and ridiculous. Twilight’s characters intrigued me. The love between Edward and Bella is beautiful to me. Their fight to simply be together was a fun, sometimes heartbreaking, journey to take with them. This is more than I can say for most of the Harlequin novels I’ve read – and yes, I’ve read them, because I don’t believe in judging a book from its cover – or its reputation.

I mean – come on. Hate it if you will, I have no problem with that, but if you can’t see the difference between a typical romance novel and Twilight, I truly feel sorry for you.

No – I’ve never said Twilight is deep or profound, but it is a lovely and, to get cornier, heartwarming fantasy. It’s like the Star Wars of romances. Star Wars is crap. It’s all been done before and then some. There’s nothing DEEP about it, nothing profound. But it’s just so FUN, I can’t help but enjoy it.

Twilight is NOT a great film. I specifically said that there are many romances that are better. Lord only knows there are hundreds upon hundreds of movies that are better. And where you get off TELLING me why I disliked Wanted? I never said why I disliked it, I said it was horrible, and didn’t deserve to lick the crap off Joker’s boots. (Hint: It wasn’t because I couldn’t suspend disbelief – in fact, those stunts were, perhaps, the best part of the entire movie)

Look – the characters in Twilight, the book mind you, are very well developed, different and enjoyable. Your points about respect are not invalid – just a little silly in context. If Edward had respected Bella he would have left her alone – which would mean that there would be no story. In fact, if fictional characters did what they were supposed to do 100% of the time, there would be no fiction.

You are essentially knocking the series because you can’t get behind it. If you don’t like it – fine, cool. That doesn’t make your points valid.

Take, for instance, your point about being a vegetarian vampire not being a matter of character. Of course it’s been done before. There is no new concept under the sun. That doesn’t stop it from being a matter of character. The fact of the vampire world Stephenie has created is that these vampires EAT people. We are their food. We are cows by the wayside. Despite the fact that NATURE urges them to drink our blood and puts them in a place of superiority at the top of the food chain, the Cullens have a deep respect of human life. They consider human life precious, and they refrain. Has it been done in literature before, sure. Does that make it less of a matter of character – no.

It’s easy, when you don’t like something, to strip it down to its bare bones and say, well, it’s just a mixture of this and that, and all it is this crap character doing this with that crap character. Watch, let’s take Casa Blanca for instance, which I thought was a horribly boring and crap story.

Casa Blanca is all about a stuck-up bitch who can’t make up her mind and the emo , pathetic loser who can’t get off his ass and get over her already.

Is there more to their story? Well, of course. But there’s more to Edward and Bella then a creepy stalker guy and a snobby girl too. Does that mean you should like Twilight or I should like Casa Blanca.

Hell no – cuz personally, I refuse to like Casa Blanca.

High Fidelity was good though. Not up to the standards of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, but very good nonetheless. The book was even better.

Oh – and comparing Robert to Corey Feldman?! I mean… seriously, you need to check the ol’ eyes. I can’t find even one feature that they have similar.

@Herman The point was that I don’t think with my genitalia. That was a reaction to your seeming not to be able to enjoy a romance without thinking the leading man is effeminate and your, frankly, ridiculous attitude about what makes a man manly. It has been my experience that men who think this way are much more insecure about their manhood than they want to believe. You know – the types of boys who refused to go within 100 yards of Brokeback Mountain ( a very good film).

The Dark Knight is as close to perfection as I’ve seen, and believe me when I say calling me a movie buff would be putting it mildly. It has to do with a combination of factors – amazing acting, a deep, profound (and yes I’ve been using those words a lot in these responses, but they are simple and to the point for what I want to say) story line, killer action, incredible cinematography. I mean – action movies are like romance movies, they’re enjoyable but usually not…GREAT, epic, deserving of being on the top lists of anything. The Dark Knight is not only a comic book movie but an exploration of the very nature of good and evil. It ’s astounding. But arguing favorite films is pointless as there are no facts involved – only opinion. I didn’t like 2001 a Space Odyssey, though, Like Citizen Kane which I also disliked, I can certainly see its qualities. The rest of the movies you listed I must confess I haven’t gotten around to seeing, though they are all on my list. Rest assured, if any of them top the experience that was Dark Knight for me, then I will gladly rearrange my favorites list. I have to admit I haven’t ranked Dark Knight yet. I need to study it a bit more before I give it a place in my tops list.

For the record, the heroine getting obliterated is neither new nor refreshing. It’s been done. Not only that, but the character was not so much the heroine as she was the love interest. The love interest frequently gets destroyed. But repetition of theme, as I’ve stated numerous times, is only to be expected. All the “new” in the universe was done before the time of the Greeks. It’s a matter of presentation at this point.

As for films, Fight Club remains one of my favorite films of all time, not due to the violence (though the fight sequence with Edward Norton fighting himself in front of his boss was epic), but due to the message of the movie. The plot. “You are not your fucking khaki’s!” to say the least.

Cloverfield was horrible, I’m sorry. But again, here is opinion. Where on earth did you get the idea I’m a sci-fi hater? Quite the contrary in fact. Almost all of my other obsessions are in the sci-fi realm: Star Wars, The X-Files, Firefly. Sci-Fi can be wonderful – like any genre can be. See also Ray Bradbury and Orson Scott Card.

I’m curious as to this vampire “legacy” you speak about. Whose and WHY? Putting a limitation on fictional characters is mildly ridiculous to me, but calling any type of vampire traditional is down right laughable. You realize vampire myths have been prevalent throughout most cultures and societies? They don’t all drink blood. They aren’t all killed by sunlight.

You misunderstand the entire point of my argument. I don’t WANT anything. I don’t go into any fictional piece EXPECTING something. I find it abhorrent to think that, in order for me to like a character, they must be this, they must be that. People intrigue me. All facets of them. If they’re megalomaniacal assholes, I want to understand the depths of that emotion. I want to understand why a gentle person is gentle. I want to understand why you carry such a set in stone definition of fictional characters you enjoy (doesn’t that get boring?) and what a “man” should be. If we were all facsimiles of each other – what would be the point? You talk about positive values in a male, but whose values are you speaking about? Your own, certainly, but the world doesn’t exist by your standards – thank heaven for that. Again, by MY standards, your male values are, again frankly, disgusting. I don’t want a man like you.

I don’t want a man like Edward either. Obviously, I spend a lot of my time reading about a man like Edward. Again, I adore the boy, i adore the character, but I’m also spending a lot of time with the likes of you -dissecting your arguments etc. Why do you think that is? It’s somewhat fascinating to me. So please, think before you dictate my likes and my reasoning, I guarantee you that you don’t know.

I want to release many types of books and movies. Only one of them is a romance thusly. If I come up with a compelling enough plot to write your zombie romance, like I said, I will.

That is precisely why I love Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Above all things, I love films that are honest about life. Life ain’t always pretty, and love can be downright miserable. That’s what Eternal Sunshine shows – the misery of love…all culminating in that perfect point at the end when Kate’s character goes on a rant about this is how she is, and every bad thing he thought about her is completely true. What is Jim’s response. “Okay.” As in…yea, he knows that, he’s realistic, he still wants it. Isn’t that life? The essence of it, the beauty?

Here’s another dozy for you, Quills. Fantastic movie. Great acting…the essence of human darkness, in a delicious, titillating, clever format.

PS Nietzsche is one of my heroes because he was not afraid to think (a rarity) and he had an incredible gift for words. Again, I wouldn’t attempt to cast me in a mold. You don’t know me, and you don’t know my tastes.

As for GG Allen, I honestly have no idea who that is, so I wouldn’t presume to say whether or not I’d cast him in a romantic roll.

PPS – Stephenie’s vampire don’t have fangs. And Edward doesn’t smell like any perfume known to man (or Bella anyway), he smells better.

PPSS – there are so many stock -anything films out there. I mean, for every one GREAT or even GOOD movie there are at least 5,000 entirely crappy ones. And I’m probably underestimating.

PPPSS – I’m about to go see Twilight for the 14th time. I just thought I’d mention it. Okay, I’m done with the PS’ing, lol

First of all “Star Wars is crap”..sure that is why there are 6 of them(7 if you count the animated clone movie), people line up on the sidewalk days in advance to see a new one, and why it is probably one of the top grossing sci-fi franchises of all time. You will watch twilight 14 times yet dismiss star wars as meriting the greatness it deserves?

Granted if you don’t like star wars then you probably will not like cloverfield or any other monster/space opera sci-fi film since it relies more on special effects than on shallow characters ripped from trashy novels.

It is interesting that you must equate having a feminine side with being a true “man” and any lack thereof as indication of not being one. Any human being has a wide range of emotion and it is not to say that a man or men in general must be devoid of this because it would simply be hard to be without(with the exception of persons trained to be stoic such as marines or navy seals).

However in life one need not be overly feminine nor be condemned to emote on command as you would or would like men to do at ever an sickening frequency or so it seems. Also in fiction, men should not have to be trapped in an unrealistic fashion whereby they must seem overly feminine if in real life they completely are the opposite(or at least men who have not been castrated..literally or psychologically).

Sure it is fun to live in a Oprah dream world where men have been emasculated and look pretty while fixing things yet exude homoeroticism. Granted this can be found in plenty of adult themed entertainment and does not need to pollute the screens of the local cineplex.

Quills? That was a good movie since it had the Marquis De Sade in it(or his characterization anyways). Granted if he were alive, he would have burned the master copy for Twlight and remade it into a Gothic oriented S+M flick devoid of the vampire theme and strickly pale females(who are not anorexic since he would have eighteenth century standards and they liked em big and healthy back then) being whipped and you fill in the rest with your imagination.

The vampire legacy twilight is debasing started with nosferatu, and bela lugosi’s dracula. It continued in the sixties and seventies with the hammer vampire films. Recently if can been seen in films such as 30 days of night. These films established vampires as monsters not as pathetic romance caricatures for tween-age females.

Reality is far afield from any romance novel including twilight. Sure he can be abusive but then again he still is a GQ model as opposed to an overweight, balding bastard-breeder as He would be in real-life. And of course they are not living out of a trailer which serves as a meth lab as well as a procreation factory situated neatly in a white trash cove of Americana.

If they made romance films like that, then I would have nothing to complain about. Hell I might actually go see one if if they were not so bloody predictable both in setting and in character.

As for GG Allen, he was a pioneer of punk and covered himself in blood and feces during his performances. Interesting guy….http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GG_Allen.

Sure, you want to believe in the cinderella-esque fairy tale whereby the powerful and/or rich prince escorts the not so rich or attractive princess to a life of leisure and content living as a royal or neu-aristocrat(granted this may be implied in twilight as happily ever after or something close to it). And you there will be plenty of addled and deluded females who will buy tickets with you to see renditions of centuries old smut on silver screens and in print.

Seriously, even films I like(jesus christ vampire hunter, blood car, battle royale), I cannot watch more than 4 times in a row. Watching something 14 times has got to be boring since you already know what is going to happen and it is not like a p*rno where you watch it for other reasons..:.>(granted twilight is an emotive p*rno for downtrodden tween-agers but still).

