Hi! Hello! this is not a message you would probably think to receive, but i must say : THANK YOU! i recently became disabled to the point where i cant hear no more sound, and i missed a ton essays on youtube since most of them don't appear to have subtitles! Thank you soo much for the hard work to put them in!
Hi, I actually need to thank you for leaving this comment. See im legally blind. I'm currently editing a video. Naturally I've made everything big enough for me to see and read. But I wasn't considering other people. Who might have similar but different considerations. I even said I don't need a subtitle track. So again thanks for leaving your comment. Take care and have a good one 🫡
I really felt the "There's so many hills I'm already dying on." I feel that exhaustion. Trying to still have things for yourself when it seems like everything has a negative.
I feel like it’s great understanding why you something you like can be bad but being on the internet and seeing people constantly trash on stuff can be really exhausting
the phrase i find helpful is 'There is no ethical consumption under Capitalism/the Current System'. not as an excuse, but as a way of seeing that you cant really escape from interacting with bloodstained things while the world remains exploitative and based on violence and imperialism.
Eventually you need to internalize that the shallow impressions of people you will never meet matter less than a box of cat poo, or you will drive yourself to destruction. And let he without cognitive dissonance cast the first comment, anyways.
It's really become one of the most exhaustive things in life for people with any sort of social conscience these days. It's very difficult to give a shit when you are bombarded from every direction regardless of how hard you try. To me this is one of those issues that has been packaged up and foisted upon us by "the powers that be" so they can say bullshit about how the change needs to be done by us from the ground up, when in reality the systems that need changing are so overwhelmingly massive and set in place that the only way they will see meaningful changes is from a national governmental level or by the massive corporations causing the problems (lol like that would ever happen). That isn't to say you should give up and do nothing, but more accept that there is only so much you can do while still trying to live a practical life, and that it's impossible to live guilt-free inside our current rampantly unchecked capitalist society.
If you’re looking for critiques of Twilight from an indigenous perspective (there’s PLENTY to dissect and vivisect against Meyer and the fan reception of the twilight series) Ali Nahdee’s essay about twilight is absolutely amazing and deserves more eyeballs!
Thank you for mentioning that video! I ended up watching it today and it was really interesting to hear about it from a First Nations perspective. While I’ve heard some people mention the racism and domestic abuse of Emily, Ali added some cultural and historical context that floored me.
Hello! This is the most autobiographical piece of work I have ever made, public or private. If you're not a fan of this format, don't worry. I'll be back to my regularly scheduled video style with the next upload. Although I've made an effort to substantiate every genuine claim I make in this video with sources, you'll notice most of it is subjective opinion/anecdotes. That's intentional! This is the 10 year anniversary to the year I first left home and stepped out into the big wide world. I am over double the age I was when I read Twilight, and as part of starting a new chapter I needed to work through some stuff: to celebrate some things, and let go of others. (and yes, it is monetised. I apologise, but I really do rely on the adsense from EVERY upload 😢my country's economy is shagged). "Please be respectful" always goes without saying, but I just wanted to emphasise it here. This is not intended to be analysis or education. It's a subjective reflection/discussion piece that I spent over a month writing and re-writing and re-writing. Please do not hold this video to the same standard of rigour as my others, but rather recognise it for what it is: a girl reflecting on the factors that influenced her growth, who she is today, and what she cares about. Maybe you'll see some of you in there too? Maybe not. Either way... I hope you enjoy the video :)
Also check out Ali Nahdee's video titled "ONE SCENE FOR FORGIVENESS / THE TWILIGHT SAGA IS RACIST": ua-cam.com/video/AVKTdkSny6A/v-deo.html&ab_channel=AliNahdee, which has come hotly recommended in the comments.
You've come a long way as a content creator. I haven't been here that long (Rachel Foster video brought me in), but your analysis has been getting more and more insightful every video. I haven't watched all of this one yet since I'm doing the ADHD thing, but I think you're being overly self conscious (I can relate). Just because you aren't referencing well known thinkers (ie dead white dudes) doesn't mean you won't contribute something of worth. Either way congrats on your 10th anniversary. Your voice is really becoming your own.
This is genuinely so good. Something always bothered me about video essays that only look at it as an adult reader today. Your sections about being socially excluded and then socially inept particularly struck a chord with me. I based a lot of how I saw irl conversations from dialogue I read in books, not necessarily Twilight, but YA in generally. Using these books as a reference for real life as a young, quiet preteen was something I had to spend several years of adulthood fixing. Thinking about how I viewed sex and relationships through these books is even more complex and messy. Once again thanks for your analysis and emphasis on personal experience.
Now that you say it out loud, I see the autism. I mean, I’m not a licensed psychologist or anything, but I’ve been on the spectrum long enough to recognize my own kind-especially that part about the cycle of ostracization stunting your development as a social animal. When you already are at a disadvantage at recognizing subtle social cues being further isolated from your peers *by* your peers is more cruel than they can even intend.
I loved it. I really felt like you were sharing your heart (in a far more concise and organized way than I ever could.) All your videos are amazing, I'm consistently blown away by how well put together they are, and (I assume) mostly by your own hand, not a team of professional editors, set designers, etc. like so many larger video essayists have!
Fanfiction is so full of hills, you'd think you were looking at a forest from a distance. That is, until you notice that most of those hills are either covered in corpses or have one singular body at the very top. I still remember pre-purge tumblr being... an interesting place.
Already commented once, but honestly, thank you for talking about non-consent fantasies. I won't go too much into this because it would just be weird, but I've had fantasies like that for waaaaay longer than one would expect. Naturally I've had a LOT of guilty feelings about that, wondering if there's something wrong with me, if I'll get desensitized to real abuse, or if I'm downplaying it. It's not something people really talk about, and I've always been terrified that I'd be shunned if I talked to anyone about it. I've just eventually come to the conclusion that unlike in real life, fantasies about situations like that are able to be consensual in a way reality obviously never could be. If I'm imagining something, I have the easiest safe word in the world; I can just stop imagining it. It doesn't mean I'd want those things in real life, but exploring aspects of myself through fiction has helped me in many ways, including with figuring out my gender identity and sexuality. But you also didn't gloss over the possible negative effects, which I'm happy for. I do wonder how my preferences might have changed depending on the kinds of fiction I was exposed to. I DID find some really dark stuff at a very young age too, because I was morbidly curious, and I'm sure not all of that has changed me strictly for the better. Sorry for the ramble, appreciate you as always!
genuinely heard horror stories of the Ezra epidemic, back when Pretty Little Liars was still in. if there's just one show aimed at teenage girls that i would call genuinely dangerous, it's that one.
38:01 Back in my fanfiction days, I wrote a ton of stuff where I tried to tell an original story set in a world which maybe would have cameo appearances by the main cast, but were ultimately side stories that just shared a universe. I think it was because I wanted to be a writer at one point and found it easy to play with other people’s toys, so to speak. But it was also a way I could interact more deeply with the media I consumed
So, about incest: Incest has a problem irl is that often its not named. People may see what is happening, but its "teasing" or familial love or something. And then when you speak up things are not taken seriously or are hushed up. Incest is too strong, too unthinkable to a lot of people, thus allowing it to be normalised. Incest is also more often than not an abusive dynamic, not an affair between two equals.
I was really thrown for a loop when she started talking about it. So many victims, in general, are victims of incest. In the cases I knew of personally, the SA wasn't even addressed because it was family. Incest gets to be "not taboo" by it being not addressed at all to begin with...
As someone who writes extensive amount of fanfiction, read even more, as far back to the age of 12 (Twilight was my first exposure to gay fanfiction in fact, this goes out to the mpreg I stumbled over) I feel like you just cracked open my soul in this video holy shit. Amazing work and thank you for allowing yourself to be so vulnerable. I had a similar upbringing with the bullying and probably need that autism diagnosis (but like you said, what would that prove at this rate at almost 30) and it always astounds me how others find their comforts in fanfiction, sexual or otherwise. Sex being that taboo thing that I wasn't allowed to understand until stumbling over Jacob shagging Edward and being like: woah. That's a thing. I don't think Breaking Dawn had been released yet. Sorry Stephanie, random fanfiction beat you to the first Twilight sex exposure.
Thank you Jerome. I cut SO much from the last section of this video and your comment singlehandedly made me wish I left it in, because you have made me feel so understood. Thank you for this comment. I feel healed
How’s your writing been going and how has it changed as you aged? I considered starting to write fanfiction again, since I have more free time and want to exercise my writing muscles in a low commitment way. The problem is, all of my ideas are for IPs that are basically dead.
@Magnesium-BasedLifeform-i9e It's interesting because I've seen it become more detailed to the point that I actually need to start cutting back on it. Themes have changed, going from romance to vengeance to grief, and it really reflected my mental health over the years, too. Darker times are so extreme I'm almost ashamed of it but it's how I could see that my past self was hurting. It's an outlet more than anything else. Some of my IPs are definitely dead and it does hurt my motivation to write, but being able to express emotions over dumb things like Leon S. Kennedy having a pet frog he names after a past partner and then dealing with grief over it and coming to terms is very healing. I'll always tell people it's never too late to write, just like it's never too late to start drawing. You always have the chance to help someone in what you create too
@@JeromeSankara Thanks for the reply. I’m mostly trying to explore the BioShock and Halo IP’s, particularly what their extraordinary environments do to ordinary people. My favorite part of playing any videogame is stopping and ogling the setting to try and recreate what life was like for the people in the setting before/after the story happens, and Fanfiction is a great way to do that.
@Magnesium-BasedLifeform-i9e Oooooo I like that! I wouldn't say the Halo fandom is super dead, though it probably is one that doesn't have a lot of writers for it. You could open your way up with crossovers into the universe! Someone experiencing it for the first time sort of thing and marveling at the world. I'm currently writing for the Death Stranding fandom and I love interacting in a world that is so against survival yet people still find a way to survive and connect both good and bad.
i think there's also something to be said about the fact that people act as if art was created in a vacuum, and its creators weren't also part of society and subject to its beliefs? you touch on it briefly on your discussion of meyer's mormonism, and i think it's a part of the discussion that always gets left out. if so many romance books have this kind of alpha male billionaire love interest, isn't it worth questioning why the authors and readers (who, i'm assuming, are the same kind of demographic) find this archetype attractive? yes, it's a fantasy, but why is it a fantasy that props up patriarchal relationships within a capitalist system? i don't ask this in judgement, but more so in curiosity. we know we live in a sexist society that often reduces women to objects for the sexual gratification of men, so yeah, i think we can spare a bit of critical thinking about these stories beyond "it's fiction and not real!". sorry for the word salad here, this is a topic i find endlessly fascinating!! this was a great video, thank you for posting!
Absolutely! People really love to act like their desires have no relationship to their experiences and societal concepts and it always annoys me. Nobody is making them stop enjoying certain fantasies but they might as well think about them for a second to live them out healthily and consensually. If not for their own sake, then for the sake of the people and stories they are attracted to?
I stopped giving Twilight shit when I saw that 4chan post saying "Imagine you, as a guy, having a classy pale readeheaded vampire and hotheaded tanned tomboy werewolf fighting for you." and I was like "I gett it now." Even then, back in 2008, I could still somewhat relate to Bella - the weird kid moving out but she manages to find friends and lover. That's cozy. I do think society gives a harsh judgement to young girls and women in general, whence why CNC is popular - you can't blame them, they were "forced". Most of this issues can starting being solved when we as a society stop giving shit to women about everything. With this said, fuck Twilight tho, that shit is ass, although, I no longer mind it's existence nor judge people who do, but I think it cant still criticized fairly. Happy New Year, Merty! Cheers!
I’m on your side about blooper still - I’m glad they did well with SH2 but, much like with the Sonic movie, I think Bloober saw the criticisms (like yours) of their other games and incorporated it into SH2 (so ty for doing it!)
As a father of a boy, the topics you raised are often on my mind. Perspectives such as yours help to navigate those issues. Thank you for sharing your story. Also: big fan of your chanel, love your work.
Man, seems like I could listen to you talk about pretty much anything and find it interesting. It's rare for me to find someone whose videos I'll watch without fail, no matter the subject!
Excellent video! What we consume does shape us! Aside based on the fanfiction chapter of this video. I remember existing (and still exist) in the Gen category of fanfiction as a teenager. I didn’t flock to the romance flame, but that doesn’t mean that fanfiction didn’t shape me in some way - tropes still exist when you aren’t reading/writing attractive characters banging. I’ll take this as an invitation to think about ways I was shaped by it! Thanks!
Okay I'm going to be completely transparent here; I'm much more keen on viewing hantei over live-action stuff because I don't have to think about the possibility of horrifying ethical violations occurring behind the scenes, of which I would prefer not to get into. It's like watching the anime of Death Note and knowing that I'm not watching actual footage of a horrific train crash in which actual people died, and that many victims and their loved ones were very outspoken about the use of that footage instead of literally any other B-roll.
I never understood the appeal of hentai over real people Especially when hentai sometimes more often than not has designs that border on being underaged people not adults
@chandlerburse It's not a more often than not situation, in fact its quite easy to avoid stuff with those designs. That's not to say it isn't a problem, it's way more prevelant than it ever should be. But it's not as prevalent as you say.
