Vaginismus: Feminist Vaginas, thank you for being rebels!

Painting by Vanessa Tiegs, done with menstrual blood and acrylic.

Vaginismus awareness is almost non-existent – a very sad thing, for a variety of reasons.

Take a look at this wonderful, humorous and caring site:

http://www.vaginismus-awareness-network.org/

and please take your time to hang out there. Vaginismus refers to a behaviour of the vagina that won’t allow things (whether this is a penis/tampon/speculum) inserted into it, causing pain and inability to be penetrated. It’s not a problem, it’s not a disease, it can be overcome.

YET!

If it’s not overcome: no one cares. What I find wonderful about this site is that the authors make a serious effort to change our views about sex: it’s not the vagina’s problem, it’s the society’s. Women with vaginismus offer us with their own unique view of the world. They can help us debunk (among others):

• The myth that sometimes, and most probably the first time, sex is painful for women. NO. Even the first time, there are ways for it to NOT be painful. If sex is painful for you, stop doing it. Right now. No one has to “put up” with it, even just once.
• The myth of virginity and hymens. Hymens don’t have to “break” and cause pain. Girls are rarely educated about what really happens then, because almost no one is interested enough to seriously research this.
• The myth that sex is a rite of passage to womanhood. This is associated with the patronizing views on virginity. A woman’s sexuality is her own, the end. You don’t need special rites (always around penetration, of course) to confirm you’re a woman and that you’re sexual.
• The myth that sex = penetration. Even though we have understood this partially, still, a woman who can’t or won’t be penetrated is seen as less sexual. No! You can be very sexual and have a sex life, because sex is not just that.
• The myth that a relationship without sex is doomed. Women with vaginismus have had the unique chance to discover wonderful, caring partners, who stayed with them and supported them no matter what. Love without sex exists; here’s the proof.

According to studies, vaginismus is viewed as a psychosocial reaction of the vagina muscles. Therefore, it’s not a disease, but it’s not “in our minds” either. It is psychosocial, because it is our vaginas’ natural, thoughtful response to all the violence women experience. Your vagina is taking care of you; why not be friends with her instead of hating her for making you feel “abnormal”? It can be a blessing, not a curse. You’re infinitely cool: you have a feminist vagina! You are the rebel of sex, help us change it!

Break that glass slipper part II: on royal weddings, fairy tales and Disney princesses

The royal wedding hysteria caused many of us to raise an eyebrow. It is true: princes and princesses fascinate not just little girls but women too; men though, rarely.

Fairy tales used to be the common people’s entertainment. 19^th century’s efforts to create national identities and most notably brothers’ Grimm collection of folklore stories in the spirit of Volksgeist gave birth to the fairy tale as we know it: polished, moral and targeted towards bourgeois children.

Why are fairy tales always about kings and queens and princes and princesses? Angela Carter noted in her introduction of The Virago Book of Fairy Tales that modern soap operas like Dynasty, include most elements of fairy tales: evil stepmothers, tortured brides, powerful and wealthy protagonists. I’ve watched way too many contemporary romantic comedies to say for certain that, even though the “rich & famous” pattern is a bit passé, all girl protagonists are, one way or another, Cinderellas taken from ashes to palaces. Kings and princesses were the glamorous celebrities back then; they were the usual material of stories targeted at common people, who enjoyed fantasizing how the ever-beautiful, rich and famous people must live like.

Turning those oral, bold and impressively creative stories into written, moral stories to be read in a Victorian nursery, automatically changed their status from entertaining bits of wisdom to pre-made ethic formulas. Victorian morals and gender roles were incorporated into the fairy tale. So the sexual experiments of Red Riding Hood slowly turned into the story of a girl punished for the loss of her virginity (in the adaptation made for the royal court) to end up as a moral tale for children, to keep them safe from possible molesters (in the final, as it is known to us, adaptation for children). Princesses cause now a new, different kind of fascination: that of the good girl who gets her reward for being good.

Disney was instrumental to the completion of the modern princess myth of femininity. Snowhite, Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella created powerful images that kept being imprinted for almost half a century in girls’ minds. To grow up into a woman means to grow up to be beautiful, graceful, elegant – and useless. Your greatest achievement should be getting the perfect guy: the prince. This has been the dogma for Disney females though I must admit, the ‘90s offered interesting new choices of princesses, most importantly Pocahontas and Mulan.

These two non-Caucasian heroines were a huge leap forward for the modern princess myth and actually, they’re both in my list of favourite characters ever. This year Tangled made a difference: the Rapunzel myth was far from the romantic ‘50s classical Disney. The audience now asks for more comedy and action. And with it, came a truly stunning heroine. The scene where she stands up to her abusive mother left me absolutely speechless. Freudians would applaud.

