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An apology to anyone who is a fan of Twilight, but its everything that's wrong with this country. Also, an apology for my lack of knowledge regarding its context, but all I know about Twilight is what I've read on Wikipedia. Normally I wouldn't judge something until I'd read it myself or seen the movie, but the plot summaries on-line told me all I needed to know.

My beef with Twilight has nothing to do with the pussing up given to the vampire mythology. Yes, I think its totally lame that the blood suckers sparkle, and that they play sports, and that they go to school...I could go on, but why bother? You all either agree with me that this is retarded or you don't.

My problem with Twilight is with the main character of Bella. She's a high school girl who falls in love, gets married, and has a baby. I'm not exactly sure if she's still in high school when her baby is born, but she couldn't possibly be more than 19 when that happens. But its okay, all you religious conservatives, because she and Sparkles the Vampire are married.

In a country where educating kids about sex means telling them not to have it until their married, where kids having access to condoms is a public outrage, where sex is censored on TV while violence of the worst kind is permitted, and where gay people can't get married because it would "destroy the very foundation of marriage itself," is it any wonder that Twilight is so popular while Harry Potter has the religious right carrying picket signs? After all, Harry Potter is about the pursuit of knowledge, while Twilight is about dumb ass high school girls getting knocked up by vampires.

As an idiot who got married at 20, I speak from experience—fuck around before you get hitched. Wear a condom, use birth control, but fuck as many people as you can before you tie yourself down. Don't do it for thrills, or to “sew your wild oats.” Do it so that, when you do get married, you've been around the block enough times to know that the person wearing your ring is the one for you.

I have three daughters, ages 10, 12, and 14. They don't like Twilight, because their mother and I have instilled in them a desire to go to college and find fulfillment before they get married. The idea of being a wife and mother in your teens, the way Bella is, horrifies them. It should horrify more people. 

I've been married, and it ain't all its cracked up to be. The woman I live with now was also married young. Having done the marriage thing, neither of us is in a rush to do it again. We live together, we sleep together, we raise our kids together, and we do just fine without having gone through a ceremony. We're also in our 30s, and have enough experience to know that love is a fickle thing. You don't meet someone in high school, fall in love at first sight, get married, have a kid before 20, and live happily ever after.

Twilight is the whole reason gay marriage should be legalized. The idea that two young kids who have no idea what life is all about could get married should be what undermines the sanctity of marriage, not two consenting adults who love one another and are old enough to know what they're doing. Bella and Edward can get married right out of high school, and that's okay, but Adam and Steve...well that would just be wrong!

So to all you Twilight fans out there, please understand that my beef isn't with the plot or the concept, its with the morals being taught to these young girls. There's more to life than mooning over a boy. Find out who you are first—go to college, have a couple of apartments on your own, travel, find a job you love, date a lot of different people. When you feel fulfilled, if you want to, go ahead and get married and pop out a kid. Remember, the guy you marry right out of high school won't be a dreamy vampire, he'll be an immature loser with no money. Not as sexy a concept, huh?