I don’t expect things when watching a movie or reading a piece of fiction. It would actually be nice if they were not so predictable and went in an entirely different direction(protagonists get killed in the first 5 minutes, serial killer saves the day, romance film turns into a full on bacchanalia, etc).

Granted if twilight is not so great(the film), why defend it with such vigor? Why not chuck it on the used pile with the other burlesque novels and call it a day? You try to differentiate it from the books in the same genre yet more and more it seems to be so similar albeit dressed up to be more realistic or ugly even though this falls far short of being worthy of any literary merit.

Yes, corey feldman and the male lead of twilight are very similiar. They are both pale, whiny, and cherished by tween-age females for god know’s what reason(money?).

“Again, by MY standards, your male values are, again frankly, disgusting. I don’t want a man like you.” That makes me sooo sad. To think I was hoping for so much more and you have dash my hopes. A sad day indeed. :.<

Did you not read the part about how much I love Star Wars? First of all – a movie meriting sequels doesn’t mean it’s greatness, it means it’s popular. Otherwise there wouldn’t be a Jaws 47, and let’s not even talk about Star Trek. /shudder. But, if in your mind the existence of multiple Star Wars movies and the reaction to it is equivalent to greatness, I’d have to say Twilight is well on its way. I was one of the thousands waiting for Twilight’s midnight showing. We’re getting at least 2 other movies, and really, have you seen the books dominating the best seller lists? Money and popularity does little to impress me in terms of quality. Star Wars was poorly written, poorly directed and poorly acted (except for The Empire Strikes Back). Did that make it less enjoyable – of course not! I’ve seen each of the 6 movies much more than 14 times. But they are what they are, and they are not GREAT. Star Wars is one of my many obsessions though. I even own almost every single one of the intensely crappy books.

I never said anything about a feminine side making a “true” man. Your penis tells me you are a man. Now what value that has on you as a human being, to me, is slim to none.

I’m going to take this rather ludicrous opinion that I love overly feminine men to mean that you think Edward is in some way overly feminine. Perhaps you’d care to explain that to me? I don’t see his character as feminine in the slightest. Examples if you please – and this should be interesting as I gather from your rants you have not read the books or seen the movie. Where are you getting your opinions?

Living in any world associated with Oprah would be more likened to hell than heaven. You seem to be stuck on sex. You realize, and believe me I love sex as much as the next person if not more, that Twilight isn’t ABOUT sex or even sexiness. The Marquis De Sade would have hated Twilight, I’m sure, but he was a man of very elicit, and wonderfully so, taste.

Vampire legend STARTING with Nosferatu? Oh honey. That’s a bit naive. Vampire legends are much, much, much, much, much older than Nosferatu. You can’t debase fictional characters. They’re fictional, and by definition subject to the creator’s ministrations. Give me a break. If you don’t want to read about a vampire who is capable of not only monstrosity but also of love then don’t. It doesn’t make it any less valid a form of art.

No one is saying romance is realistic. It is utterly unrealistic and the reason why, apart from Eternal Sunshine, I sincerely doubt that any romance film would ever make my tops list. Have you ever heard of escapism? It’s good stuff on occasion to just escape the REALITY of life. You feel free to go see your monster-type vampires (unless you’re going to tell me that those vampires are true to real life) and I’m going to feel free to enjoy Twilight for the 15th time this Friday. What’s the difference? It’s all a matter of preference…and for the record, monster movies are intensely predictable. If that predictability doesn’t deter YOU from enjoying Bela Lugosi then why would you look down on me for enjoying the occasional fluffy romance?

I’m going to make the Star Wars comment again because the same thinking process applies. Is Star Wars not a fairy tale? It always seemed that way to me. And yet no less enjoyable for that fact. So it is with Twilight. Happily ever after fluff piece? Sure, but enjoyable. As a well rounded person, I can enjoy both movies and books and still enjoy the more nitty-gritty, realistic, sad, dark aspects of fiction as well.

Again with the sex, why does EVERYTHING relate back to sex with you? I find Twilight to be very sensual and that’s a pleasant, tingly feeling, but that’s not what does it for me.

Wasn’t there ever a story you just couldn’t hear often enough? I don’t know – usually seeing something that many times in such a short period WOULD bore me. Honestly, the previews before the movie bore me to tears, but the movie itself never does. How does one explain this? It’s just enjoyable. Think about your favorite food. It tastes the same every time, but is it less enjoyable because you know how it will taste? So far it isn’t remotely boring. I’ll stop, I’m sure, when it becomes boring, but I haven’t reached that point yet.

You say you don’t expect things, but you have a really, really exact rubric as to what types of characters are acceptable for you…so is that not an expectation? To only be able to enjoy certain characters in fiction? It’s not that I don’t agree with you. I’d love to see a protagonist killed right off. Of course, you realize the fallacy here…if you kill someone off before you get to know him or her you lose the impact of the death.

I can turn your question around. If you hate it so much, why spend this much time knocking it down? I mean, I don’t go onto boards searching out all the movies, books, etc I find crappy and ranting on and on about how bad they are. I find that if a book or movie is not worth my time…then it is quite literally not worth my time!

As an avid reader and movie buff, I find that a book or movie causing an intense reaction in me is extremely rare. Understand that the movie Twilight could never hold a candle to the book. What happened to me when I read the book was nothing I’d ever felt before – and I read around 10 books a month, have since I was small. What happened to me was PHYSICAL in the extreme. I laughed, I cried, I screamed. It was amazing. As a person who wants to be a writer and as a person who wants to understand herself, I’ve been over and over this book trying to figure out why I love it – and why other people love it. The secondary part of that is understanding why people hate it.

Lol, I can’t speak for the tweens, but I love Robert Pattinson.I mean, I adore that boy. The reason has nothing to do with money or looks. Rob is gorgeous, to be certain, but I fell in love with him when I listened to him talk. He’s humble, he’s funny, he’s utterly honest and transparent. And he’s intensely talented. Not even just in his acting, which was fantastic, but also, he wrote the music for, played the guitar and sang 2 songs during the film. Do you know how sexy that is?

The point in my telling you that by my standards you are sub par was not for you to feel crushed. I mean, Christ, I don’t have that big of an ego hon! The point was your version of what makes a man is not FACT, so putting those judgments on other people’s creations, and not being able to enjoy those creations because they are not YOUR ideal, is just plain ridiculous.

GG Allin seems like an interesting fellow. Not a lot said about his personal life though. To each their own. Just as some people find a scaring flogging romantic, I’m sure some people find a little sexy bloodletting the essence of romance too.

For the record, I’m 26. I was never attracted to, liked, or even thought twice about that Feldmen kid. Of course, this whole celebrity adoration thing is new to me. Yet another first Twilight has opened me up to. I’ve never utterly adored a celebrity the way I adore Rob. But then again, my adoration of the lad has almost nothing to do with Twilight.

In addition – he isn’t rich. LOL. Twilight was an independent film. He might be rich after New Moon though.

First and foremost, Star Wars is not Science Fiction by definition. It is a space opera as much as Flash Gordon is. Secondly, the only thing about Firefly that makes it Sci-Fi is that it is set in space, other than that its a spaghetti western, and is pretty typical plot line of smallish frame, frail looking girl being super weapon that Joss Weddon has thrown into his shows in the past, don’t believe me? Look at Willow in Buffy. Its just repeated stories with a male lead instead of a female lead, set in space instead of the valley. Nice job remaking a series you wrote Joss, no wonder it didn’t make it past the first season.

Looking at your other tastes, and calling them Sci-Fi. X-files is Sci-Fi, i’ll give you that right off the bat, but the rest.. Lets be real here. Not sci-fi.

Secondly, in regards to Cloverfield, I really do feel sorry for you that your imagination is so limited to accepting that a beast taller than two humans is okay on Tantooine but not in New York, or Tokyo. Thats really sad if you can accept it in one scenario, albeit a fictional setting, but not one that is a mirror of our own world.

Additionally, the whole Rob Pattinson craze – yeah, feldman 2.0. Just wait for him to start chasing the dragon and I’m sure he will fall down the same slipper slope into obscurity. I also hope you are aware to the fact that most actors and screen writers receive royalties (It was a big topic during last years SWG strike, especially royalties on DVD’s hence why I only got like.. half an episode of scrubs last season.) So yeah, Rob will be rolling around in piles of money the size of the aforementioned cloverfield monster.

Oh and Rhett Butler, classic story – Guy Chases girl and finds that once he has girl that she was not what he had built her up to be. Regardless of how much of a classic southern gentleman he is, the story is still about a whore(and yes a woman who plays a man for money is as much a whore as a prostitute on the street) and a man who falls for her, only to find that she’s still a whore and he doesn’t want her and she just wanted his money. Sounds a bit like a dishonest version of Pretty Woman if you ask me. Too bad it wasn’t Rock Hudson playing Rhett Butler, then at least Scarlett wouldn’t be getting any and she’d have a reason to sleep with half of the workers on her plantation. Rhett Butler is just a damned fool and only some man hater would think he’s ideal for manliness.

Well The first Star Wars was a modestly(see no budget) produced film. You can say the sets and costumes were cheap(they were). It however had a decent script(sure it borrowed from everything before it and it was a space opera) and the acting wasn’t all that bad. The main fact was that it was first of a resurgence in sci-fi films that expanded special effects and CGI to what we now see.

There wasn’t much special effects laden sci-fi before(to the degree of star wars anyways). After it, every memorable sci-fi film emerged(alien, blade runner, etc) that has increased special effects and CGI. Granted this may not be important to you since you don’t seem to really appreciate the sci-fi genre(firefly is not a sci-fi film, it is a western set in space, the space element is just a cheap gimmick) but for those of us who appreciate the genre, it was a godsend and thus it is memorable moment in film history that no ghey arse romance film can ever tarnish.

True as I have said before I have not seen the film nor have I read the book. I would imagine you would think this would prevent me from having an opinion(then again you would not be able to comment on much of anything except that which you know of personally which would be a rather small amount in the huge universe of information we inhabit).

Well from a man’s perspective, the world is intertwined one way or another with sex. Whether this is imagined or perceived, it exudes from every orifice(no pun intended) and corner of the world. To think that it does not(or does not motivate a person’s behavior..just type in 3 way in google and you will see what I mean with regards to hits) is rather silly.

Most romance novels skirt with the idea of carnality or at least implicitly in one form or another(and since twilight seems to follow them letter by letter, I would bet that is the case). Sure undying love and devotion are usually the main themes but if you dig deep enough(again no pun intended) you will find some hint of salacious goings-on with the characters.

By Vampire traditions, I was referring to them in the movies. Sure there are a thousand different oral and written variations of vampires or vampire-ish creatures. However I was referring to them in the movies not elsewhere.

To the contrary, I do not expect a certain format to a film. Granted if someone threw feces at other people for 2 hours it might be a bit boring(but then again it would be a new concept). In a film, you would expect with the money they spend to have at least a inkling of a script and some fleshed out characters or some sort of cohesion in events. Most movies fail at this miserably regardless of the genre(same with other media).