Princesses fascinate, mostly because they’re more made of myth than reality. It is very easy and tempting to state that these people “live happily ever after”, simply because we want to believe that people who have more than we do, who apparently have everything, are happier. We know it’s not true, yet we wish we could live the fantasy.

We tend to forget one thing though: for fairy tales that end with a royal wedding, the fantasy ends there as well. Reality is what follows.

Fantasy genre: the gate to women’s country

As it was mentioned in my post about Game of Thrones, Teitelbaum made an excellent remark on the fact that fantasy is not just for boys and men. She writes:

The characterization of fantasy as “boy fiction” is offensive to the genre and offensive to women. That we for the most part will only read what Oprah has picked, and especially if a woman wrote it, is a stereotype that is not only demeaning to women — it is also untrue.

When we categorize books as “boy fiction” and “girl fiction” it’s just another way to promote gender stereotyping. It is predicated on the assumption that people will only read books that reflect their personal experiences, so therefore women will only deign to read about dating, shopping, and kitchen intrigues. This is patronizing to women and undermines one of the core purposes of literature, which is to take us on voyages beyond the scope of our personal experience so that we expand in our understanding and capacity for empathy. And I think most women get this; I think most women are willing to read novels with male protagonists in worlds apart from their own. To imply otherwise is an offense to the gender.

A few months ago, Bioware’s gaming community received a message from a desperate “straight male gamer” who felt offended and had his masculinity threatened by the romance attempts of male characters in the video game Dragon Age II (in case you didn’t know, Bioware is famous for creating role playing video games with -mostly bisexual- romances as an optional subplot). His message stated:

 To summarize, in the case of Dragon Age 2, BioWare neglected their main demographic: The Straight Male Gamer.

I don’t think many would argue with the fact that the overwhelming majority of RPG gamers are indeed straight and male. Sure, there are a substantial amount of women who play video games, but they’re usually gamers who play games like The Sims, rather than games like Dragon Age. That’s not to say there isn’t a significant number of women who play Dragon Age and that BioWare should forego the option of playing as a women altogether, but there should have been much more focus in on making sure us male gamers were happy.

Now immediately I’m sure that some male gamers are going to be like “YOU DON’T SPEAK FOR ME! I LOVE DRAGON AGE 2!”, but you have to understand, the Straight Male Gamer, cannot be just lumped into a single category.

[...]

In every previous BioWare game, I always felt that almost every companion in the game was designed for the male gamer in mind. Every female love interest was always written as a male friend type support character. In Dragon Age 2, I felt like most of the companions were designed to appeal to other groups foremost, Anders and Fenris for gays and Aveline for women given the lack of strong women in games, and that for the straight male gamer, a secondary concern. It makes things very awkward when your male companions keep making passes at you. The fact that a “No Homosexuality” option, which could have been easily implemented, is omitted just proves my point. I know there are some straight male gamers out there who did not mind it at and I respect that.

[...]

I’m certain that some will declare “That’s only fair!” but lets be honest. I’ll be generous and assume that 5% of all Dragon Age 2 players are actually homosexuals. I’ll be even more generous and assume that the Anders romance was liked by every homosexual. Are you really telling me that you could not have written another straight romance that would have pleased more than 5% of your fans?

To my delight, creator of DA David Gaider gave a remarkable response:

 The romances in the game are not for “the straight male gamer”. They’re for everyone. We have a lot of fans, many of whom are neither straight nor male, and they deserve no less attention. We have good numbers, after all, on the number of people who actually used similar sorts of content in DAO and thus don’t need to resort to anecdotal evidence to support our idea that their numbers are not insignificant… and that’s ignoring the idea that they don’t have just as much right to play the kind of game they wish as anyone else. The “rights” of anyone with regards to a game are murky at best, but anyone who takes that stance must apply it equally to both the minority as well as the majority. The majority has no inherent “right” to get more options than anyone else.

More than that, I would question anyone deciding they speak for “the straight male gamer” just as much as someone claiming they speak for “all RPG fans”, “all female fans” or even “all gay fans”. You don’t. If you wish to express your personal desires, then do so. I have no doubt that any opinion expressed on these forums is shared by many others, but since none of them have elected a spokesperson you’re better off not trying to be one. If your attempt is to convince BioWare developers, I can tell you that you do in fact make your opinion less convincing by doing so.

