Precisly why I don't care for Twilight
Yet another conservative hack holds fourth (ad nauseam).
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If Bella was a guy, Jacob and Edward would still need to "save" him.
Moreover, doesn't anyone remember that Bella SAVES EVERYONE in the fourth book? In fact, SHE IS THE MOST POWERFUL VAMPIRE!
Moreover, why do people constantly harp on how Bella is sooooooooo for traditional gender roles cuz she makes her Dad dinner? She makes her Dad dinner, she wants to have premarital sex, she doesn't want to get married, she's lets Alice have a big, big fancy wedding (if anything it's all these vampires that want traditional gender roles), she wants to have Edward's kid....but she also really freakin' wants to be a vampire too.....which consequently, to become a vampire, she has to abandon her life with her father (and NOT make him dinner! ZOMG!!)
Yes, sooooo traditional, that Bella.
Well, actually, if Bella were a male character written in the Twilight world, she wouldn't need to be saved. That's the point. It's not just her that she has a "weak" personality and is also a female... it's that she was purposely given that personality because she is a female character. And the males do not have that quality.
She was written, as a character, to be the image of helpless femininity.
Vampires, werewolves and gangs of men can kill human men too.
And yet there are about twenty bajillion helpless human lady / sexy monster man books for every book where the roles are reversed. Weird. It's almost like there was some sort of gender bias involved, or something.
She's a pushover. She doesn't want to get married - Edward bullies her into it. She wants to be a vampire - Edward won't turn her unless she marries him. She wants to have sex, wants to hang out with Jacob, doesn't want a big wedding, doesn't want to go to prom, doesn't want to go shopping, doesn't want to be babysat by the Cullens whenever Edward's away, doesn't want to go to college - but Edward makes her do all of that by force, if not subversive coercion, save for the college thing. If her man wants her to do something, she ends up doing it because she's weak-WILLED. Which is the traditional female role.
And so what if she was the most powerful vampire? (Which is so Mary-Sue, by the way, but that's a different gripe.) She made absolutely no effort to get powers or learn self-defense or get a weapon and learn how to use it. It's not just that she's human, it's that she so readily accepted her own weaknesses. Bella played into the role of being the damsel in distress like she truly had no other options.
For a short time there, I think Edward was equating being a vampire with being married, which I thought was kinda brillant, cuz if Bella has problems getting married, how in heavens will she deal with being a vampire FOREVER.
Unfortunately, he had to be all like, "let's have premaritial sex" when he found out about the wedding.
And Edward totally "earned" his powers?
Vampires are powerful and she loved the power when she became one. And of course she accepted her human weakness. She ain't Buffy. They are vampires/werewolves and she is human.Inherent problem in the story line. I personally never felt that her weakness was due to her being a girl, but rather her being a human. *shrug*
Weak-willed? Edward and Bella spent 3 books arguing about it! Not only that, but she made Jacob and Edward be friends. She kept Jacob as a friend. She had the kid when Edward wanted to kill it. She became a vampire against his wishes. She got Edward.
Bella and Edward fight like an old married couple.
Whether Bella's wimpy or not, I'm kind of tired of articles declaring the popularity of X in pop-culture as some sort of death knell for feminism. Whether that be Twilight, Sex & The City, Ally McBeal, what have you. Feminism is concerned with a much broader range of social issues and is not going to curl up and die simply because someone creates an un-feminist heroine in a teen romance novel.
The most irritating part in that article for me is: "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".... Despite WHAT indoctrination? I never even came across the idea that human nature wasn't gendered to the core until I was an undergrad taking very progressive courses at a very progressive school, and I imagine a lot of people never encounter it at all - or encounter it in such a watered-down version it couldn't be anything but wrong.
Of course girls are going to express certain ideas if those are the only ideas they've been exposed to!
Very true - and even kids from consciously feminist families are going to be affected to some degree by the rest of the culture.
And, the idea that our culture's sexism doesn't ALSO constitute indoctrination is pretty laughable. And it starts so early; even in infancy parents underestimate their daughters' physical capabilities and 'rescue' them sooner.
I love how they're like "oh, girls like it because of the traditional gender roles!" and I'm sitting here thinking to myself "and it has nothing to do with the hot vampires?" because, from the girls and women I've talked to who enjoyed the saga, the hot vampires (or werewolves) were the real draw - not Bella's incessant need to be rescued and Edward's constant bullying. (Though some people thought it was romantic. That kinda creeps me out.)
I was just about the post something similar!