{"id":99,"date":"2010-11-18T11:15:34","date_gmt":"2010-11-18T11:15:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html"},"modified":"2010-11-18T11:15:34","modified_gmt":"2010-11-18T11:15:34","slug":"twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html","title":{"rendered":"Twilight Is Bad News for Girls and Women"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flunkingsainthood\/twilight-saga.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"twilight-saga.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/83\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/11\/twilight-saga-thumb-208x267-19416.jpg\" class=\"mt-image-left\" style=\"float: left;margin: 0pt 20px 20px 0pt\" height=\"267\" width=\"208\" \/><\/a><\/span>Over at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/Resources\/Additional-Resources\/Is-Twilight-Bad-News-for-Girls.html#comment\">Patheos<\/a> today, WJK author <a href=\"http:\/\/experts.patheos.com\/expert\/elaineheath\/\">Elaine Heath<\/a> has posted a persuasive essay on the troubling messages that Stephenie Meyer&#8217;s <i><a href=\"http:\/\/www.stepheniemeyer.com\/\">Twilight<\/a><\/i> novels send to girls and women. Issues Heath raises in her 2011 book <i>The Gospel According to Twilight<\/i> are: <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Edward&#8217;s controlling and manipulative behavior<\/li>\n<li>Rosalie&#8217;s rape at the hands of a fiancee who was &#8220;overcome with desire for her beauty&#8221; (way to blame the victim, Stephenie Meyer!)<\/li>\n<li>Jacob&#8217;s creepy &#8220;imprinting&#8221; on the toddler Renesmee, an obsession that in other contexts we would call pedophilia, and<\/li>\n<li>Bella&#8217;s perennial incompetence <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><!--more--><br \/>\n<br \/>I think that Heath, like me, has a love-hate relationship with the <i><br \/>\nTwilight<\/i> books: she can appreciate a great adventure story with its beautiful<br \/>\nthemes of romance, but cringes at the novels&#8217; underlying misogyny and subtly dangerous messages to girls and women. She writes:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p>My greatest disappointment with the <em>Twilight<\/em> series is<br \/>\nStephenie Meyer&#8217;s thematic representation of violence against women in a<br \/>\nway that minimizes and normalizes abuse. No matter how wonderful it is<br \/>\nthat Meyer promotes sexual abstinence before marriage, a fact that<br \/>\nelicits praise from many religious leaders about the series, she offers a<br \/>\nterrible message about violence against women at the hands of their<br \/>\nintimate partners. Few of those enamored religious leaders who praise <em>Twilight<\/em> even notice the saturating theme of violence against women in the novels.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>So true. (You can read the rest of the article <a href=\"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/Resources\/Additional-Resources\/Is-Twilight-Bad-News-for-Girls.html#comment\">here<\/a>.) <\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<blockquote><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over at Patheos today, WJK author Elaine Heath has posted a persuasive essay on the troubling messages that Stephenie Meyer&#8217;s Twilight novels send to girls and women. Issues Heath raises in her 2011 book The Gospel According to Twilight are: Edward&#8217;s controlling and manipulative behavior Rosalie&#8217;s rape at the hands of a fiancee who was&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":226,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-99","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-reviews","category-cultural-commentary"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Twilight Is Bad News for Girls and Women - Flunking Sainthood<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Twilight Is Bad News for Girls and Women - Flunking Sainthood\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Over at Patheos today, WJK author Elaine Heath has posted a persuasive essay on the troubling messages that Stephenie Meyer&#8217;s Twilight novels send to girls and women. Issues Heath raises in her 2011 book The Gospel According to Twilight are: Edward&#8217;s controlling and manipulative behavior Rosalie&#8217;s rape at the hands of a fiancee who was&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Flunking Sainthood\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-11-18T11:15:34+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flunkingsainthood\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/11\/twilight-saga-thumb-208x267-19416.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jana Riess\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Twilight Is Bad News for Girls and Women - Flunking Sainthood","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Twilight Is Bad News for Girls and Women - Flunking Sainthood","og_description":"Over at Patheos today, WJK author Elaine Heath has posted a persuasive essay on the troubling messages that Stephenie Meyer&#8217;s Twilight novels send to girls and women. Issues Heath raises in her 2011 book The Gospel According to Twilight are: Edward&#8217;s controlling and manipulative behavior Rosalie&#8217;s rape at the hands of a fiancee who was&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html","og_site_name":"Flunking Sainthood","article_published_time":"2010-11-18T11:15:34+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flunkingsainthood\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/11\/twilight-saga-thumb-208x267-19416.jpg"}],"author":"Jana Riess","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html","name":"Twilight Is Bad News for Girls and Women - Flunking Sainthood","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flunkingsainthood\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/11\/twilight-saga-thumb-208x267-19416.jpg","datePublished":"2010-11-18T11:15:34+00:00","dateModified":"2010-11-18T11:15:34+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/#\/schema\/person\/fe5046ba89e9602d4de4c0e9b4ef53f8"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flunkingsainthood\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/11\/twilight-saga-thumb-208x267-19416.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flunkingsainthood\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/11\/twilight-saga-thumb-208x267-19416.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/2010\/11\/twilight-is-bad-news-for-girls-and-women.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Twilight Is Bad News for Girls and Women"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/","name":"Flunking Sainthood","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Jana Riess","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/#\/schema\/person\/fe5046ba89e9602d4de4c0e9b4ef53f8","name":"Jana Riess","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/954\/9541c99a399647166f0db1fe22b238ecx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/954\/9541c99a399647166f0db1fe22b238ecx96.jpg","caption":"Jana Riess"},"description":"Jana Riess is the author of Flunking Sainthood, a 2011 book about failing at twelve different spiritual practices. She is also currently working on The Twible, a three-year Twitter project with humorous daily Bible updates for your amusement (find her on Twitter as @janariess). She has a few silly degrees from swanky schools but was never once able to climb the rope in gym class. Her spiritual director is Buffy the Vampire Slayer.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/author\/jriess"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/226"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flunkingsainthood\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}