tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86363197227441682372024-03-13T09:51:07.996-07:00NeverMediaPop culture critic, Omni-disciplinary nerd, High-functioning vampireTyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-79579370414428162712014-03-27T05:15:00.005-07:002014-03-27T06:47:45.052-07:00Hungry Vampires and Vampires That Just Want to Live<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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These days, the vampiric need for blood tends to be portrayed as an uncontrollable and all-consuming hunger. On a genre level, the vampiric hunger just seems to keep on getting worse.<br />
<br />
Writers seem to keep topping each other and making the hunger increasingly severe. I fully predict that eventually someone is going to write a Vampire story where our protagonist has to be hooked up to a constant feed of blood and has all these Renfields constantly grabbing more people off the street to keep it going.<br />
<br />
Here are a lot of other common threads:<br />
<br />
-<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Vampires have no satiety, or almost none. They crave blood constantly. They see a person, and their bodies basically react thusly: ‘hey, someone brought blood!’ They need a tremendous amount of willpower just to avoid killing everyone around them all the time. Why any Vampires that aren’t completely and utterly evil even bother living in society at all is anyone’s guess, but they do, and they rack up enormous body counts simply by existing.<br />
<br />
-<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>They crave blood regardless of all utility. They’re like reverse bloody Kantians (I must have blood regardless of utility).<i> Twilight</i> and<i> Being Human</i> take the cake, here: their Vampires don’t even need blood to live at all. In <i>Being Human</i> it’s basically an addiction that they have because…um, they’re Vampires and Vampires are supposed to drink blood?<br />
<br />
In <i>Twilight</i>, Vampires are technically immune to starvation, according to the <i>Illustrated Guide</i>. Blood makes them stronger, I guess – even though they’re already strong enough to juggle minivans, so it seems redundant. Blood also makes them less hungry – kind of, temporarily – but they’re hungry most of the time anyway. Really, these guys should just take one for the team and accept that they’ll be hungry forever and live in the woods.<br />
<br />
If real predators were that hungry all the time, they’d end up wasting most of the energy they ingested just trying to get more food in a loop that wouldn’t favor long-term survival.<br />
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Many Vampires are creatures conceived in the mindset that says all predators are just trying to hurt us all the time and aren’t actually acting in their own self-interest by trying to frigging eat. It’s the same mindset that produces stories where predators seek out one particular target at all costs and pass up plenty of other viable food sources along the way and paints predators as having more in common with serial killers than hungry animals. Vampire fiction often tries to have it both ways.<br />
<br />
-<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Vampires’ desire for blood is constant, but their need is not desperate. I don’t usually see Vampires that are on the verge of death if they don’t get blood right that minute. You’d never know it, given how hungry they are, but we’re definitely supposed to think that it’s the human in danger and not them. The writers severely downplay the conflict that’s actually associated with feeding on people. In the aftermath of the murder, the Vampires mourn the death of their victims or don’t, but there’s rarely any sense that they narrowly avoided dying themselves.<br />
<br />
<i>Twilight </i>helped popularize that whole idea that if you get so much as a bloody paper cut around a Vampire you’re screwed. I’ve seen that in plenty of other places too, but it’s a pretty iconic scene in <i>New Moon</i>.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jasper, is that how you reacted when one of your high school classmates misused the stapler?</td></tr>
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Still, though, the Cullens have got their wilderness animals to binge on, and even then, they can take long breaks in between feedings. Edward and his family certainly don’t go ‘camping’ all that often. There are huge sections of the books where their actual consumption of blood doesn’t come up at all. They may crave it all the time for some reason, but they’ll survive with relatively infrequent feeding periods. As we’ve established, they don’t even frigging need the blood at all, and their need to feed never puts them in any real danger.<br />
<br />
My condition is exactly the opposite.<br />
<br />
Get a nosebleed around me; I’ll get you a tissue. Cut yourself with a knife, and I know first-aid. Get a paper-cut around me – I honestly probably wouldn’t even notice, because my nose isn’t any better than a normal person’s and most people don’t bleed as much as Bella did after getting a frigging paper-cut. Paper is not razor wire, and I don’t have any razor wire at my house anyway.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yes, that is the correct reaction.</td></tr>
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I’m not Louis either. I can easily take one pint from someone at a time, and no more. I know my mouth capacity. I know how many swallows I need to get to a pint. My fangs are not poisonous, and my bite is neither lethal nor infectious (infecting someone with my vampirism is pretty hard to do unintentionally). I can stop when I get to sixteen ounces, withdraw, and start cleaning the wound. No problem.<br />
<br />
I just need to do it every day, or I’ll die.<br />
<br />
If I fed Tuesday, but not Wednesday – well, every Thursday henceforth is going to be cancelled forever. I could drink from eight different people on Tuesday, and it wouldn’t matter – I’d still need blood Wednesday. Hell, I could drain a person dry on Tuesday if I was an evil idiot monster with an unlimited stomach capacity, and it wouldn’t matter. My body wouldn’t use the excess, and it has no way of storing it for later. You wake up the next day, and the stopwatch resets. I also can't use animal blood as a substitute and hospital blood is completely out of the question. I need a fresh, human, near-constant supply.<br />
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For Hungry Vampires, their lives are basically battles of wills between their urges and their sense of moral and physical restraint.<br />
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My life is a lot more like a survival narrative. This is what I need. What do I have? What do I need to do every day to get what I need? What are my obstacles? When can I rest?<br />
<br />
Yeah. My type of vampire doesn’t get days off, but we at least get to take breaks.<br />
<br />
With many Hungry Vampires, it’s unpredictable. Today may be another good day for you where nothing happens and you can forget about having to clean up after yourself that last time you fucking killed someone. Or it may be the day you kill some people or infect them against their will and have to deal with the consequences.<br />
<br />
With me, it’s a daily grind. That’s not random. The only unknown is how I’m ultimately going to get blood today.<br />
<br />
You can plan ahead, at least a little. But you have to be ready to change plans and reschedule at the drop of the hat. <br />
<br />
My people have tried to respond to this by building an enormous social network around our need, or at least trying to. It’s by no means a stable network, but I thank each and every one of our hosts every day for what they do for us. Having said that, just plain running that network and maintaining it is a full-time job.<br />
<br />
Hungry Vampires don’t do much in the way of planning when it comes to their condition. Their lives are all about picking up the pieces when their passions inevitably overpower them.<br />
<br />
Their experience is one huge cycle of hunger, euphoria, and guilt.<br />
<br />
Vampires of all stripes and types are not necessarily philosophers or even philosophy nerds, but they do tend to be the cause of philosophy in others.<br />
<br />
Hungry Vampires? They bring out everyone’s inner Puritanical Ascetic. Your natural desires are evil! There is absolutely no way to fulfill them in a way that is safe and mutually beneficial for others. You will either spend life in a state of perpetual deprivation where you are constantly relying on nothing but your noble willpower to save you and other people, or you are a shameful, ruined monster whose only joys lies in your continual destruction of sapient life which will ultimately prove unfulfilling and get you killed. Enjoy your dystopia!<br />
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The only difference between this and the worldview of a shocking number of both modern and historical people is scale. I can see why so many social conservative types like many modern Vampire stories.<br />
<br />
My people bring out everyone’s Consequentialist Utilitarian, including our own. Is it ethical to give one person an indefinite lifespan if it means that an indefinite number of people will get hurt? Hurt, but not killed – so the math balances out?<br />
<br />
Sadly, even consensually and safely getting blood from hosts isn’t completely morally unambiguous. There are emotional consequences for getting involved with a paranoid, shady society of criminals. Our hosts have to live almost as much of a double life as we do, with all that that implies. We’ll never be able to get around the fact that even when we help our hosts financially, socially, or otherwise, there’s always that background motivation of: ‘see, this way, they’ll be less likely to leave us.’<br />
<br />
And that’s not even the worst of it. No matter how much time and energy we invest in finding hosts, we never seem to have enough. Our blood requirement is that persistent. When we inevitably come up short, we resort to parasitic vampirism, either on an individual level or a societal one. In our slang, it’s called ‘red-lighting.’ Our victims don’t die, but they do get hurt. On a relatively good day, you can incapacitate someone relatively peacefully and seamlessly remove a pint of their blood, followed by a smooth memory erasure. It may still be an act of violence, but at least the suffering level is low.<br />
<br />
On a bad day, you have to chase them down and maybe beat them up first. On a really bad day, you might not even be able to successfully incapacitate them, and they’ll feel everything that happens until you can wipe their memories. The rule is that you minimize harm as much as possible, but there’s no way of minimizing it all the way.<br />
<br />
But at the end of the day, they’re still alive. And I’m still alive. The thousands of people we’ve sired all get to live. Is it worth it?<br />
<br />
It’s hard to be objective about utilitarian dilemmas when they involve you personally. How can you give an objective answer to the trolley problem when you’re the one that might get run over? But I’ve been on the other side of this issue, too. I’m a sire. Every time we add someone new to the community, we ask that question again.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alternatives?</td></tr>
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<br />
I’ve sired ten people, but I’ve rejected way more people than that.<br />
<br />
Plenty of people in our culture think that not siring people is tantamount to killing them, since they’ll all die of aging eventually. Plenty of other people think we should stop siring people altogether, since it would ease the pressure off the hosts. They disagree about how the math works out, thinking that the current system causes too much suffering.<br />
<br />
I do think siring is saving someone’s life. Ultimately, give me a utilitarian moral dilemma, I say: take the third option. Try to save every person involved in the trolley problem. In this case, the third option is ‘find an artificial blood substitute.’ Sadly, none of the ones that medical science has come up with yet have worked, and scientifically researching vampires is a huge hot-button issue in our society. Taking a third option is turning into a long-term goal, whether I like it or not. So at present, I’m still stuck with the same moral dilemma and I haven’t figured out a way to cheat.<br />
.<br />
I’m still here. I still think about this question, but in practice it doesn’t really matter what solid opinion I’ve formed if I’m living my answer every day.<br />
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Image Sources in order of appearance:<br />
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Flickr user celesteh: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/celesteh/102616364/sizes/o/">http://www.flickr.com/photos/celesteh/102616364/sizes/o/</a><br />
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Flickr user rcrhee: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/rcrhee/10864891045/sizes/m/">http://www.flickr.com/photos/rcrhee/10864891045/sizes/m/</a><br />
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<a href="http://images2.fanpop.com/images/answers/43000/43618_1252760153049_400_310.jpg.">http://images2.fanpop.com/images/answers/43000/43618_1252760153049_400_310.jpg.</a><br />
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<a href="http://s.mcstatic.com/thumb/7707125/28846117/4/flash_player/0/1/interview_with_the_vampire_the_vampire_chronicles_1994_releasing_louis.jpg?v=4">http://s.mcstatic.com/thumb/7707125/28846117/4/flash_player/0/1/interview_with_the_vampire_the_vampire_chronicles_1994_releasing_louis.jpg?v=4</a><br />
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<a href="http://s3.amazonaws.com/data.tumblr.com/tumblr_l6m0zkEeqO1qa4ey1o1_1280.jpg?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAI6WLSGT7Y3ET7ADQ&Expires=1396011196&Signature=jXHwPFcL9fRL%2FhckCvOQd01Z1zA%3D#_=_">http://s3.amazonaws.com/data.tumblr.com/tumblr_l6m0zkEeqO1qa4ey1o1_1280.jpg?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAI6WLSGT7Y3ET7ADQ&Expires=1396011196&Signature=jXHwPFcL9fRL%2FhckCvOQd01Z1zA%3D#_=_</a><br />
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<a href="http://images4.fanpop.com/image/polls/252000/252138_1293840783196_full.jpg">http://images4.fanpop.com/image/polls/252000/252138_1293840783196_full.jpg</a><br />
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<a href="http://theteenphilosopher.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/split-track.jpg">http://theteenphilosopher.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/split-track.jpg</a><br />
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<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/Immortality.JPG">http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/Immortality.JPG</a><br />
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Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-47478061038392784382013-11-24T21:23:00.000-08:002013-11-24T21:52:35.222-08:00What is This Thing You Call Boredom?One of the standard objections to mass immortality is that if we lived a long time, we’d be bored.<br />
<br />
Obviously, I have plenty of objections to that:<br />
<br />
1. “So – boredom is a fate worse than death?”<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: start;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Flickr user Julie Edgley</span></span></td></tr>
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2. “Seriously – you'd really rather die than be bored? Wouldn't that disqualify you from half of all jobs? Hey, if you don't want to live forever, it can only mean that someday you want to die.”<br />
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(Trigger warning for suicide)<br />
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3. “People don’t get bored because they’ve just been alive way too long, and they'd better kill themselves so they can cross 'death' off their bucket list. They get bored because they're dissatisfied with their lives at present, and it's time for a change. They usually get new jobs, meet new people or move. They don't off themselves.”<br />
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4. “Suicidal people aren't tired of living. They're hopelessly depressed and looking for some way out. They can't imagine their lives getting better or they don't want to live through it until it does. I sincerely hope that if you ever meet a suicidal person and they just say that they're bored and that they've somehow 'seen it all,' you don't take them seriously.”<br />
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5. “So – you're okay with people that have indefinite lifespans offing themselves? Really? You wouldn't get a suicidal immortal person help, because their suicide is obviously just a natural consequence of their immortal ennui? What if it wasn't? What if the immortal was suicidal for all the reasons people are actually suicidal – how would you even know? You'd be a suicide enabler?”<br />
<br />
6. “What difference does it make if the suicidal person is 213 years old instead of 13 or 81 or 31 years old? Would you pull a double standard and say suicidal tendencies are okay past a certain age? If so – what age? Can we vote?”<br />
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7. “Well – if we live long enough, maybe we'll be able to put people in living stasis if they just get tired of living anyway, and then they can be revived and be immortal again. That's a way better deal than we have now.”<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Source: Wikimedia, Tomas Castelazo</td></tr>
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But I have to say, as a 143-year-old, my initial emotional reaction is as follows:<br />
<br />
“What is this thing you call boredom?”<br />
<br />
Really. If we’re talking about sustained, prolonged periods of boredom where you just don’t have a clue about what to do with yourself, everything you can think of sucks, you're tired of absolutely everything – yeah, I've never felt that.<br />
<br />
I've had boring jobs before, sure. At those times, I was always thinking about the way to get a better job. Shockingly, I never blamed it on my supposed immortal ennui – I blamed it on the job. Being bored to death is a bad joke and a dead metaphor, not a career path.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Flickr user XPeria2Day</td></tr>
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<br />
It's also difficult to be bored when you're always with people. Seeing as how lots of modern conversation topics didn't exist when I was younger, I sure as hell haven't heard them all. And if meeting new people could ever get boring, most people would get bored of it way before age eighty.<br />
<br />
I've also never spent one day alone.<br />
<br />
Some of my younger friends will talk about days they slept in when they were single or their parents were away, and they just hung around the house or apartment alone and bored out of their minds. That's literally never happened to me.<br />
<br />
I grew up with six siblings, and we sure didn't have separate rooms. Most of my early jobs – well, suffice to say, I didn't get days off, and if I did, I spent them with family. During those years, my family barely saw each other, and we wanted something to remember us by.<br />
<br />
Vampire life – you definitely don't get days off. Spending an entire day without some form of contact with another person would literally be a death sentence for me. And I'm alive!<br />
<br />
That is one thing about my own version of vampire life: it is a surefire cure for boredom. How do you be bored when life never gives you any time to be?<br />
<br />
Really though – I thought the Internet was supposed to be a mass cure for boredom. You're bored? Have you read all of this Indie author's books? Have you read all the blogs on this subject? Or the most highly recommended fanfics? Have you read every new science journal that is freely available to the public now? Have you tried this new game? You know everything there is to know about the Byzantine Empire and you couldn't read more? You've watched every video on Youtube?<br />
<br />
You couldn't possibly have seen every cat video yet, come on.<br />
<br />
I grew up on the frontier. I'm pretty sure the worst boredom of my life was in my preteen years, before the family moved to Chicago. I couldn't have made my hundred teens that boring if I tried.<br />
<br />
Somehow though, immortal ennui is practically the default theme in vampire and immortal fiction, and that's with folks that are way older than I am and should know full well how lucky they are to be here.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Source: Wikimedia Commons</td></tr>
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<br />
Better yet, for some mysterious reason, it's still usually the good Vampires in fiction who want mortality, and the evil ones pointing out the obvious.<br />
<br />
Hey, even if you're a stereotypical reactionary conservative who thinks that all social and technological progress is just leading us further and further from the promised land of your youth – don't you still want to live a long time, just to see if the world goes back? It's happened before.<br />
<br />
There's an oft-repeated saying about immortality: millions long for immortality who don't know what to do with themselves on a rainy day.<br />
<br />
That seems like a pretty good test to me: have you ever had a moment where you didn't know what to do with yourself on a rainy day?<br />
<br />
Me neither.<br />
<br />
So we're fine.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Flickr user epSos.de</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-65071395182864377202013-08-04T11:46:00.000-07:002013-08-04T12:36:16.471-07:00Twenty-Six For a Year, Immortal Forever<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="File:Youth and Time 1901.jpg" height="324" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/Youth_and_Time_1901.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Youth and Time</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
All my life, I’ve been getting into some variation of the following conversation:<br />
<br />
<b>Generally Well-Meaning Host or Recruit:</b> “How old were you when you were sired?”<br />
<br />
<b>Me: </b>“Oh, I was twenty-six.”<br />
<br />
<b>Generally Well-Meaning Host or Recruit:</b> “And you’ve been twenty-six ever since.”<br />
<br />
<b>Me:</b> “No. I was twenty-six for one year. And then I turned twenty-seven! Next month, I turn 143.<br />
<br />
That’s what I’ve said to everyone who asked me that question this month. Yeah, it comes up a lot.<br />
<br />
I was born on September 22, 1870. I’m not the same person I was in 1896.<br />
<br />
This shows up all the time in immortal fiction. Nothing wrong with asking an immortal when it happened – the only thing I take issue with is the assumption that ‘twenty-six’ is was pretty much when my life and my personal development ended.<br />
<br />
Some immortal fiction has that same conversation almost word for word. <i>Tuck Everlasting</i>, <i>Let the Right One In</i>, and <i>Twilight </i>all come to mind. Except the immortals almost always respond differently than I did.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Tuck Everlasting (2002 film) poster.jpg" height="326" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/26/Tuck_Everlasting_%282002_film%29_poster.jpg/220px-Tuck_Everlasting_%282002_film%29_poster.jpg" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/26/Tuck_Everlasting_%282002_film%29_poster.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/26/Tuck_Everlasting_%282002_film%29_poster.jpg 2x" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="220" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
And almost all of those protagonists were ‘turned’ as frigging children. I always hope that’s just for pathos and not wish fulfillment. Some days I don’t feel like giving the writers the benefit of the doubt.<br />
<br />
Jessie Tuck says he’ll be seventeen until the end of the world. Eli says xe’s been twelve for a long time. Edward Cullen says he’s been seventeen for a while.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Edward Cullen.jpg" height="333" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/69/Edward_Cullen.jpg/250px-Edward_Cullen.jpg" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/69/Edward_Cullen.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/69/Edward_Cullen.jpg 2x" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="250" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Seventeen for a while? Whose fault is that?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Guys – you’ve gotten older since this conversation started. You can’t stop chronological aging, and it will never be the same thing as physical aging.<br />
<br />
My people don’t turn into vampires overnight. In most Vampire fiction, it happens in a few minutes, or at least a few nights. For us, it takes one and a half to three years between the infection and your full transition. Hell, it took me a full three years.<br />
<br />
We’re not entirely sure when the aging process stops during the transition, so really: my age at my ‘time of siring’ was twenty-six to twenty-nine. God knows: you age so fucking much between the ages of twenty-six and twenty-nine.<br />
<br />
And it doesn’t matter, because I’m still 142. But the idea is that I can somehow be over a hundred years old and only twenty-six at the same time.<br />
<br />
Ah, but did I officially stop ‘aging’ when I was twenty-seven? Twenty-eight and three point five months? Really – what is my number?<br />
<br />
I still remember what happened with my initiate Adam. He was getting nervous about his impending thirtieth birthday and tried getting me to sire him a few months early so he’d be sired at twenty-nine. I’d already spent the requisite five years evaluating him, so I did it – a few months weren’t going to make any difference to me. They apparently meant a world of difference to him, though.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="thumbimage" height="169" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/45/Loganlifeclock.jpg/225px-Loganlifeclock.jpg" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/45/Loganlifeclock.jpg/338px-Loganlifeclock.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/45/Loganlifeclock.jpg 2x" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="225" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Logan's Run came out the year the youngest Baby Boomers turned thirty. Clever.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Yeah, the Baby Boomer youth obsession hit him pretty hard. Trusting people over thirty was one thing, but being over thirty? I was quite a bit over thirty myself at the time, so you can imagine the depth of my sympathy for his plight.<br />
<br />
To this day, he still insists he was just kidding. And to this day, after a round of chuckles, I still insist that I believe him. Yeah, we’re both liars.<br />
<br />
Sigh. You know, as a sire, I was supposed to teach him to be a good liar, too. I failed.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="File:Doriangray 1945.jpg" height="207" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/4d/Doriangray_1945.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="300" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dorian Gray: the Poor Man's Immortality</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I’ve said this to every one of my initiates before and after: “Babe – I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but you will turn thirty. Vampirism only cures physical aging. We already have a cure for chronological aging – it’s death! The only alternative to getting old is dying young. And our business is saving lives, not validating absurd societal prejudices.”<br />
<br />
People who actually care about things like chronological age don’t care how young you look or how healthy you are, not usually. If they did, they wouldn’t go by chronological age at all – they’d go by your appearance, health, and abilities. They sure as hell wouldn’t care about the difference between twenty-nine and thirty.<br />
<br />
I know these people. I know that back when I was in my eighties, a lot of them would start getting real uncomfortable around me. I mean – I was older than their grandmother. Who cares if I look like I’m still a twenty-something?<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="File:JeanneCalmentaged20.jpg" height="256" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d9/JeanneCalmentaged20.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="230" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jeanne Calment, 20</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
I don’t have these problems so much anymore, though. I’m 142! They have no basis of comparison between this and what I’m ‘supposed to’ look like. There’s no accepted and highly stereotyped social role for a 142-year-old. I’m free from their expectations and judgments!<br />
<br />
Yep. The Immortal Ageism Paradox. When I was eighty, I was a granny in disguise. Now that I’m sixty-two years older, I’m young again!<br />
<br />
Other thresholders go through the same thing. 123: yeah, that’s pretty much a twenty-something, right?<br />
<br />
It's actually considered a major threshold when you hit 123 in vampire culture (at least today). Jeanne Calment (RIP) was deceased at 122 and holds the record for the oldest verified human lifespan. If you're a 'thresholder,' you're older than the oldest human who ever lived. Naturally, that threshold is subject to change, with improved medical advances. I look forward to the day when the threshold is two hundred or more.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Jeanne-Calment-1996.jpg" height="318" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7f/Jeanne-Calment-1996.jpg/220px-Jeanne-Calment-1996.jpg" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7f/Jeanne-Calment-1996.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7f/Jeanne-Calment-1996.jpg 2x" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="220" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jeanne Calment, 121</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
At 142, I’m not treated like a forty-something. But in my privileged position, I get to see how the ageists of the world treat them.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="thumbimage" height="251" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bf/JeanneCalmentaged40.jpg/170px-JeanneCalmentaged40.jpg" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bf/JeanneCalmentaged40.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bf/JeanneCalmentaged40.jpg 2x" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="170" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jeanne Calment, 40</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Aging and gaining life experience aren’t the same thing – you can stop your aging process in your twenties and it wouldn’t change your ability to accumulate life experience. Aging is the accumulation of damage, not wisdom. And maturation is kids turning into adults physically and psychologically – you can be mature and inexperienced.<br />
<br />
Life experience happens just over the course of your being alive – twenty-somethings aren’t ‘twenty-something-shaped’ because their bodies are too healthy; they’re ‘twenty-somethings’ because they haven’t had enough years to be anything else (literally and metaphorically). Except for all those twenty-somethings who are wise beyond their years, of course.<br />
<br />
People need to recognize aging and maturation for what they are. And they need to recognize chronological aging for what it is – the earth has made this many revolutions around the sun since you were born. Congratulations!<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="thumbimage" height="218" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/54/Archivo_362.png/400px-Archivo_362.png" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/54/Archivo_362.png/600px-Archivo_362.png 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/Archivo_362.png 2x" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
It is not a statement of a person’s worth, life experience, or even an exact measurement of the amount of damage they’ve accumulated, really. People can be healthier than their years, and visa versa.<br />
<br />
This crap goes away in an immortal society. I figure it’s a relief for a lot of human members of the vampire nation. I mean, they turn forty, their American friends give them cards that say crap like: ‘you’re over the hill and its so fucking funny that we’ll laugh at you at make jokes about failing memory, weight gain (because that’s also so fucking funny), and other stereotypes that we’ve decided you’d love to hear about!’<br />
<br />
Come to us and you can celebrate your birthday in a place where the forty-somethings are impossibly young, the people under three hundred are hip, and the people over three hundred are revered and respected.<br />
<br />
There’s no double standard here – ask most vampires, and they’ll tell you that humans never get old. They all die far too young.<br />
<br />
But obviously this stuff can’t go completely mainstream until we discover the cure for aging in humans. In the meantime, all we can do is try to fight this nonsense through education, cultural change, and as much mockery as possible.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="File:Peter Pan 1915 cover.jpg" height="400" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/15/Peter_Pan_1915_cover.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="259" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I am not Peter Pan.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
<br />
<br />
Images Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki. </div>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-84943277535289861522013-05-09T10:17:00.002-07:002013-05-10T13:11:17.124-07:00Historical Apologism – Apologize For No One<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="265" id="irc_mi" src="http://www.likecool.com/Gear/Projects/Looking%20Into%20the%20Past/Looking-Into-the-Past-1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 18px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A stroll down Memory Lane.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: large;">Introduction</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
Can we judge historical people by the standards of our
times? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s a popular topic of discussion amongst high school and
college students the world over. I know, because I get into conversations like
that all the damn time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the vampire community, it’s a hot-button political issue that has never been resolved.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For me, it’s even a relationship problem. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="321" id="irc_mi" src="http://willcountyhistoricalsociety.org/uploads/civil-war-uniforms.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 1px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was born during the Reconstruction after the Civil War. I
was born into a family of abolitionists who supported the Radical Republicans –
who, among other things, had representatives who supported racial equality a
century before we actually achieved it in this country.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My parents weren’t exactly perfect on race relations. I
still cringe whenever I think of things they said about the Native Americans,
especially my father. And I know that if someone more liberal had ever called
them out on it, they probably would have said something like: ‘I refer only to
the wild Indians – there live some civilized Indians’ – yeah, that’s not much
better.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But if I can think of one group my parents taught me to
hate, absolutely hate with no caveat or qualification – it would be the
Southerners. Especially my father. My mother was fresh off the boat from Norway;
when I was born, she’d been living in Wisconsin for less than five years. My
father was a born and bred Norwegian American whose own father was killed in
action in the Civil War. Seeing as how my father was born in 1851, he was still a child by today’s
standards. Goddammit: he was a child one way or another.<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="266" id="irc_mi" src="http://whynoteight.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/pioneer-day-medium.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 39px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Young adults in any era.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I grew up being told that the South was an evil society who
wanted to own people like us Northern folk owned livestock, and that those
traitors to our country deserved far worse than what our overly lenient
government dished out to them. My father tended to call them ‘rebel bastards.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was twenty years old when I first fell in with the vampire
community and met Cathy. She confessed that she’d been a slave-owner. An
English one, mind – she didn’t come to America until after the Civil War. But
she was a slave-owner. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And yes, this was when she was a vampire. She was indeed
using the slaves for as much blood as they could give and still survive.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She didn’t kill any of them. And she did eventually set them
free. To her credit, she never tried to use that to rationalize what she did. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Also to her credit, she did disclose early on. And when I
met her, she was a huge supporter of racial equality, labor rights, women’s
rights, temperance – the very model of a modern major Progressive Era progressive,
even for a progressive of the era.<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="273" id="irc_mi" src="http://www.nwhm.org/media/category/exhibits/progressiveera/peaceship.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 34px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
That’s what I kept telling myself, as I obsessed about it
over and over again and tried to square it in my head.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It wouldn’t have affected my decision to be sired, I can
tell you that much. I might have asked to be switched, so Charles could sire me
instead (I was just friends with both of them at the time, and there wouldn’t
have been a conflict of interest). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He’s done his own share of unethical things, but most of
them fall into the category of: ‘he was poor and desperate and starving to
death, and while no society on Earth ever legalized what he did, most juries
would be lenient.’ At this point in my life, I’m not much better. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Charles didn’t do much socially sanctioned evil. Not even in
Byzantium. During the Enlightenment, he was a liberal on the Jeremy Bentham level and more.
