My Sister Is Reading Animal Farm; Why I Don't Hate Twilight

[nexus]

Your little sister is going places.

I wish I knew more people that read Animal Farm, 1984, etc. because they feel obligated to..

She's been touched by the divine, that one has.

 

[recruit00]

Harry Potter did it better, in my opinion. But yeah, just about any piece of fiction that gets people into reading can be a gateway drug.

I'm not fond of Twilight. It's dual-fold. Aside from the actually offensive stuff in it, I don't hate it. It's just boring. If it wasn't offensive, it'd just be boring. And that's a large part of what's unappealing, it seems like really typical teenage romance drama fair. And what makes it worse is that it's honestly kinda sexist. Edward is an old man stalking a little girl, I don't care what he looks like.

I feel like most people hate Twilight for all the wrong reasons. Here's what I'm talking about.

It's much like the reasons a lot of guys give for why they hate Justin Bieber. Not music talent or anything usually, no, they just hate the idea of girls or women finding a male attractive who isn't their idea of a tough alpha male.

God, I watched that video and she is such a condescending *****. Nothing against feminism but wow she loves messing with what the "wrong reasons" are like Republicans and quote mining.

As for the books on that list I read

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
Canterbury Tales by Chaucer
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Grendel by John Champlin Gardner
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
Little Red Riding Hood by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Separate Peace by John Knowles
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare

I give props to your sister to not being another idiot of the generation.

(That's supposed to be nice, donthurtme)

 

[RESURRECTION21]

the ussr was not a hellhole till about 1930 all because of goddamn stalin the asshole

 

[Simskiller]

Have her read Fahrenheit 451 and lord of the flies and my mind just drew a blank of good books that haven't already been mentioned.

 

[snekadid]

Animal farm and 1984 are no longer banned, in fact i had to read animal farm for a highschool English class like 12 years ago, i liked it so much the teacher loaned me a copy of 1984. animal farm was banned at one time because through reading them you could gain insight into the workings of the USSR and while painted in a negative light, the administration viewed any knowledge dangerous as even the bad stuff wasn't as horrible as the bs propaganda they were using to misinform people.

1984 was probably because at the time it was very easy to see how something like that could come about and become a reality, it could still happen potentially but with the advances in technology keeping it contained would be much more difficult.

I heartily recommend Atlas Shrugged for her list as its another viewpoint added to her personality which makes her a stronger person in the long run.

 

[Olas]

Just wait until she gets to Naked Lunch. It's going to be hilarious, believe me.

Naked Lunch, still a better lovestory than twilight.

 

[jackinmydaniels]

If it's her book the school has absolutely no fucking right to take it away, that's like them taking away a shirt you wore because they didn't agree with it, maybe they can tell you not to wear it again, but they sure as shit can't take it away from you and burn it. That's some grade A bullshit right there and if I were the parent I'd be throwing a god damn fit.

I'm sorry, good on your sister for reading better books, but still, that's fucking ridiculous.

 

[Godhead]

Of Mice and Men and Lord of the Flies are really good books. Tell her to read those after she's done with The Color Purple.

 

[Winthrop]

Very similar to Harry Potter ( well, HP is actually quite good, but whatever), anything that gets people into reading more is a-okay by me.

If I may ask, why?

I've heard this a lot, and until recently just sort of accepted it, that kids/people spend too much time in front of the computer or TV instead of a printed page, and this is somehow bad.

Now, there are certainly crap TV and internet stuff around, but printing the stuff out doesn't make it more informative.

I have to agree with this. I've been reading books for school a lot, and most of them boil down to "racism is bad and jesus is good." But if I go and watch Breaking Bad its seen as less classy despite it having a deeper narrative and being much more insightful. It seems really silly and arbitrary to me. Some movies or shows convey points much more elegantly than some books in a much more concise and much more enjoyable fashion, but the books are still seen as the more educated option.

The point where it struck me was when I was reading Lord of the Flies while also watching Season 2 of The Walking Dead. Both can be viewed as allegories about the breaking down of society and humanity in the wild, and they actually make pretty similar points, but Walking Dead actually seems to bring up a lot of points that Lord of the Flies missed but for some reason, Lord of the Flies was considered the more educated option. This just seemed silly to me.

I'm not hating on books, sometimes they can tell a story in a way that no other medium can, but I don't feel reading is this precious wonderful thing that a lot of people view it as.

 

[Overusedname]

Your sis sounds kinda badass. XD I admire her stubborness and resolution, and she's clearly becoming very clever very quickly.

Twilight is just silly escapism. Most women treat as such. The same way we guys treat Dead or Alive. Or rather how other guys treat it, I hate jiggle physics.

It's not harmful. It's just stupid and MUST be treated as such. Just like Cheesecake games.

 

[waj9876]

Wait, people are still ganging up on Twilight? Really? I thought that had died down by down. I mean I personally don't like the series, and I'm also not that big a fan of normal vampires either.

But seriously? People are STILL going on, and on, and on, and on about how Twilight is a pus-filled abomination that is ruining the collective IQs of everyone who calls themselves human, simply by existing?

 

[EstrogenicMuscle]

wow she loves messing with what the "wrong reasons" are like Republicans and quote mining.

There's pretty much no context that those quotes can be in that isn't problematic.

And I don't see anything wrong with what she said, those are clearly the wrong reasons to hate Twilight.

And funny how you decided to call her a "*****". If there was a guy on youtube voice his opinion in a similar tone, I get the feeling you wouldn't call him a "*****".

 

[Chairman Miaow]

Animal Farm is a banned book? That's disgusting.

Alright everybody. We're going on a magical journey called clicking the given link and actually reading what the webpage says [http://www.adlerbooks.com/banned.html].