As someone who got bullied daily all through primary school, I just wanna say I'm sorry to hear that it happened to you too. Luckily I went to a different high school to all the people who gave me a rough time and got to be virtually invisible after that, but the damage was already done. Permanent self-esteem issues. . . I also have feeling I'm neurodiverse too, but can't afford to get tested atm. Nobody really tested girls for Autism and ADHD in the 90s. Anyway, I love your work and have always thought you were AWESOME! I know it must have been scary, but thank you for sharing your story. . .
@@coldturnipgreensIt's a miracle your wind pipe hasn't been crushed yet, wait no miracles are good but unlikely this is a tragedy but it won't last long
One of my main thoughts about Twilight is the fact that Edward sneaking into Bella’s room and watching her sleep ISN’T seen as creepy. Like I’m sorry if I woke up and saw a guy standing in my room watching me, I’d be screaming! Do not allow young people to think that is acceptable behavior
Mert, this is absolutely one of the best, most thoughtful and nuanced essays you've made so far. There were so many points you touched on throughout the video that I found myself deeply relating to. While I'm not a woman nor have I ever read twilight, as a gay guy who grew up in a conservative, religious household that also had an internet connection, this video really hit home for me in ways that I can't even get into without writing an essay myself. 54:40 "Yes Edward is problematic, yes he is not real, no [...] that doesn't really matter" this line in particular, as well as everything that lead up to it, hit me like a truck, but kinda in a good way... hear me out. There's so little room for nuance when discussing porn addiction online, especially when that content is drawn/written/etc. It's so often downplayed with phrases like "oh it's just a drawing, it's fantasy, it's not a big deal." But I've personally met enough people in online communities who seem to be physically incapable of keeping it in their pants to confidently say otherwise. Having been a sexually repressed gay teenager with an iphone and a discord account, you can imagine just how often I'd come across people online that seemed to value their own sexual gratification above my emotional well-being. They'd all have similar justifications for their actions with phrases like "you're making a big deal out of it, it's not real, it's just art/role play/fantasy/etc, it's okay because it's online." After being dismissed so many times in the past with "No it's not problematic because it's not real," hearing "Yes it's not real. No that doesn't really matter" is just so refreshing, you have no idea.
I really really appreciate this perspective. The internet operates on such a hazy level of “real” and things like cyber bullying / grooming can seem distant until they really affect you. Sexual development in the wild west era of the internet was such a mine-field and I really hope this becomes a larger conversation for every generation who grows up online.
23:37 I think that something people don't realize is that most incest is abuse. Most incest isn't "my stepsister is too hot", it's children being groomed by adults in their family, or victims of COCSA.
As a certified Good Girl (tm) who just couldn’t bring myself to read anything overtly sexual in high school, I am so thankful for Stephanie Meyer and the Twilight series for allowing me to explore my sexuality in a “safe” way that didn’t make me feel incredibly guilty. Those books will always have a special place in my heart.
I don't want to just repeat the same points made in this video, but I can confirm that consuming an abundance of media that romanticized grooming at a young age made me EXTREMELY groomable myself. I can draw a direct line between each experience of grooming in my real life, and the media that I consumed that caused me not to question it
I don't want to dogpile too much on our anonymous commenter, who might also be reading this right now. But I think it's pretty telling that they tell their own story, "When I was 14, I recognized a teacher-student relationship as predatory, and another 14 year old friend of mine did not," and that their take-away from this memory is not only "I am the Normal one, my friend just needed therapy," but also that they then extrapolate to "most people are normal, therefore most 14 year old readers are also going to recognize teacher-student relationships are predatory." Like, they had a direct example otherwise, and based on their anecdote we only have a sample rate of 50/50.
I think the difference is empathy. I've had a similar experience even down to the age (difference was said friend was dating an 18 year old even after I told her I thought there was something weird about him) but instead of not understanding why she didn't recognize the age difference as bad, I was left wondering why the hell the dude was being a weirdo (found out later its because he's an awful person to his partners after what I'd been informed of). Not everyone is going to recognize when sketchy things are happening, but people are more likely to say "I can see it, why don't you" because a lot of people, especially when they're younger, don't recognize that their knowledge and experiences don't always match others.
If you want to be pedantic, then "most people are normal" is true. Normal is defined by common factors among a group, after all. That said, sussing out what is normal among a group is harder than people seem to realize. Most people could probably figure out what's normal in their friend group or family, but if they try to apply those "normal things" to larger (or even just different) groups, their definitions tend to fall apart. Like Mert was saying, it's kind of a lottery what you will or won't find normal.
I agree. And the funny thing is that I've caught myself making similar arguments as that commenter in relation to the romance genre. I really like how Mert furthered this discussion and complicated it. Every time I try to defend my opinions on why problematic romance has a right to exist I also feel that dissonance of reducing a nuanced issue into something more simple and defensible. I'm conscious of the fact that 14 year old me had some very wrong and unhealthy ideas about relationships in part because of secretly reading smut. Thanks to decent Sex Ed and healthy influences I managed to develop a more healthy mindset as I grew up, but I've become gradually more aware over the years that many kids didn't have those wrong assumptions adequately dealt with. I remember reading student teacher romances in manga and never pausing to think about how screwed up and abusive that was.
Freakin’ JUMPED to this video when I got this notification. You’re fr one of my favourite deep dive/video essay creators (your video on It is one of my fave vids on UA-cam) and I always look forward to the next topic/IP you cover XD 🖤🖤
I think a lot of progressive internet discourses have a tendency to lean to black and white echo-chamber territory, and the Twilight discussion is no exception. The assumption that the "normal teen" knows that romance books are just fantasy fulfillment and we live in a post-sexual revolution feminist utopia is something that I've come across multiple times in well intentioned but deeply flawed think pieces, comments, etc. from progressive online circles (not trying to say that Contrapoints made that assumption, she didn't, but as you mention some people reduced her arguments, and I think it's because of that misconception). I was also a bullied working class girl (just from LATAM) and GOD, I have yet to meet a fellow woman from my same upbringing who have not suffered SA and/or grooming and normalized it at some point of her life. While we can't blame problematic romance media as the main culprit it doesn't exist in a vacuum, moreover a lot of the time it's the only exposure to romance and sex that we have. If our fantasy escapisms are equally misogynist as our environment, we almost have no room to understand that their problematic portraits of love are wrong at a young age, before the trauma happens to us.
6:47 Funnily enough, I remember when the internet called the Devil Wears Prada movie the most embarrassing movie Meryl Streep ever agreed to star in up until 2016
I plan to do a video on it! I rewatched it on my birthday and, while I do love it, it is a bizarre mish-mash of hypocrisies. Always wanted to unpack it
As someone dipping my toes into making video essays, this was really interesting to think about how discourse evolves. Edit: ok had time to actually sit down and think. As someone grew up a girl (I'm trans - not related but just sharing grew up socialized similarly) ...My teens were during the dial-up days, spent roleplaying Star Wars OCs in AOL chatrooms. It was one of my main exposures to sexuality, through 'dating' other ppls' OCs, I remember being 12 or 13 and 'dating' a 19 year old, he asked me some very messed up things I never clocked as problematic until years later... This essay reminds me of how frustrating it is that humanity is bad at passing on information - isn't that just a byproduct of our mortality though, and how inefficient it is for each generation to rebel, struggle with, then pass on info to the next generation too? I don't think there's a solution but sometimes the 'system' of mortality just causes inefficient education I guess? Welcome to my possibly-undiagnosed-autistic thoughts lol. Also shoutout to "orbs" haha that took me back.
Funky! :D Hello! Happy New Year. I love your point about the inefficiency of passing on info - I think that's totally fair. Also the imprecision and the imperfection. No voice is truly untainted and our parents are a product of their parents and so on and so forth. Maybe humanity will refine itself eventually, but it will be a long way away.
Always so insane how you release a video about stuff I'm also currently thinking about. Truly one of my favorite people on the internet, always feels like hearing from a friend.
What hit me about this video is your vulnerability. I think that takes an incredible amount of bravery, not only in talking about your own experience, but in acknowledging the complexity of both the subject and the discussion itself. I hope this video could be some form of catharsis - I know for myself, it served as an important reminder of the nuance of such a topic, as my own biased experiences with fanfic become distant. Thank you for that
Your miserable childhood is so relatable. Its hard to imagine you as someone who struggled with making friends and were cast out. Not everyone makes it out alive and hearing you share your experience is so touching. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your vulnerability i love you mert, you deserved better 🥺❤
As a gay guy in an all boys school in Devon of all places, the ostracisation until uni feels very relatable - especially in bristol - now I’m quite a popular guy with lots of friends (apply a humble tone) and yet every time I go home and see someone from school I crumble back into feeling like I need to be quiet and discreet. It’s so strange because of how much ive grown, yet it still hasn’t left me. That I should have known to be who I am now back then is such a weird way of thinking :/
The argument of “harmful abuse in fiction doesn’t impact people in real life, and if it does those people need therapy” is so disheartening cause I was negatively impacted by stuff like this as a kid. I had amazing parents, great friends, a super safe community, and an altogether quite wonderful adolescence surrounded by unconditional healthy love. I was also surrounded by media that depicted romantic relationships like this. I based my first understandings of romance off these depictions, which led me to very dangerous situations. Is that Meyer’s fault? No, but it wasn’t mine either. I was a young girl who just wanted the type of love depicted in a lot of the surrounding media marketed towards me. Also just have to say, reading these books as an adult, the racism is SO blatant. Not even just the werewolves, pay attention to how Meyer describes the vampires of color. Great video!
Really appreciate your perspective! I'm a big fan of both you and Contrapoints and I love getting to see someone add important context while highlighting why they still find the content they're responding to worthwhile even if they disagree/felt something was missing.
Something that I always wonder with this discourse is, how far will the people who believe in it take it? My WoW characters are dangerous mass murderers with hundreds of thousands of kills. Do they believe this is what I crave in real life?
Thank you for bringing your perspective to the table!! I often find that discussions around the effect of media on the minds of consumers are needlessly black and white, and harassing the people who enjoy the fiction rather than the fiction itself (as it often happens online) is horribly counterproductive. Likewise, telling people who are uncomfortable with certain art that they're underdeveloped for it is faulty. Art is a product of life, and life imitates art. The only true solution to this conflict is education, and the next best thing given its lack in schooling is patience and understanding for our fellow people, especially young ones 🙏
Fabrication rec: Luminosity. It's twilight but Bella is very pragmatic, and basically becomes aware she's in a romance novel. It's so fascinating. It also discusses the problems with imprinting as being basically grooming.
I feel this "fiction isn't reflective of who you are" thing, I am a Berserk Fan, its impossible to have any kind of nuanced discussion about it in some circles.
"yeah I like Griffith. He's a cool and well written vi--" Average berserk fan: OH SO YOU'RE A GRAPIST AND AN INCEL HUH? I swear berserk fans can't tell reality from fantasy. They'll lose their mind in the GOT community lol.
Man, there's so much in this video that I have half-formed opinions on and frankly don't wish to verbalize because, to be honest, it's not something I know well enough to give a worthwhile opinion on, you know? The one thing I can give an opinion on is your experiences growing up. I'm sorry you had to live through that bullshit from your classmates and it makes me quite grateful that my social ostracization was purely neutral and never negative. I'm glad you've grown past that, obviously, and are writing and putting out such interesting material. You're 100% correct in the essay format being one to many and subsequently having to kind of contend with a deluge of opinions with greater nuance than could ever be handled by any one person. So I'll close by saying that I'm glad most or all of that shit is behind you, that you're doing great things, and that you're employee of the month. Congratulations!
