Reason for being stoic.

My favorite type of characters has been The Stoic types and it seems to me that those kinds of characters are seldomly the main character. In my current draft, The Hero is The Stoic Emotionless Boy and here' the stuffs that he went through without moving a single facial muscle.

• Someone making a good joke
• Fanservice, Mashmallow Hell, and whatnots
• Being spit on.

Also, he's extremely prone to Major Injury Underreaction, and some of the worst he goes through and shrugged off includes:

• Having a demon that eats him from inside in his stomach
• Getting his arm and part of torso blown up.
• Getting his eyes burnt out.

Here's my question:

• What usually makes a person to become The Stoic?
• Does that necessarily leads to Major Injury Underreaction?
• What happens if MIU applies to a character too often?
• How would other characters, both people who care about him and those who are against him?

edited 13th Mar '11 8:55:05 AM by dRoy

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Woof, that's quite a thing your character's going through!

I have a Hero that's mostly Stoic. In his case, it's

- His job emphasizes the need to control your emotions and remain calm when associating with others - A touch of his own emotional insecurities. Not so much a fear of rejection so much as just... Considering his feelings private (and possibly not as important as solving a situation, anyway). - Also the two other characters he interacts with... One is someone he's not on very good terms with, who also taunts him anytime he comes close to breaking his careful emotional control, or taunts him in an effort to break his careful emotional control, or just taunts him while he's down. In that case, he's stoic more to deny that character the satisfaction of his reaction, and on a subtler note, to show that character that he thinks they're an idiot and not worth listening to. Or something like that.
The other character is a bit nicer to my Hero, more 'cause he's a Blank Slate than anything. In that case, my guy remains calm and controlled to set an example, since the other character is impressionable, young, and, erm, when angry, flies into a berserk rage and tries killing anything in sight. So, teaching that character control is important. That, and he's trying to appear like a trustworthy, respectable authority figure, which by his culture's standards is that calm, professional, stoic image.

- Major Injury Underreaction ... In his case, his former job was in some inter-dimensional world defense... Long story, the point of it here being that he's been trained to resist torture. However, erm. He starts the story as more of an energy being, then gets turned into a flesh-and-blood creature (long story), so there's a part where he's not sure how he's supposed to react to an injury.
... Which I think, doesn't count for your guy. ^^: I guess the usable point here is that he's trained himself to handle pain, but I personally think that whether a Stoic reacts at pain depends on their tolerance and determination to keep up the whole... Stoic thing, and whether they're good at it. ... If this makes any sense.

- I wouldn't use MIU on characters too much, because it starts taking the drama away from serious injuries the more it happens.
... Then again, as long as the character's body reacts to the injuries, that might maintain some of the effect, but a complete unflinching response to huge injuries may still take away some of the impact. If... I'm still making any sense. Uh - Basically! Be careful with this. ^^: I mean, I guess it depends on the character physically (an undead guy won't react at all, for example) and the tone of the series...

- ... I'm not sure what this last one is, I think I'm really tired right now, though. ^^ Sorry. Also, my apologies for getting progressively more incoherent. I hope there's... Something helpful in this mess. ^^:

edited 13th Mar '11 10:09:03 AM by Rexila

I'm writing a protagonist at the moment who's The Stoic, and I'm actually enjoying it (her work partner and kind of Love Interest is Captain Emotional). Because I'm writing it in first-person, I'm trying hard to show the contrast between the emotions she is feeling and the very calm way that she speaks and behaves. The reason she acts like that is mainly because she comes from a major political family, and has been trained from a very young age that self-control is one of the most important skills you can have and that emotions are fine but they belong on the inside. So she's just had it trained into her. A while later, when her father gets killed she goes into a Heroic BSoD and starts alternating between total calm in front of people and screaming and throwing things when she's alone.

Anyway, I wouldn't say that being The Stoic necessarily leads to Major Injury Underreaction. It's possible to stay calm, deal with the pain well, and not angst about it while still recognising that your injuries are serious and making a judgment on how much help you need, which is what I suspect most sensible characters would do.

edited 13th Mar '11 11:40:58 AM by cityofmist

Scepticism and doubt lead to study and investigation, and investigation is the beginning of wisdom. - Clarence Darrow

Poor parenting. The brain recognizes that it's not going to be able to get what it needs from the parent, so it looks for a substitute role model. Now if that substitute role model is a fictional AI, or even just a real computer, the resulting personality will try to emulate their lack of emotion. I had my computer as a parental substitute growing up, for example. Also, emotional abuse may teach the child that emotions are exclusively bad and should therefore be eliminated. Someone who is particularly good at manipulating people's emotions, like a therapist.

Stoic Personality: Power Incontinence. He forces a Stoic facade on himself to keep something bad from happening.

