Emotional separation from fictional content

surreality

@faraday The game I'm planning has a setting that involves chattel slavery, forced prostitution, murder, rampant sexism, racism, and homophobia, death cults, spirit possession, death from horrifying diseases, children being sold to brothels as early as the age of 8 in its era (though this WILL NOT BE happening on grid it does happen in the larger world and is known to be a thing).

Yeah, I have to actually consider this and how it can affect people, because as the creator of that game world, I do feel I bear some responsibility for what happens to the real people who play on it and the quality of their experience while they do so. I care about them having fun, and not having every possible landmine (and there are many potentials) stomped upon. Providing people with tools to moderate amongst themselves in a comfortable way is something I consider important. Prefs are a part of that. Labels are a part of that.

I do actually consider this to be a pretty solid list:

Trigger/Content Warning List: (only slightly modified from the tumblr list)

Rape and Sexual Assault
Abuse (physical, mental, emotional, sexual)
Child abuse/pedophilia
Animal cruelty or animal death
Suicide
Excessive or gratuitous violence (heavy gore)
Depiction of pornography (including child pornography)
Incest (including any and all elements of romantic or sexual relationships between family, tonal in theme, thought, or activity)
Kidnapping (forceful deprivation of/disregard for personal autonomy)
Death or dying
Miscarriages/Abortion/Forced Pregnancy
Torture
Slavery
Extreme and extended heavy focus on an *ism (sexism, racism, homophobia) in the plot or event (examples: an actual hate rally, the investigation of a gay bashing, people being kidnapped as slaves with the constant assertion they are less than human, etc.)

I don't think this list is so hyperspecific that it should present a problem of requiring people dance on eggshells at all times lest they stumble across that secret hidden giant rabbit phobia, and it covers the major common umbrella issues that tend to raise widespread objections or discomfort.

I also do not think that someone saying, "Hey, the baby seals!" is reason to tell others they are not allowed to do that thing; it's a reason to tell me 'hey, there will be those baby seals in this, so unless you want to suck it up, don't show up to this one' -- which is totally fine because not all scenes are for everyone, and that is OK. The entire point of labeling things and setting up clear personal preferences is to allow people to, on their own, seek and avoid the things they want out of their play experience. Say somebody really loves playing an abolitionist -- and wants to be a spy in a slave trader's camp. That means they're going to be immersed in some subject matter that a number of players would find very uncomfortable and objectionable. I do not believe in denying that player the opportunity to explore that storyline with others who would also have a lot of fun telling that story together because of the people who don't want to participate in it themselves.

@Thenomain My take on it isn't quite that. The above sums it up a bit better, I think.

Mature themes require maturity and consideration from everyone involved. It isn't all on the players, it isn't all on the GMs, and it isn't all on the staff. Everybody has to do their part to adult if you want a setting populated by adults.

@Ghost Again, this is why labeling things is relevant. Labeling oneself, labeling a plot, labeling how the game is going to handle a thing. No one is suggesting that people fly blind. Generally speaking -- and the files say as much -- most people are not assholes and if they know something is an issue, they won't go there. Most people who step on a land mine are blown up, too, and while they may not be going through a flashback, they are not exactly feeling good about it, either, and they wouldn't have done it if they knew it was there. Giving people the ability to say: "Hey, this is my thing, please don't go there." is granting them a powerful tool to express their wishes in a non-confrontational, non-emotionally explosive moment, in which they are likely to be considerably more clear-headed and rational and sensible.

@mietze Here's the thing with that. If I have no idea about content, I apparently will have to assume the worst about <subject>. <subject> is potentially damaging to me. You are a complete stranger. You may or may not be around a lot. Approaching you to ask about the content of your plot or event, in regard to things that I may not even want to have to think about enough to have to ask about, is not easy.

I will tell you what, I've been a lot more open with a lot of the stuff I've gone through on this board than many folk would be, but I actually never had told the entire story of what happened in a certain incident in my life until 20+ years after it happened -- not in voice, not in text, not even in some private journal somewhere, because it is private and traumatic to think about, let alone have to approach someone to try to broach the subject of it with them. I had to write it out over a period of days, and link it to someone in order to open a discussion about it, because it had, unfortunately, become relevant that they understand all the uncomfortable details. I think you're a wonderful person, and you're among the handful of folks I genuinely trust in this hobby, but I don't know you well enough to share that experience with you. Even my husband only knows the rough overview of events of that particular issue. People have stuff that's buried. It is not always easy for them to discuss it. Sometimes even bringing up that they have an issue at all can be uncomfortable. Being able to do so in as non-confrontational and composed a way as possible, over whatever period of time it requires for them to do so in whatever level of detail they find appropriate, is something I feel is valid enough to make it an available option. I do not find it childish or immature or weak, and I also don't think it eliminates the need for further conversation in many instances. If someone is unwilling to engage in that conversation at all, yes, I do think you could have a problem.

