The Twilight vs Harry Potter Debate: Question #3

December 24, 3:42 AMBook ExaminerMichelle Kerns

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Ready for Question #3 Twi-hards and Potter heads? (If you missed the first two, catch up here: Responses to Question #1, Responses to Question #2.)

Question #3: What lessons does your favorite of the two sets teach to young readers and how do those compare to the lessons taught by the other series?

 

What say you, Team Twilight?

Ms. Taelor Ball: Even if vampires don’t exist, neither do wizards and witches. You can relate better to Twilight because the main character is an average girl who falls in love with a guy that she can’t have. That has happened to me more than once. I think Twilight can teach young readers to never give up and always follow your dreams, even if you dream about your boyfriend who is also a vampire.

Ms. Caroline Suh: If Harry Potter has taught me anything, it's that if you don't get killed by a looming evil in your first year of school, then do something even more ballsy in your second year to get it done. For a boy who grew up with no proper parenting figure throughout a portion of his year where one is most necessary, he is able to show minimum disregard to warnings and school authority and go breaking the rules. Rather than being even mildly punished for his actions, he is greatly celebrated by his whole school. Sure, Harry Potter's hard work and determination helped him "triumph over evil" but so did his sheer luck. Yes, he is not the brightest wizard at school or the most athletic, that's why he has smart and athletic friends to help get the job done for him. So lesson is: if you know you can't beat He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named on your own, make friends with people that have talents that you lack and have them risk their lives with you. The Twilight series on the other hand teaches lesson of patience, self-control, sacrifice, responsibility. Bella and Edward make chastity a virtue again by waiting to take their relationship to the next physical level until they're married. From Bella alone, we learn to appreciate valuable human experiences in life and how it is important not to rush them as they happen. Before making choices, we have to realize the full potential of the aftermath, which is something Bella learns about her decision of wanting to become a vampire once she meets Brie in Eclipse. From Edward, everyone should not expect someone with perfection to his extent, but we can learn to have some expectations from people of what it truly means to make sacrifices for loved ones, practice self-control, and open the car door for others once in a while.

Ms. Laura Nelson: Twilight certainly taught readers to fight with all that they have, for whatever they believe in. In Twilight’s case, this included eternal love, family values and devotion, parental love (in Breaking Dawn, when many risked their lives for Renesmee’s), friendship, and righteousness (Edward always wanted to do right for Bella, no matter the sacrifice to him). Twilight also shows readers to love with their whole selves and nothing less. There are also lessons to be learned from Twilight about empathy and sympathy in how one’s choices affects others, and also to think through every decision one makes, because some decisions are irreversible. Harry Potter also teaches readers to fight for what they believe in, a good example would be when Harry formed “Dumbledore’s Army,” a group to fight against Dark Magic. This was not an easy feat for Harry because at this time during his education at Hogwarts it was against the rules to gather in groups, for any reason. Twilight’s lessons mainly centered around protecting those you love no matter what, while Harry Potter’s lessons contained messages of doing right for all and protecting the greater good. Harry was a very noble wizard. I think that both books offer superior messages to their young readers, although I do argue that the messages in Twilight where more easily revealed, and less hidden in confusing plot lines.

Ms. Caroline Gates: Wow, this is a difficult question to answer. For me personally, I think Twilight taught a few lessons for young readers. In Twilight, the big lesson was choices. You always have a choice in life and its up to you what you decide. Edward could have left Carlisle and become a "monster" as he put it, but didn't want to become that. Edward had another choice to kill Bella, but he didn't. Bella could have listened to Edward and not gone after James, but she did anyways. I don't think they could have killed James if Bella didn't do what she did. Its up to you to make the right choice for you. In Harry Potter, I guess the big lesson was to never give up. Even though Voldemort was hunting Harry down, Harry never ran away with his tail between his legs. He stood up to him and defeated him. However, I think Twilight taught the better lessons though. Along with the choice, Twilight was filled with morals. You never EVER see that in a vampire book. Most vampire books are filled with blood and sex. Twilight didn't have that much blood, and the sex came only after Bella and Edward got married. Its hard to teach young people about morals, but I think Twilight did a good job of showing that.

Team Potter's response:

Ms. Molly Gerber: This question marks the center of my disdain towards Twilight, so I apologize if this gets long. Twilight readers argue that the series teaches lessons of the power of love, friendship, loyalty, and even abstinence. It is great that readers find these lessons within the series. However, these books weren't meant to teach lessons. You may think I'm being biased and unfair, but believe it or not, I'm getting that information straight from the author's mouth. In episode 156 of MuggleCast (a Harry Potter podcast, in which many of the hosts are big Twilight fans), Stephanie Meyer was interviewed. The MuggleCasters asked her what message is in the Twilight books, and she responds, "there is no moral of the story, the point is to have a good time." She went on to say that it is about "having fun and entertainment, and nothing beyond that was intentional." There is absolutely nothing wrong with having a book merely for entertainment purposes, I am not criticizing her for that. That is what a book should first and foremost be. However, this fact makes comparing it to the Harry Potter books a ridiculous notion.

