In love with a fictional character?

I must admit it's happened to me a few times. The first time I saw an ad for Everquest in a PC Gamer mag I totally fell in love with whoever that spokeschick suppsed to be, but that was just a physical thing and I eventually had to break it off.

Then in high school my friend introduced me to a manga called Battle Angel Alita (or Gunnum, for japonophiles who need to be picky) and I still have a thing for the main character in that series, Alita (or Galley, whatev). It's pretty much the only manga I read, just because it has that X factor where I just really, really like it.

Originally Posted by AliceNWonderland

Now, pay attention. That's sick. You can not LOVE a person who isn't real. There has to be interaction between two people, mutual chemistry and appreciation, etc. Anything else is just obsession. It is NOT real love.

So how could you define real love? I'm sure you'd be very adamant in saying that true love exists, but a cynic such as myself can always say that ideal is stemed from cultural conditioning - too many chick flicks and Hallmark greetings cards have etched the illusion of love into your mind to the point where you believe it to be real.

Now I'm not saying I don't believe in love - I see the way people interact with each other and the varieties of love (romantic love, brotherly love, love between parent and child) and since I have felt deep seeded hatred of other people it's not hard for me to expect that I can feel the oppisite towards others as well.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that love, and hate for that matter, both are feelings that stem from obsession; unlike the black and white seperation you defined, how can love be described except a controlled degree of obsession? Is not love the act of careing deeply for someone? Is not hate the act of, in it's basic nature, careing deeply about someone as well? And is not obsession the act of caring for something deeply?

So then I must say it is entirely possible to fall truely in love with a fictional character - I don't believe it has to be an interaction either; haven't you had a crush on a real life indivdual who didn't return the love? The problem then, in your personal situation, was that he had only blurred the lines between fantasy and reality, or rather the line beween what is physically possible and what is not. And that, by a majory vote, is most definately insane (or sick, if you wanna call it that).

All I'm trying to say is that it is entirely plausable for someone to truly fall in love with a fictional character and the only thing that keeps it from going to far is a clear distinction between reality and fantasy (which I have always prided myself on keeping).

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by AliceNWonderland

The way I know I truly love my husband and children is because I know that I would sacrifice my life for any of them, that I would do whatever it took to make them happy, even at the expense of my own happiness. We have a history together...memories (good and bad), we've made one another the center of our lives. We admire and celebrate the good things about each other and we also know each other's bad traits, and we stick together anyway. That's love. Anything else is just infatuation.

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.

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. And anybody who isn't obsessed with their own life, who has lost interset in their own life, is ten seconds from jumping off a bridge.

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.

The rest of my argument was just that other emotions stem from obsession as well, such as hate (most would consider the opposite of love) because to truely hate something you must care an aweful lot about it.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by PiccoloNamek

In my opinion, the opposite of love isn't hate, it's self. Love always focuses on the other person, and what can be done to make them happier, but selfishness only cares about me, myself, and I.

But that's for another thread.

well, what the hell, I'm on a roll - might as well talk about this as well

The way I see it is this: student.elon.edu/mbell2/!file/obsession.png
Yes, I am lame enough to go into mspaint and create a visual aid.

My point, Piccalo, is that since love and hate are emotions, and self...isn't, then self can not be the opposite of love. Rather, self is a target of love (or any varying degree of obsession). Thus, the story of Narcissis - a man so egotistical he fell deeply in love with his own reflection. Selfishness is defined as self-love, as self-obsession. Other's can also be a target of love, as I said in an ealier post: parents, brothers, children.

Originally Posted by CryHavoc

It's just plain weird, wrong, geeky/nerdy and completely idiotic. That's sticking to the fact that we're talking about "love".

I know this wasn't aimed at anyone in particular, but I want to use it to facilitate a point. I have no doubt that people who fall madly in love with fictional characters have several issues to work out and I am upset with people who can not comprehend the difference between reality and fantasy.

Even though it's insane, I do not doubt that it's entirely possible for a person to, in the true sense of the phrase, fall in love with a fictional character.

