If one were told about a popular series of novels that glorified possessive and controlling behavior in relationships, insinuated that women were always damsels in distress, and that the goal of every woman should be motherhood; in what time would one assume it to have been written? Perhaps the early 1900's, possibly the 1950's, but definitely no later than the 1970's. Surely! Surely these books wouldn't exist in the 21st century, much less be popular! Alas, it is so! Despite having been written in the latter half of the 2000's, the Twilight Saga feels at home in a Victorian library. Edward and Bella's relationship is the oh-so-romantic love of every teenage girl's dreams, or so it is portrayed, yet the hallmark in every movie ever shown in health class about abusive relationships is a couple who behave much like Edward and Bella! We modern people laugh at the classic silent movie scene where the pretty girl is tied to the train tracks and then falls into the arms of the strapping man who unties her and handcuffs the bad guy who strokes his curly mustache. Yet, Bella, whom so many pre-teen and teenage girls envy, is constantly being rescued by a man, always the damsel in distress. Since when has the philosophy that women should be "barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen" come back into vogue? Apparently, according to Stephenie Meyer, a woman's purpose in life is to have children. They say we are a post-feminist society! Bull! If a story like Buffy the Vampire Slayer is relegated to the vaults of the cult classic while the Twilight Saga pervades every aspect of our culture, I'd wager we are NOT post-feminist; we are Neanderthal!

Say your boyfriend s going through your call log on your cell phone, always asking where you're going when you say you're going out, tracking your friends to see if you are with them when you said you would. That would make you uncomfortable, yet Edward does the exact same thing, albeit sometimes in a more supernatural way. He follows her, "keeping tabs on Jessica. . . randomly searching through the thoughts of people on the street. . .so I would know where you were." At this point, when he met her in Port Angeles, they barely knew each other, yet she dismisses this blatant admission that she was being stalked.

Speaking of invasion of privacy, Edward also eavesdrops on Bella's friends' thoughts to find out more about her, what she really thought about him. Not only does Edward follow her, invading the privacy of her friends and everyone in the vicinity to find out about her, he also spies on her, coming into her room and watching her sleep, by his own admission, almost every night, without her knowledge, let alone consent. Bella tries to be angry and yells at him, but as every girl in an abusive relationship, she just can't be angry with him for it. "'You spied on me!'. . .I was flattered."

Now, what if your boyfriend refused to let you go out, or said that he had to drop you off to make sure you were really with your friends. You would want out of any relationship with him. Nobody likes someone who is controlling, except Bella. For instance, in Twilight, Bella gets a little faint from watching blood get drawn at school. Edward insists on driving her home, being so persistent and forceful that she eventually gives in, though she admits that she is perfectly capable of doing it herself, and she really does not want to go with him. In Eclipse, she wants to go to a camp-out with Jacob and the rest of the Quileutes, whom she spent all of New Moon coming to regard as family. He lets her go, though insisting that he drop her off and admitting that he'll "be here," as in, where he parked the car, "30 yards away." Not only this, but Edward has to bring her to Jacob and hand her off. Bella admits to this experience degrading her to the level of a child. "'It's like when I was a kid and Renee would pass me off to Charlie for the summer. I feel like a seven year old.'" Seriously, when characters in the story admit something about the story itself, you know it's true. Jacob actually tells Bella in Eclipse, "Is he your warden, now, too. You know, I saw this program on the news last week about controlling, abusive teenage relationships and-'" Of course, in the fashion of a girl in an abusive relationship, she denies it, cutting Jacob off mid-sentence and pushing him out of the house.

Bella never is able to save herself from any situation. Edward saves her so many times, that he admits, "Keeping you safe is beginning to feel like a full time occupation." He saves her from horny, drunken men, various vampires, and the doldrums of high school life. He saves her so much, he even tries to save her when he's not actually there. Bella's so accustomed to having him save her, that when he's not there in New Moon, her subconscious produces an Edward to try to save her.

Speaking of New Moon, why does Bella not find happiness again until she finds a specific man? She "felt much healthier with Jacob." Why could she not feel much healthier when she wrote poems or stories, why not when she took up an interest in the school yearbook? There are a whole bevy of activities that have been known to ease the pain of a loss, but Bella has to wait until she finds another man.

