Hunky vampires.

[dropzone]

Well, it goes back a long time. I mean, who isn’t attracted to Bela Lugosi?
(shudder)

[Reply]

(he just can’t win, can he?)

[coffinjumper]

@DocCathode

We too are driven by over riding passions.

We too wear hot outfits (The Victorian double-breasted lab smock is smokin!)

We too are outcasts.

We often shun the daylight (ever try to exhume a corpse during the day?)

Just because my last experiment regrettably (but very educationally) killed three subjects, does that mean I should not be loved?

It’s because you never did make us that half pony half monkey monster. We’re shallow like that…

[Irishman]

Nava said:

And, they do go for the neck. Which for some reason is a surprisingly hard spot to get dudes to pay attention to, dagnabit (it’s my neck, not my feet! it doesn’t smell!)

I go for the neck. Just when I nibble, I’m not trying to draw blood.

[Justin_Bailey]

@Jodi

To asking why the love for “hunky vampires.” My position is that they’re not vampires. I realize that can read like pedantic nitpicking, but that’s my reaction to the love for “vampires.”

Except, as people keep pointing out, bitching about the Twilight vamps not being “real vampires” would also disqualify a huge number of other characters from being considered vampires including Angel, all of the vampires from Blade, all of the vampires from Del Toro’s The Strain (except possibly for the elder vamps) and a wide variety of others.

It’s not pedantic nitpicking, it’s willful ignorance.

[Dan_Norder]

@Justin_Bailey

Except, as people keep pointing out, bitching about the Twilight vamps not being “real vampires” would also disqualify a huge number of other characters from being considered vampires including Angel, all of the vampires from Blade, all of the vampires from Del Toro’s The Strain (except possibly for the elder vamps) and a wide variety of others.

It’s not pedantic nitpicking, it’s willful ignorance.

OK,

1. Who is Del Toro, what’s The Strain, and who cares?

2. Many people complaining about Twilight vampires not being vampires also think Angel and Blade vampires aren’t proper vampires either.

3. The vampires and Buffy and (especially) Blade are substantially different from the sparkly fays of Twilight and more like classic vampires.

4. Please save the “willful ignorance” twaddle for things people are actually ignorant about instead of situations where you want to try to be pedantic about other people’s pedantry based upon poor arguments and a totally unjustified feeling of superiority.

[Justin_Bailey]

@Dan_Norder

4. Please save the “willful ignorance” twaddle for things people are actually ignorant about instead of situations where you want to try to be pedantic about other people’s pedantry based upon poor arguments and a totally unjustified feeling of superiority.

That’s what you got from my post? Really? OK, let’s try this again. The complaints against the Twilight vamps are…

1. They can go out in sunlight.

• Vampires in the Blade movies can be out in the sun by taking precautions
• Dracula himself, as written by Stoker, could walk around in the day

2. They don’t drink human blood.

• Blade doesn’t drink human blood, he drinks a synthetic.
• Angel doesn’t drink human blood, he drinks animal blood.
• But most importantly, vampires in the Twilight books do drink human blood, but the main character does not due to a moral choice.

3. They sparkle.

• You got me. I can’t think of any other sparkly vampires. However, every vampire has their own physical quirks. Anne Rice’s vampires lost their penis. Vampires on Buffy have a “game face”.

4. Crosses, garlic and holy water do not harm them.

• Again, the methods of disposal of a vampire vary from source to source. Do I really have to list all of the different ways in all of the different stories?

There is no such thing as a “proper vampire” and no amount of hate for the Twilight series will change that.

[C_K_Dexter_Haven]

@The New and Improved Superman

Vampire ‘sex appeal’ is a lingering, somewhat watered-down holdover of Victorian era morality. In an age in which any and all discourse on the subject of sex was considered ‘base, indecent and unfit for polite society’, vampire stories like “Dracula” and “Carmilla” were a covert way of dealing with sexual themes and situations. The image of the male vampire baring his fangs at a young woman’s neckline (considered a ‘discreet area of the body’, one that ought to be covered up) had an enormously visceral sexual association to the original 1890s readers of ‘Dracula.’

Think of the common scenario: Count Dracula comes out under cover of night, stalking the gaslit back-streets of London, seeks to satisfy his blood lust, and typically pursues young women with borderline moral principles and transforming them into damanable creatures - after suffering a prolonged, grievious illness. Substitute the vampire’s blood lust with a lust for sex, and much of the rest of the elements fall into place: Society Gentlemen would often make visits to backstreets in search of whores to have sex with under cover of darkness. The anemic illness the vampire’s victims suffered was akin to contracting V.D., and it was generally believed that even associating with loose moralled people would cause a previously ‘pure’ woman to degenerate into a wanton woman.

Being gay of course is still by many (ignorant IMO) people considered to be ‘wrong’ and inherently immoral. It is associated with contracting a fatal illness. It is associated with being out at night (nightlife, late night bars, etc.) It’s not a stretch for young gay people who are being taught that to be gay is to be a damned creature of the night to identify with vampires.