I really appreciate this analysis because it covers an issue I've had with YA fiction for a long time. It's written by grown women who have mostly, if they're good writers, finished their emotional development. Their sixteen year olds aren't sixteen year olds- they're heroic, aspirational, thirty year old fantasies of being sixteen again. Unfortunately this was not clear to me when I was twelve and reading their work. We have some similarities. My family wasn't poor but I was a weird kid with intense interests, I had a couple of friends but not tons. I lived on a farm with no close age siblings, so my social development was stunted as hell. Public education in my conservative state was a total joke, so I was learning many important things from books and the internet, even though I exceeded at school. The YA I read had a lot of girl power fantasies. I figured I was in the clear, because I didn't read passive wallflowers like Bella. I liked sword and sorcery stuff, and for some reason, even feminist authors like Tamora Pierce and Robin McKinley loved age gaps. I do not think either of these women or the other less known authors were into grooming. I think they grew up in the 70s where older men dating younger women was grossly normalized, had age gaps with their husbands, then rewound that too far to teenagers without thinking about it enough. I know now. When I engaged with their fiction, I didn't. I was a young teen, bi and in denial about it, and I could not stand young men my age. Answers for my problems lay in understanding that boys are taught patriarchal behavior, and that some of my resentment wasn't about them at all, it was about how much attention my girl crushes were giving them. The tools I needed to face these answers were not readily accessible to me in Dirt Road Arizona. Fantasy books were. Fantasy books had an easy answer to my issues with boys. Maturity, just like my mom said! Boys were an obstacle to most cool sword girls, just like they were to me. Smart, tough girls that were not like other girls didn't need gross boys, oh no. We needed something more refined. Sophisticated. Something like a vampire count who swills wine and has four hundred years worth of scholarly writings in his head to discuss. Or like the hot centuries old elf mage who has wise answers to everything and heals wounds in a way that requires loads of tender touches after a badass dragon fight. At least those examples were safely impossible. The dangerous one for me was the worldly, handsome, but young at heart teacher, who was head over heels for his underage student. It wasn't weird and unequal, you see, because the older guy was really nice and likeable, he wouldn't hurt a fly. And the girl was hypercompetent and mature! Like you talked about, I vaguely knew that this was not okay and not allowed, but I didn't really get what that meant. "Age gaps are weird" was more of an abstract rule to me than a fully understood truth. Internalizing that older men were safer than young ones lead to some very not good situations in my late teens and early twenties. I didn't invite anything at work or school, but my boundaries were basically a one foot garden fence to the kinds of men I needed more of a twelve foot stone barricade against. It didn't go as far as rape, but it got close, and the emotional abuse I dealt with was incredibly damaging. More than one older guy messed with my head before I had enough important conversations with kind, helpful people to learn how screwed up the situations I was in were, even though I was technically of age. There was nothing in my life experience and education before that to warn me, and a lot of the stories I read set me up to be too trusting of older men's interest. The problem isn't any one YA book, it's how many there are with this idea, and the culture the women writing this idea were raised in. Edward has an insane age gap with Bella that's just glossed over. The Cool Immortal or Older Guy Who Just Gets the Very Special Weird Girl is a staple of fantasy. Older adults making younger people feel special and different from their peers is also Grooming 101. I doubt anyone who thinks age gaps are hot is thinking that though. Nobody who wrote that stuff is to blame for how I lagged behind in emotional development, nobody writing age gaps is trying to prime the reader for abuse. Some of those authors probably were abused considering their age and what the world was like before I was born. It would have been really, really good for me to see someone ripping apart age gap relationships with scalpel precision when I was younger, like you said about abuse in the video. I don't think all age gaps are evil, I especially don't think all age gaps in fiction are evil, but I do think it's important for age gaps to be examined with a level head and an eye towards power dynamics. Critique like that can help vulnerable people make informed decisions about what kind of people they trust. Sorry for the essay, this video gave me a lot of thoughts. Thank you for making it.
I love this video and tackling it respectfully. I think your argument that someone saying "people arent dumb and know better" can also be applied to people who say "I didnt do x y z bad thing when I was 16" People seem to think just because they knew better than to do the wrong thing means that other people should even if they had different lived experiences that coild imfluence their idea of right and wrong. It's honestly disheartening how unempathetic people are on the internet holding everyone to their moral standards without thinking about how other people might not be able to meet those standards because of their lived experiences Also another APH: Russia fan!!
Thank you for making this video. You might not be the first or the only person speaking on these topics, but it's important to keep it in people's minds.
Thank you for this, it really helped tie up some of the loose threads in my mind after Contrapoint's video. I came away from that with the philosophy "If a single work of fiction is enough to push a young girl into an abusive relationship, then censoring _Twilight_ would not have saved her because there were already too many other factors working against her." And after your video, I think I can actually argue those factors more articulately.
As a fan of both your and contrapoints I think you’ve handled expanding on the original video essay really well. I think you made a really valid point that video essays work on a level of viewer understanding the same way an academic essay does. I like your explicit aim to “yes and also…” contrapoints video. Really enjoyed this one 😊
This was a really good video, thank you for sharing ^^ And I'm glad you didn't go through with keeping in the parts that made you uncomfortable. No one should feel like they have to expose their hurts to be taken seriously.
It's comforting to see someone else who's gone through the same sense of social isolation as a child, and to hear the impact it's had on you into your adult years. I still, to this day, struggle to interact with people, struggling to know what to say, when to say things, and I can put it all down to being isolated and ostracised as a child. It's horrible that you've had to go through that, but I hope you know you've provided me with a sense of comfort and belonging by opening up about your experiences
Only 30 minutes into the video but just wanted to comment and say I’m so glad you’re a creator who is so incredibly thoughtful and mindful, it’s really rewarding listening to your thoughts and I love how you present them.
As someone who also grew up heavily bullied in school I just want to reach through the screen and give you a hug. The most appalling thing to me is always when people go through that and the adults don't give a shit. What is wrong with those adults? I have myself since come to realize that I am definitely on the autism spectrum and that is part of the reason why other kids believe me so badly, but there's an aspect of internalizing that that does not normalize the harm. Just because they saw something that was certainly there that made me weird doesn't make it okay that they treated me like shit. And the same goes for your situation. 🫂
"I don't agree with her on every opinion she has but her opinions are so reasonably well reasoned that I respect every word out of her mouth" : THIS! This is the same way I feel when I watch your videos ❤
I would never see myself watching deep dives on horror games I played or watched videos about before and yet ... You somehow bring something to the lore noone managed to spoon feed me with before. I probably went trough your whole Chanel by now, in span of couple days and while I listened to monotone, guy telling me more about song of horror than you played, he actually didn't tell me anything. It was your engaging, sometimes chuckle worthy narration that made me understand and actually listen to what you're saying. You're brilliant. I'm glad I found you
Thank you! I thought for the longest time that the whole calling eyes “orbs” thing was just something I noticed and got annoyed by. This was a wonderful video!
Thank you for bringing a load of nuance to a conversation that's sorely been missing it. By the time I read Twilight when I was 14, I'd thankfully already had a relatively decent sex education (it was still laser-focused on hetero missionary-style sex, but we had a lot of discussions about what healthy relationship look like, too, so...balance?). So I was one of those unicorns who could read Twilight as a teenager and let most of its problematic ideals slide right off of me. I ALSO distinctly remember having long conversations about the series with two adult counselors at a Christian summer camp, of all places, which probably helped me unpack things, too. As you said, our upbringing is a lottery. As an adult who writes fanfiction (canon cast, as you termed it, not self-insert -- no shade, that's just not my thing), I think one thing that's sorely missing from discussions about fanfiction's impact on younger minds is, well, the fact that it *can* impact young minds in unexpected ways. Doesn't meant that adults have to censor their own writing by avoiding certain topics, obviously, but it's certainly something worth bearing in mind. Also, I feel weird whenever someone mentions Quizilla, because I totally missed the boat on that one. Pity. Finally, thank you for being vulnerable to the extent you were on this video. I know it's not easy to do, and it's not required in a hellscape like UA-cam. I'm proud of your choice to cut that part of the video where you would have, to paraphrase, used your own trauma to make a point. Saying "sorry you were so badly bullied" feels a bit glib to me, but it is how I feel.
Thank you so much Jadu! This comment is such a "explore over a beer" kinda conversation because I have so many questions and UA-cam is very clunky at helping me return to comments I've responded to. Just wanted to say that I really enjoyed reading it and I appreciate your perspective massively Also I'm sorry you missed out on Quizilla, it were the tits :'(
53:03 so I think Japanese academia has discussed the effect of hentai on sex crimes in Japan, especially with chikan which is a term for sexual assault on public trains. I remember Al Jazeera covering an Osaka group started by a mom and daughter after the daughter complained she and friends would get groped to and from school in their uniforms regularly.
I hope you had some nice holidays. It's was heartbreaking to hear your story about growing up specially the part about how being ostracized affected your social development because I kinda went through the same. Just adding something that may be a little of tangent of what I was saying before, but I always hated when people say "girls mature faster than boys" because that phrase to me is at best a way to tell girls they should be looking for older man to provide to them (nothing inherently bad here) and at worst a way to justify and normalize teenage girls getting groomed by man 10 years older than them.
Jose you've been around on my channel a long time with your comments, and (while they're always a delight), this one felt especially poignant. Like, I feel like you really sat down and levelled with me here for the first time. Thanks for watching!
About boycotting: It's always good to realize that none of us are perfect and I really appreciate you putting your voice behind that! (Also to add, Starbucks and McDonald's are pro IDF so there's that too!)
The idea that liking (insert genre or trope here) *must* mean your morals match what you enjoy has always irked me. I love horror. Doesn't mean I condone murder. Fiction is fiction. By that logic, horror writers agree with murder. Writing or reading something isn't condoning it and it's a slippery slope to go down
About 18 and a half minutes in, and as usual, excellent work, I have no doubt I will continue to enjoy the rest. The UA-cam comment you're addressing reminds me of a simple sentiment that runs true for me and seems to encapsulate what the comment was talking about: it's only fun when it's not real. For example, I enjoy paintballing, clay pigeon shooting, and shooter games. But guns actually terrify me. I remember seeing a news clip of security footage of some kind of meeting with a panel or board and this man. The man pulls out a gun, and shoots the panel members. You hear them begging for their lives. That clip has haunted me since I saw it. I still enjoy various violent media, but since seeing that clip it just brought a whole new awareness to me that I only enjoy these things because they're not real. Another example, I love crime dramas and procedural shows, but I cannot for the life of me watch true crime documentaries unless they're historical. When it's real, it really gets to me.
(Pretty early in the video but thought I'd note for comment readers): Whilst I fully agree that no one healthy is going to start a wanting to be incestual based on fiction of incestual relationships, I think an important note on your script is that often in a real incestuous relationship there IS an abusive dynamic (be it between those in the relationship or the family in general), even where those involved are similar in age (and upsettingly... there is usually a generational divide involved, which is far more obviously abusive). This isn't a slight on you for writing your script this way since it's thus far not really a central topic, but since the follow up was re: not believing abuse victims & victim-blaming I thought it was worth noting. Depictions of incest kind of fall in the same zone as other depictions of abuse imo, it can be a very difficult line to tread, but when done well can be a valuable one? Unfortunately with fan-works on AO3 and other sites it seems rarely trodden well (at least judging from summaries & tags from what crops up untagged with a ship or when I forget to filter), and falls more into the realm of "I'd rather ignore their familial relationship" (weird because it's like... do family relationships mean nothing to you or???) or outright fetish (big ick). And you are so right to raise all the factors that lead to people that young realising something in fiction isn't necessarily okay. I got the proper "internet safety" spiel at school and thought I'd internalised it, but fandom spaces were a weakness I didn't notice when I was a precocious teen. I am... deeply lucky that the adults who shared inappropriate fanworks with me (and I'm not talking a lil bit saucy, I'm talking heavy kink and sometimes involving adult/minor) were just fucking idiots who didn't understand how to behave around teens instead of predators, because for a little while I absolutely could have been groomed off that stuff. And I had so many of those factors going for me.
hahaha omg the bit about hentai has me cackling wow ik this is different from ur usual content but i love it. You are great at sharing great info while striking a humorous balance :3 edit: wanted to say im so sorry for what happened to u! totally understand not keeping it in the video.
A lot of great points so far but I did want to add my two cents to the “House of the Dragon won’t make you do incest” point - I don’t think it’s helpful to frame real world incest as a conscious choice against social norms when in reality sibling incest is usually the result of years of predation, grooming, and familial dysfunction. I think it could be more useful to point out that watching House of the Dragon is not going to act as a substitute for the years of abuse that commonly precede sibling incest. Sibling incest in fiction is almost always rhetorical shorthand for moral degradation, social stratification, and corruption. The Lannisters own half the continent but are going to crumble from within. Sibling incest. King Robert’s rule is doomed. Sibling incest cuckery. The Targaryens are as gods to the common man and thus could never successfully rule the common man. Every incest imaginable. And so on. Sibling incest in fiction is the culmination of a downward spiral, and acts as shorthand to show us that things are degraded beyond repair.
Amazing point Tempy! And true. I should have specified. Also, WOW, yes, that makes so much sense! Rhetorical shorthand for moral degradation. Thanks, I honestly had no idea. Thanks for sharing, I didn't know. (No sarcasm at all)
I'm usually a silent viewer of your content, but I really loved this video. In an era of UA-cam where AI slop is so prevelant on my feed, you make such high quality content that is always a breath of fresh air.
to quote MertKayKay from a previous video, one which i often put on to fall asleep to, "i don't just feel seen but harassed by this." I read all the twilight novels at the same age range. I wrote anime fanfiction in middle school enough that i ran out of paper and wrote around the margins of already written pages. Once i grew up, i never looked back but i think i too needed that stage in my life.
Ali Nahdee did an excellent video on Twilights racism towards the Native community and how no one seems to want to talk about Emily (the one who was mauled) and her abuse but everyone acknowledges Bella and her abuse. It was really eye opening. Twilight is a bad series with horrible messages and racist overtones written by a white mormon who profited off making a fanfiction about a pre existing Tribe and hasn't given back a cent. It's not the same thing when fans do it. Oh and Alice is an extremely racist character. You don't go around mockingly telling a Native character that he's a dog and be a good person. I know he's a werewolf but you should look up the history of people using dehumanising language to people who are considered other. Think Jews and rats.
