Free Writing 2

In a high school setting, relationships are everywhere. Whether they are bonds of friendship or romantic bonds, they are all complicated, and they always seem to be changing. The show Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a great portrayal of your typical high school relationship. Xander and Willow are hanging out and are about to share their first kiss; a vampire appears and tries to kill them, and then Buffy shows up out of no where and slays vampire. Sounds like a typical high school relationship, right? Well, almost. Think of it this way, Xander and Willow are actually two best friends, the vampire is the rest of the world and a few unconscious thoughts, and Buffy is their best friend. No one knows it, but Xander and Willow have this thing for each other. Xander is finally about to make the first move that he has been so nervous to make, when all of a sudden this vampire appears and ruins the moment. Xander and Willow try and act like nothing was happening after Buffy shows up and slays the vampire. The only difference between this scene and high school is that it's not really a real vampire.

The vampire is just the metaphor used in the show. The vampire can represent a million different things when we look at high school relationships. First, there are all the unconscious thoughts that both the boy and girl have going in to a relationship, or even when asking the other out for the first time. They're always wondering, "does she like me?", "will this work out?", "what if he says no?", and many other questions to that effect. Not only are both of them thinking about the others reaction, but also what everyone else will think. Will they approve? What will they say? All of these things are going through a teenagers mind and sometimes they're just not sure what to do, which leads me to the next thing that this vampire can represent, sabotage of the relationship. I believe there can be internal and external sabotage in a relationship. Internal sabotage occurs when the teen gives in to peer pressure. They don't want to be the new object of gossip at school, so they make sure that the relationship never develops into anything more than innocent flirting. The external sabotage of the relationship comes from other girls most of the time. Jealously is a major concept in high school relationships, and it has ruined many before they even get started. As stated in aggression and adaption: the bright side to bad behavior, "social aggression among some girls may emerge as a function of increased feelings of competitiveness towards other girls-particularly for the attention of males- during the transition to heterosexual relationships in adolescence."

As you can see, the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer really is a true portrayal of a high school relationship. The metaphors used can be related back to everyday life in high school. See, there really are vampires ruining relationships in high school.

Works Cited

Hawley, Patricia. Little, Todd. Rodkin, Philip. Aggression and adaption: the bright side to bad behavior. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence erlbaum associates, 2007.