Are You in Character or Not ?

[Rumba Rue]

I had a long discussion last night with my companion and it's opened my eyes to what I wasn't seeing.

Some of us here at the Pub play our parts as the characters in which we wish to be percieved - regardless of the reality of our real lives.

I do it to a certian degree, but I can never forget my real life, and my problem seems to be forgetting that others do it to forget their real lives.

So I'd like to ask the question here to you members of the Pub, when you come here, do you act like the character you wish to be seen as, or just be a name connected to you, but still in reality?

Rumba Rue

** **

[HarborMaster]

For me Reality is a constant

[The Doctor]

That's an interesting question... I find meself split, in a way, between the persona I must convey in the workplace and the persona that is the real me. Fortunately (or not) for everyone on this board, what you're seeing is the PG-13 (pushing R whenever I can) version of me. Those who have the (mis)fortune of meeting me will see the undiluted, full-strength Mad Jack. May God have mercy on your souls. :)

Was that of any help?

[lady snow]

i guess for me it's about 50/50. i love the fantasy, and i'm still grounded in reality. this is one place where i can just let my imagination play. i love pirates and all about pyracy. and the members of the pub also share that passion and it's o riot to cmein and play. lady snow is also the persona i use at faire - me being the rennie than i am. i am alo a member of 3 ren sites (which all happen to belong of mine). and there is a part of my garb that i have known to wear in my dane life. i hope that isn't too confusing or not the answer you're looking for.

[Christine]

This is pretty much who I am in real life too; just a fun, out-going person. And of course, Christine is me real name! :)

[PyratePhil]

Interesting question, Lady Rue...

I suppose a lot depends on what you see as "reality"...

I am who I am, but am constantly changing... what I post here is, as Mad Jack mentioned, a somewhat sterilized version of the real me...yet it's also a role I play, to an extent...

In my "work", I'm anything from deadly serious to gut-busting funny - depends on the situation. Here - I see it as a relief valve, a place to mix my true and perceived realities for the enjoyment (hopefully) of others, and to discover new friends.

[lady snow]

must admit, you are far better than i with wirds, but that's about what i was trying to say!

[The Doctor]

Thank ye, mate. Ye've distilled it to it's core.

[HarborMaster]

I concur with Mad Jack as well .., wel said aye.

I try to be me., and me wears a piece of his "Pirate garb" daily. I cant wear all of it every where., the 21rst century wouldnt tolerate it. Also the care free foot loose and fancy free attitude wont provide a good living for my future..., but its in my heart and alive and well and focused so deep in my dreams I am creating a place I can live it out. Reality., right down to everyday soon!

[Lady Seahawke]

in serious topics I post as me...RL...version

When it comes to the fun posts...

Well tat be 'nther side meself...tis true. Tain't it now.

OK...ahem...you can always tell when I be me, and when I be fun'n.

[PyratePhil]

I also think a lot of it is the Pyrate attitude - if you have it at heart, no matter how you express it, you belong here.

[CaptainCiaran]

This is a great question, RR. I would say that my persona here (Captain Ciaran) is pretty much the same as me in "real life". If I allowed Ciaran to be all that I wanted in a persona I'd probably be banned from posting! Ha! That might apply fer many of us here. Do we not temper our personas? If this became a "real" pyrate pub and we were all "real" pyrates in it, I bet it would be one hell of a WILD scene!

[Kalum]

If this became a "real" pyrate pub and we were all "real" pyrates in it, I bet it would be one hell of a WILD scene!

Ain't that the truth!

This topic has come up on a few other boards I post on in the past. While they were regarding a broader range of personas I think my explaination still fits here....

When I'm at a Ren Faire, reinactment or Pennsic War I am truely me. My persona isn't a persona...it's who I am. "Reality", the real world, probably couldn't handle that so I put on a face for the masses that hides my true self a bit. As HarborMaster said...the 21st century just wouldn't allow for it.

It all boils down to the fact that I have to mute my personality in public, but in private...here on the board or at an event it's 100% unadulterated me. Granted even here I put the brakes on a bit. Because as Ciaran said...I'd probably end up banned as well!

[Capt Grey]

I've been here for nearly two years and in that time almost everyone shows their "real" persona. Some of the threads invite us to be silly and "piratey" all in good fun; other threads - especially in Beyond Pyracy - let us express our thoughts and feelings honestly as ourselves.

This is a good thing.

[callenish gunner]

tis true the "real world " doesn't allow for the individual freedom to let us do what we imagine here ....but this is a part of who we are.... that we try to express, but keep in check ......by allowing ourselves to portray who we feel we would be if times were different ....it gives us an outlet for the energies that we keep bottled up to function in our modern "civilized" society where ruthless behavior makes you a criminal or a politition or corporate executive it's a matter of perspective and history ...........

i for one live my life by a personal code of honour that i feel will set my course as long as stay true to my independent nature and the principle of harming none who do not act agressively towards me first .....but when threatened i give no quarter and take no prisoners (they only slow you down!!!)

and i also believe the old gaelic tradition of "neither collar nor crown"

[Cap'n Pete Straw]

I yam what I yam.

