The Atlantic - Latest Comments in New Mooned

Re: New Mooned

Lemmy Caution — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 02:33:25 -0000

Star Wars fandom isn't OK either. Star Wars is cliche-ridden, brain-numbing trash.

(If you're going to argue that it's just a matter of taste and to each their own, well, wouldn't that apply to Twilight as well? Or is anti-elitism only a one-way street?)

Re: New Mooned

JL — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 11:07:36 -0000

Yeah, this. I might think it's dreck, but so what? I have my own brain candy books that I love, and I had my own crazy-level pop-culture obsessions as a teen, even if they were kind of unusual ones. I don't see an inherent problem with it. People read and watch movies to be entertained, most of the time.

Re: New Mooned

calexical — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 09:24:29 -0000

I agree with you completely. More than a few people have told me that fanfiction for Twilight is almost overwhelmingly X-rated, and that doesn't surprise me, seeing as how it would be a generic romance novel if the sci-fi elements were removed and the protagonist aged up a bit. Porn for women is exactly what it is.

And the worries that girls' romantic preferences will be warped by the books don't move me in the least. Any portrayal of an unhealthy or overly-idealized romantic relationship has the potential to make an impression on young minds, and let's face it, most popular media is guilty of one or both. Kids do stupid things, for a variety of reasons. They learn from those stupid things. If they don't, then they stay stupid. Can't stop parents from worrying, I know.

Re: New Mooned

M.C. — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 09:05:09 -0000

Read the first Twilight book and nearly died of boredom. Will not be going back for more.

But I do understand why teenage girls might go in for passivity. In most places in this country, there really isn't all that much for teenage girls to do. If you're smart enough to find public school unchallenging, and if your family is prosperous enough that your housework burden is small, there may not be much to keep you busy besides hanging with friends and reading great big bricks of boring books.

It's not as though you have the resources to take a flight to Paris and visit the museums, or even change your major to something that really pushes your limits. The most adventerous thing you're likely to do before you get a driver's license is have a crush on the wrong boy. That doesn't mean you're going to be passive when your life opens up and you have other options. It just reflects the limitations of the teen years in much of suburban and small-town America.

Re: New Mooned

Ta-Nehisi Coates — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 15:44:47 -0000

Nor should you try. I wouldn't have wanted anyone trying to take me off comic books because they weren't "literature." You're doing the right thing. Gotta take kids where they are. I doubt she'll stop with Stephanie Meyers.

Re: New Mooned

BrianSierk — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 02:09:42 -0000

Correcting- PKD patients present 1.17:1 Male female, and Men present 1.3 years earlier.

http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0272638600700424

This article also states that the differences in PKD, while pronounced are actually smaller than other diseases. So, men are presenting younger, with more of them in readily transplantable states.

Not sexism, natural selection against males in terms of renal health.

Re: New Mooned

BrianSierk — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 02:07:23 -0000

Correcting- PKD patients present 1.17:1 Male female, and Men present 1.3 years earlier.

http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0272638600700424

Re: New Mooned

BrianSierk — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 01:53:26 -0000

Because women are less likely to get CKD5, especially from a transplantable pathology. A higher ratio of Female CKD5 patients present with Poorly controlled Type 2 diabetes, which is strongly correlated with cardiac issues circulatory problems and very high BMI, all of which are exclusionary conditions. A higher ratio of men present younger, with hypertension as primary renal pathology, which is the most transplantable pathology. Also, Polycystic kidney disease (PKD) patients present CKD5 at a 3.3:1 Male:female ratio. These two pathologies can occur while the rest of the body remains fairly healthy.

Thank you for highlighting the issue of CKD5, and renal transplantation. However, what it has to do with Twilight......

Re: New Mooned

Byrk — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 23:28:53 -0000

My wife has said the same thing, but it's a pretty unfair comparison. My analogy would be for me to point towards a porn star and ask her to be more like that. The biggest reason is that Edward has unlimited money with no need to eat/sleep/work. He sure has a hell of a lot more time and money on his hands to be romantic than I do.