If you mean by intense reaction vomiting blood then I guess that would qualify as my reaction. it is great that you had a or*asmic experience with the book. God know’s that would benefit most women greatly if they experienced the same thing doing something more mundane like cleaning or doing errands.

You should then try to marry Robert Pattinson. Just for god’s sake please do not reproduce. The world does not need anymore horrible actors, we already have enough. Great He can twang on the geetar and write fluff in d minor. I doubt he would hold any sway as someone who is truly multi-talented such as jack black or robert rodriguez.

Well my version of man is actually part of wider hoministic tradition that can be found in a multitude of books by many leading western authors. I would hardly call it my own(well I have my own version of it but the main ideas of masculinity are very common even in your friend Nietzsche’s works).

Corey feldman and Robert Pattinson are very similar in that they have little to no talent and their fame rests on their boyish looks(corey feldman also could play guitar and also wrote songs..coincidence? nope). He will be a flash in the pan unless he can diversify himself out of the teeny booper romance role or he will be doomed to be part of it until his career dies(just like mathew mcconahey).

Granted your limp-wristed vampire flicks will undoubtedly do well since there are always fatuous drones of females ready to shell out cash to make believe they are(cinderella, sleeping beauty, barbie, just put your stick thin white female stereotype here). Persons such as myself can always hope for everyone in the film to die and maybe if it is a good year they will in a horrible car crash(well I can always dream since that is cheap escapism, right?).

Speaking of Escapism, Isn’t what the movies are for? To escape? Locking yourself in this predesigned perception of what is and is not acceptable is pretty pathetic. “Oh the Rancor is so cool!” but the moment some half life type monster comes crawling out of the new york sea board its “What the fuck is this nonsense bullshit?”. If you really accept that a giant space worm lives in an asteroid with zero enviroment but can’t accept a sea monster destroying new york as something believable then I think you need to stop and take another look at it and let the suspension of disbelief do its work.

If you think that, just because its set in modern civilization, that we can’t have mythologies and frightening tales of our own that don’t revolve around mass murdering, child molesting clowns or some saucer floating in the sky with giant beam cannon that decimates capitals and major population centers. Give fiction some room to breathe.

You two are too much, sincerely. I get the feeling that my novel length responses are all for naught since you’re clearly writing your own versions and ascribing my name to them. I have no problem with accepting the Cloverfield monster. For heavens sakes, I never said one way or another why I think Cloverfield is crap. Hint: It’s not the concept. If you haven’t noticed, I have no problems with concepts. Acting, writing, directing – these are things I have a problem with when it comes to movies.

I’m well aware of how movies work. Yes, in some cases actors do get a percentage of the profits. This is was not the case for Twilight. The boy isn’t rich…yet. When he gets his salary for New Moon he will be. 10 million baby! And worth every red cent.

Just because other people have acted, sung and composed songs doesn’t give a basis for comparison. Corey Feldman was not a good actor… Rob Pattinson is. He’s already breaking out from his role. Look up Little Ashes, but then again, you probably won’t give it a chance because it’s a movie about Salvadore Dali’s boyfriend. I think both of the leads have fantastic things in front of them, but time shall tell.

Star Wars, as a film, making huge strides for not only the genre of science fiction (and I agree, Star Wars is NOT science fiction) and film itself is irrelevant to the quality of the material. Harrison Ford was known to say to George Lucas during this film, “You can write this shit George, but you sure can’t say it!” because the dialog was so ridiculous. Like I said – for a nice space opera fantasy, it works. Obviously. But, just like Twilight will never make my tops list, neither will Star Wars, despite the fact that I will probably NEVER see the movies on my tops lists as much as I’ve seen either series.

@Herr – You’ve said that my tastes were not sci-fi, and I’ll give you Star Wars and Firefly. But you forgot that I also enjoy Ray Bradbury and Orson Scott Card. I challenge you to call them non-sci-fi. No, I’m not a mega-sci-fi fan, I am a major LITERATURE fan. I love all genres and can find examples in each genre that I adore. How could I have forgotten about Douglas Adams? The man is brilliant.

And again, if you boil down any film, book or the like to the bare bones basics it’s ALWAYS going to sound ridiculous. Congratulations – you’ve resorted to a tactic used by naysayers for … oh, well, forever.

@Herman – uh, I tend not to give opinions about things I have not seen because that concept is faintly idiotic to me. Yea, there’s a whole wide world out there that I know nothing about – how can I have an opinion on something I don’t know? Sure, you can HAVE an opinion… but based off what? It just makes you come off as ignorant – which is, by definition , the case. There’s no shame in ignorance, but I don’t like coming off as such. That’s my perspective though.

The fact that your version of a man is shared by other people is irrelevant to my point. My point was that we have differing tastes and opinions as to people. I’ll go ahead and make Edward an example again. If Edward were to pop up here in front of me making romantic overtures, I’d turn him down. He is NOT my ideal of a man. But that doesn’t mean that I can’t enjoy his character. After all – he’s dating Bella, not me! I’m pretty sure I’d enjoy YOUR ideal of a man, in fiction, without wanting that man for myself. I suppose my mind is just that open.

And just because Rob and I would make cute babies, doesn’t mean they’d be actors anyway.

PS – Scrubs and House are the only television shows I watch currently. Brilliant!

Oh and one more thing i agree with Herman on.

Why waste the money seeing twilight umpteen times when there are much better films out there, most notably (as i haven’t seen Benjamin Button or Gran Torino yet) Milk, which was viciously robbed at the golden globes.

It makes me smile. It makes me happy. The better question is why NOT spend money on something that makes you happy? Sure, there are better films out there – but just because they’re better doesn’t mean they’ll make me leave the theater with a huge grin on my face. I’m pretty damn sure none of the films you mention would have that affect.

Besides, in the time I’ve seen Twilight 14 times, I’ve seen a few other movies. I’m not neglecting my movie going, I’m adding to it. I never used to go to the movies during the week. Most of my Twilight viewing has been on days that I didn’t normally go to the theater.

@Herman:

While I’m all for the idea that vampires. Don’t. Sparkle! … I really can’t condone using the word “ghey” as an insult, or to imply effeminate behaviour. It’s homophobic language, no two ways.

@Kristina:

Oh, how rare it is to find a fluent pro-Twilight essay. I despair quite a lot. I’m not here to bash, nor to attempt to convert (I eventually decided that escapism is escapism, and some people just don’t feel like investing in a really deep construction).

But I do find a contradiction in the idea that Edward is both “more animalistic” and at the same time superior to humans. Rather like Magneto’s idea of mutants, eh? I guess I’ve just been overexposed to superheroes (and to Terry Pratchett’s vampires as well, thank heavens!), but I find Edward Cullen very amoral, and while that’s fine as a character, it doesn’t work when Meyer’s emphasis that he’s some kind of generally perfect guy clashes with this picture. – And Bella’s fangirlling doesn’t do much for her characterisation either Twilight is, I suppose, a little over-influenced by Meyer’s Mormon beliefs for a jaded reader like me.

Nonetheless, your essay was quite interesting – especially since there’s a dearth of grammatical commentaries on your side of the schism! Thanks for an enjoyable ten minutes.

@ Beka Again, I’m going to emphasize that most people on the Internet can’t spell and think that grammar is just another word for grandma! It has nothing to do with the quality of the Twilighter. HEHE. That being said, I thank you.

I do have one qualm with your response though. You seem to imply that loving Twilight leaves one lacking for actual DEEP characters. I’ve said multiple times – Edward, Bella and Twilight in general are not deep. It doesn’t mean that I don’t have an appreciation for the more intellectually stimulating books. I love Terry Pratchett. I count Douglas Adams, Chuck Palahniuk, and Kurt Vonnegut among my favorite authors.

It should be noted that Stephenie is NOT the one that calls Edward perfect, his fans are. Stephenie, after all, wrote a character that is flawed. He is a know-it-all, he is arrogant, he is over-protective. That being noted – he’s also kind, polite, and extraordinarily tender and unbearably sexy (jesus christ, Twilight was so sensual I could hardly SEE straight). Who could blame the legions for falling in love with him? Personally, and I’ve said it before, had I the choice, I would not choose him, but I can understand how others would.

Additionally, there is no contradiction in Edward being more animalistic and at the same time superior to humans. He is more prone to his a nature than a human would be, humans having domesticated themselves. Vampires never had a need to domesticate themselves. Think about it. Their food source is plentiful and even without it – they can survive. They don’t need shelter. They don’t need water. They don’t get sick. You see my point? At the same time – they are smarter, faster and stronger than the humans. Can they enslave the human race? Most certainly, but as Stephenie says, “Who would want to be the king of cows?”

In that mindset, it makes the Cullens all the more impressive to me. After all – nature is compelling them, every day, to eat the very people they associate with. Especially since it IS such an animalistic thing, it’s impressive to me that they chose to suppress it. It makes them interesting characters. Not deep but certainly intriguing. And I can see Bella’s fascination in that fact. “The vampire that tried to be good, who ran around saving lives so he wasn’t a monster.”

Actually, as an agnostic, I shudder away from most any kind of religious overtones. I have to say, I couldn’t find many in Twilight. Sure, there is the conversation about souls and Edward’s insistence that they get married before he’ll try the sex thing – but that comes off as 1) more of his over-protective side (he’s been trying to protect her soul for the last three books at that point), 2) Part of his upbringing (the morals of the early 1900’s) and 3) Somewhat natural, to me anyway. Edward’’s beliefs are not unlike my own – I struggle with the idea that there’s nothing – it doesn’t seem right, but I don’t find that any religion feels right either.

And as far as overexposure to superheroes – well, that’s the idea I’ve been rallying against in the first place. I really don’t see the point in coming into any fictional work with an idea in your head about what you want the characters to be. It seems closed minded to me. I enjoy all sorts of characters – and I never hold it against a character that he or she or it is unlike any other character I’ve read and enjoyed.

Now – I’ve said before and I’ll say it again – I certainly don’t make these arguments to convince. You either enjoy a book or you don’t, and I can understand how Bella’s infatuation with the lad can be off-putting to a reader. Mostly I argue because the Twilight Nay-Sayers, for the most part, tend to give the book guidelines and criticisms it, frankly, doesn’t deserve.

[...] beli­eve me, tak­e a lo­o­k­ at s­o­me o­f the arg­um­ent­s ou­t there on the web a­bou­t the cha­ra­cter of­ Edwa­rd in [...]

[...] b­elieve me, t­ake a lo­o­k at­ so­me o­f t­h­e arg­u­m­e­nts out th­e­re­ on­­ th­e­ we­b­ ab­out [...]

i LOVE twilight:D

[...] Debunking the Anti-Twilight Propaganda Part I: Edward Cullen – A Thin Line Between Abusive Teenage Boyfriend and the Perfect Man Debunking the Anti-Twilight Propaganda Part II: Bella Swan – Human Heroine or Pathetic Wallowing Weakling? Debunking the Anti-Twilight Propaganda Part III: And So The Lion Fell In Love With The Lamb… [...]

first off, I would like to say that I am more on the side of Edward as abusive, but after reading your article, I do agree that maybe he’s not as abusive as I once thought. Abusive might be too strong of a word, but they do share a rather unhealthy relationship with Edward making too many decisions for Bella than necessary.

