Twilight's Internal "Problems"?
Welp, I haven't put up a "serious" discussion or topic in a while, so I figured "Why not now?" what with people going off on Twilight again, and for even deeper reasons than before.
But first, I want to offer my quick opinion of the EXTERNAL problem that most people (especially here) seem to have:
Yes, it's a REALLY bad movie. Yes, it's getting way more money and attention than it deserves. Is this type of phenomenon new?
Of course not! Just look at all those generic action movies that come out that decide to slap some specific super heroes name on it's cover, or something like AVATAR, or even the new Star Trek movie, or even the Transformers films, and you can see that tons of overall crappy or insubstantial cinematic productions get by on "less than stellar" terms.
It's just how it is. People, and especially their children, like to see big shiny glossy thingies, so big shiny glossy thingies they provide, and the people, especially with children, pay for it. It's that simple.
But then, of course, all the haters seem hell bent on insulting and ridiculing it for every-little-thing it does, all while mostly ignoring the fact that it's just a hokey dokey hinky dinky romance novel/story for 14 YEAR OLD GIRLS.
It's almost like watching some full grown dude walk over to a little girl playing with her Barbies and toy unicorns, and then snatching the girl's toys away and yelling at her for being such a little b*tch!
What? You all thought that the things you all liked as youngins' (i.e. dinosaurs, giant robot fights , racecars, VAMPIRES, mummies, zombies, robots, monkeys, etc) were any more substantial? Hurp de durp de durp - No...
To be honest, if I had a daughter that was reading this stuff, I'd just be happy that she was READING something! Like, something other than a fashion or bridal magazine. I would then try to introduce her to other books, for instance maybe suggest to her that she may like the Harry Potter books, or maybe the Chronicles of Narnia.
Or maybe if ya'll are bad@$$ enough, FIGHT CLUB!
Maybe... perhaps... kinda...
You may not wanna push it...
But at least its a start! At least its SOMETHING! SOMETHING to help steer the kids away from the magazines and visually over-sugar coated and mindless television shows that EVERYONE has absolutely NO PROBLEM complaining about to a considerably more "wholesome" form of entertainment.
But alas, this is only part of what I wanted to discuss. The next part will probably get me flamed and hated for all eternity here, but whatever. If everyone else is allowed to shove their over indulgent opnions on me, then I'd at least like to share some of mine.
Now onto the INTERNAL problems. Particularly the ones that our beloved MovieBob pointed out about Twilight's message:
At first glance, most people would think "What the fudge!? How stupid is it that this movie try and teach women to marry early without enjoying themselves a little!?!? RAGE!!!!". And to an extent, they are right. You shouldn't just marry as quickly as you can. You should, of course, have some fun and spend ample time with your partner BEFORE going to the altar (lest you engage too quickly, and wind up having a crappy son like me, and your marriage in shambles before your kid even turns 10).
But do you want to know the truth about this though?
Way back when, in the Evil Old Patriarchy of the 1950's and before, marriage and family were regarded as pretty important. Actually, they were just about THE most important things most regular people engaged in. Marriage and family are the foundation, the bedrock of any successful society.
It was in marriage that men found the motivation to push themselves enough to work and produce far more than they'd ever really need to for just themselves, in order to earn the amount of money needed to support there family. This extra work and production, as you can probably guess, was good for the society as a whole.
That left the women with the duty of caring for and raising the kids - the next generation. And since, if you go back far enough, most households were not allowed to have more than one person employed and working, it made since that the man (the naturally stronger and more endurable of the sexes) be the one to work. Women COULD go out and work at a job, but most did not want to, especially since back then most jobs were terribly demanding and unsafe, it wasn't all just filing reports and sitting behind a computer screen.
Plus, there were only but so many jobs to go around anyways, and it would have been unfair if one household had both parents working and bringing in loads of extra cash to luxurify their living quarters, whilst the neighboring family may not have been able to find ANY job, and be stuck both unemployed and in poverty. This of course would lead to poorly and/or unhealthily raised children, crime, and so on. And especially since there was no overall welfare or much in the way of police and government protecting, the communities that DID allow double-income families tore themselves apart and were closed down.
And so, most young girls were groomed for marriage. Often taught how to cook, clean, sow, how to be polite, how to deal with children, and discouraged from sleeping around so that they would be seen as attractive marriage partners. Also, the timeframe for adolescence used to be a lot shorter (often ranging from ages 12-16), and after that you could more or less actually go out and start your life, whereas nowadays it's difficult for those at ages 16-17 to even find part time work, and most people, upon reaching 18 and graduating high school, delay their start in life even further by going to college for around four years.