As for Cathy – yeah. <br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="340" id="irc_mi" src="http://utilitarianphilosophy.com/photo/bentham1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 37px;" width="240" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jeremy Bentham: a product of his time.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Given my own attempts at being the very model of a modern major
Progressive Era progressive, I tried to tell myself that ‘those were the
times.’ Yep. I was going through a huge period of self-education at the time,
and that probably only made it worse. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Shockingly, Cathy didn’t actually agree
with me, and was somewhat disturbed by my opinion, as she is by any modern
person who makes the same argument. I just dismissed that as her being extra
redemptive: not, you know, <i>correct</i>. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yes, what she did was horrible – but should I really be
putting early 1900s standards on 1700s people? I mean: here we were living in a time
of great social and technological progress beyond what the people of the 18<sup>th</sup>
century could even have comprehended. I mean, look at us – we’re on the verge
of getting the vote, we’re showing the Robber Barons who’s boss, we’re
conquering the vile specter of drunkenness – we’ll be in a utopia before we
know it, and any point in history is going to pale in comparison.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Of course our standards would be better – that’s what
supposed to happen. History is, of course, the process by which we get better and better
morals and learn from the mistakes of the past, and should we blame the people
who couldn’t have known better and managed to suffer them for us?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yep, that was pretty much what I convinced myself, well into
my forties.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then people started saying the same things about the
Progressive Era. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.radford.edu/rbarris/Women%20and%20art/amerwom05/suffragefemale72.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://www.radford.edu/rbarris/Women%20and%20art/amerwom05/suffragefemale72.jpg" width="263" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Circa 1912</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
I still remember the day in the 1960s when I got into an
argument with a then-modern feminist about the Suffragette Movement and the
bastards that tried to stop us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her: Oh, Lyddie. You can’t judge those guys by modern
standards. You shouldn’t hate them for what they did – you should understand
that they did what they did because it made sense in their time. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" src="http://www.radford.edu/rbarris/Women%20and%20art/amerwom05/suffragewomansmind72.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="253" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br />Another anti-suffrage cartoon, showcasing the conservative position on the issue.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Bear in mind, anyone who calls me ‘Lydia’ or some variant is
a member of the vampire community, human or non, because that’s only my
Masquerade name and has never been my legal one. She did indeed knowingly say
this to someone from the Suffragette Movement. In fact, here’s what happened
next:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Me: Yeah? I sure hated ‘em then.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her: Well, I guess that’s okay; you’re actually from those
times.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Me: But I can’t hate ‘em now?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her: No.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Me: So when was I supposed to stop hating them? 1920, when
we got the vote? 1930s? 1940s? Does this shit have a half-life?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Apparently, yes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In my culture, we call this phenomenon ‘historical apologism.’
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That’s okay. Nowadays, people do the exact same thing to the
1960s. Sometimes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sometimes the 60s were those crazy liberal times when
everyone was all crazy and liberal. Sometimes they were those terrible times in
that primitive conservative dystopia where no one was crazy or liberal. Other
times, they were those nobler conservative times when everything was as it
should be: ten years of conservative nostalgia.<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="259" id="irc_mi" src="https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSliDFyyh8ONYI_2IQM7GAGoxWERf1nOhPuANKeesu7bnJnQJSt" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 22px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I know, that used to be the 1950s. It still is, mostly, but
now it seems that the 1960s are making that transition. Just in time for the
1950s to fade out of living memory. I’m sure that’s just a coincidence.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As far as living memory goes, people who were children in the 1950s certainly don't count. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;">Trigger Warning</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I expected this phenomenon to level off at some point during
my lifetime. Not a chance. I at least figured the 1980s were untouchable. No
one’s going to say that the 1980s were a time before liberalism, when, among
other things, professors who sexually harassed their students couldn’t be held
accountable for their actions.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then someone said that to Naomi Wolf. About her own
experiences being harassed by a college professor in the 1980s, I might add. <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.nndb.com/people/454/000117103/naomi-wolf-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.nndb.com/people/454/000117103/naomi-wolf-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img align="right" alt="Naomi Wolf" border="0" height="400" hspace="10" src="http://www.nndb.com/people/454/000117103/naomi-wolf-1.jpg" vspace="10" width="327" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Naomi Wolf: historical figure from an earlier age.<br />
Who is currently living.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What amazes me the most is that those people were probably
under the impression they were being sensitive and enlightened.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Oh, but don’t worry. It’s happening to the 1990s too. Yes.
The <i>19</i>90s. Any conversation about the homophobia in movies in the 1990s, and
some people will be falling all over themselves to talk about how you can’t
blame people from the 1990s – everyone was homophobic back then!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yes. Gay marriage was a hot-button issue in the 1990s and a
major topic of national discussion, but somehow, if someone was homophobic in
the 1990s, it was the decade’s fault and not theirs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t wait to see what won’t be someone’s fault two decades
from now. I can’t wait to see someone defend Bush and Cheney. I mean, geez:
that was five whole years ago – it’s totally a separate era completely out of
the bounds of contemporary moral judgment, right?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well, I fully expect and predict that it will be in twenty
years. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
God knows, Bush may beat us to it.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="300" id="irc_mi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS4X2RihyW8xBuYc_Vtufk3q-xJUGO6F2FraamhNEXj1hGH-21wDb3YBcWWxGl-ODkFaWo7HtQAvAm7Ur5rladb9fLFiKq-LTORestnLO6Gsl-Nv93Ov9KL_KQV5v8ZWiDxeEsw94NP6I/s400/bush+smiling.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 75px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Image links in order of appearance:<br />
<br />
http://www.likecool.com/Looking_Into_the_Past--Projects--Gear.html.<br />
http://willcountyhistoricalsociety.org/civil_war.html.<br />
http://whynoteight.wordpress.com/2010/08/10/pioneer-day/.<br />
http://www.nwhm.org/online-exhibits/progressiveera/peace.html.<br />
http://utilitarianphilosophy.com/jeremybentham.eng.html.<br />
http://www.radford.edu/rbarris/Women%20and%20art/amerwom05/suffrageart.html.<br />
http://www.radford.edu/rbarris/Women%20and%20art/amerwom05/suffrageart.html.<br />
http://www.jewishjournal.com/hollywoodjew/item/mad_men_comes_out.<br />
http://www.nndb.com/people/454/000117103/.<br />
http://terrenoire.blogspot.com/2009/01/why-is-this-man-smiling.html. </div>
<!--EndFragment-->Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-12602312772642985072013-04-30T23:22:00.000-07:002014-04-02T14:59:04.032-07:00King Triton is an Oppressive Dictator and an Abusive Father<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://images2.fanpop.com/image/polls/472000/472902_1277209116305_full.jpg" height="266" id="irc_mi" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 39px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: large;"></span><br />
I want to say, with no irony whatsoever, that I like King Triton. He’s a rare grayish character in Disney’s black and white moral landscape. He goes through an actual, definable character arc during the Little Mermaid (I choose to ignore all supplemental material and sequels, and everything else that didn’t exist in 1989 and wouldn’t exist now if the film hadn’t been so financially successful). Kenneth Mars did an awesome voice performance with him. And Triton kinda looks like God on the Sistine Chapel, except a merman. He’s awesome.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://www.artchive.com/artchive/m/michelangelo/god.jpg" height="400" id="irc_mi" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="285" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Clearly Triton was actually drawn by Zombie Michelangelo.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
And it’s nice to see fairly well rounded, active senior citizens as characters.<br />
<br />
Disney’s fixation on monarchy is fascinating. I guess kings and queens are less threatening than other types of autocrats. Imagine a delightful family film with Emperor Triton. Or Chancellor Triton. Or President (for life) Triton. Frightening.<br />
<br />
Ah, but I cast my suspicions on the notion of benevolent dictatorship, of which there are preciously few examples throughout history. Let’s look at what we see from Triton in the film:<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img class="CSS_LIGHTBOX_SCALED_IMAGE_IMG" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMZA2TY2qvteoMF2wuLlACi5CRjBumRtr6s-T5upzY0aFeOjDjN8D0gan2U20WkKAs5rO29HPzaZ2uYpgXvp1xs9XAHkLlr_846HSqAfc2Xokt8ur_hKbKInP5TD5BSVzsLLgLV6905siI/s400/The-Little-Mermaid-the-little-mermaid-16414078-600-338.jpg" height="225" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Triton's Dictator CV</b><br />
<br />
1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Triton rules by the threat of force</u>.<br />
<br />
Think of all the terror monarchs of history accomplished without godlike magical powers. Really – imagine Henry VIII as Poseidon. But I think the fact that he’s a magic king kinda makes the situation worse.<br />
<br />
We see no actual limits to the triton and its mighty omnipotent power. We do see Triton using the triton to terrorize his citizens, especially his own goddamn daughter. After finding out she’s an anthropologist and saved a human from drowning, he destroys her life’s work with the triton in all of a few seconds.<br />
<br />
He also used it to turn her into a human at the end, after the Character Development happened. Ursula takes the triton and uses it to alter the frigging tides and weather. The triton is like several X-Men rolled into one. That thing is a frigging weapon of mass destruction. And the king named himself after it. Well at least he’s self-aware. King Warhead.<br />
<br />
2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Triton imposes strict limits on his people’s behavior</u>.<br />
<br />
No merfolk are allowed to go to the surface. Or the land. Think about that: imagine if going to the seaside was illegal. Or for that matter, moving to Europe. Most of the frigging biomes on Earth are illegal for merfolk, as is the frigging air. That’s some Soviet shit, right there.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="221" id="irc_mi" src="https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTcQVvMILkPgAKThVNi5eFIe1x4FJ7b1DM7QPE3YNZ44F9uE_moDg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 72px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">And Disney thought Scar was their fascist dictator.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Also, apparently taking an interest in human culture is forbidden for the merfolk. I mean, Triton destroys Ariel’s museum after being mildly provoked – and this was his daughter. Ariel’s also suspiciously the only citizen who seems to have done this. Imagine what he’d do to someone who wasn’t Royal Blood.<br />
<br />
3.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>He spreads noxious invective against foreigners out of proportion to all utility</u>.<br />
<br />
<br />
Classic dictator technique right there – what better to promote the insularity of your people than having a common enemy? Wag the dog and make him bark. And look at the way Triton does it – he goes on rants about humans who are all evil, harpoon-wielding face-eaters. In other words, it’s not ‘I hate humans,’ so much as ‘humans hate us.’ It’s spreading the meme that merfolk are the persecuted ones. And it reinforces the need for Triton to act as their noble defender, and makes it all the easier to frame his actions as noble defense.<br />
<br />
That’s great – citizens are that much less likely to venture outward if they’re in fear. They might reach out to someone their group despises who seems harmless, but someone their group despises because of how harmful they are?<br />
<br />
Triton seems to believe all of this himself, since he goes off on these rants even when it’s extremely inappropriate and undermines his credibility (and it’s in front of his own daughter). But the results would be the same either way.<br />
<br />
Humans in this case encompass absolutely everyone outside his kingdom – there’s nowhere for merfolk to go where they won’t find the evil humans. They’re stuck there. And damned if Triton doesn’t want to keep it that way, out of hate completely disproportionate to the actual risk posed by humans.<br />
<br />
And again, the event that prompted Ariel to resort to Ursula’s shadiness in the first place: Triton angrily threatened her before destroying her life’s work. He did it because she saved a human’s life.<br />
<br />
She saved Eric’s life, and in such a way that it did not in any way affect the Masquerade or lead to merfolk being discovered. Actually, Triton didn’t even ask about that; he just got angry she saved a guy’s life. This isn’t maintaining the Masquerade; this is blind hatred.<br />
<br />
Here’s the thing about Masquerades: continually killing people to keep them going is not only evil; it’s useless. If the Masquerade is so fragile that one witness can destroy it, it’s going to fail anyway. Fuck, if it depends on all citizens maintaining perfect behavior (not going to the surface) forever and you can’t control their behavior on every level, as Triton cannot – it’ll definitely fail.<br />
<br />
You’re prolonging the inevitable instead of preparing for it, like you should. This isn’t a political conspiracy where a tiny number of people just need to keep a few military secrets behind bars while going about their days legally until their dealings end and they’re cloaked by history (and those often fail, too); this is people hiding their entire existence from a world that just keeps getting more and more tech-savvy – with no end in sight. Imagine the merfolk trying to hide today, now that we have footage of giant squids in the deep sea.<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/01/13/color-squid_wide-67ac7c93cd56b37eb02710eb3df21c97dc3a04ab-s6-c10.jpg" height="224" id="irc_mi" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 37px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Triton: you're next!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Now, unlike vampires, the merfolk actually have the option of living excluded from humans, so maybe it’s more complicated here. But humans are a seafaring race even in your time, Triton, and it’s only the mid-nineteenth century. It won’t last forever.<br />
<br />
You’ll have to face them sooner or later, and killing them is just going to set them up to be your enemy down the line, faster than you can say ‘self-fulfilling prophecy.’<br />
<br />
My people figured this out around this same year - we started openly reaching out to humans in the mid to late nineteenth century, and forming the vampire community. Our elders were more or less under the impression that the Masquerade was in imminent danger of ending, and we may as well try to find some allies as a start (and increase our own population). Their timing was off (our Masquerade is kinda still going on, depending on your definition), but I'd say they succeeded, since we're in a much better situation now than we were even when I was first sired. But it was easier for our elders, since they were just frightened survivalists and not angry human-hating bigots.<br />
<br />
<img alt=" Triton & Sebatian - king-triton Photo" border="0" class="border_black main" src="http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/2700000/-Triton-Sebatian-king-triton-2781292-500-375.jpg" height="375" style="border: 0pt none; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin: 0pt; padding: 0pt;" title=" Triton & Sebatian - king-triton Photo" width="500" /><br />
<br />
4.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Triton prioritizes family problems over running his kingdom</u>.<br />
<br />
Ariel goes missing, and he has literally his entire kingdom looking for her, at the expense of whatever the hell else everyone was supposed to be doing – not that we have any idea what they were supposed to be doing. Most of what we see Triton doing is focusing on Ariel. I guess Atlantica mostly runs itself.<br />
<br />
That’s monarchy for you. It should be noted that this usually doesn’t equate to devoted, nurturing parents deeply invested in their children’s future so much as obsessive parents trying to protect what they consider ‘theirs.’ Triton sending out his manservant Sebastian to stalk Ariel was the least of their problems.<br />
<br />
As for Triton's other daughters - even the film frames them as possessions. They're nothing but a long list of names beginning with 'A.' I think the blonde one Andrina had two lines, and the others had even less. They had little to no bearing on the plot. You could edit out all of them, and not only would it not change a thing, the film would make more sense.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://images4.fanpop.com/image/quiz/543000/543651_1298323147134_450_300.jpg" height="300" id="irc_mi" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 79px;" width="450" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
All I could do was stare at the screen wondering how the hell merfolk reproduce, since Triton appears to have six daughters of about the same age, and one who's only slightly younger. Are they actually close in age and the unmentioned Queen Triton just had one after the other and timed their conceptions? Was Triton polyamorous? Are merfolk prone to multiple simultaneous births? Are any of them adopted?<br />
<br />
(That's what I was wondering in 1989, anyway. The prequels are good for something: at least they confirmed that the sisters are merely close in age. We even learn about the Queen. She looked exactly like Ariel, for one.)<br />
<br />
It's great that Triton's other daughters are adults, since he spends all of his time focusing on his youngest.<br />
<br />
This was bad enough in the beginning of the story. Ursula knew well enough that this was the flaw to go for, Triton’s Achilles heel. And it worked.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2KTVtMtuA6p8T4XVGKENCSHANKJaAtmzEi-_eHXTog4VbPFgTJgRI8oaR9LebjYOlMAafvoHYa04Qtl-QQQNQdExoI1ZmWXHQqR41NEUdba95v-aJTS7PEXwAbLyPNcym9GnyDXZ9W5c/s1600/king+triton.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2KTVtMtuA6p8T4XVGKENCSHANKJaAtmzEi-_eHXTog4VbPFgTJgRI8oaR9LebjYOlMAafvoHYa04Qtl-QQQNQdExoI1ZmWXHQqR41NEUdba95v-aJTS7PEXwAbLyPNcym9GnyDXZ9W5c/s400/king+triton.jpg" height="195" id="irc_mi" style="margin-top: 90px;" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
I know we’re supposed to be touched when Triton lets himself get turned into a sea polyp in Ariel’s stead. Even if it meant letting the triton fall into Ursula’s diabolical hands, we’re still supposed to be touched. So I guess if some world leaders gave a rogue nation the nuclear codes because they were threatening their families – they’d be doing the right thing and it would represent a serious, complicated moral dilemma?<br />
<br />
<br />
5.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Triton has slave labor</u>.<br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="King Triton - little-mermaid-ariels-beginning Photo" border="0" class="border_black main" src="http://images1.fanpop.com/images/photos/1600000/King-Triton-little-mermaid-ariels-beginning-1602953-480-270.jpg" height="270" style="border: 0pt none; display: block; margin: 0pt auto; padding: 0pt;" title="King Triton - little-mermaid-ariels-beginning Photo" width="480" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dolphins are not horses!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
During the concert scene, we see Triton’s chariot pulled by dolphins. He can’t just swim there himself? I know that’s just the film’s ‘water is air’ problem, but that’s fourth wall knowledge, right there. If you look for an explanation within the context of the film, it looks like conspicuous exploitation to me. What does he pay them with? How does he pay or otherwise compensate Sebastian? He squeezes Sebastian into his fist at one point, after being mildly provoked – not exactly the mark of a benign boss.<br />
<br />
6.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Merfolk scientific and social progress is in the gutter, and there’s a strong sentiment of enforced ignorance</u>.<br />
<br />
Ariel asks during her fantastic ‘Part of Your World’ number – ‘what’s a fire and why does it burn.’ Merfolk society has less scientific knowledge than hunter-gatherers (even if fire is an exception because it’s a land-based phenomenon, that only proves that being ocean-dwellers has stifled scientific progress. Humans know about volcanoes despite never having truly visited them). Merfolk appear to have no industry and no technology. And it seems they also have no written language.<br />
<br />
Yeah, we see Ariel sign her name, when Ursula whips out that magic contract during their amazing ‘Poor Unfortunate Souls’ number. But plenty of otherwise illiterate people can sign their names. Illiteracy used to be a lot more common, and I’ve run into quite a few people who can write their names and nothing else.<br />
<br />
<img class="CSS_LIGHTBOX_SCALED_IMAGE_IMG" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBI2uRq2ZimuTnfzt3CNMHdZtuIVEaX8rPSKqhIf0ALn8rGuDc7M_BugK0Wf8JthZl5wvFVM6kcb2TAXOA0iNRZoaLCBm5kkJ9CFb_LLDRVkHxxhq8D69XIiPWooPXKyPfzWKUhoJXFrcz/s1600/The-Little-Mermaid-the-little-mermaid-11046515-520-367.jpg" style="height: 367px; width: 520px;" /><br />
<br />
Ursula’s contract may have been English, but it wasn’t anything that required much of a reading level. Yeah, it’s English – a human language, and not a merfolk one. Assuming Ariel actually read it – it’s not like she needed to in order to make her decision. She also has plenty of books in her museum, but doesn’t appear to have read any of them. She’s ‘ready to know what the people know,’ she says, as she flips through books there’s no evidence that she can read.<br />
<br />
We can interpret all of that as convenience on the part of the animators, but I like it better when I can find an in-universe explanation for things. It’s more fun than just laughing at the plot holes and the limitations of the film medium.<br />
<br />
I never understood why Eric didn’t offer Ariel some writing utensils up on the surface. Or for that matter, why Ariel didn’t try to get her hands on them. She briefly tries to communicate using sign language, but after that, they communicate through inference. It would have been nice if they had thrown us a few scenes of Ariel trying to write and failing. But as it stands, the plot makes a hell of a lot more sense if we just assume Ariel is illiterate. Along with the rest of merfolk society – if your royals are uneducated, what hope is there for the rest of you?<br />
<br />
7.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Merfolk culture mainly consists of propaganda promoting the royal family</u>.<br />
<br />
The concert that opens the underwater portion of the film that Ariel misses? It’s Triton’s daughters introducing themselves and singing about how great Triton is. Ariel misses her cue to perform, and Triton looks like he’s going to explode. Hey man – the Show Must Go On. His reaction makes more sense of the concert is a reflection of his ego, which it clearly is. There doesn’t seem to be much more to merfolk culture.<br />
<br />
<img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6m4oLRv_4LLmfTJr9hG54JZUKTX3z7m-lCaxEZ-RyloYwXz9blKEXXmzdo1JlWv4ci4PuYZ7AO-vGfsWjrTMbZ5DGaX0Y-J8Fd8x6xhnfmqjKi-WTuWP-BxoLCcmow9oFVxkDLx8QenQ/s400/tumblr_m8zj2wJLb91rufgaro2_1280.jpg" height="225" width="400" /><br />
<br />
8.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Ursula seems to be kind of a magical version of a black marketeer.</u><br />
<br />
That’s what happens in most dictatorships; you get a black market. The dictatorial government won’t provide for your needs, so you go to the criminals. Naturally, the criminals are unregulated and screw you over, but really, the dictator was screwing you the fuck over by not providing for you in the first place. Indeed, black markets under authoritarian regimes can actually be liberalizing forces for economic and even political freedom - look at the Soviet Union.<br />
<br />
Hey, Ursula almost looks like a libertarian hero, here. And like many libertarian heroes, she's a frustrated despot. Rock on, Ursula. The mighty Triton is always all right as long as you're the one wielding it, right?<br />
<br />
Like many dictators, Triton undermines his own power in the process – Ursula seems to get a lot of her magic goods in her deals with merfolk, so Triton is just sitting there letting her consolidate her power. Which she could only do if he left his people no other alternative but to go to her, and since the merfolk economy appears to be mainly magical, with magic the province of only a few elites capable of understanding it, you can appreciate their plight.<br />
<br />
Geez – Triton can turn merfolk into humans. We find out that Ursula helped her clients by making them, among other things, more conventionally attractive – they couldn’t have gone to Triton? We don’t actually see any limits to the power of the triton. Any reason they didn’t go to him, and preferred to risk their lives by making a shady deal with an unscrupulous sorceress instead of doing what should have been legally and logistically better and gone to their king? Methinks Triton is a mite stingy with what magic he’ll give the masses. Let ‘em eat cake, right Triton?<br />
<br />
9.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><u>Ursula manages to enslave dozens of Triton’s citizens and he doesn’t interfere</u>.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130418172513/villains/images/2/21/Ursula's_Garden.jpg" height="216" id="irc_mi" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 74px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<a href="http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130418172513/villains/images/2/21/Ursula's_Garden.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Ursula frigging lines the entrance to her evil lair with polyps of the people she’s permanently enslaved with her (which I actually always found a bit irresponsible. Why aren’t they in an evil storage closet, Ursula? Don’t you think lining your lair with monuments to your own shadiness might put off new clients? Let’s not get overconfident, dear.) This has been presumably going on for years. And the one time Triton interferes is when she threatens to do it to his daughter. His is a Daddy State, run by a deadbeat Dad.<br />
<br />
<b>Wacky Paranoid Speculations</b><br />
<br />
1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Triton actually is an emperor who ousted the other sea kings:<br />
How much of the ocean does Triton control, anyway? He gets called the ‘sea king’ sometimes, but then Ursula takes his place and claims to be ruling the whole ocean. You mean the Atlantic Ocean? Oh. So what about all the others? Triton says to Ariel ‘as long as you live under my ocean, you obey my rules.’ <br />
<br />
2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>King Triton created merfolk:<br />
Triton turns Ariel into a human at the end of the film. So – he can turn merfolk into humans? I’ll bet he can do the opposite. Merfolk are pretty strange, biologically. They appear to have most of the organ systems of fish and humans, and yet almost none of the weaknesses that their human half should have underwater (they can breathe, see, and not have their bones and organs crushed by heavy pressure – incredible). That’s not evolution; right there – that’s magic. Magic which exists in the story, and which King Triton appears to control.<br />
<br />
Merfolk are also excellent singers with a musical culture – I’m trying to think of something that seems less appropriate for an underwater society, and I can’t. Now, vampire culture is musical, too – we’re voice mimics, and with a shit ton of training, you can get a good vocal range. But, you know, we’re terrestrial. And the voice mimicry is related to our batty echolocation. Merfolk don’t do echolocation like dolphins – they appear to talk and sing like humans and they can somehow do it underwater. Could it be because they were originally human, at least as a species?<br />
<br />
We’ve established that Triton is paranoid and horribly racist against humans, yet well-intentioned and with the capacity for altruism. That can actually be a frigging scary combination, even in the real world without all the magic. Imagine giving someone like that nigh-omnipotent power.<br />
<br />
Could he have turned a bunch of people into merfolk, taken them to the ocean as a protective measure, at least in his own mind (and erased their memories, we assume)? Triton does seem much older than almost all the merfolk we see. It certainly would explain his rise to power.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Conclusion</b></span><br />
<br />