However, if I see a plot or event with the 'rape' box checked in it? I don't have to ask. I know to not show up.

I can write: "I do not do rape plots, please do not involve me in these themes," in my preferences -- and barring massive public scenes where it gets mentioned by somebody in a crowd, it is probably not going to come up and it's even more unlikely to just happen right in front of me or to my character. Generally speaking? People are not going to bring that up around me if they are aware, which I will appreciate.

The game can make a policy (like the common one a lot of games have re: 'for <subject>, consent is required to involve someone') re: rape, though similar themes are sometimes singled out like this elsewhere. Arx's take on sexism is similar; they just altered the setting rather than make policy to govern it. I don't believe in stripping it out of the setting -- read: making it unavailable to everyone -- just because some people find it objectionable.

In order to do that and ensure as comfortable an experience as possible? Yeah, I do think everyone has to do their part. It's important for that to be as comfortable as possible for not just me and my way of doing things, or you and your way of doing things.

@Thenomain re: mission statement: this is what I came up with for a main page. It's not the theme file, it's not the setting file, it's not a policy file.

Here Be Dragons is first and foremost a collaborative roleplaying environment. We're here to provide a cooperative framework for people to tell stories together in a game setting based on the Golden Era of Piracy in the Caribbean with a supernatural twist.
The game uses an original system, designed for a persistent multi-player online game world. The system helps establish the strengths and weaknesses of all of the characters in play. It is designed to be easy to learn and use in play, and to allow players to select ways in which their characters are distinctive if not truly unique in their abilities and individual characteristics.
While our setting is historically-based, it is not designed to be a strict historical recreation of the period. On the whole, player characters are exceptional by default. This means the unusual, the atypical, the unique, and the different will be more common among player characters than they would be in a realistic depiction of the era, even in the permissive setting that has been chosen as the primary focus of the game world.

I think that covers a lot, but the first paragraph is really key. I think the approach I aim to take, and have described, supports that statement pretty well, and supports the kind of community I want the game to have.

Arkandel

@faraday That's true, but how many adult games can you think of where domestic abuse or rape aren't plausible IC? That doesn't mean they need to be right there on the grid though.

The issue here isn't having a reasonable discussion about systems or somehow converting it to games, although I really believe we can cover a lot of ground using some the suggestions we've thrown into this thread already - communication, tagging PrPs, auto-matching squicks... if there's a little consideration from every side it's doable. We know it is because Shang has been doing it, and if they can so can everyone else.

The problem starts with assholes - as usual. Folks who strut this stuff - who show up with their NPC ghoul sporting a black eye, or run PrPs based on surprise-buttsex because it's IC. And the core of it is the idea that somehow this is in any form acceptable or even tolerable by game-runners - because in the past it has been.

You know what the major effect of implementing things like we've been talking about is? It shows that the game gives a shit. That it's an actual, honest, actionable goal staff has to make sure their players are protected from assholes - maybe if that checkbox is covered then folks who can be triggered might be able to afford to be more trusting.

Because as it stands historically on nWoD games at least players - unless they have OOC friends to intervene - have been on their own.

mietze

But I do not leave players hanging to approach me. As I have stated from the beginning, I ASK them to please communicate with me any no go areas they think I should know about, and also ask that should anything arise in scene to please let me know immediately.

I also open every scene I do with specific areas I will not venture into due to my own preferences, including respecting game rules.

If someone cannot handle that two way communication, not even proactively but when warmly invited and encouraged with my own disclosure first?

I am sorry, but I do think that is a massive, massive red flag. And I do not think it is ever a good idea to automate/code something with the express intent of allowing players to avoid communication on a collaborative game.

surreality

@mietze said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

But I do not leave players hanging to approach me. As I have stated from the beginning, I ASK them to please communicate with me any no go areas they think I should know about, and also ask that should anything arise in scene to please let me know immediately.

You're not, no. @faraday and some others were suggesting that, however.

If someone cannot handle that two way communication, not even proactively but when warmly invited and encouraged with my own disclosure first?

Which is mentioned here explicitly:

@surreality said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

Sometimes even bringing up that they have an issue at all can be uncomfortable. Being able to do so in as non-confrontational and composed a way as possible, over whatever period of time it requires for them to do so in whatever level of detail they find appropriate, is something I feel is valid enough to make it an available option. I do not find it childish or immature or weak, and I also don't think it eliminates the need for further conversation in many instances. If someone is unwilling to engage in that conversation at all, yes, I do think you could have a problem.