Re: New Mooned

TheRaven — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 21:08:48 -0000

TheRaven is amazed that out of 60 comments 'Victorian' doesn't appear once.

What do you think vampires are but the plainest sexual metaphors from the high-collar age? The nocturnal activity, faces grotesquely contorted, supernaturally beautiful, victims moaning, c'mon!

So with New Moon we have the irony of Victorian era chastity grafted onto a sexual trope born while Queen Vic still ruled. TheRaven appreciates irony like a vampire sucks blood and wonders where the hell you people went to school. Hope it wasn't expensive.

Dracula was published in 1897. The whole blood fetishism thing almost didn't happen. Bram Stoker's working title was 'The Undead'. That would have recast vampires as zombies out of the gate. Has anyone ever seen a sexy zombie?

Ps - Ta-Nehisi - might have missed it but any post on Sandra Bullock's secret plan to take over the world? Did you ever think any man would ever say "I want to see a Sandra Bullock movie?" TheRaven's vast network reports men saying this in Cleveland, Cincinnati and in the land of those-who-wave-rags. Simply unbelievable!

Re: New Mooned

Darth Thulhu — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:55:06 -0000

(Thank you for the compliment, Jess. Since I read and posted close to midnight, I wasn't expecting lots of response.)

I'm with you on the Buffy love (and Xena love, and Leia love, and Eowyn love, and River Tam love, and Zoe love, and Morgaine love, and any Pern heroine or Darkover heroine you care to name). I also love me my male superheroes in whatever power fantasy genre you care to name. At a certain point, though, I like some diversity, and the best counterpoint to fantasies of superpower is fantasies of powerlessness. AKA true, non-subverted horror.

Monster fairytales (and Twilight is full of dark monsters) are originally cautionary tales. In the original, the brave hero might triumph while everyone round dies. More likely, evil triumphs over unwise and rash foolishness, children get cursed or eaten, and only incredible wit/virtue/prowess enables one to manage to survive.

Bella stars in a horror tale. Unlike Buffy, she'll never be powerful enough to subvert that horror tale on her own. To her grace, she gets a metric buttload of goodguy monsters as friends and family, and a personal superpower best described as 'immunity to targetted attacks'. That's enough for her to survive, maybe. Or not.

Since death and defeat are everpresent options, every moment is precious. Every friend and loved one is irreplaceable. If you're going to convey a pro-life viewpoint, that's the way to do it.

Re: New Mooned

Jess — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 16:51:25 -0000

I'm sad and surprised this comment didn't get more attention. It's kind of beautiful.

I saw a lot of the same things in Bella-she's a competent, normal girl with low self-worth, crippling shyness, and a powerful devotion to caring for her family. I think a lot of women can see something to relate to in that.

However, it's really frustrating to see, over and over, characters like Bella who are so passive and powerless-not just because of their circumstances, but because it never occurs to act to affect their circumstances.

I understand women who behave like that in real life, and I feel sad for them, and hope they recieve understanding.

In my fiction though? To steal from Neil Gaiman, fairy tales are important because they teach you that dragons can be slain. The Heroine should be DOING something, not mooning under a table. Grr...

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I prefer Buffy to conventional chick targeted things because Buffy has melodrama and romance (yay!) AND asskicking, powerful females (also yay!) The two don't have to be mutually exclusive.

Re: New Mooned

mpbruss — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 15:42:25 -0000

I agree with this almost wholeheartedly. Good thoughts.

Re: New Mooned

thefoulness — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 14:37:07 -0000

Ugh, ugh, ugh, gross! K Stew is closer to Jodie Foster than any of those actresses. Stewart is hardly the perky type, she just happens to be in a huge blockbuster. Sort of like Leo or Kate Winslet in Titanic.

Re: New Mooned

chmatl — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 14:13:02 -0000

Edgepark - we tried that w/our 13-year-old daughter. We wanted Tolkien, she wanted Stephanie Meyers. Guess who won?

