Not In My School (16)

Not In My School is a weekly feature that throws out one YA lit cliche a week to compare to my own high school days. Because we all know how accurate those fictional nuances are . . .

ABC

Evil step-parents

Usually female and usually with some level of ulterior life-destroying motives, whether it's keeping the step-child from the person of their choice, failing to recognize one's need to save the world or repeated murder attempts, a lot of step-parents are portrayed as ultimately wanting to eradicate the fruit not borne from their own loins for whatever evil reason that fuels them.  I can't help but wonder why step-parents aren't ever portrayed as nominally normal.  Do people think that all step-parents, after convening from their evil step-parent meeting, go forth and destroy, as is their sole purpose?  As someone that has a step-parent I can assure you no poison apples were ever involved in any of our exchanges.  I never lived with my step-parent but I was around enough and I never got an evil vibe.  That's not to say people can't be dicks.  Of course they can.  But they can be biological and be dicks too.  Just because a parent is step doesn't automatically file them into the evil category.