I am sorry, but I do think that is a massive, massive red flag. And I do not think it is ever a good idea to automate/code something with the express intent of allowing players to avoid communication on a collaborative game.

I don't. I see it as an understanding that different people have different comfort zones. I see it as an understanding that not everyone is comfortable being asked about these things, even with the best of intentions behind it, and that proactively communicating their wishes in a different manner allows these people to also be heard in a way that can help provide them with a useful means of making their wishes known.

Think about this one, and in the general context, not only in the context of how you personally do/run things or approach running a scene: how many people come to staff when they have a problem on the game?

Probably less than half, and we all know it. We all know who the creepers/jerks/drama squads are, and know half the time no one will file a complaint. Why? Discomfort, awkwardness, embarrassment, and uncertainty. That has not served us well as a hobby. Do you really think bringing up personal issues with random strangers just to see if you may or may not want to participate in a one-shot event they're running is any less daunting? It's usually more so due to how personal it is -- and it's ultimately for less 'payoff' than 'I am being constantly hassled and this person won't leave me alone!' being resolved would be. But it's still a thing, it's still real, and it still happens. People leave games to avoid having to talk to someone about the problems they're having with some random jackass; that's frustrating and it's pretty damn tragic.

Communication issues, especially around personal sore spots, are far from rare in these parts. I don't see how recognizing that and taking steps to try to ensure these folks who may feel cowed or caught off guard in a confrontation or inquiry shouldn't have a means of making their wishes known in the way that they're comfortable doing so any more than you should be prevented from asking players about their comfort zones for events, or players approaching another GM to do the same.

faraday

@Arkandel said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

@faraday That's true, but how many adult games can you think of where domestic abuse or rape aren't plausible IC? That doesn't mean they need to be right there on the grid though.

It also doesn't mean that they shouldn't be, either. As @Thenomain pointed out, BSG had some pretty dark themes and yet it was only rated TV-14 (yet again proving why, as a parent, I completely ignore the movie/TV ratings and investigate for myself). I rated BSGU TV-MA(LSV) and generally expect things to be in keeping with the show's level of restraint. I consider that to be sufficient warning to people. I think there are plenty of ways to show, as staff, that you give a shit. If you disagree, that's fine. I respect a difference of opinion. I've said my peace though and won't belabor the issue since I don't want to upset anyone further.

mietze

This is why I tend to be selective in who I run meaty scenes for.

As a scene runner I put myself out there and am just as vulnerable as any PC. It's why I do not do non-social/gathering scenes larger than 3-4 people (not including me). I do probably have higher expectations of my players than some--I start on time (unless someone mails or otherwise communicates to me they won't be there on time and the other player's consent to moving the time). I hold fast to space limits. I respect time by paying attention and managing bog downs and always allow for spillover times in case we don't complete by the original time (so that people don't have to worry about work or other commitments because we went through 4 hours not even getting past the first stage).

I don't make my players spectate. I try to make sure everyone has some spotlight and something unique to do (easier to manage with smaller amount of people). I do big scene poses and @pemits. I ask for and keep tabs of preferences and I read everything my players write.

Risky and/or dark RP is imo by definition pretty intimate and in need of extended trust and respect.

If someone cannot or will not meet me halfway, or if staff sets up the expectation that interpersonal communication is optional rather than necessary, especially during risk-containing scenes--then I'm not really cut out for their game as a prp runner. And probably not as a player. There's a reason I don't play on "Surprise! You're getting raped tonight!!" total non consent games like Haven, but also why should I play again I will run like hell from any game that has no expectation of real-time communication between people. It's a fine line. But I really think creating a system for the express purposes of sheltering avoidant people from needing to talk to anyone about things that may or are bothering them may have unintended consequences. That does not contribute to a community that would welcome me, or that I would feel comfortable in.

SparklesTheClown

While I haven't read the entire thread, I figured I'd respond to the first post, since I have pretty particular ideas about this sort of thing.

I think that ultimately, this sort of thing boils down to communication and trust. If you know that your content is generally considered unacceptable or triggering for a large portion of people, then warning them ahead of time before they even enter the story, that a plot might contain certain hard themes, is only respectful. This is a collaborative hobby that's supposed to be fun for people, so I think that it's only fair to have other people in mind when doing this sort of thing.

That said, you can't be prepared for everything, nor can you really add a laundry list of warnings, like, "Warning, there will be rabbits", just in case someone is afraid of rabbits. You warn for the most commonly accepted triggering things. If someone has a problem, they should politely bring it up, though this can be troubling if you're in a plot run by someone you don't trust or feel comfortable with, which is why I generally suggest to have a healthy caution about knowing at least something about the person running your plots, and if they're cool to communicate with.