When we do so, we can clearly see that the page says (repeat after me)

[HEADING=2]
Books Banned At One Time or Another in the The United States[/HEADING].

Not, "these books are banned and anyone caught reading them will be subjected to punishment", it's just a list of books that at one point or another were banned.

Also, for the most part it's not a federal government ban, more like Soccer Moms got together and got the book banned from their library/school curriculum.

I just said it's disgusting that it's banned. And it is banned at that particular school. Which I find disgusting. You don't have to be patronising and rude about it.

 

[freaper]

Hold on.

So they banned Harry Potter at some point, but never "Lolita" or even "Mein Kampf"?

<img src=http://mlkshk.com/r/DBLT>

 

[Therumancer]

Animal Farm is on the banned book list? That's weird. Here in the UK it's one of the books on the syllabus for English literature.

I had to read it in school as well, and I'm in the US.

A lot of the banned books (though not all) were pretty much banned by left wing crusades, though there are a few the right wing has gone after as well. In general books do not stay banned in the US due to our free speech laws. "Tom Sawyer", "Huckleberry Finn" and other books have been in trouble due to their allegedly racist portrayals of groups like blacks and indians.

"Animal Farm" is pretty much a slam on socialist idealogy, which can also be applied to the US. The entire "All Animals Are Equal" thing being rapidly undermined by one kind of animal that winds up being smarter than the others, taking control, and ultimatly exploiting the rest. While it can be applied to Russia, it can also be applied to a lot of general left wing idealogy and be seen as sort of reinforcing the perception that some are indeed better than othrs, after all the failure of the farm was that all animals were NOT equal, apply that to
a racial analogy and raise questions about how things could be avoided, and well, you can see why it's been the recipient of a lot of criticism.

That said, reading books from the banned list doesn't really mean much when the books aren't currently banned where you are (and to the best of my knowlege, none of the ones mentioned currently are).

When it comes to "Twilight" I suppose I can see the school's point in regards to the increasingly insane policies preventing contact and affection between the genders and such. I'm one of those people who favors sex education and distributing condoms and contreceptives, but right now the general run of school policies don't favor my point of view. As a result I can see why a book series showing a pair of hands clasping an apple (the forbidden fruit of mythology) might hit the 'no-no' list. Don't be shocked though, you can get expelled for having something with a picture of a gun on it in some places. The policy is insane, but I at least understand it.

While something of a political minority on these forums, I will say that if your sister is interested in this kind of "stories as social theories" thing beyond just trying to engage in rebellion (badly) I recommend reading Kurt Vonnegut, Asimov's "Foundation" series, and pretty much anything by Heinlan from the beginning or middle of his career. All of which heavily shaped how I think today.

At any rate, you'll find that most books that wound up getting banned for a while did so due to accusations of hate speech and promoting racism, or anti-family messages (on respective sides of the coin), at least in the US. Likewise there has been a bit of backlash against the right that has been going on longer than most people realize, and pretty much anything critical of left wing politics has been under fire for decades now. To be fair though there were laws at one time that prohibited the transport of communist propaganda, which lead to other kinds of bans (in the other direction) when he did "TV Nation" Michael Moore did a parody of this by driving a trailer truck painted with a russian flag around, full of commie propaganda, and reading it in truck stops and such to see if anyone noticed or cared, because I guess there were still some laws about it in some states.

 

[Weaver]

I feel like most people hate Twilight for all the wrong reasons. Here's what I'm talking about.

I feel like this video has cherry picked a very select few morons on the internet and decided that all males who hate twilight hate it for these reason. I've never seen it argued on this site that twilight "ruined vampires" or anything like that; just that it's schlocky, poorly written and features characters who have an incredibly unhealthy sense of dependency on each other.

I haven't read twilight, but the movies were just bad. The acting is largely flat, the direction is generally mediocre, though there are a few moments with some impressive camera techniques. Micheal Sheen in the second movie out acted everyone I feel they had to limit his screen time so it wasn't so flagrantly obvious what a completely better class of actor he was.

 

[Therumancer]

Hold on.

So they banned Harry Potter at some point, but never "Lolita" or even "Mein Kampf"?

<img src=http://mlkshk.com/r/DBLT>

Actually both have been banned I believe. "Has been banned" and "currently banned" are entirely differant things, it can also vary state by state.

To be honest "Mein Kampf" doesn't have all that much in it that is ban worthy by any real standards, people mostly hate it by association. It's a valid academic tool for understanding the time and the perspective that drove "World War II". It also includes a lot of valid social criticism at it's core, Hitler was the toast of the globe for a long time, 99% right 1% totally insane, it's just that 1% that snuck up on people turned into things like oh... attempted Genocides.

"Lolita" is a touchy subject because of the way pornography works in the US. What we call "Porn" isn't really "Porn" legally speaking, it's adult entertainment material. In the US all pornography is illegal and defined as something that is "offensive and without redeeming value". Lolita seems to bounce around because it's understandable why a lot of people find it offensive, but there are questions as to whether it has redeeming value or not given it's overall "message" which either provides an alternative perspective or just makes it more offensive.

 

[Westaway]

I'm not following why everyone is so impressed. I read 1984, Animal Farm and Catcher in the Rye when I was 15. I'm 16 now and I've read To Kill a Mockingbird, Lord Jim, Our Mutual Friend, among others. Is it not expected to read the classics? Most, if not all my friends read similar books (The Crucible, Slaughter House 5, Macbeth)...
This whole thread kind of confuses me.

 

[EstrogenicMuscle]

decided that all males who hate twilight hate it for these reason.

She didn't say anything like that. You're stramanning her.