So this is more or less why I liked <i>The Little Mermaid</i>, beyond the great songs, animation, and voice performances. I see it as the story of a liberal adventurous young girl who escaped her abusive family and by extension her backward, racist, xenophobic, oppressive police state in favor of a liberalizing European monarchy and freedom, and by extension brought both cultures together.<br />
<br />
I get the distinct impression that this isn’t what the writers intended.<br />
<br />
Yeah, I think Triton and her sisters were supposed to represent a loving family and a genuine sacrifice for her. But hey, Eric: irresistible.<br />
<br />
Well, that’s the way Ursula framed it anyway – always listen to the villain. Even when the villain doesn’t believe what she says, and is transparently using it to manipulate the protagonist, as with Ursula’s rant in her Poor Unfortunate Souls number.<br />
<br />
Well, as much as the prospect of a girl marrying some guy she barely knows frigging bothers me, it doesn’t sink the movie for me. The protagonist is still in a better place than she was before, shit got done, and even if she and Eric had an amiable breakup she’d be better off in his kingdom than her father’s.<br />
<br />
And they brought both cultures together. Just think of the economic possibilities of being a seafaring nation and knowing a bunch of merfolk.<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://laurap123.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/ariel-and-king-triton-ariel-18260719-400-550.jpg" height="264" id="irc_mi" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 97px;" width="399" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Plus, this way, maybe her father won’t suddenly realize the implications of the power he wields with the triton and take over the world, or something.<br />
<br />
And now maybe her father’s learned a lesson and will go on to be a less alternately deadly and negligent monarch and father. Really though, I’d be more comfortable if Ariel and Prince Eric stole the triton.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Image links in order of appearance:<br />
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<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/disney-princess/picks/results/472902/pick-best-throne">http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/disney-princess/picks/results/472902/pick-best-throne</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.artchive.com/artchive/M/michelangelo/god.jpg.html">http://www.artchive.com/artchive/M/michelangelo/god.jpg.html</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://lilianarosabelle.blogspot.com/2010/12/disneys-magic-part-5.html">http://lilianarosabelle.blogspot.com/2010/12/disneys-magic-part-5.html</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://theanonymousgamer.wordpress.com/2011/09/26/the-lion-king-has-disney-still-roaring-after-all-these-years/">http://theanonymousgamer.wordpress.com/2011/09/26/the-lion-king-has-disney-still-roaring-after-all-these-years/</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.npr.org/2013/01/13/169274472/the-kraken-is-real-scientist-films-first-footage-of-a-giant-squid">http://www.npr.org/2013/01/13/169274472/the-kraken-is-real-scientist-films-first-footage-of-a-giant-squid</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/king-triton/images/2781292/title/triton-sebatian-photo">http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/king-triton/images/2781292/title/triton-sebatian-photo</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/disney-princess/videos/34005564/title/what-disney-princesses-teach-girls">http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/disney-princess/videos/34005564/title/what-disney-princesses-teach-girls</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://dibblyfresh1.blogspot.com/2010/08/movies-in-minute-disneys-little-mermaid.html">http://dibblyfresh1.blogspot.com/2010/08/movies-in-minute-disneys-little-mermaid.html</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/little-mermaid-ariels-beginning/images/1602953/title/king-triton-photo">http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/little-mermaid-ariels-beginning/images/1602953/title/king-triton-photo</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://lilianarosabelle.blogspot.com/2010/12/disneys-magic-part-5.html">http://lilianarosabelle.blogspot.com/2010/12/disneys-magic-part-5.html</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.btchflcks.com/2012/09/women-and-gender-in-musicals-week_8721.html">http://www.btchflcks.com/2012/09/women-and-gender-in-musicals-week_8721.html</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://villains.wikia.com/wiki/Ursula's_Garden">http://villains.wikia.com/wiki/Ursula's_Garden</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://laurap123.wordpress.com/author/laurap123/">http://laurap123.wordpress.com/author/laurap123/</a>. </span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-6646398104657069192013-03-18T01:27:00.001-07:002013-04-13T18:25:05.409-07:00Deathism and Music: If I Die Young Lyrics Fisking<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Damien Hirst's Requiem, White Roses and Butterflies (2008) at the Wallace Collection" height="266" src="http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Arts/Arts_/Pictures/2009/10/13/1255429965435/Damien-Hirsts-Requiem-Whi-001.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
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<b>Artist:</b> </div>
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The Band Perry<br />
<br />
<img alt="File:Thebandperry.jpg" height="300" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6b/Thebandperry.jpg/800px-Thebandperry.jpg" width="400" /></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: white;"><b>Lyrics:</b></span></div>
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<b><br /></b>
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">If I die young bury me in satin</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">lay me down on a bed of roses</span><i><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></i><i><br />
<span style="background: white;">sink me in the river at dawn</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">send me away with the words of a love song</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">ooh ooh ooh ooh<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">If I die
young/put me into cryo/<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Lay me
down/so I can be frozen…um?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Damn, I wish
we had more poetic imagery for cryonics. Since I’m more of a ‘rhymes are funny’
rather than a ‘rhymes are pretty’ person, I’m clearly not up to the task.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">So anyway,
‘Bury me in satin, bed of roses…’ yeah. That’s nice – it’s detailed, it creates
a nice mental image. Good description. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">I just can’t
personally relate to it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">If I die
young, throw my corpse in a wood chipper for all I care. I’m dead – I lost. Anything
short of cryonics isn’t going to give me one sliver of hope, and I’m actually
not legally allowed to sign up for it. One of the few genuine risks to the
Masquerade in modern times is anything involving the medical profession.
Especially if it’s as headline-worthy as ‘vampire cryo patient.’<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><img alt="File:Cryo surgery.jpg" height="299" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/76/Cryo_surgery.jpg" width="386" /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Yeah, we’re
really cryo-friendly to human members, but if you’re a vampire, our main advice
is ‘don’t die.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">So yeah –
imagining my elaborately decorated deathbed isn’t all that comforting. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">And besides,
just to be as overly literal and specific as possible, sending me away at dawn
would be bitterly symbolic in my case: ‘You live by the night, you <i>die</i> by the
<i>day</i>, bloodsucka!’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">For another thing, it would
mean none of my vampire buddies could attend my funeral. God knows; that’s
always been a problem for me. I'm always having to disappoint human friends with my constant excuses for missing all of their daytime functions (these are people outside the community). I'm sure my fellow vampires would love some more of that. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><img alt="File:Bouquet de roses roses.jpg" height="300" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/00/Bouquet_de_roses_roses.jpg/800px-Bouquet_de_roses_roses.jpg" width="400" /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Also I’m
allergic to roses. All of my people are. Yeah, that's one of those folkloric tropes that never really seeped into the mainstream. I mean, not a lot of human members even need a reminder about the garlic, but every now and then someone forgets about the roses, and it's one awkward birthday. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Roses aren’t as bad as something
like garlic, but we do get the sniffles and the sneezes something awful.
Romantic. Now there’s the reason I want my half my guests’ eyes watering up.</span><br />
<br />
<i><span style="background: white;">Lord make
me a rainbow I'll shine down on my mother</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">She knows I'm safe with you as she stands under
my colours</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">oh and life ain't always what you think it ought
to be</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">no it ain't even grey but she buries her baby</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">the sharp knife of a short life</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">well I've had just enough time</span></i><br />
<i><span style="background: white;"><br /></span></i>
<img alt="File:Paradiso Canto 31.jpg" height="400" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d2/Paradiso_Canto_31.jpg/540px-Paradiso_Canto_31.jpg" width="360" /><br />
<i><br />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br />
<!--[endif]--></i><span style="background: white;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Atheists get asked all the
time what would happen if we meet God post-dying. Lots of people have all these
really impressive answers. Me, I’d just start the groveling. I’m talking hands
and knees, tearful, humiliated groveling. Dignity is for the lucky.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I figure that’s win-win. If
God’s actually a <i>nice</i>
superintelligence, my groveling will be unnecessary, harmless, and over before
I know it. If God’s an unfriendly superintelligence, well, I’ll need all the
help I can get. At least I was sent to Hell giving it my best shot.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yeah, watching over my loved
ones, as a rainbow or otherwise, probably wouldn’t be first on my agenda. If I
was in any position to ask, I think I’d rather God did something more
substantial for them. Like, say, not letting them die horribly like I did.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I really like ‘the sharp knife
of a short life’ line, though. That’s a great one-liner. Good imagery, too. <o:p></o:p><br />
<br />
<img alt="File:The Sacrifice of Isaac by Caravaggio.jpg" height="309" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/42/The_Sacrifice_of_Isaac_by_Caravaggio.jpg/775px-The_Sacrifice_of_Isaac_by_Caravaggio.jpg" width="400" /><br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And then you had to follow it
up with ‘well I’ve had just enough time.’<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m 142. I could still die
young (in my culture, you’re not old until you’re 300, and maybe not even then). I
haven’t had anywhere near ‘enough time,’ as if anyone was allotted a set amount
at birth. You know, it’d be nice if we could see what it was. How overdue was I
fifty years ago? Or a hundred twenty years ago, when I decided there was no
such thing as ‘enough time?’<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That line also completely
undercuts the rest of the verse. We just got the image of your mother burying
her child too young, and completely unexpectedly. You follow that up with a
generic death acceptance sentiment, and it looks forced. It also borders on
insensitive.<br />
<br />
<img alt="File:Princess Beatrice mourning.jpg" height="400" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/63/Princess_Beatrice_mourning.jpg" width="394" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When I was growing up, if a
mother lost a child, she mourned for a year in keeping with Victorian mourning
practices. I don’t think trying to assuage it by saying: ‘your five-year-old
daughter had a good run’ would have helped much.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><br />
<span style="background: white;">if I die young bury me in satin</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">lay me down on a bed of roses</span></i><i><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></i><i><br />
<span style="background: white;">sink me in the river at dawn</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">send me away with the words of a love song</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">the sharp knife of a short life</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">Well, I had just enough time<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">There’s that
line again. It clashes so damn much with the rest of this verse, it’s crazy. It
doesn’t even rhyme with any of it, or fit the rhythm at all. God, it sounds
even more abrupt in audio. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And now they've gotten me thinking about 'love songs.' Huh. The main love song sentiments are as follows: 'You're awesome;' 'You're mine;' and 'I'll love you forever.' </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And now you're dead! </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sure, I guess there are some love songs that could work just as well as funeral dirges. In <i>Titanic</i>, 'My Heart Will Go On' was practically both. But I don't know. Knowing my luck, they'd choose something like 'I'm a Believer.'<br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;"><i>and I'll be wearing white</i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;"><i>when I come into your kingdom</i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;"><i>I'm as green as the ring on my little cold
finger</i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;"><i>well I've never known the lovin' of man</i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;"><i>but it sure felt nice when he was holdin' my
hand</i></span><br />
<i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">there's a boy here in town</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span><br />
<span style="background: white;">who says he'll love me forever</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">who would have thought forever could be severed</span></i><i><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></i><i><br />
<span style="background: white;">by a sharp knife of a short life</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">well I've had just enough time</span><br />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br />
<!--[endif]--></i><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="285" src="http://www.carltonhobbs.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/9176-helen-email.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Nice. Really. Wearing white
on your wedding day isn’t enough; you have to wear it to your funeral. Sneaky.
Abstinence moralizing in a song about death. Nothing better than some good old medieval reinforcement of the notion that a woman’s worth is her virginity and
she needs to keep it in order to die fulfilled. They even used the traditional
definition of the verb ‘know.’<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not to mention some subtle
glorification of the idea that the first guy you meet when you’re young is your
True Love and grab him fast while you’re still a virgin so you can be a virgin
at marriage. Because that leads to so many happy marriages. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Fuck, the ‘green as the ring
on my little cold finger’ line is unbelievably fucking creepy. Prettying up the
horror of death gnaws at me, but this is one line short of celebrating how
great it is when someone dies before they can sin. By which I mean 'have sex.'<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><br />
<span style="background: white;">so put on your best boys, and I'll wear my
pearls</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">what I never did is done</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a penny for my thoughts oh no I'll sell em for a
dollar</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">They're worth so much more after I'm a goner</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">and maybe then you'll hear the words that I've
been singin'</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">it's funny when your dead how people start
listenin'<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Yeah, that’s
a thing that can happen. And it sucks. It's been said: ‘Once you’re dead,
you’re made for life.’ I always love it when the media targets certain
celebrities with a barrage of cruelty while they’re alive, and then they die
(sometimes through suicide) and suddenly now it’s cruel to insult them. Seems
like your timing was a little off, guys. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><img alt="File:Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps - The Suicide - Walters 3742.jpg" height="277" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/50/Alexandre-Gabriel_Decamps_-_The_Suicide_-_Walters_3742.jpg/800px-Alexandre-Gabriel_Decamps_-_The_Suicide_-_Walters_3742.jpg" width="400" /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">It’s even
worse with celebrities who die young, what with our culture romanticizing
youth, and this absurd notion that dying young means preserving that youth
because – well, at least our most recent photo of you will always be young. I
agree. Let’s take a picture of your corpse. Or where it used to be. There’s
your ‘dying young.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">However, this
is kind of hypocritical sentiment for a song that’s all about romanticizing
death. It’s also a fairly cynical sentiment in a fluffy backdrop. Clash. </span><br />
<br />
Also: 'goner' and 'dollar.' Ouch.<br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">if I die young bury me in satin</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">lay me down on a bed of roses</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">sink me in the river at dawn</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">send me away with the words of a love song</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">ooh ooh the ballad of a dove</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">go with peace and love</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">gather up your tears and keep them in your
pocket</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">save em for a time when you're really gonna need
em.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">oh the sharp knife of a short life</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">well I've had just enough time</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-style: italic;">so put on your best boys, and I'll wear my
pearls</span><i><o:p></o:p></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So yeah: ‘if I die young, I’ll decide I really didn’t need
that lifespan anyway.’ Like if you get mugged in the street and decide you were
better off without that bag. Except then they shoot you. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">I think I’d
like to split this song in two, actually. Take that previous verse (after fixing the dollar/goner pain rhyme), the ‘knife,’ and the
basic refrain. Beef it up with some more cynical lyrics, and you might have
something. The melody and voice performance definitely worked for me. Well. I
doubt this song would be even remotely controversial for many people, or the artists
even imagined the existence of a critic like me. Then again, that’s the real
problem. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Sour grapes’ is a coping mechanism. I get it. I just think
there are ways that we can cope with this without distorting the reality of
death or telling people not to grieve properly. Coping mechanisms can
unfortunately become problems in their own right. I tend to prefer coping
mechanisms where you do slightly more in the process than just make yourself
feel better. Or at least, coping mechanisms where your ‘feeling slightly better’
doesn’t come at a price. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whenever I bring up anti-aging research in pretty much any context, people are rarely shy about criticizing it on a technical or ethical basis. If nothing else, it makes for a much more productive coping mechanism than pretending that death is pretty.<br />
<br />
<img alt="File:StillLifeWithASkull.jpg" height="306" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/ae/StillLifeWithASkull.jpg/782px-StillLifeWithASkull.jpg" width="400" /><br />
<br />
Image links in order of appearance:<br />
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />
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<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/oct/14/damien-hirst-paintings-wallace-collection">http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/oct/14/damien-hirst-paintings-wallace-collection</a>.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Thebandperry.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Thebandperry.jpg</a>.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cryo_surgery.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cryo_surgery.jpg</a>.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bouquet_de_roses_roses.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bouquet_de_roses_roses.jpg</a>.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Paradiso_Canto_31.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Paradiso_Canto_31.jpg</a>
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Princess_Beatrice_mourning.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Princess_Beatrice_mourning.jpg</a>.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.carltonhobbs.net/art/paintings/vestal-virgin-condemned-to-death/2009/06/18/">http://www.carltonhobbs.net/art/paintings/vestal-virgin-condemned-to-death/2009/06/18/</a>.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Alexandre-Gabriel_Decamps_-_The_Suicide_-_Walters_3742.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Alexandre-Gabriel_Decamps_-_The_Suicide_-_Walters_3742.jpg</a>.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:StillLifeWithASkull.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:StillLifeWithASkull.jpg</a>. <span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment--></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-18640321399633345612013-02-26T15:23:00.000-08:002013-04-13T18:32:11.065-07:00Bloodsucker Am I<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<h3>
</h3>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="thumbimage" height="239" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/23/Desmodus_rotundus_feeding.jpg/220px-Desmodus_rotundus_feeding.jpg" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/23/Desmodus_rotundus_feeding.jpg/330px-Desmodus_rotundus_feeding.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/23/Desmodus_rotundus_feeding.jpg/440px-Desmodus_rotundus_feeding.jpg 2x" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="220" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
I don’t mind being called a bloodsucker. It’s not insulting;
it’s descriptive: I am a bloodsucker. Literally. Calling me a bloodsucker would
be like saying it to a flea – it’s just a simple reference to their feeding
habits for good or ill. And I can’t even spread disease like a flea: I win! </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Flea" height="180" src="http://hardinmd.lib.uiowa.edu/pictures22/flea.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="250" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now see – it is an insult to call a mainstream person a
bloodsucker. When you say that to me, it’s literal. Call a mainstream person a
bloodsucker, and you’re implying that they’re exploitative or a selfish drain
on society. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Although, I suppose you could try applying that one to me. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<h3>
<b>Real Bloodsuckers</b></h3>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t help but notice that the people who get called
‘bloodsuckers’ in mainstream society tend to be people like politicians,
lawyers, and people collecting for charity. And don’t forget that delightful
quasi-mythological ‘welfare queens.’ We also tend to say things like ‘they’re
draining me dry,’ usually in reference to money. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve said before that my people in particular would actually
be the perfect libertarian bad guys: we’re literally charity bloodsuckers! We
have this enormous, complicated social network whereby we solicit semi-regular
donations from those more independent than us, and we are really and truly
asking for blood and living moment by moment on the altruism of others. And
that’s fresh blood, right from the source, and much more than just the
bloodiness equivalent of the spare change a libertarian wouldn’t give to a guy
on the street (and, unfortunately, sometimes we have to steal it). I am honored
to be a libertarian’s bogeyman, and promoting the evil altruist agenda.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-1630" height="300" src="http://www.bradwestness.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/rand-2-300x300.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" title="rand 2" width="300" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I don't like you either, Ayn Rand.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But lo! We’re also a group that’s evaded federal government
detection (kind of – they don’t know we’re anything other than regular citizens
anyway – I guess that’s good enough for a libertarian fantasy). Sure, we have a
socialist, underground society with high taxes from our citizens, where people
live under frequent surveillance by a government capable of lie detection – but
we never force anyone to join! Such is our respect for freedom of choice.
Conundrum!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Fantasy Racism</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whenever Vampires are portrayed as a persecuted minority in
fiction, one of the most common racial epithets for them is ‘bloodsucker.’
Without going into whether you should really be using Vampires as a metaphor
for oppressed minorities or not, I want to say that I find it interesting that
it’s almost always ‘bloodsucker’ that makes the list. Or leech. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="323" src="http://www.breakingdawnmovie.org/images/2010/07/Edward-Cullen-bad-vamp-2.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="304" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eyes on the 'evil' setting.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You know, say I wanted to insult one of the many Vampires
that deserved it, like, say, Edward Cullen. He deserves it more than most because
the books and most of the characters present him as reformed or at least
fundamentally good-natured when he is nothing of the sort. Maybe I’d give him
one of those brutal Richard Dawkins polysyllabic numbers that truly did him
justice: ‘you unrelenting obsessive abusive control-freak; you mass-murdering
megalomaniacal monstrosity; you stalking sexist sadistic kleptocratic conservative
criminal irrational racist wannabe-genocidal bully!’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I guess that’s kind of long to yell during a riot, so how
about just ‘murderer?’ That’s a pretty good insult, in that it could not possibly
be interpreted in a positive or neutral way, and any person with even the most
basic level of human decency shouldn’t want to hear it. That’s a pretty good
reason not to like someone like Edward. Saying ‘also you drink blood!’ sounds
like a case of misguided priorities. <br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="File:Elizabeth Bathory Portrait.jpg" height="519" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/Elizabeth_Bathory_Portrait.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #f9f9f9; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Erzsébet Báthory:
front-running candidate for the most prolific female serial killer in history.
Also, she drank blood.</span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment--></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Are writers trying to say that people in real life wouldn’t
actually be prejudiced against Vampires for any substantive reason; that they’d
just be grossed out by the blood drinking? They’re not entirely wrong. God
knows, we’ve had that happen in our community, and it’s such a small population
cross-section. Even some of our hosts have been like that, but then there are
thousands who haven’t been. A little nuance would be nice. Particularly when
you’re dealing with a group of people that have actually done bad shit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Seriously, if you’ve killed people: who cares whether or not
you wasted their blood afterwards? I still can’t get over Stephenie Meyer
saying she couldn’t watch <i>Interview with
a Vampire</i> because: ‘gross.’ Not: ‘I hated watching people die,’ but:
‘people dying is icky.’<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://staticmass.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/interview_4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Interview With The Vampire" border="0" src="http://staticmass.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/interview_4.jpg" style="margin-top: 10px;" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Geez, Lestat, couldn't you just slaughter her politely? Or use a napkin?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Another thing I see a lot in speculative fiction is Vampires
or aliens or Atlanteans making up similar racial epithets for humans, which
also sound unintentionally ridiculous. ‘Air-breather,’ ‘solid,’ ‘ugly/large
bags of mostly water.’ Yes – they are actually saying ‘You inhale air and
that’s terrible somehow.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t wait for a gelatinous alien to insult humans by
saying: ‘you have bones!’ I bet it never occurred to anyone to be ashamed of
that. ‘Bone people!’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve spent half my life trying to help stop this from
developing in my community and crushing it fiercely when it does, but now I’m
wondering about what kind of equally ridiculous things we could call humans.