And if there is any doubt why such an opinion might be met with hostility, it has to do with privilege. You can write it off as “political correctness” if you wish, but the truth is that privilege always lies with the majority. They’re so used to being catered to that they see the lack of catering as an imbalance. They don’t see anything wrong with having things set up to suit them, what’s everyone’s fuss all about? That’s the way it should be, any everyone else should be used to not getting what they want.

The truth is that making a romance available for both genders is far less costly than creating an entirely new one. Does it create some issues of implementation? Sure– but anything you try on this front is going to have its issues, and inevitably you’ll always leave someone out in the cold. In this case, are all straight males left out in the cold? Not at all. There are romances available for them just the same as anyone else. Not all straight males require that their content be exclusive, after all, and you can see that even on this thread.

Would I do it again? I don’t know. I doubt I would have Anders make the first move again– at the time, I thought that requiring all romances to have Hawke initiate everything was the unrealistic part. Even if someone decides that this makes everyone “unrealistically” bisexual, however, or they can’t handle the idea that the character might be bisexual if they were another PC… I don’t see that as a big concern, to be honest. Romances are never one-size-fits-all, and even for those who don’t mind the sexuality issue there’s no guarantee they’ll find a character they even want to romance. That’s why romances are optional content. It’s such a personal issue that we’ll never be able to please everyone. The very best we can do is give everyone a little bit of choice, and that’s what we tried here.

And the person who says that the only way to please them is to restrict options for others is, if you ask me, the one who deserves it least. And that’s my opinion, expressed as politely as possible.

David Gaider summarized with stark elegance what many people, men and women, straight and gay, tried to say all these years but couldn’t find a voice: the gaming industry and the fantasy genre have been from the beginning wrongly marketed towards straight, white males. Proof of this is the immense success of games like Dragon Age, exactly because they offer to women and gay gamers what they couldn’t find all these years: their own fantasies and their own life experience. Fantasy and SF offer a chance for underground voices to be heard: they can be queer and feminist.

Bioware is smart enough to attract new target groups and earn more money. But what is important for this community is that we all have started to realize that fantasy is not just a boys’ playground. Just because first comics were created on the sexist standards of 60′s pulp, it does not mean this has to go on.

I’ve felt guilty many times (especially when I was younger and read a lot of comics) for reading books and playing games where females were nothing but a juicy piece of fanservice, only a supplement to a virile hero. I kept wondering, is this really worth my time? I do want to read about great adventures and fantasy lands and –why not? – war and strategy and all kinds of exciting things. I didn’t want to read just about princesses, I wanted to read about everything; no one could deny me that. Why should I be confined to what’s targeted at ‘girls’? But it felt as a castration all the same: fantasy was still a forbidden area for women, since it was cut to match perfectly strict, male needs. I had to play by the rules, so I was still an outsider.

I remember vividly talking about books and video games with my boy classmates and I kept getting weird looks, no matter how good friends we were and how much fun we had. I was trying to play boy in a boy’s area. I tried to find myself in one of these stories and all I could find was a sexy female, sometimes posing as empowered but really, nothing more than a sex object. I knew it, but tried to find something in it. Some heroines were actually interesting in their own right but, alas, so few and fragmental. Conventional models of women did not please me; I had to find new ones. In my late teens, I realized that as long as I played in a boys’ theme park, I would never find them.

I had to dig deeper.

So I turned to women writers, to feminist fantasy, to other kinds of comics. It was a deep, relaxing breath to finally find alternative options, away from the sexist standard. Gradually though, I noticed a change: popular products slowly became more women and gay friendly, though not necessarily written by women or gay people.

Even if it is simply the reflexes of an economic crisis in the field, leading to a desperate need of more buyers and thus, a wider audience, still it is radical, exciting. Perhaps we have started understanding the fact that things like stories are way too important to people to simply label them “teenage boy fantasy&SF”, “women’s romantic fiction”, “children’s stories” and find it weird and laughable if a woman reads fantasy or a grown man reads children’s books.

Stories keep us alive: they should be good stories. This,  I think, is all that’s needed.

Game of Thrones: in case you doubted, it IS feminist

I must admit it, I was suspicious at the beginning. The TV show is abundant in sex and blood, causing some reviewers like this one repulsive feelings. Let me remind you that a singled-out element of a story does not make it a priori good or bad. Let us judge the aesthetics and the actual facts, dialogues, characters.

I’ve been reading the novels and watching the show too. As I said, at the beginning I had a hard time sympathizing with most of the characters, but once I accepted the fact that every single one of them has their own morality and acts according to it, I began enjoying it a lot. Now I like even the most vicious of characters (and note down that the show has made every one of them more heroic than they actually are in the books).

