So, I'll admit it. I was completely obsessed with the Harry Potter series. I would buy a 600-page book and would not eat sleep or drink for two straight days until the book was read cover to cover (not exaggerating). So two days and 600 pages later I would lie on my bed and take two aspirin for the hunger headache that would eventually ensue, take a long nap to catch up on some sleep and then eat a light meal whenever i woke up. It was so bad that I'd literally feign illness so that I wouldn't have to go to school and would have more time to read. Every time I finished a book I'd be depressed for at least a week. Every time another book came out I'd beg and plead and clean the house extra nice so that my mom would buy it for me. She wouldn't do it, of course, so I'd just put my name down on the waiting list at my local library and patiently wait for the copies to come in. It was a pitiful existence and part of the reason why my social skills are so meager. I spent seven years inside a book. It was an awesome book, but still. It was a book. And I'd be willing to bet that there are lot more kids out there who can relate, whether they found their escape in the Harry Potter series or in the World of Warcraft or in their favorite anime series or an internet forum (ahem), or what have you...
I see the Twilight saga as no different. True, it may be entertaining and fun to read as was the Harry Potter series but the obsession I've noticed in young teen girls who wait desperately for the next book and scream with excitement whenever they spot Edward Cullen on the big screen has amounted to a rather unhealthy extreme. It's also important to note that most of the lessons and subliminal suggestions in the Twilight saga are things that young girls should really not be exposed to. For example, Bella puts herself in constant danger of death just to be able to be close to Edward. She devaluates herself constantly, amounting in a suicide attempt later on in the book just so that she can see Edward in her mind telling her not to do it. She puts herself underneath him and behaves as though her life is of no importance and no value. Any girl can relate. We've all met that guy that we thought was just so unbelievably perfect that we didn't deserve him. If only he would look our way, if only he would feel the same, blah blah blah. Well, Edward did look Bella's way and now she can't think of anything else but him. And she's willing to die so that she won't lose him. Maybe I'm being a bit too pedantic, but I see a dangerous message hidden between the covers of that amazing love story. True, Edward would never hurt Bella because he loves her and what-not, but she has given him the power, the opportunity and the tempation to do so, just so that she can be close to him. That's a pretty serious message to be sending out to little girls. Most people don't really think about those things, and I'm sure even the author herself doesn't see it or else she wouldn't be promoting the message. But it feeds just that. It feeds a girl's insecurities that she's not important enough to be loved because she's just a normal, common, clumsy girl. And when she does find 'love' (which every girl eventually does find, even if it's not in an Edward Cullen), she will do anything to keep it. The story suggests that it's commendable and romantic to do anything for love but the reality of the matter is that not every man is Edward Cullen. In the real world, to put yourself in the position that Bella has put herself in will result in an abusive relationship, and that's the message that this generation of teen girls has dived head-long into. Romanticizing the dangerous. And that would be fine for a grown woman to read. She is already aware of the realities and dangers a woman's heart faces in the real world. But little girls find this ridiculously false image of what love should be and cling to it for dear life.
Now couple that with the obsession of the latest fad, sort of like the obsession I had with Harry Potter and tell me you don't see the same dangers I see. They are subtle ones, of course. But no less important.