 

Harry Potter's lessons are immense. Obviously, first and foremost, the books as a whole are a lesson that love conquers all. Anyone who has read and truly understands the meaning of Harry Potter can't argue the fact that love underlies each aspect of the plot. It isn't as clear-as-day as it is in Twilight, but I believe it shapes the characters in Harry Potter even more than it shapes those in Twilight. Sure, Bella and Edward are in love. But Lily died for her son Harry, saving his life. Dumbledore completely changed his ways after the accidental murder of his sister, whom he loved above all others. Snape completely changed his alliance, risked his life, protected Harry, and eventually died all because of his love for Lily. Aurthur and Molly Weasley love their children so much that they risked their lives to fight Death Eaters to keep them safe. I could go on and on about examples of the true power, strength, and meaning of love in the Harry Potter books, but there are more lessons to touch on.

Ms. Juliana Gomes: Both of the books, in my opinion, teach a lot about all kinds of love, and what we’re willing to do to protect the ones we care about. One of the reasons why I think the Harry Potter series are a bit richer, though, it’s because of that – J.K. Rowling doesn’t only send us this message about desperate love and what we’d do to keep the people we love next to us, like Stephanie does. Rowling takes it a bit further. Harry lost his real family, whereas Bella’s got two families to rely on (Charlie and Renée and then the Cullen family, including her own daughter). What Harry does to save the only family he’s got left – his friends, since he lost his real family –, to me, at least, is much more than Bella has to do to keep Edward. And this kind of love between them (Bella and Edward) is not something everyone can relate to, especially if the people reading the books are only kids. Harry Potter teaches lessons to ten-year-olds as much as it does to sixty-year-olds – losing people we care about to valuing true friendship.

 

Ms. Victoria Landaker: I’m sure that everyone has a different way of looking at the lessons taught by the Potter books, but in my opinion they are classic good vs. evil stories. The Potter books teach younger readers the meaning of self-sacrifice for others, which is a theme that plays constantly through all seven of the books. From Lily’s self-sacrifice for her son in the beginning of the series, to what Harry thought his self-sacrifice would be at the ending of Deathly Hallows, these books teach younger readers the importance of fighting for a cause greater than yourself.

Ms. Annalisa Freeman: As both series fall in the young adult genre, I believe the question of what lessons we learn from the series is a viable and important one. You can't excuse away the messages innate in these stories by claiming its just fantasy and kids know the difference. Particularly with the mass followings these series procure, parents should be wondering what exactly their children are gaining from the books they love.

 

In Twilight, we learn that true love comes hard, fast, is all encompassing, and most importantly trumps all else in our lives. Life ends when you get a boyfriend. In some cases (as with imprinting) love is out of our control and excuses the type and form of our love and even our behavior because love at first sight takes our ability to think and choose for ourselves hostage. According to Twilight, love makes it reasonable for you to sneak a boy into your room and lie about it to your parents. A relationship that goes from intriguing to intense in nothing flat becomes the center of your universe and the only relationship that truly matters. In fact, everyone else in your life may as well disapparate because they become meaningless. It did not appear that Bella ever once thought of her high school friends past the meadow scene or mourned the fact that she would never see them again once she became a vampire, friends that were rather prominent in Twilight but slowly became less of a backdrop until they were completely absent in Breaking Dawn.

 

While there is encouragement for education from Edward, this girl who gets married right out of high school because she can't wait to have sex, doesn't really care that she develops or learns or grows anymore. All that is important to her is Edward. I know that when you get married, the world around you fades and your family becomes most important, but when you start dating in high school, and rarely do people marry their first love, you need to keep a balance between relationship and life. Your friends (and your grades) aren't always going to be happy to greet you back in their inner circle once your passion dies out. So when you're out searching for your ideal Edward (or Jacob if you prefer) don't ditch the rest of your life for him.

 

The saga portrays female characters that are weak and need to be cared for by a man and male characters who are overbearing, forceful, and a little too intense. Men in real life who are intense and overbearing may make for a romantic chase, but that anger just below the surface can be a scary characteristic once the relationship develops. While Edward makes a fascinating vampire, I'm not entirely impressed by SM's vision of the perfect boyfriend and wonder what type of boyfriends this generation of Edward-obsessed fans are out to find.

 

It is that vision of a perfect boyfriend that concerns me the most. On the surface this series appears to condone morality and is being hailed for its standards, but what it does in my opinion is far worse. It lures girls into a false sense of security that if they are open and honest with their boyfriends without setting prior standards for how far they are comfortable with a relationship going, that said boy will respect their morals and be the one to stop when things get too heavy. Bella is constantly begging for sex and girls are the ones who are reading these books wanting to be her. The series tells girls that it's perfectly acceptable to push their boyfriends and never be guarded with their own sexuality because if their boyfriends truly love them, they will have the willpower to encourage chastity. I think this is an extremely dangerous underlying theme in the book and hope parents are discussing the pitfalls of this series with their daughters, particularly younger ones who didn't realize how intense and non-young-adult-appropriate these novels truly are.

Ready for Question #4? How successful do you think your favorite series is in encouraging new readers to continue reading and how does this compare to how new readers will react to the other series?