I am always me... but when I am in the Pub (or wandering around a few other areas in here) I am usually allowing the pirate vision of myself (that would be Cap'n Pete Straw) to do the talking.

In other areas, I generally talk express my regular self (still a fun piratical kinda guy), depending on the tenor of the discussion at hand.

Or when Pyrate Phil gets me in Monty Python mode... then I am someone else entirely, I fear.

But when I am drinking at the computer, it is again Cap'n Pete who is doing the talking/typing.

[Red Bess]

I'm sorta glad to hear so many people say that the person they are at the Pub is as real (or even more real) than the person they are in the day-to-day world. Here I say what I feel, tease a bit when I can, talk like a pirate (frowned upon at my place of employment ) and hang out with a whole bunch of scallywags as nutty as myself. In the "real world" (interesting that we so often put quotes around that phrase), when I need the inner strength to do something beyond my comfort level, I just remember that I'm Red Bess the pirate lass. It's amazing how much confidence I get from that.

So the short answer to your question, Rumba, for me is: Red Bess isn't my persona -- it's the better side of me.

[dasNdanger]

YES!! I AM a character!!! oh....wait... *reads question again*

sorry mate, misunderstood ya there for a sec...

Well, like Cap'n PS says, "I yam what I yam..."

I don't know how to 'act', so even when in pirate mode ('Arrrrr, me 'earties!'), it's just 'me', being insane. I do it here, I do it in real life. I don't change my personality for my audience...but I might change the way I interact depending on my mood. Sometimes I come here, or to other sites, and I'm just wired - happy and playful and it'll come out in my posts. But I'm not 'in character' when I do that, nor am I acting...it's just... me. But then when I'm in the mood for deep discussion, I try to put on my serious face and behave...but sometimes it's hard because I love to joke around. Not always sure how it's perceived on-line, though. But I'm like that in RL too - if I hold the door for someone, I ask for 'toll money', and usually get a chuckle out of the person...and I've been known to dance down the street during a storm, belting out 'Singing in the Rain'.

When it comes to escaping reality - well, I USED to go online to escape reality, that's how I discovered the net, actually. But I was always myself on any site I visited, I never tried to pretend to be something or someone else. Well, I got bored 'escaping reality' about two years ago (it gets really old after a while), so now I just come here (an to other sites) to 1. have fun, and 2. keep informed, but always as myself, and nothing else...

das

[Fancy]

In real life I am a playful, funny, usually in a great mood type of person.

Here I am a playful, funny, usually in a great mood type of person. :)

So, what you see is me.

playful

flirtatious,

funloving

a bit naughty at times (hopefully keeping to pg13)

99% of the time happy

a little pirate savvy, but not as much as others (like Foxe) so I don't try to get into too many "serious" conversations.

and somtimes a bit sad, as I don't do the reinactments or ren-faires... although I'd like to. someday I will, so I reckon I'm also hopeful :)

[Sjöröveren]

When I'm "in character" in the pub, I talks like this, a right proper salt, but when I'm "me" I tend to use complete sentences, proper punctuation, correct grammar and the like. I like both ways, because I love using language. Maybe it's because I don't get an opportunity to talk much at work. The pub is about the only place I have to exercise my brain on a regular basis.

[PyratePhil]

Interesting to me how so many of you mentioned how the "real world" (Yes, Bess, I used the quotation marks!) won't allow you to be your "true" selves.

What is wrong with this picture - you can only be yourself in this "false" world?

SO...realizing the need to earn one's bread and a little butter in the land of the living-but-almost-soul-dead...I ask:

Why NOT allow yourself to BE yourself more in the RW? Those who are remembered most fondly in life are the "characters", NOT the worker drones with the corporate attitude...when you are in your declining years, will you look back at a life lived YOUR way, or one spent in servitude, both physically and mentally, to the Great Big Machine of What Is Acceptable?

Jes' thinkin' out loud, is all...

[Cap'n Pete Straw]

Here, here!

[PyratePhil]

Here, here!

Where, where?

[Hawkyns]

I guess I have 2 real worlds. Mon-Fri, 8:30-5:00, where I deal with all the gits who think they are somehow special because they are CEOs and Division Chairman, and the rest of the time. I allow very little spiilover between the two. At the job, I have to play the part of the corporate drone, no matter how these idiots gall me. At home, I am by no means the same person.

Gwen and I (we use our persona names all the time, BTW. legal names are for jobs and families only) do as much as we can to maintain our personas. I guess by doing that, you could say that the persona is the real me. We don't have anything like a standard life. We don't have kids, so we can do whatever the hell we want. Since we do 3 different periods, it is easy to do a muster just about every weekend. Weapons are a part of life, I train a couple of times a week and there are some in every room. We have more garb than mundane clothing. We have a very loose attitude to the standards and mores of the modern world, and find the rules very confining, so we push them as far as we legally can.

So I guess I'd say yes, we live in persona.

Hawkyns

[PyratePhil]

Huzzah fer Hawkyns!

O' course, jes as a small point..."legally" is open to interpretation... :)

Lord Neptune knows, it be difficult ta live a split life - been there, got the tattered T-shirt - but iffin ye HAS to do it, yer way be THE way.