@chadinthemaking69 @adam-l

How do you spot a psychopath when they have such well crafted and unbreakable masks?

Very diligent attention to congruence and follow through on promises and duties. A look at their long term friends and relationships... the notable lack of any is a big red flag. A history of drama and scorched earth breakups. If people who know her well give you a glance of pity at the news of you getting closer to her.

Most important to all men: Not letting your little head override your better judgment in pursuit of some nookie. That was my failing that time decades ago now when I ignored red flags about the psychopath I was starting to ldate and the ending of her last relationship. Six months and not enough good sex to make it worthwhile later, she was successfully breaking into my house as I slept AFTER screwing all the doors and windows shut from the inside.

Goes to show that even a man who fancies himself smart and identifies the red flags in advance will still blunder right into the clutches of a psychopath woman IF he doesn't watch his own ass.

@Durek_The_Bald

You're more correct than you know.

As an author, my job is to be invisible. Anytime you're reading, I'm supposed to help you forget that I exist, and to feel like my story is a sequence of real events that you are witnessing, rather than a narrative I planned out for you.

So anything I do that reminds you of my existence is a failure on my part. You're only supposed to remember me when you close the book, and want to know where to look to find more.

So, if I have a "message" for you, something I want to tell you, something I want you to believe, instead just some themes to ponder on your own, then I'm reminding you that I exist. I'm pulling you out of the story. I'm reminding you that it's fiction.

The puppet show is only enjoyable if you can't see the puppeteer.

Woke films, tv, and books don't suck because they're based on a bad ideology. They suck because they are based on an ideology at all. Atlas Shrugged, a novel based on an ideology that was correct about a hell of a lot more than it ever got wrong, was still a preachy, smug, piece of garbage that should never have been written.

And if I ever write a novel that is intended to convince you of anything other than "I had a good time reading this", with a possible side order of "this gave me some interesting things to think about", then please hurl it across the room with great force instead of finishing it.

@redpillschool

I was until someone asked.

The problem with Moana is very simple.

You have two decently likeable main characters with well-developed personalities, and they could certainly carry a story... in fact, either one could probably do so solo. So that's not the problem.

I'm told by girls that the music is substandard, but that's not really the problem. Disney song numbers tend to sell themselves even when they are bad (Frozen).

No, the problem is that NEITHER OF YOUR MAIN CHARACTERS IS NECESSARY TO YOUR PLOT.

The "ocean", in form of a sentient wave, is shown in the very beginning to be capable of retrieve the main MacGuffin thingy from wherever it was, and delivering it to any shoreline anywhere.

And the whole point of the plot is to deliver the MacGuffin to the special place.

Ergo, this could have been done in 30 seconds of screen time, with maybe three more minutes to set up the scenario. In other words, a project for three second-year animation school students.

"Yes, Whisper, but you are logical, exacting, and analytical. This wouldn't this spoil the film for ordinary people who just ignore the 'fridge logic' and roll with it!"

Yes, it would, and it did. It turned what should have been a great film into a mediocre one... that couldn't even compete with "Frozen", a very low bar to clear. Yes, if you read the news articles, they'll call it a success, but it's easy to do that when you don't have to make comparisons to what it could have been, or compare box offices in adjusted dollars.

No, Moana didn't land anywhere near as hard as it could have, and this plot hole is why. You see, even if you are the type to ignore, or not notice, plot holes, its effect on the story is that the writers had to spend the entire script finding stuff for the characters to do.

Moana needs to sail to Maui's island... except she doesn't, because Maui isn't necessary to the story. Maui needs to find his magic fishhook... except he doesn't, because the whole main quest is just a package delivery, and he doesn't need any special magic powers, just a boat. Which they also don't need, because the fucking ocean can just make the delivery itself.

This is why all the characters' action feel inconsequential... because they are. They are busywork constructed by scriptwriters, and even if we don't notice this while they are happening, it becomes clear at the end, when none of this shit turned out to be necessary.