The point is: Westeros is a harsh place. It is dominated by a patriarchal system pushed to the extreme, resulting in socially and morally accepted everyday madness. G.R.R. Martin knows that; I don’t think he enjoys the absurdity. Simply, that’s his tool as a writer, that’s what he writes about: human soul. Our world now is quite absurd, as it was before us, exactly because we are human. Why not Westeros then? Why not see what people do when faced with a system that crushes and molds their very personalities to fit this constant obsession with honour, pater familias and struggle for power? Characters are put in this social arena and before our eyes unfold not in abstracto theories, but true, heart-breaking dilemmas. Take a look at it carefully, and you will see that men in this story are also victims of this oppression. Try and read Thomas Hobbes along with it, it will make much more sense.

So apparently, the famed nudity of the show and the very detailed scenes in the book as well have caused us to wonder: are women there only as sex objects, to satisfy a female gaze? Teitelbaum cleverly suggested that fantasy is not just for boys and it would be patronizing to think so. Eördögh has also marked that it is not a story about men’s heroic deeds, but one where women play a vital, important role in the story. On the other hand, feminist cinema critique has correctly pointed out that what we see on screen is mostly a male’s gaze of the female sex. A naked woman’s body holds much of each episode’s screen time; the problem is not with nudity but how and the context it is portrayed.

My opinion is that women in ASOIAF are born in an extremely patriarchal society. They have two options: submit or fight it. Every single one of them is fighting it, they just have to find their own weapons, including sex sometimes (let me remind you that it has been for centuries one of the few powers granted to women to alter things). Their struggle is absolutely breath-taking.

For example, Daenerys is practically sold as a sex-slave at the tender age of 13. This plot element was not there to satisfy a male viewer, who’s “having fun” watching a girl being raped; the story then would have been about her barbarian husband and/or her prince brother. But it’s her story as a survivor and as a winner of a deal that was played against her.

Arya, the tomboy,  is with no doubt a feminist icon. The weapon she chooses is not her sword, but rather her willpower to go against all odds and earn her right to carry a sword. Her own struggle is a double effort, compared to her brothers Robb and Jon who (each with their own predicaments, though) simply have to prove themselves in battle as men, but not as women.

Catelyn and Cersei are also very complex. Even Sansa has her own fight: she’s the conformist, not the rebel. She has to figure out for herself what is truly worth it and she has a hard time. Her struggle is of the kind we face every single day; don’t forget that most of us are the conformists. It takes a huge leap of faith to get rebel.

In conclusion, I’d like to say that it is one of the best things I’ve read, not just as fantasy, not just as a feminist work (and it is feminist, in case you missed my point). The moral conflicts it raises are of an almost Shakespearean level; I can’t help but see Lady Macbeth in Cersei, King Lear in Robert, Hamlet in Jon. The prose is fantastic, the plot intricate and the characters are in a constant zone of grey: none a saint, none a devil, very flawed, very petty.

Very human. I’m in awe.

Recommendations

Constant work in progress of my recommendations on books, film, television even video games can be found here.

Break that glass slipper

As a child, I was thirsty, ravenous for stories. But alas, they wouldn’t give me any, at least not the kind I enjoyed. I took a look at my favourite books as a child and they were of two kinds:

one, packed with mystery and/or adventure;

two, interesting female leads.

Dianna Wynne Jones wrote very honestly that children had no problem following complicated plots, while adults actually had:

Once when I was doing a signing, a mother came in with her nine-year-old son and berated me for making The Homeward Bounders so difficult. So I turned to the boy to ask him what he didn’t understand. “Oh, don’t listen to her,” he said. “I understood everything. It was just her that didn’t.”

Amazingly, I realised that my favourite books were full of rapid action, complicated plot, amazing twists. Books for children aren’t supposed to be soaked in pastel colours. Children have no need of “innocent themes”. They already are “innocent”, not in the Victorian sense but meaning that their judgment is pure, clean, clear. They need food for their wild imagination, stories to enhance it not to kill it. Innocent themes and simplistic tales underestimate their intelligence and critical thought, which is sharp, pointy, straightforward. Boring stories bore them and eventually tire them, distract them. Boring stories forge a deadened, poor imagination.

Now the second part is even more interesting. As a girl I felt a strong need for heroines. I wanted to see little girls, just like me, being the protagonists of their own stories. Cinderella always bored me: even though she was her own story, she never did anything great besides getting the prince. As did Snowhite. As did Briar Rose. As did every single one of those princesses. It was plain boring. But I loved books like the Secret Garden. The girl does not become a princess. Yet she is smart, curious, stubborn and adventurous. She discovers a mysterious garden and changes its fate. On her own. Not with a fairy godmother. Not with a prince. Her own willpower drives things; she truly is a heroine.