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

oh man, I failed to refresh the page to see MeTheGelfling's post ealier. And since it's directed at me, I feel obligated to reply.

First, let me try and answer the misunderstanding with the way I'm using the word "obsession":

Originally Posted by MeTheGelfling

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

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 am aware that the term obsession is defined as something along the line as:

"A persistent, repetitive, and unwanted thought. Cannot be eliminated by logic or reasoning."

"A recurring, unwanted idea that cannot be eliminated. Obsessive ideas are often unreasonable and disturbing. Preoccupation with an obsessive idea can interfere with normal daily activities."

and a slew of others that poped up in Google, and even though I could make an argument bending them in the way I want, I won't bother. 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?

I know you're thinking of obsession with all the negetive connotations it comes with, and it's my fault for not making my definition clearer, but I'm pretty sure I said something along the lines of

Originally Posted by Whinehurst

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.

to try and claify what I meant.

I agree the little math equation was pretty lame, but I am obviously having trouble translating my opinions into words.

Originally Posted by MeTheGelfling

The idea about love being a feeling is silly. 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.

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...


Lastly, and I'm not entirely sure if this bit was aimed at me or not, but just in case...

Originally Posted by MeTheGelfling

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.

As I was literally the first to admit, I have never (and I use the word never in the only sense it can be used) had a relationship with a girl or even a boy - so I can't deduce why you'd go and compare me with a 14 year old with a crush or, worse yet, a 17 year old who got laid for the first time. I think, and this seems perfectly logical, that as a neutral observer I am in a good postion to make these kinds of observations. You know, so I don't let personal feelings, sorry, emotions get in the way and all that. I'm basing all this on logical reasoning.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

whoa, I missed a flurry of activity. But no matter, for my issues seem to be drawing to a close.

AliceNWonderland, MeTheGelfling, I am happy to report that something you said has made sense to me. This is in regaurd to how "Love" was being defined, and as I hope you can see, there is a similar misunderstaning in your use of "Love" as there was with my use of "Obsession"

The concept I have of Love is that it is an emotion that people feel, and I'm not wrong in this, as the very first definiton that appeard in a "define:love" serach on Google reported this:

Originally Posted by Google

a strong positive emotion of regard and affection; "his love for his work"; "children need a lot of love"

Emotion being a key word here I decided to run a similar search

Originally Posted by Google

any strong feeling

Another serach on Feeling gave me the run-around back to Emotion, leading me to belive they are synonomous.

That being said, I have now come to the realization that what you actually intended by the word Love is rather a concept more akin to Commitment. A word, a conecpt, that is more permenate and character defining; along the same lines as Honor and Loyalty. I do not doubt that on this new defination of Love, we can all agree. Or at least us three.

Originally Posted by MeTheGelfling

so you're using your own definition...[yadda, yadda, yadda].

Again I'm the first to admit that I failed to define Obsession in acceptable terms before hand, try as I might. But that issue, I think, has passed, so mea culpa, my bad, whatever. I'm glad we have that all settled out now.

Originally Posted by neus

Therein lies your problem and the reason why Alice's argument is far more valid than yours ever will be.
You see, it's perfectly natural to reason through photosynthesis, cellular respiration, nuclear fusion and artificial insemination - not love. Scientific concepts can be reasoned through but love needs to be lived through to be understood. One simply needs to accept this and trust the wisdom and life experience of older people.

Welcome to the fray, Neus. I don't expect you thought to pass by this vortex without getting sucked in somehow.

Yes. I can not truely argue how it feels to be in love (I hope such word choice as 'feel' won't get me in trouble here). What I can do, and attepmted to do, was argue the meaning behind words. And what better way to look at words, or anything really, then with logic? After all, we are creatures of logic, for what are words than a vain attept to categorize and sort the chaos that surronds everyday life? And with such a varity of words as found in the English language, and with each word possessing layers of meaning, I love nothing more than to string them together into little paper airplanes and let them fly around in the abyss we call the internet, to meaninglessly pass some by and land with the weight of giants on others.

Well, maybe not the weight of giants, but at least get noticed, knowwhatimean?

I was speaking idiomatically.

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.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?