A unique question I kind of feel bad about to ask. (Mature Content)

@GuardianWynn: Another thing I feel like I ought to comment on is the way you're framing the character in this thread, as if she's a living, breathing person you're writing a factual account of. It's like you're using the Thermian argument on your own story. I'm not saying you have to change any particular thing about this character, but if there's anything that you want to change or that wouldn't work with a particular approach, you have plenty of leeway to rewrite and reimagine.

(Honestly, I'm still not sure why you wrote this character. I don't know enough about your story to evaluate what purpose she serves in it.)

 

Yeah, I have trouble with the first topic. If I expand too much there, sometimes it becomes too long and is skipped. The reverse problem happens too. Though, given the post you quoted. I am still not following the logic?

I am somewhat familiar with BPD. It goes a bit over my head to be honest.

Though, perhaps my original phrasing was at fault. She is vulnerable in the sense that it is easy to manipulate her, but this is her own desire. Can't say no isn't a compulsion she hates or fights against. She is a self made slave. She seems to prefer it that way to some degree. No magical or situational bond is forcing her. She just literally hates being confused. To the point that she gives her opinion away under the assumption that doing so will prevent her from being confused. Her opinion is your opinion and your opinion is right. Period. No confusion.

Given the disorder you referenced. I bet you won't find it strange for me to say she is kind of voilent. This is where I don't picture vulnerable or shame fitting into it. If you insult her Alpha, she will want to kill you. And will actively attempt to do just that. Even to the point that if her Alpha tells her to stop won't change that she will want too, but she would of course listen. So for a slave, she isn't exactly meek. She stands tall and kills people.

Funny enough, I was thinking and still thinking there is probably no real condition as percise as what I was talking about here, but I now am curious how close BPD is.

 

Yeah, but at this point I have such a clear picture of her. I feel like I would be killing her to alter her for the needs of the well my own sadness of her being something I am sad for.

Plot wise she is sort of worthless to be technically accurate. I haven't fully developed the only plot she is currently apart of and all she is a soldier/slave to the Vilian of that plot. To which she acts as his personal body guard. Just given the themes mentioned here. I imagine I would probably expand on her in such a way to show the heroes notice that she is unaware that her actions are evil and want to help her perhaps, but as her mind just won't accept this conclusion probably ultimately fail and she would then probably die. Which is practically needed as her power at this point that it would be difficult for her Alpha to die as long as she is alive. It is almost completely fair to say she is stronger than her Alpha. A part I think only further presses the tragedy of her mind placing him into a master-like role.

And all of that really only pushed my position further into that Thermian argument, didn't it? lol. Is that bad? I am not sure if I see how that is bad?

 

Do read up on BPD. To give a quick run down:
-Black/White thinking meaning you are either the best or the worst and this may change for about no reason.
-Emptiness/Boredom meaning may feel completely empty inside and without emotion (apathetic)
-There may be connections to violence/cheating, but NOT IN ALL CASES.
-Troubled Relationships meaning the closer you are to them the more problems you will have. (ie you will get in more fights with a romantic partner than a friend.)
-Other disorders are linked to this one.
***The above is not all there is to BPD, but some you may be interested in.

BPD is likely the closest, but perhaps BPD+Schizophrenia could be what your character has? Except for the lack of hallucinations. Simply google "will disorder" or something to that effect.

Well here is the thing. Say I love someone. I have a disorder and hit her. I will likely feel shame and guilt after doing so. Now, while never hitting a girl I have argued with my ex (while together) or otherwise had verbal confrontations and felt shame and guilt after such occurrences. A more apt title to what happened between us would be reaction/overreaction or incorrect reaction (rather than overreaction) and though it may feel right at the time, afterwards it would not. So I can still imagine shame and depression.

So wait. Does she want to be easily manipulated? Or is she easily manipulated to want to do something?