Major Injury Underreaction: There's a nervous disorder where your body's pain receptors don't fire, so you literally won't feel pain. And now that I think about it, the two together would be an excellent metaphor. He doesn't show when he feels emotional pain, and yet he's unable to experience physical pain.

edited 13th Mar '11 2:03:39 PM by SalFishFin

Yes, but isn't that an incredibly dangerous condition? It was on Scrubs once: you can't feel temperature, so you're constantly in danger of hypo/hyperthermia. And you're also at risk of, say, scratching your face off in your sleep, because you won't feel it and wake up. And that's just what I can think of off the top of my head after seeing it on TV. I'd think twice before giving a character a condition like that.

Scepticism and doubt lead to study and investigation, and investigation is the beginning of wisdom. - Clarence Darrow

So have him take the necessary precautions against face-scratching and hypo/hyperthermia. That would make the metaphor even tighter. He has to constantly protect his physical body from itself, while hiding his fragile emotional state from the outside world.

He does feel pain and understand what he needs to do to take care of the injury. It's just that his mindset is a lot calmer. Let's say if you get your arm blown up. His immediate thought would be something like, "Better reconstruct it back before I lose too much blood and the pain become intolerable and disturb my focus. He's much stronger than I thought, must reconsider attacking him on distance.", not "OHMYGOD my ARM!!!"

edited 13th Mar '11 2:47:51 PM by dRoy

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Now that sounds like a good character. I love reading people who are far more self-controlled and sensible than I will ever be, which is why I'm attempting to write one.

Scepticism and doubt lead to study and investigation, and investigation is the beginning of wisdom. - Clarence Darrow

My narrator/protagonist suppresses/hides away his emotions because, after his parents died, he lived in what was essentially a group home, and constantly suffered pity, before cracking several times. after a while it seemed like any time he showed emotions he, or those around him, suffered, so he subconsciously suppressed his emotions to try to stay sane. Then he joined the military, whre such was a more common (though, still not majority) mindset.

My troper wall

Stoicism is primarily the result of personality type. A great example is the INTJ on the Myers-Brigg Type Indicator.

"Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person that doesn't get it."

A possibility is having a dislike of commitment- if he's worried about attaching himself to others he may fabricate that exterior. Sociopathy is a possibility, with a lack of emotional reaction to suffering or the emotions of others.

MIU- depends whether he fabricates that image or truly believes it and therefore has it affect him outside of personal interaction.

This is this.

Speaking of stoic characters, this made me think about an Emotionless Girl character named Jessica in one of my Sailor Moon fanfics. She was intended to be pretty much emotionless (or at least her emotions are dulled compared to a normal person's because she otherwise would have no motivation to do anything if she didn't feel ANYTHING) and an extreme introvert who has stated in the story that she doesn't ever remember feeling lonely. Is it possible for a human (she's human, although a Sailor Senshi) to not ever feel the need to be around other humans, or is Jessica just unaware of her emotions that she doesn't realize are there? When I first read about schizoid disorder, I thought it sounded like her, at least in the DSM criteria, but then it goes on to describe people with that disorder as actually feeling lonely and having some traits that I didn't intend Jessica to have, so I don't know if that disorder would be a real diagnosis for her or not (if she was real, I mean).

The idea with her character is that she DOESN'T have some event or series of events in her past that made her be an Emotionless Girl, as in, no one abused her and she doesn't have a tragic past because when I created her I wanted to create a character who was naturally "unemotional" and not hiding some kind of inner torment. Some of this is that when I first created her, it was at a time where I wished I could be more unemotional and so she was a little bit of what I wished I was, even though she's otherwise not really based off of me. Thus, I have a hard time trying to make her legitimately flawed without ruining the "naturally emotionless" idea of her character, without making her evil (part of it is I hate the Loners Are Freaks trope and don't want it to be wrong for Jessica to be an Emotionless Girl in itself). She's luckily not the star of the story, though, since the "screen time" is pretty equally divided amongst the 16 Senshi, and Jessica isn't the leader or the one who always saves the others, so she doesn't have those kind of Mary Sue traits. I guess some part of me wants her to be a bit idealized (in that a part of me still idealizes being unemotional and logical, being an INTJ type), but I also don't want her to be a Mary Sue. (she does seem to be a little too passive in battle sometimes, and that does lead to her getting defeated in battle when most of the other Senshi were successful in defeating the enemies)

Basically, is it possible for someone to be "stoic" without having it be caused by some tragedy or abuse?

edited 14th Mar '11 8:34:24 PM by Rainbow

Also, is there any justiable reason for a sixteen year old Ordinary High-School Student/Demon Hunter to be a total The Stoic who's EXTREMELY prone to Major Injury Underreaction? He does frequently has to face creatures with severe case of Body Horror, Eldritch Abomination, and Yakuzas.

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Is it possible to be a fairly good martial artist while being one of the top students in school?

