power play #4

robin wilson is "chubby". francine pascal's word, not mine, and by "francine pascal" i mean kate william. weighty issues abound in this book which is laced with really unhealthy messages about weight vs popularity. unlike the last SVH i read, "don't go home with john", which dealt with teen issues in a really classy (well, for SVH) and subtle (well, for SVH) way, this book just didn't ice my proverbial cake.

robin wants to get into pi beta alpha, the hottest sorority on campus, the one that jessica wakefield is president of and the one that liz casually turns up to when something important is going on like voting to get a "chubby" chic membership, because liz is cool like that.

robin basically worships these popular kids, she thinks her whole life is going to be amazing if she can just get popular and get into their club. she follows jess around like a lapdog, picking up her dry-cleaning and doing random chores for her while she's out doing other fun stuff with lila. when liz puts robin forward to be part of the PBA that bunch of skinny bitches go totally power crazy and make robin do like a gazillion embarrassing things from having to spend a day on the beach in a far too small bikini playing beach volleyball to asking bruce patman on a date and they even make her wear short shorts and run around the track every day while people yell out mean things about her size from the sidelines. 

robin gets blackballed (whatever that is) and even though she did EVERY SINGLE THING the PBA told her to do she still didn't get in because, well, she's chubby. 

seriously, i actually wanted to punch jess in the face, what a bitch. so not cool jess, and even liz doesn't really do much, she just tries to get robin into the sorority and it's like - WHY DO YOU EVEN WANT TO HANG OUT WITH THOSE SKINNY BITCHES WHO ARE TOTALLY MEAN?????

so robin goes like totally depressed but she keeps running round the track and starts eating lettuce leaves (like she ACTUALLY eats just lettuce leaves for lunch)... and after a couple weeks she is suddenly SKINNY and HOT and she got some designer jeans and even bruce patman is like - WHO'S THAT GIRL in those designer jeans? and he almost walks into a wall.

and then the next day she wins the miss sweet valley high beauty contest, or whatever the hell contest it is.

like WHAT????????!!!!!! seriously, what message is this trying to get across to teens? even i was like - OMG i should go running and eat lettuces! then i remembered my bad knees and that i didn't want to be in a sorority so i ate a biscuit.

SORORITIES ARE BAD MMMK? just because you have a few extra kilos doesn't mean you should live off a lettuce leaf. don't get me wrong kids, i'm all for healthy lifestyle and fitness and stuff, but eating a lettuce and working out for like hours every day when you never did a sit up before all because you want to be skinny so that bruce patman walks into a wall is like kind of whack. 

*sigh*

2 stars for irresponsible ghost writing.

don't go home with john #90

TRIGGER WARNING - date rape. 

this is such a hot topic right now! everyone all over the interweb is blogging on about that american prick and his definition of "legitimate rape" and sparking a bit of a feminist uprising. well here's a little story from first published in 1991 which is so scarily relevant TODAY it makes me wonder if nothing in the last 20 years has even changed?!  

kate williams wrote this one, and tells ya what, it's AMAZEBALLS with a capital AMAZEBALLS! it's just so gosh darn good. sweet valley gold kids!! it's one of the proper svhs which TEACHES A REALLY IMPORTANT LESSON, a SERIOUSLY important and amazing good lesson in this one you guys.

DID I MENTION I REALLY LIKED IT?!

so lila is having a crush on john pfeifer, semi-cute sports editor for the svh paper and general nobody until he gets an internship with a real newspaper and lila decides he's suddenly actually kind of somebody, but let's face it - she's scraping the barrel with this one... and BOY does she scrape it! 

lila finally gets a date with john, and because he's a really nice guy and she totes fancies him she suggests driving up to the lookout after dinner and dancing for a bit of macking out, because, that's just what they do in sweet valley (only easy annie goes all the way!). BUT when a girl says NO, john, it means NO!!! even if she's wearing a lyrca mini-dress and kissed you back when you kissed her first when she says "stop it, take me home" what she REALLY MEANS is "stop it, take me home".  

NO MEANS NO!!! 

so mr nice guy sports editor john actually then tries to rape her. it's a bit full on, i was reading it on the bus to work and it made me a little uncomfortable, really. he like actually tries to get his pants off and everything, it's quite graphic... well you know, for sweet valley, it's not all that much compared to PUSH by sapphire. 

the worst isn't over though. lila spends a week walking around school in silence without make up on and wears only sweat pants because she doesn't want to be beautiful any more. she doesn't want boys to look at her or talk to her at all. she thinks the whole thing was her fault and she brought it upon herself even though she said no. she's totally ashamed. sadface.

when john then has the guts to turn up at lila's masquerade party AT HER HOUSE the next weekend, right when she was starting to feel a tiny bit better, AND with a sophomore dressed as a RABBIT no less, she fully goes nuts and yells at him and calls him a rapist in front of, like, the WHOLE SCHOOL (well, those cool enough to be invited to a fowler mansion party)! everyone is pretty shocked but then you know what they do?? they tell her she asked for it, had it coming, all that CRAP that people say. it's only when another girl he tried to rape comes forward and the two girls confront him at the dairi burger that people start to believe lila and they send john to counselling.

seriously, john needs more than counselling. so not cool john. 

who would've thought something like this could happen in sweet valley? who would've thought something like this could happen to lila?? who would've thought something like this could be done by john pfeifer?? i mean, john is such a good guy, even ELIZABETH doesn't believe it at first. well guess what girls (and boys), you just don't know do you? anyone can be a creep when you get them alone at miller's point, even john pfeifer. anyone can get date raped, even perfect rich important lila fowler. and if sweet valley isn't safe from rapists, where is?

i seriously think all high school aged girls need to read this book. it's like date rape for dummies sweet valley style. 

FIVE MILLION STARS!!!!!!! ************************************


DISCLAIMER: if this in any way sounds as if i am not taking this issue seriously i apologise. i think rape is an horrendous crime and the reason i love this book so much is that it is super educational and deals with this issue with loads of integrity and girl smarts.