That said, if you are the runner and someone brings something up to you, I think that being polite and having a discussion about how they can accommodated is important. If you can't compromise for that particular scene, do what I've done in the past, which is promise that you'll have a place for them in a future scene. Sometimes it's all you can do, and hope that the player understands.

At the end of the day, communication is what matters. If there's no mutual communication, trust, and respect, then it's very difficult for everyone to have fun. And that is the key here, the point is for people to have fun, because this is a hobby where we all just wanna do our shit and feel awesome, and possibly escape the shit we deal with irl.

I recall an extreme case on Shang of someone saying they were triggered by semen. I have no idea what you do with that on Shang, to be honest, but there are limits. Like, you don't play Megaman MUSH if you find robots triggering, or Fallcoast if Mages and Vampires trigger your PTSD. People can only accommodate within reason, but obviously these are, as I mentioned, very extreme cases.

I also believe that certain MUs and communities find certain things more/less offensive or unacceptable than others. I think this is perfectly fine, not every community is the same. But I think that as human beings, you can't really argue, "Alright but I should have the right to just do my rape plots without warning anyone", that's kind of a toxic 2005 dick move in my opinion. If you wouldn't walk into a crowded bar and yell, "HEY, EVERYONE I'M GONNA TELL YOU THIS STORY I WROTE ABOUT RAPE", you shouldn't do it in a MU.

Incidentally, I know exactly how a bar responds when someone starts singing a song at an open mic about bears raping people (Spoilers: EVERYONE GETS SUPER UNCOMFORTABLE!)

tl;dr Basic social skills go a long way.

WTFE

@Thenomain said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

@WTFE

Eh, I never minded people wanting to raise awareness of something without being an activist for it.

I did stipulate "'raising awareness' of things people have known for decades". If it's genuinely something new or not really very high up in the public consciousness, awareness-raising is a valuable first step. The problem is when you've got people "raising awareness" for ... I don't know ... breast cancer. Which has about a million foundations from the small to the ginormous doing active research and awareness raising for decades now.

If they donate one dollar to a cause and ask everyone they know to also donate one dollar to a cause, they're still doing something for that cause.

Donating isn't awareness raising. Donation is an actual action. It's activism (albeit often pretty piddling activism--most people donate less to charities they purportedly "believe in" than they spend on drinking sugar and water in cans). Putting on a ribbon or tweeting a hashtag is bullshit.

My general rule of thumb is "if it doesn't cost you something, you're posing". That cost can be time, or money, or even peace of mind. Hashtag and ribbon slacktivism costs you nothing except dignity which, given that people are doing, you know, hashtag and ribbon slacktivism instead of real things, there isn't a whole lot of to begin with in that crowd.

WTFE

@mietze said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

If that makes me "entitled" so be it, but I have enough dealing with mentally ill/selfish or narcissistic/emotional vampires in my RL extended family and volunteering organizations at present that I could not tolerate it in my recreational activities. When I did, or attempted to, the outcome was not well received by the other person ever and certainly didn't improve my experience in the hobby.

Emphasized for truth.

It's OK to ask that I'm a bit careful around common trigger issues (like rape, say, or excessive gore). In the end, however, it is up to the triggered people to get the fuck out of things that trigger them. Demanding that everybody around them conform to their psychological quirks is hubris at a level that staggers the imagination.

And lest someone screech "PRIVILEGE" at me, I have my own fucking trigger. It's a circumstance that happens a whole fucking lot in dramatic fiction of all stripes--even in CHILDREN'S LITERATURE. It's the kind of thing that if it catches me unaware it can fuck up a day (or longer, in my weaker moments) as I work through some very complicated (and once-crippling) emotional and mental states that have been going on for about two decades now.

I'm going to guess that not a single person who's ever played with me over the past two decades knows what that trigger is. They may have even seen the trigger go off and not recognized that it happened. This is because I kind of think that it would be shitty of me to dump my emotional triggers onto other people who are just playing a fucking game.

If your triggers are such that you can't make this considerate, considered decision, then fuck yeah, I don't want you anywhere near a hobby of pretendy fun-time games! And if that makes me an asshole, fine, so be it, consider me to be your personal asshole placed on the world solely to make you miserable.

edited to add

For a clue as to just how wide-ranging this trigger of mine is:

I was unable to read all the way through Mark Helprin's Winter's Tale the first time because I got blind-sided by it. It took three YEARS before I had the courage to pick up the book and face it again. And it was a rough ride even when forewarned and prepared.
One of my favourite books as a child--The Little Prince--is a book I can only read with great caution these days. I have to start from a good place to not emerge from it a wreck.
Naguib Mahfouz's (in?)famous Cairo Trilogy took me eight tries to get through because the motherfucker blindsided me, like, every fiftieth page or so.
There's two episodes of Star Trek (the real one, not the latter-day shit rip-offs) I can't really enjoy any longer because of this trigger.