‘Round-teeth!’ ‘Bread-eaters!’ Uh: ‘solar panels?’ </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some Vampires insult humans by calling them ‘mortal.’ One of
the fundamental beliefs in my own vampire culture is that aging is a disease,
and we’re the only people who currently have any acquired immunity. Calling a
human ‘mortal’ would be on par with insulting someone by calling them a ‘cancer
patient.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most of the rest of these epithets sound like a frigging <i>Cosmo</i> article title: ‘How Having Bones
Can Hurt Your Figure.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Taking a completely benign biological trait and making it
something to be ashamed of, without even giving a reason why – yeah, that’s
pretty much the standard for a lot of insults. People don’t say ‘you’re ugly
and that’s bad;’ they just call you ‘ugly.’ Same thing goes for most racial
insults. I guess that’s a strength of speculative fiction – take an issue like
racism outside of its preferred real world context and you can see how
absolutely absurd it is. <br />
<br />
<h3>
Morals versus Insults</h3>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Plenty of people think bloodsucking is inherently wrong,
even if you do it safely and consensually. They’ll point out that you have to
hurt someone one way or another, since you still have to break the skin. And it
isn’t as if humans have pints and pints of blood to spare without any health
consequences. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And it’s not like establishing a hosting relationship
doesn’t have many indirect personal consequences for both parties that make the
whole process more complicated than a simple exchange of blood. And nearly
everyone in our community chose to be vampires, and therefore consciously said,
after years of thinking it over, that yes: they were willing to make themselves
difficult burdens on an ever-expanding number of people for the rest of their
indefinite lifespans.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I can actually respect that position well enough,
because at least it’s a real moral argument. I’m a professional sire. I’m a
professional recruiter. I’ve lived well past the maximum natural human
lifespan. This position more or less flies in the face of everything I do and
the entire basis of my continued existence on Earth.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But at least it’s an argument and they’re not just calling
me icky.<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://vampirelegends.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/vamp-tuey1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="235" id="irc_mi" src="http://vampirelegends.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/vamp-tuey1.jpg" style="margin-top: 29px;" width="400" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Images in order of appearance:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire_bat.<br />
http://hardinmd.lib.uiowa.edu/fleabites.html.<br />
http://www.bradwestness.com/ayn-rand-was-a-not-a-republican,1629/.<br />
http://www.breakingdawnmovie.org/images/2010/07/Edward-Cullen-bad-vamp-2.jpg. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_B%C3%A1thory<br />
http://staticmass.net/the-emporium/interview-with-the-vampire-movie-1994/.<br />
http://vampirelegends.wordpress.com/2010/05/19/vampires-online-and-bats/. </div>
<!--EndFragment-->Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-857105832247796852012-11-25T19:06:00.000-08:002013-04-13T18:30:45.990-07:00Edward Cullen is Not Gay<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="282" id="il_fi" src="http://www.annagibson.com/duke/eng26/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Carmilla.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
In the late nineteenth century, the two main tropes for Vampire sires were:<br />
<br />
1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Lesbian Vampire seducing innocent young girls to ruin.<br />
2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Male Vampire, also seducing innocent young girls to ruin.<br />
<br />
<img alt="Le Vampire de John William Polidori" class="grandeimage aligncenter" height="350" src="http://ifisdead.net/wp-content/uploads/livres/le_vampire_John_William_Polidori.jpg" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(194, 194, 194); border-bottom-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 10px; border-left-color: rgb(194, 194, 194); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 5px; border-right-color: rgb(194, 194, 194); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 5px; border-top-color: rgb(194, 194, 194); border-top-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 10px; display: block; font-family: Arial, 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" title="Le Vampire de John William Polidori" width="300" /><br />
<br />
It occurred to me after getting educated on Vampire fiction in my late twenties (after I’d already been sired) that according to some definitions, I got ‘em both, as an innocent young girl pre-ruination.<br />
<br />
Hey, there are plenty of people who believe ethical siring is an oxymoron, and that may never change. Although maybe Charles is off the hook, since Cathy’s the one who actually sired me. He was more of a siring enabler; really, depending on what the hell you insist siring is a metaphor for.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://psiresearcher.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/z-burne-jones-le-vampire.jpg" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(168, 239, 157); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #a8ef9d; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: rgb(68, 68, 68) 0px 0px 4px; vertical-align: baseline;"><img alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-302" height="400" src="http://psiresearcher.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/z-burne-jones-le-vampire.jpg?w=212&h=300" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: none; background-origin: initial; border-bottom-color: initial; border-bottom-style: initial; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-style: none; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-style: initial; border-top-style: none; border-top-width: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" title="Le Vampire by Burne-Jones." width="282" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: white; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"></span><br />
<br />
One interesting thing I’ve noticed is that people usually still assume Charles is the one who sired me. And I’ve gotten some fun responses over the years from the more conservative human members of our community after I set the record straight:<br />
<br />
1950s: “Oh. I see. Well, you are vampires, what did I expect? If you’re already damned you may as well get magnificently damned, right?<br />
1980s: “Oh, fuck. Oh right, you guys are immune to that, right? Right?”<br />
1990s: “Oh, hey, that’s cool. You know, that’s you guy’s choice, and I totally respect that. What you guys do in your bedrooms is perfectly fine – there is nothing wrong with that as long as you don’t shove it down other people’s throats.”<br />
2010s: “Holy shit, you’re a lesbian! That’s awesome!”<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://data.whicdn.com/images/23609521/Lesbian_Vampire_by_Bilesuck_large.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="290" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nicely done, ~Bilesuck on deviantART - you got the expression just right. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span><br />
<br />
Indeed, 1950s-2010s. As we all know, bisexuals still don’t exist, omnisexuals are just something they made up for <i>Torchwood</i> and to piss off conservatives (that’s just a bonus, man), and of course, siring is exactly like sex. Who doesn’t grow fangs and start drinking blood after sex? I know I do now – so I guess that means everyone does. It’s logic!<br />
<br />
Also, sex makes you immortal.<br />
<br />
If Twilight fan reactions are any indication, my conservative hosts are by no means distant outliers.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="384" id="il_fi" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_MjhX1sQ4y-Q/SxkscpZmRiI/AAAAAAAACZY/Xz805hp6efM/s400/Edward-Cullen-Gay-Sparkle.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Brilliant</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span><br />
<br />
If you spend any time reading Team Anti-Twilight screeds against Edward Cullen, it doesn’t take too long for people to start calling him gay.<br />
<br />
Well, he’s not.<br />
<br />
Here’s how I know: he never expresses any sexual attraction to men. Or does anything sexual with men. Also, he expresses sexual attraction to women in his interior monologue, and has sex with women. Homosexuality is defined as exclusive attraction to one’s own sex. If you express attraction to the opposite sex, you cannot be gay, and if you never express any attraction to your own, you cannot be bisexual.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb3NKG0w-srwY49kfJk8cr7SLkUE75w14_msswi3nR08GcpaZdXLRNHNZ2RoruXZ6GVLBeaOjB9lk4Of4_s2dh8lG-HPsNU85yMEc6-K0qk8yKhKpKkZ9Q93mKiWaE39dfje_XeQHb6Ck/s400/twilight.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">You kissed a girl?! That is so gay!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
See, I think this is a pretty solved issue, but no. As it turns out, there is a multitude of ways you can be gay without actually being gay.<br />
<br />
The unmistakable airtight case:<br />
<br />
1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Edward is sparkly: Sigh. Folks, sparkling is a biological trait for Meyer’s Vampires. Applying body glitter to look ‘fabulous’ and naturally producing body-glitter, as part of a skin disease really can’t be judged by the same standards.<br />
<br />
Fun fact: guys who were not gay have worn body glitter. When your hasty generalizations keep getting trampled by hordes of outliers, it’s time to let them run you down. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="320" id="il_fi" src="http://1pumplane.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/eddie_izzard.jpg?w=500&h=400" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Set 'em straight, Eddie Izzard. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Edward is pretty: Ah, yes. Prettiness and homosexuality are genetically correlated in men. I love Imaginary Genetics. Or maybe it’s just that gay men spontaneously develop prettiness after puberty once they realize they’re attracted to men, to suit them in their gay dating lives. Magic Biology is fun! Or maybe pretty men realize women will never want them because women only like ugly guys (as is evidenced by the obsession over men like Robert Pattinson in real life – clearly it’s only gay men that are into him), and thus ‘choose’ to be gay, which is totally a conscious choice. Pseudo-sociology is even more fun!<br />
<br />
Also, prettiness is a biological trait for Meyer’s Vampires and all other Mary Sues. What are they, a Species of Gay?<br />
<br />
3.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Edward is thin: Nothing burns calories like homosexuality. Is it because of all the gay sex? Which is weird; if these stereotypes were any indication, you’d think gay men didn’t even have sex. They just sit around and sparkle together while dressing nice and writing poetry. I mean, if they didn’t even need gay attraction to be gay, where’s the sex?<br />
<br />
Also bears and chubs don’t exist – gay men only like skinny guys or want to be skinny guys. To suggest otherwise is to suggest diversity of the kind liberals have invented as an insidious plot.<br />
<br />
4.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Edward is stylish: Fun fact – in the early 20th century (and most throughout most of Western culture before and after), men were encouraged to dress nicely. It didn’t make them ‘gay’ or anything (well, ‘gay’ meant something different back then). If Edward were somehow frozen in his 1910s perspective, you’d think he’d be pretty flabbergasted by the macho culture ‘men are slobs’ ideal. Also, he should wear hats.<br />
<br />
I take it back. All men before the 1980s macho culture were gay. Look at Teddy Roosevelt. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/graph%20harv%20col/HC4.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="275" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fierce big game hunter, and tough-as-nails politician. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
5.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Edward is well spoken: He is? Okay, I’ll play along. Did you know that in the early 20th century the idea of a good woman writer was still controversial, and we were still using goddamn male pseudonyms to make a damn sale? Yeah, the ‘verbal skills are for women’ phenomenon is pretty modern, too. It’s almost like it’s a cultural construction or something. As is the idea that gay men are women.<br />
<br />
6.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Edward hates Jacob, which means he’s attracted to him: Yes. You know what? All my friends go through a stage where they hated me and tried to kill me before accepting my awesomeness. In fact, Cathy and Charles both teamed up to destroy my life and torture me before declaring me their beloved poly partner. It’s how all courtship works, and is a necessary stage in all romance.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="224" src="http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4021/4210450980_1f08718f24.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So well drawn. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Edward also threatens to kill Jacob on multiple occasions. He actually toyed with the idea of slaughtering Jacob’s entire tribe in Midnight Sun. And they fight all the time, usually over Bella. Abusive dominance games are exactly like love and attraction, and that is something normal and healthy people think. Also, guys paternalistically fighting over a women like a prized possession aren’t misogynists, they’re secretly into each other.<br />
<br />
Stop following us, Freud. Don’t make me get my zombie hammer.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="251" src="http://shaunphilly.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/hammer_silhouette-svg-hi.png" style="-webkit-user-select: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://janetthomas.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/sigmund-freud.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="299" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I'll show you 'penis envy.'</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
7.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Edward was a virgin before he met Bella: Yes. Virginity is a sign that you like having sex with men. See, I’d think that not having sex for a hundred years would be a sign of being, um, asexual (or traumatized, or religious, etc.). But no. Apparently the only explanation is closet homosexuality.<br />
<br />
We’ve already established that bisexuals just don’t exist. I guess asexuals don’t either. Also, men never voluntarily stay virgins. Entire religious and spiritual philosophies have been built around abstinence, but it has never happened in recorded history. No – even men who know that having sex with women WOULD KILL THE WOMEN (which is true for Vampires and human women in Twilight) cannot abstain from sex. Such is the male sex drive that it trumps all moral concerns and overrides every other personal conviction. Which is why prostitutes in the real world are respected professionals with waiting lists of hundreds of people every single night and promiscuous women are considered the world’s greatest humanitarians.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="232" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhss1lBjv8sr1oJi1UyudZ-vmlU8hO1SLZyL_dhaV9bbapBGqyQElvFJ5NsE-lgm_rmrRI7Qa3UZCnKT_BkasTYXdvtD0dcXm2bUEpARU7nAN3grcsbag6eSgYoP1EYngK9fTiHtM1yHeub/s400/astro3001_468x272.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We all have testosterone and oxytocin, goddammit!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Whenever I hear people say that stupid ‘Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus’ cliché as a segue to the opposite gender stereotypes way of thinking, I want to say “Could you guys make it any more obvious that you’re talking about weird space aliens that don’t exist?” I also want to ask: “Which planet do you think gay people are from?”<br />
<br />
One of the interesting things here is that a lot of these very same critics actually accuse Meyer of homophobia in other areas, like not including any openly gay characters. Yeah, a lot of them are otherwise pretty liberal.<br />
<br />
And some of them have even imagined the existence of critics like me, and have preemptively asserted that they are not homophobic for saying these things about Edward. No, Meyer is. She’s the one perpetuating gay stereotypes by making Edward not a straight stereotype.<br />
<br />
Yes. They’re using gay stereotypes to diagnose someone with homosexuality in the absence of any actual homosexual behavior – but they’re not perpetuating or validating gay stereotypes. I’m sure some of their best friends are gay, and they asked those gay friends, and those gay friends didn’t mind, too.<br />
<br />
Hey, why stop there? You know what – Emmett Cullen is gay. I know, I know – he’s all ‘big’ and macho and weightlifting and sarcastic and aggressive and making fun of Edward. Don’t you see – he’s a bear! He’s big, he’s hairy, he likes hunting, and wrestling – bear. Rosalie is just his beard. Anyway, when Emmett goes blood hunting, his favorite animal to hunt is a grizzly bear, so clearly he’s trying to tell us something.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Carlisle Cullen and The Twilight Saga: The Official Illustrated Guide Photograph" height="400" id="media_photo_element" src="http://www3.images.coolspotters.com/photos/696200/the-twilight-saga-the-official-illustrated-guide-gallery.jpg" style="height: 618px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; width: 415px;" title="Carlisle Cullen and The Twilight Saga: The Official Illustrated Guide Photograph" width="268" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">He looks like Joseph Smith. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Also, Carlisle is gay. Esme is also just a beard. The first guy he sires is a pretty teenage boy – totally the move of one of those depraved homosexuals they warned us about on TV during the 1950s that totally exist. Edward was your ‘companion’ Carlisle? Snort – you are you kidding? Men don’t have friends; just people they hope to have sex with (ask any Pick-Up Artist). Also, siring is exactly like sex.<br />
<br />
Rosalie’s gay, too. Don’t let all that femme ‘world’s hottest woman’ thing fool you – she’s a lipstick lesbian. I mean, when she was eighteen, she didn’t even care about marrying the guy her parents wanted her to marry for social reasons – she just wanted a baby. And all lesbians want kids, and all girls love being practically sold into marriage. Plus, she likes fixing old cars, and straight women don’t do that, they get men to do it for them. And hey – she went to college and studied electrical engineering, medicine, astrophysics, and business – straight women just study liberal arts, which are inferior. She’s a lesbian. That’s probably the reason she hated Bella all those books – she was into her. Animosity is always attraction.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="image" src="http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mbhmytW1al1rd235yo1_500.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gay couples. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Also, Alice is gay. She has short hair, for one thing. And look at how she’s always hugging Bella – clearly indicative of sexual intent, because women never do that under any other circumstances. I guess she’s a lipstick lesbian though, what with the whole fashion plate thing.<br />
<br />
As for Esme, um – I don’t know; she’s so underdeveloped as a character she could be anything. Oh right – she wasn’t into any guy after she met Carlisle that one time, but really that means she just wasn’t into guys and is a lesbian.<br />
<br />
Jasper’s tougher, what with his highly manly psychopathy, but he does wear designer clothes and is also really pretty, so there’s no hope for him either.<br />
<br />
The werewolves are easy – they’re a bunch of shirtless guys hanging out together. They’re all gay.<br />
<br />
Wow. In one page we went from a book with no gay characters to a Cast of Gay. And I didn’t even get to all the reasons Bella, her mother, and her father were gay.<br />
<br />
And here’s the best part: Edward used to hunt men and then torture them, who turned gay in response to his gay Vampire bite. Aw. Not only were they criminals, they died gay, too. And now he’s infecting everyone with gay with his gay presence, because the level of gay grows with age.<br />
<br />
No, wait: this is the best part: the Cullens are rich. And gay. And we have no idea where all their money went, except towards all of their gay interior designing in their gay house, and gay clothes. I bet they were using it to fund the homosexual agenda. Think about it – the gay agenda has only gotten steadily worse in the twentieth century, and that’s when the Cullens were sired. It wasn’t the Progressives because we failed at everything according to practically everyone today, but now the Cullens and their ilk have won and everything is gay gay gay through gay osmosis of gay!<br />
<br />
Sigh.<br />
<br />
Homophobia is like any other form of paranoia. You’re afraid of something enough, you start seeing it everywhere – even ‘guilt by faint association’ can be enough.<br />
<br />
I understand. Really. Some of my best friends are homophobes. Or were, anyway. I’m old – there were people in favor of gay rights when I was young, but they were just as closeted as the gay people. Well – we’re out and proud now, folks.<br />
<br />
Obviously, I’m not actually interpreting the ‘Edward Cullen is Gay’ phenomenon as anything resembling an argument. It isn’t. They’re just making fun of him. They’re making fun of him by using homosexuality as an insult. I know a lot of people are under the impression they can insult people by calling them gay while somehow not implying homosexuality is bad, but every one of them who isn’t lying is wrong.<br />
<br />
Folks – Meyer did not intend for Edward to be gay. She wrote him as, gasp, a non-macho straight male lead. What with Twilight being a formulaic vanilla straight romance novel with a female protagonist and all, Edward being heterosexual is pretty much central to the plot. It’s no minor detail. If she did intend for Edward to be gay then, yes, he would be a gay stereotype. But if you’re saying that someone can unwittingly write gay character despite clearly writing a straight character – that’s you.<br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/9764/schermata20110411a15423.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="263" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">How do you make a drawing look airbrushed?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Now it’s true – Edward is a stalker. And an abuser. And frankly, he fits a lot of the criteria for Antisocial Personality Disorder. And Meyer didn’t intend any of that, either. But those are real conditions with real documented symptoms, and you can make a diagnosis. Diagnosing homosexuality by using anything other than, um, homosexuality is endorsing homophobia in every way, shape, and form.<br />
<br />
Part of the ‘pretty men are gay’ thing is a denial of female sexuality. If anyone thinks a guy is hot, it must be another man, because why would women think that? Part of it is projection – if you notice a guy is hot, well, are you gay? Better accuse him of being gay, just to be on the safe side.<br />
<br />
Mainly, though, the Edward Cullen is Gay phenomenon is pure old-fashioned gender policing. It’s not coming up with a list of behaviors straight guys don’t do, but can’t do. Homosexuality is just a bogeyman synonym for ‘not manly,’ in a culture where men are taught to hold ‘masculinity’ as the ultimate ideal. Femininity is essentially a contaminant, and gay men have been so poisoned by it they have the same sexual preferences as women. Not too long ago, that was practically a mainstream belief in psychology. <br />
<br />
Give me five reasons why that isn’t implying that women are inferior, and the first ten don’t count. Also give me ten reasons why this attitude is actually socially useful or non-injurious to the psyches of millions of men and women, and the first fifty don’t count.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="293" id="il_fi" src="http://www.old-picture.com/american-history-1900-1930s/pictures/Suffragettes-parade-001.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Say it, brothers and sisters. Forever. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
When I was growing up, we had the Cult of Domesticity (i.e. True Womanhood). Here were the basic ideals:<br />
<br />
1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Piety – Translation: That’s one hobby that won’t interfere with housework.<br />
2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Purity – Translation: Sex is for men only, somehow, even when they do it with women. <br />
3.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Submissiveness – Translation: Get Out of Argument/Reciprocity Free Card for men.<br />
4.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Domesticity – Translation: Your home is your cage.<br />
<br />
And of course, they were just as afraid that liberating women would somehow emasculate men. Back in my Suffragette days, I got to plow through loads of delightful comics like these:<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="632" id="il_fi" src="http://blogs.opb.org/oexjournal/files/2011/03/11_1909_anti-suffrage_cartoon_big.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="395" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wait until she votes for a liberal.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I guess masculinity is a limited resource, and voting is manly because it’s manly. Also, men should not love or care for their own children.<br />
<br />
Well, we’ve certainly made progress. But we still have gender boxes full of junk that people desperately want to be true for some horrible reason. It’s more than obvious that people already know what it’s in them, too. <br />
<br />
Today, the misogynists who are trying to enforce it aren’t conservatives trying to keep things the same; they’re reactionaries trying to bring things back to the way they used to be. I was there. The least I can do is put up a road sign, or something.<br />
<br />
Misogyny and misandry have always been natural allies. You put women in a box; men get a complementary box. If you think in terms of opposite genders, you can’t have it any other way than that: they all get put in boxes, little boxes. Well, brothers and sisters, I say burn the boxes like the artificial boundaries and good fuel sources they are. Be whoever you want to be, have whatever hobbies, clothes, and personal expressions you want, and let everyone else do the same goddamn thing without fear of your superlatively lame reprisal. Stop wondering whether the hell they’re masculine or feminine, and stop pretending those terms mean anything.<br />
<br />
Sadly, this means you’ll also have to give up the bad jokes, like randomly accusing pretty Vampires of homosexuality or treating homosexuality as something random pretty Vampires ought to be ashamed of. I understand. I’m a comedy writer, and there’s nothing worse than laying down a joke and getting a room full of awkward, angry stares as your reward. But it’s not always everyone else’s fault. If society’s growing, comedy should grow with it. Or you’ll turn into Krusty the Clown telling TV dinner jokes while dressed like an Asian stereotype.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="301" id="il_fi" src="http://allisnow.com/images/themes/humor/krusty-the-clown-flapping-dickie-bad-jokes.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It wasn't funny the first time, Krusty. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Image sources in order of appearance:<br />
<br />
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<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.annagibson.com/duke/eng26/?p=543">http://www.annagibson.com/duke/eng26/?p=543</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://ifisdead.net/livres/le-vampire-de-john-william-polidori/">http://ifisdead.net/livres/le-vampire-de-john-william-polidori/</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://psiresearcher.wordpress.com/2011/05/06/">http://psiresearcher.wordpress.com/2011/05/06/</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://bilesuck.deviantart.com/art/Lesbian-Vampire-33356391?q=boost%3Apopular%20lesbian&qo=192">http://bilesuck.deviantart.com/art/Lesbian-Vampire-33356391?q=boost%3Apopular%20lesbian&qo=192</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.sodahead.com/">http://www.sodahead.com</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb3NKG0w-srwY49kfJk8cr7SLkUE75w14_msswi3nR08GcpaZdXLRNHNZ2RoruXZ6GVLBeaOjB9lk4Of4_s2dh8lG-HPsNU85yMEc6-K0qk8yKhKpKkZ9Q93mKiWaE39dfje_XeQHb6Ck/s1600/twilight.jpg">https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb3NKG0w-srwY49kfJk8cr7SLkUE75w14_msswi3nR08GcpaZdXLRNHNZ2RoruXZ6GVLBeaOjB9lk4Of4_s2dh8lG-HPsNU85yMEc6-K0qk8yKhKpKkZ9Q93mKiWaE39dfje_XeQHb6Ck/s1600/twilight.jpg</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://ericdoesnotexist.wordpress.com/2010/06/13/like-a-hundred-million-hotdogs-sir/">http://ericdoesnotexist.wordpress.com/2010/06/13/like-a-hundred-million-hotdogs-sir/</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/life/biopictures.htm">http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/life/biopictures.htm</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4021/4210450980_1f08718f24.jpg">http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4021/4210450980_1f08718f24.jpg</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://shaunphilly.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/hammer_silhouette-svg-hi.png">http://shaunphilly.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/hammer_silhouette-svg-hi.png</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://janetthomas.wordpress.com/category/consumerism-sigmund-freud-marketing-advertising-wish-fulfilment-desires/">http://janetthomas.wordpress.com/category/consumerism-sigmund-freud-marketing-advertising-wish-fulfilment-desires/</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://mralvy.blogspot.com/2012/04/men-are-from-mars-women-are-from-venus.html">http://mralvy.blogspot.com/2012/04/men-are-from-mars-women-are-from-venus.html</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://coolspotters.com/characters/carlisle-cullen/and/books/the-twilight-saga-the-official-illustrated-guide#medium-1601882">http://coolspotters.com/characters/carlisle-cullen/and/books/the-twilight-saga-the-official-illustrated-guide#medium-1601882</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/emmett-cullen?before=1350756304">http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/emmett-cullen?before=1350756304</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.twilightfansitalia.com/en/category/the-twilight-saga-the-official-illustrated-guide">http://www.twilightfansitalia.com/en/category/the-twilight-saga-the-official-illustrated-guide</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.old-picture.com/american-history-1900-1930s/Suffragettes-parade-in.htm">http://www.old-picture.com/american-history-1900-1930s/Suffragettes-parade-in.htm</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.museumofsexism.org/">http://www.museumofsexism.org/</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/166702/mspa-hussmaster-a-raises-2-million-trillion-bajillion-dollars/p44">http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/166702/mspa-hussmaster-a-raises-2-million-trillion-bajillion-dollars/p44</a>. </span></span></div>
<!--EndFragment--><br />
<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-6131922282003366232012-09-30T18:37:00.001-07:002013-04-13T18:33:35.296-07:00Overpowered Vampire<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hot damn, I am such a frigging overpowered vampire. I can
see in the dark:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="135" id="il_fi" src="http://www.xda-developers.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Flashlight.jpg?f39ce1" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="200" /><img height="105" id="il_fi" src="http://www.nightvisionstore.com/%20link%20page%20lenses.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="200" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My top speed on the ground exceeds that of the fastest
running animals on Earth (take that, cheetahs):</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="253" id="il_fi" src="http://www.whitegadget.com/attachments/pc-wallpapers/71103d1314243733-car-car-pics.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have super-human strength:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="300" id="il_fi" src="http://www.governmentauctions.org/uploaded_images/bulldozer-780634.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can fly:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="225" id="il_fi" src="http://static.memrise.com/uploads/mems/584207000120610171915.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can breathe underwater:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://i.ehow.com/images/a02/57/e7/maintain-scuba-gear-800X800.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="300" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can do that weird spidery wall-crawling thing most
vampires in fiction don’t do anymore:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://www.princeton.edu/~oa/images/climbing/2CrackClimbers.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="295" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have super-vision:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.universetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/OrionEON.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" id="il_fi" src="http://www.universetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/OrionEON.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="200" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://openclipart.org/image/800px/svg_to_png/29061/Minduka_A_simple_magnifying_glass.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="126" id="il_fi" src="http://openclipart.org/image/800px/svg_to_png/29061/Minduka_A_simple_magnifying_glass.png" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="200" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can quickly recognize blood types and distinguish one
animal’s blood from another:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p> </o:p><img height="200" id="il_fi" src="http://www.vet.upenn.edu/Portals/0/images/research/blood_testing.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="250" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have extraordinary healing abilities:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="317" id="il_fi" src="http://acnehubs.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/antibiotics-for-acne.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can survive nuclear explosions:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><img height="308" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2i302_TB1wP4cEHMndVc7NITWZgUZ_qdUIwRanNO3FTOtwDjazxV9ndAGsqj4-YcMVcbsH_z8nyFNSnYm_ROeAuWeqf9bUQYRIGbXEm5dwvZOJ2i5-imDl-4dSLh1Akaiv5DA_FwR8Wk/s400/New+Deal+Scare+BombShelter.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can communicate across long distances, especially with
people I have fed upon:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="271" id="il_fi" src="http://blogs-images.forbes.com/johngaudiosi/files/2012/09/iphone-5-release-date.png" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(I have their phone numbers)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can silently communicate with people I have formed strong
bonds with:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p> </o:p><img height="240" id="il_fi" src="http://frommypocket.pocketprimer.com/images/59836-52518/Gmail%20login.png" style="padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="240" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(I have their e-mail addresses)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can extract information from almost anyone, anywhere in
the world:<br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 48px;"> The Internet</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(I couldn’t find a picture of the Internet) </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The list goes on and on. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My people do genuinely have what could be considered bona
fide biological superpowers. It's all relative. I have the ears of a dog, the echolocation of a
bat (and I do decidedly non-batty things with it), the voice mimicry of a
parrot, and the immune system of – the transhumans of the future, I hope. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But most importantly, I have the brain of a human, which can
make all other superpowers possible. And I have the indefinite lifespan of a hydra/planarian flatworm, so I’ll live to see them all. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I hope to keep adding to this list. When and if we ever mastered mind uploading, and if changing
bodies ever became as easy as changing clothes, I’d be getting a bat body. And
a wolf body. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I guess becoming utility fog a la <i>Transmetropolitan</i> would count as turning
into mist. I’ll have that, too.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As they say, sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic. And scientists are increasingly becoming indistinguishable from wizards. Ask Nikola Tesla. </div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://kollectivjournal.com/images/nikola2.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="306" /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://kollectivjournal.com/?p=548">http://kollectivjournal.com/?p=548</a>. </div>
<!--EndFragment-->Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-40007592294894826692012-08-03T21:46:00.001-07:002013-04-13T18:50:54.792-07:00Defending the Indefensible: The Little Mermaid Introduction<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://media.photobucket.com/image/recent/disneyhush/194lilmer-00626.jpg">http://media.photobucket.com/image/recent/disneyhush/194lilmer-00626.jpg</a>
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The <i>Little Mermaid</i>
is the first Disney Animated Canon film I liked (except <i>Fantasia</i>) and nearly every group I’m in has a list of justifiable
problems with it. It’s anti-feminist, body-biased, classist, monarchist, and
racist against mermaids – and by extension, all non-humans generally regarded
as fictional.</div>
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This puts me in an awkward position because I can usually
see both sides, and find myself drifting towards the excluded middle. There are
patterns in most of my opinions on media:</div>
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<u>Rule number indeterminate</u>: I can like something no
matter how offensive it is.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.btchflcks.com/2011/12/animated-childrens-films-you-say.html">http://www.btchflcks.com/2011/12/animated-childrens-films-you-say.html</a>
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And that’s good too. Pop culture skews conservative, and I
saw the whole 20<sup>th</sup> century. If I hated anything that offended me,
I’d pretty much hate anything made before twenty years from now at least. The
number of people who share my exact politics could probably share an apartment
together and still have room for orgies. I support political movements that
haven’t happened yet. Given the state of past and present political movements, I'm lucky I can be flexible. </div>
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And honestly, if a good message won’t save a bad film, a bad
message won’t condemn a good film. Unless it’s really fucking bad. You know, <i>Birth of a Nation</i> bad (that film looked
really impressive back in 1915, but I hated it anyway. And now it looks like
drama club crap – all’s wells that ends well). </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">filmsquish.com</span></td></tr>
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At least all sides of the <i>Little Mermaid</i> debate can agree on one thing: it’s not as offensive
as <i>Birth of a Nation</i> (the animation
has held up better, too – but then it’s only been 23 years). High praise
indeed, but at least that means a <i>Little
Mermaid</i> debate is less than completely unthinkable, which it would be for <i>Birth of a Nation</i>. The objections to the<i> Little Mermaid</i> are reasonable, so my
defenses range from Devil’s Advocate to Rejecting Confirmation Bias to Wacky
Extrapolations. </div>
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<u>Rule number indeterminate the second</u>: I can make fun
of a work that I like.</div>
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Picking apart movies is one way that I enjoy them. Not the
only way, but it is important. If I stopped, they’d be less fun. Plus, this way
you can enjoy more movies. If good movies are fun to pick apart, bad movies are
even more fun. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">flixist.com</span>
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And really – how many films are perfect from start to finish
according to everyone who views them, irrespective of time, place, and culture?