The big secret of creating fiction is that READERS ARE DOING WORK. They are investing effort to follow your story. This is less true of viewers, but it's still true. If you ever throw that work away by making it inconsequential, you are discarding, instead of rewarding, the readers' investment.

So, a character can screw up and still be a hero, but a character cannot be unnecessary and still be a hero. The very idea of heroism subsumes the concept of necessity... a hero is he who does what is needful, even against impossible odds.

Otherwise the whole story just feels unsatisfying.

"But, Whisper, it's a twist ending! It's perfectly logical that the characters would do these things, because they don't know they are unnecessary!"

Sure... but "satisfying story" does not mean "any logically connected sequence of events". Just because something could or would happen doesn't make it a good story.

"Okay, Whisper, so how would you fix the story?"

Simple... take away the sentient ocean.

Moana doesn't wait around for the ocean to "choose" her by giving her a package to deliver that it could have delivered itself. Instead, she chooses HERSELF by taking heroic action on her own initiative... the ocean is blighted because Tefiti's heart was stolen, and hey, her ancestors were sailors, she's gonna go find Maui and make him give it back.

This makes her both heroic, because she took action on her own to save others, and necessary, because she instigates the solution to the problem, instead of just being sent on a fedex quest.

So she goes and finds Maui. Problem, he doesn't have the heart. But he knows where it is, and retrieving it from the clutches of {inserting fantasy monster here} will require all his power and skill.

Now Maui is necessary, and heroic, even if we want to do the whole "refusing the call to adventure" bit they did in the film. Because he doesn't have to be heroic right away... just eventually.

So, whether he's reluctant or not, he's out of shape with no magic fishhook. Cue the retrieval sequence for that, which is now necessary. Then cue the retraining montage.

So then they go fetch the heart. Epic battle, success. And they go to deliver it.

Now you can still have your lava monster twist, because the heroes have two to three minutes of screen time spent on wasted effort, not the entire film. Even if they had known they didn't need to fight the lava monster, Moana still needed Maui to find the heart, Maui still needed his magic weapon/tool to get it back, and the world still needed Moana to get Maui's ass in gear fixing his old blunder.

Now the story works, and the characters can actually shine, using almost all the same character beats.

You can even use the same monsters, because you need two, and you have two, except now they have a reason to exist as well. Sure, they're not strong Disney villans in the tradition of Jaffar or Scar, but a good story doesn't actually need villans. Plenty of stories work fine without them.

What you are obstacles that actually NEED to be overcome, instead of just being time-wasting make-work for confused and unnecessary characters.

"M.E. Thomas", a pseudonym, is a female psychopath running a popular blog. She wrote "Confessions of a Sociopath: A Life Spent Hiding in Plain Sight", a book trying to raise understanding and acceptance for psychopaths (another word for sociopaths).

It's a brutally honest book, but still psychopathic, i.e. manipulative. I believe it unwittingly highlights Clecley's (the psychiatrist that pioneered the diagnosis of psychopathy) conclusion that psychopaths are really a kind of psychotics.

No normal human being can be understanding and accepting of the fact that he's near someone who has to excercise constant effort to restrain herself from literally slitting your throat just for the fun of it. "High functioning" is an euphemism, psychopaths are truly abominations.

You have to be aware of their existance in society, become impervious to their charm and learn to keep a distance.

@Chantfire I can’t watch “debates” like this. Rollo does pretty well but he could have absolutely wrecked the guy who purported to know statistics. Completely asinine statement by him that 30% of women have the proclivity to become engineers. Anyone who’s ever seen two normal distributions can easily refute this in 10 seconds. He also was completely at Rollos mercy because he tried to fight his argument on his terms. It’s not Rollos strength to be short and concise in verbal discourse, which is why he missed some golden opportunities here. He doesn’t get into RP knowledge that much either.

Funnily enough, the reason why he may not outright win this debate is because he is the opposite of Andrew Tate. Tate would have smoked them, even though he distorts red pill ideas on the regular.

Rollo is for the reader, he’s not flashy.