Twilight Vegetarian Food Rage

Twilight by Stephanie MeyerEvery now and then something comes along and tells me that vegetarians and vegans still have a long way to go.

Friday night was date night for me and my wife and she REALLY wanted to see Twilight. We compromised for our date night. First, we went to go to Spin (which I like) and then we went to see Twilight (which she liked.)

While I could talk about Twilight for a while, BlogWellDone.com is not a movie review site. Thus, I shall spare you my feelings about the movie as a piece of cinema. However, there was one part I found particularly disheartening. Not irritating and it did not make me mad, just disappointed.

Twilight and Vegetarianism

The main character of the movie, Bella (the lovely damsel), is vegetarian (yay!!) and the vampires who drink only animal blood are called vegetarian (which is, a little perverse since to qualify for vegetarian status they have to eat animals as if humans aren’t animals…) I could let that slide, though. Who am I to lecture a vampire about terminology? They have supernatural strength. And fangs. And a unique sense of style that just doesn’t look good on me.

Anyhow, the part of the movie which actually got my to talk back to the screen (a habit I normally reserve for watching Jayhawk football and basketball games) was when Edward (our handsome hero) told Bella that being a vampire vegetarian was like eating tofu. “Sure”, he said. “You can life on tofu your entire life, but you won’t be satisfied.”

Grrrrrrr!

Twilight Could Have Promoted a Healthy (Vegetarian) Diet

A million things popped into my head about the relative amounts of saturated fat in meat vs. tofu, the differing amounts of unnatural hormones in tofu and meat, etc. It was also obvious that Edward had not read my blog, which was, of course, really disheartening.

Still, it really did bother me that a movie that has grossed as much as Twilight and has attracted as many young teenage girls as it has is going around insulting a vegetarian diet. In an age of teenage obesity and eating disorders, where girls are maturing much faster due to hormones in their food, why take a shot at a vegetarian staple? Why not encourage healthy eating habits?

So, there’s my soapbox. Thanks! Next up, a recipe. I promise!

Image courtesy of StephanieMeyer.com.

PS…to be fair, I have NOT read the book.  The book may be more veg*n friendly.

10 Comments

  1. It seems like people have to find a way to see that you’re different, or the same, if you’re vegan or vegetarian. But why give tofu (a food that already has an undeserved bad rap) a knock? It’s a blank canvas, just like chicken for the flesh-eaters.

    And when people see me, they often want to know how they can look as healthy as I do. Eat well and vegan as often as you can. You can eat more and feel great.

  2. okay Im not vegan or vegetarian, but I like veggies, and I like tofu…and vampires really need to get a life. (and Im too tired to be pithy in comments, but this post made me smile and thats a good thing this week:)

  3. Bella Swan is not a vegetarian. In the book she eats steak and meat lasagna, along with several other meat-based meals. She also eats mushroom ravioli and other vegetarian dishes in the book as well. I am not sure why they chose to only show her eating the vegetarian meals in the movie.

    I too was slightly confused about the tofu comment that Edward made. He says that in the book and the movie. I think what they were trying to get at is that tofu isn’t as satisfying to a meat-eater as, lets say, a burger would be, not that tofu isn’t as nutritious.

    Just my two cents! I rarely eat meat but I have a LOT of friends that do and they have made it pretty clear to me that eating a meal devoid of any meat products just doesn’t satisfy them.

  4. I’m not a vegetarian, but I love tofu. I can easily eat only tofu in a meal and be satisfied.

    Can the vampires in Twilight eat “regular” human food, and be able to taste them like humans do? If not, how would Edward Cullen even know what tofu tastes like? The last time he was human was presumably a hundred years ago, and I don’t think tofu was a well known food in the west back then…

    • I think you’ve actually hit on something that’s been bothering me. It all felt like needless tofu bashing because you’re right Edward has never had tofu.

      Tofu was just used as a metaphor for an unsatisfying alternative to meat eating. Booo….

      Okay, that’s all I am going to rant.

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