Virginity, Vampirism and Mister A: Nothing, nothing, nothing in between

Subtle.

That the politics of the Twilight saga are reactionary is not exactly shocking, but I feel there's a connection to be made here between Meyer's decision to use vampires (who, as previously mentioned, are irrevocably changed - dead, in fact) in her addressing of burgeoning pubescent sexuality. Meyers' view of sex as tempting predation which must be constantly struggled against reminds me of Steve Ditko's Mister A comics, which were intended as a sort of primer in that writer's objectivism. The basic plotline runs thus: Some hapless citizen is tempted into a life of crime/sin because it seems so easy. Before they know it, they're in over their heads, realize they've made a mess of things, and try to escape from their sordid circumstances. It is at this point that the super-heroic(?) Mister A shows up, dispatches the bad guys who tempted the hapless sod into sin, and more often then not lets the latter die as well. A's calling card is a literal card, divided into black and white, reflecting his (and his author's) belief that there is only good or evil, and if you're not good, you're worthless. This kind of moral reductionism so bothered Alan Moore that he and his band did a song about it. No, seriously.

And of course Moore parodied Mr. A (and Mr. A's slightly watered-down alternate version, the Question) with the character of Rorschach in Watchmen, which Ditko dismissed as "insane". For all that Rorschach was more or less an unchanged version of A.

So what does all this have to do with Stephanie Meyer? The moral duality of Mister A is echoed in Meyer's sexual and mythological politics. Virgin or whore, human or vampire, you're one or the other and if you're the latter, you're really just a walking corpse who hasn't realized it. Of course, I have to admit that the analogy breaks down when Bella both becomes a vampire and has sex, although both are treated as absolutely the last straw and permissible just this one time (and for procreation, of course). Such excuses (or any excuse) would never suffice for Mr. A's morality.