When I say this trigger happens a whole fucking lot, I really mean it!

Arkandel

@faraday said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

I think there are plenty of ways to show, as staff, that you give a shit. If you disagree, that's fine. I respect a difference of opinion. I've said my peace though and won't belabor the issue since I don't want to upset anyone further.

Of course I don't disagree - it'd be pretty arrogant to suggest only what we've discussed in this thread works. Different games have tried different approaches, some of which I have disagreed with (Arx...) and some which have seemed promising (Reno has a 'preferences' system which is a definite step in the right direction).

But I don't have skin in this game. I've ran risque scenes before with controversial material, but always with people I knew well, and I'd be a hard target to trigger.

I think debating these things out in the open matters, perhaps even a great deal. What's the better alternative, not talking about them?

surreality

If y'all seriously think it is "hubris at a level that staggers the imagination" to ask that people label common trigger content when advertising an event or starting a game so that people can effectively "get the fuck out of things that trigger them" and make informed decisions to avoid the content they know will be problematic in order to avoid problems for themselves and others around them, I know for damned sure this is not the hobby for me any longer.

WTFE

@surreality said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

If y'all seriously think it is "hubris at a level that staggers the imagination" to ask that people label common trigger content when advertising an event or starting a game so that people can effectively "get the fuck out of things that trigger them" and make informed decisions to avoid the content they know will be problematic in order to avoid problems for themselves and others around them, I know for damned sure this is not the hobby for me any longer.

Your reading comprehension is usually better than this:

It's OK to ask that I'm a bit careful around common trigger issues (like rape, say, or excessive gore).

It's like I ... already said this.

The point is that there are literally BILLIONS of triggers out there. Name something. ANYTHING. Oranges. Cuttlefish. Cheap Chinese oscilloscopes. Anything. Someone, somewhere, will be triggered. (Hell, that last one is self-triggering!)

I have a trigger. One that was once verging on the crippling and even now is pretty shattering when it fires. And it's of a dramatic situation that's so common no reasonable person is ever going to guess it in advance. Any attempt to come up with a way to get me to avoid situations that will fire off that trigger is going to be comically unmanageable. The onus is on me, not on everybody else in the fucking universe, to deal with the situation if it arises or, if I can't, to get the fuck out and stop fucking up everybody else's entertainment.

And if that last thing is the solution? Fuck yeah, that's going to suck for me (or whoever is dealing with the trigger). But welcome to life. It largely sucks like a broken Hoover: badly.

surreality

@WTFE Except the shit you are flipping the fuck out about is people suggesting exactly that kind of labeling as being onerous and extreme, and accusing the folks who think this is a good idea of being too fragile for this cruel world, and they should just go off and play tennis instead.

The subject of more rare triggers has also come up, repeatedly. I have a few of those; they're not on the list of shit I'm suggesting people label, either.

Nobody's suggesting people not be allowed to play those things. Nobody is suggesting that they not be permitted on the game.

Some folks are saying: 'label common extreme triggers if you're going to run something that will likely include them' and 'if your game includes these common extreme triggers, you should outline how you intend to handle them in the context of the game'.

This is what is being decried in the stuff you're citing, because various people prefer to handle this in a different way, when there is clearly still room for both to occur concurrently.

Yes, really.

Nobody is asking to be treated like a precious snowflake because they got their feefees hurt. Nobody is screaming for heads to roll if somebody dares misstep. Nobody is demanding games be covered in bubble wrap.

Some people are asking that common extreme triggers be labeled so they can avoid engaging with that subject matter, thus avoiding trouble for themselves or the potential to cause trouble for others to the best of their ability, ideally without having to do more than glance over a list potential warning flags to make an informed decision without even having to bother anyone about it.

This prevents a shit-ton of drama. All the damn hand-wringing that it will never prevent it all because of the endless corner cases the world knows are out there as a justification to shriek and wail about how it's a crap solution is simply fucking bonkers.

You don't solve drama in this hobby. At best, you minimize it. And when such a clear and simple mechanism to reduce a considerable measure of it by ticking off a few little checkboxes on a web form is decried as horribly onerous and simply too much to bear, well... not my circus, not my monkeys, because I'm sure as shit doing it in the way that I think will spare me at least some of the shit-flinging from said monkeys.

Ghost

I found a constructive point to ring in once more.

