Giffin’s New Novel Embraces Negative Stereotypes
Boys are not always villains, and girls are not always victims
I have been a fan of Emily Giffin’s for over 10 years. I first “found” the author of Something Borrowed and Something Blue when I was on bed-rest, pregnant with my twin boys. Something Blue tells the story of a woman who has unexpected twins herself. Fascinated and feeling the affinity of the situation, I researched and found out that Ms. Giffin herself has twin boys. She wrote the story from her experience and from the heart. I immediately fell in love with her. Since then, I have read all of her books, buying and devouring each as soon as they are published.
As with each year, I waited excitedly to have her latest novel, All We Ever Wanted, released this summer. And…I was disappointed. This novel hit on every social justice issue that I can think of, and not neutrally or positively. Many issues were not even relevant to the story at hand. Even “Planned Parenthood” had to be mentioned in some absurd, unneeded utterance.
All We Ever Wanted is a story of teenage crushes, with an odd elitist, victim perspective. High school girl gets drunk at a party. Passes out. Inappropriate pictures are taken of her, by her boy crush nonetheless, and shared through texting. Boy is accused. Boy blames a different girl. It comes across as a classic he said, she said story with leftist stereotypes. One of the main characters, the accused boy’s mom, Nina, questions the character of her husband and son and in the end believes they are both selfish, horrible persons whom she must extricate from her life.
The story is so frustrating for me. As a mother myself to two girls and two boys, I hate this current cultural view that “boys are bad.” All boys are NOT bad, and I’m tired of the narrative saying so. This book does a disservice to all boys out there, as most males, I believe, are doing the right thing, with good character and honor. While not every male character in the story was shameful, the stereotype and gender profiling in this book hit low.
The book also touched on every condescending position that elite leftists try to take. For example, a character in the book, Teddy, has good morals — with Christian faith and a Southern accent. He’s portrayed as small town, small minded, and naïve. She also pokes fun at another character who has a Bible Study, not portraying her as anything but a hypocrite. While this may be true of some folks, the blanket profiling of Christians is demeaning, and actually, mean.
At another point in the novel, Ms. Giffin talks about a relationship between a white girl and a black boy. Of course, one of the characters, a rich, white character says something derogatory about the bi-racial couple. And for what? This depiction of racism has absolutely nothing to do with the story. It was yet a passing portrayal of characters not even mentioned again in the larger story. Why was it even mentioned? Why play the race card? It is frustrating.
The theme in the novel is that girls are not responsible for their bad decisions, but boys are. In the book, girls made bad choices (getting drunk, having sex at a young age, letting their sexual escapades be video-taped). When terrible consequences happen, the girls are portrayed as the victims and the boys are the perpetrators. Indeed, and for certain, boys can take vulnerable girls and/or vulnerable situations and ruin a girl’s reputation. Ironically, I know this first hand. Maybe this is why the book makes me so enraged. But we have seen in our world many boys and men ruined by manipulative girls with agendas of their own, such as the false allegations made by the Mattress Girl at Columbia University, the false allegations made against the UVA fraternity in Rolling Stone magazine, the false allegations against the Duke Lacrosse Team, and even false allegations made against Ryan Seacrest. Additionally, we continue to see the left spread the false narrative that women are victims.
The fact that published stories focus so much on the negatives of male behavior and portray Christians and Conservatives as vile characters angers me. The focus on class warfare and victimization is hyperbolic. I do enjoy Ms. Giffin’s style of writing. Her books are a fantastic descriptive playground of situations, words, and characters. I am only disappointed in the direction of this story. My husband and I are working hard to raise our sons to respect women in thought, word, and deed. It is exhausting to feel our culture is working against them so mightily. As a mother of two daughters as well, I absolutely want to ensure their safety. But we cannot paint the majority of boys as unruly in the process.
While I do know this is just a fictional story, the continual repetition that being a male today is a negative quality continues to degrade the strength of our culture and our communities. Authors are, of course, allowed and expected to use their creative license to portray villains, protagonists, and other characters in certain ways; however, when a novel focuses so much on advancing negative stereotypes, it damages actual people in real society. I know we can tell stories that demonstrate and characterize good role models, behaviors, and values for all members of humanity. I also know that I will be looking forward to reading Ms. Giffin’s next book as I still believe she is an engaging author with great talent.