Second, I just want to say its really interesting to see both sides of view and its really cool when you actually get people commenting who pose insightful and intellectual commentary rather than the preteen defensive insult “Stop hating on Edward b/c you’re jealous” or some other such nonsense.

Now on January 1st, you said (quote) “It IS only fear for her safety that drove him to such extremes in the first place.

If you doubt it, answer me this – name one time Edward even attempted to control her when her life wasn’t in danger, whether in actuality or by perception (”Werewolves constitute a risk”).”

I can name 4 separate occasions where Edward either did control or attempted to control Bella’s life.

Situation number 1. Bella clearly stated that she did not want to go to Prom. DId Edward respect her wishes? No. He took her there without telling her where they were going. Regardless of whether or not she had a good time there, it was HER decision not to go and he should have respected it.

2. Bella clearly stated that she didn’t want a birthday party. (after reading Midnight Sun, you can tell from day 1 that he knew she was shy and hated being the center of attention.) Again, he ignored her decisions and threw her a surprise birthday party.Its her birthday. If she doesn’t wanna celebrate it, she doesn’t have to, and its wrong of him to force it on her.

3. Edward wanted her to apply to Dartmouth. She said no. She didn’t want to go to dartmouth. SO he took the paperwork and told her he would forge her signature. How does going to college outside of the Ivy League have her life in danger?

4. When Bella was pregnant, Edward and Jacob had a discussion on the subject of an abortion. Jacob proposed drugging her and having the abortion against her wishes. Edward then confides that he PLANNED on doing this, but that Rosalie stopped him. Her baby, her body, her life, HER DECISION. Bella’s lucky Rosalie was there, b/c otherwise Renesmee would never exist.

Do these circumstances make Edward abusive? most likely not. But do they show an unhealthy amount of a controlling personality acting through the excuse of a “protector”? yes, i think so.

Please respond, b/c you seem to be the one person on the internet with some amount of decorum and intelligence.

Hehe, the teens would have responded with something like: OMG EDWARD IZ SO HOT AND LOV BELLA AN UR JUST A MASSIVE IDJIT FOR HATING

Except, you know, not as coherent.

Alright, first let me say that you and I have very different visions of “control”. Bear with me for a second because this is kind of difficult to articulate. I think part of what makes a very healthy relationship is the way two people are able to challenge each other, break each other out of their shell a little bit. We all think we know what’s best for ourselves and for the most part that’s very true. However, sometimes it takes another person to see something that might be better for us. I’ll give you a personal example. I was once painfully reclusive. I’d stay at home all day and all night. I was dragged out by a good friend, coerced, literally dragged, night after night. And each time, I found that I had fun, even though it was quite against my will. And eventually – my life became fuller because I realized not only was I not regretting those nights, but they were filling a void in me. See – and not to say that it is SERIOUS in every case, but just letting a person do whatever they want all the time is also a form of enabling. Okay, I hope I explained that correctly. Let’s get back to context.

1) The Prom. Well, I think I kind of explained this one. There are a number of teenage girls that think things like the most important of high school dances are just nonsense – myself included. And our mothers always tell us – you’ll regret it later! And you know something, they’re right. No, it’s not something that you’ll ever cry about – just a small wistful thought, I never had a prom.

Ok, take the fact that Edward understands this and multiply it by his obsession with Bella’s humanity. The Prom is a symbol. He will not allow her to miss any human experience because she is with him. She’d never agree to it on her own so he surprises her, and if you pay attention to the entire rest of the chapter – it does end up being a good surprise.

Alright – there are a couple of good reasons, but here’s another thing to consider. It takes two to make any relationship, right? In Twilight, Bella and Edward are both 17 year old kids in their first relationship. Sure, Edward might technically be over 100, but he’s as new as any teenage boy is to love, romance and partnership. As such – don’t you think he wants his firsts? Don’t you think he wants to hold his girlfriend in his arms at their most important high school dance? Is it not selfish for Bella not to think of these things?

I mean, I suppose I can see your point, but at his point in their relationship, neither of them is really great about respecting the others wishes (which, thank god because if Bella had respected Edwards wishes, she would have walked away from him (again – you see what I mean how the best relationships has an element of the other party pushing you gently even when you’re scared?)). New Moon, they spend apart but end up truly understanding the depths of the other’s commitment. But if you read Eclipse you can see they are both learning how to be in a lasting relationship. They are figuring out their boundaries, and how to find a compromise. If you’ve ever been in a relationship I think you’d know that you can’t always do what you want and you can’t always have what you wish – at least, not exactly. So even if I didn’t see those other factors, I’d forgive Edward this one. After all – if he did respect Bella’s every desire he’d be a horrible character – who actually does that? There is no 17 year old kid who is going to get it right the first time. Hell, there’s no 97 year old person who’s going to get it right every time.

2) EDWARD did not throw Bella a surprise party – his entire family did. You’ll remember that Edward kept to his promise of not spending a dime on her, but Carlisle and Esme did not, for instance. You’ll also recall that Bella’s own parents marked the day despite her wishes. You might recall from your own life when a friend or family member showed reluctance to be celebrated, and yet people still said happy birthday – brought a present or a card, etc. Edward and his family love Bella, of course they want to celebrate her. I mean, up until the almost getting killed part, she was enjoying the party and appreciating the gifts. Even afterward, she was very appreciative of Carlisle and Esme’s gift and touched to tears by Edward’s.

Now, you mark this kind of controlling behavior as unhealthy. I really can’t see it as such. Bella is used to being the parent in her world. You can see it throughout the books with Charlie, and through Bella’s memories with Renee, and of course Edward makes the observation in Midnight Sun. One of the overlying themes of the series is family. When one is part of a family such as the Cullen family, no one of them depends on the other. Quite the contrary – though symbolically Carlisle and Esme are the parents of the clan, each of the Cullens stands as their own individual. In other words, none of them needs to be the parent, in terms of a caretaker, of any of the others. One of the things Bella needs to learn, and does learn over the course of the series, is that it is actually healthy to let others take care of you sometimes, or let them celebrate you, as it is in this case.

3) I don’t see how submitting an application and giving Bella another option is controlling. Edward wants Bella to go to COLLEGE so as to experience more of her humanity. He chooses Dartmouth because he’s Edward – he wants his baby to have the best. And while he pushes the idea, at no time in the series does he EVER force her to go.

4) I fail to see how this scenario counts towards the criteria. Not only was Bella’s life in danger – she DIED. Having this baby literally killed her. Of course Edward was going insane. He’d have done anything to keep her alive and, at that point, only saw the baby as a manifestation of the most evil, monstrous parts of himself. And he was right, to an extent – the kid starved her, beat her and TORE HER APART from the inside. I’m sorry, I grant exceptions to the issue in life and death circumstances. Additionally, you could again look at it from the other side. In choosing to keep the child, Bella is forcing Edward to watch her die, in effect, killing him with her. She is right in her observation later in the book – their lives are entwined – cut the string of one and you cut them both. She is making the decision for both of them.

Thank you for the compliment. There are a few of us out there that try to make logical sense. Hehe. I honestly and truly see Edward and Bella’s relationship as one of the healthiest in fiction, and very honest in the way they came up. It’s not that Edward doesn’t have controlling behaviors – I think I’ve admitted more than once that he does.But this is, if you will, a human characteristic and not unhealthy, but something that goes a long way to examining just how deep and three-dimensional Edward is as a character. Think about it. Stephenie created a character that’s been alone for over 100 years, never having to really think about his life as part of someone else’s, never having to deal with something he wanted that was ephemeral, breakable…not immortal. This whole thing is new to him – and while he starts off the series wanting nothing more than to wrap this precious, fragile human – the very essence of his existence, the core of his soul if you want to get melodramatic – in cotton balls and keep her safe on a pedestal, she never lets him, and he begins to understand that he CAN’T. They learn together to compromise. They learn together their strengths and weaknesses, and in the end they finally stand as complete equals – equals in physicality as well as having compatible souls.

PS – OMG a guy who’s read all the books AND Midnight Sun. HOT, even if you do find Edward unhealthy.

i was going on a plane ride, and I needed something to read. I went into Barnes and Noble, couldn’t find anything worthwhile, so I stole a glance towards the Twilight table where all the books were displayed, and remembered their overwhelming popularity. With a deep sigh, I went over, grabbed the 4 books, and tried to move as quickly to the counter as I could b4 someone saw me with them. Despite my promise that I would never read this “chick series”, I did. I’m ashamed of myself; I was weak. I bought them, I read them, and I thoroughly enjoyed them. I went on wikipedia and found out about MS, and of course, i read it immediately. (PS, i told the lady at the counter when I bought them that my gf was making me read them)

Its really sad that SM won’t finish it b/c it got leaked. Music artists have their works leaked all the time. JK Rowling had Harry Potter leaked how many times? too many to count. But she kept writing. And look at her, she has more money than the QUEEN!!!

Between you and me, i wish she would do an Edward’s perspective for all the books. Every Twilighter would read them, not to mention the Anti’s for more proof against Edward. She really wouldn’t have to worry too much about a storyline (except maybe for New Moon when Edward is away tracking) I honestly find Bella’s viewpoint a little bit boring.Doing Edward books gives you a deeper understanding of not only his character, but ALL the characters, due to his mind reading. Just from Midnight Sun, we got a closer look at Jessica, who even starting out wasn’t the friend Bella thought she was.

I adore Midnight Sun and I’m confident that Stephenie will finish it eventually. I can appreciate why you liked Edward’s POV more. Bella does think like a girl – hence the little bits of insecurity and a lil more oogling of Edward than boys tend to like.

While I believe that all of the things Edward notices, for instance about Jessica, are apparent in Bella’s thoughts (she never thinks Jessica is a great friend – often noting that her enthusiasm for Bella is more than likely due to the fact that Jessica, by being by her side, is getting more attention), I love Midnight Sun because we get to know all the Cullens better. Midnight Sun is when I started not only understanding but REALLLLY loving Emmett, for instance.

And while she has promised she wouldn’t, I also wish that Stephenie would do all four books from Edward’s perspective…although you have to admit New Moon would be a wallowing fest of sadness. Poor boy.

I don’t know if you noticed, but I responded to your questions with a novel above the PS post.

Also, don’t be ashamed! The Twilight Series are a fantastic set of books. Mike, the owner of this blog, our friend Audrey and I run a blog called WhereIsEdwardCullen.com and I’m going to be doing a post soon attacking (logically) the naysayers even within the Twilight universe that think Stephenie is not a good writer. Profound? Certainly not, but a very, very good writer.

I did notice, its just that you won the argument. I (and most of the other anti’s) was only looking at the actions, not the reasons behind them. you presented the information logically and concisely, and I applaud your debate skills. Unfortunately, I don’t care that Edward apologized later, disabling her car is a MAJOR no-no in my book.