 

To answer the first part. She wants to be manipulated. I think the clearest way to express would be like this. She can't stand the concept of subjectivity. Even the act of hearing someone debate on what it means to be beautiful sends her into rage. Because in the end, she kind of does want to know. But she wants to know the right answer. But she doesn't know the right answer. And that angers her. All things like this have a similar effect on her. So her internal solution was to identify a source. A source in which she can ground reality. She names that source her Alpha. And she uses that source as sort of a center of the reality. Beauty is what he decides it is. Good smells are what he decide they are. What she want to do is what he decides it is. And this sort of even explains her rage. He is the center of the universe. Any insult to him is by that definition evil, and vile and must be destroyed. And this is why she hates being idle. When he is not ordering her around, thoughts begin to creep into her mind.

So, she is easily manipulated because she is basically always shouting "I don't know what to do, tell me what to do so that I know what to do! Please! I can't stand not knowing!!!"

If I didn't make this clear before. Forgive me. She is complicated. Expressing her accurately is not so easy on the first run.

Does that clear up most of her? The list you left, parts do describe her. Just not sure she fits the whole ball of wax. I am still sort of thinking there is no real condition like hers. But I am not an expert. So,lol.

 

Well to be labelled as BPD only 5 of 9 symptoms are required I believe, though I'd suggest research to be certain.

That certainly does clear her up, however, I think it is important to know/understand her morals especially about herself. Basically, does she have any respect for herself?

So the definition of an Alpha would be "someone that commands without hesitation".

 

I can always brush up. Thing I was saying though. I had researched BPD, several times. I never quite could gain a grip on what it actually is. This is including a time a psych teacher tried to explain it to me. So I doubt one more google search since the last time I did 3 years ago is going to instantly clear it up. lol.

Well, I am not quite sure I understand the question. Like... are you asking how she viewed herself before she had an Alpha? I mean, because how is the girl we are talking about, who can't decide on her own if she likes the taste of blue berries supposed to rate if she has any form of self respect?

Yeah, pretty much. As I previously mentioned in the forum too. Alpha is not perfect. She has 2 main abandon him/her conditions.
1. They die. Duh, lol.
2. If they don't fulfil her needs. Meaning an Alpha that asks her if she likes the taste of blueberries will severally annoy her and if that annoyance gets high enough. She will leave in search of a new Alpha.

So, since that previous post explained her better. Do you think people having sex with her is rape? Has your view on that changed based on this? Or do you think she is able to give consent? Or still no?

 

BPD is rather easy to understand. All you need to do is understand the symptoms.

Everyone has some form of self-worth, though your character is more likely to have low self worth. People who like to be subordinate tend to have lower self worth.

It is still rape. If a girl is drunk, she may be unable to say no. I think there is a very simple way for you to get your answer, or actually to derive it from what you know. What do you know? She has a mental disorder. That alone is reason enough to consider it rape.

 

I tried to read this and my head just hurt from it all so I didn't bother reading every post.

So out of annoyance, you can put me down to a vote of NO, it is not rape and that's from a female.

On the one hand you like to say she is strong, stronger than her 'Alphas' and that once Alpha man is indecisive, then she is out. So she can make a choice, and she chose to follow and serve and take on the opinion of one person, so she didn't have to have an opinion.

And then we have people saying, "Oh but she is not capable of saying no, so it is rape because yes means no" and all that crap. Oh really? This 'character' who is stronger than her Alphas and can exit whenever they don't meet her very specific need?

If this is to be a two way relationship, then I guess she needs to fulfill a need for them or it wouldn't work. And I'm pretty sure from all the garble I read, these Alphas did not sign on to be her nanny and simply think for her?

And what who be an ethical partner for this person? I'm thinking mind reader, someone with telepathic skills.

You can't have a 'strong' character that wants to serve, doesn't want to think for herself, can and will leave if her needs aren't met and then portray she is abuse material because she has mental issues.

I don't even like what you're trying to establish here. It just comes across as contrived to me.

 

The issue is that consent doesn't function normally for her, so it doesn't work the same way. It's like alcohol, your answers aren't counted the same way because your decision making is impaired. In much the same way as her's is disfunctional. It's equivalent to an insanity plea. Sure, like with alcohol, it's not quite the same level of abuse. But it's not right.