What I mean to say is that, as a person involved with children’s books’ illustration, I see more and more children’s books that bore me to death even as an adult. Children have no use of such books. Children are smarter than that, they can do better. I too ended up crafting my own stories, since I liked less and less the books adults gave me. Lucky I rarely watched Disney: it has literally devised sexism all over again.

Interesting tales can be a powerful tool of female empowerment and emancipation. Or for the exact opposite. I was looking for female leads to identify with – and how annoying, they gave me stupid, docile Cinderella. Most girls will end up identifying with Cinderella, though; no strong heroines were given to them as a spark to fire their imagination, as a chance to demand more for themselves. Just think of His Dark Materials’ Lyra: those books may seem way too cruel for children, but I think they’re one of the best examples of children’s literature.

I rejected Cinderella eventually, because I decided to make my own stories. They will not. They will embrace Cindy’s pumpkin carriage, glass shoes and prince as their own. We all know this is the greatest lie of them all. No one wants to feed their children lies, right?

Seirei no Moribito (精霊の守り人) “Guardian of the Spirit”: a matriarchy myth

(spoiler warning)

If you’re looking for a nice anime to watch, this might be a good choice for you. It’s the story of Balsa, a woman bodyguard, and the little prince Chagum whom she’s sworn to protect, set in a fantasy feudal Japan.

Two women in SnM

There are two impressive female leads: first, Balsa. She’s a strong, independent woman, making her living as a warrior. Nevertheless, I can’t think of her as a ‘man character in disguise’.  Her image is essentially that of a mother to the young prince and their relationship would simply not be the same if she were a man.

Second, there’s Torogai, the shaman, an eccentric elder with powers on earth and its spirits. She’s the leading figure of the ‘Earth Party’ (see next paragraph) and the main source of wisdom for our protagonists. I find interesting the fact that she’s not clad in the calm, saintly countenance we usually see wise people portrayed. On the contrary she’s lively, always exploring and jumping around.

The matriarchy myth

No one ever says the word matriarchy in the story, but the symbols are too obvious for anyone to ignore. The story can also be interpreted as a fight between upper and lower classes, past and future. Mainly, it’s the opposition between nature and civilization. The fact that for ‘nature’ we have motherly figures all over the place, and for ‘civilization’ primarily one solid figure of male authority (chiefly the master of star gazers, secondly the emperor) and the whole opposition is represented via the ‘Sky Party’ (star-gazers of the emperor) and ‘Earth Party’ (folk shamans) makes one see other hints too.

The story focuses around the water spirit, one that star-gazers view as harmful and try to eliminate. Actually, (spoiler) history was written wrongly. It’s a benevolent spirit, one that people intentionally exiled in order to establish their authority over other people. Decode this, and you find a ban of the feminine from every aspect of human life.

Motherhood in SnM

Really, it’s cramped with mothers. They’re everywhere and their common goal is protecting the water spirit. A quiet, strong coalition of women devoted to the single task of returning to humankind something they had forgotten. Chagum’s mother, Balsa, Torogai, even the mother of the spirit herself; eventually, earth and her own symbols (like a ‘cloud in the shape of a breast’ etc). The peaceful figure of Tanda reminds us that fatherhood is not excluded, in fact, it’s needed.

I interpreted  SnM in this way, and loved it. Most people might see just the opposition earth-sky, nature-technology. Still, the way this is depicted makes us think a little further. The part of us we forgot lies in water, and water is our very origin. We swam in amniotic fluid for good nine months. Perhaps there are memories from the womb we should really make an effort to recall.

Dracula: Victorian sexual ennui

This is not from an academic point of view. It’s from a purely personal one, explaining why I found it hard to like this story.

Well, I can’t say Dracula has ever been much of an interest to me, so it was only natural not to have read the book and not even watched a related film – ever. I decided to watch Coppola’s version since it is much famed, and I faced in its wholeness for the first time the universe Bram Stoker has created for his fantasy version of the historical figure.

The film was good indeed, wonderfully directed with exquisite photography to match. Gary Oldman was fantastic. Apart from these two things, it was a film that had nothing, nothing at all, underneath the fancy wrap. Let me explain.

I haven’t read the book (and I won’t) so I can’t say whether Stoker writes well or not. What I can say, though, through merely watching the film, is that this story is but a symbolic version of the world’s worst set of prejudice: misogyny, sexism, fear of sexuality, virginity, racism and homophobia. I half-expected that: Stoker was a catholic living in the Victorian era. He needed an outlet for the piled up tension of his era and this is the result.