What about the non-extreme triggers?

We've waxed philosophical for a bit on the extremes, themes such as rape, incest, etc. I don't think we're at the point of a dead horse on the topic yet (because finding new ways to better communicate harsh themes without coming across as some kind of edgy-kink-drama monster to unsuspecting players never, ever hurts).

The non-extreme triggers so to speak, are more common, harder to identify, and harder to control. The original topic being about emotional separation from fictitious content, I feel this applies.

Self Worth
Romanctic Fulfillment
Abandonment
Rejection
Isolation
Feelings of not being wanted

I could write a list a mile long, but I think we tend to come across emotional separation issues surrounding the more mundane concepts listed above than we do themes of rape, incest, mutilation, extreme misogyny, stalking, etc.

As someone who's tripped a few wires before in the past, I'll openly state that when it comes to the people who have trouble separating themselves on an OOC level from the IC equation, the majority of trouble and drama I've come across in the hobby has been due to these mundane attachment issues and not the extremes.

(Spoiler: This is PROBABLY because I've never ever ever ever been involved in rape or incest roleplay? Might be a reason why.)

HOWEVER, how often have we come across nasty interpersonal issues where the core hurt stems from OOC attachment to an IC situation, and the likelihood that the IC situation strummed one of these more mundane attachment concepts?

This hobby is impermanent. The games are impermanent. The character relationships are impermanent just as much as we are strangers and we cannot guarantee even our closest roleplaying partners that a particular bit of RP meta will last as long as we think it could/should. Life happens. Games shut down. People move on.

...but god-damn do some people place a lot of emotional attachment stock in certain characters, relationships, etc despite the fact that years have data have shown us that we don't really get to keep characters; we get to rent them.

These mundane concepts are so subjective, but when paired against a personality that has placed a certain bit of self worth, wish fulfillment, escape from reality, emotional attachment, etc into these concepts, we run into regular issues.

At some point we may want to move away from the extreme to discuss how to mitigate these mundane attachment problems.

surreality

@Ghost The things you are describing here are real issues. They're deep, emotional subject matter, and need to be handled in a mature way.

They're not the same as the kind of triggering content most folks are trying to describe here. As I keep saying: what people are talking about is not having to go through RP that stirs uncomfortable emotions or sadness.

The things people have thus far talked about labeling are things that, commonly, can trigger flashbacks of RL abuse and panic attacks.

People, generally, can control their reaction to sadness, or things that make them question themselves.

Panic attacks and flashbacks are just not the same thing, and it is unwise to equate the two.

mietze

Ghost, this is why I prefer, as a scene runner, to at least have an open invite to conversation one on one on the table.

Granted, as a PrP runner usually I will never have to deal with relationship issues, ect, because those tend to be a private RP thing (and thus all the labels in the world will not prevent people from going apeshit or running away, they need conversation at least of the "what are your boundaries" variety--which for some people may legitimately be 'I don't want to talk about this OOC ever, it is what it is, no backsies' in which case the other player needs to decide if they can cope with that, ect.).

I do think virtually all "emotional separation issues" stem from reluctance/inability/unsuccessful communication between the two (or more) people involved.

And you know, I have actually, in the course of running a PrP or action scene for people who were not my friends or I had had minimal contact prior to that point, had players say to me privately "You know, I've had a really shitty day/week. I would like things to not be nuanced, and preferably I'd like to at least have some sort of a 'win'." And we all had a wonderful experience. Or, midway through a law scene I ran, someone disclosed to me that they were starting to feel a little anxiety (not because of graphic content, but becuase they were feeling sensitive and were anticipating stuff) and asking for a spoiler/reassurance that it was NOT <subject>.) That too was happily and safely and privately resolved.

In none of those cases would a blanket warning have helped. Nor would a general warning. Nor would have preferences entered the month before at chargen or even a week before when they signed up for the scene, or even 48 hours before.

If people cannot fucking bother to talk to each other, then I don't know what on earth we can do to make a collaborative community scene work.

Ghost

@mietze @surreality I think, in a way, it's all connected. The panic attack that comes from extreme content can be just as bad as an emotional response due to extreme attachment, which can both tie to feelings of self worth, exclusion, ostracism, lack of safety, insecurity.

In the end, communication is great, but in cases where there is something unhealthy in the lack of emotional separation, the equation of self with character, even the most accommodating of players simply aren't equipped for the task. There are people who use these games (knowingly or not) to work through very real emotional issues, and because of this, unwittingly pit other players against these issues in a testing grounds of the sort.

I've seen failed marriages being worked out through RP resulting in nasty jealousy fits when other players are drawn into TS.

I've met quite a few people hiding online through relationship rp while avoiding difficult RL marriages.