 

Also accusations of "garble" are unnecessarily mean. And admitting an emotional and incompletely researched response means "I am not making a very good argument." You made yourself sound lazy. Why don't you just read all the stuff first? Or at least respond to specific posts if you don't want to read everything?

 

You are awesome! Just simply put. I love you expressing your opinion and I love that your open is so different than the standard here.

And to be fair, she isn't stronger than all of her Alphas but some, yeah.

And I know she is unique, but I am not sure contrieved fits. I mean, I never tried to establish her as a victim. I started this thread because I wonder if people thought her unique condition would be considered like rape. Which number wise most people do, and they think this passionately.

But I really wasn't sure and one of the arguments I even used to defend it was that she doesn't feel like a victim. She wouldn't hide in the corner, or be scared. And if you told her she was a victim she probably wouldnt believe you.

So when you have that list of her traits, I think her being a victim isn't on there. I granted still fell sad for her because she lacks the ability to think for herself completely. I say completely because obvious she came up with the Alpha concept.

Does that sound less contrived or if not could you explain why it sounds contrieved in more detail?

Oh and yeah, you are right. Her picking an Alpha thing is usually done by sight. So, she likely would just start following her new Alpha around without even prompting them that she views them like an Alpha unless questioned. Meaning she would follow you home and break into your house just so she could try and serve you.

I can picture it now. Someone telling her to go away and her coming back the next day asking if she had been away long enough. lol. There must had been some awkward moments in her life.

And lastly yeah, the issue you noticed and one I don't think I spelled out yet was that her loyalty isn't to the person but to the title of Alpha she placed on them. So that is why she can abandon them, if they don't adhere to her understanding of that title. Does that make sense?

Okay. I get consent doesn't work the same for slave. I don't get how that is similar to alcohol?

 

Her condition affects her understanding of consent. Namely; she can't really say no. In the same way as alcohol impairing your judgement, her functioning of consent is therefore sufficiently broken as to be a major red flag. As I said, it's like an insanity plea. She's not in her right mind when it comes to the Alphas. Her logic becomes warped.
Also it's worth noting she is essentially enslaved to that ideal of the Alpha. She can't escape it. She can't avoid it. It dominates her and consumes her, in some ways it's worse than slavery because it makes her mind change rather than just forcing her to act that way. It's almost like she is mind-controlled except for the self-produced nature.

 

I don't think that is quite the same thing.

Alchol depresses your brain literally making you unable to understand the effects of what you are doing.

From what I gather. My girl here seems to be completelyy aware of what she is doing. Just her value system is way leaning away from her favor and as such she sort of can't understand the idea of no as long as her Alpha is fulfilling his duties.

Which I can see as both being issues you say take away her ability to give consent. I just don't see how they are similar in how they do it. I mean, a drunk girl can't give consent because she can't value what she is giving away. My girl has a perfect understand of what she is giving away, she just values the asker more than herself and is stuck thinking that way. Not similar, still not seing how you see them as similar.

 

They're not exactly the same or anything. But they're a both a way of indirectly removing consent functioning through faulty or twisted judgement. She's not right; she's quite illogical when it comes to these people. Illogical, like drunk people are illogical. Just more disturbed and less stupid. It's cultish; another example where consent is removed; proven cult brainwashing is equivalent to an insanity plea I believe. If you want a different way of explaining, perhaps one of the other people saying could use their phraseology that might be more in sync with your thinking (hint, hint guys; get over here.)

 

Oh you can think or describe it anyway you want. I was more just taken aback because the person you replied to had given a long detailed answer and you just sort of said one thing that didn't really address any of her points. And I think it is something you said already in the thread. And it just didn't strike me as the strongest argument, and it looked even weaker where you put it. I suppose those were the issues I should have addressed. Though, her thinking as being illogical is opinion based. It is logical from her point of view. Which is not really true of a drunk person. A drunk person is more just unable to realize. She can realize and she can make value calls. So, yeah, big difference. lol

 

