In love with a fictional character?

Originally Posted by whinehurst

Listen, I don't have any personal experience dealing with the romantic notions of love, so I'm only working with what I've observed.

So admittedly, you're hardly the expert. Why not consider Alice's opinion as she is somebody who has had personal experience dealing with romantic notions of love... she's married and has kids.

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Now that I've said that, how is anything you discribed above not a form of obsession? "We've made one another the centure of our lives"? Admit it, you are obsessed with your family. How could you not be? If you wern't, then I'd be concerned. You should be obsessed with your husband and your children, because they are your life.

So the idea of putting others before yourself equates to obsession? That's a pretty twisted perspective.

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You must be thinking that obsession is always a bad thing, and it's not. I just think the meaning behind the word implies a massive amount of careing. So love, as an emotion (and love has to be an emotion/ feeling, are you kidding me?) stems from obsession: if love=caring+caring and obsession=caring+caring then love=obsession.

I don't know what that little math equation was about but equating caring for something and being obsessed with it are extremely different. Obsession implies compulsive behavior based on emotion which is not even close to love. I take care of my friends, my family, but am I obsessed with them? The idea about love being a feeling is silly. Can you promise to love somebody forever? Sure, you do when you get married. I'll bet that Alice loves her husband and her kids and she will continue to do so for as long as she's here. If loving somebody was merely a feeling, then you couldn't promise to love someone any more than you could promise to have a headache for the rest of your life.

Love is choosing to put another person before yourself despite your feelings at the time. It's easy to love somebody when you're enfatuated with them and you're glowing for just having a roll in the hay. It's not easy to love them when they piss you off and make you upset.

So based on this can you acutally love a fictional character? Not a chance. You may be inspired by the ideas, values, and beauty that they represent but you cannot put their needs before your own, you cannot be kind to them regardless of your feelings, you cannot be patient with them when they offend you, because they aren't real.

This argument about whether or not love is a feeling has never been settled on this board because every now and then another 14 year old comes along feeling reflective and they figure that the overwhelming emotions associated with a first huge crush, or even worse, when some kid on here gets laid for the first time at 17 and thinks they have "love" all figured out.

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Originally Posted by whinehurst

Because the point I want to make is this: I only hijacked the word Obsesion to use as a blanket term meaning "careing deeply about something". I did that because I can't think of another word that means exactly that. So, by my definition, I would certainly hope that AliceNWonderland "cares deeply" about her family. Otherwise, she doesn't have much of a leg to stand on, does she?

so you're using your own definition instead of the acutal defnition. Before you can make such an argument, you must properly define your terms so we're all on the same page.

I'll define obsession as such from dictionary.com:

"1. Compulsive preoccupation with a fixed idea or an unwanted feeling or emotion, often accompanied by symptoms of anxiety.
2. A compulsive, often unreasonable idea or emotion"

Based on this definition, obsession cannot be equated with love as actions of love are not purely governed by unwanted feelings or anxiety. A parent loves their child not out of compulsive behavior based on unreasonable idea or emotion. A parent loves their child regardless of their emotional state. Those that let their emotions directly govern their actions may at times give the appearance of showing love because of the nature of the actions, but fail to acutally love in that their actions are emotionally based.

Here's an illustration:

A parent finds out that their kid has done something terrible.

1. The parent punishes the child in hopes that they will learn from the mistake.

2. The parent punishes the child because what they did made them furious.

One is love and the other is not because the motivations of the action. One has the best interest of the child at heart. They dicipline out of love, the other punishes out of anger. One is a logical choice to achieve a goal, and the other is an emotional reaction.

Another illustration:

There are many times where I feel "love" as an emotion when I'm hooking up with a new girl. The feelings are overwhelming and so for a few weeks we tear each others clothes off and screw like bunnies. These are actions that might appear to be love, but in reality, they are only emotionally based complusive behavior. This situation lines more up with the definiton of obsession.

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Wait, are you serious? I didn't expect anybody to have trouble wrapping their mind around the concept that I mean feeling as an emotion and not feeling as in "feeling hungry" or "feeling tired" And if you're going to turn around and tell me that Love isn't an emotion then I will go throw myself off my third story balcony. And I think that's all that needs to be said about that...

Feelings as in "i'm feeling hungry" are just as feeting as feelings like, "i'm feeling happy or sad or infatuated." Based on that, you can't promise to feel lovey dovey feelings towards somebody for forever any more than you can promise to always be happy. So in order to promise be able to make a committment to love somebody, love must be more than an emotional state as you can't promise to maintain any single emotional state.

And that last bit wasn't directed at you. It was just be going on a bit of a rant because I've seen the whole, Love is a feeling/ Love is a choice argument on this board several times.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Reminds me of Holden McNeil in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back:

"These are fictional characters. Fic-tion-al char-ac-ters! Am I getting through to you at all?"

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Leknaat

Since gaming is into drawing and graphics, he was wondering if anyone liked a character based on the look--the way they were rendered.

How is liking the way a character is designed "considered weird and freakish for normal people?" The freakish and weird part implies that he's got a little more attachment than just, "I love the way that looks."

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Originally Posted by whinehurst

I gotta say, I believe one of my original arguments still applies, which is that it's entirely possible for someone to fall in love with a fictional character. Whoever does actually fall in love with a fictional character has blurred the line between fantasy and reality, which is very bad, but it's still possible.

I still don't think this is possible under what I consider to be love as stated earlier. Instead the word love here is used to represent something more along the lines of admiration. Here a person is "in love" with a fictional character but really they just admire the ideals that the character embodies.

I was speaking idiomatically.

When I was 11 I though Cammy from SSFII was drawn really hot... and so was Psylocke from X-Men comics. Once in 6th grade the teacher called on me when I wasn't paying attention and asked me to answer some question. I replied with, "Cammy's a babe!"

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?