We have chaste Victorians for protagonists, model men and women of the era (Mina, Jonathan, even Lucy with her playful attitude was a “chaste and innocent girl”). Then Dracula (symbol of unknown terrors, standing for repressed sexual instincts) comes and turns everything upside down. He can transform the loveliest and most innocent of virgins into a wild sexual temptress, apparently in constant orgasm (Lucy was in this state probably during the whole film). Women in this film were but tools of awakened, raw sexuality: Lucy, Mina later, and the three brides of Dracula (the instruments of his will that exist only to lure Jonathan away from his fiancée).

The main theme is all about loss of virginity, through the symbolic “bite” and vampirism, and a constant, lurking fear of female sexuality, represented in the notion “she transforms into an uncontrollable beast of lust”, something scandalous for a devout woman, something by men to be feared. Some say it’s an empowerment of female sexuality; no, it isn’t. Sexuality is typified as something bad and harmful, I fail to see anything healthy in that. Not to mention the “realist” part of the story (much better explained in the book itself) which is but a sterile reproduction of Victorian sexual ethics (Mina is the only woman who has some kind of importance and that because “she has the brains of a man”…).

All this symbolic retelling of uninventive ethics is highlighted with the help of a plethora of paper-figures of completely indifferent characters, so Victorian-generic it bores you, and so inconsistent regarding their actions they turn the already problematic scenario into a huge collection of story gaps. Only the figure of Dracula remains interesting (again, because it was Gary Oldman and not someone else) with his more “humane” aspect of a lover, but it failed to impress me. You can’t make us watch aesthetic porn and then try to convince us it’s a love story. No one in there loved anyone. Even Dracula was simply obsessed.

This work is but a hymn to the core Victorian ethic: we have so much sex we can’t think of anything else but it’s a taboo to ever talk about it. It’s sad. Mainly, because it’s done so sloppily.

Twilight: misogyny has fangs now

Yes, we’ve all heard about it. Some of us have even read it. Take a look at the outrageous mr Leonard Sax here.

“Yet on some level, it seems that children may know human nature better than grown-ups do. Consider: The fascination that romance holds for many girls is not a mere social construct; it derives from something deeper. In my research on youth and gender issues, I have found that despite all the indoctrination they’ve received to the contrary, most of the hundreds of teenage girls I have interviewed in the United States, Australia and New Zealand nevertheless believe that human nature is gendered to the core.” (my bolds)

these quoted after research on gender issues in the lovely year of 2008.

An intelligent and honest response to this can be found here.

“But as someone who was a teenage girl not that long ago, it’s easy to see why these books are popular, and it has nothing to do with the rejection of feminism or traditional gender roles being inherent. I know when I was 12, I would have been more likely to have found the idea of the coolest, most popular, incidentally immortal, guy in school loving imperfect me appealing enough to ignore the politics behind the writing. But then I grew up, just asTwilight’s readers will grow up, and realized that the real world is nothing like books, and that it’s a lot more satisfying to be my own woman than a damsel in distress.”

My review (with a small philosophical/sarcastic commentary), written July 2010 on my personal blog is posted here for your convenience:

I’ll be plain: Twilight is NOT good literature. There are several reasons for this (like the zero literary value, the impossible plot, the dramatically imbecile characters, the complete lack of ingenuity, the whole stupidity of sparkling arms and shirtless werewolf boys – oh, I could go on forever) but I would like to focus on the reasons why I consider Twilight a work entirely unfriendly to women of all ages. Allow me to put little numbers before them, so I won’t tax your reading:

1. The main character, Bella.

Bella is a high school girl. Twilight is blatantly marketed towards a female target group so we guess she’s the character we’re supposed to relate to (reader’s age is irrelevant, judging by how many fans are way past their 30’s). Actually, Bella is perfect for her role as a protagonist to relate to: she’s an empty vessel; it’s too easy to subconsciously imagine yourself in her place. She has no personality whatsoever. Her only value as a human being comes from all the attention she gets from Mr. Edward Cullen (oh, and Jacob and half her classmates). Bella’s character screams: “I am a boring person but a hunk adores me because of some kind of magic so I’m cool”. Girl, get a character. You might then have an actual reason for people liking you.

Has Bella done anything noteworthy? Did she go to college? Did she open a business and earned her own money? No. She wasn’t even prom queen! All she did was “being protected”. And then she finished school, married Cullen and had a child. Some will say “it was her choice”. Sure. I totally agree. The problem is, Bella’s only fulfillment comes from marrying the man of her dreams and having his child;exactly the kind of middle class fantasy imposed on women so they won’t forget their role: in the house, raising children. The problem with Bella is not that she chose this, everyone is free to make their own choices. It’s that her life revolves around a man. Sorry, but she’s a dupe. And if you want to be patronized as well, I guess you haven’t really felt what freedom of choice smells like. You should try it – they say it’s intoxicating.

