I’ve lost track of how many bars there are in Borderstan. In the neighborhood, we literally have places to imbibe on every corner. It follows that we have a robust drinking culture here, too. Along with drinking comes merriment, of which we greatly approve.

However, there is a darker side to revelry. Since Stephanie Meyer published the Twilight series, I’ve noticed that human conduct (under the influence) has gone from fun and frivolous to well, more vampire-like. After asking around, I realized I wasn’t the only one seeing this.

Here are some similarities between Twilight and DC bar behavior

“Every time he touched me, in even the most casual way, my heart had an audible reaction.”
-Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 16, p.335

“I was chatting with a hot guy during happy hour one Friday. He reached up to point to something, only his hand grazed my breast in the process. He didn’t apologize. I covered my breast at that point. Less than 10 seconds later, he grabbed the hem of my dress and shook it. I told him to knock it off, he got angry and touched me again! I left pissed and uncomfortable.”

“I’m feeling extremely insignificant...”
-Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 15, p.326

“It was really late one night on 17th street. I was walking home, and out of nowhere, a guy came out and spanked me with his hand. Just like that! I ran home.”

“Yeah, it’s an off day when I don’t get somebody telling me how edible I smell.”
-Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 14, p.306

“I was out one night with a guy friend on U Street. We’re drinking and making jokes, it’s all good! Until he leaned over, hugged me and wound up putting his face in my boobs, and bit me in the arm…don’t think that’s allowed in The Saloon! Not to mention he made an obnoxious comment about how “if he didn’t have a girlfriend…” Let’s just say Dracula is not my friend anymore, and that I feel really sorry for his girlfriend.”

“I tried to flirt — it worked better than I thought it would.”
-Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 9, p.184

“A year ago, I went out with a former friend. We had a flirty thing up to that point, but he had a girlfriend so I counted on nothing crossing the line. We had been drinking a lot…he started unbuttoning my top in the bar. I didn’t know what to do, so I just got out of there as soon as I could. Looking back, it was scary as crap. I don’t talk to him anymore, really.”

“I’m not quite that delicate.”
-Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 10, p.197

“Went out dancing with my girls on a weekend, and somehow wound up with some guy trying to grind me into a wall. His hands were everywhere, so I slapped him and told him to back off.”

•  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •

If you want to defend yourselves just in case your night of inebriated revelry turns Twilight on you, check out the self-defense classes at the studio in Chinatown. For even more resources, feel free to contact namita[at]borderstan[dot]com.

For those of you who don’t grope, grab, spank, bite or undress your friends or strangers without consent in public places, thank you for keeping our social lives and neighborhoods enjoyable.