I've met people who don't have many friendships, romance, or a feeling of belonging outside of MU, and the games represent the whole of their social circle. Like Second Life, the text version.

As much as we communicate or try to accommodate, there are simply some scenarios in play where the emotional separation will not be possible because the hobby itself, or someone's presence in it, is skating a healthy line, and I think there are plenty of us (people who approach this hobby as a team-based creative hobby) who run into these emotional separation issues and think: "Fuck, I'm sorry, that sucks, but I'm...not a therapist? I wish I could help but I can't and I've got my own RL to put first, and I wish you the best, but please, please, PLEASE don't put the responsibility for that stuff on me.

surreality

@Ghost said in Emotional separation from fictional content:

@mietze @surreality I think, in a way, it's all connected. The panic attack that comes from extreme content can be just as bad as an emotional response due to extreme attachment, which can both tie to feelings of self worth, exclusion, ostracism, lack of safety, insecurity.

Except it really, genuinely cannot. You know I adore you to bits, but they are genuinely not the same thing.

Connected, yes. The same, no. They are, genuinely and fundamentally, different things.

The example I am about to provide does not relate to an experience on a game. It's no secret on this board that I've been violently raped. I've said as much before; I'm not ashamed of it. It still took years to deal with it. It took over twenty years to write it out in detail over time so that I might share it with someone who, not understanding what they were doing, kept hopping up and down on the real trigger button with some of their language and behavior.

This didn't make me sad. This didn't make me uncomfortable. This gave me three months of the most terrifying nightmares I have ever had the misfortune of having. I literally could not look in the mirror in the morning as I brushed my teeth, terrified that I would either see the battered and bruised face of a 19-year old me -- or worse, the face of my attacker -- staring back at me. I had to go have a cup of coffee, a clove, go read something funny or watch something entertaining, before I could look at my own image in a mirror without physical paralysis kicking in and a panic attack starting to kick off if I caught something in the periphery of my vision of a reflection.

This went on for three months. It was not the extent of it. Presently? I may as well simply not have genitals, or any sexual drive that isn't directly hardwired to a sense of horror and revulsion. Some of the other aspects are simply too personal to share on a forum like this one, because the details are endless and etched indelibly into my brain. One of the reasons I am not playing at the moment is that I simply do not trust my own brain right now to do so.

This is part of what I wrote when I discussed the experience with the friend, in explaining why I really needed them to change their approach in regard to a specific issue, and to not make the kind of references they were making at the time. (It doesn't address that specifically, but I think you will see what I'm getting at.)

ADD brain exploded in a flare of tangents like the finale of a 4th of July fireworks display. (And I flinch, just now, realizing I typed that simile out only to suddenly remember that the fourth of July is his birthday. A shot of vodka gets added to the coffee for that one.) He almost killed you once. He loves guns. He’s always loved guns. He learned to shoot from his father. You remember what his father did for a living, don’t you? That he was one of those guys who invented new methods of killing people with ordinary household objects as a government contractor and consultant? You remember that, don’t you? You remember that his brother, his hero, murdered his wife? You remember that night with his hands around your neck but you remember him sobbing and begging and suddenly there’s that flash of standing in the park on what could have been any of a thousand different days in junior high or high school of him, the kid who wanted to grow up to be MacGuyver, smiling and looking back at you and crooking his hand and inviting ‘come on, keep up, let’s have an adventure!’ and then friend-since-age-five Sean’s voice is reminding you of how many ways they taught him in Pararescue school to kill someone with something nowhere as innately lethal as a gun and there are so many things in this bathroom but I’m not strong enough to make a weapon of any of them and I’m not faster than a bullet even if I was and…
And then it just got quiet. Dead quiet in my head. It’s never been like that. There has sometimes been peace, or tranquility, or just enough of a dull roar that I could think clearly, but it was just quiet, as if the sum of all of those thoughts had swelled my skull and cracked it apart to explode in their escape.
I just stared at him and to this day I could not tell you if I was even breathing. I felt my face swelling up with blood like I had when he was trying to strangle me, going so red my eyes felt on the verge of bulging, and I was cold enough to start shaking. All the blood in my body was rushing to my face and maybe my head had just exploded and blood was pouring out in spurts with the release of every terrible and terrifying thought.
Hindsight is 20/20. Monday morning quarterbacks, including myself, could doubtless, given time, have come up with an escape, or an out, or a defense that would be possible. I know because I’ve done it.
I could tell you every item that was in that room and likely where it came from, describe its layout. I could even tell you about the case of empty Yuengling in the attic access crawlspace behind a three foot square door with a little latch on it that you would enter by using the toilet as a stepstool, and who was there the night it was emptied over the very first tabletop Sabbat game I ever played with Matt and Ryan and Dave and Tom and Josie and the guy whose name I always forget because I can only ever recall how rivetingly beautiful his eyes were when I think of him, and it blots out absolutely everything else.
I could tell you everything about that room and every single item in it and none of it mattered.
I’ve hated myself for years at a time for not thinking of that thing to do or that thing to say, no matter how unreasonable, or unforgiving, or blind to the reality that expecting someone to react in an instant in the same way they might with the advantage of years of time to mull over the possibilities is absurd to the point of actual cruelty.
We do it all the time in our culture. Everyone does it all the fucking time. It’s all over politics. It’s all over every social outlet, in the media. All those things she could have done to protect herself that we tell ourselves to make ourselves feel safer and better because ultimately the idea that what happened to her can happen to you is fucking terrifying.
One edge of that sword is ‘it was her fault because she didn’t do the thing I’d know to do!’ and the other is ‘I can feel safe from that ever happening to me because I would have done that thing!’
I leave it to you to wonder which is actually more insidious along with me, because I will tell you this much: in that moment, none of those things matter. Once you have lived through it, you know with horrible certainty that there is no woulda-coulda-shoulda that makes one damned bit of difference. What you have is what happened, not what could have happened, or should have happened, or maybe would have happened, and you have to deal with the realities, not the what ifs.