As for the college thing, it wouldn’t have killed her if she went to the school in Alaska. It kind of has a different connotation between “forging her signature on an application to a school she didn’t want to go to” versus ” Giving her another option and wanting the best for her”. I think this is something we’ll have to agree to disagree on, b/c I see the action, and you rationalize the action with the motives behind it.

Another problem I have with Edward is when he went into her home and hid her personal possessions. Destroying/hiding someone’s stuff is never OK and always an abusive act. Even – especially! – when he’s trying to control her healing process. He also forbid Alice, Bella’s best friend at the time, to talk to her when he left. He did this because he wanted her to have a “clean break”. He was trying to control her healing process. That is also a BIG no-no in my book. If Bella wants to get over him, HOW she does it should be HER choice. IF she wants to mope for a week b4 saying “fuck you , i don’t need you, i’m better off” thats her choice. But what HE did was try to CONTROL her even when he was GONE. He might have intended it be a benign action, but that doesn’t change the fact that he was trying to control how she healed. He assumes that her healing process and how she deals with the breakup should be decided by him. NOT OK.

I’m also confident SM will finish MS, but just the same, just b/c it leaked, she shouldn’t have stopped in the first place. Think of a world where all the world’s artists (art, music, writing, etc) stopped their works b/c a small portion got leaked. All cultural advancement would be non-existent b/c the culture WOULDN’T advance. As Issac Asimov said “I write for the same reason I breathe…..without it I would die”. By not writing, she’s hurting her readers, her characters, and (at least I pray she has enough decency) herself.

Also, just something you might wanna see, someone did a psychoanalysis of Edward based off of MS, and its really well thought out. check it out here: http://www.gaiaonline.com/journal/journal.php?mode=view&post_id=10956409&u=5076946

lol, forgot to add this in the last post, but wasn’t New Moon from Bella’s perspective just as much of a wallowing fest of sadness?

To your previous post I’ll say this – OF COURSE Edward was making mistakes. How boring would books be if he, and Bella, actually were perfect people. Perfect people don’t exist in real life so hell if I want to read about them in fiction.

And as for your question about New Moon – oh there was sadness and there was wallowing, but the thing most people never realize about Bella is that of the two of them, she is much stronger. As Edward said – she at least tried, with some success, to go about her daily life, to be better, to be normal. He couldn’t be around his family. As he said, he more or less curled into a ball and let the pain have him.

You’ve read the New Moon outtake Rosalie’s News right? Heartbreaking, but you can see what New Moon from Edward’s perspective would be – continuous wallowing. And I can’t blame him.

And as far as Edward and the truck, try to see it in context and perspective. It’s easy to see such an action and call it abusive, because we are used to hearing stories of people who abuse important people in their lives by controlling everything they do out of the need to assert their superiority, out of selfishness, out of anger etc. You’re seeing Edward as a normal boyfriend.

Quite the contrary, Edward is not a normal boyfriend. Bella is not a weak human girl – she’s a human trying to exist in a world of monsters which SHE CANNOT FIGHT. Edward knows that by being a part of this supernatural world, Bella is constantly skating the brink of death.

Try to think about it this way. Perhaps you’ve seen House? Well, there was an episode with Michelle Trachtenburg playing a girl who is essentially allergic to anything. In other words – a human girl so frail most anything in the outside world could kill her. To keep her safe, to keep her ALIVE, her mother went overboard protecting her. Consider the following conversation from that episode:

Foreman: You’re not just being overprotective; you’re one of the most overprotective parents I’ve ever seen!

Barbara: She has the best private tutors. I let her friends visit, I’m not going to apologize.

Foreman: Just giving you my thoughts.

Barbara: She almost died 3 times during her childhood. Penicillin, bee stings, peanuts.

Foreman: I’ve seen her file.

Barbara: Six months ago, we leave her home alone for the first time on a weekend. She goes out, buys one chocolate chip cookie, peanut butter in the dough. She’s forgotten her epi pen, she drives to the hospital, passes out, has an accident. Steering wheel crushed her chest. She ended up losing her heart. So when you say to me that I’m one of the most overprotective parents you’ve seen, please, please introduce me to the ones who were more protective. So that I can find out what they’re doing right.

At the end of the episode, she does loosen some of her rules (despite the fact the girl was on deaths door yet again), because she realizes she can’t protect her from life. But tell me that, if this was your precious daughter – if this was someone who could not protect herself (because Bella CAN’T protect herself from werewolves or vampires), that you would not have the same urge.

And I think it’s highly unfair that you don’t give Edward credit for learning from his mistakes. So…fictional characters should all be perfect? Never make mistakes? What’s the point of that? Could you honestly tell me you’d enjoy a book in which the characters always do the right thing? Right, by the way, being extremely subjective.

What would have been unhealthy is if Bella had simply accepted his behavior. Quite the contrary, she continually asserts her point that Jacob is not dangerous to her. And, which again I believe is quite healthy, Edward does not continue his actions, but controls the utter fear he has (because don’t for one minute think that the entire time she’ with Jacob, Edward isn’t going insane with worry), and compromises that he be allowed to take her and pick her up.

Sigh, I should just get it over with and write a textbook. lol.

If you wrote a textbook, I swear I would buy it and read it cover to cover.

No, i haven’t heard of Rosalie’s News, but now i’m gonna google it as soon as i’m done with this comment.

again, the car situation is something we’ll have to agree to disagree on. I can’t look past the action and see the rationalization. Its too abominable an action to get over. He might as well have tied her up in her house with rope, and untie her only when she had to go to school. (Granted, Bella might have liked that, “you can take me hostage any time you want” pg 189 Eclipse after the car incident)

I noticed you only commented on the first part of my last post. Why didn’t you respond to the other paragraphs? I was looking forward to your commentary.

Hmm, well let’s see.

The college thing I think I already put my views out there on. I don’t think this should come up in an argument for Edward being unhealthily controling because there’s no part of this action that controlled her. Dartmouth is a symbol of all of Bella’s human experiences. At this point, Edward has accepted that she will join him in immortality so he’s trying to stall her. I guarantee you he’d be just as happy to go to Alaska as Dartmouth, he’s just giving her the extra option, perhaps hoping against hope that an Ivy League education will sway her and grant her a few more years of immorality.

And as for him leaving in New Moon – how can I possibly excuse that? It was foolish. It was wrong. It did nothing but hurt both him and her to the point that they almost both died. From what you said about not reading Rosalie’s News, I’d guess you haven’t been to Stephenie’s website. I highly suggest a visit. The outtakes and FAQ’s are amazing. I mention this because Stephenie explains Edward’s mindset a lot more fluently than I can.

Edward acknowledges that leaving Bella was the biggest mistake of his very long life. But as I’ve said before – mistakes are what make up a life. I mean – it’s plot. Characters, just as real life people rarely grow unless they make mistakes. Edward’s collassal mistake was essential to the story. Essentially, he was right. If Bella was a normal human, and her love for him a normal human love, then breaking her off from all contact would have been the best thing, albiet probably the most painful. Bella is stubborn. As long as she remained a part of the super natural world she would never have let go – even if it was just Alice she spoke to. I think his actions are misguided, not abusive, as he did not act out of anger or selfishness. He figured seeing these presents from him and his family would only bring back memories for Bella, and memories could only ever bring her pain. He wanted her to forget him. He believed she could. And you can’t forget something when peices of them are everywhere.

But his leaving taught him that Bella’s love for him was not human. Bella and Edward’s love does not exist in this world (which is the only way this story could be as…epic as it is to me, I don’t go for all consuming love stories normally). And in turn Bella learns the depths of Edward’s love for her – he loves her irreperably, despite her being only a lowly human.

Additionally, Edward’s mistake brings with it no small amount of consequences. I might agree with you that the situation was not healthy, for the reader, if he faced no consequences, but that is not the case.

I suppose I just don’t understand the point of being so harsh with Edward. No one’s saying he hasn’t made mistakes, but I can’t think of a single REAL LIFE relationship I’ve been a part of or seen that both members haven’t commited some…wrong act. Abusive relationships are bad because they are consistantly abusive. Now, I say this believing THOUROUGHLY that not a single act Edward ever made was abusive, but since we have agreed to disagree on this point, I will say that an abusive ACT does not an abuser make. We’re all capable of doing the worst thing possible, and I myself am a believer in second chances. Another real life situation for you – my first boyfriend hit me once. I am NOT excusing the act at all, and I did hold him responsible, but I did not consider him an abuser at that point. I gave him the benefit of the doubt – he was very sorry, and we worked through it. Would it be fair to him to call him abusive for a single act of abuse? I personally don’t think so, especially with all the rest of our time together being everything contrary to that.

You can see it as rationalization, but honestly every person’s actions are guided by reason. Flawed reason perhaps but reason none the less. To ME, reason is what makes the difference between an abusive person and a person who makes a mistake. If Edward disabled Bella’s truck out of jealousy or anger, because he didn’t want her to see Jacob (which, by the way, as a boyfriend he had EVERY right to not want), then I would have found his actions extremely unhealthy. If he had left her because he didn’t think he was good enough for her, or just wanted out and then done the things he did to dictate her healing process, I would have considered that unhealthy. But it was so much more than just trying to take himself out of her life – he was trying to erase the supernatural world from her life completely. But in every instance Edward’s heart was in the right place, he just hadn’t come to terms yet with how to deal with the situation properly. I mean, give the kid a break. The entire series takes place in the space of LESS than 2 years. I don’t know a couple – a good couple anyway – that doesn’t have to work on their relationship CONSTANTLY. Give him the credit that in EVERY instance, he learned from his mistakes.

And as far as Stephenie and Midnight Sun, I couldn’t agree with you more. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that I am more than a little pissed off that Stephenie is too butthurt to continue Midnight Sun right now. It hits me especially hard since it was due to be released next month. /sigh. She has so many thousands, millions, of devoted fans.

I should write a book on this. Lol. I don’t think there’s a single angle from which I haven’t looked at this story. Feminist, humanist, you name it.

PS – just realized I forgot to spell check so please pardon me if you see some major flaw. LOL. When I’m in argument mode I type fast and furious and sometimes my spelling suffers. :-p

PPS – I feel the need to shame you since, as a Twilighter, you should at least have the decency not not smear Edward’s good name on his birthday. tsk tsk.

*gasp* I have indeed been put to shame

*sigh* i can understand what you’re saying. But Edward DID disable her truck out of BOTH anger and jealousy. Anger, b/c werewolves are the natural enemy…blah blah blah. THink about it, you’ve been fighting with someone for 70-80 YEARS, and you can’t even be in the same room with the person without being civil. Your girlfriend/boyfriend is BEST friends with that person. I don’t know about you, but that would bother me VERY much.

Also, as seen in the cave scene, Edward knew Bella was in love with Jacob before Bella knew it. He even admitted he was afraid to let her go to Jacob b/c he wasn’t sure she would pick Edward. That sounds like jealousy to me.