Really enjoyed this one. Hearing about your experiences with bullying and some of the other stuff you didn't get into, I think sharing that kind of stuff takes a lot of guts and didn't feel at all cheap or like you were after sympathy or anything. I appreciated you sharing it. I still want to say I am sorry you were treated badly and that this is one of my favorite channels because of how thoughtful you are regardless of the topic or how it relates to your personal experiences. I also think your hair is very cool. Thanks for another great watch as usual.
Great work on this video! You're absolutely right that its hard to communicate nuance through UA-cam, but I think you do a pretty good job of it. On the one hand, I oppose any blanket disapproval of fanfic, shipping, and/or adult content in general. But you're also right that we can't dismiss those things as completely harmless and safe. Even completely platonic stories can model some very messed up relationship dynamics. Thank you for this excellent video.
I've been thinking about this video all day, thanks for making this. I think there's a lot of room for nuance in this conversation, even if the Internet hates nuance, so thanks for making this.
1:06:55 so I have to admit I accidentally read a published essay collection of twilight critiques in middle school visiting a public library that absolutely smacked the series for being Mormon af which was why I grew out the series much sooner than my peers.
This was an interesting video essay, a format that would be cool to see some more of. Often I find when watching your videos, you go into more depth than other essay creators I watch and I personally like the deep dive analysis you do in your videos, they feel unique and are a blast to watch.
I think this is probably one of your best videos so far, there were so many things about critiques of media that I both agreed with but also were illuminated by in this video. I think I agreed most about your critique of how people further along in their development look back at people left behind as a 'personal failure' but never really had the words to articulate my thoughts on that. Thank you for all your hard work Mertkaykay!
I want to say that I have enjoyed both Contra Points and your videos extensively and you are definitely on par with her analyses. Without a doubt. You are well spoken and you drawn comarisons that are well researched and thoughtful to a degree I usually hadn't considered before your videos. (You're also fucking hilarious). I'm always delighted to see an upload from you. I just want you to know you're an amazing media analysist. Can't wait for your next video :)
This video made me feel seen in ways I wasn't expecting. From one "weird kid" in school with a Spyro and Naruto obsession to another, thank you, your videos always fill me with joy 💛
also i really appreciate you adding subtitles too! i saw someone mention that and it is really nice :) funnily enough tho if i hit subtitles it will go to autogen since youtube knows im a yanki and obviously, i cant speak uk english.
@@MertKayKay right? it's very silly. fortunately it still shows that there's formal subtitles on the video, so I know they're there and just have to select them. Theyre really good subtitles too- ssome people just copy paste the script and while thats nicer than nothing it shows that you put extra effort in.
I'm only 15 mins in and I can't stop giggling every time you say "Twilight Vertical Bar Contrapoints". Full gov't naming a video 😂😂😂 I'm so seated for this edit: 20 mins in and i'm ready to start a fund that gets this video essay in Times Square and on every major media outlet holy fucK THANK YYOOOOUUU
As someone who was deeply influenced by the media I consumed as a child, I really appreciate the points made in the video. While I have many good memories about my twilight era - aka meeting random people at the book store and talking for hours about something we loved, having playful fights with my friend about being Team Edward or Team Jakob (while secretly discovering Team Alice and Team Rosalie) - I think it is fair to critique the story. While it is also fair to say that a lot of critique esp. back then was done in bad faith. Both sides can and should exist equally. (Is it sad to admit that most of my fanfics back in the day where about having an amazing family or really cool friends? Yes, I did write myself into the twilight universe, learning to play baseball with the Cullens 😂 )
Fantastic video, as usual Mert. I dont think I can fully express how much I appreciate your openness and vulnerability in this video, which I think makes your point in a way it couldn't have otherwise. It almost feels like your point isn't necessarily - media critique will always be hopelessly nuanced and therefore constantly open to bad faith actors (not even bad faith!), but more that - *because* of that nuance, it becomes necessary to contextualize our critique. It both it and isn't sexist to critique Twilight (which, in itself, both is and ISNT sexist) because of what we (or the critic) assumes as baseline facts for their case. Really enjoyed this one. And you are as well-spoken, articulate, and thoughtful as Contrapoints for me, so I am expecting that collab any day now
I was bullied for seemingly no reason, was awkward weird and keep lots of random lists for no reason" - Wait no way that's exactly the same as me. " I think I should get an autism diagnosis" - ah for fucks sake😭
There's many other things you mentioned about your school and uni life in this video essay that hit me right in the gut. Especially that part about learning to be human. I wasn't expecting to be read for filth at 3 in the morning Merty, Jesus😭
At the risk of getting personal on the internet... The moment you started by mentioning Contra's video, I knew this was going to be good. As an AFAB someone who still struggles with a lot of shame and guilt over many apparently completely normal thoughts and feelings (for reasons nebulous even to myself, societal norms and taboos notwithstanding), that video is a godsend, I've watched it twice now and probably will rewatch it many more, until I stop beating myself over the head with pointless negativity. I never read Twilight nor have any intention of doing so, but now it's because it's just not my thing (and the actual yikes inducing details in the narrative), while before I too carried the immutable opinion that "twilight bad because it's romance and it's bad", to the point of laughing at my partner when I found out they not only read but actually liked it (that was years ago). I think I owe them an apology. When you brought up fanfiction I also laughed because that's something I still struggle with, being able to read fanfiction without feeling that I'm being *gasp* cringe. (And also because, disappointingly, the sort of story I'd like to read doesn't seem to actually exist, my desire to go on a date with the videogame women I like is apparently too niche for the writers on AO3) Thank you so much for this video! It's very comforting to know we're not alone in such experiences. Wish you all the best in 2025!
33:14 Wow Mert I can’t believe you have a foot fyetish, and you just came out and said it too! Jk, I’m not done watching the video, but it’s great so far. Very insightful, especially since I’ve been on a kick the last week or so looking at really bizarre and bad literature and trying to work on a bit of my own writing. It’s interesting keeping these sorts of ideas in mind.
Fantastic video. Lots of great points and such an interesting discussion. Your ability to communicate efficiently, entertainingly, and concisely is great. I feel very emotionally seen as someone who also didn't start to find themselves until adulthood (my reasons are related to being in a cult-the very same one that influenced Myer's more terrible lore building). Fanfiction was a major lifeline. While I escaped terrible bullying and isolation from peers by age 12, it was still a passive thing I experienced when I was separated from my other "weird" friends. I was lucky enough to be in a huge school, so enough of us weirdos stuck together and it made the ages 12-17 a lot more bearable. I wrote so much fanfiction, so so much fanfiction. And then I stopped once I started college, had some of the worst years of my life to date, escaped a cult and moved in with my partner, and now I write fanfiction lots again. It's funny, how it's come back to me. Or maybe I've come back to it. Then it was exploration of topics I didn't know existed within worlds and characters I loved. Now it's a self discovery and processing of trauma, on purpose or accidental, within worlds and characters I love. Bonus points now, I get to enjoy the sex without feeling guilty about it! The ten in five is so. It really hits me. I took a *Very* brief look at your sources related to the porn stats, and to the best of my ability they all seemed to focus on real life filmed porn. What about other kinds of porn? Animated porn, be that hentai, western, or 3D, drawn photographic porn of various styles, written porn without visual elements, or even audio porn without visual elements? There's a lot of types of porn! Do they all do the same thing? I'm curious to know, especially since I avoided irl porn like the plague as a kid, but read tons of "lemon" by the time I was 13. It also feels reflective of our men-focused world that real life filmed porn (or photos) is studied in such detail while the drawn, written, and vocally performed porn isn't. Stood out to me. And a note, if you ever do get a chance to test for autism easily (and free or very cheap), I'll toss my recommendation in to do so. I figured out I was very likely autistic a few years back, but only just got diagnosed last spring because my therapist has the requirements to do so (it didn't cost me any extra, since the assessments replaced my weekly therapy sessions). It's hard to explain how the difference between "I am probably autistic" and "I am autistic" has changed my understanding of my self and my behavior so much. Maybe you don't have the same block I did, that kept me from thinking of myself as autistic and thus truly treating myself as autistic. I didn't think I had that block. Clearly, I did. Now I can see meltdowns for what they are. I can communicate so much better than before. There's reasons and explanations and *names* for my behaviors. I guess it just opened a world of language I couldn't use before. Anyway, thanks for the video and happy belated birthday.
Holy crap, I'm so sorry all that happened to you. And yes, I made quizzes on Quizilla. One of them I tried really hard on "Which Dark Fantasy Character Are You?"
7:00 i’m pretty sure it was Lindsey Ellis’s video about Twilight ~2017 that flipped the narrative about making fun of Twilight is sexist. Just watch Dominic Noble trying to read through the books only to be raging by the end
This video brought out a lot for me. A lot of memories, from a time that I wish I could go back and give myself a hug and just be there for younger me, who needed it. Fan fiction was my escape from the reality I felt like an outcast. I was bullied pretty badly and books (and eventually fan fiction) became my safe place. It started off normal enough, but I did eventually weave my way into the more heavy sexual stuff. That definitely had an impression on young me and I am pretty sure it’s why I have an interest in things like dubious consent and to an extent, non-con. After my first relationship, where he abused me pretty badly, I think it solidified my interest more in it, not because I enjoyed it, but I felt like deserved it at that time in my life. In a safe environment, I do like exploring dub and non-con, because I know it’s in my control now and I can stop it whenever. Even now, at 26, I will admit I still enjoy fan fiction, I even write my own, but it’s strictly video game characters where the same themes fall into play. Of course the things I enjoy on my own time are not something I actually condone. To think about it, honestly, it is crazy how fan fiction as a whole shaped me into the woman I am today.
As someone that missed the whole twilight thing as a teenager, this was an awesome video format and would love to see more deep dives. Really learned a lot between the contrapoints video and this one. Great brain you got there, please keep on brainin'
"just like we can recognize that being a meth kingpin responsible for mass suffering is not aspirational"... girl... I have bad news about some grown men who watch Breaking Bad. Ultimately, it's not whether it's directed at young impressionable girls or grown adults, there will be people who lack the skill to evaluate for themselves if their protagonist is aspirational or not. To them, the protagonist is always the one you should root for. I think it turns out that your take ends up putting a lot of mistrust in the skills of young girls compared to adult men, when in reality these two groups have the same amount of idiots. Edit: I realize this sounds a little like I'm saying they have the same capacity for understanding, when one is clearly still growing people who didn't have the life experience to know better, but what I mean is that there will be people who can't tell fiction from reality regardless of target audience. Your point that normalizing bad behavior to teens whose only experience with romance might be these books is absolutely valid, but the thing I meant to add when mentioning walter white idolizers is that media doesn't owe the readers an explicit disclaimer of what exactly in their contents is aspirational or not, because people will see it both ways regardless.
10:56 I caught a 15 year old trying to kill herself back in 2022. Already held the belief that they are scorned too much but for fucks sake… really proud of her for healing from it. I’m built quite strong and I don’t get frightened easily but I can admit fucking right up that I was scared. Gets even worse as I could tell she was kicking herself for some of her actions involving me but I wish he didn’t, can’t help but feel guilty.
Hi! Hello! this is not a message you would probably think to receive, but i must say : THANK YOU! i recently became disabled to the point where i cant hear no more sound, and i missed a ton essays on youtube since most of them don't appear to have subtitles! Thank you soo much for the hard work to put them in!
That's my pleasure!! Thank you so much for being here, I'm always happy to add subtitles
Mert's a real bro for that one. It's always nice to have accessibility options.
Always great to see
I wish more youtubers would do that. I just copy and paste my script into my captions lol
Hi,
I actually need to thank you for leaving this comment. See im legally blind. I'm currently editing a video. Naturally I've made everything big enough for me to see and read.
But I wasn't considering other people. Who might have similar but different considerations. I even said I don't need a subtitle track. So again thanks for leaving your comment.
Take care and have a good one 🫡
I really felt the "There's so many hills I'm already dying on." I feel that exhaustion. Trying to still have things for yourself when it seems like everything has a negative.
I feel like it’s great understanding why you something you like can be bad but being on the internet and seeing people constantly trash on stuff can be really exhausting
the phrase i find helpful is 'There is no ethical consumption under Capitalism/the Current System'. not as an excuse, but as a way of seeing that you cant really escape from interacting with bloodstained things while the world remains exploitative and based on violence and imperialism.
If it wasn't hard to do it would be worthless
Eventually you need to internalize that the shallow impressions of people you will never meet matter less than a box of cat poo, or you will drive yourself to destruction. And let he without cognitive dissonance cast the first comment, anyways.
It's really become one of the most exhaustive things in life for people with any sort of social conscience these days. It's very difficult to give a shit when you are bombarded from every direction regardless of how hard you try. To me this is one of those issues that has been packaged up and foisted upon us by "the powers that be" so they can say bullshit about how the change needs to be done by us from the ground up, when in reality the systems that need changing are so overwhelmingly massive and set in place that the only way they will see meaningful changes is from a national governmental level or by the massive corporations causing the problems (lol like that would ever happen). That isn't to say you should give up and do nothing, but more accept that there is only so much you can do while still trying to live a practical life, and that it's impossible to live guilt-free inside our current rampantly unchecked capitalist society.