Was it a perfect system? Of course not! NOTHING in this world is perfect, there will ALWAYS be some problems, no matter what you do. So long as men and women are different, so long as PEOPLE have ANY sort of differences between one another, there will always be some amount of conflict, or inequality.
And god-for-F*CKING-bid that anyone, especially our young princesses and females, be expected to try and find a good marriage partner/mate whilst they are in THEIR PRIME, rather than waiting until they're an old career hag hitting her 30's and up who, unlike most men, always marry UP and ignore most lesser earning men, whereas men have no problem taking on a woman who earns less, if anything at all, thus helping a fellow human being rise above their previous status.
Nowadays though, no one seems to really care much for marriage, or even for family. Especially considering that marriage is such a crap deal for guys nowadays, and even co-habitation can lead to problems (depending on the laws of whichever nation or whatever you're in), and also that women's entry into the workplace has diluted the workforce to where the average family can't easily live off of a single income, and thus has both parents working on their "careers" whilst little Timmy has to go to a daycare or just plain stay home alone (as I did for many a year).
'Cause, well f*ck, who cares about actually raising their kids anymore anyway? Marriage and family and unity is overrated! It's every man, woman and child for themself! I wish to have my cake and eat it, and no one shall stop me!
And yet everyone will sit here and wonder why we have so many social problems and how crappy our society is...
Okay, admittedly, this one is actually somewhat justified, at least from a "realistic" point of view.
Stalking someone in real life is NOT a-okay, and is not an admirable act of love in the least. But honestly, look through just about ANY overblown love story, or Hollywood/media-induced "act of love", and you'll see crap like this.
Climbing up to your crush's bedroom window in the midst of the night and quoting Shakespeare isn't a good idea either. Nor is riding in on a horse in shining armor, or pulling out a rapier and declaring "En Garde!" on anyone who happens to be checking out your girl, nor is going out into the wilderness to wrestle the paws off a bear so you can bring them to your woman in an attempt to prove that you're a "strong, suitable mate".
It's just the typical over blown Romance novel/movie/story B.S. that they always pull.
This is just the kind of crap that came about with all that feminist "Women's Liberation" bullsh*t. Most decent guys (at least the ones I know of) know that the term "Sexually Liberated Woman" is just another, fancy term for slut. And it is not surprising that it was with the rise of this notion, that todays "Slut-Culture" was born.
Everyone with half-a-brain will complain about how sex nowadays is such a casual topic, when it honestly very well shouldn't be, and how irritating it is to have to listen to people chat and argue about eachothers sexual orientation, and also how kids are learning about sex at younger ages, and some, unfortunately, even try to emulate such things, and at how perverse everything has become.
As stated earlier, sex used to be a "taboo" topic, not one to be taken lightly or out in the open. And people, at young ages, were often discouraged from "sleeping around" and to wait until they found that special someone to "get their groove on". It's obvious why it was sone this way. No one wants to be caught off-gaurd with a suprise/accidental or unwanted pregnancy, and also because most decent people don't like the idea of knowing that their partner has slept around with a bunch of other people. It's just a naturally bad way to start off a relationship. Common sense. Sense of the common variety.
But of course, that's now considered "oppression", and we all should be allowed to just sex whoever we want, whenever we want.
And then you go on OkCupid.com and see all the desperate "single mommas" looking for a "sugar daddy". I sure as hell don't feel sorry for most of them. They couldn't keep their legs shut, or went out with some irresponsible (but exciting!) bad boy or thug, and are now paying the price, and expect some sympathy for their mistake.
Of course not ALL of them are bad. If some couple had been married for 10+ years, had some kids, and the dad dies or something, yeah, that's bad. Someone like her could use help.
But no-f*cking-way is that the case with all of them, or even most of them. It's usually some girl in her early twenties, with some 2-3 year old brat, now looking for a "nice, responsible guy", many of whom she probably rejected in favor of the more "exciting" (A.K.A. douchebags, thugs, etc) in her earlier years.
I COULD go on, but this is already a major TL;DR, and have already cast myself into the fire.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go find a furnace to climb into, for I expect to be flamed.
Welp, I haven't put up a "serious" discussion or topic in a while, so I figured "Why not now?" what with people going off on Twilight again, and for even deeper reasons than before.