As for the “He made a mistake, all people in relationships make mistakes” argument, there is a difference. There’s a difference between being a little too clingy vs. kidnapping your girlfriend. Now i know the “He’s not human, its not the same type of relationship” argument is coming, so let me say this. He was human for the first 17 years of his life, and he lived amongst humans for 107 years. His mind-reading ability has let him see more clearly into the minds of humans than most. If ANYONE should know right and wrong in relationships, it should be HIM, as a being who has witnessed relationships start and finish through the years, in addition to having seen Carlisle meet Esme, Emmet meet Rosalie, and Alice and Jasper together.

You’ve argued that he hasn’t been in a relationship before, so that might make some difference. In addition, when vampires find their mates, it makes a permanent difference blah blah blah. I’ve never been in that all consuming love before, and all that “love is irrational” stuff, but still, c’mon, there has to be a limit.

Honestly, i’m gonna stop here. I’m not a “has to keep arguing until I’m right” type person. I’m not gonna convince you, and you’re not gonna convince me (more than you already have). You empathize with Edward too much, and you ignore his actions by saying “he has his heart in the right place”. I see the action, and base my judgment of him based on what he does, not what he MEANT for his actions to do. “Actions speak louder than words” and all that jazz. It has been very nice debating with you, and thank you for being a mature opponent who uses logic rather than insults and childlike behavior to annoy the other into leaving. (please respond to this comment, b/c i’m still interested in what you have to say )

I hate to comment on my own blog, but I’m starting to think the comments between readers and the writer of this post are going to make history as the longest blog comments EVER!

Oh, but Mike, doesn’t knowing that your blog has inspired such passion in the readers that they feel compelled to have a rich, intelligent discussion fill you with pride? IF anything, it means you have a great blog with a wonderful writer.

Wow, you make me blush. Ty!

Anyone who knows me knows I say I don’t argue to convince – they don’t BELIEVE it, but they know I say it. I honestly don’t argue to convince as that is virtually impossible and pointless. Mostly I argue to ensure that I have looked at any issue from many perspectives. If I can continue to justify my own opinions then I come out stronger (to myself), if not then i have to go back and review where I’m coming from on any given topic.

Anyway, that being said, onto the “show”.

I never said that Edward wasn’t jealous, I said Edward disabled her truck out of fear of her safety, not jealousy. Is he jealous of Jacob – oh most certainly so. And of course he’s afraid that she’ll chose Jacob. But there’s also a part of him that hopes she will. However, he tells Jacob during that same conversation (which, by the way, is my favorite chapter of the entire SERIES), that he has learned from the mistake he made in New Moon, and he will not force her into that option again. So no, there’s no part of me that believes that Edward disabled her truck out of jealousy, regardless of the fact that he IS jealous of Jacob. He has a right to his jealousy. Come on. If your girl was hanging out with a guy that you KNEW would want to steal her away – wouldn’t you be jealous too?

I support the argument of why I know Edward didn’t disable her truck out of jealousy with the Mike argument. You’ve read Midnight Sun, you KNOW Edward is irrationally jealous of Mike. You know from Breaking Dawn that his jealousy has not abated. Yet Edward at no point stops Bella from her friendship with Mike – and Mike is one of only two TRUE human friends Bella has.

That’s jealous – as far as anger, I just don’t see it. Certainly, Edward’s knowledge of werewolves has made him biased towards Jacob, and vampires and werewolves are natural enemies – but Edward’s natural inclination is to eat humans, so we know he’s good at overriding nature. Additionally, he never displays anger. In Twilight, he certainly displays irritation at whatever Billy’s thinking when he drives up with Bella, to the point that he taunts the man by kissing Bella’s neck, but at the end of Twilight, during the prom, he tells Bella that he isn’t angry with Billy. Additionally, he even emphasizes with the wolve’s inclination to stay be wary of the vampires. In New Moon, despite Jacob’s venomous thoughts towards him, he takes a moment to THANK Jacob for taking care of Bella. In fact, at the time when Edward has the MOST cause to be angry at Jacob – when Jacob kisses Bella the first and second time, he instead reacts with calm and then with acceptance that he has no one to blame for Jacob and Bella’s feelings for each other but himself. So, taking all that into consideration – I don’t see his disabling the truck as coming from either jealousy or anger. It just doesn’t fit his personality.

Of course there’s a difference. You make the mistake of thinking that I excuse Edward from his mistakes – I most certainly do not. Excusing him would be to wave them off as nothing. Far from this, I have acknowledged them as mistakes. Regardless of whether Edward should know better – as he observes in Twilight, knowing about something (jealousy in that case) is much different from experiencing it first hand. I make no excuses for him just like he makes no excuses for himself. My only point is that we all make mistakes – and in the course of our lives I think most of us will make a pretty bad mistake – at the very LEAST being on par with stopping our significant other from going somewhere we don’t want them to go. It doesn’t make it RIGHT, it just makes it, for lack of a better word, human.

And I agree that there has to be a limit – all I’ve ever said is that I think that Edward is so far from that limit, it’s laughable. I don’t buy this all or nothing viewpoint of life. I have stolen before – should I be considered a thief? Rather, I hope the one or two times I have stolen would not be considered before or above what I am most of the time. Ask anyone who knows me, I am a pretty generous, giving individual. So throwing away all the good Edward is for the few mistakes he’s made – particularly after he’s not only taken responsibility but honestly LEARNED from them – no, I can’t agree with that.

It has been nice debating with you. If you’re interested, I have two other articles here on Mike’s blog (one for Bella and one for Bella and Edward’s relationship in general), as well as occasional, hopefully insightful, posts on our website whereisedwardcullen.com. I live for healthy, mature arguing, and I rarely ever find it.

I have looked at the other two, and believe me when I say you haven’t seen the last of me! I have a few thoughts on Bella….

HA!!!! I think i found a compromise that we can both agree on!!!!!! (maybe you can use this as the opening statement in your textbook)

The mistakes Edward makes in his relationship with Bella during the Twilight series can be considered abusive, but that does not classify him as an abusive boyfriend.

Oh dear. I’m very protective of my Bella, not that she needs it by the way, but honestly I love her.

And while I don’t agree with the abusive moniker at all – I will digress on this point. Lol. Wrong perhaps, but not abusive. It’s just too strong a word for me.

hey, I was kinda bored, so I went on youtube looking up twilight spoofs for a kick. You really have to see this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MKz0gkcgAo. It takes about 2:10 seconds in pick up, but I found myself laughing.

Eric, that is a great parody. I’ve seen it before and have always like it. Thanks for commenting about Twilight and thanks for sharing!

I, as an anti, find some validity in this argument. The argument against him being overprotected is all I find wrong.

” In Twilight, he very nearly whisks Bella away quite against her will after James starts his hunt. But it only takes a few minutes for Bella, Alice and Emmett to talk some sense into him.”
If he had sense talked into him, though, he should have left her as she was. He’s making decisions for her!

“Then the whole Jacob issue. It’s not as if Edward is keeping Bella away from Jacob out of jealousy.”
He actually is, and admits it at one point in the series. (I don’t have the exact quote, sorry.)

“Knowing what he does about werewolves, his fear is that she’ll end up like Emily, or worse.”
What about the unnamed singer girl that Emmet killed? Jacob probably fears about that, and does he prevent Bella from seeing Edward?

“Bella’s friendship with the completely harmless Mike Newton would be non-existent. After all, Edward admits numerous times to his jealousy of the boy and yet he never attempts to stop their friendship.”
Waitwaitwaitwaitwait, hold the phone. So, he’s jealous of Jacob and Mike. He prevents Bella from seeing Jacob, and lets her go on with Mike. There’s something wrong with that. Do you see it? Because I do.

And Jacob being a werewolf and Edward a vampire is no excuse for Edward to stop her from seeing her friend. It’s like an Englishman preventing his girlfriend to visit an American friend.

And there are MANY other examples of abuse and control besides that.
-Repeatedly threatens to “stop” Bella if she goes off to do something he doesn’t want her to. (Visiting Jacob in Eclipse, for example.)
-Again and again shows examples of how strong he is and how she wouldn’t stand a chance and how they shouldn’t date, but makes no effort to stop it.
-Makes Bella lie to Charlie about their relationship.
-Bella says she doesn’t want to go to Dartmouth. Edward ignores her, forging her signature on the papers.

And those are only a few examples. I want to see if you can counter them.

Hookay, as you wish.

“If he had sense talked into him, though, he should have left her as she was. He’s making decisions for her!”

Um – I’m assuming then that say, when people push other people out of the way of a moving car, or when a fireman removes a person from a burning house when they haven’t SPECIFICALLY requested to be rescued – this is controlling behavior? Um, well technically I suppose.

So your suggestion is that Edward should have just been like “Oh, well James seems to want to eat you, sucks to be you, deal with it! See ya!”

Yea…I can see that happening in ANY relationship.

Let’s be clear about what’s happening here. Bella knows James wants to eat her. She KNOWS she can’t protect herself. She has absolutely NO problem with Edward whisking her away for her protection. Her whole issue here is he is ONLY thinking of her. She is thinking of everyone else BESIDES her. She wants to do this in the safest way possible for her father AND the Cullens.

You want to demonize Edward for this one? Really? What would you have done? This bloodthirsty monster is after your girlfriend. He can kill her with a finger. She has ABSOLUTELY no defense. At all. All James needs is 1 second in close proximity to her and she’s gone. Done. Can’t come back from that one.

So he panics, and he grabs her and he runs. And once he’s had a chance to take a few breaths they put together a solid plan – one that will keep Charlie as safe as possible. Which is ALL BELLA WAS ARGUING ABOUT. Everything else – she’s fine with to an extent. I mean, don’t get me wrong, if she could stop the Cullens from fighting for her, she would. (Which is somehow more understandable to people, hmm)

So…maybe I missed it in the umpteen times I’ve read that book – where in that scene did he make a decision for her? I mean, yea at first he was going to take her away without taking her back to her father, but he ended up doing it her way…100%. It was all HER plan.

“He actually is, and admits it at one point in the series. (I don’t have the exact quote, sorry.)”

Um – yea, of course he’s jealous. He’s so jealous he can hardly see straight. (He says it to Jacob, in my very favorite chapter of the entire series “Fire and Ice”). What I said was he wasn’t keeping her away from Jacob BECAUSE he was jealous. In other words, his jealousy was not what was prompting his actions – if it was, I would agree it is unhealthy behavior.

“What about the unnamed singer girl that Emmet killed? Jacob probably fears about that, and does he prevent Bella from seeing Edward?”

Yes – you’re absolutely right. Jacob is not overprotective as Edward is. Instead, his faults lie in that he’s manipulative and pushy. Two traits which, just as I don’t blame Edward for being overprotective, I don’t blame Jacob for doing whatever he needed to do (like FORCING a kiss on her, manipulating her emotions etc, etc, etc) to get her away from Edward. He just fights differently – he’s no better than Edward.