2. The love interest, vampire Edward Cullen

Edward has all the stuff some (not me though) women consider attractive, such as being a mysterious vampire. This vampire thing worked really well for Ms Meyer. She used it as an excuse for various weak inventions such as sparkling arms (seriously, who finds this hot besides preposterous?) but mainly for others, subtler ones. Like, for instance, his constant stalking and patronizing.

Because Bella is a mortal, dealing with vampires puts her in danger. Soooo how do we deal with this interesting plot hook? Oh, easy. We put Mr Cullen in charge of: watching her sleeping ALL THE EFFING TIME, saving her from EVERYTHING (cars, mobsters and of course evil vampires) as if she can’t do a single thing by herself. Even when he leaves her so she can be safe (a heart-warming sacrifice indeed) he’s STILL stalking her, talking to her via his vampire powers. I mean LEAVE US ALONE ALREADY!

Personally, I don’t want anyone stalking me. But I have some friends who find this attractive, makes them feel special. Truth is, this is done not of interest, but of a wish to dominate the other part. A boyfriend who’s truly caring leaves you a personal space, because he knows and respects the fact that you have a personality as well.

Really, all the real women (us, not Bella) who have no super vampire boyfriends to save them from mobsters, how do they deal with this? In REAL LIFE? ‘Cause if you were raped for example, imagining about Edward saving you won’t do you good. A fantasy might be soothing, but it’s still a fantasy. The only thing that’s good for you is being strong, getting strong, facing life and dealing with it. And guess what: only you can do this. No imaginary boyfriends. No real boyfriends, either.

3. The love triangle

So Bella apparently has a cute werewolf friend who walks around half-naked. Interesting. This girl, instead of thinking about her future like all senior high schoolers (should), is torn apart by her dilemma.

If I were in her place, I would dump both the dead guy and the hairy one and go to college and become a lawyer. Or go to Hollywood and become a movie star. They’re both more interesting. And they both grant me a) my health, b) my financial independence, c) my self-respect. Bella choosing either of them results in a) constant fear for her life, b) no job, no education, c) not being allowed to make any decisions because she has to be protected and thus, leaves all decisions to her beau – being something less than a child. And I say less, because she is supposed to be a mature human being, capable of deciding on her own – unlike a child.

This obsession with romance that can be found in Twilight is so anachronistic it reeks of sexism.

Romance is nice, we like it. It reminds us that love, cookies, and other fluffy stuff still exist and make our world nicer. But romance is not that big a deal so that it defines ALL the things we do – nothing is! If someone does this in real life, you will probably call them stupid (and they are indeed). If you feel that passion is lacking from your life and choose to find it in Twilight, I think you can do better. Passion is by definition shared among individuals with strong, willful personalities. I’m sure that Bella (at the very least), is not one. Sorry Ms Meyer if you dreamt of Jane Eyre, but Charlotte would laugh. And she was a Victorian!

4. The werewolf “imprint” theme

Werewolves in Twilight have soulmates. The moment one sees their soulmate they “imprint” on her and they’re destined to be together. In fact Jacob imprinted on Bella’s baby the moment she was born.

Something is very wrong here.

We have a baby that is destined to be with a person 20 years older than her. Did anyone ask her? No. Will anyone ask her? No. Jacob will protect her like a big brother while she grows up (translation: stalking her) and when she’s 18 he’ll take her to the prom. And they will live happily ever after. The concept of destined lovers might sound nice to some (not me though!) but really: ARE YOU KIDDING US?

Plus, we witness the following in “New Moon”: the werewolf pack’s leader soulmate has a half-ruined face. If you’re wondering why, it’s because her lover is a werewolf thus, has occasional temper issues (it’s his nature, you understand) and without any intention at all, ruined her face during his frenzy. But of course it’s alright. He loves her, duh.

The above incident, translates starkly and plainly to me as: it’s acceptable to get beaten by your lover/husband, because he didn’t mean to do this, it was just a bad moment, he is a good person and he actually loves you. Exactly the kind of excuses domestic violence victims make up for their ill-treatment. Think again about what it’s teaching your daughters. This is the main reason I consider Twilight a huge, gigantic, titanic failure.