I don’t even know how you’d produce a film like that – you’d need
indoctrination plus the cessation of social and technological progress to even
come close. So – there’s always a basis to mock something, even if it’s good or
used to be. </div>
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Part of my job involves getting some idea of how people will
react to us when the Masquerade ends, with whatever limited evidence available.
Picking apart non-human fiction itself is great, but picking apart critical and
fan reactions is way more revealing. Fan reactions and discussions are usually
undiluted opinion, and there’s so much there. </div>
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It all depends on the topic. The <i>Little Mermaid </i>touches on enough sticky issues - on touches on them in a sticky way - that it's hard not to get stuck in any place. Including the center.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">article.wn.com</span></td></tr>
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Part One</div>
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<u>One interpretation</u>: Ariel drastically alters her
physical appearance to please a man and to become sexually mature. </div>
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<u>My interpretation</u>: Ariel transcends the physical
limitations she would have suffered in her chosen environment and is able to
live the life she wants using Magic Indistinguishable from Advanced Technology.
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People tend to interpret Ariel’s desire for legs as a desire
to have sex. Last time I checked, though, legs were for, um, walking. Yes,
there’s a cliché in mermaid fiction that mermaids don’t have human sexual
organs, so how do you fuck them (you writers have no imagination, do you?) but
there’s no evidence for that in the film. As it stands, it seems more like a
raunchy joke than an argument, and the day jokes start substituting for
critical thinking is the day I eat the sun. </div>
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It’s a trope being projected onto the film. And naturally, it’s
about sex. Stop following us, Freud. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.btchflcks.com/2011/12/animated-childrens-films-you-say.html">http://www.btchflcks.com/2011/12/animated-childrens-films-you-say.html</a>
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It’s all there in the Part of Your World number (probably my
favorite animated musical scene of all time). Ariel wants legs to properly
function as a human, and especially jump, dance…walk down a street…and she wanted
them before she even meets Eric or pines for any man. Ariel doesn’t see Eric
until several scenes later. </div>
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And no, ‘dancing’ does not equal ‘sex,’ (I wish) unless
that’s your kink.</div>
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There are definitely legitimate criticisms of ‘Eric and
Ariel,’ not the least of which is the fact that they barely know each other. I
frigging hate the One Week Courtship trope. As far as I’m concerned, if I’ve
known you for less than a month, you’re an acquaintance, no matter how much I
like you. I’ve known some of my friends for over a century, and my people won’t
sire anyone we haven’t known for at least five years. A marital commitment for
life, after less than a year – that’s completely alien. </div>
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But given the evidence from the film, if things didn’t work
out with Eric, Ariel still probably wouldn’t ask her father to turn her back
(although she might ask him for money. Or pearls – Triton should have some
liquid assets). </div>
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She wanted to be human anyway. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">pajiba.com</span>
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But people still make it all about Eric. Okay, Ariel always
wants to go to Land, that elusive foreign country whose borders are policed
(badly) by her dictator father. Just like I’ve always wanted to move to <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Norway</st1:country> and
can’t (international immigration is considered an unacceptable risk for
vampires with illegal identities. Sadly, I agree with that policy.). Say that
changed, and I met this great Norwegian, and now I want to move there with him
or her (or them). I’d still want to see <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on">Norway</st1:country>, damn it. </div>
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Ariel goes the whole song without even talking about men,
except about how human men probably don’t reprimand their daughters, and ‘they
understand.’ Well, given her father’s behavior, I see where she’s coming from.
Wait until later in the movie: I don’t think any human father has ever
destroyed all his daughter’s archeological findings using an omni-powerful
weapon of mass destruction. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://fuckyeahthelittlemermaid.tumblr.com/page/64">http://fuckyeahthelittlemermaid.tumblr.com/page/64</a>
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That still has nothing to do with romance or sex, and
everything to do with wanting personal freedom. </div>
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She wanted to be part of human society, for reasons
intellectual and aesthetic. I mean: look at all the awesome stuff we have.
Ariel has that enormous museum of human artifacts. We see her add a few things
to it in the early part of the film. At that rate, it probably took her years
to assemble all that stuff, meaning she was interested in human culture for
years. She got it from a shipwreck, too – how many shipwrecks can there
possibly be, even before the days of steamers?</div>
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Forget <st1:place w:st="on">Milo</st1:place> from <i>Atlantis: the Lost Empire</i> – Ariel is
Disney’s Adventure Archeologist. Ariel got all that stuff under extreme risk
from predators like sharks and her father, and even does what research she can.
Which is itself a grim reminder of the days when checking your sources was so
much harder, and you’d have almost no way of knowing if you were consulting an
expert or a know-nothing seagull like Scuttle. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://www.jimhillmedia.com/mb/images/upload/Little-Mermaid-11-web.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">jimhillmedia.com</span>
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(Although I have to give Scuttle some credit – forks being
combs almost seems credible if you don’t have hair and have never used a comb
before, and you eat with your beak. It might even sound more plausible than the
truth. And the idea that prehistoric humans stared at each other all day long
until they spontaneously invented music is only slightly sillier than how many
pop historians characterize pre-history.)
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Ariel’s ready to do things she’s never done before, which might
include sex but need not be limited to it. And hey, she’s “ready to know what
the people know/ ask them my questions and get some answers.” Don’t worry,
Ariel – it’s the mid-19<sup>th</sup> century, you’re living in a time of
educational reform, and you’re marrying into the upper class anyway.
Everything’s fine. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">yadambross.wordpress.com</span>
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And Ariel’s questions include, ‘Fucking fire, how does that
work?’ Yes. It’s the mid-19<sup>th</sup> century, and Ariel doesn’t know where
fire comes from, putting her knowledge of science at pre-caveman levels. Well,
that’s what happens when you’re raised in a totalitarian dictatorship that
forbids access to the outside world and all its knowledge, lest you be
corrupted by tolerance. She sure won’t want for intellectual stimulation when
she escapes the hydrosphere. </div>
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Yeah, you could take that as a joke about how <i>of course</i> a
mermaid wouldn’t know about fire. They’re underwater! Well, humans live on
land, and know plenty about the sea, not to mention outer space and the inside
of volcanoes and other places that are much harder to visit than the beach as an air-breathing mammalian mermaid. But
hey, half the time people assume that I don’t know what a kitchen is, because
why would a vampire need that? So I guess Ariel’s pretty much screwed. </div>
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People are also using a cosmetic surgery metaphor here:
Ariel is altering her physical appearance to please a man. All right –
‘surgery’ I can understand. That’s the closest real-world analogue I can think
of, given our current lack of transformative omni-powerful magic. But<i> cosmetic</i> surgery?</div>
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Okay, if this film really was about a girl who needs (or
thinks she needs) plastic surgery to get a guy, and the <i>Little Mermaid</i> was in fact the <i>Hottie
and the Nottie</i> with fins: yeah, I’d hate it. No amount of cool animation,
entertaining voice performances, or awesome songs can save you from that
message. But I don’t think it is. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://themorpheusheadcase.blogspot.com/2012_02_01_archive.html">http://themorpheusheadcase.blogspot.com/2012_02_01_archive.html</a>
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According to some definitions, plastic surgery involves the
restoration of form and function – cosmetic surgery is only a subset of a set
that includes reconstructive surgery and the treatment of burns. It’s never
said how long pre-op merfolk can stay on land, but let’s just say for the sake
of argument that they can at least exist on land efficiently for long periods
of time. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Do people who raise this argument object to Ariel living on
land at all, or just living on land with Eric? Would they be fine with the
story if it were just one mermaid’s valiant struggle to be terrestrial? If so,
Ariel would still probably want legs, and it still would have nothing to do
with sex or appearance. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Cosmetic surgery is literally all about appearances. Your
abdomen doesn’t do anything different after a tummy tuck. If it did, it would
change how we feel about tummy tucks. We’d call them something different, at
least. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Even if Ariel doesn’t have to keep her fish tail moistened,
she still can’t walk. Eric has a whole fleet of merchant clipper ships – from
the looks of it, anyway – so this is around 1840s-1860s. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" src="http://buyvintage1.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/bath_chair4.jpg?w=470" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="363" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">buyvintage1.wordpress.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those godawful uncomfortable Bath Chairs were still probably
on the market then. Hey, Eric’s royalty, maybe he can hook Ariel up with one of
those newfangled wheelchairs with the reclining backs and footrests.
Proto-self-propelled wheelchairs didn’t happen until about 1869, and even then
they weren’t all that great. New technology does have a tendency to work like
shit and cost you an arm and a leg when it’s first introduced. Also,
wheelchairs are suspiciously always designed for humans.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now I’m imagining a wheelchair specifically designed for a
mermaid. I hope everyone else in this fictional European society is just as
liberal as Eric, anyway, and can accept a mermaid queen consort, especially his
family. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Eric &amp; Vanessa The Little Mermaid" height="266" src="http://i655.photobucket.com/albums/uu279/SweetAngelFace21/EricVanessa1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://s655.photobucket.com/">http://s655.photobucket.com/</a>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Although, they did agree to marry Eric and Vanessa, a woman
with no papers, no known family relations, who seemed to have appeared by
magic, and then they more or less did the same thing all over again with a
post-op Ariel, so who’s to say how they’d feel about her pre-op? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well, Ariel does still technically come from royalty, so
maybe that trumps all other concern with frigging monarchists (I fully support
anyone who criticizes Disney Princess films for their glorification of
monarchy. Why is there so much damn monarchism in fantasy, anyway? Must fantasy
always glorify the censored past?). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“She’s a mermaid? Well, is she a <i>royal </i>mermaid? All right then, just make sure she doesn’t change
back again like that Vanessa girl you almost married, you have no idea the
angry letters we’ve been getting.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://thisrecording.com/storage/4286365109_5435a910ec_o.png?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1263873295355" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://thisrecording.com/today/tag/disney">http://thisrecording.com/today/tag/disney</a>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maybe Ariel wouldn’t have social problems so much as
physical ones. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Handicap accessibility is unfortunately modern. Ability is
all relative to where you are and what you’re doing. Ariel’s body is just fine
under water (for reasons that defy biology and physics, but whatever. The
audience will accept the impossible but not the improbable and all that), but
she would be handicapped on land. Obviously Ariel isn’t inherently handicapped,
but there’s no such thing – what she wanted was to be on land, and she lacked
the ability to do that in the way she wanted.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Obviously, handicapped people can make whatever decisions
they want about augmentation, but I certainly wouldn’t fault any handicapped
person for wanting it. Wheelchairs are augmentation, too. Even Bath Chairs. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As for cosmetic surgery – Ariel never complains once about
the appearance of her tail. The only time she refers derisively to her fins is:
“flipping your fins, you don’t get too far.” In other words, function. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yes, the transformation had the side effect of altering her
physical appearance. Indeed, people given prosthetic limbs do look different
afterwards, but I doubt that’s what they were after. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="333" src="http://onceuponatimeinscience.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/mermaid1.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">onceuponatimeinscience.wordpress.com</span>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yes, Ariel loved the look of her new feet afterward. And
after people get sired, they always make fang faces at the mirror a few times
(fuck, I still do that), but I’m pretty sure that’s just a perk. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hah – Ariel, if anything’s slowing you down, it’s your hair.
Even stubble creates drag – swimmers shave, or wear bathing caps. So Ariel, if
you’re doing anything cosmetic, get a shave. Or wear a bathing cap all the
time. See: function. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
C’mon, 1980s – even a mermaid has to have big hair? Well,
Eric does too, so why not? <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="212" src="http://colossalvitality.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/prince-eric.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="320" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just like all 1800s princes.<br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">colossalvitality.wordpress.com. </span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/be/Prince_Albert-1842.jpg/220px-Prince_Albert-1842.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Prince Albert<br />
en.wikipedia.org.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Saying Ariel got cosmetic surgery to look hot for a man
implies the guy wanted her to, and wasn’t attracted to her before, or was more
attracted after. Ariel certainly wasn’t self-conscious about her tail so much
as physically limited by it, so what about Eric?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Is there any evidence that Eric didn’t find Ariel attractive
as a mermaid? He saw her phase into mer-form again, and when Ursula captures
her, he immediately follows them: ‘Grim I lost her once; I’m not going to lose
her again,’ and risks his own life to help Ariel defeat Ursula. That implies
that he does think Ariel is the same woman he fell in love with, even now that
he knows she’s a mermaid. His feelings for her seemed unchanged by the
revelation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He takes the whole ‘undersea world of merfolk’ revelation
pretty well, too. I wish half the people in our community reacted half that
well. There’s a reason we have so many therapists on staff. </div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="300" src="http://www.availableimages.com/images/pictures/1984/splash/aph_30.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.availableimages.com/celebs/h/daryl-hannah/pictures-splash_pph_30.html">http://www.availableimages.com/celebs/h/daryl-hannah/pictures-splash_pph_30.html</a>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Contrast that with the way Alan Bauer reacted in <i>Splash</i>: he finds out his long-term
girlfriend <st1:city w:st="on">Madison</st1:city>
is a mermaid, and broods about having fallen in love with something like that. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s a romantic comedy trope to complain about your love
interest’s character – just before the redeeming third act to make way for the
happy ending. In this case, <st1:city w:st="on">Madison</st1:city>’s
flaw is that she’s a member of a species other than human. A quote from Alan
Bauer: “I don’t expect love to be perfect, but it should at least be human.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhreTT7NE7d9_JzLY1oQ5MaT2uZEkkroKJZC7MYXvYq-NVQDkA5BX-OB-cgiKzSoKB5JmMyeudNq9Yv16BrZblxkfS1Bn9ZNcYuo_P0Q6LkANqtiXQJ6IyPQDhPrCLSPy0iwdBfIrcFuGUP/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">alittlesprite.blogspot.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Geez – this is how much he freaks out over someone as benign
as a mermaid. I guess if it were one of my people, he’d be breaking out the
garlic and stakes. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Oh, and Alan actually refers to her as a fish. Awesome. It’s
okay to be shocked, Alan. But blatant racism is another thing, especially when
it’s the 1980s. Where’s your historical apologist excuse?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’d say Eric was just the guy the film needed to get Triton
to re-consider his racist rage-ahol (all the more impressive for an 1850s
aristocrat). When Triton overcame his racism, it felt organic. With Alan, it
seems to have happened because the plot said so and John Candy agreed.
Redemption is great, but I still prefer the guy who wasn’t a racist in the
first place, especially in the context of choosing a frigging life-altering
political and marital partnership. And did Alan overcome his racism, anyway? Or
did he just decide to make <st1:city w:st="on">Madison</st1:city>
an exception? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUk13H7guSSx3TkoL6PSaqddZvDL_NeJQ8byR0kR7RprQbKelbp7pupwAKAUM3Q1D1GE-IEGXDDD_R7Udf3tkAWSvVkk0g4xrT9TRSg0lQ1JbMKCtPv8zDQwjfA58MhcuiujAwEQTS5qk/s1600/splash.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">thatchbo.blogspot.com</span>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(Racist or species-ist, whichever term fits; they’re morally
equivalent, and I don’t label different groups of people different species
without proof that they’re incapable of producing viable offspring. I’ve spent
the last few decades explaining to people that vampires and humans are the same
species – vampires can’t breed with anyone, let alone each other. ‘Species’
doesn’t mean ‘so different you’re not one of us.’) </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Is there any evidence that Ariel turned human for Eric, and
not for herself? Even if being with him was motivating her, wasn’t she still
ultimately doing it for herself? And again, what the hell does it have to do
with sex, instead of, say, the travails of long-distance relationships?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eric and Ariel don’t live in different cities so much as
different habitats. Forget sex, Ariel and Eric can’t do anything together! He
can come visit her on board ship in between running his kingdom and hanging out
with his sailor buddies, but she can’t see him. It would make her a pretty
passive player in this relationship, anyway. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="300" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrb1Hr4vlZEl3pZ4Ps6eBq6RQBEcZp5cEGmNBYZC3nSuPDFiCKzQxHmHcEFa4PlwUnKYasBBAC8YrD5yzZk6SWCSr7CY6dBFAb-9SMU9BqklVC-SwEYZhi7CCCECc7YAMpcB7sBli9xInH/s400/littlemermaidcastle.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">mommymouseketeer.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eric can’t visit her underwater and see Atlantica, despite
being a skilled mariner who would probably want to see a cool undersea world.
Sure, he successfully swam to the bottom of the ocean in that scene where he
harpooned Ursula, and managed not to have his organs crushed by the pressure.
He’d still need to come up for air repeatedly, though, and how long could he
keep that up (the one rule most writers seem to remember about the physical
consequences of humans and water is that humans can’t breathe underwater)? And
I know Ariel and her people have awesome ‘talk underwater’ superpowers (I want
those), but does Eric?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ariel certainly couldn’t function as a queen consort from
the sea, and Eric would be expected to find another, despite being in love with
Ariel. Yeah, I hate monarchy too, but that’s what we’re stuck with here. It’d
be hard to have even an unconsummated relationship with her being all
sea-bound. So even of you ignore the overwhelming evidence that Ariel wanted to
be human anyway, and make it all about her relationship with Eric – it’s still
about a relationship, not just about sex. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And yes, I’ve heard people say that being a mermaid as a
metaphor for sexual immaturity. Yes, just like werewolves are a metaphor for
menstruation – hey, they have a ‘time of the month’ too. And phasing into a
ravening monster is kinda like PMS, right? With my people, geez – vampires have
been used as a metaphor for so many things I just exude symbolism. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://media.comicvine.com/uploads/10/108927/2264698-2264681-beastlywolf.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">comicvine.com</span>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So let me get this straight: Ariel is nonsexual because of
her lack of an obvious vagina. Well, we don’t know her <i>that </i>well. Maybe merfolk have internal genitals like dolphins with
urogenital openings way down the backs of their tails (merfolk tails look like
dolphin tails with scales, anyway) but come on! That’s not where they’re
supposed to be – they only count if they’re at the crotch. And dolphins
definitely don’t get pleasure from sex; only humans get sexual pleasure. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="300" src="http://www.realclearscience.com/blog/167644_10150146900274196_639019195_8059092_3749947_n.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">realclearscience.com</span>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Triton initially thinks that she’s crushing on a merman –
merfolk sexual behaviors seem to be similar to human ones. Triton doesn’t freak
out about Ariel dating a merman; in fact, he was giggly about it, and wondering
whom the lucky merman was. Ariel was already sexually mature for merfolk.