So, why exactly does Edward need to save her all the time? Surely a non-Stephenie Meyer created human would be able to handle him or herself in at least one kind of situation! Edward takes it upon himself to protect her because she is a danger magnet, he always feels obligated to save her because "If there is any trouble within a ten mile radius, it will invariably find you." He also wants to protect her from her klutziness so inhuman that it's described as "'The fact that you can't walk across a flat, stable surface without finding something to trip over.'" Nobody would truthfully say, "I was serious. . .when I told you not to fall in the ocean."Meyer is specifically trying to make her the damsel in distress; no human is so klutzy for someone to say that "You fell down two flights of stairs and through a window. You have to admit, it could happen." Damsels in distress are not allowed to save themselves and others, thus when, in Eclipse, Bella tries to break out of her damsel in distress status, Stephenie Meyer denies it to her. "Both fights were too close. Seth was about to lose his, and I had no idea if Edward was winning or losing. They needed help. A distraction." Bella then comes up with a plan to save them. Of course, though, Bella's attempt to save her friends was noble, but unnecessary, the men had it under control. Edward tells her that, "'Seth was only feigning that he was hurt, Bella. It was a trick.'" He also tells her that she almost gave him a heart attack when she tried to execute her plan to spill her blood to distract Victoria and Riley, and most importantly, not to do something like that again. So Edward would like for Bella to never try to help again.

It's not just Edward and Bella, though. We have one more gleaming example, this time from the semi-villain Volturi. Of the entire Volturi guard who came in Breaking Dawn, who is everyone surprised to see? The wives; "two drifting. . .figures in the back. . .their sheltered position suggesting they would not be involved in the attack."

A person who was new to our culture who read the Twilight Saga would come to the unfortunate conclusion that a woman's life culminates with motherhood. Apparently nothing else matters, if most of her major characters spend at least some time angsting over their sterility. Esme is said to make due with her adopted children, but apparently it's not the same. If one was killed, I doubt she would jump off a cliff in despair like she did when her human son died! Yes, when her infant died there was nothing else to live for, suicide being the only option! Speaking of Esme, it seems that being a mother figure is her only job. Never once do we see her fight. She doesn't even play baseball; she referees because she "'likes keeping them honest'" as a mother must do with two of her sons. She doesn't play, she gets the mother's job. In fact, it is even implied that Esme's special gift that gets carried over into vampirism and amplified is mothering instinct. Her instinct is so strong, it's as if it were carried over and amplified, not to mention its similarity to Carlisle's compassion (both being personality traits that have only grown stronger with vampirism), which has, on numerous occasions, been described as his gift.

Now we move on to Leah, the werewolf. Nobody wants to be around her because they can all hear each others' thoughts, and hers are full of angst. Nobody knows why she's so upset though, until she pours her heart out to Jacob in Eclipse. "'I'm a genetic dead end and we both know it!. . .I'm menopausal! I'm twenty years old and I'm menopausal!'" Which brings us to the pinnacle of lack-of-maternity angst, Rosalie. Throughout Twilight, New Moon and Eclipse, Bella describes Rosalie as seeming to hate her every time she sees her. When Rosalie explains her history, Bella asks, "But you still don't like me. . .Would you tell me why?" to which Rosalie responds, "You have a whole life ahead of you- everything I want. And you're going to just throw it away!" So what is it that Rosalie wants? ". . .so I could have pretty babies. That's what I'd wanted all along." She even explains that she saved Emmett from the bear that was killing him for one reason: he looked similar to her former human friend's young son, Henry, with whom she had always played and regarded as a symbol for her wanting her own children. She chose her mate because he reminded her of her desire to have children. Speaking of, why do the men never angst about their sterility, since up until Breaking Dawn, they thought that they were sterile? Apparently fatherhood is not as important as motherhood, so it's not as big a deal to forsake.

If the purpose of a woman is motherhood, why should she live if it would mean the death of her child? Apparently, this is Bella's philosophy. Renesmee is killing Bella from the inside, and what does she do? Not care. She doesn't care. Jacob yells for Edward and the rest to "'Get it out of her!'" but apparently "'She won't let us.'" Apparently, "'She's ready to die to have a child.'" Of course there was no way that Stephenie Meyer was going to kill Bella off, but in their universe, independent of their status as characters in a book, there was a very real chance that they might not have been able to save Bella. Unfortunately, Bella does not care. Motherhood is more important that her own life, which I suppose it should, if being a mother is a woman's purpose. Speaking of Renesmee, of course a woman's purpose is to have children, why else would Bella get pregnant so soon after her marriage? Seriously, it's maybe about a week or two. I really doubt that a lot of women get pregnant the very first time they have sex, but since motherhood is the purpose in a woman's life, I guess that she should get to it as soon as possible.

How sad it is that our culture has regressed this far as to have these books become popular. Think of the consequences of these novels! A whole generation of girls will grow up thinking that this twisted sense of femininity is the ideal! Of course, if they act this way, men will be quick to take advantage, and we'll be right back where we started, having to push for equality where it is not welcome. Unfortunately, the one benefit of these novels, getting the ditzy girls to actually crack open a book, is outweighed by it's enormous impact on our culture. The worst part is, nobody is noticing what these books are really doing, undermining the image of the healthy, self-sufficient woman as attractive. I think it's time to bring Buffy back.

(Go to rebelliouspixels .com for an enlightening, and entertaining, video on the sexism inherent in the Twilight Saga, and the gender equality inherent in Buffy the Vampire Slayer)