Edward Cullen was the first stable man the media gave me
On how the media tells women that men are going to be
I grew up in the grand age of YA. I had Hunger Games, I had Harry Potter, I had Twilight. While some of these series get laughed at now for being so simplistically written, they are still due revere for the way they brought the enjoyment of reading into a time when electronics were taking over. For many of us these books started the beginning of looking for the ever-elusive “forever.” We argued between Gale and Peta. We wanted Hermoine to pick Harry. And then a few people who were wrong wanted Bella to end up with Jacob (it’s okay, I forgive you.)
Edward was the first man in any of these books who was stable. Most of the portrayals of men/boys we received in books during this time were scruffy and haphazard (Harry) or dumbfounded and poor with emotions (Ron, Gale). Even Peta, for all of his goodness, was not a very supportive or open partner. Some older books were revived during this time due to movie fandom like Pride & Prejudice where we get Mr. Darcy (distant and not good at communicating) and that redhead dude that Jane marries, again, dumbfounded and poor with emotions. Or hell, leaving books behind in general, look at the guys Rory dated through Gilmore Girls. Dean was probably the only decent human and he turned out to be the kind of guy who cheats on his wife.
When Edward arrived on the scene he was educated, well-dressed, kind, protective in a righteous way (cause he could hear thoughts) and not in a creepy “who’s that guy you just waved at” way. He bought Bella presents and made even days she wanted to ignore important. He was trying to teach her that she was in fact important, despite her awkwardness and being the perfect image of a “forever sad girl.” He was eternally loyal.
Never had I ever cared about a storybook character the way I cared about Edward. Multiple times he attempted to tend to Bella’s needs at his own demise. And while forgoing your own well-being to take care of someone else might not be healthy, it was a needed contrast to this idea that men are bad at communicating, not able to identify their own emotions, reckless, and dumb/awestruck easily. The media gives so many examples of the girl going for the poorly dressed, unprofessional, “bad” boy. Even when they do give you a professional well-educated man, he’s usually a horrible person (Logan from Gilmore Girls.) Even for all of his great qualities, they still had to tell you that it took Edward like 100 years to get to his level of awesome. They had to let you think that it was literally SUPERNATURAL for a man to be pretty, nice, educated, responsible, tidy, and capable of handling their own emotional needs. In fact, the only other example I can think of that the media gave me of a good man was in Tuck Everlasting and that man was also well beyond his years.
The media, from my perspective, has really given me shit to hope for in regards to a man. Most images I was given are of man-children, or bad boys. On occasion you get the down-home Southern sweetheart, but he’s usually dumb and a little reckless. The media is always portraying men to women as someone who will hurt you (through their recklessness and general inattentiveness) or someone who will need you to coddle them (through their inability to deal with their own emotions, and inability to care for their own home needs). And when they don’t and you get someone like Cedric Diggory, they die young — because that’s when the good die, I hear.
Personally, I have been working very diligently to correct this error that the media has created in my expectation of the future, but even still I swoon at every man wearing hole-y shoes with poorly kempt hair (I bet he’s so deep and misunderstood). What are some negative and positive images of men you’ve seen in the media? If you’re a man, do you feel like the media represents you well?
I’d love some feedback on how to create more positive rolemodels for men and get out of this idea that man-children will get all the girls.