If you’re looking for critiques of Twilight from an indigenous perspective (there’s PLENTY to dissect and vivisect against Meyer and the fan reception of the twilight series) Ali Nahdee’s essay about twilight is absolutely amazing and deserves more eyeballs!
Thank you Lady Grey!
Oh yes there its absolutely terrible and the only good is that some of the tribe milk it for tourism as income.
Yes! Definitely recommend 😊🙏❤️
Thank you for mentioning that video! I ended up watching it today and it was really interesting to hear about it from a First Nations perspective. While I’ve heard some people mention the racism and domestic abuse of Emily, Ali added some cultural and historical context that floored me.
Hello! This is the most autobiographical piece of work I have ever made, public or private.
If you're not a fan of this format, don't worry. I'll be back to my regularly scheduled video style with the next upload.
Although I've made an effort to substantiate every genuine claim I make in this video with sources, you'll notice most of it is subjective opinion/anecdotes. That's intentional! This is the 10 year anniversary to the year I first left home and stepped out into the big wide world. I am over double the age I was when I read Twilight, and as part of starting a new chapter I needed to work through some stuff: to celebrate some things, and let go of others. (and yes, it is monetised. I apologise, but I really do rely on the adsense from EVERY upload 😢my country's economy is shagged).
"Please be respectful" always goes without saying, but I just wanted to emphasise it here. This is not intended to be analysis or education. It's a subjective reflection/discussion piece that I spent over a month writing and re-writing and re-writing. Please do not hold this video to the same standard of rigour as my others, but rather recognise it for what it is: a girl reflecting on the factors that influenced her growth, who she is today, and what she cares about. Maybe you'll see some of you in there too? Maybe not.
Either way...
I hope you enjoy the video :)
Also check out Ali Nahdee's video titled "ONE SCENE FOR FORGIVENESS / THE TWILIGHT SAGA IS RACIST": ua-cam.com/video/AVKTdkSny6A/v-deo.html&ab_channel=AliNahdee, which has come hotly recommended in the comments.
You've come a long way as a content creator. I haven't been here that long (Rachel Foster video brought me in), but your analysis has been getting more and more insightful every video.
I haven't watched all of this one yet since I'm doing the ADHD thing, but I think you're being overly self conscious (I can relate). Just because you aren't referencing well known thinkers (ie dead white dudes) doesn't mean you won't contribute something of worth.
Either way congrats on your 10th anniversary. Your voice is really becoming your own.
This is genuinely so good. Something always bothered me about video essays that only look at it as an adult reader today. Your sections about being socially excluded and then socially inept particularly struck a chord with me. I based a lot of how I saw irl conversations from dialogue I read in books, not necessarily Twilight, but YA in generally. Using these books as a reference for real life as a young, quiet preteen was something I had to spend several years of adulthood fixing. Thinking about how I viewed sex and relationships through these books is even more complex and messy.
Once again thanks for your analysis and emphasis on personal experience.
Now that you say it out loud, I see the autism. I mean, I’m not a licensed psychologist or anything, but I’ve been on the spectrum long enough to recognize my own kind-especially that part about the cycle of ostracization stunting your development as a social animal. When you already are at a disadvantage at recognizing subtle social cues being further isolated from your peers *by* your peers is more cruel than they can even intend.
I loved it. I really felt like you were sharing your heart (in a far more concise and organized way than I ever could.) All your videos are amazing, I'm consistently blown away by how well put together they are, and (I assume) mostly by your own hand, not a team of professional editors, set designers, etc. like so many larger video essayists have!
Fanfiction is so full of hills, you'd think you were looking at a forest from a distance. That is, until you notice that most of those hills are either covered in corpses or have one singular body at the very top. I still remember pre-purge tumblr being... an interesting place.
Already commented once, but honestly, thank you for talking about non-consent fantasies.
I won't go too much into this because it would just be weird, but I've had fantasies like that for waaaaay longer than one would expect. Naturally I've had a LOT of guilty feelings about that, wondering if there's something wrong with me, if I'll get desensitized to real abuse, or if I'm downplaying it. It's not something people really talk about, and I've always been terrified that I'd be shunned if I talked to anyone about it.
I've just eventually come to the conclusion that unlike in real life, fantasies about situations like that are able to be consensual in a way reality obviously never could be. If I'm imagining something, I have the easiest safe word in the world; I can just stop imagining it. It doesn't mean I'd want those things in real life, but exploring aspects of myself through fiction has helped me in many ways, including with figuring out my gender identity and sexuality.
But you also didn't gloss over the possible negative effects, which I'm happy for. I do wonder how my preferences might have changed depending on the kinds of fiction I was exposed to. I DID find some really dark stuff at a very young age too, because I was morbidly curious, and I'm sure not all of that has changed me strictly for the better.
Sorry for the ramble, appreciate you as always!
genuinely heard horror stories of the Ezra epidemic, back when Pretty Little Liars was still in. if there's just one show aimed at teenage girls that i would call genuinely dangerous, it's that one.
38:01 Back in my fanfiction days, I wrote a ton of stuff where I tried to tell an original story set in a world which maybe would have cameo appearances by the main cast, but were ultimately side stories that just shared a universe. I think it was because I wanted to be a writer at one point and found it easy to play with other people’s toys, so to speak. But it was also a way I could interact more deeply with the media I consumed
I love the analogy of "playing with other peoples' toys", because that's so right!
So, about incest:
Incest has a problem irl is that often its not named. People may see what is happening, but its "teasing" or familial love or something. And then when you speak up things are not taken seriously or are hushed up. Incest is too strong, too unthinkable to a lot of people, thus allowing it to be normalised. Incest is also more often than not an abusive dynamic, not an affair between two equals.
this is something she completely missed and turned me off this video completely tbh
I was really thrown for a loop when she started talking about it. So many victims, in general, are victims of incest. In the cases I knew of personally, the SA wasn't even addressed because it was family. Incest gets to be "not taboo" by it being not addressed at all to begin with...
As someone who writes extensive amount of fanfiction, read even more, as far back to the age of 12 (Twilight was my first exposure to gay fanfiction in fact, this goes out to the mpreg I stumbled over) I feel like you just cracked open my soul in this video holy shit. Amazing work and thank you for allowing yourself to be so vulnerable. I had a similar upbringing with the bullying and probably need that autism diagnosis (but like you said, what would that prove at this rate at almost 30) and it always astounds me how others find their comforts in fanfiction, sexual or otherwise. Sex being that taboo thing that I wasn't allowed to understand until stumbling over Jacob shagging Edward and being like: woah. That's a thing. I don't think Breaking Dawn had been released yet. Sorry Stephanie, random fanfiction beat you to the first Twilight sex exposure.
Thank you Jerome. I cut SO much from the last section of this video and your comment singlehandedly made me wish I left it in, because you have made me feel so understood. Thank you for this comment. I feel healed
How’s your writing been going and how has it changed as you aged?
I considered starting to write fanfiction again, since I have more free time and want to exercise my writing muscles in a low commitment way. The problem is, all of my ideas are for IPs that are basically dead.
@Magnesium-BasedLifeform-i9e It's interesting because I've seen it become more detailed to the point that I actually need to start cutting back on it. Themes have changed, going from romance to vengeance to grief, and it really reflected my mental health over the years, too. Darker times are so extreme I'm almost ashamed of it but it's how I could see that my past self was hurting. It's an outlet more than anything else. Some of my IPs are definitely dead and it does hurt my motivation to write, but being able to express emotions over dumb things like Leon S. Kennedy having a pet frog he names after a past partner and then dealing with grief over it and coming to terms is very healing. I'll always tell people it's never too late to write, just like it's never too late to start drawing. You always have the chance to help someone in what you create too
@@JeromeSankara Thanks for the reply. I’m mostly trying to explore the BioShock and Halo IP’s, particularly what their extraordinary environments do to ordinary people. My favorite part of playing any videogame is stopping and ogling the setting to try and recreate what life was like for the people in the setting before/after the story happens, and Fanfiction is a great way to do that.
@Magnesium-BasedLifeform-i9e Oooooo I like that! I wouldn't say the Halo fandom is super dead, though it probably is one that doesn't have a lot of writers for it. You could open your way up with crossovers into the universe! Someone experiencing it for the first time sort of thing and marveling at the world. I'm currently writing for the Death Stranding fandom and I love interacting in a world that is so against survival yet people still find a way to survive and connect both good and bad.
i think there's also something to be said about the fact that people act as if art was created in a vacuum, and its creators weren't also part of society and subject to its beliefs? you touch on it briefly on your discussion of meyer's mormonism, and i think it's a part of the discussion that always gets left out. if so many romance books have this kind of alpha male billionaire love interest, isn't it worth questioning why the authors and readers (who, i'm assuming, are the same kind of demographic) find this archetype attractive? yes, it's a fantasy, but why is it a fantasy that props up patriarchal relationships within a capitalist system? i don't ask this in judgement, but more so in curiosity. we know we live in a sexist society that often reduces women to objects for the sexual gratification of men, so yeah, i think we can spare a bit of critical thinking about these stories beyond "it's fiction and not real!".
sorry for the word salad here, this is a topic i find endlessly fascinating!! this was a great video, thank you for posting!
Absolutely! People really love to act like their desires have no relationship to their experiences and societal concepts and it always annoys me. Nobody is making them stop enjoying certain fantasies but they might as well think about them for a second to live them out healthily and consensually. If not for their own sake, then for the sake of the people and stories they are attracted to?
I stopped giving Twilight shit when I saw that 4chan post saying "Imagine you, as a guy, having a classy pale readeheaded vampire and hotheaded tanned tomboy werewolf fighting for you." and I was like "I gett it now." Even then, back in 2008, I could still somewhat relate to Bella - the weird kid moving out but she manages to find friends and lover. That's cozy. I do think society gives a harsh judgement to young girls and women in general, whence why CNC is popular - you can't blame them, they were "forced". Most of this issues can starting being solved when we as a society stop giving shit to women about everything. With this said, fuck Twilight tho, that shit is ass, although, I no longer mind it's existence nor judge people who do, but I think it cant still criticized fairly.
Happy New Year, Merty! Cheers!
Happy New Year to you too my dearest Lemon! :D
I’m on your side about blooper still - I’m glad they did well with SH2 but, much like with the Sonic movie, I think Bloober saw the criticisms (like yours) of their other games and incorporated it into SH2 (so ty for doing it!)
Mert, you’ve been cranking out banger after banger. I really liked this video. It’s easy to say you’re my favorite youtuber.
:o thank you Royal!
As a father of a boy, the topics you raised are often on my mind. Perspectives such as yours help to navigate those issues. Thank you for sharing your story.
Also: big fan of your chanel, love your work.
Thank you BJ! :D
Man, seems like I could listen to you talk about pretty much anything and find it interesting. It's rare for me to find someone whose videos I'll watch without fail, no matter the subject!
Thank you so much!
Excellent video! What we consume does shape us!
Aside based on the fanfiction chapter of this video. I remember existing (and still exist) in the Gen category of fanfiction as a teenager. I didn’t flock to the romance flame, but that doesn’t mean that fanfiction didn’t shape me in some way - tropes still exist when you aren’t reading/writing attractive characters banging. I’ll take this as an invitation to think about ways I was shaped by it! Thanks!
Okay I'm going to be completely transparent here; I'm much more keen on viewing hantei over live-action stuff because I don't have to think about the possibility of horrifying ethical violations occurring behind the scenes, of which I would prefer not to get into. It's like watching the anime of Death Note and knowing that I'm not watching actual footage of a horrific train crash in which actual people died, and that many victims and their loved ones were very outspoken about the use of that footage instead of literally any other B-roll.
No I get it, I call it "free range" haha
I never understood the appeal of hentai over real people
Especially when hentai sometimes more often than not has designs that border on being underaged people not adults
@chandlerburse It's not a more often than not situation, in fact its quite easy to avoid stuff with those designs. That's not to say it isn't a problem, it's way more prevelant than it ever should be. But it's not as prevalent as you say.
@@hectichero321 it feels like thats most of what people who enjoy that consume
As someone who got bullied daily all through primary school, I just wanna say I'm sorry to hear that it happened to you too. Luckily I went to a different high school to all the people who gave me a rough time and got to be virtually invisible after that, but the damage was already done. Permanent self-esteem issues. . . I also have feeling I'm neurodiverse too, but can't afford to get tested atm. Nobody really tested girls for Autism and ADHD in the 90s. Anyway, I love your work and have always thought you were AWESOME! I know it must have been scary, but thank you for sharing your story. . .