Saying that she needed a human vagina for sex – what, merfolk sex doesn’t
count?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hell, I actually thought it was funny thinking that Triton
immediately assumes Ariel’s crushing on a merman instead of a human – c’mon,
Triton, she doesn’t swing that way, but thanks for assuming she does.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hey, it’s not that much of a stretch, intentional or
otherwise. In 1980s film, alternative sexuality wasn’t discussed so much as
mocked derisively, even though the gay rights movement was well underway, and
the Civil Rights Movement was winning. In 1989, Loving v. <st1:state w:st="on">Virginia</st1:state> was more than two decades old, and
by 1990, there were 964,000 interracial couples compared to 310,000 in 1970. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wish it didn’t have to take so long every time. Critics
today give stories about interspecies love a lot of flak, and it isn’t even a
political issue yet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="272" src="http://www.chilloutpoint.com/images/2009/09/human-and-robots-visions-of-the-future/human-vs-robot-09.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px;">chilloutpoint.com</span>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When and if we achieve sapient AI, virtual reality people, animal
uplift, make first contact with aliens, the Masquerade finally ends, the
bioengineering of humanity to the point of speciation, or all of the above – I
expect I’ll have to listen to the same arguments about same-sex marriage and
relationships with a new name and a cheap tuxedo (it’s unnatural, your love
isn’t as good as ours, you’re so icky, I’m actually secretly attracted to or
sympathetic to ‘x’ but won’t dare reveal it for fear of my reactionary social
group so I’ll cover it with unwarranted hostility, etc.) </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Vampire society is ahead of the curve: human/vampire sexual
relationships are the norm (friends-with-benefits counts). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Really, Xenophobes of the Future should be happy about
Ariel/Eric – they’re the same species by the end of the movie. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-74930049538295990002012-07-19T20:10:00.000-07:002013-04-13T18:51:55.452-07:00President Vampire Hunter: Possibilities (Part Two)<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="265" id="il_fi" src="http://www.washingtonpost.com/rf/image_606w/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2011/02/23/Local/Images/PHO-11Feb23-293066.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">washingtonpost.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span><br />
<br />
Seth Grahame-Smith decided Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter
needed a framing story. And the framing story is about ALVH, the story. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So many possibilities:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Framing Story<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>None<o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Why the fuck-hell do you need a framing story for this?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Throughout, different nineteenth-century activists and/or or modern
historians read this journal in real time</u>: </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maybe ALVH the main story is a frightening post-Civil War
discovery – and by frightening, I mean inflammatory, because it was after the
Civil War. The Confederate interprets it as Union propaganda (understandable,
given Jefferson Davis’s moustache-twirling Captain Planet Snidely Whiplash villain
portrayal), the abolitionist interprets it as anti-Lincoln (or pro-Lincoln) propaganda
of the most absurd sort, and the Frederick-Douglass-style former slave debates
both of them. This creates some ambiguity on how we should interpret this 'Lincoln' journal, including its existence and validity.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="300" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG2GjyfCkgTGbJmj0xs3gy5acdIkGM_ZK35dTsst2_LMbykaXS661QyM2RuvzVRYeY9Tf1Jpo12WNaiiG8E7lpNOOo_cdtF9UTym8ecpPxJkUeiUPv-BV-95Qp2sIJBXHv1va3Wp5l_sxp/s400/lincolnescape.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">scoobydoomansion.blogspot.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span><br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wonder how the historians would find the journal. Maybe Henry
(Abraham Lincoln’s in-universe Vampire Obi-Wan Kenobi. Yes) would give it to
them. That’d be funny – I bet it would go like this:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I hear you are fascinated by tales of the Civil War.”
(Seriously, that’s the way he talks. What I like to call Overly Formal
Anachro-speak). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Well, I am a Civil War historian, sir. Would you like to
schedule an appointment, because it’s really late, and I need to head home.
Also, it would be best if we met at my office, and not in a dark alley.” (Henry, successful shadiness requires subtlety). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maybe the historians debate the journal’s validity and
politics, but with the perspective we have today. They talk about the
multi-million dollar industry that Lincoln has become, that he’s one of those
historical figures that’s almost become as much a fictionalized,
sensationalized part of our pop culture as Vampires themselves. Hell, Lincoln
has almost as many impersonators as Elvis. He’s already an undead celebrity. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="225" id="il_fi" src="http://www.dailyyonder.com/files/u2/abes-many-in-grass-540.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">dailyyonder.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A Confederate-sympathizing historian and a Lincoln fan-boy
debate the level of hero worship that surrounds him. Lincoln’s life is given a
Christian spin in pop culture – the liberator martyred after saving the Union
and freeing the slaves (with over a million total deaths, of course, including civilians) – which oddly
compliments the traditional notion of a valiant hunter destroying the evil
Vampire hell-demons (with a to-be-determined number of deaths). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maybe the journal is determined to be real, maybe not. Maybe
Vampires are recognized as real in this present – hell, one of the historians
could be Vampiric. The possibilities go on and on. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Historians’ discussions illuminate their own personalities
and provide meta-commentary on the place of a book like ALVH in pop culture. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://www.unwinnable.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Lincoln-and-Washington-in-Heaven.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="327" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">unwinnable.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Henry is telling the framing story, and offering his own
retrospective on the event</u>.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You know, because he was actually there. And shaped the
events. And could actually do something about them now, like finish what
Lincoln started and end the cycle of death and destruction his people have
wrought. And he’s had centuries to reflect upon it, and knows what the fuck
he’s talking about. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What actually happened</u>:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s about Seth Grahame Smith writing the book! Yes, he
wrote himself into the story. Who
is he, in-universe? A random guy Henry met at a general store that can’t
influence the events at all and knows absolutely nothing about them. Perfect!
It adds so much. </div>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-38687718381671551432012-07-14T01:57:00.000-07:002013-04-13T18:46:08.926-07:00I Want to Be Forever Knight<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="300" id="il_fi" src="http://carling2u.co.uk/files/kp/carnival.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">carling2u.co.uk</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You know what – I like the night. Even when they find a
treatment and I take back the daytime, I’ll still be nocturnal. I like it that
way – I am biologically and culturally nocturnal. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Any sunlight treatment would eliminate the huge risk
vampires run every time we’re away from a nice windowless shelter – which is
great, because that’s the real problem. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On a smaller, universal scale with nocturnal living, you
have the limited job opportunities, the inconvenient hours for anything worth
doing (Museums, galleries, libraries – they almost always close at five) and
the lack of bargain matinees.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No bargain matinees. Hey, that was a big deal before Netflix
and the wonders of the Web. Ah, the wonders of the Web, where there are no
hours, either for jobs or for entertainment. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’d still be working the night shift, sun treatment or not. I
don’t miss the sunshine. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="360" id="il_fi" src="http://i.ytimg.com/vi/6TvOQZPa250/0.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="480" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">article.wn.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Part of this might be generational. I spent my early
childhood on a frontier farm. Sunlight dictated our schedules in the other
direction.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sunshine meant work. On a good day, I’d be doing the
housework indoors in my honored capacity as ‘eldest child.’ More likely, we’d
all be doing the hard labor outdoors. And then fiddle music later, hopefully
distracting us from the fact that we had no air conditioning, no electric fans
or even electricity, no sunscreen, and not even a hat with a brim. And we
didn’t even know it. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A decade later,
I was in the city working inside all day, as one of the first generations to do
that. Another decade, and I was with the vampire community, slowly adjusting to
their schedule. Actually being in the sunshine, instead of seeing it on TV, is
a distant memory from another world. Almost as much as the frontier. I’m a city
slicker now – I can’t go back. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="192" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-eCzfA_kk9Q1N9za9doo3E9eKnxH7XNztqa25kSKFVVh_r7ABDuYG97ZQsB3efAuK1_xc1EYhM5lRSTGNUPMTHJF9qB08GLbfunPvDWc9pm03qrGtXI-Wsv6YY-VG50A_gFaeste0uw7G/s400/sophie+day+room.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">truebie.blogspot.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When Sophie-Anne Leclerq had her little artificial beach
party on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">True Blood</i>, it made her even
more alien to me. How can she miss the sun after 500 frigging years? I’m 142. I
did at first. Now? It’s like that isn’t even the way the world looks anymore. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I feel like I live in a different climate than everyone else
I know, where everything’s usually several degrees cooler, it’s always dark,
and the wildlife is a lot more like me. Sure, I’ll talk to them about their
weather, but I don’t want to move there. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Don’t tell that to Nick Knight, the protagonist of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Forever Knight</i>. He wants to move there
for life, regardless of the cost. Which is death. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="320" id="il_fi" src="http://www.yuchtar.com/Nick.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="256" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">(God, it's hard to find a picture of Nick where he looks normal. Stop snarling at me, Nick.)<br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822;">yuchtar.com</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Forever Knight</i>.
Love the title. You could interpret that four different ways: Nick’s last name
is Knight, and he’s immortal. He’s also a Vampire with a traditional sun
problem, and thus has a ‘forever night.’ Also, he was an actual knight in
medieval France, so he’s a knight made immortal. And most importantly, now he’s
a knight-in-shining-armor cop who happens to be immortal, with all that that
implies. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Too bad it’s a misnomer.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Nick doesn’t want to help people forever, because he doesn’t
want to live forever. His main goal throughout the series is to become mortal
again. He tries that even if it consequentially puts humans in danger, because
his domineering sire LaCroix won’t stop hounding him and anyone in his way.
Atonement is a secondary goal, and Nick jumps at every opportunity to be human
even if that would mean cutting short his life and time to help people.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="253" id="il_fi" src="http://home.sprynet.com/~looscann/gwdnbsl.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="320" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">home.sprynet.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Nick – you spent nearly 700 years killing people. You can’t
make up for that. You’ve gone 100 years without killing anyone – you’re not a
threat anymore. All you can do is help people now. You can save people who
wouldn’t be saved by a conventional police officer – and that’s more or less
the organizing principle behind this series, so you should have realized this
by now. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You’re a philanthropist who’s given millions of your
ill-gotten gain to help the needy with your De Brabant foundation – awesome.
One of the things I’ve liked best about the show is its emphasis on real-world
good deeds. Nick doesn’t do good works by saving people from a never-ending
supply of demons like Angel – he does it the sort of bureaucratic, down-to-earth
way that makes society function. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
During the Civil War, Nick was working as a medic for the
Union Army (despite not completely giving up killing). During the Civil War
Angel was – uh, still evil, but I guess 150 years later is when he’d be running
his unlicensed PI service that repeatedly butted heads with the actual police
force. Which was, of course, useless in the fight against demons despite
overwhelming evidence of the existence of demonic activity. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="300" id="il_fi" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-XvnzbID2BNY/SrYJEx2YUHI/AAAAAAAAGrI/y_bhRDEVKTo/conviction.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">en.bestpicturesof.com. </span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Angel the Serie</i>s
makes up for it with the gray Wolfram and Hart plot arc, where the Fang Gang
tries reforming an evil law firm. And Angel signs away his opportunity to be
human, because it meant fulfilling his scheme and saving the world. Nick? Not
so much. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He has all the time in the world to use his gifts for the
good of the society he’s supposedly trying to repay. And he’s throwing it all
away to feel redeemed, without actually being redeemed. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Dying for your own sins, which is Christian in kind of a self-absorbed
way, is easier and more selfish than the hard work, difficult decisions, and
moral ambiguity that constitutes redemption through good works. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Becoming human would be less moral, Nick. You may feel like
you’d be on the side of good, because your understanding of metaphysics is
stuck in the Middle Ages. But all the people you could have helped will still
be dead. And then you’ll be dead. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="290" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaw3GpEiLw0QjKogpGcxFSRx5-n8SDug9TlBaG1RuOovpXIiyXMWQzjinTWACqixY840ohm3_uqVJA7FRSe6J0cplRaEAYmSPIINB8HPaEXAid6TnIbbTBnR6KnH_euV1aGkoNB9l9Yik/s400/Sunrise.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">mybeutifulroses.blogspot.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But I have to say; the absolute worst is when I have to
listen to Nick frame his desire to be human as the desire to see a sunrise. The
theme narration says it all: ‘emerge from his world of darkness, from his
endless forever knight.’ Yes – Classic Vampire Angst in a nutshell: seasonal
affective disorder. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Louis had that same thing in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Interview</i>. I kinda liked that scene, I guess – at least Louis was
getting enthusiastic about new technology. Hah: some of our elders flinched the
first time they saw a sunrise film. I was mostly just excited about the film
itself. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Films were exciting for just being films back in the
Progressive Era. It was just so cool that they could do that with pictures.
Seeing the sunrise itself on film was like looking at old tintypes: ‘Oh yeah. I
forgot about this.’ Commemorating the past, not looking toward the future. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Nick - it’s the early 1990s. Watch a video if you want a
sunrise. You can fast-forward through it, too – and you have color, not like us
poor slobs a few decades before. YouTube is less than two decades away – you
can get all the sunrises you want, all over the world. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wait a little while longer, and we’ll have Augmented Reality
technology that can simulates the sunrise so it’ll look more real than the real
thing. Constant simulated sunrises that never stop, and all you may need is a
high-bandwidth Internet connection and decent AR glasses. ‘Sun’ = ‘human?’
Wouldn’t that make you superlatively human?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="319" id="il_fi" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b1/Sunrise_masada.ogg/mid-Sunrise_masada.ogg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">simple.wikipedia.org</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Why are you pining for what you lost in 1228, when you have
the whole twentieth century at your disposal, and the 21<sup>st</sup> is right
around the corner?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I know that sunlight is a symbol, and the sun represents
‘humanity’ for Nick. Well, Nick – think of it this way. Our technology will
allow you to see the sun, meaning technology has created a bridge over which
you can rejoin the human race. We’ve advanced to the point where we can all be
‘human’ together. If that’s what you want, and you don’t know how to feel good
about yourself in any other way. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The sunrise is great: if people like the sun, awesome. We
all have our preferences. And Nick, I’m sure you’d start tearing up if you saw
the sunrise again. You know something that made me cry? Seeing a picture of my
planet from space. </div>
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<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="319" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgptVdxvbnxMSJFWlF36TLUB6X_FKB5qhDcEXUkqq7o7hAb0j5SE6IdZp2yjmAlVCEnpymc-KNxEARK1PcmuAxJNttxK39YwftRxOWMzwLGNie19xgec0rpwJA2_TDhPIxRMVQgkbQIiD8/s400/cool-space-picture-5.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">collthings.co.uk</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1px;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That Big Blue Marble photo from the Apollo 17 mission? It’s
one of the most published photographs now, and barely even raises an eyebrow.
But I saw it and I couldn’t stop thinking: that’s the earth. That’s us –
everything that’s ever happened in human history – right there. Even the Lunar
Orbiter 1 photo from 1966 was exciting – we saw this little scrap of the Earth,
but it was still Earth. </div>
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<br /></div>
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Now you can watch videos on YouTube that pan out from our
planet through the universe. </div>
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<br /></div>
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Here’s an artist’s rendering of the Earth from the 1400s: </div>
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<br /></div>
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</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/John_Gower_world_Vox_Clamantis_detail.jpg" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: none; background-origin: initial; color: #0645ad; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="File:John Gower world Vox Clamantis detail.jpg" height="358" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/John_Gower_world_Vox_Clamantis_detail.jpg" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; vertical-align: middle;" width="358" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">en.wikipedia.org</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"></span><br />
<br /></div>
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It makes me cry for a different reason.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The amount of scientific and social progress that has
occurred in my lifetime boggles the mind. It’s genuinely humbling to look back,
and think where we were in the 1870s, and where we are now. And I got the
opportunity to be a part of it, to whatever extent I could.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Nick, I don’t know why you’d genuinely give up everything
for the sake of moral symbolism. </div>
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<br /></div>
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I haven’t led a blameless life either, Nick, and I’ve done a
lot that I’m not proud of. But I don’t regret still being here for a moment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And, in the words of Daria, ‘there’s nothing like seeing the
sunrise, except seeing the sun set in reverse. Get a VCR. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Or better yet, a spacesuit. </div>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-40319389843147149542012-07-08T00:12:00.000-07:002013-04-13T18:52:34.597-07:00President Vampire Hunter: Possibilities<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Introduction:</div>
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<br /></div>
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I like wacky premises. I like it even more when authors take
a theoretically absurd idea and build a quality work around it. Usually, you
can’t lose – you’ll get ‘wacky’ and ‘good,’ or at least ‘wacky.’ Which is still
good. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I would have been delighted to discover that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter</i> was,
contrary to all expectations, an awesome piece of non-claptrap that never made
me want to wretch. In the words of Sideshow Bob, about MacGyver.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_16cBXvWQcjU/SwcnDwteutI/AAAAAAAAAO0/6TkkQ8JjOxQ/s200/sidesho_bob_2.gif" style="-webkit-user-select: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="185" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">tonibroxton.blogspot.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.macgyveronline.com/control/macgyver12.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://www.macgyveronline.com/control/macgyver12.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none;" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">http://www.macgyveronline.com/control/macgyver12.jpg. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
God damn it, how do you take a book with a US president
fighting Vampires and make it so damn dull? How did it fail at wackiness,
goodness, or wacky goodness?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For starters:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p> Part One</o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">President</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">1. <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">Teddy Roosevelt</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">2.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"> Andrew Jackson</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">3. <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">The Founding Fathers, as part of a Dracula-style
Vampire hunting team.</span></b></div>
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</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
What actually happened: Abraham
Lincoln</div>
<!--EndFragment-->Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-36685437832274190272012-05-13T23:00:00.003-07:002013-04-13T18:41:42.846-07:00Titanic: Life Story<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
There are countless stories about immortals, Vampires, and long-lived
fantasy races. How many stories are there about human centenarians?<br />
<br />
<br />
<img height="240" src="http://www.silverwhistle.co.uk/fanfic/ficpics/ElvenWallpaper.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none;" width="320" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
http://www.silverwhistle.co.uk/fanfic/ficpics/ElvenWallpaper.jpg.<br />
<br />
Really, how many honest-to-gosh, non-supernatural
centenarian humans are there in fiction? You’d think Hollywood would’ve gotten
the memo about humans living longer. No one’s interested in stories about
centenarians? Or is that just what Hollywood thinks?</div>
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<br /></div>
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I wonder. I get people asking me questions about the 1950s
through the 1970s. And not just vampire questions, either. And I’m just sitting
here wondering if they ask their grandmothers or, well, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">mothers</i> the same questions. Sometimes, yeah – they’ll even relay
their grandmother’s stories to me, which is great. Other times, well, it’s hard
not to be cynical. </div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #47842a; font-family: Arial; font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 17px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></span></span></div>
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How often are older characters ever protagonists? When you
do see centenarians in fiction, they’re usually played for laughs – as are most
older characters, even if they’re under sixty and therefore barely twice the
age of much of the audience. Look at Grandpa swear, because older people don’t
do that. Hilarious! Look at Grandma have a sex drive, because older people can’t have
that. Hilarious the second! Look at Gramps forget things and walk slowly, because memory problems and
the systematic loss of your mental and physical faculties is really goddamn
fucking Hilarious, isn’t it my fellow young person?<br />
<br />
Okay, occasionally they mix it up and give us a psychotically evil old person like Mr. Burns, but that's not what I call progress. If they're not giving us Mr. Burns, it's Grandpa Simpson.<br />
<br />
<i>The Simpsons</i> sometimes tries to make up for it with a few sympathetic nods to the plight of American old folks and some Lisa Speeches. I'm talking Golden Years <i>Simpsons</i>, here, too. Guys, that doesn't work if you're laughing at Grandpa, too, and you treat him as 'Generic Old-Shaped Old Person Representing all Old People.' </div>
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<br /></div>
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Even <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic </i>does
that a bit. In an early scene with 101-year-old Rose, she forgets a social
encounter that happened a few minutes ago - which, of course, her granddaughter
condescendingly reminds her of. And earlier, before Brock Lovett talks to her,
he gets reminded to: ‘speak up; she’s kinda old.’<br />
<br />
<img height="177" src="http://www.cornel1801.com/1/t/TITANIC/1-pictures-quotes/The-woman-in-the-picture-is-me.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none;" width="400" /><br />
<a href="http://www.cornel1801.com/">http://www.cornel1801.com/</a>.</div>
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Sigh. If she needs you to speak up, she’ll tell you. Don’t
start by barking at her – she’ll know what it means. And Brock urges her to
tell the story – the movie, basically – by saying ‘anything you can remember,
anything at all.’</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She snarks back: ‘Do you want to hear this or not, Mr. Lovett?’ (Ha - I'd have been tempted to say: 'well, I was on the Titanic - and it sank! True story.')</div>
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<br /></div>
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And then – fast forward to the end of the film, when all the
characters are hanging on Rose’s every word, after she’s told this story at the
level of detail any historian would weep for.</div>
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<br /></div>
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They hear about Rose the Younger, the bold, witty, Progressive-era
girl who wanted more out of life, and they start seeing her again in the
present. And we the audience see her too. They give Rose a sense of humor and a
wealth of wisdom and depth that older characters should have, and she becomes a
person with a rich and interesting life story instead of the ‘very old goddamn
liar’ they reduced her to at the start of the film. </div>
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<br /></div>
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I’ve been there. God, I’ve been there. For my people,
talking about our history is like Pinocchio syndrome: we become real. It makes
us real, and it makes history real.
</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I love that. And I love how the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic</i> characters go from seeing the sinking of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic</i> as nothing but an excuse for
collectibles and trivia questions to seeing it as a real event affecting real
people. (God, especially Brock, who calls Rose his 'new best friend' after he infers that she must have the Heart of the Ocean if she really was on the Titanic. That's right, Brock: beg the disaster survivor for the valuables she secured the night she watched thousands of people die. 'You lived through a hurricane? Did you bring me some loot?' At least he got better.)<br />
<br />
I love the way the film almost effortlessly conveys that this is what
history was – historical people were not aliens with incomprehensible
motivations, and had romance and sex and drives and ambitions that steered them
right or wrong, in this case literally. It’s so great to hear that, in an era
of anti-presentism and ‘historical relativism’ – which usually translates to
‘history is really hard to understand, so we give up.’ </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My people are hyper-aware of our place in history. It’s a
huge part of our culture. And we were partly founded by Enlightenment people
from circles that were just as hyper-aware of the past and the future. But most
people you meet just aren’t, whatever time period they’re from. They live for
today, and that’s where they stay. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Rose and Gloria Stewart single-handedly elevate <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic</i> from just another disaster movie
with a big ego, an ungodly budget, and special effects that'll look impressive for about ten years, and will be unintentionally comedic in forty. Hell, it's one of the only disaster films that actually shows one of the survivors years later and gives any thought to the long-term. At least for a little while, it stops
being just another film exploiting an historical catastrophe and becomes an
historical commentary.<br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #47842a; font-family: Arial; font-size: 17px;"><img alt="Victor Garbor actor" border="0" height="186" src="http://www.chasingthefrog.com/reelfaces/titanic/vctgar.jpg" width="130" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Times; font-size: small;"><img alt="Thomas Andrews shipbuilder" border="0" height="186" src="http://www.chasingthefrog.com/reelfaces/titanic/thmand.jpg" width="130" /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="color: #47842a; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13pt;">chasingthefrog.com<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It could have done a better job at being that. Mr. Andrews
and the Unsinkable Molly Brown, played by the excellent Victor Garber and Kathy
Bates, should have been co-protagonists if they really wanted to make the film
a first-rate historical drama. But as a fictional account of fictional people’s
historical love lives in interesting times, it succeeds much better than most,
and better than I ever would have anticipated.<br />
<br />
<img alt="Kathy Bates Molly Brown" border="0" height="186" src="http://www.chasingthefrog.com/reelfaces/titanic/kthybts.jpg" width="130" /><img alt="Unsinkable Molly Brown" border="0" height="186" src="http://www.chasingthefrog.com/reelfaces/titanic/mollbrn.jpg" width="130" /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
chasingthefrog.com.<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I love Gloria Stewart’s quote: “When I graduated from Santa
Monica High in 1927, I was voted the girl most likely to succeed; I didn’t
realize it would take so long.” I hear you, Gloria. I love that she was the
only <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic </i>cast member who was
alive when it happened, and lived to be 100-years-old herself (RIP). Hollywood
society even gave her respect and admiration in the only way it knows how: she
got nominated for an Oscar and she was voted into People magazine’s ’50 Most
Beautiful People in the world’ list in 1998. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWkGGrGhlflTATa5ufdX_ojqB065rk0-pICpxr6v0TOYZLj-RmgnWXKiisr-7d7ich6CWOqUDPR_P7_H6LjFZBgUvocgPkXhXgZ_WUs0uCnCUR6DKTQQXnEOadjIJm_8r782zwpMxGiEw/s1600/GloriaStuart3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" border="0" height="200" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374505400915757714" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWkGGrGhlflTATa5ufdX_ojqB065rk0-pICpxr6v0TOYZLj-RmgnWXKiisr-7d7ich6CWOqUDPR_P7_H6LjFZBgUvocgPkXhXgZ_WUs0uCnCUR6DKTQQXnEOadjIJm_8r782zwpMxGiEw/s200/GloriaStuart3.jpg" style="display: block; height: 250px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center; width: 228px;" width="182" /></a>In an industry that treats people like fashion trends, casts
out any forty-plus woman who isn’t Meryl Streep, and has had more influence on
the modern youth obsession than air-brushing, Gloria Stewart’s story is a
breath of fresh air. Her biography is pretty damn interesting, too.<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">flapperdays.blogspot.com. </span><br />
<br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;">She helped found the Screen Actors Guild and, in 1936, the
Hollywood Anti-Nazi League. After getting stage roles in New York, she opened a
successful art furniture shop, got some of her oil paintings into the permanent
collection at the Los Angeles County Museum, then got some of her
professional-grade bonsai trees in the Huntington Library Japanese Garden permanent
collection – and this was all after re-marrying and while raising a daughter.