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Depends on the school, really. If you mean that the character in question is the best in his/her class but isn't "the best in the world" level, you could show the other people in the class as being very BAD martial artists and thus your character just happens to look better than that group. Or even if the people in the class are just average and your character is better than average but not the best ever, your character would still stand out. Being better than others often depends on who one is being compared to. To use a different skill, it's one thing to say "I'm better at math than my friends" when your friends are in advanced math classes and get good grades but it's different to say the same thing when your friends are all failing math.

Actually, that's a pretty good justification for it right there. If he's been dealing with this stuff on a regular basis, in high school, he probably developed with it - it's every bit as normal for him as, say, stubbing a toe, or tripping. It just happens.

Also, noting what the guy above said earlier about personality archetypes, the one that he mentioned is referred to coloquially as the mastermind type - characterized by a tendency to always, always have a plan, and make or adjust one for each new situation. I'm that type myself, and my approach to injury is usually along the lines of, "Shit, better fix that up. oh well." It seemed like you described him as an analytical type, so it seems to fit.

Birthright: an original web novel about Dragons, the Burdens of Leadership, and Mangoes.

Well, not quite. He just have a calmer mindset. In terms of intelligence, he's slightly better than average. Also, I hope that you are right; I always found odd that many anime characters are prone to crazy stuff so much that at some time, you'd expect them to be just get used to stuff.

edited 26th Mar '11 3:17:04 AM by dRoy

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Oh, and if The Hero is a "Well Done, Son" Guy, then would said father being The Stoic personification might justify The Hero being The Stoic as well?

Also, what causes children to be a "Well Done, Son" Guy?

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

"Also, what causes children to be a "Well Done, Son" Guy?"

1) When a father notices that his son has done something that he wasn't expecting him to do, and is prouded of him because of that.

2) When a son shows his capacity of being able to do something that a father expects him to do, and the father is prouded of him because of that.

Back to Topic, most of the things that have caused a character to be The Stoic are tragic Tear Jerker experiences both in the past or at the moment of the stories. Abusive Parents, Parental Abandonment, Kids Are Cruel, Kick the Dog, Player Punch, Unlucky Everydude, etc. The Stoics may have Bumblingdad, Jerkass Brother, or Dead Little Sisters that The Stoics blame themselves for their deaths. They may usually be in situations they don't want to be in, they may be being bullied a lot, or never get praise when they do something right, but always get scolded when anything has gone wrong. After some amount of unfair treatments, they turn into quiet persons and anti-social, and they may think that showing emotions to others would be the last thing they do in such a cruel society they're in.

As far as I realized, The Stoic and Wangst are totally different stuff, but due to sad and cruel back stories these characters usually have, they tend to lean toward angsty type rather than being friendly but emotionless, and most of The Stoic in fictions will automatically be The Woobie because modern fictions loves to play with a tragic genre, and tune it Up To Eleven in any possible moment.

edited 7th Apr '11 7:35:09 AM by manat31790

Is it possible for a character to be The Stoic without having some kind of tragic event/set of events cause it? As in, they're just naturally less emotional than the average person, nothing made them act that way where they would otherwise be all expressive and friendly. Because one point in the story with Jessica is, long story short, another character assumes that Jessica's lack of emotions was caused by something tragic happening to her and then is shocked to find out that Jessica's just naturally that way and that she DOESN'T have a traumatic past.

There are definitely reasons beyond trauma that will cause someone to be a Stoic.

A Stoic, in the classical sense, is someone who made a philosophical choice to suppress emotions, because emotions lead to stupidity and ugly social situations. Someone could make that choice just by observe other people getting carried away with their emotions and saying, "Not me." Alternately, they might have gone through a period where they had trouble controlling very strong emotions, so they overreacted by suppressing all emotion. Or it could just be cultural.

There are also, as has been mentioned, personality types that don't outwardly show emotions. An introverted person is, by nature, less likely to broadcast his/her emotional state. No childhood trauma, not philosophical decision. It's just who they are.

The third possibility (that I can think of right now) is that there are personality disorders characterized by just not feeling emotions. Such a person would outwardly seem Stoic, since there are no emotions to suppress.

edited 7th Apr '11 6:12:20 PM by kathelm

Yeah, that makes sense. I probably should've known that already.

edited 7th Apr '11 3:06:46 PM by Rainbow

Certain kinds of brain damage, such as amygdala damage, can make someone unable to feel emotion (or certain specific emotions, like fear). Generally, losing the ability to feel emotions causes impairment in judgement, because the person depended on those emotions to signal important things. Eg, fearlessness leading to taking stupid risks. They also tend to forget how it used to feel like to feel those emotions, and are unable to recognize those emotions in others.

If I'm asking for advice on a story idea, don't tell me it can't be done.

Oh, very fascinating. I might consider that.

By the way, would it possible for a child as young as 7 to be The Stoic?

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.