There’s lots of other things to add to that. There’s an exchange of bodily fluids (you drink my blood, I drink yours). The vampire comes into the woman’s bedchamber when she’s asleep or nearly so. He hypnotizes/fascinates her and she becomes subservient to his will (the common image of the “dutiful wife” in the late 1800s). So there’s lots of sexual sub-text to Bram Stoker’s Dracula, which later vampire movies and stories have played on, in more contemporary terms.

[Jodi]

@Justin_Bailey

Except, as people keep pointing out, bitching about the Twilight vamps not being “real vampires” would also disqualify a huge number of other characters from being considered vampires including Angel, all of the vampires from Blade, all of the vampires from Del Toro’s The Strain (except possibly for the elder vamps) and a wide variety of others.

It’s not pedantic nitpicking, it’s willful ignorance.

Excuse me, but I get to decide which version of completely fictional supernatural creature will be embodiment of the class for ME, and if I choose to decide that “vampire” FOR ME means nothing more or less than the creature Bram Stoker dreamed up, you are hardly in a position to declare that I am “willfully ignorant” in doing so. Maybe to you a creature that doesn’t drink human blood, is not evil, and can reproduce is still a “vampire” but who the fuck do you think you are to make that decision for me? To ME, there sure as hell IS a “proper vampire” just like there’s a “proper Frankenstein” and a “proper Phantom of the Opera,” and if you put fairy wings, hotness, and a ninja sword on a Frankenstein, that wouldn’t be a Frankenstein either – nor would my conclusion spring from ignorance of the genre.

You can argue your own position perfectly well without insulting me or mine, and frankly most people would consider that the polite thing to do in Cafe Society. “Willful ignorance” my ass. :mad:

[Justin_Bailey]

@Jodi

Excuse me, but I get to decide which version of completely fictional supernatural creature will be embodiment of the class for ME, and if I choose to decide that “vampire” FOR ME means nothing more or less than the creature Bram Stoker dreamed up, you are hardly in a position to declare that I am “willfully ignorant” in doing so.

Except vampires had existed in folklore for centuries before Stoker “dreamed them up”. Hell, he didn’t even write the first vampire novel.

So yes, you are wrong, and no amount of anger at me is going to change that.

[Jodi]

@Justin_Bailey

Except vampires had existed in folklore for centuries before Stoker “dreamed them up”. Hell, he didn’t even write the first vampire novel.

So fucking what? You don’t get to tell me, or anyone, where to set the ur-vampire, the canon vampire, or even whether one exists or not. Why? Because it’s a fucking fictional character. Who the fuck do you think you are, to declare that people are “wrong” about matters of opinion? Are you making a run for Most Obnoxious for informing people as to The Truth in fictional entertainment? Because to date, that post has been filled by someone else.

You’re trying to dry-hump my leg with your superior Monster Cred, and it pisses me off. Knock it off.

[Justin_Bailey]

@Jodi

You’re trying to dry-hump my leg with your superior Monster Cred, and it pisses me off. Knock it off.

Are you fucking high? This isn’t about monster cred (as I’d surely fall short compared to many other people), but there is no “canon vampire” as you put it. There’s just not. There’s no two ways about it.

Just look at the Vampire entry on Wikipedia. The word has existed since the early 1720s and various other folkloric entities existed for centuries before that. This is centuries before Stoker was even born, let alone even wrote Dracula.

None of the vampires in the folk lore match completely with each other, but they’re all still vampires. Just as all of the vampires in modern fiction don’t match. Yet, if you say it’s a vampire and it meets some of the criteria, it’s a vampire.

[Jodi]

@Justin_Bailey

Are you fucking high? This isn’t about monster cred (as I’d surely fall short compared to many other people), but there is no “canon vampire” as you put it. There’s just not. There’s no two ways about it.

Which means you don’t get to tell me what the term means! YOU do not get to decide FOR ME what is or is not a legitimate vampire, because it’s a matter of personal opinion about a fictional construct. So neither you nor Oh My God Wikipedia gets to tell ME at what point an ficitonalized construct becomes so NOT vampiric – alive, good, not blood sucking, walks around in the daylight – as to become NOT A VAMPIRE.

“If you say it’s a vampire and it meets some of the criteria, it’s a vampire.” Which criteria are those? How many criteria are enough? How many are too few? And who died and left you in charge of deciding? You have YOUR opinion and welcome to it, but you are NOT entitled to try to cram it down MY throat by declaring as the Self-Appointed Arbiter of Vampires that I am “willfully ignorant” in deciding what constitutes a “real” vampire TO ME. Seriously, what the fuck is so hard about this? Why can’t we just disagree without you being a jerk about it?

[C_K_Dexter_Haven]

> TWEEEET!! < ::: Moderator blows whistle for attention :::

Jodi and Justin: you will cease and desist at once. You both know that personal insults are not permitted in this forum. You are both receiving Official Warnings.

If you think someone has insulted you, the proper response is to REPORT the post (little ! in red triangle in upper right corner) and let the moderator handle it. When a moderator comes into the middle of such a fray, both sides are going to get warned. I don’t want to have to deal with “he hit me back first.” Isn’t much more satisfying NOT to respond in kind, so that when the moderator comes along, only the other person gets warned?

Anyhow, it should be possible for two grown ups to have a discussion without calling each other “jerks” or asking if the other person is high, or …

Cool it. NOW.