Thank you DJ! It's been really nice to see all the people with identical/similar experiences
@@coldturnipgreensIt's a miracle your wind pipe hasn't been crushed yet, wait no miracles are good but unlikely this is a tragedy but it won't last long
One of my main thoughts about Twilight is the fact that Edward sneaking into Bella’s room and watching her sleep ISN’T seen as creepy. Like I’m sorry if I woke up and saw a guy standing in my room watching me, I’d be screaming! Do not allow young people to think that is acceptable behavior
I once had my mom doing this when I was a teen and scared the crap out of me lol
Mert, this is absolutely one of the best, most thoughtful and nuanced essays you've made so far. There were so many points you touched on throughout the video that I found myself deeply relating to. While I'm not a woman nor have I ever read twilight, as a gay guy who grew up in a conservative, religious household that also had an internet connection, this video really hit home for me in ways that I can't even get into without writing an essay myself. 54:40 "Yes Edward is problematic, yes he is not real, no [...] that doesn't really matter" this line in particular, as well as everything that lead up to it, hit me like a truck, but kinda in a good way... hear me out.
There's so little room for nuance when discussing porn addiction online, especially when that content is drawn/written/etc. It's so often downplayed with phrases like "oh it's just a drawing, it's fantasy, it's not a big deal." But I've personally met enough people in online communities who seem to be physically incapable of keeping it in their pants to confidently say otherwise.
Having been a sexually repressed gay teenager with an iphone and a discord account, you can imagine just how often I'd come across people online that seemed to value their own sexual gratification above my emotional well-being. They'd all have similar justifications for their actions with phrases like "you're making a big deal out of it, it's not real, it's just art/role play/fantasy/etc, it's okay because it's online."
After being dismissed so many times in the past with "No it's not problematic because it's not real," hearing "Yes it's not real. No that doesn't really matter" is just so refreshing, you have no idea.
I really really appreciate this perspective. The internet operates on such a hazy level of “real” and things like cyber bullying / grooming can seem distant until they really affect you. Sexual development in the wild west era of the internet was such a mine-field and I really hope this becomes a larger conversation for every generation who grows up online.
Thank you Skybriel ; - ; look at us bonding over this
23:37
I think that something people don't realize is that most incest is abuse. Most incest isn't "my stepsister is too hot", it's children being groomed by adults in their family, or victims of COCSA.
Absolutely! But I am referring to the hypothetical of merely wanting to shag a sibling after watching a TV show
As a certified Good Girl (tm) who just couldn’t bring myself to read anything overtly sexual in high school, I am so thankful for Stephanie Meyer and the Twilight series for allowing me to explore my sexuality in a “safe” way that didn’t make me feel incredibly guilty. Those books will always have a special place in my heart.
I don't want to just repeat the same points made in this video, but I can confirm that consuming an abundance of media that romanticized grooming at a young age made me EXTREMELY groomable myself. I can draw a direct line between each experience of grooming in my real life, and the media that I consumed that caused me not to question it
I don't want to dogpile too much on our anonymous commenter, who might also be reading this right now.
But I think it's pretty telling that they tell their own story,
"When I was 14, I recognized a teacher-student relationship as predatory, and another 14 year old friend of mine did not,"
and that their take-away from this memory is not only "I am the Normal one, my friend just needed therapy," but also that they then extrapolate to "most people are normal, therefore most 14 year old readers are also going to recognize teacher-student relationships are predatory." Like, they had a direct example otherwise, and based on their anecdote we only have a sample rate of 50/50.
Most 14 year olds likely wouldn’t recognize a relationship as predatory, which is why teachers who pursue these kinds of relationships go after them
I think the difference is empathy. I've had a similar experience even down to the age (difference was said friend was dating an 18 year old even after I told her I thought there was something weird about him) but instead of not understanding why she didn't recognize the age difference as bad, I was left wondering why the hell the dude was being a weirdo (found out later its because he's an awful person to his partners after what I'd been informed of). Not everyone is going to recognize when sketchy things are happening, but people are more likely to say "I can see it, why don't you" because a lot of people, especially when they're younger, don't recognize that their knowledge and experiences don't always match others.
If you want to be pedantic, then "most people are normal" is true. Normal is defined by common factors among a group, after all. That said, sussing out what is normal among a group is harder than people seem to realize.
Most people could probably figure out what's normal in their friend group or family, but if they try to apply those "normal things" to larger (or even just different) groups, their definitions tend to fall apart. Like Mert was saying, it's kind of a lottery what you will or won't find normal.
I agree. And the funny thing is that I've caught myself making similar arguments as that commenter in relation to the romance genre.
I really like how Mert furthered this discussion and complicated it. Every time I try to defend my opinions on why problematic romance has a right to exist I also feel that dissonance of reducing a nuanced issue into something more simple and defensible.
I'm conscious of the fact that 14 year old me had some very wrong and unhealthy ideas about relationships in part because of secretly reading smut. Thanks to decent Sex Ed and healthy influences I managed to develop a more healthy mindset as I grew up, but I've become gradually more aware over the years that many kids didn't have those wrong assumptions adequately dealt with. I remember reading student teacher romances in manga and never pausing to think about how screwed up and abusive that was.
Freakin’ JUMPED to this video when I got this notification. You’re fr one of my favourite deep dive/video essay creators (your video on It is one of my fave vids on UA-cam) and I always look forward to the next topic/IP you cover XD 🖤🖤
I think a lot of progressive internet discourses have a tendency to lean to black and white echo-chamber territory, and the Twilight discussion is no exception. The assumption that the "normal teen" knows that romance books are just fantasy fulfillment and we live in a post-sexual revolution feminist utopia is something that I've come across multiple times in well intentioned but deeply flawed think pieces, comments, etc. from progressive online circles (not trying to say that Contrapoints made that assumption, she didn't, but as you mention some people reduced her arguments, and I think it's because of that misconception).
I was also a bullied working class girl (just from LATAM) and GOD, I have yet to meet a fellow woman from my same upbringing who have not suffered SA and/or grooming and normalized it at some point of her life.
While we can't blame problematic romance media as the main culprit it doesn't exist in a vacuum, moreover a lot of the time it's the only exposure to romance and sex that we have. If our fantasy escapisms are equally misogynist as our environment, we almost have no room to understand that their problematic portraits of love are wrong at a young age, before the trauma happens to us.
6:47 Funnily enough, I remember when the internet called the Devil Wears Prada movie the most embarrassing movie Meryl Streep ever agreed to star in up until 2016
I plan to do a video on it! I rewatched it on my birthday and, while I do love it, it is a bizarre mish-mash of hypocrisies. Always wanted to unpack it
Disagree, she owns in the movie and its a good movie. And Meryl Streep so fun.
Amazing stuff as always ❤(5min after upload but I watched this video last night)
I'm super proud and I love you.
As someone dipping my toes into making video essays, this was really interesting to think about how discourse evolves.
Edit: ok had time to actually sit down and think. As someone grew up a girl (I'm trans - not related but just sharing grew up socialized similarly) ...My teens were during the dial-up days, spent roleplaying Star Wars OCs in AOL chatrooms. It was one of my main exposures to sexuality, through 'dating' other ppls' OCs, I remember being 12 or 13 and 'dating' a 19 year old, he asked me some very messed up things I never clocked as problematic until years later...
This essay reminds me of how frustrating it is that humanity is bad at passing on information - isn't that just a byproduct of our mortality though, and how inefficient it is for each generation to rebel, struggle with, then pass on info to the next generation too? I don't think there's a solution but sometimes the 'system' of mortality just causes inefficient education I guess? Welcome to my possibly-undiagnosed-autistic thoughts lol.
Also shoutout to "orbs" haha that took me back.
Funky! :D Hello! Happy New Year.
I love your point about the inefficiency of passing on info - I think that's totally fair. Also the imprecision and the imperfection. No voice is truly untainted and our parents are a product of their parents and so on and so forth. Maybe humanity will refine itself eventually, but it will be a long way away.
I'm super early, so I don't have much to say about this video, but wanted to take the 'posted
Don't, I'll cry :'( thank you pear, this is extremely kind. I really appreciate it. Happy new year!
Always so insane how you release a video about stuff I'm also currently thinking about. Truly one of my favorite people on the internet, always feels like hearing from a friend.
What hit me about this video is your vulnerability. I think that takes an incredible amount of bravery, not only in talking about your own experience, but in acknowledging the complexity of both the subject and the discussion itself. I hope this video could be some form of catharsis - I know for myself, it served as an important reminder of the nuance of such a topic, as my own biased experiences with fanfic become distant. Thank you for that
Thank you Steph! This video was crazy cathartic to write and I'm glad you enjoyed it
Your miserable childhood is so relatable. Its hard to imagine you as someone who struggled with making friends and were cast out. Not everyone makes it out alive and hearing you share your experience is so touching. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your vulnerability i love you mert, you deserved better 🥺❤
; - ; Thank you lil Blondey, it is my pleasure to have made you feel heard.
As a gay guy in an all boys school in Devon of all places, the ostracisation until uni feels very relatable - especially in bristol - now I’m quite a popular guy with lots of friends (apply a humble tone) and yet every time I go home and see someone from school I crumble back into feeling like I need to be quiet and discreet. It’s so strange because of how much ive grown, yet it still hasn’t left me. That I should have known to be who I am now back then is such a weird way of thinking :/
The argument of “harmful abuse in fiction doesn’t impact people in real life, and if it does those people need therapy” is so disheartening cause I was negatively impacted by stuff like this as a kid.
I had amazing parents, great friends, a super safe community, and an altogether quite wonderful adolescence surrounded by unconditional healthy love. I was also surrounded by media that depicted romantic relationships like this. I based my first understandings of romance off these depictions, which led me to very dangerous situations. Is that Meyer’s fault? No, but it wasn’t mine either.
I was a young girl who just wanted the type of love depicted in a lot of the surrounding media marketed towards me.
Also just have to say, reading these books as an adult, the racism is SO blatant. Not even just the werewolves, pay attention to how Meyer describes the vampires of color.
Great video!
Really appreciate your perspective! I'm a big fan of both you and Contrapoints and I love getting to see someone add important context while highlighting why they still find the content they're responding to worthwhile even if they disagree/felt something was missing.
Something that I always wonder with this discourse is, how far will the people who believe in it take it? My WoW characters are dangerous mass murderers with hundreds of thousands of kills. Do they believe this is what I crave in real life?
Exactly! Like if a line is drawn then someone will always want to push it further. I think it's better to have these things as a cautionary tale
Thank you for bringing your perspective to the table!! I often find that discussions around the effect of media on the minds of consumers are needlessly black and white, and harassing the people who enjoy the fiction rather than the fiction itself (as it often happens online) is horribly counterproductive. Likewise, telling people who are uncomfortable with certain art that they're underdeveloped for it is faulty. Art is a product of life, and life imitates art. The only true solution to this conflict is education, and the next best thing given its lack in schooling is patience and understanding for our fellow people, especially young ones 🙏
YES!!! Absolutely agree.
All that work and no fuckin?! What a blow! I been there.
Also,damn! Feels like we're getting a lot of videos lately. Awesome!
Fabrication rec: Luminosity. It's twilight but Bella is very pragmatic, and basically becomes aware she's in a romance novel. It's so fascinating. It also discusses the problems with imprinting as being basically grooming.
I feel this "fiction isn't reflective of who you are" thing, I am a Berserk Fan, its impossible to have any kind of nuanced discussion about it in some circles.
"yeah I like Griffith. He's a cool and well written vi--"
Average berserk fan: OH SO YOU'RE A GRAPIST AND AN INCEL HUH?
I swear berserk fans can't tell reality from fantasy. They'll lose their mind in the GOT community lol.
Man, there's so much in this video that I have half-formed opinions on and frankly don't wish to verbalize because, to be honest, it's not something I know well enough to give a worthwhile opinion on, you know? The one thing I can give an opinion on is your experiences growing up. I'm sorry you had to live through that bullshit from your classmates and it makes me quite grateful that my social ostracization was purely neutral and never negative. I'm glad you've grown past that, obviously, and are writing and putting out such interesting material.
You're 100% correct in the essay format being one to many and subsequently having to kind of contend with a deluge of opinions with greater nuance than could ever be handled by any one person. So I'll close by saying that I'm glad most or all of that shit is behind you, that you're doing great things, and that you're employee of the month. Congratulations!
I really appreciate this analysis because it covers an issue I've had with YA fiction for a long time. It's written by grown women who have mostly, if they're good writers, finished their emotional development. Their sixteen year olds aren't sixteen year olds- they're heroic, aspirational, thirty year old fantasies of being sixteen again. Unfortunately this was not clear to me when I was twelve and reading their work.
We have some similarities. My family wasn't poor but I was a weird kid with intense interests, I had a couple of friends but not tons. I lived on a farm with no close age siblings, so my social development was stunted as hell. Public education in my conservative state was a total joke, so I was learning many important things from books and the internet, even though I exceeded at school. The YA I read had a lot of girl power fantasies. I figured I was in the clear, because I didn't read passive wallflowers like Bella. I liked sword and sorcery stuff, and for some reason, even feminist authors like Tamora Pierce and Robin McKinley loved age gaps.
I do not think either of these women or the other less known authors were into grooming. I think they grew up in the 70s where older men dating younger women was grossly normalized, had age gaps with their husbands, then rewound that too far to teenagers without thinking about it enough. I know now. When I engaged with their fiction, I didn't. I was a young teen, bi and in denial about it, and I could not stand young men my age. Answers for my problems lay in understanding that boys are taught patriarchal behavior, and that some of my resentment wasn't about them at all, it was about how much attention my girl crushes were giving them. The tools I needed to face these answers were not readily accessible to me in Dirt Road Arizona. Fantasy books were.