A drunk person can make value call but is unable to recognize their illogical nature because their faculties that would decide this are also the ones that make the decision in the first place. In the same way, this character develops an unjustified with somewhat chance individuals, it's not rational, but she adheres to the idea strictly, religiously, and is incapable of doubting it because of her obsessiveness about the idea. Unless you're changing the description here? Again, can someone else from before who was saying this stuff back me up here?
Also, the way I said what I said was supposed to counter the idea that her judgement is fine and therefore she had a functioning choice. Actually, looking at it the post is suggesting her behaviour is a choice. Mental issues are not a choice. And this was specifically mentioned to be very innate to her. I'm starting to think @LinnyV really should have just read more of the thread. It's not good for or others to not know details because you might miss something crucial and ruin your whole point. Not to be pointed or condescending. It's just my opinion she made a mistake. Your argument is always better off with information; it can't hurt to just check places where relevant information might be (the other posts in this case). Again, this is just my opinion, but I think I have good reasons.

 

Not every mental disorder interferes with consent. This one does, but don't generalize.

 

@GuardianWynn, when I said contrived, I am really saying she doesn't sound believable to me as a 'Victim'.

If your intent was to make her a Submissive who owns who she is and what she needs, because she is compelled by her need to serve then I don't have an issue with that. In that scenario, her mind being geared differently would be interesting. You can probably use the attitudes expressed in some of these posts and have them judge her choices, her lifestyle and her Alphas. Have them tell her she is a victim.

Not that I see any sense in comparing her to a drunk person being assaulted. She is not physically impaired that she cannot walk away, she doesn't even sound mentally handicapped, her brain is just wired differently and she has different needs. Someone is fulfilling that need. A relationship requires giving and taking. Poor Alpha, being in a relationship having to do all the thinking and decision making and take full responsibility for the happiness of another person would be hard work. The poor guy would like some stress relief from all that pressure via some sex in return? No! Rape! Oh give me a break.

She doesn't sound like a victim at all. Nothing would annoy me more than to read the character you described crying rape and the lost of free will. I would just say she has a very different set of priorities. Fine.

Anyway, your later posts doesn't sound like you are in the rape camp, so for that I am glad to hear.

@Oscar Leigh you must be right, I must be mean and lazy to take the time of out my life to respond to the OP. My opinion is as stated and beyond that, my care factor isn't very high. I'm responding to @GuardianWynn out of respect for his/her request for an opinion, to which I responded honestly, in my typically snarky style when annoyed. I appreciate that they didn't seem to take offense, so I'll leave it at that.

 

I'm not taking offense or accusing you of any personality flaws. I'm just saying it looks bad and it doesn't help for your argument's sake. I assure you, I don't know you at all, even vaguely superficially, I'm not going to judge you like that without more understanding of you.

 

This might be self-centered, but in reading through the thread I keep sort of comparing @GuardianWynn's character to one of mine. He's been manipulated and abused a lot in the past, to the point that he has very low self-worth and will almost always defer to other people (especially a certain type of person, ie the type who's abused him) on pretty much any matter, which does include sexual things. IMO, this means his ability to consent is compromised - not in the same way drugs or alcohol compromise that ability, but I can see how the comparison could be made since it's still compromised. I'd see your girl similarly. Her self-worth or sense of self full stop is pretty nonexistent, so what does she care if someone takes advantage of her? She doesn't matter to herself; only her alpha matters.

She can still consent or not to other people, because she doesn't value them the same way she does her alpha - I assume she cares about them about as much as she does herself? I'd be curious how much of a self-preservation drive she has - if her alpha told her to kill herself, directly or by sending her on an effective suicide mission, would she do it? If he told her to stop eating, or keep doing a task until he told her to stop and then never told her to stop, would she stick with it even when she knew she was about to die? What would the cut-off point be? (Sorry if that came up before and you answered; read most of this thread last night.) How does she choose what to do when her alpha hasn't given her orders? Does she have hobbies or habits that she enjoys? Will she function well enough to keep herself fed and warm or do even base needs like that need the okay from someone else? I'd think about to what extent she stakes herself on what her alpha tells her what to do, exactly how absolute their control over her it. Who is she when she doesn't have an alpha or have any active orders from one?