But first, I want to offer my quick opinion of the EXTERNAL problem that most people (especially here) seem to have:
*barfbarfbarfbarfbarfbarf*
Yes, it's a REALLY bad movie. Yes, it's getting way more money and attention than it deserves. Is this type of phenomenon new?
Of course not! Just look at all those generic action movies that come out that decide to slap some specific super heroes name on it's cover, or something like AVATAR, or even the new Star Trek movie, or even the Transformers films, and you can see that tons of overall crappy or insubstantial cinematic productions get by on "less than stellar" terms.
It's just how it is. People, and especially their children, like to see big shiny glossy thingies, so big shiny glossy thingies they provide, and the people, especially with children, pay for it. It's that simple.
But then, of course, all the haters seem hell bent on insulting and ridiculing it for every-little-thing it does, all while mostly ignoring the fact that it's just a hokey dokey hinky dinky romance novel/story for 14 YEAR OLD GIRLS.
It's almost like watching some full grown dude walk over to a little girl playing with her Barbies and toy unicorns, and then snatching the girl's toys away and yelling at her for being such a little b*tch!
This is how b*tches are made
What? You all thought that the things you all liked as youngins' (i.e. dinosaurs, giant robot fights , racecars, VAMPIRES, mummies, zombies, robots, monkeys, etc) were any more substantial? Hurp de durp de durp - No...
To be honest, if I had a daughter that was reading this stuff, I'd just be happy that she was READING something! Like, something other than a fashion or bridal magazine. I would then try to introduce her to other books, for instance maybe suggest to her that she may like the Harry Potter books, or maybe the Chronicles of Narnia.
Or maybe if ya'll are bad@$$ enough, FIGHT CLUB!
Maybe... perhaps... kinda...
You may not wanna push it...
But at least its a start! At least its SOMETHING! SOMETHING to help steer the kids away from the magazines and visually over-sugar coated and mindless television shows that EVERYONE has absolutely NO PROBLEM complaining about to a considerably more "wholesome" form of entertainment.
But alas, this is only part of what I wanted to discuss. The next part will probably get me flamed and hated for all eternity here, but whatever. If everyone else is allowed to shove their over indulgent opnions on me, then I'd at least like to share some of mine.
Now onto the INTERNAL problems. Particularly the ones that our beloved MovieBob pointed out about Twilight's message:
Message #1. Marry as early as you can.
A visual representation of what ALL families should strive to achieve!
At first glance, most people would think "What the fudge!? How stupid is it that this movie try and teach women to marry early without enjoying themselves a little!?!? RAGE!!!!". And to an extent, they are right. You shouldn't just marry as quickly as you can. You should, of course, have some fun and spend ample time with your partner BEFORE going to the altar (lest you engage too quickly, and wind up having a crappy son like me, and your marriage in shambles before your kid even turns 10).
But do you want to know the truth about this though?
Way back when, in the Evil Old Patriarchy of the 1950's and before, marriage and family were regarded as pretty important. Actually, they were just about THE most important things most regular people engaged in. Marriage and family are the foundation, the bedrock of any successful society.
It was in marriage that men found the motivation to push themselves enough to work and produce far more than they'd ever really need to for just themselves, in order to earn the amount of money needed to support there family. This extra work and production, as you can probably guess, was good for the society as a whole.
That left the women with the duty of caring for and raising the kids - the next generation. And since, if you go back far enough, most households were not allowed to have more than one person employed and working, it made since that the man (the naturally stronger and more endurable of the sexes) be the one to work. Women COULD go out and work at a job, but most did not want to, especially since back then most jobs were terribly demanding and unsafe, it wasn't all just filing reports and sitting behind a computer screen.
Plus, there were only but so many jobs to go around anyways, and it would have been unfair if one household had both parents working and bringing in loads of extra cash to luxurify their living quarters, whilst the neighboring family may not have been able to find ANY job, and be stuck both unemployed and in poverty. This of course would lead to poorly and/or unhealthily raised children, crime, and so on. And especially since there was no overall welfare or much in the way of police and government protecting, the communities that DID allow double-income families tore themselves apart and were closed down.
And so, most young girls were groomed for marriage. Often taught how to cook, clean, sow, how to be polite, how to deal with children, and discouraged from sleeping around so that they would be seen as attractive marriage partners. Also, the timeframe for adolescence used to be a lot shorter (often ranging from ages 12-16), and after that you could more or less actually go out and start your life, whereas nowadays it's difficult for those at ages 16-17 to even find part time work, and most people, upon reaching 18 and graduating high school, delay their start in life even further by going to college for around four years.