This is a pick-your-battles issue in our household. We thoroughly reviewed the first book on line to make sure there was nothing obviously inappropriate in it. Then we pretty much ceded the futility of keeping her away from it. You can't control what your kids are gonna read at the school library or a friend's house, and the teenage girl obsession with this stuff is ubiquitous, so she was bound to read it with or without our approval. I'll probably end up reading at least enough of the first book to have an informed conversation w/her about the problems w/the characters identified by many commenters here.

Re: New Mooned

Sharon McEachern — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 14:10:38 -0000

And should the witch, warrior or queen need a kidney transplant? Well, the little warlord gets one first because he's a boy.

It's true -- even today -- even in real life, not fantasy. The supposedly fair and trusted UNOS kidney transplant list puts boys and old men before girls and old women -- for no real medical reason. Wake up and read about it at:

http://www.ethicsoup.com/2009/04/life-death-sexism-fewer-girls-women-on-kidney-transplant-list.html

Re: New Mooned

edgepark — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 13:08:48 -0000

I posted this previously in an open thread but wanted to enter it here again. I actually think I've grown to hate the whole twilight thing even more after the hype for the new movie.

im sorry but this whole twilight thing is really ridiculous, seems to me the biggest piece of crap written (and I use that term loosely) in a long time. I remmember picking up the book and scanning through it, in two diferent sections 50 to 60 pages apart theres graphic detail about how the "vampire" shines in the sunlight and how hypnotic he is. I know its a good thing kids are reading books but it seems to be a dumbing now of american literature. THis is not even going into the absurdity of the whole premise. I understand artistic freedom but making vampire shine and not burst into flames in the sunlight is the equivalent to me of writing a book about santa claus the pedophile. There will always be evolving changes in myths over the years, but the heart of a myth has to stay somewhat grounded. Talking about how beautiful a "vampire" shines in the sunlight makes absolutely no sense to me. Allright im done ranting, just have this deep hatred of all things twilight. When my kid gets older im shoving the thickest fiction book i can find in front of him to read before he even tries to read the tripe of the day.

Re: New Mooned

steve — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 12:45:15 -0000

The story line departs from the evolutionary argument -- but it doesn't change the logic of why the story appeals so strongly to women/girls.

In the first movie, Edward does save her from some unsavory types about to do her some serious harm -- this physical protection is what woman have needed from men for 99.99% of our history. You argue that kind of emotional reaction to strong handsome men is a relic, but that won't change the parts of woman's brains that want men like that.

Re: New Mooned

quix0te — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 10:53:07 -0000

I have no more interest in reading the Twilight books than Sex In The City. But its more because the themes don't interest me than out of judgement. Yep, the main character is almost barnacle-like in her passivity. So what? What bugs me is the Time Traveler's Wife gets praised to the sky for a character who is JUST AS PASSIVE. Has anybody stopped by Lifetime Movie Network recently? More of the same. Women writers often write in a passive voice, with characters who are reactive to their environments. And their readers identify with them.

As far as the quality of the prose.

Meh. To me thats just people griping their disbelief that McDonald's sells so many hamburgers or Pop Star #871 keeps selling albums. People like things that suck. Observe Full House and whatever that show with Urkel was. Or don't. Just accept that you've got your dumb vices and other people have theirs.

Re: New Mooned

johnw — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:29:44 -0000

Is Kristen Stewart the next Sandra Bullock/Meg Ryan/Doris Day?

Re: New Mooned

Darkrose — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 02:00:43 -0000

If I hadn't been reading the first book electronically, I'd have thrown it across the room around the beginning of the second chapter. I loathed Bella, who makes Anita Blake not look like quite so much of a Mary Sue, and worse, I couldn't get out of her head because of the first person POV. I thought she was a pretentious, stuck-up drama queen who was frankly rude to nearly everyone around her.

As for Edward, I thought he was a whiny, overly emo, pretentious stalker creep. I do think he and Bella were meant for each other, in that, "they deserve each other" sense.