I don't think the question is so much "would she consider this rape?" but "would other people consider this rape?" which has obviously garnered different responses.

Since I keep comparing her to one of my characters, when it comes to writing for him I have different people see his situation different way. Because his ability to consent isn't compromised in all situations, some people see no problem with taking advantage of him: "He physically can say no or walk away, so it's fine". This ignores the psychological reason for not saying no / leaving. Physical power or ability has no real bearing on psychological need, in this case the need to please/obey/defer to someone else. Other people are more concerned with not knowing what's going on in my guy's head at all times, never knowing for sure if his ability to consent is compromised with them - one person in particular knows that he fits my guy's 'type' (you could maybe see him as a 'prospective alpha') and thus has power over him that could prevent him from saying no even if he doesn't want to do whatever, so that person would never come onto him. He personally would see it as an abuse of his power. For other people, who don't fit the type (aren't 'prospective alphas'), being concerned about his ability to consent is never an issue, because they know my guy can at any point be like "nah" - he's not going to value their needs more than his own so everything he does with them is on his terms.

And yeah, it's important to take into consideration that her alpha could easily not understand her deal, and if he doesn't realize that she'll do anything he tells her to and that that's a bit sketch, then yeah, he totally thinks she's consenting %100 of her own volition (which she is ... but she's consenting under the terms of "your wants matter more than mine, I'm unimportant"). It's not his fault if he doesn't get it. I'd only pass moral judgement on him if he knew how she ticked and still opted take advantage of her state of mind. But could people who DO know how she ticks see him as an abuser regardless? Yeah.

 

Seriously! Why have we not chatted on this forum before. You are awesome!

Actually, in spite of thinking about this girl for the past two weeks if not longer. I find it very interesting how this forum has helped me realize ideas about her that I think I had, but just well, didn't realize. So thank you for that. Also, my mind is still very much torn. Throughout this thread you could find arguments of me supporting/not supporting the idea of it being rape. I really am undecided, even now. So I guess it makes sense that being so undecided means that I am swayed fairly easily by the arguments of others, especially strong ones.

And I think @izzybot brings up an important point. That in a sense there are two important perspectives.
1. Her view
2. An outside view

And as she owns her condition. Obviously her view doesn't support it being rape. Or her being a victim or it being in any way negative, but it is easy to see how an outside view might think it is all 3.

So, that made me wonder. If she isn't innately a victim, why do I feel sad for her? I mean her condition isn't sad when you think about it. That is the point as you were saying, right? That she is different but she does that own purpose and seems proud of it. So, we can't mark it down for being different. Though, while I think it is true it can be viewed as sad simply based on the fact she is strong but her happiness is connected to another. I don't think that is why I feel sad for her.

I think I feel sad for her because her current Alpha is a freaking jerk that doesn't deserve her! Seriously. Ironically for this forum, he doesn't have sex with her, but in spite of that he might have been the most manipulative person she ever had. For one, he is stronger than her and is fully aware of her condition and intentionally uses it to his own means. He uses her like a soldier. But the messed up part? He has almost killed her! Out of anger. The idea is that she isn't perfect and occasionally just fumbles. In one such occassion, he was so upset with her for failing the mission that he wanted to kill her. You know, instead of abandoning her or causing her to abandon him. Nope, his solution is more geared towards she must die. He held off and after doing such he calmed down and realized her value exceeded her errors, but still. What a jerk! Right? He knows how devoted she is and he still considered that.

As if that wasn't enough. He would have easily been enough of a jerk to order her to murder her own parents just to see if she was really that devoted. The irony being that for never touching her sexually, he really did take the most advantage of her. Right?

Oh and yeah. I have no intentions of showing her as internally weak because she is submissive. Any story idea that revolves around her being called weak would be by a third party. Not herself.

Do you like the story concept? I am very curious of your opinion.

 

First. You are awesome! I knew this already, but well. Yeah awesome!

Second, no worries. I am so deep into my own story it is almost impossible for me not to relate in the same way in different situations.

Also, none of your questions really have been asked. Warning. I am kind of sleepy. So if I miss one of your questions or don't answer it in full. Please point it out so I can fix that later.