Gloria returned to acting in her sixties – when most women’s careers are long
over – and got to be the oldest person ever nominated for an Academy Award at
age 88. Meanwhile, she was writing fine art printing books, one of which is in
the permanent collection at the J. Paul Getty Museum. She was still acting at
the age of 94, and made her last appearance in film at age 100.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wish she had gotten to see the Titanic Anniversary.<br />
<br />
allvoices.com</div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://img3.allvoices.com/thumbs/image/609/480/64292299-gloria-stuart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Gloria Stuart" border="0" height="248" src="http://img3.allvoices.com/thumbs/image/609/480/64292299-gloria-stuart.jpg" title="Gloria Stuart" width="320" /></a></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic</i>, for all
its flaws, gave us a great centenarian character and treated her, and the
historical event it was depicting, with at least a modicum of respect.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One great thing about historical relativism is that it works
just as well on the present and recent past – you can use it on 1897 just as
easily as 1997. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic</i> was made in a
time period that’ll be remembered for (among other things) its ageism. And I
might have to defend non-ageist 1990s people the same way I defend liberal
1912 people from generalizations like ‘those were the times,’ while
acknowledging that we have made progress and the culture really has changed.
After enough time has gone by, all citizens represent their eras, and all
fiction becomes historical.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For all these reasons and more, I declare <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Titanic</i> the movie ‘fair for its day,’
and can’t wait to look back at it in relief for how far we’ve come. <br />
<br />
http://i.usatoday.net/. </div>
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</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<img height="400" src="http://i.usatoday.net/communitymanager/_photos/lifeline-live/2010/07/06/gloriastuartx-large.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none;" width="305" /></div>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-6254954068639335512012-04-11T20:14:00.000-07:002013-04-13T18:39:26.169-07:00Friendly Woods Vampire<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="125" src="http://wigenweb.org/racine/photos/tradingpost.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="200" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">wigenweb.org. </span></td></tr>
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My biggest problem with Louis is
the same problem I have with all Vampires who fail at ethical vampirism: why
don’t you just live in the woods? You can’t resist human blood long enough to
be in the same room with someone? You have no business living among humans,
then, and you are putting countless lives at risk just to try to test your own
goddamn willpower. </div>
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The woods are full of game, guy,
and you can live off animal blood. This was the 1790s in New Orleans; you
didn’t even have the problems with hunting regulations we do today, and the fur
traders hadn’t yet run animal populations into the ground. You – woods, now! Or
the mountains, or some other uninhabited region – it’s 1791, and there’s lots
of it. </div>
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Yeah, sunlight problem: get some of
your slaves to build you a woods hut, within a one-night’s journey. Yeah, yeah,
the killing is symptomatic of the loss of humanity inherent in the Vampirism
and all that. How do you know which direction the correlation or causation runs
(do you even know which it is)? Has anybody ever even tried ‘separation as
redemption’? Test it: if I’m wrong, the test results would reflect it, and at
least you know that you tried. </div>
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Louis still had enough ‘humanity’
(whatever the fuck hell that means) to try the animal blood route for a little
while, and avoid some murder – he could have made the escape then. Maybe ‘loss
of humanity’ (there’s that word again) is a gradual process. Maybe it’s like a
progressive illness: stop it at the right time, and you avoid the worst of the
symptoms, or even make a full recovery. Just test the damn thing: this was
after the Scientific Revolution, and they had the scientific method.</div>
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If you’re in the woods sucking down
animals, you might be able to retrain your body to rely on them. Then you could
return to civilization. Say you end up killing an explorer or a traveler –
that’s terrible, yes, but compare that death against all the people you would
have killed had you stayed in the city for some damned reason. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">http://www.twilighthooked.com. </td></tr>
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Yes, the woods suck. I’m a former
frontier girl; you don’t have to tell me that. Bring books. And candles. Yes,
Lestat would harass you because he has nothing better to do. And he would
continue slaughtering innocent people also, apparently, because he has nothing
better to do. How about getting a nice cage for him in your woods hut, so
you’ll have company? </div>
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Really, he’ll have to talk to you
eventually, no matter how much he hates you for imprisoning him and ruining his
life and stopping his serial genocide. People go crazy in solitary confinement,
so I’ll bet you’ll have a better relationship than ever as you both try to stave
off desperate, crushing loneliness. And you guys don’t seem to really talk to
or interact with anyone else anyway (killing doesn’t count), so would this even
be that much of a break from your routine?</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">http://www.finalgirlproject.com.</td></tr>
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So, you’ll be able to test whether
isolation from humans improves your self-control. With favorable results, maybe
eventually you could find someone new to sire yourself, someone you can train
in the whole non-murder way of life. Or maybe you can turn Lestat around.</div>
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It’s the Enlightenment: sentence
him to hours of reading philosopher tracts. It’s a start. Jeremy Bentham would
be best, but you could always go with Rousseau. If you can get your hands on them. Not Hobbes, though. Never Hobbes. If Lestat can’t read them, which
I suspect, then read them at him – long-term prisoners will eventually listen
to anything to stave off another few hours of staring at blank walls. If
nothing else, at least you’ll benignly torture him.</div>
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Hey, compare that plan to the one that failed, which as far
as I could see was: eat up your finite supply of livestock and then, um – eat
Lestat? <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">therottingzombie.blogspot.com</span></td></tr>
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You’re a slave master: you couldn’t get a
few slaves to bleed into a bucket for you? Lestat’s method of murdering them
really isn’t very sustainable: slaves were expensive, and he was draining your
fortune literally and figuratively (which makes his ‘gold digger sire’ thing
even stupider). How were you going to even keep your plantation up and running
if he keeps killing the slaves? </div>
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Why not just try getting them all
to bleed for you, in another room, and then drink it after they leave? They’re
slaves – asking them to bleed for you is probably the least awful thing you’ve
ever done to them. Maybe they’d be less likely to revolt that way, you know,
compared to when Lestat was killing them. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">reviews-of-movies-i-watched.blogspot.com</td></tr>
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Honestly, the mass consumption
method of vampirism works just as well as economically: getting large numbers
of people to give small amounts of blood/money is a much better recipe for
wealth and health than getting small numbers of people to give large amounts of
blood/money. Ask Bill Gates! <br />
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Yeah, some businesses can get by on
tiny niche markets or a few wealthy and devoted customers (Business jargon: whales. Hey, blue whales have 15,000 pints of blood), but in your case,
your customers are really frigging cash-strapped. Yeah, Lestat will never see
your point, but he’s never run a business before. You could always try locking
him in the attic. </div>
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Or, if you must, just kill him.
That’s a tough threshold to establish, but given that his successful escape
means more deaths, if you can’t efficiently contain him it’s not worth the risk.
</div>
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I’m against the death penalty, and
even in vampire society - which is more or less built on crime - we don’t execute our criminals. We do everything we can
to rehabilitate them. But I don’t deny that these are special circumstances.
Louis really should at least test the containment strategy first, while
preparing himself to do what might be necessary. That’s some fan-fiction I want
to see. </div>
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Lestat is a telephone telepath, or
as I like to say, a ‘telephony’ – but they never really established whether he
could read other Vampires. Even though we meet another telephony that can. I’m
assuming he can’t, otherwise, you’d think Claudia wouldn’t have been able to
kill him the way she did. You
know, right there in the room next to him, while smirking about him going along
with her evil plan, immediately after making up with him, thus giving him the
perfect opportunity to be suspicious of her intentions. I hope Claudia knew about Lestat’s
hypothetical mind reading limitations, for the sake of her reputation as a villain. She already didn't know how good a regenerator he is.<br />
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You’d think that if his
mind-reading was voluntary – which it seemed to be with the planter’s wife – he
would have read her mind at some point during that scene to, you know, confirm
she wasn’t doing exactly what she was doing. Or, I don’t know, maybe read her mind at
some point while she was pissed off at him for the same reasons. Okay, we’ll
give Lestat and Claudia the benefit of the doubt, and say he can’t read
Vampires’ minds. </div>
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<a href="http://www.hotflick.net/flicks/1994_Interview_with_the_Vampire/994ITV_Tom_Cruise_050.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="223" src="http://www.hotflick.net/flicks/1994_Interview_with_the_Vampire/994ITV_Tom_Cruise_050.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none;" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">hotflick.net</span></div>
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I don’t about you, but if feeding
off of dead people could kill me, I probably wouldn’t bite into a stiff,
motionless body without at least checking the pulse, no matter how warm it was. Especially not after
someone who I had threatened moments earlier, who had every reason to take revenge, gave it to me as a ‘peace
offering.' Goddammit, Lestat. </div>
Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-41768918151681196882012-03-06T19:52:00.002-08:002013-04-13T18:43:19.688-07:00Lestat's Evil Overlord List<br />
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Lestat
has become something of a villainous icon for us pop culture types, especially
as a sire. Not an icon for abusive siring – that honor goes to Lucien LaCroix
from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Forever Knight. </i></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://lucienlacroix.com/images/lucien-la-croix-portrait.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Lucien LaCroix, Vampire Master from Forever Knight" border="0" height="320" src="http://lucienlacroix.com/images/lucien-la-croix-portrait.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">lucienlacroix.com<br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: Times; font-size: small; line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; line-height: 15px;"><br /></span></span>(That man spent
nearly eight hundred years making his initiate’s life miserable at the
exclusion of almost all else. Yeah, he needs to get his priorities straight,
but he had a goal, and he succeeded, dammit!)</span></span></td></tr>
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Lestat is more of an icon for
staggeringly irresponsible siring. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="223" src="http://images2.fanpop.com/image/photos/14000000/Interview-with-a-Vampire-interview-with-a-vampire-14084111-600-338.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">http://images2.fanpop.com</td></tr>
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How’s
this for a smart strategy:<br />
<br />
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1.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>Choose your initiate after having observed him
at a distance for what appears to be one occasion.<br />
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2.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>In fact, choose a guy who tries gambling away
his own fortune, gets into fights, and nearly gets himself killed several times
in a matter of hours. Especially if you’re a gold digging sire and looking for
stable financial support. <br />
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3.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>After killing two people in front of him, nearly
killing him (really, I can think of several non-vampiric ways Louis should have died in
the harbor scene, including blood loss, infection, stroke, drowning, injury from the water's surface tension from the fall, hell, all of the above), and breaking and entering into his home while he’s in bed
sick – proposition him! <br />
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4.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>Only tell him the benefits of vampirism, and
none of the costs, and trust that he figured those out in context.<br />
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5.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>Give him one day to think about it. <br />
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6.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>Later that day, give him his last chance to back
out after it’s already too late.<br />
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7.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>Now tell him about the consequences, and give
him very little other useful information except for how to kill Vampires,
especially you. <br />
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8.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>Take him and try systematically and repeatedly
breaking down the psychological and physical barriers that stop people from
killing each other, whether you need to or not.<br />
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9.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span>After he successfully stops killing, mock him,
and make it clear that not only does he have to keep killing, but he also has
to keep doing it with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">you</i>, the guy
who’s responsible for all this in the first place. Offer him absolutely no way
out. Maybe unconvincingly argue he can’t kill you. <br />
<br /></div>
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10.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';"> </span>Act
surprised when he destroys everything he owns the next time he kills someone,
and fail to understand why he did it. <br />
<br /></div>
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11.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';"> </span>The
next time he almost kills someone under very horrific circumstances,
immortalize both the victim and the event so he has a permanent reminder of his
resentment for you, what he is, and what he’s done.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">http://media.tumblr.com. </td></tr>
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12.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';"> </span>Oh,
yeah, make sure the victim has a built-in ticking time bomb reason to resent
you, and raise her to be a bigger monster than you.<br />
<br />
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13.<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';"> </span>Act
very surprised when they both kill you.</div>
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Now, if Lestat was a
six-thousand-year-old evil overlord with hordes of underlings and he behaved
this way, I’d have a problem with it. Near as I can tell, though, he’s a bum
who goes from bad relationship to bad relationship while being a social
parasite and crashing someplace every time the lifestyle nearly kills him. So
it works, and it’s clear that Lestat’s reckless irresponsibility makes perfect
sense for the character. </div>
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Naturally, he’s the character that
a lot of the audience seems to like and identify with, compared to Louis. </div>
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Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-80252897235617370502012-03-06T19:37:00.000-08:002013-04-13T18:47:42.098-07:00Interview with... need I go on?<br />
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(Disclaimer – this is just about the movie. The book series
is sufficiently different that it merits a different write-up.)<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMFvDwQWYo9Z4tppbfhH3RMqHb6d_O3YVrhr4VsGTY6CuK768URjc-tln8YuaHaimjJCBZPjQ_SOX6k6zXRfJ_cYf7Wkxb2M9h7FpFogh93tw5lbytGw0DJboyjQmz0wBkCnvEh1qDwQ36/s1600/interview+3" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMFvDwQWYo9Z4tppbfhH3RMqHb6d_O3YVrhr4VsGTY6CuK768URjc-tln8YuaHaimjJCBZPjQ_SOX6k6zXRfJ_cYf7Wkxb2M9h7FpFogh93tw5lbytGw0DJboyjQmz0wBkCnvEh1qDwQ36/s320/interview+3" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">http://therottingzombie.blogspot.com </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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The Man, the Myth, the Movie</div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Interview
with a Vampire</i> is a Vampire movie, not just an action/romance movie with
Vampires. Really, does <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Underworld</i>
need to be a Vampire/werewolf movie? You could replace the lichens (hey, lichens are composite organisms, too), I mean,
‘Lycans’ and Vampires with any warring faction and barely change the story one
bit. If your leading lady is just going to be shooting people and wearing tight
leather for the whole movie, couldn’t she be almost anybody? If these guys have
been doing the same thing for a thousand years, do they really have to be
immortal?</div>
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<br /></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Interview</i>, on the other hand, really
uses the Vampire premise. Here, Vampires aren’t monsters for a protagonist to
defeat to prove his self-worth, or masculinity, or anything else so subjective.
Again, that could really be any monster: you could swap the Vampires for
gang-bangers and barely change the story (look at the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lost Boys</i>). Also, these Vampires aren’t generic dangerous love
interests for young women. Those could just as easily be real life sociopaths,
and still be the stuff of spectacularly ill-advised fantasy (look at the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lost Boys</i>). </div>
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No: Louis’s character conflict and
arc and relationship with Lestat are all defined by this unique situation and
set of circumstances. The existential questions raised by Vampirism, the moral
implications of killing to survive, the process of gradually becoming
desensitized to murder, ‘siring’ as seduction, and the experience of
agelessness without physical maturity: these are not window dressing. They’re
the substance of the story. I really have to give Anne Rice and the filmmakers
credit for that: these kinds of stories can still succeed regardless (I do
mildly like the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lost Boys</i>), but
thinking through a premise allows more opportunities for originality. Plus, you
feel like you get your money’s worth.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcJNSysVBI0MBxswSAOYgxCaiGXNBSbt4CcSNiavIG6RvKWmEYf9hz6uclMbyC_fEaibyGwmHY6CEtlDPJF5p8BHKE2LK44rAt2TFvxq_0h_J9VIrLXtvE0TnXQvVV2R8OK15trKDQCMtI/s1600/daniel-malloy-christian-slater-intervista-il-vampiro-louis-de-pointe-du-lac-brad-pitt-nel-film-interview-with-the-vampire-127947.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="270" nx="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcJNSysVBI0MBxswSAOYgxCaiGXNBSbt4CcSNiavIG6RvKWmEYf9hz6uclMbyC_fEaibyGwmHY6CEtlDPJF5p8BHKE2LK44rAt2TFvxq_0h_J9VIrLXtvE0TnXQvVV2R8OK15trKDQCMtI/s400/daniel-malloy-christian-slater-intervista-il-vampiro-louis-de-pointe-du-lac-brad-pitt-nel-film-interview-with-the-vampire-127947.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #228822; font-family: arial; line-height: 15px;">http://deliciousreadsbookclub.blogspot.com. </span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
I
liked the basic idea back in the 1970s and still do: a Vampire narrating the
story of his life – which we get to watch in flashback – to a then-modern
reporter. It’s still rare to find any Vampire media that reflects my actual
experiences, though I obviously shouldn't and don't expect this of writers, and I like
escapism and new takes on old ideas as much as the next person. Still, I do
love a human character whose response to encountering an old Vampire is to sit
and talk with him. Most of my coolest hosts are like that. I love Daniel
Molloy’s line: ‘I’m a collector of lives.’ I’ve often felt the same way, and so
do many of the people who talk to me.</div>
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Incidentally,
one fun series of questions I get from the aforementioned cool hosts is: do
vampires find Vampire movies scary? What movies do we find scary? In fact, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">do w</i>e find movies scary? Sure. My
scariest movie: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Threads</i>, a British
docudrama about post-nuclear war survival. I first watched it in the 1980s, when it
was basically the world’s most horrifying weather forecast. Expecting a genre
film to replicate that experience would be unfair. Movies are obviously
not aimed at my people, but they’ll work if they reflect our insecurities and vulnerabilities.<br />
<br />
Take<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Interview</i>: the scene where Claudia and Madeleine are burned to
death by the sun. Horrifying. Especially the build-up: Claudia and Madeleine
are trapped in this narrow tower, sentenced to death in a chaotic flurry, with
just one vent leading to the outdoors – no exit, barely enough room to move let
alone escape, and the vent is too high for them to reach or guard. Then it’s
daytime, we watch the sunlight slowly descend upon them, and we watch Claudia’s
confusion and gradual realization of the situation, her gasping in horror as
direct sunlight slowly hits them. Then the payoff: we see this sculptural pile
of ashes that’s still shaped like her in her last moments of horror. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">True Blood</i> pulled something like this
recently (except it involved a witch and voice distortions), and it was
unintentionally hilarious. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Interview</i>
made it as horrifying as it should be. <br />
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<img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5406503543017965266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAt63SwfRBcx6hDWPP2oWxrU8FNBCJwISRkf3A-lOBjJVk1rGnXNIngOYRnG5DwLOjbZWOTo0MynWr27gXrNkgKzCRXTn41s4qbVSHB7MNP8bFbNp-dNy3mIt67UFdd9yPG7U2tchFXPBB/s320/burned+claudia.jpg" style="cursor: move; display: block; height: 150px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center; width: 266px;" /></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
http://reviews-of-movies-i-watched.blogspot.com. </div>
</td></tr>
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I hated Claudia from start to
finish, and this scene still made me feel for her. Madeleine was innocent though,
and I still don’t understand why the Paris Vampires killed her. She wasn’t an
accessory to Lestat’s murder, and she was an adult. God, five minutes earlier
she was promised immortality, and it all ended like this. Executed for her
sire’s crimes. Bastards.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Basically, the whole film is a
scary what-if scenario for my people. What if there was no real vampire
society, and you and your sire had to fend for yourselves? What if your sire was
evil? What if you really were hungry and desperate for blood every minute, and
could blow at any time? What if you pulled away from a victim, and he/she
really was dead? </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
The scenario’s not so far-fetched.
There are vampires sired outside of our community, generally called
‘extra-nationals,’ and they make Louis look mentally balanced by comparison.
Whenever we find and imprison one of them, it’s a reminder of what we could
have been, and that it’s our circumstances that made us who we are – now that’s
psychological horror, right there. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
My culture emphasizes
introspection and personal development. The fear of losing your ideals and the
basis of your personality with time, and with the changing cultural zeitgeist –
that fear is very real, whether it’s justified or not. My people are by no
means alone in that regard. Sometimes as you get older and learn about moral
ambiguity, and the role of conditioning and moral breakdown, the monsters don’t
look as external anymore. They may not even look much like monsters. </div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
I think <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Interview</i> works better as horror, especially adult horror, than
most of the Vampire films that take the perspective of the hunters and the
victims. Those films usually play on the fear of monsters. Stories like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Interview</i> play on the fear of becoming
monsters ourselves. That’s one reason the Vampire genre has lasted so long: it
combines the two. I think the latter is scarier. And really, which one is more realistic?</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
<img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5406503549565753650" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDK-I3eOkDD8M80df5P8FEpYglhJGVZssMaWKfyGeg5zgnQenaoaft7qibuij0_HDeJEzVcB_YQYvQ1kQlsafxFhzysAzyFnfEOBTHcMg00v8CQcD4Y0RT13eCbVScbGx1vp30scFRl5WF/s320/louis2.jpg" style="cursor: move; display: block; height: 320px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center; width: 213px;" /></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
http://reviews-of-movies-i-watched.blogspot.com. </div>
<div>
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</div>
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In <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">1984</i>, the Inner
Party wouldn’t just torture you for resisting them: they’d break down your
sense of reality and morality until you could maintain the controlled lunacy of
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">doublethink</i>, and you’d be willing to
throw your lover into a cage of rats if it meant saving your own ass. Contrast
that with, say: ‘some guy from the Thought Police killed Winston Smith in the
middle of the night, oh, and he had scary teeth and claws.’ Yeah. Lestat
killing the prostitute at the beginning of the film was alarming but not scary.