As a writer, Stephanie Meyer makes J. K. Rowling look like Shakespeare. Her worldbuilding is nonsensical and inconsistent and the cultural appropriation is awful. Her prose is clunky and pedestrian at best.

Er...I may have strong opinions about Twilight and how much I dislike it. And in conclusion: Buffy staked Edward. The End.

Re: New Mooned

Darkrose — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 01:47:44 -0000

What's the appeal? The vampire dude is hugely powerful, gorgeous, sullen, seductive, etc..

...I guess. I admit that I couldn't get past the first chapter of the first book, but I did see the movie, and Edward struck me as a whiny, pretentious, emo, creepy stalker. Also, Robert Pattinson really needs to wash his hair.

woman did very well by falling for the most bad-ass and handsome dude around that could both protect her AND give her beautiful healthy children.

Given that Bella's eventual child almost kills her in utero, I'm not seeing the "beautiful healthy children" part here.

Re: New Mooned

Darth Thulhu — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 23:32:31 -0000

Bella is definitely a cipher. She's deliberately a cipher. She's even aware that she's a cipher, constantly reflecting on her own bland mediocrity. She's no physical wunderkind (that would be Rosalie), she's not especially gifted at smarts (that would be Alice). She's aware that she is modest at best, outside of being an obsessive reader (way to bond with those reading the book, Ms. Meyer!).

So when obsessive love of a fairytale prince comes up, she's all in. She knows she's just a dull brown peahen, and that the resplendent shimmer of her peacock prince is the only thing of significance in her life. Until that shifts to the life growing inside her, threatening to kill her. All of this is terrifying. All of it is joyous.

At the risk of disagreeing with Ms. Rosenberg, I found Bella much more interesting than the average forgettable fantasy heroine. She is the anti-Buffy, which is to say that she is completely believable. She is always in over her head. She is not able (and never will be able) to take down any Big Bad by herself, although she might be able to help enable her family, the Cullens, continue the long slow work of civilizing a barbaric society.

She is a girl who found love, then motherhood, then endless responsibility, and all the while she is in over her head, worried half to death about everyone she cares about, and joyous. Unlike the girl who gets superpowers, Bella only speaks to the reality of most every girl in the history of ever.

That millions of young ladies fantasize about being overwhelmed yet joyous helpmeets to dashing, controlled princes is a frequently reiterated fact. In the Mad Men threads, Betty Draper née Hofstadt is regularly reviled for it. Yet Ms. Meyer's Bella has almost certainly accumulated more readers than Cimorene, Juniper, Morgaine. and Wise Child combined.

Many like fantasizing about being saved, about finding worth in being desired, about distilling joy from simple pleasures amidst adversity. Condescending to them for it doesn't accomplish much.

Re: New Mooned

steve — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 22:44:11 -0000

"love' at 15 isn't deep, but it is one of the most passionate experiences you'll have in life -- if you're lucky. Of course, it most often is followed by one of the most painful experiences when your "love" falls apart over something trivial and stupid.

Re: New Mooned

Darth Thulhu — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 22:35:50 -0000

I'll give Meyer more credit than that. The reality of her narrative isn't that Bella changed Edward. In Meyer's narrative, the (literally) hot-blooded, increasingly powerful, and angrily-emotional badboi-who-used-to-be sweet is Jacob. By contrast, the (literally) cold, iron-willed, spent decades becoming composed-at-all-costs Darcy-equivalent is Edward. I was constantly prepared for Jacob to hurt Bella in a fit of emotion. I never worried for her safety with the Most Moral Vampire in the Universe.

Bella didn't change Edward, and she (wisely) didn't even try to change Anger Issues Jacob. Jacob was just the overdemonstrative teen alpha getting outbid by the suave and composed successful man.

We can ask if that sets up creepy Japanese-culture riffs of middle aged guys sincerely wooing high school girls, but Bella wasn't ever deluding herself. She got crushes on a couple boys but went with the one who turned out to be rich and restrained.