[freebreakfast]

I recently discovered "systems" people via Reddit (r/SystemsCringe) will searching for systems engineering. The core belief seems to be that the individual has "multiple people" living in the same body. They've devised a whole language for talking about it as well[0].

This reminds me of the "otherkin" fad that occurred primarily on Tumblr about a decade ago[1]. It was where teenagers believed themselves to not be humans but rather other creatures like dragons, bears, and so on. I remember reading about one girl who argued with her mother over whether or not she needed to eat diamonds because she was a dragon.

0. https://old.reddit.com/r/SystemsCringe/comments/w95q5q/alter...

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otherkin

Edit: Corrected a typo. Added more explanation of how I discovered that sub. It seems some are misinterpreting it as a judgment.

[rngname22]

There are also online communities where people (the posts read as children/teens but that may be my own bias) actively discuss and strategize about how to essentially 'summon' / 'create' / manifest a second internal person in their mind. Like, they essentially actively _try_ to create an 'imaginary friend' that is more than just imaginary but is almost a split personality like entity. The goal is for the 'thoughts' / internal monologue of that second entity to feel like they are thoughts that are not generated by the host, but instead truly feel to be generated by an external entity.

That community is called tulpas and the subreddit bears the same name.

By one token you could seemingly accurately describe the discussion there as unchaperoned children and teens actively trying to become mentally ill through meditation and self-talk.

On the other hand, I remember when I was a kid we used to talk about how maybe if we wished hard enough we could become more powerful like the characters in Dragonball Z. And I remember a web forum where kids talked about how maybe Digimon was real and there was a parallel universe where Digimon existed and how the forumbase could merge that world with our own if they wished hard enough.

So maybe kids have always been quite out there and it just looks more alarming when you are an adult.

[thenerdhead]

At first I thought you were talking about the popular “family” theory of the mind.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Family_Systems_Mode...

But now after clicking these links I’m reminded why I stay on the surface of the internet.

[germinalphrase]

FWIW - Internal Family Systems has been a very helpful therapeutic tool for someone I know suffering from Childhood PTSD.

It has nothing to do with... whatever this TikTok/Social Media thing is.

[azeirah]

Schema therapy has fairly similar underpinnings, your mind operates in various "modes" which can communicate internally. Some modes are helpful, some are maladaptive.

Kinda wonder if Marvin Minsky had something useful to say on this? I recall he wrote a book on how the mind is socially organized

[woodruffw]

I think there are more charitable ways to look at this. Even if you doubt that some of these people don’t have the disorder they’ve self-diagnosed themselves with (thinking you’re a dragon is an extreme one), it’s clear that something about the situation requires professional evaluation.

That, in turn, is made more difficult by clinical perceptions of MPD: many psychiatrists are openly skeptical that it’s a “real” disorder, meaning that they’re less likely in turn to be empathetic towards a prospective patient who claims (perhaps incorrectly, but perhaps not!) that they have MPD.

[freebreakfast]

The vast majority of those claiming to have Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) on TikTok do not need professional evaluation. They're teenagers behaving like teenagers. They're experimenting with different identities to see which one fits. They'll move on.

"Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a <i>rare condition</i> in which two or more distinct identities, or personality states, are present in—and alternately take control of—an individual."[0]

0. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/conditions/dissociative-i...

[naravara]

> it’s clear that something about the situation requires professional evaluation.

One of the problems is that the kids themselves are so awash in information and misinformation about this stuff, including awareness of how things are defined in the DSM-V, that they can muddy up your attempts at evaluating them.

It's kind of like if you take enough personality tests, like the MBTI, you eventually just sort of know how each question is being evaluated and you can, consciously or unconsciously, start optimizing your responses around the result that lines up with your narrative about yourself but isn't necessarily the most honest set of answers.

[__s]

It's not too hard to pick up on multiple identities, tho I'm sure it can get out of hand when you pick out the people who are reinforcing each other as a trend

My view of it, for my own personal reflection, is to first define identity. I opt to have two prongs to it, rooted in game theory: executive identity & motivational identity. Given a decision matrix executive identity is the actor being able to choose. Motivational identity is what determines the pay off values of the outcomes

It's possible to have conflicting motivation, which ends up debating itself until it's decided by your executive identity. In various contexts these motivations will overtake each other on executive identity, causing one to behave rather differently

There's a range on how cohesive these behave for people, for some it can be distinct enough to feel like a different person

[Akronymus]

> It's not too hard to pick up on multiple identities,

you wear one mask with one group, another with a different group. Wouldnt say multiple identities though.