The first important aspect to realize is that she can abandon an Alpha something I did mention. Because an Alpha is serving a purpose and if it isn't doing that she will walk away. I originally saw this as being a rare event, but your questions made me realize it may happen more often than I thought. About your situations. It is really the speed that is notable. Remember, she doesn't wish to think. She places her Alpha in a position as the position of being the center of the universe to which she can base her reality around in a objective light. Well, she would be willing to die for him. I don't mean to imply sucidal either. I mean she is not a girl of half measures. If you send her into a fight, she will fight too the bitter end. And she is going to assume any mission you send her on is something she can accomplish.

But lets take another example. Imagine he commanded her to stab herself in the stomach with a knife. There are two possible results here.
1. She knows it will kill her. And she knows she doesn't want to die. This would begin to break his illusion of him as Alpha. Because he is telling her she wants to die and she knows that isn't true.
2. He proclaims that she won't die. I could see her wanting to trust him to the point of trying, even if on some level she knows it is false. This is where speed comes into play. If she only has 10 seconds to think, it might not be fast enough to break the illusion.

It really means anything that paints her Alpha up in a dumb light can possible break the illusion. Dumb light in a intellectual way. She has been stronger than many of her Alphas. It isn't perfection she seeks, rather she claims them perfect. Like I think a perfect example. If an Alpha called fire cold. This would break her illusion. Because it isn't true and she can't force herself to ignore reality. So he is wrong and if he is wrong here, what else is he is wrong about? But lets play this differently towards calling the blue sky red. I don't think that would break her illusion. Because I think she could just invert it. As in begin calling all blue objects red. Her mind can handle that change.

So in the sense of starvation, the time table it would take I think would save her life.

Does that make sense?

The other notable aspect you seemed to be asking about is her self effectiancy. And I think there is a connect that probably many see that isn't true in her case. But I never explained it. So my bad. In a sense I don't think I felt it notable to the rape aspect of the opening question. But well, remember in a sense she is strong willed. So she is not on her knees waiting to be told to breathe. She is actually very self-pushing. She tries to anticipate. Like, for example, if she saw you wake up and seem frustrated at cooking breakfest. She may attempt to cook breakfest for you the next day. This would be without you asking her directly. She sees a need or desire and tries to fulfil it.

This goes back to the fundmental idea of her placing you into the center of the universe. Her value system places you as good. So if she is inactive without any instructions than like anyone, she wants to do something good. Good in her mind is defined by what you want. So she will try to supply you with what you want. No asking is needed. In a sense this is a major flaw of her that makes her hard to deal with. This is the counter balance to her pure devotion, and by that I am referring to her well, being wrong. A perfect example is break fest. You don't like making break fest. So, she will try and make break fest for you but lets say at this time, she doesn't know how to cook. She is going to make a mess, but she tried. Lots of errors can happen like this.

You whistled at a girl on the street and commented on how you wish you could spend one night with her. Yeah.... imagination can probably see how this girl would react to that.

As for hobbies. Well, most of her Alphas don't realize this, but her hobbies become a reflection of their desire. Dial back to cooking. She made breakfest, but failed. it is a mess. After this she may express a huge interest in learning how to cook and many of her Alphas may think that is just her desire, but no. It is only her desire so that she won't fail in the future.

Any questions?

 

I'd argue otherwise. Provide a mental disorder that doesn't. You say don't generalize. i say provide evidence..

 

I'd have a harder time relating to her as a character than anything else. If she can't feel and she's only doing things because that's in her wiring - what's the point? Her Alpha says drink poison - she pours herself a cup. Her Alpha says lets have sex - she lays down. She sticks up for her Alpha because she believes he's good but it's not a feeling it's just what she's been programmed to think so her loyalty is useless. It hasn't been earned. This is the problem I have with the recent rash of personality disorder characters - I can only feel for the ones they affect not them because they don't seem to be aware, or care that they're different. If I went ahead with a character like this I'd take it from the Alpha's pov and the helplessness he feels in loving someone who has no emotion for him only blind loyalty.