Fantasy books had an easy answer to my issues with boys. Maturity, just like my mom said! Boys were an obstacle to most cool sword girls, just like they were to me. Smart, tough girls that were not like other girls didn't need gross boys, oh no. We needed something more refined. Sophisticated. Something like a vampire count who swills wine and has four hundred years worth of scholarly writings in his head to discuss. Or like the hot centuries old elf mage who has wise answers to everything and heals wounds in a way that requires loads of tender touches after a badass dragon fight.
At least those examples were safely impossible. The dangerous one for me was the worldly, handsome, but young at heart teacher, who was head over heels for his underage student. It wasn't weird and unequal, you see, because the older guy was really nice and likeable, he wouldn't hurt a fly. And the girl was hypercompetent and mature! Like you talked about, I vaguely knew that this was not okay and not allowed, but I didn't really get what that meant. "Age gaps are weird" was more of an abstract rule to me than a fully understood truth.
Internalizing that older men were safer than young ones lead to some very not good situations in my late teens and early twenties. I didn't invite anything at work or school, but my boundaries were basically a one foot garden fence to the kinds of men I needed more of a twelve foot stone barricade against. It didn't go as far as rape, but it got close, and the emotional abuse I dealt with was incredibly damaging. More than one older guy messed with my head before I had enough important conversations with kind, helpful people to learn how screwed up the situations I was in were, even though I was technically of age. There was nothing in my life experience and education before that to warn me, and a lot of the stories I read set me up to be too trusting of older men's interest.
The problem isn't any one YA book, it's how many there are with this idea, and the culture the women writing this idea were raised in.
Edward has an insane age gap with Bella that's just glossed over. The Cool Immortal or Older Guy Who Just Gets the Very Special Weird Girl is a staple of fantasy. Older adults making younger people feel special and different from their peers is also Grooming 101. I doubt anyone who thinks age gaps are hot is thinking that though. Nobody who wrote that stuff is to blame for how I lagged behind in emotional development, nobody writing age gaps is trying to prime the reader for abuse. Some of those authors probably were abused considering their age and what the world was like before I was born. It would have been really, really good for me to see someone ripping apart age gap relationships with scalpel precision when I was younger, like you said about abuse in the video. I don't think all age gaps are evil, I especially don't think all age gaps in fiction are evil, but I do think it's important for age gaps to be examined with a level head and an eye towards power dynamics. Critique like that can help vulnerable people make informed decisions about what kind of people they trust. Sorry for the essay, this video gave me a lot of thoughts. Thank you for making it.
I love this video and tackling it respectfully. I think your argument that someone saying "people arent dumb and know better" can also be applied to people who say "I didnt do x y z bad thing when I was 16" People seem to think just because they knew better than to do the wrong thing means that other people should even if they had different lived experiences that coild imfluence their idea of right and wrong. It's honestly disheartening how unempathetic people are on the internet holding everyone to their moral standards without thinking about how other people might not be able to meet those standards because of their lived experiences
Also another APH: Russia fan!!
Thank you for making this video. You might not be the first or the only person speaking on these topics, but it's important to keep it in people's minds.
Thank you for this, it really helped tie up some of the loose threads in my mind after Contrapoint's video. I came away from that with the philosophy "If a single work of fiction is enough to push a young girl into an abusive relationship, then censoring _Twilight_ would not have saved her because there were already too many other factors working against her." And after your video, I think I can actually argue those factors more articulately.
As a fan of both your and contrapoints I think you’ve handled expanding on the original video essay really well. I think you made a really valid point that video essays work on a level of viewer understanding the same way an academic essay does. I like your explicit aim to “yes and also…” contrapoints video. Really enjoyed this one 😊
This was a really good video, thank you for sharing ^^ And I'm glad you didn't go through with keeping in the parts that made you uncomfortable. No one should feel like they have to expose their hurts to be taken seriously.
It's comforting to see someone else who's gone through the same sense of social isolation as a child, and to hear the impact it's had on you into your adult years. I still, to this day, struggle to interact with people, struggling to know what to say, when to say things, and I can put it all down to being isolated and ostracised as a child. It's horrible that you've had to go through that, but I hope you know you've provided me with a sense of comfort and belonging by opening up about your experiences
Only 30 minutes into the video but just wanted to comment and say I’m so glad you’re a creator who is so incredibly thoughtful and mindful, it’s really rewarding listening to your thoughts and I love how you present them.
Thank you Grieve! :D
As someone who also grew up heavily bullied in school I just want to reach through the screen and give you a hug. The most appalling thing to me is always when people go through that and the adults don't give a shit. What is wrong with those adults?
I have myself since come to realize that I am definitely on the autism spectrum and that is part of the reason why other kids believe me so badly, but there's an aspect of internalizing that that does not normalize the harm. Just because they saw something that was certainly there that made me weird doesn't make it okay that they treated me like shit. And the same goes for your situation. 🫂
Thank you Syd
"I don't agree with her on every opinion she has but her opinions are so reasonably well reasoned that I respect every word out of her mouth" : THIS! This is the same way I feel when I watch your videos ❤
opened youtube to see a mertkaykay video, already good. a mertkaykay video about TWILIGHT?! automatically the best part of my day 💜💜💜
I would never see myself watching deep dives on horror games I played or watched videos about before and yet ... You somehow bring something to the lore noone managed to spoon feed me with before. I probably went trough your whole Chanel by now, in span of couple days and while I listened to monotone, guy telling me more about song of horror than you played, he actually didn't tell me anything. It was your engaging, sometimes chuckle worthy narration that made me understand and actually listen to what you're saying. You're brilliant. I'm glad I found you
Thank you so much! :') this is so kind
Thank you! I thought for the longest time that the whole calling eyes “orbs” thing was just something I noticed and got annoyed by. This was a wonderful video!
Thank you for bringing a load of nuance to a conversation that's sorely been missing it.
By the time I read Twilight when I was 14, I'd thankfully already had a relatively decent sex education (it was still laser-focused on hetero missionary-style sex, but we had a lot of discussions about what healthy relationship look like, too, so...balance?). So I was one of those unicorns who could read Twilight as a teenager and let most of its problematic ideals slide right off of me. I ALSO distinctly remember having long conversations about the series with two adult counselors at a Christian summer camp, of all places, which probably helped me unpack things, too. As you said, our upbringing is a lottery.
As an adult who writes fanfiction (canon cast, as you termed it, not self-insert -- no shade, that's just not my thing), I think one thing that's sorely missing from discussions about fanfiction's impact on younger minds is, well, the fact that it *can* impact young minds in unexpected ways. Doesn't meant that adults have to censor their own writing by avoiding certain topics, obviously, but it's certainly something worth bearing in mind. Also, I feel weird whenever someone mentions Quizilla, because I totally missed the boat on that one. Pity.
Finally, thank you for being vulnerable to the extent you were on this video. I know it's not easy to do, and it's not required in a hellscape like UA-cam. I'm proud of your choice to cut that part of the video where you would have, to paraphrase, used your own trauma to make a point. Saying "sorry you were so badly bullied" feels a bit glib to me, but it is how I feel.
Thank you so much Jadu! This comment is such a "explore over a beer" kinda conversation because I have so many questions and UA-cam is very clunky at helping me return to comments I've responded to. Just wanted to say that I really enjoyed reading it and I appreciate your perspective massively
Also I'm sorry you missed out on Quizilla, it were the tits :'(
53:03 so I think Japanese academia has discussed the effect of hentai on sex crimes in Japan, especially with chikan which is a term for sexual assault on public trains. I remember Al Jazeera covering an Osaka group started by a mom and daughter after the daughter complained she and friends would get groped to and from school in their uniforms regularly.
I hope you had some nice holidays.
It's was heartbreaking to hear your story about growing up specially the part about how being ostracized affected your social development because I kinda went through the same.
Just adding something that may be a little of tangent of what I was saying before, but I always hated when people say "girls mature faster than boys" because that phrase to me is at best a way to tell girls they should be looking for older man to provide to them (nothing inherently bad here) and at worst a way to justify and normalize teenage girls getting groomed by man 10 years older than them.
Jose you've been around on my channel a long time with your comments, and (while they're always a delight), this one felt especially poignant. Like, I feel like you really sat down and levelled with me here for the first time. Thanks for watching!
About boycotting: It's always good to realize that none of us are perfect and I really appreciate you putting your voice behind that!
(Also to add, Starbucks and McDonald's are pro IDF so there's that too!)
The idea that liking (insert genre or trope here) *must* mean your morals match what you enjoy has always irked me. I love horror. Doesn't mean I condone murder. Fiction is fiction. By that logic, horror writers agree with murder. Writing or reading something isn't condoning it and it's a slippery slope to go down
About 18 and a half minutes in, and as usual, excellent work, I have no doubt I will continue to enjoy the rest. The UA-cam comment you're addressing reminds me of a simple sentiment that runs true for me and seems to encapsulate what the comment was talking about: it's only fun when it's not real. For example, I enjoy paintballing, clay pigeon shooting, and shooter games. But guns actually terrify me. I remember seeing a news clip of security footage of some kind of meeting with a panel or board and this man. The man pulls out a gun, and shoots the panel members. You hear them begging for their lives. That clip has haunted me since I saw it. I still enjoy various violent media, but since seeing that clip it just brought a whole new awareness to me that I only enjoy these things because they're not real. Another example, I love crime dramas and procedural shows, but I cannot for the life of me watch true crime documentaries unless they're historical. When it's real, it really gets to me.
(Pretty early in the video but thought I'd note for comment readers): Whilst I fully agree that no one healthy is going to start a wanting to be incestual based on fiction of incestual relationships, I think an important note on your script is that often in a real incestuous relationship there IS an abusive dynamic (be it between those in the relationship or the family in general), even where those involved are similar in age (and upsettingly... there is usually a generational divide involved, which is far more obviously abusive). This isn't a slight on you for writing your script this way since it's thus far not really a central topic, but since the follow up was re: not believing abuse victims & victim-blaming I thought it was worth noting.
Depictions of incest kind of fall in the same zone as other depictions of abuse imo, it can be a very difficult line to tread, but when done well can be a valuable one?
Unfortunately with fan-works on AO3 and other sites it seems rarely trodden well (at least judging from summaries & tags from what crops up untagged with a ship or when I forget to filter), and falls more into the realm of "I'd rather ignore their familial relationship" (weird because it's like... do family relationships mean nothing to you or???) or outright fetish (big ick).
And you are so right to raise all the factors that lead to people that young realising something in fiction isn't necessarily okay. I got the proper "internet safety" spiel at school and thought I'd internalised it, but fandom spaces were a weakness I didn't notice when I was a precocious teen. I am... deeply lucky that the adults who shared inappropriate fanworks with me (and I'm not talking a lil bit saucy, I'm talking heavy kink and sometimes involving adult/minor) were just fucking idiots who didn't understand how to behave around teens instead of predators, because for a little while I absolutely could have been groomed off that stuff. And I had so many of those factors going for me.
hahaha omg the bit about hentai has me cackling wow ik this is different from ur usual content but i love it. You are great at sharing great info while striking a humorous balance :3
edit:
wanted to say im so sorry for what happened to u! totally understand not keeping it in the video.
A lot of great points so far but I did want to add my two cents to the “House of the Dragon won’t make you do incest” point - I don’t think it’s helpful to frame real world incest as a conscious choice against social norms when in reality sibling incest is usually the result of years of predation, grooming, and familial dysfunction.
I think it could be more useful to point out that watching House of the Dragon is not going to act as a substitute for the years of abuse that commonly precede sibling incest. Sibling incest in fiction is almost always rhetorical shorthand for moral degradation, social stratification, and corruption.
The Lannisters own half the continent but are going to crumble from within. Sibling incest. King Robert’s rule is doomed. Sibling incest cuckery. The Targaryens are as gods to the common man and thus could never successfully rule the common man. Every incest imaginable. And so on. Sibling incest in fiction is the culmination of a downward spiral, and acts as shorthand to show us that things are degraded beyond repair.
Amazing point Tempy! And true. I should have specified.
Also, WOW, yes, that makes so much sense! Rhetorical shorthand for moral degradation. Thanks, I honestly had no idea. Thanks for sharing, I didn't know. (No sarcasm at all)
truly employee of the month 👍
I'm usually a silent viewer of your content, but I really loved this video. In an era of UA-cam where AI slop is so prevelant on my feed, you make such high quality content that is always a breath of fresh air.
to quote MertKayKay from a previous video, one which i often put on to fall asleep to, "i don't just feel seen but harassed by this." I read all the twilight novels at the same age range. I wrote anime fanfiction in middle school enough that i ran out of paper and wrote around the margins of already written pages. Once i grew up, i never looked back but i think i too needed that stage in my life.