But yeah, the mutual reinforcement is a BIG problem.

[noobker]

> you wear one mask with one group, another with a different group. Wouldnt say multiple identities though

You're just establishing that for a given persona there is a spectrum from 'Mask' to 'Identity' and insisting that there is an arbitrary threshold.

For a moment, embrace a worldview that there is no singular, core Identity -- in fact all personas are masks to some degree. An Identity may be a mask you're particularly dedicated to wearing, but it's still a mask. The rest of these "systems" people's perspective follows from this point and emphasizes certain experiences -- that you may suppress -- over others that you may hold on a pedestal.

[Zircom]

You have a salient point in regards to mask vs identtiy being an abitrary distinction and I agree it's definitely a spectrum to an extent, but thaat's nothing to do with the majority of the people on those subreddits and tiktok circles. They will literally fake seizures or passing out to indicate when they change between alters, or insist that they have literal fictional(often anime) characters as part of their "systems", and do these delusional showcase videos where they will rapidly shift between all of their "alters" on video, changing their facial expressions and posture to signify that they're a different one.

[hhjinks]

It doesn't follow. A system is a collection of distinct, separate, entities in a single body. They are not equivalent to the personas of most people. They are, to a greater or lesser extent, siloed off from one another, as distinct as you and I. That is the description given by a significant part of the systems community, and is not compatible with your view of identity. A system would likely take offence at your suggestion that each member is just a persona.

[nkrisc]

Obviously I don't know how other people feel, but even when I have to project different "identities" in different social situations, I'm still the same person within and just tailoring the output to be appropriate to the settings. I act differently when I'm playing with my son, when I'm at work, when I'm with my wife, etc... But I'm always the same person in all those situations with the same thoughts, the same desires, and can be thinking about those other situations while actively expressing a different "identity" for a different one.

I think the mask analogy is a good one, it feels to me that regardless of what "mask" I'm wearing, I'm still the same, singular person underneath it in all situations. I am only one person, even if I only choose to show selective parts of my personality at different times.

[vianneychevalie]

If you like this topic, what you’re describing is the essentialist worldview, and in my opinion a major part of societal debates today touch on the rejection of this worldview (classically by existentialists).

Is there stability to who you are? This question can also be asked of nations, of language… And this debate dates back to Plato.

[noobker]

> But I'm always the same person in all those situations with the same thoughts, the same desires

I think that's debatable, and further, a lot of that coherence is a personal/cultural choice and not something inherent to consciousness. At a minimum, you might admit the existence of biases like anchoring -- maybe you'll more heavily weight your child's desires while playing with them versus when your in the middle of work a day later (maybe vice versa!) -- but such things might be a hint of how these other perspectives work.

[uoaei]

Absolutely. Identity is best defined as "genuine pretending". This framing makes it obvious that there's a potential for behaviors to differentiate into a few modes (personas) in various contexts (both internally and externally derived!) based on predilections of the base organism.

[jnovek]

For the Otherkin stuff, did you mean Tumblr? I’ve often seen TikTok described as the new Tumblr.

[freebreakfast]

I did. Corrected.

[walleeee]

The idea that there are multiple people in the mind is likely a reflection of its malleability just as is the (typical) conception that there's a single person with a single concrete, tangible identity in there. The fact that different groups of humans plausibly claim to experience one or the other state of being likely tells us something about the flexibility of the substrate we're running on. Moreover plural self-conceptions seem pretty compatible with some well-regarded (while very speculative) theories of mind, e.g. Dennett's multiple drafts model.

[bitwize]

Try reading up on plural systems before you make such judgements. And don't hang around /r/SystemsCringe; it's a hate sub.

Otherkin is not a fad, and it's not confined to Tumblr; it's been around for decades, all over the net and real-life society. There's considerable overlap between otherkin and furry; otherkin is basically furry for fictional species.

Anyway, furry/otherkin and plural people read and post here to Hackernews all the time -- often as experts in their professional field. One of the most consistent producers of high-quality content featured here, Xe Iaso, appears to be both. Mind your manners.

[xena]

Xe Iaso here, thank you for your kind words. It really means a lot. A lot of the time we just fire things on the blog out into the darkness and it can feel like we get nothing back. ^^

Reactions like the GP are why we prefer to be more tactical about plurality in public. We've found it's better to be seen as an expert in your field AND THEN be more safe with talking about plurality topics than it is to be a vocal example of being plural and then having to fight uphill to be seen as an expert in things. Stigma is a bitch and a half to deal with.