“Waitwaitwaitwaitwait, hold the phone. So, he’s jealous of Jacob and Mike. He prevents Bella from seeing Jacob, and lets her go on with Mike. There’s something wrong with that. Do you see it? Because I do”

Um, okay you’re going to have to explain it to me. Jealousy is natural. To an extent, it’s even healthy. If you’re in a relationship and you don’t feel jealousy at time, I’d question your investment in that relationship. Remember – emotions are irrational. 100% of the time. Emotions are not something you can help. What you CAN help is how you react to them. So if Edward was a jealous ass, I wouldn’t appreciate his character. Instead, Edward is jealous but he doesn’t do anything about that jealousy. He never stops Bella’s FRIENDSHIP with Jacob. Never stops her from calling him, etc – even though it obviously bothers him. And in ALL honesty it is his RIGHT as the boyfriend to say something about it – but he never does. I mean, he knows for dead FACT that this boy is after his girl. He has every right to bring that up to Bella, but he doesn’t.

Again – he only ever stops Bella from going to see Jacob because he believes, to the very DEPTHS of who he is, that Jacob is dangerous. Remember – not only is Edward’s LOGICAL side screaming that Jacob is dangerous but his very NATURE is to fear for Bella’s safety around Jacob. Think of a cat whose hackles are raised at a dog. It’s not because the cat is racist against dogs. It’s just nature. Nature is much stronger than any vendetta. And Jacob IS Which is absolute truth. (Although – as you point out, just about as dangerous as Edward himself is).

You also have to remember that this is all new to Edward. He’s never been in a relationship before. And his little human is SO fragile he lives in CONSTANT terror that she is going to be ripped away from him. So yea, sometimes he overreacts. (remember New Moon?). But Edward also learns from his mistakes. When he figures out what he’s doing is over the line, he stops. He apologizes. He promises never to do it again – and he never does.

Now – does his jealousy go away? Not at all. But Edward continues to watch Bella go off with Jacob. Knowing he’s trying to take her away. Why are we not giving him any credit for learning and evolving? It seems unfair to me.

“Repeatedly threatens to “stop” Bella if she goes off to do something he doesn’t want her to.”

Ok – You’re making it sound like he’s threatening her. Like she’ll be punished if she goes against his will. Yea – he threatens to stop her. He DOES stop her…with the truck and then later with Alice. And he ONLY does this in regards to Jacob. A truly abusive, controlling person would do this in regards to … anything. Anyone. Friends, clothing, whatever.

“Again and again shows examples of how strong he is and how she wouldn’t stand a chance and how they shouldn’t date, but makes no effort to stop it.”

Again, you’re making it sound like he’s threatening her. In Twilight, he shows her these things mostly in a desperation so she’ll understand. Try to imagine – all the things he knows and is afraid about in Jacob are true about him as well. And he knows that. And just as he is desperate to keep her safe from Jacob, he’s also desperate to keep her safe from HIMSELF. What do you MEAN he made no effort to stop it? Again, did we miss New Moon completely? Or the 6 weeks in Twilight when he tried to ignore her? He couldn’t stay away. He was not that strong. Neither was she.

As far as his strength, he never, EVER threatens her with it…but at the same time he doesn’t hold it back – because she does need to know. She does need to understand what being with him means. Throughout most of the series Edward firmly believes he’s a monster, that he doesn’t deserve Bella, that he is destroying her soul. One of the things he almost doesn’t forgive himself for is pursuing her anyway. Think of all the things he says. For instance “I had no right to want you – but I reached out and took you anyway.” This is part of the whole POINT of Twilight. In even wanting to be together they are, essentially, destroying each other’s world. It’s not logical. It’s not supposed to be. If it was, it wouldn’t be a struggle – and there would be no plot. LOL.

“-Makes Bella lie to Charlie about their relationship.”

Uh – ok. I’ve tried to figure out what the heck you’re talking about here and I just can’t. You’re going to have to back that one up.

“Bella says she doesn’t want to go to Dartmouth. Edward ignores her, forging her signature on the papers.”

Oh, yes, highly abusive. Aren’t we getting a little nitpicky here? Ok, let’s delve into this one a bit.

First of all – Edward wouldn’t give a damn if they went to the local community college. What he really wants is for her to have as many human experiences as possible. What he wants for her, more than anything, is for her to stay human. This in and of itself should PROVE that Edward isn’t controlling. He wants her to stay human, and yet he has agreed to change her himself – against his wishes. Or if she prefers to have Carlisle do it, Edward will not act to stop it from happening. But he’s going to do what he can to convince her otherwise.

So, in essence, Dartmouth is just waving a bit shinier gift in front of her. There’s a part of her, the human part, that does want to go. Especially for her mom and dad. Remember when she thinks about how proud and thrilled they will be? And Edward knows this. It’s a means to an end for him. If she takes the bait, she gets a few more human years and more human experiences.

I’m going to make a comparison I’ve made before. Here’s the thing – as human beings we don’t always know what’s best for us. And yea, you can say everyone should be left to do exactly what they want and not be pushed, but then there’d be no such thing as social interaction.

So onto my example. In my past – I was painfully reclusive. I didn’t go out. I barely liked interacting with people. If you asked me I’d tell you I preferred it, but I didn’t realize how lonely and miserable I was. So – a friend of mine kept on pulling me out. Mostly against my will, kicking and screaming. Again, and again, and again…until I realized how important it is to be around people.

So, by your thinking, it would have been “right” for my friend to just leave me be – because that was my choice. Well, I’m really glad she didn’t. Let’s just leave it at that.

And I will say what I’ve said before. In most relationships that are really – right, you will hear one partner say of the other that they pushed them when they needed pushing. It’s part of what makes really good couples a great team.

Edward and Bella and Dartmouth – well, it’s not precisely the same thing as there are many factors at work here. On the one hand, because he believes that in becoming a vampire Bella would be losing her SOUL, Edward is pushing her to experience as much of her humanity as possible. On the other hand, Bella knows that Edward will forever be 17. Her anxiety over getting to the vamp stuff ASAP has more to do with equality than anything else. They can’t stay on equal footing if she ages out of her teens. It’s not that Bella is dead set AGAINST college. Quite the contrary – she knows in choosing this life with Edward not only will she go to college but she’ll go to college repeatedly. So for her, not wanting to go to Dartmouth is because she is choosing to begin her life as a vampire FIRST. That’s her priority. Her goal. Edward is just trying to make humanity her goal and wrapping it up in as attractive packaging as is possible.

Oh! Oh! I am so excited to see this debate! You all are so interesting! I personally am on the pro-side, though I do of course qualify many anti arguements, as well. I am sick of being ridiculed for my interest in the series, but by people who’s primary arguement is “You’re stupid.” (No joke.)

There’s a fine line between non-conformity, in which people are wary of the books because many like it, and ant-conformity in which people aggressively oppose the books for the same reason. The latter falls in line with rabid fandom, in my opinion, and I am SO happy to see some pro and anti arguements here that are qualified!!!!

So he’s known thousands of people, and the one person whose behavior he can’t predict is the one whose behavior can be predicted by everyone who’s ever known a teenage girl, or ever read a Judy Blume book?

It just amazes me how Edward can’t be classified as an controlling

boyfriend even though there are plenty of times in the text where it is

SHOWN, not told where he is being a controlling jerk. Never is it SHOWN

where he is being nice. It is only told to us. I’ll give examples of him being a

controlling boyfriend after I give a definition to the phrase.

The Top Ten Sides of a Controlling Boyfriend

He’s Always By Your Side

‘If you are in a relationship where it seems that you have no time to

yourself, chances are you have a controlling boyfriend. He never wants

you to go anywhere without him. There is no more “girls night out” for you

and your friends, unless he is with you. Doesn’t sound like a good time.”

While Edward does ‘give’ Bella time to hang out with Angela and Jessica

he shouldn’t have to ‘give’ her time to spend with her friends. He never lets

her make her own decisions unless someone from his family prevents him

from controlling her.

And whenever she is having ‘fun’ with her friends he’s always around the

corner with his Volvo to save her from the ‘dirty rapists’ who want to hurt

her. (Chapter 8 of Twilight)

Now it takes Alice and Jasper to prevent him from controlling her opinion in

the end of Twilight. It takes Emmet and Alice to prevent him from sucking

her blood in the beginning of the book. It takes Rosalie to prevent him from

forcefully giving her an abortion in Breaking Dawn.

See something wrong with this trend?

You Do What He Likes

“When you do go out, it is to an event that HE chooses. You may not feel

like going to a movie, but it is what he wants to do, for example. Also, his

turning down an offer to do what you would like is a key sign that he is not

flexible. It often leaves the impression that he does not care about your

interests. He may, or may not, but he is not supportive either way.”

When Bella is in Port Angeles for the first time and he ’saves’ her he

forces her to go to a restaurant even though she’d been looking for a

bookstore. This can pretty much sum up the whole conversation.

“Drink,” he ordered.

I sipped at my soda obediently

She always does what he wants her to do. Forging her signature to go to

Dartmouth, the Prom, the Wedding. These are things that she didn’t want

but he forced them upon her. Even if it is logical to want some of these

things it doesn’t excuse the fact that he forced them onto her. If a child

agreed to being abused does that make it right for the abuser to abuse

them? No.

You Do Things For Him

“Honey, go pick up some soda for me.” sounds like a genuine request for

assistance. If your boyfriend is constantly asking you to run errands,

without including you as the benefactor, this is another sign of the need to

feel in control. Instead of “…pick up some soda for me.”, the request

should be, “We’re out of soda. Can you go pick some up, please?”. Can

you see the difference? WE are in need of soda, simply.”

Very honestly I see nothing that he gives Bella in return for ‘all the things’

she does for him. Her life would have been much easier without him

returing again and again to give her another dose of the dazzle.

No Manners

“In the previous example, the “please” was left out intentionally. Your

boyfriend will not be polite. He will not say “thank you”, “you’re welcome”,

“please” or even “excuse me” to you. It is because he is expecting you to

comply with his requests. He also feels as if you should be thanking him

for allowing you to do things for him.”

Whenever Edward does say please it’s not polite. He doesn’t have

manners. He’s not a gentleman. Honestly what sort of gentleman does this

to a lady?

“His long hands unexpectedly gripped my waist, and his foot pushed mine

off the gas pedal. He pulled me across his lap, wrenching my hands free

of the wheel, and suddenly he was in the driver’s seat. The truck
didn’t swerve an inch.”

“We were near the parking lot now. I veered left, toward my truck.

Something caught my jacket, yankingme back.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asked, outraged. He was gripping a

fistful of my jacket in one hand.

I was confused. “I’m going home.”

“Didn’t you hear me promise to take you safely home? Do you think I’m

going to let you drive in your condition?” His voice was still indignant.

“What condition? And what about my truck?” I complained.

“I’ll have Alice drop it off after school.” He was towing me toward his car

now, pulling me by my jacket.It was all I could do to keep from falling

backward. He’d probably just drag me along anyway if I did.

“Let go!” I insisted. He ignored me. I staggered along sideways across the

wet sidewalk until we reached the Volvo. Then he finally freed me — I

stumbled against the passenger door.”