Was it a perfect system? Of course not! NOTHING in this world is perfect, there will ALWAYS be some problems, no matter what you do. So long as men and women are different, so long as PEOPLE have ANY sort of differences between one another, there will always be some amount of conflict, or inequality.
And god-for-F*CKING-bid that anyone, especially our young princesses and females, be expected to try and find a good marriage partner/mate whilst they are in THEIR PRIME, rather than waiting until they're an old career hag hitting her 30's and up who, unlike most men, always marry UP and ignore most lesser earning men, whereas men have no problem taking on a woman who earns less, if anything at all, thus helping a fellow human being rise above their previous status.
Nowadays though, no one seems to really care much for marriage, or even for family. Especially considering that marriage is such a crap deal for guys nowadays, and even co-habitation can lead to problems (depending on the laws of whichever nation or whatever you're in), and also that women's entry into the workplace has diluted the workforce to where the average family can't easily live off of a single income, and thus has both parents working on their "careers" whilst little Timmy has to go to a daycare or just plain stay home alone (as I did for many a year).
'Cause, well f*ck, who cares about actually raising their kids anymore anyway? Marriage and family and unity is overrated! It's every man, woman and child for themself! I wish to have my cake and eat it, and no one shall stop me!
And yet everyone will sit here and wonder why we have so many social problems and how crappy our society is...
Message #2. Stalking = Love.
http://somecallmeduh.files.wordpress.com/2007/06/stalking1.jpg
Okay, admittedly, this one is actually somewhat justified, at least from a "realistic" point of view.
Stalking someone in real life is NOT a-okay, and is not an admirable act of love in the least. But honestly, look through just about ANY overblown love story, or Hollywood/media-induced "act of love", and you'll see crap like this.
Climbing up to your crush's bedroom window in the midst of the night and quoting Shakespeare isn't a good idea either. Nor is riding in on a horse in shining armor, or pulling out a rapier and declaring "En Garde!" on anyone who happens to be checking out your girl, nor is going out into the wilderness to wrestle the paws off a bear so you can bring them to your woman in an attempt to prove that you're a "strong, suitable mate".
It's just the typical over blown Romance novel/movie/story B.S. that they always pull.
Visual representation of what a typical Romance story has to offer. Women luv chocolate!
Message #3. The most important thing about you is your virginity.
A magnificent display of one's respect for their body and sexual status.
This is just the kind of crap that came about with all that feminist "Women's Liberation" bullsh*t. Most decent guys (at least the ones I know of) know that the term "Sexually Liberated Woman" is just another, fancy term for slut. And it is not surprising that it was with the rise of this notion, that todays "Slut-Culture" was born.
Everyone with half-a-brain will complain about how sex nowadays is such a casual topic, when it honestly very well shouldn't be, and how irritating it is to have to listen to people chat and argue about eachothers sexual orientation, and also how kids are learning about sex at younger ages, and some, unfortunately, even try to emulate such things, and at how perverse everything has become.
As stated earlier, sex used to be a "taboo" topic, not one to be taken lightly or out in the open. And people, at young ages, were often discouraged from "sleeping around" and to wait until they found that special someone to "get their groove on". It's obvious why it was sone this way. No one wants to be caught off-gaurd with a suprise/accidental or unwanted pregnancy, and also because most decent people don't like the idea of knowing that their partner has slept around with a bunch of other people. It's just a naturally bad way to start off a relationship. Common sense. Sense of the common variety.
But of course, that's now considered "oppression", and we all should be allowed to just sex whoever we want, whenever we want.
And then you go on OkCupid.com and see all the desperate "single mommas" looking for a "sugar daddy". I sure as hell don't feel sorry for most of them. They couldn't keep their legs shut, or went out with some irresponsible (but exciting!) bad boy or thug, and are now paying the price, and expect some sympathy for their mistake.
Of course not ALL of them are bad. If some couple had been married for 10+ years, had some kids, and the dad dies or something, yeah, that's bad. Someone like her could use help.
But no-f*cking-way is that the case with all of them, or even most of them. It's usually some girl in her early twenties, with some 2-3 year old brat, now looking for a "nice, responsible guy", many of whom she probably rejected in favor of the more "exciting" (A.K.A. douchebags, thugs, etc) in her earlier years.
I COULD go on, but this is already a major TL;DR, and have already cast myself into the fire.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go find a furnace to climb into, for I expect to be flamed.
My new roommate. He's hot and you're jus jealous!1!.