Lestat destroying Louis as an individual as we watch him regress into a monster
as horrible as Lestat, on the other hand, is memorable and scary. </div>
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Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-18200154716814404182012-02-19T22:46:00.000-08:002013-04-13T18:37:02.705-07:00Sparkling Wine and Cheese<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="363" id="il_fi" src="http://giannaperada.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/edward_sparkling-1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="328" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just like a diamond living statue crystallized predator. </td></tr>
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(Notation note: ‘Vampire’ capital ‘V’ refers to any of our ‘fictional counterparts.’ Lowercase ‘v’ refers to my people. It would be even more awkward otherwise.)<br />
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<br />
Trivia that will live in infamy: vampires in <em>Twilight</em> sparkle in the sunlight. People were talking about this back in 2005. Even after <em>Breaking Dawn</em>, which has its own rap sheet (Multiple counts of Mary Sue, Elusive Plot, Vandalism of the English Language, Harassment of a Minor…) I still don’t think that anything’s gotten more attention than the fact that Twilight Vampires secrete organic glitter-glue.</div>
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<b><br /></b>
<b>How the Hell Does the Sparkling Work?</b><br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="size-full wp-image-14271 aligncenter" height="367" src="http://cdn.zmescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/diamonds.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" title="diamonds" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This could have been the cover of <i>Twilight</i>!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Nah, that’s not it. Maybe it’s that they’re covered in a layer of diamonds ‘embedded into the surface,’ or disco-ball tiles that somehow simultaneously look like grains of shimmering glitter. That’s roughly what you get when you put the ‘sparkling’ descriptions together, anyway (seriously, almost all those phrases and adjectives were used at some point). Each description looks different, and we get all of them, even when Meyer’s talking about the same person. If you go by the movies, though, the Vampires look like they’re covered in dew with its own theme song.<br />
<br />
I don’t know, the Vampires are supposed to have smooth skin (of course), so I guess their skin doesn’t sprout glittery stones, even though they’re supposed to be rock-people (I guess they’re not granite). But if they were solid mica, they’d just be shiny (which is why I don’t think they’re ‘sparkly like <em>diamonds</em>’); you need lots of different tiny uneven reflective surfaces to produce sparkling. Some areas are reflective; some aren’t. Shouldn’t they be rough?<br />
<br />
Are the sparkly parts exactly even with the non-sparkly parts of their skin, so it feels smooth, in just the right way? That’s convenient. Even glitter feels a little rough to the touch if you wear enough of it, and if the glitter grains are big enough to catch as much light as here. Do they have some sort of smooth transparent film over the sparkles?<br />
<br />
I don’t know how Meyer managed to describe this damn phenomenon so often in a way that still feels so insubstantial and unexplained. We don’t get the real physical explanation until the <em>Twilight Illustrated Guide</em> and it makes less sense than anything I thought the descriptions were talking about (see below). You’d think this was all misdirection, and someone involved with this project was distracting us from the absurdity of the Fool’s Gold Vampires at Tiffany’s. They failed.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="281" id="il_fi" src="http://www.pricescope.com/files/tutorial/centenary-diamond.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="375" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<b>Just Lie and Say it was a Parody</b><br />
<br />
I heard about the sparkling before I read the book, and I figured that this just <em>had</em> to be a parody – and if so, it was brilliant.<br />
<br />
Vampires being <em>killed</em> by the sun is fairly new: folkloric and early literary Vampires were usually only weakened by it, or else they were biologically or culturally nocturnal. The great <em>Nosferatu</em> helped push sunlight to lethal weapon level. Hell, that was actually to dodge the copyright on <em>Dracula</em>, who was also only ‘weakened’ by sunlight. If you were parodying this trope with the sparkling it could work at least one of two ways:<br />
<br />
Question 1: Does sunlight weaken or bother you? Answer: Yeah. It makes me look ridiculous. Question 2: Will sunlight kill you? Answer: No. It’ll just make me look ridiculous.<br />
<br />
Most of your audience will be on Question 2, since the casual modern Vampire fan is more familiar with it. Sometimes parodies are funniest when you take something dramatic and make it as absurd as possible: the more dramatic and more absurd, the better (<em>Dr. Strangelove</em> is a great example).<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="168" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPVxFv03vgMdYVc4wAlIYo6TgohEIZTOrbQTwoVhNECgsuw-NBptt1EmznL9X4PHs6q5kgkwI18hxuB7-QsflERZh9m7iDOtp4mPg2ay55XZ66nqBOujMzSTYi8LrBDINJQzCIV_Po-yg/s400/ltroifire.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Being burned alive is pretty frigging dramatic. So everybody’s expecting <em>that,</em>and you give them frigging <em>sparkling</em>? Hilarious! I know I was cracking up when I read it. And we were all cracking up even louder in the theatre. Damn, they even gave Edward the funniest line they could have: “This is the skin of a killer, Bella.”<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Lethal Lack of Self-Awareness </b><br />
<br />
It wasn’t a parody. As brilliant a parody as this would be – that’s how bad it becomes when you realize it was dead serious. There’s a reason almost every <em>Twilight </em>parody exaggerates nothing, or needs to. As is, how would you even parody the sparkling? I guess Edward could step into the sunlight, and a heavenly choir of angels could appear and anoint him with a celestial gloss of shimmering confetti, and Bella could pass out from an overload of awe. Then again, in <em>Twilight </em>she does literally faint when Edward kisses her, so you’re back to square one.<br />
<br />
We weren’t just supposed to take the sparkling seriously; we were supposed to take that whole damned scene seriously. It was a prelude to Edward revealing that he’s a murderer, and Bella revealing she doesn’t frigging care, apparently because he’s so beautiful. Body glitter is silly looking at the best of times. Here, it’s awesome enough to redeem murderers.<br />
<br />
I should tell all my anti-capital punishment buddies about that: maybe during the appeals process convicts will help their cases by applying body glitter. At least they’d have a better chance at insanity pleas.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="267" id="il_fi" src="http://www.thefastertimes.com/vampires/files/2009/12/twilight-edward-sparkle.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
None of the characters respond the way the audience does to the sparkling, or, really, the way any normal person would. Even in the book, Bella sees Edward like this and gushes about how gorgeous he is: she’s literally awe-inspired. Oh, he isn’t just figuratively awesome, he’s literally fucking awesome. Then he lists every way he could brutally murder her, and she’s <em>still </em>dazzled and awe-inspired. That’s how most characters of widely differing personalities in the series react to the Vampires: awed at beautiful creatures, especially when they glitter.<br />
<br />
It’s like a fantasy world where everyone has the same standard of physical attractiveness, and beauty is something that people literally worship. This would be great if this was s<em>upposed</em> to be creepy, but as it stands, it seems to reflect the way Meyer believes real people behave.<br />
<br />
The Cullens seem to take the sparkling pretty seriously. They live in a glass-walled house so they can ‘be themselves,’ and in <em>Midnight Sun</em>, Rosalie gets in a good whine about how in cloudy places like Forks, they can be ‘normal.’ The sparkling seems to be part of their identities.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>What Could Have Been</b><br />
<br />
Edward, at least in the first movie, sets up the sparkling as dramatic and horrifying. If I didn’t know any better, I’d have been expecting him to turn into some hideous monster. Why didn’t he?<br />
<br />
Meyer gushes about how gorgeous her Vampires are, and they avoid the sunlight. So make them turn ugly or monstrous in the sun! That has a cool dark fairytale feel to it. It also fits with the usual folkloric notion of the ‘light showing your true nature’ or perceived true nature. It has a social commentary vibe, and would be the perfect setup for Meyer’s attempted ‘love conquers all’ theme.<br />
<br />
More importantly, it gives the Twilight Vampires a real drawback to their condition. It could also create some real plot conflict: say a certain level of sunlight is necessary to initiate the change, and they’re in public and the weather changes? You could construct a pretty dramatic scene around that – which Meyer does.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>It Gets Sillier</b><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="200" id="il_fi" src="http://twilightsagalayouts.com/myspace-graphics/images/New%20Moon%20Movie%20Pictures/sparkling-edward.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vampire!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
She constructs a very dramatic scene around Edward exposing himself in public to sparkle, and then he’s in trouble with the Volturi and we get our climax to<em>New Moon</em>. Apparently, seeing a guy flash a parade and sparkle at the color guard reveals the existence of Vampires. Imagine what would happen if he were also doing the chicken dance and wearing a feather boa. He’s a witch!<br />
<br />
That’s part of the reason I can’t just ignore the sparkling, as superficial as it initially looks: it’s a plot point and a character point. It’s the reason the Cullen kids and Carlisle the medical <em>Doctor</em> miss work. It dictates their movements during the main plot action, at least whenever Meyer remembers it. It helps determine where they live, and apparently grates highly on their self-esteem.<br />
<br />
They live in frigging Forks because they fell hook, line, and sinker for the stereotype about the Pacific Northwest being perpetually cloudy. I’m assuming these guys need more than partial cloud cover, since it shouldn’t take too much sunlight to trigger the sparkling. But you get plenty of heavy cloud cover in the Great Lakes region, too. Even the cloudiest (three quarters of cloud cover plus) cities are only cloudy between fifty to sixty percent of the year. The top of the list, Seattle, beats out Buffalo, New York by only five cloudy days. I don’t know how these guys function.<br />
<br />
So why Forks? Why Forks, where their alleged and unjustified arch enemies the werewolves live? Why did they come back after only seventy years? There were probably survivors who would have recognized them. Why don’t they live in Seattle, or Buffalo, or, you know, a city? If the Cullens were so worried about the ‘secret’ they’d be better off in a big, anonymous, individualistic city then a stereotyped small town like Forks where everyone knows everyone. Why is sparkling their first priority, and why haven’t they even thought it through?<br />
<br />
But what am I saying? The Volturi and the Cullens each treat the sparkling itself as a bigger security threat than the trail of bodies both groups have left behind, which law enforcement officials would trace back to them in any honest version of this series. Just after the Volturi posture and threaten Edward about his public <em>New Moon</em> sparkling incident (and create a much bigger scene while doing it), we get to listen as they brutally slaughter a group of forty innocent people they lured into their dungeons, and still the penny refuses to drop. Why? Why would anyone see a guy sparkling and think something supernatural was going on? It’s an effect easily simulated with two-dollar makeup.<br />
<br />
Why would anyone connect it to Vampires? It’d be one thing if it was established in-universe to look for sparkly guys when hunting Vampires, but that seems to be something that only the werewolves know about. Humans in <em>Twilight </em>only know about the tropes everyone in our culture knows (e.g., the ones Meyer heard of, since she didn’t do any research). Sparkling is a new trope in universe and out of universe, so they’d react the way the audience would and it sure wouldn’t be any kind of dramatic climax.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="250" id="il_fi" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaZpVSx2PDjUJ-IN2-6OUCCy8JkhSgNBK4I9DZ-zw3oG65uaJoJWPKz-QntAIK6RptcZu_D5krLuQm_Kj9hAqb8Na02_5Kz0GYSN9tte7CpgmrkauKFa5AbhrBt6o8615kl5N5DVLHDh_S/s400/sparkling-edward-cullen-wallpaper.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Is there some unmentioned supernatural explanation for why Vampires can’t just use full-body foundation to cover the sparkling? Hell, you wouldn’t even need full-body: putting it on your face, hands, and neck would be enough with the right amount of clothing, meaning you’re got a slightly more involved makeup job than many Americans before coffee.<br />
<br />
You’d need touch-ups throughout the day, of course, because otherwise, god forbid, people would think you were wearing glitter, and nothing’s scarier then someone like me thinking you have bad taste. Hey, I hate wearing make-up, but I don’t let it rule my life. Rosalie and Alice don’t hate makeup, so I can’t even come close to justifying this. I like looking for an in-universe justification for a plot hole: it’s more fun than the real answer. Here, I’ve got nothing.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Overexposure</b><br />
<br />
Now, if you threw me into the sun, if the anaphylactic shock didn’t kill me, the off-the-charts adrenaline surge would. And vampires have long since ruled out any simple solutions to the problem. So here I am, seeing these Cullens let a horrific non-problem control their lives in a way I’ve actually experienced.<br />
<br />
Humans will wax poetic about how vampires never see the sunrise, but that’s the least of your worries: the real problem is your schedule is now completely inverted, and you’re terminally dependent on artificial microclimates for at least half the day. It limits your job opportunities, dictates where you live, your actions, how you get your blood, how you survive from one day to the next. It’s a factor in nearly every decision you make for the rest of your life, and it’s a permanent long-term threat to your existence. Well, the Cullens and Volturi seem to feel this way about the sparkling.<br />
<br />
You can’t have your characters react so dramatically and so substantially to an easily resolved practically non-existent problem without making them look like they haven’t even lived in their own worlds.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Really, How the Hell Does the Sparkling Work?</b><br />
<br />
While we’re on the subject, why do they only sparkle in the sun? Ultraviolet light is different from visible light. You don’t get cancer from visible light because it’s low-energy on the electromagnetic spectrum, and it’s higher energy radiation like ultraviolet that’s carcinogenic. As for allergies, well, as my people know all too well, you can be allergic to almost anything, even if some allergies are rare. But why would visible light and ultraviolet light react to glittery skin any differently?<br />
<br />
Why wouldn’t sparkling happen in dim sunlight on cloudy days, or in bright enough artificial light? For that matter, what the hell kind of adaptation is this? What function does it serve? How much prettier do the pretty people need to be to attract prey with no physical advantages and no real defensive ability? It’s not like nature knew humans would develop explosives.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>What the Hell is the Sparkling Supposed to Mean?</b><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="311" id="il_fi" src="http://www.nosferatuscoffin.com/portal/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/nosferatularge.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One of these days, we'll see good Vampires who look more like this. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
The sparkling doesn’t just fail on a logistical, character, and plot level, but on a thematic one. Nocturnal Folkloric Vampires were a symptom of the primal fear of darkness. In literature, ‘Light equals weakness or death’ was an overly literal interpretation of sinners being afraid of the holy light, or of elusive beings’ fear of the truth. In my fiction, I’ve occasionally used darkness as a metaphor for ignorance, so light basically means ‘enlightenment.’ Here, um, I guess it means that pretty people can look even prettier in the right light. It’s a theme worthy of a fashion model.<br />
<br />
And it gets worse. When Vampires are good guys, usually you’re using a ‘dark is not evil’ motif. Hell, yeah. Well, Edward is always melodramatically calling himself a monster, and Bella’s usually reassuring him, herself, and the audience that he isn’t. You have Carlisle giving the usual Christian speech about how he’s trying to do his best even if he’s ‘damned.’ So, at the minimum, Meyer was going for ‘dark is not necessarily evil.’ Hey, she told us so!<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="332" id="il_fi" src="http://www.andrewgarvey.com/wizard/characters/Images/Glinda%20the%20Good%20Witch%20of%20the%20North%201.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Appearances can be deceiving.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Most of Meyer’s Vampires <em>are</em> evil, even if we exclude her ‘good’ guys. But are they ‘dark?’ Are Vampires ‘dark’ by default, even if they’re diurnal supermodels with no fangs and not even a hint of otherness? The whole point of the exercise is light and dark not necessarily corresponding to good and evil, and at its root, the concept is all about challenging preconceived notions and cognitive biases and saying ‘weird people aren’t always dangerous.’ A moral version of Count Orlock would be ‘dark is not evil.’ Even Joss Whedon's 'Angel' counts. Glinda from <em>Wizard of Oz</em> sure doesn’t, and that’s what we have here.<br />
<br />
Meyer tries justifying their beauty by saying that they need it to attract humans and kill them. Basically, they’re ‘beautiful but deadly.’ That inverts the motif altogether, making it ‘light is not good.’ That would work better if her Vampires were exclusively intended as villains and it was a classic story of the dangers of the forbidden. So with the Cullens (and the Denali sisters, but who cares about them? Meyer sure doesn’t) you’re supposed to be taking away the ‘deadly’ part, making them – beautiful. Awesome. I guess the motif is: ‘light is good, except when it’s not.’<br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="269" id="il_fi" src="http://blog.hirestrategies.co.uk/.a/6a00d8341facab53ef011278efe79a28a4-320wi" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-left: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="320" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Go towards the light; your brain is shutting down. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b><br /></b>
<b>The Science and Un-science of Sparkling</b><br />
<br />
Finally, the real honest-to-gosh explanation for sparkling doesn’t make sense. You wouldn’t think it’d be that hard to justify something as simple as a skin condition, but Meyer wasn’t content to make the sparkling ‘just one of those things.’ She made the sparkling a huge part of the Vampires’ general biology.<br />
<br />
Now, I love it when authors give scientific explanations for anything in speculative fiction, but it’s fine if they don’t, as long as the authors don’t try to spin that into an anti-science message. Designing fictional science is just another way of using your imagination, and working within scientific parameters can actually create new plot and character opportunities. Given how important this fictional science was to the story and how much research Meyer obviously didn’t do, I don’t see why she even bothered.<br />
<br />
I think she threw this idea together after skimming some Internet cell biology she was looking up for Bella and Edward’s biology class scene. Or else, it’s a half-remembered terminology bit from a class she had twenty years ago gussied up with some last-minute improvisation. I’d understand if this was a public meeting and she was unprepared for a hardcore fan question, but this was in the frigging <em>Twilight Illustrated Guide</em>.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="297" id="il_fi" src="http://www.bellasdiary.com/wp-content/uploads/TheTwilightSagaOfficialIllustratedGuide.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Such a fount of clarifying detail. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
She said Vampires’ plasma membranes are not semi-permeable, unlike every other plant and animal on the planet, but crystalline. And that’s what creates the sparkling. Yes, they sparkle at the <em>cellular level</em>. She didn’t say whether this applied to all their cells' plasma membranes. Is it just skin cells?<br />
<br />
She did say the ‘crystalline cell membrane’ is why they’re so strong, so I’m guessing that means if I flayed them, I’d see sparkling exposed muscles. Unless she thought that giving people tough skin would also give them the equivalent of super- muscle strength, but I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt. Is their venom sparkly? How about if I cut open their heads – do they have sparkly brains?<br />
<br />
She seems to be using ‘analogy’ reasoning here: our cell membranes are semi-permeable and we’re weak, so Strong Vampires should have nice hard crystalline membranes. Except strength is the result of major interactions between whole tissues, surface to body ratio, ability to handle physical stress, et cetera, and animals ranging from bears to birds all have semi-permeable cell membranes, which are actually quite solid.<br />
<br />
‘Semi-permeable’ is about controlling which particles pass through the membrane, not about squishiness. I don’t see how anything could get through a non-porous crystalline membrane, so that means the cells wouldn’t function, and they’d take the rest of the organism with it. Then they’d really be rock-people.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="315" id="il_fi" src="http://www.biologyreference.com/photos/cell-wall-3878.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="420" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo by Sebastian Kaulitzki</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
It <em>is</em> true that plant cells have cell walls, thickened and strengthened by cellulose fibrils. It’s the reason plants aren’t piles of sludge and it’s hard to make them burst. Vampires have cell walls, apparently. They’re rock-people <em>and </em>plant-people. Are their cells plant-like in other ways? Do they have big vacuoles? I guess Vampires can’t photosynthesize, since they’re not green. Well, they’re the worst plant-people ever.<br />
<br />
Cell walls are located outside the cell membrane, though. Plants have semi-permeable cell membranes, too. Actually, the cell wall is porous. Animals have skeletons for structure: we don’t need cell walls, and they wouldn’t help us with strength, because our structure is completely different. I’m not even sure an animal with cell walls could move. Meyer keeps calling the Vampires living statues, but I think they were at least intended as living action figures.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="400" id="il_fi" src="http://twilightguide.com/tg/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/new-moon-action-figures.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The animal/plant cell wall distinction is one of the principle differences between the two. And I know Meyer probably knew that, and wanted her Vampires to be an exception. Yes, they must be Mary Sues down to the cellular level, and as with most Mary Sue tropes, it must defy the laws of reality.<br />
<br />
Vampiric plasma membranes harden as part of the transformation process. Sounds like a loss of plasma membrane integrity to me, or in other words, cell necrosis and dead frigging tissue. Was that Meyer cleverly trying to justify the Undead Fallacy? Well, the Vampires sure don’t look like they’re covered in gangrene.<br />
<br />
The worst part? Cell membranes are microscopic. If sparkling occurs at the cellular level, we shouldn’t be able to see it. 100 micrometers or less is microscopic and cell walls are 10 micrometers thick at most. Animal cell membranes are only .008 micrometers (you can’t even see them with light microscopes). I wonder if Forks High has an electron microscope? Maybe he and Bella should have had a scene looking at Edward’s cells, a follow-up to their bio class scene –<em>that </em>I’d like to see.<br />
<br />
Writing fictional science is difficult, even if you have a science background. You design a fictional humanoid and take something out or put in something foreign, it usually has consequences you have to account for, which can be hard to foresee. Fair enough, and again, I do applaud any writer, regardless of background, for making an effort. Even with these results.<br />
<br />
One fictional science writing method is taking the physical characteristic you’re thinking of applying to your non-human, seeing if it has some precedence in nature, seeing how it works in that animal, and trying to apply it to a humanoid in a way that’s justifiable within general anatomy. Okay, what are some animals that sparkle? Fish! Make the Vampires scaly!<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="266" id="il_fi" src="http://www.photo-dictionary.com/photofiles/list/2195/2878fish_scales.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
If you want them to be smooth and scaly, put a transparent film over the scales. You can make it a pretty pattern of tiny scales if you want. Say the film was some kind of protective adaptation, and say that whatever it is that causes vampirism has a recent marine-based evolutionary history. What’s wrong with that?<br />
<br />
C’mon, Meyer, scales are sexy! There’s a whole ‘scaly’ subculture now, right up there with the furries. And look at mer-people! Everybody loves mer-people, and they don’t have to be fifty/fifty fish-human hybrids. Vampire mers, or vampires who are slightly mer-ish or vice versa? Awesome! It worked for <em>Pirates of the Caribbean 4</em>.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="168" id="il_fi" src="http://cdn1.screenrant.com/wp-content/uploads/pirates_mermaid.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 8px; padding-right: 8px; padding-top: 8px;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Meyer, are you prejudiced against mer-people? I hope not, what with you working on a mermaid book, and all. You’ve said that you’re obsessed with mermaids, and I can quote you. But your books are filled with prejudice against werewolves, V/vampires, and humans, so I’ll not be giving you the benefit of the doubt about the mer-people.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Why?</b><br />
<br />
You know, all the way through these books, I kept on asking the question: why? Nobody involved in this project knew enough science? Nobody had a <em>cousin </em>who knew enough science? Nobody said ‘if no one’s doing the research, we shouldn’t bother with the science?’ Nobody pointed out any of the overwhelming problems with the sparkling concept? The original working title of <em>Twilight</em> was <em>Forks,</em> after the setting, and Meyer’s agent got her to change that. She had that much power, and she didn’t take down the sparkle? Her editor didn’t, either?<br />
<br />
The thing is, they must have taken issue with it. I don’t even think most of the fans like the sparkling; they tolerate it and defend it, but I don’t think it would have been their first choice. And yet the sparkling seems to become more prominent in every book, going from a vague plot device and a few bad descriptions in the first book to being the arguable inciting incident in <em>the Short Second Life of Bree Tanner</em> and a huge part of Vampire general biology.<br />
<br />
I think Meyer got fixated on the sparkling, for some reason. She was met with all the opposition you’d expect, defended it as vigorously as she could, and we get to watch the sparkling get a more prominent role much in the way that arguments escalate between people: someone defends his/her side to the point where it descends into madness. We’ve all been in this situation, it’s just that most of us aren’t bestselling writers whose fixations go public, to receive all the praise and scorn the public can muster. And you should never underestimate the public, or conflict escalation, or fixation. Even on a meta-level, you don’t need to exaggerate when it comes to the <em>Twilight </em>series.<br />
<br />
Image sources in order of appearance:<br />
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://giannaperada.wordpress.com/category/vampires-2/">http://giannaperada.wordpress.com/category/vampires-2/</a>.
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://cdn.zmescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/diamonds.jpg">http://cdn.zmescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/diamonds.jpg</a>.
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.pricescope.com/wiki/diamonds/diamond-clarity">http://www.pricescope.com/wiki/diamonds/diamond-clarity</a>.
<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://charlottesfilmresearchblog.blogspot.com/">http://charlottesfilmresearchblog.blogspot.com/</a>.
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.thefastertimes.com/vampires/2009/12/13/holiday-spirit-for-vampires/">http://www.thefastertimes.com/vampires/2009/12/13/holiday-spirit-for-vampires/</a>.
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.twilightsagalayouts.com/myspace-graphics/New_Moon_Movie_Pictures/18">http://www.twilightsagalayouts.com/myspace-graphics/New_Moon_Movie_Pictures/18</a>.
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://thetwinewstimes.blogspot.com/2009/05/spoiler-alert-shirtless-sparkling.html">http://thetwinewstimes.blogspot.com/2009/05/spoiler-alert-shirtless-sparkling.html</a>.
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.nosferatuscoffin.com/portal/synopsis/">http://www.nosferatuscoffin.com/portal/synopsis/</a>.
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.andrewgarvey.com/wizard/characters/GlindatheGoodWitchoftheNorthProfile.html">http://www.andrewgarvey.com/wizard/characters/GlindatheGoodWitchoftheNorthProfile.html</a>.
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://blog.hirestrategies.co.uk/erecruitment/2009/02/woekplace-20-will-hr-see-the-light.html">http://blog.hirestrategies.co.uk/erecruitment/2009/02/woekplace-20-will-hr-see-the-light.html</a>.
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.bellasdiary.com/tag/the-twilight-saga-official-illustrated-guide/">http://www.bellasdiary.com/tag/the-twilight-saga-official-illustrated-guide/</a>.
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.biologyreference.com/Ce-Co/Cell-Wall.html#b">http://www.biologyreference.com/Ce-Co/Cell-Wall.html#b</a>.
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://twilightguide.com/tg/2009/09/24/twilight-new-moon-action-figures-2/">http://twilightguide.com/tg/2009/09/24/twilight-new-moon-action-figures-2/</a>.
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.photo-dictionary.com/phrase/2195/fish-scales.html#b">http://www.photo-dictionary.com/phrase/2195/fish-scales.html#b</a>.
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<span style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://screenrant.com/pirates-4-interview-astrid-berges-frisbey-rothc-116436/">http://screenrant.com/pirates-4-interview-astrid-berges-frisbey-rothc-116436/</a>. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 16pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8636319722744168237.post-61478390136296239192012-02-19T22:29:00.000-08:002013-04-13T18:53:23.245-07:00<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Twilight Review: Introduction</span></h1>
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<em><span style="font-family: wp_bogus_font;">Or, </span></em></div>
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<em><span style="font-family: wp_bogus_font;">Twilight is a Bad Victorian Novel</span></em></div>
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<em>Twilight</em> was published in 2005, and I’ve been talking about it ever since.</div>
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The vampire community analyzes vampire media as part of our ongoing series on the depictions of nonhumans, trans-humans, and immortals in the media. Here, we can get some evidence of how the culture will react to us when the Masquerade finally ends, not to mention how our hosts will react to us in the meantime. It’s not perfect evidence, but as social experiments go, I can’t thank vampire writers enough. And when they create a publishing phenomenon like <em>Twilight</em>, where millions of people talk about it and you can see a whole spectrum of opinion: yeah. That’s very revealing.</div>
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Humans certainly aren’t shy about talking to us about vampire media, I guess because it’s a safer way of framing the very awkward questions they’re inevitably going to have. Hey, that’s fine; I want to get it all out in the open, and I love talking about this stuff. Let me tell you, though, it’s pretty funny listening to some questions if you don’t know much about vampire media and don’t know the context (Do my eyes change color? When I’m drunk, you mean? Can I turn invisible? You tell me. Can I travel through time to accelerate or decelerate my own aging process and experience all of human history in an eye-blink? Where did you come up with that, and can I read it?) The media analysis alone would be way too big a job for one person, and not everyone has the time or the inclination for it. Hence, a few vampires like me will interview individual recruits and have the conversation with them that no one else wants to have. And we don’t even have job titles.</div>
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Hey, I’d have talked to my sire Cathy about this stuff too, probably with the same enthusiasm. Except I hadn’t read <em>Carmilla</em>,<em> Varney</em>, ‘The Vampyre,’ or even heard the word ‘vampire’ before in my life. <em>Dracula</em> hadn’t even been published yet. And now? I’ve seen Dracula evolve and grow as a character filtered through the perspectives of so many different creators: evil Dracula, really evil Dracula, romantic Dracula, sympathetic Dracula, campy Dracula, and maniacally evil Dracula. We grew up together! I’ve seen the vampire archetype emerge as one of the most fluid metaphors, versatile enough to be used in almost any genre, all but transformed from its folkloric roots. And I’ve seen the rest of literature do the same. So it really is a bloody wonder that <em>Twilight</em> is published over a hundred years later and it reads like a bad Victorian novel. Here are the telltale signs:</div>
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1. Purple Prose</div>
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2. Filler combined with a sensationalist plot</div>
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3. Submissive Mary Sue</div>
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4. Bastardized Byronic heroes</div>
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5. Obsession with social class and wealth</div>
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6. Obsession with beauty</div>
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7. Racism and colonialism</div>
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8. Misogyny</div>
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9. Black and white morality</div>
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10. Asceticism</div>
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Tyler August Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00186726033804078340noreply@blogger.com1