5. The question of sex

Sexual frustration is an interesting topic. Someone said that Twilight did excellent job on illustrating it among teenagers of our time. Allow me to disagree. The lady who wrote this was a teenager long ago and her children are too young. What she actually wrote about is the sexual frustration of a 30-something woman (I could have added more parameters to this but I chose to narrow it down). Just think of how many 30+ Twilight fans exist. So we are actually talking about something a bit more extended: women uncomfortable with their own sexuality.

Bella wants to have sex. Edward disagrees, as he might eat her during the act.

Someone said on this that it is actually revolutionary: it’s the guy that refuses, not the girl. This appeals to many women since Edward seems like a guy who’s responsible, and who’s willing to wait because he truly loves you. My opinion is a little bit different: this is so puritan. And once again, patronizing. My reasons:

Patronizing: Bella has her own sexuality. She decides to use it as she likes. But Edward refuses this. He takes control of Bella’s sexuality, something that men (fathers, brothers, husband) have been doing to women for at least the past 2000 years. This was the whole point of the sexual revolution, dear readers.

Puritan: They agree to wait until marriage. Really, I laughed at this. So much. What a glorious, convenient, Christian solution! I love it, I adore it! Honestly, I’m European and I am an atheist. I don’t have to be a feminist (which I am) to smirk at this. Neo-virginity prejudice (which is exactly what this implies) is somewhat of a trend in the USA I suppose.

I think I made my point. We are not talking about actual questions and thoughts young people have about sex, but rather about a confused woman’s stale and problematic view of sexuality. People’s taboos about sex have to change, not find a messiah in Twilight’s text.

This pretty much sums it up. Before some of you say:

“Twilight is a fantasy/romance/teenage story, narrated by a schoolgirl, so please treat it as such.”

There is a difference between “fiction” and “fantasy”. Tolstoy, Balzac wrote fiction. Fantasy is closer to James Bond. It has no response to reality whatsoever. It does not reflect real human beings and their agonies; thus, has no value besides simply offering an escape, a delicious base to start imagining/writing your own fanfiction, because you have no hope of ever living it. Twilight is an escape for some people. A very disappointing one.

Or

“Don’t take it very seriously, I won’t act like the characters, gee.”

Perhaps you won’t. but the fact that you like it shows me something is wrong at its very core. Plus, I don’t think that feeding this to young girls prepares them for their future life as real women. Just think of the points I made above (yes, those with the little numbers).

Also, if I might suggest that you should read J.L. Austin’s book “How to do things with words”. You might understand a little bit why the things we say have more power than we think, and this includes the text of Twilight.

So, I actually do treat it as what it actually is: a sexist, prejudiced, anachronistic, pathetic excuse of written speech.

My advice? Do yourself some good and read Virginia Woolf.

The Liveship Traders: Characters! Characters! Characters!

Finally, I’m writing something about my favourite fantasy writer, Robin Hobb. This woman introduced me to characters who are realistic, who breathe, a plot that genuinely combines down-to-earth politics and a stunning high-fantasy background, all these wrapped in wonderful storytelling. More importantly, she puts there women who are worth reading.

Each and every woman character has an impact. None is perfect, but all are great, even the weaker ones. I’ve never seen such skill in presenting excessively different psychologies without falling into stereotypes. They grow up, evolve, change and offer us eventually a kaleidoscopic view of the female soul.

Characters (possibly small spoilers ahead, skip this if you want to make sure you avoid them)

We have Ronica, the strong-willed grandmother, Keffria, the submissive wife and mother, Althea, the anarchic tomboy, Malta, the spoiled child too hasty to grow up. And then we have Jek, a strong, entirely de-gendered person, Etta, the cynical prostitute, Serilla, the insecure scholar, Kekki, the concubine. Along with many secondary characters (and other too, those I should not reveal), these women are all unique, struggling with reality in a world by men for men.

Their male counterparts are also interesting. Kyle, Torg and Cosgo are three fearsome examples of male domination and patriarchy. But Ms Hobb does not stop here; she does not demonize men in order to gain sympathy for women. Other men are also there, men like Wintrow, Brashen, Reyn, men that learn from life and more importantly, from their female counterparts: they make an effort to behave like people, not “males”. I have no words for the figure of Kennit –I’ll spoil you so hard you’ll hate me for life- just that he is an ingeniously created character

And there is Amber too. She poses as woman, but she’s actually of ambiguous gender.

Now! What you must do is stop reading this blog and order immediately your copy of “Ship of Magic”, the first book of the trilogy. It will reward you on many levels. The pace at the beginning is relatively adagio, but as you proceed you won’t have time to turn pages, trust me. It’s one of the best fantasy book series you can find. 

Visit her at http://www.robinhobb.com/