That is how brutally and crystal clear those moments are in someone's head.

That is not sad.
That is not disappointed.
That is not revisiting the pattern of a breakup that you still feel wronged by.

It. Is. Not. The. Same.

Both things are important.

That gives them commonality; it does not make them the same.

mietze

Yeah, this is where I think I step out of the conversation, too.

I am a trauma survivor. I understand very well the nature of triggers (not in the anti-SJW sense, but like...the real professional sense). I understand very well how innocent or offhand references made by other people or suddenly confronting it in text or other media form can really be devastating, even if you are capable of holding it together.

But asking me to be prepared to deal with other people's trauma, who I am not close to at all, and making it my as a scene runner responsibility to navigate it for them, when they are incapable or unwilling to communicate beyond very impersonal slotted in advance ways...honestly, that is a fucking trigger for ME, as the caretaker child of a physically and emotionally abusive mentally ill alcoholic parent in a culture where image was everything and the weight of responsibility of family livelihood and community standing rested on my ability to solve the problem/keep the mentally ill person on an even keel/manage their experience and minimize their destructiveness to everyone else.

It is very VERY easy to get sucked into online, especially with so many other trauma surviving folks as part of the community. But honestly, that expectation kind of makes me want to hurl. It's not something I ever EVER want to do again, it's one of the things that drove me out of MUSHing in the first place, and dealing with those kinds of folks is probably what will keep me away in the future, at least as someone who runs anything or has close contact with folks I don't know (which to me lessens the appeal of the hobby, as I love meeting new people/new thought and approaches and creative minds are exciting).

It is simply not worth the risk of having someone try to make me responsible for managing their trauma, or putting the onus on me or I'm the bad person. I need equal partners who respect boundaries.

SparklesTheClown

re: Non-extreme triggers.

Almost any decent game I've been on encouraged communication and just generally not being a dick. Except for the most extreme edgelords of this hobby, there is barely a single person who is not in some way emotionally attached to their characters. I would say that even ignoring triggers, it should be common sense that doing something that will be ridiculously emotionally distressful and cause some hardcore angst will probably also be OOCly stressful in some way if they aren't expecting it.

That said, I have done plenty of roleplay in which my partner was fully open to angsty situations, and we played it very well, because our mutual expectations were communicated. We didn't always communicate the specifics, because being surprised can be fun, but we communicated our broad expectations. I don't care if I'm in WoD or playing Dragon Ball Z or something, I'm not going to go out of my way to ignore how someone might feel about me doing something, I'd rather our fun be mutual, regardless of the nature of it.

I personally don't know how anyone could enjoy a hobby that largely depends on communicating, if you don't consider mutual expectations to be an important aspect of it. This alone pretty much takes care of half the problems in this thread, with the exception of just dealing with downright toxic or problem players who are never happy with anything. But I personally don't see the logic in suddenly going "Well, some of these players suck, so fuck this mutual expectations nonsense".

Hell, if I may play the race card for a moment?

By that logic, I should just stop assuming that people will be decent human beings just because I'm black and sometimes people are really shitty about that, rather than just continuing to treat people as I want to be treated and hoping for the best.

If people are awful, stay away from awful people, but I don't think that should be used as an excuse to just not even try to make the effort to make sure that the people around you are enjoying themselves and are comfortable.