We'd like to think that our writing and advocacy helps destignatize our form of existence in some way, but we have no way to track that other than the occasional kind comment. Maybe this job will be the one where we are more honest and open about plurality, but we've also found that it's an ultimate relationship strength test like coming out as transgender to people (I'm pretty sure it's why my brother refuses to talk to me). We don't want to lose more people, so we have defaulted to this quietly, but accurately describing how we experience reality thing and not emphasizing it too much. The blog is a team effort ;)

Interestingly enough, I've found that plural people tend to understand distributed systems problems at a much more intuitive level than others. It's to the point that if I was ever building out an SRE team to handle distributed systems problems, I'd probably try and hire as many plural people as I can and make them accommodated to the best of my ability so that we can leverage that innate talent in ways that were previously undoable. Maybe some day I'll get my wish, but not any time soon it seems.

Personally I'd say that otherkin and furry have overlaps but are not fundamentally the same thing. Think of it as the difference between being a fan of baseball games and aspiring to be a baseball player. They are in similar veins (both baseball related), but they are wholly separate things. Being furry and being otherkin are similarly different. I can ask around for a resource if you want, if you want to reach out privately please email me at xeiaso dot net.

I'd second the suggestion to avoid hate groups like /r/systemscringe, nothing good can come of it but continuing the cycle of needless hate. I'd like to think that people on this website are rational and can overcome the innate tribalistic feelings that those hate groups capitalize on, but I can wish in one hand and spit in the other then see which one fills up faster.

"Furries run the internets", and as a result the tech side of the furry fandom gives you a vast professional networking opportunity that you could never really get anywhere else. It makes fiscal sense to be a furry if you value having a large professional reach.

[DIARRHEA_xd]

Who says fads are confined to Tumblr?

[OOD]

>Try reading up on plural systems before you make such judgements

Unfortunately we have.

>And don't hang around /r/SystemsCringe; it's a hate sub.

Stop. Stop right there. Laughing at the deranged lunacy of this stupid subculture is NOT HATE. Stop diluting the word "hate" to mean "any slight that goes against my narrative or the narratives of those I ally with." There are real hate groups out there spreading their filth and getting people killed. By diluting the seriousness of hatred, you're inadvertently giving them power. STOP. IT.

>Otherkin is not a fad

Yes it is. It's a fad like emo and goth, with tons of overlap.

>and it's not confined to Tumblr

Unfortunately.

> been around for decades, all over the net and real-life society.

So has emo and goth at this rate. You're proving my point.

>There's considerable overlap between otherkin and furry; otherkin is basically furry for fictional species.

https://www.reddit.com/r/SystemsCringe/comments/ov4bsc/this/

>Anyway, furry/otherkin and plural people read and post here to Hackernews all the time

Chronically online people are online. Shocked I tell you!

>often as experts in their professional field. One of the most consistent producers of...

And often experts in our field are like me: tired of the attention seeking shenanigans like the "system" losers that we have to deal with and manage day to day. Every day chronically online socially awkward people will find some community of invented nonsense to differentiate themselves and play the victim. Nothing like a persecution fetish mixed with fantasy.

[bitwize]

> There are real hate groups out there spreading their filth and getting people killed.

If you think that fora dedicated to laughing at what you call deranged subcultures are not spreading hate and getting people killed, you haven't been paying attention. One of the greatest contributors to the emulation community is dead because of Kiwi Farms, and they're not the only one.

It's hate. Get it out of your system. Or you may well find yourself quite unwelcome. Remember, furries run the internet.

[OOD]

[flagged]

[washbrain]

TikTok wasn't around a decade ago.

I also suspect that systems cringe might not be the best source for understanding plural folks... It might be worth trying to understand before casting aspersions.

[forbiddenvoid]

I encountered variants of the 'otherkin' community in the mid/late 90s as a teenager. It was an interesting time. It existed in forums and chatrooms online at least that early. It wouldn't surprise me to find out there were BBSs for these communities even earlier than that.

Adolescents tend to engage in community-seeking behavior to a great extent, and if they're not finding it in their schools or local community, they'll almost certainly look to find it online.

[Kye]

Cringe forums inevitably select for the worst examples. You find the worst in any subset of humanity.

I know plenty of plural systems. They're just people who happen to also be people. Nothing exceptional one way or another. They're rocket scientists, sysops, janitors, baristas, etc. Just like anyone else.

[uoaei]

When you talk to yourself aloud, have you never noticed that it takes the form of dialogue rather than monologue?