I hope I’m not the only one seeing things wrong with this situation.

Questions, Questions

“When you can finally break through the chains, and find some free time

for yourself, be prepared: your controlling boyfriend will interrogate you

when you return. Putting himself in a “father figure” position will install

more of a sense of control. Treating you like a child that went to the mall,

prior to doing her homework, is the kind of humiliation in you he is trying to

achieve.”

Does anything need to be said about Edward’s condescending attitude to

her all of the time? And the countless probe sessions that he puts her

through because he is unable to read her mind.

No Questions, No Answers

“Unlike the aforementioned subject, your boyfriend will come and go as he

pleases, without answering to anyone – especially to you. If you try to

question his whereabouts or activities, he will become defensive. The

subject will immediately transfer from your asking, “where were you?” to

his comeback remark about how you nag him too much, or something

similar to that effect. He will ignore answering the question, and make you

feel guilty for asking it. This is in hope that you will not do it again.”

Edward is always denying her answers or asking a question in return to

her questions. He fits the description quite accurately.

He’s Always Right

“In an argument with a controlling personality, it is very difficult for him to

accept defeat. The controlling boyfriend will get more defensive, change

the subject, or bring up a past occurrence, when he was, indeed, correct,

in order to prove his point with the issue at hand. He may not always be

right, completely, but he is never wrong.”

YES! Edward is always right no matter what in all of him and Bella’s

‘disagreements’. She always bends to his will like a rubber band.

Can’t Buy Me Love

“Fools gold has been around for centuries. However, a fool AND his gold

have special meaning to the controlling boyfriend. He will buy you nice

jewelry, take you to expensive restaurants and maybe even offer to pay a

debt of yours. He will say it is because he loves you. Not true. He needs to

feel superior to you. You now owe him, in his mind. Who is the fool? To

him, you are.”

YES! YES! AND YES! Edward is always buying her expensive gifts and

giving her needless expensive things that won’t do her any good. She

hates having money squandered on her yet he does it anyway and allows

his family to do so not realizing that it adds to her inferiority complex.

You’re Worthless

“Belittling your self-confidence can be have very serious consequences.

Making you feel as if you are worthless without him, the controlling

boyfriend will prey on times that you may be stressed the most. If you

have just lost a job, or if you are experiencing normal hormonal reactions,

this is the time he will strike. He wants you to feel as if life is not worth

living without him. It’s hard to believe, but his confidence level is actually

lower than yours.”

Bingo. Do I even need to give an example of all the times Edward says that

he can kill her with his big toe? This is not neccesary. It is also wrong for

him to tell her to stay away from him and then say that he’ll see her later in

class. What sort of thing is that to say to someone?

No Means No

“This is the most upsetting trait that a controlling boyfriend can display. If

he forces you to do things, against your will, he is not in love with you.

Whether it is going to a baseball game, when you hate outdoor stadiums,

or, even more harsh an act, makes you perform sexually against your will,

he is NOT in love with you. Not showing you the courtesy to respect your

wishes is not a behavior that goes away. This will continue as an abusive

relationship, where you will be treated as an object, instead of a person.”

Bullseye! This is the trait that Edward displays the most. Whether it’s

forbidding her to see her friends by taking the motor out of her truck or

forcing her to eat when she insists that she isn’t hungry. This is controlling

behavior and does not need to continue.

1.Attached At The Hip – many controlling boyfriends behaviour is sparked

by their inability to trust. Someone who has to control another always

needs to be around to watch what they are doing and to ensure that their

partner is only having a “good time” when he is around. If you are in a

relationship with someone who insists on always being there and not

allowing you any time to yourself, then you are a victim of a controlling

boyfriend.

2.On His Terms – if your boyfriend is always making plans without

including you in the decision making process, then this is a major sign that

he has controlling habits. If he is constantly turning down invites and

opportunities to attend events that you have interest in and you always

seem to be attending events he has interest in, then chances are you have

a controlling boyfriend.

3.Interrogation – a controlling boyfriend is a great fan of interrogation. If

you do find a moment to yourself, spend some time with the girls or arrive

home a little later than expected, prepare to be asked a lot of questions as

to where you were, who you were talking to and why you took so much

longer than the average person would. Be careful of being in this type of

relationship which usually makes you feel humiliated and as if you are in

fact in the wrong.

4.Always Right – regardless of the situation or argument, the controlling

boyfriend will never admit to being wrong. This is often also linked to

breaking the partner down by making them believe that they are always

wrong or doing something wrong. When in this type of relationship, the

controlling boyfriend will swiftly change the subject to all the things you

may do wrong or have done wrong in the past.

5.Confidence Battering – the controlling boyfriend will be well aware of

when you are feeling stressed and a little down. He will use this as an

opportunity to “save the day” or sometimes even ridicule you or make you

feel silly for even believing you could do something successfully on your

own. This can range from social situations to work decisions that you may

have made. Breaking down ones confidence can have serious and long

lasting effects.

6.Snooping – a controlling boyfriend is usually a professional snoop. He

can often be found looking through your emails, sneaking a few peaks at

your cell phone messages and even reading your mail. This type of

behaviour in a relationship shows his need to control and always be in the

know, along with a lack of trust.

7.Isolation – when you find yourself in a relationship with a controlling

boyfriend, you will find that he will try and isolate you from your family and

friends. This will start usually with general disinterest in them to obvious

dislike and will sometimes even try to convince you that they do not love

you or care for you and are possibly even out to get you.

Those are even more signs for you to decode and bash.

It such come as a red flag for you when Edwards name flashes across

the screen whenever you type the phrase ‘controlling boyfriend’ into

google.

There is nothing loving about his behavior.

While many say that it’s ok because it’s his first relationship and he doesn’t

know how to react that still doesn’t make it ok.

Are all boys controlling in their first relationships? No.

Harry Potter was not abusive to Cho Chang. In fact it could be considered

the exact opposite.

Bella has battered woman syndrome and there is no way to say

otherwise.

Let’s see some symptoms of an abused woman shall we?

“DENIAL

The woman refuses to admit–even to herself–that she has been beaten

or that there is a “problem” in her marriage. She may call each incident an

“accident”. She offers excuses for her husband’s violence and each time

firmly believes it will never happen again.

GUILT

She now acknowledges there is a problem, but considers herself

responsible for it. She “deserves” to be beaten, she feels, because she

has defects in her character and is not living up to her husband’s

expectations.

ENLIGHTENMENT

The woman no longer assumes responsibility for her husband’s abusive

treatment, recognizing that no one “deserves” to be beaten. She is still

committed to her marriage, though, and stays with her husband, hoping

they can work things out.

RESPONSIBILITY

Accepting the fact that her husband will not, or can not, stop his violent

behavior, the battered woman decides she will no longer submit to it and

starts a new life.”

There’s one problem with this though. Bella hasn’t moved on to the third

stage. And she never will.

Here on some warning signs that Charlie and any other responsible adult

should have picked up in their relationship ages before they got married.

“The abused woman:

* shows guilt, ambivalence, and fear over living conditions.
* feels isolated and untrusting of others, even though she may be involved

in the community.
* is emotionally and economically dependent.
* has a poor self-concept (this may not have been true BEFORE the

relationship).
* has observed other women in her family being abused or may have been

abused as a child.
* feels angry, embarrassed, and ashamed.
* is fearful of being insane.
* has learned to feel helpless and feels powerless.
* has unexplained injuries that may go untreated.

The abusive man:

* shows extreme jealousy and wants to keep the woman isolated.
* has an inability to cope with stress and shows a lack of impulse control.

(This may not necessarily appear outside the home)
* shows severe mood swings.
* may have a history of abuse in his own family and may have been

abusive in courtship.
* presents a history of personal and/or family discord; unemployment,

cruelty to animals, abuse of alcohol or other substances, and other

unexplained behavior.”

Edward might not be abusive, but if he wasn’t sure that he’d kill her by

smacking her around I’m sure he would be. In all actuality he does cause

her phyiscal harm on more than one occasion.

Was it neccasary to throw her out of the way before lunging onto Jasper?

Was it necessary to drag her around by her coat into his Volvo?

I won’t even mention Breaking Dawn.

12 Ways To Tell Whether Your Partner
May Turn Into An Abuser

1. Heavy drinking or drug abuse (especially if he uses substances as an

excuse for what he does: “The alcohol made me do it.”)

2. Abuse during the courtship period is a guarantee of further abuse that

will become more frequent and severe. Don’t marry him with the belief that

“I can change him.” You won’t.

3. Morbid jealousy. This may be a bit flattering at first, but will be a curse

later on. You will never convince him that you are innocent of his

accusations.

4. Past child abuse and/or witness of marital violence. This happens in

some cases. Children learn what they live. Boys tend to copy their fathers.

Abused children discipline their own children as they were taught. He may

be a “violence carrier”.

5. Inability to handle frustration. If he blows up and explodes at small

things, and reacts with a tantrum over minor things, he may act out

frustration with violence in a marriage. How he deals with anger is the

key.

6. A violent temper. This speaks for itself. If you feel fear when he acts

out his anger, that fear is a warning signal. Listen to it!
7. Cruelty to animals, abuse and mistreatment of pets, great enjoyment of

hunting for the sake of killing animals could help you to face this question:

What makes you know he will treat you any differently?

8. Preoccupation with weapons. They are an extension of self. A

person is what she/he lives. If he ever “playfully” points a gun at you or

ever gestures at you with another weapon, what could happen if he

became very angry with you?

9. Mental illness. A person with an unsound mind or without any sense

of moral responsibility or guilt may not be in control of his actions. Does he

act in ways that you feel are abnormal or strange?

10. A poor self-image; insecurity about his own masculinity. If he feels

compulsive about always being “one up” and dominating and he lives out a

macho role at all times, you will be subject to his control and possibly

treated like one of his possessions. He may feel he has the right to treat

you like his property, to do as he pleases.

11. A pattern of blaming others, particularly his wife, for his problems. If

he never accepts his faults and responsibilities when things go wrong, be

ready to be blamed for everything.

12. Acceptance of violence as an appropriate problem-solving method.

Do you want a man who talks out or acts out his anger?

Edward fits more than 6 of these characteristics. Is that the sign of the

perfect boyfriend involved in a healthy relationship? No.

I understand that your a brunette and can picture yourself as Bella

because others have ‘known what’s best for you’.

But please don’t say that Edward is nice, even when he’s not, and that he

is a good boyfriend. He is a controlling boyfriend and these need to be

identified so that Generation Y doesn’t end up screwed up by these

books. As much as many people like to disagree, Fiction Influences Most

Teenagers Lives.

And by saying that a controlling, potentially abusive, boyfriend is a good

thing for a teenage girl you are setting many bad examples for teens.

As for your mother the psychologist that supposedly anayzed Bella and

Edward’s relationship, maybe you need to check her degree because if

she is indeed a good phsychologist why do you claim to have been a

recluse in your youth?

Just because Bella accepts it, that doesn’t make it right!