Ali Nahdee did an excellent video on Twilights racism towards the Native community and how no one seems to want to talk about Emily (the one who was mauled) and her abuse but everyone acknowledges Bella and her abuse. It was really eye opening.
Twilight is a bad series with horrible messages and racist overtones written by a white mormon who profited off making a fanfiction about a pre existing Tribe and hasn't given back a cent. It's not the same thing when fans do it.
Oh and Alice is an extremely racist character. You don't go around mockingly telling a Native character that he's a dog and be a good person. I know he's a werewolf but you should look up the history of people using dehumanising language to people who are considered other. Think Jews and rats.
Thank you! I have added that video to the description/pinned comment
👍👍👍
Really enjoyed this one. Hearing about your experiences with bullying and some of the other stuff you didn't get into, I think sharing that kind of stuff takes a lot of guts and didn't feel at all cheap or like you were after sympathy or anything. I appreciated you sharing it. I still want to say I am sorry you were treated badly and that this is one of my favorite channels because of how thoughtful you are regardless of the topic or how it relates to your personal experiences.
I also think your hair is very cool. Thanks for another great watch as usual.
Great work on this video! You're absolutely right that its hard to communicate nuance through UA-cam, but I think you do a pretty good job of it.
On the one hand, I oppose any blanket disapproval of fanfic, shipping, and/or adult content in general.
But you're also right that we can't dismiss those things as completely harmless and safe. Even completely platonic stories can model some very messed up relationship dynamics.
Thank you for this excellent video.
This is excellent and thought provoking. Thank you for creating it.
I've been thinking about this video all day, thanks for making this. I think there's a lot of room for nuance in this conversation, even if the Internet hates nuance, so thanks for making this.
1:06:55 so I have to admit I accidentally read a published essay collection of twilight critiques in middle school visiting a public library that absolutely smacked the series for being Mormon af which was why I grew out the series much sooner than my peers.
This was an interesting video essay, a format that would be cool to see some more of. Often I find when watching your videos, you go into more depth than other essay creators I watch and I personally like the deep dive analysis you do in your videos, they feel unique and are a blast to watch.
I think this is probably one of your best videos so far, there were so many things about critiques of media that I both agreed with but also were illuminated by in this video. I think I agreed most about your critique of how people further along in their development look back at people left behind as a 'personal failure' but never really had the words to articulate my thoughts on that. Thank you for all your hard work Mertkaykay!
I will always be here when MertKayKay uploads
Thanks Clem
another banger 🎉 appreciate your vulnerability and commitment to having a good faith discussion about this topic!
I want to say that I have enjoyed both Contra Points and your videos extensively and you are definitely on par with her analyses. Without a doubt. You are well spoken and you drawn comarisons that are well researched and thoughtful to a degree I usually hadn't considered before your videos. (You're also fucking hilarious). I'm always delighted to see an upload from you. I just want you to know you're an amazing media analysist. Can't wait for your next video :)
Thank you for suggesting the Contrapoint video! It was a fantastic 3 hours, and I’m now excited to listen to yours.
And your video was also fantastic. Valid criticisms all around! 👏🏻👏🏻
Thank you Katy!!
Your summary of your childhood was scairly close to my own, so I totally empathize with your experience and thank you for sharing it.
This video made me feel seen in ways I wasn't expecting. From one "weird kid" in school with a Spyro and Naruto obsession to another, thank you, your videos always fill me with joy 💛
also i really appreciate you adding subtitles too! i saw someone mention that and it is really nice :) funnily enough tho if i hit subtitles it will go to autogen since youtube knows im a yanki and obviously, i cant speak uk english.
Omg how dare UA-cam do that, I spent ages getting those subtitles ready >:(
@@MertKayKay right? it's very silly. fortunately it still shows that there's formal subtitles on the video, so I know they're there and just have to select them. Theyre really good subtitles too- ssome people just copy paste the script and while thats nicer than nothing it shows that you put extra effort in.
I'm only 15 mins in and I can't stop giggling every time you say "Twilight Vertical Bar Contrapoints". Full gov't naming a video 😂😂😂
I'm so seated for this
edit: 20 mins in and i'm ready to start a fund that gets this video essay in Times Square and on every major media outlet holy fucK THANK YYOOOOUUU
As someone who was deeply influenced by the media I consumed as a child, I really appreciate the points made in the video. While I have many good memories about my twilight era - aka meeting random people at the book store and talking for hours about something we loved, having playful fights with my friend about being Team Edward or Team Jakob (while secretly discovering Team Alice and Team Rosalie) - I think it is fair to critique the story. While it is also fair to say that a lot of critique esp. back then was done in bad faith. Both sides can and should exist equally.
(Is it sad to admit that most of my fanfics back in the day where about having an amazing family or really cool friends? Yes, I did write myself into the twilight universe, learning to play baseball with the Cullens 😂 )
Fantastic video, as usual Mert. I dont think I can fully express how much I appreciate your openness and vulnerability in this video, which I think makes your point in a way it couldn't have otherwise. It almost feels like your point isn't necessarily - media critique will always be hopelessly nuanced and therefore constantly open to bad faith actors (not even bad faith!), but more that - *because* of that nuance, it becomes necessary to contextualize our critique. It both it and isn't sexist to critique Twilight (which, in itself, both is and ISNT sexist) because of what we (or the critic) assumes as baseline facts for their case. Really enjoyed this one. And you are as well-spoken, articulate, and thoughtful as Contrapoints for me, so I am expecting that collab any day now
Waiting for Natalie to comment and begin the crossover we all need
I was bullied for seemingly no reason, was awkward weird and keep lots of random lists for no reason"
- Wait no way that's exactly the same as me.
" I think I should get an autism diagnosis" - ah for fucks sake😭
There's many other things you mentioned about your school and uni life in this video essay that hit me right in the gut.
Especially that part about learning to be human.
I wasn't expecting to be read for filth at 3 in the morning Merty, Jesus😭
Autists can sense our own 😂
@@warlordofbritannia I've said for a very long time that "You've got to be on the spectrum to see the spectrum".
I probably shouldn't've looked up what "alaskan pipeline" was...
;))
At the risk of getting personal on the internet...
The moment you started by mentioning Contra's video, I knew this was going to be good.
As an AFAB someone who still struggles with a lot of shame and guilt over many apparently completely normal thoughts and feelings (for reasons nebulous even to myself, societal norms and taboos notwithstanding), that video is a godsend, I've watched it twice now and probably will rewatch it many more, until I stop beating myself over the head with pointless negativity.
I never read Twilight nor have any intention of doing so, but now it's because it's just not my thing (and the actual yikes inducing details in the narrative), while before I too carried the immutable opinion that "twilight bad because it's romance and it's bad", to the point of laughing at my partner when I found out they not only read but actually liked it (that was years ago).
I think I owe them an apology.
When you brought up fanfiction I also laughed because that's something I still struggle with, being able to read fanfiction without feeling that I'm being *gasp* cringe.
(And also because, disappointingly, the sort of story I'd like to read doesn't seem to actually exist, my desire to go on a date with the videogame women I like is apparently too niche for the writers on AO3)
Thank you so much for this video! It's very comforting to know we're not alone in such experiences. Wish you all the best in 2025!
33:14 Wow Mert I can’t believe you have a foot fyetish, and you just came out and said it too!
Jk, I’m not done watching the video, but it’s great so far. Very insightful, especially since I’ve been on a kick the last week or so looking at really bizarre and bad literature and trying to work on a bit of my own writing. It’s interesting keeping these sorts of ideas in mind.
I've literally never cared for Twilight.
However, I am always up for philosophical meandering. Thus, will you have my full attention here. 😊
Fantastic video. Lots of great points and such an interesting discussion. Your ability to communicate efficiently, entertainingly, and concisely is great.
I feel very emotionally seen as someone who also didn't start to find themselves until adulthood (my reasons are related to being in a cult-the very same one that influenced Myer's more terrible lore building). Fanfiction was a major lifeline. While I escaped terrible bullying and isolation from peers by age 12, it was still a passive thing I experienced when I was separated from my other "weird" friends. I was lucky enough to be in a huge school, so enough of us weirdos stuck together and it made the ages 12-17 a lot more bearable. I wrote so much fanfiction, so so much fanfiction. And then I stopped once I started college, had some of the worst years of my life to date, escaped a cult and moved in with my partner, and now I write fanfiction lots again. It's funny, how it's come back to me. Or maybe I've come back to it. Then it was exploration of topics I didn't know existed within worlds and characters I loved. Now it's a self discovery and processing of trauma, on purpose or accidental, within worlds and characters I love. Bonus points now, I get to enjoy the sex without feeling guilty about it!
The ten in five is so. It really hits me.
I took a *Very* brief look at your sources related to the porn stats, and to the best of my ability they all seemed to focus on real life filmed porn. What about other kinds of porn? Animated porn, be that hentai, western, or 3D, drawn photographic porn of various styles, written porn without visual elements, or even audio porn without visual elements? There's a lot of types of porn! Do they all do the same thing? I'm curious to know, especially since I avoided irl porn like the plague as a kid, but read tons of "lemon" by the time I was 13. It also feels reflective of our men-focused world that real life filmed porn (or photos) is studied in such detail while the drawn, written, and vocally performed porn isn't. Stood out to me.
And a note, if you ever do get a chance to test for autism easily (and free or very cheap), I'll toss my recommendation in to do so. I figured out I was very likely autistic a few years back, but only just got diagnosed last spring because my therapist has the requirements to do so (it didn't cost me any extra, since the assessments replaced my weekly therapy sessions). It's hard to explain how the difference between "I am probably autistic" and "I am autistic" has changed my understanding of my self and my behavior so much. Maybe you don't have the same block I did, that kept me from thinking of myself as autistic and thus truly treating myself as autistic. I didn't think I had that block. Clearly, I did. Now I can see meltdowns for what they are. I can communicate so much better than before. There's reasons and explanations and *names* for my behaviors. I guess it just opened a world of language I couldn't use before.
Anyway, thanks for the video and happy belated birthday.
Holy crap, I'm so sorry all that happened to you.
And yes, I made quizzes on Quizilla. One of them I tried really hard on "Which Dark Fantasy Character Are You?"
Red! A fellow Quizillian, what a pleasant surprise ;D I wonder if I ever took one of your quizzes
7:00 i’m pretty sure it was Lindsey Ellis’s video about Twilight ~2017 that flipped the narrative about making fun of Twilight is sexist. Just watch Dominic Noble trying to read through the books only to be raging by the end
This video brought out a lot for me. A lot of memories, from a time that I wish I could go back and give myself a hug and just be there for younger me, who needed it. Fan fiction was my escape from the reality I felt like an outcast. I was bullied pretty badly and books (and eventually fan fiction) became my safe place. It started off normal enough, but I did eventually weave my way into the more heavy sexual stuff. That definitely had an impression on young me and I am pretty sure it’s why I have an interest in things like dubious consent and to an extent, non-con.
After my first relationship, where he abused me pretty badly, I think it solidified my interest more in it, not because I enjoyed it, but I felt like deserved it at that time in my life. In a safe environment, I do like exploring dub and non-con, because I know it’s in my control now and I can stop it whenever.
Even now, at 26, I will admit I still enjoy fan fiction, I even write my own, but it’s strictly video game characters where the same themes fall into play. Of course the things I enjoy on my own time are not something I actually condone.
To think about it, honestly, it is crazy how fan fiction as a whole shaped me into the woman I am today.
As someone that missed the whole twilight thing as a teenager, this was an awesome video format and would love to see more deep dives. Really learned a lot between the contrapoints video and this one. Great brain you got there, please keep on brainin'
"just like we can recognize that being a meth kingpin responsible for mass suffering is not aspirational"... girl... I have bad news about some grown men who watch Breaking Bad.
Ultimately, it's not whether it's directed at young impressionable girls or grown adults, there will be people who lack the skill to evaluate for themselves if their protagonist is aspirational or not. To them, the protagonist is always the one you should root for. I think it turns out that your take ends up putting a lot of mistrust in the skills of young girls compared to adult men, when in reality these two groups have the same amount of idiots.
Edit: I realize this sounds a little like I'm saying they have the same capacity for understanding, when one is clearly still growing people who didn't have the life experience to know better, but what I mean is that there will be people who can't tell fiction from reality regardless of target audience. Your point that normalizing bad behavior to teens whose only experience with romance might be these books is absolutely valid, but the thing I meant to add when mentioning walter white idolizers is that media doesn't owe the readers an explicit disclaimer of what exactly in their contents is aspirational or not, because people will see it both ways regardless.
True! I actually make this point a few lines later, I don't know if you saw :D
Im glad you're employee of the month the videos have been amazing recently
Thanks! (I nominated myself)
F&F definitely deserve more critic!
Thank you for this very personal well thought out essay!
10:56 I caught a 15 year old trying to kill herself back in 2022. Already held the belief that they are scorned too much but for fucks sake… really proud of her for healing from it. I’m built quite strong and I don’t get frightened easily but I can admit fucking right up that I was scared.
Gets even worse as I could tell she was kicking herself for some of her actions involving me but I wish he didn’t, can’t help but feel guilty.