Fictive

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Fictives are headmates based on a fictional source. Common sources are media like games and books, but almost anything can be a fictive's source, such as original characters or D&D characters created by other system members.

Origin
Fictive was previously thought to have been coined in the soulbonding community some time during or before 2004 as a less spiritual way of referring to soulbonds. Recent discoveries have led to a much more complicated history.

In 1988, Jay Martin published Who Am I This Time?: Uncovering The Fictive Personality, a book unpacking how some of the greatest artists "[take] on aspects of fictional characters to compensate for deficiencies in themselves." While likely not directly related to the creation of the plural term, it is worth mentioning. Martin's theory of the fictive personality was later explained as "[p]ropos[ing] that the fictive personality is a personality disturbance in which, in the relative absence or weakness of both normal narcissism and object love, the self strives toward total identification with characters in literary, historical, or mass-media fiction."

A Pluralpedia editor found a usage of fictive on a fanfiction site. The work in question was first archived in 1999. On the Fanlore page for fictive, there is a non-plural definition from 2009, and from there one can be led to the Subreality Café.

Subreality Café
The first archive of the writing site Subreality Café, made in 1999, defines fictive in its FAQ as "characters from the stories for whom the Cafe was created." The concept existed before the website existed, as early as 1997.

"If you watched "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," you might get an idea of what fictives are like "off duty." They're like cartoon characters; they can't really die, it only looks that way in stories, but it can sure tick them off! The only thing a fictive truly fears is their writer and readers giving up on their story, thus letting them fade away into non-existence again."

In this original definition, fictives are presented as ideas that grow to the point of near sentience. By late 2000, Subreality Café (then Subreality Central) had been redesigned twice, and the writing page now included sections for "Fictives Only," "Fictive/Writer Interactions," and "Fictives About Writers." With these changes, it solidified the idea that fictives could act independently of their writers, but these stories were still generally portrayed as pure fiction.

A metafic titled "Ancient History" brings that a bit into question. "Theoretically, the muses of Subreality had been the basis for his muse. At least, he hoped so. He'd hate to think his mind had pulled her out of nowhere." Before long, Harry, the main character, came home to a girl in his room. The fic also brings up his realization that "all" fans were in some way mentally ill or neurotic.

It's impossible to know how much of Subreality Café was fiction, exaggeration, or genuine. The story that originally spawned the concept, "Subreality Hopscotch," seems to have been a purely fictional piece, but all ideas expand. Most of the works are written in third person, which only complicates perspective more. Kielle, the site's creator, says in the author's note of "Subreality Chronicles" that she's not sure she wrote all of it, which lends itself to the plural end of the soulbond spectrum. A work on Fanfiction.net from September 2000 stands out for its portrayal of fictives meeting in a room in the writer's head. Some former Subreality members made Livejournal posts about their fictives as sentient independently from their Subreality fics. A fic called "My Dinner With Jesse" was online by 2001, the last in a series about how author Jesse Willey/Maxwell Larkin "struggles to deal with his personality fragments." "We had merged back into the one person that we were always meant to be. As I took my seat in his head, the table for two still had one person sitting there, and yet it was full."

"Walking in the Rain" has an introduction to the Subreality Café that is indispensable to understanding the origins of fictivity. "Muses are the source of a Writer's Inspiration. The Muse may be a good friend of the Writer, or a long-time enemy; either way, Muses are indispensible [sic] to the Writing community. Some Muses are specifically assigned to Writers, while others are simply imaginary friends that the Writer failed to outgrow."

LiveJournal
Subreality has an LJ community and has had it since 2001, which may explain the transition of terminology, especially after Subreality founder Kielle's death in 2005. The first mention of fictives in the community appears to have been in May, with it misspelled as "ficitive," in a post which has a comment referring to "how your ficitives get personalities and lifes of their own." User Beverly McIntyre made a separate journal for her fictional character Dakota in early 2001, referencing SC in the post, and tagged it as fictives. An earlier post of hers referenced a "fictive [fictional character]" being mad at her. Subreality has been references a few times in soulbonding spaces on other sites, including Blurty and SoulBond Sanctuary, in these cases with nearly direct links to the extended multiple community. SoulBond Sanctuary also saw fictive being used as an adjective when describing soulbonds, with the creation of "fictive characters."

In 2001, plural Sethrenn posted on their LiveJournal about soulbonding and tagged it with "fictivity," though that may have been added later. "There's a limit, I think. Even in fan culture. You can only talk about SBs and characters in your head so far, only take it so seriously, before other people start to back off and write you off as a raving loony. [...] It's interesting how, on a much smaller scale, the backlash in the fan community against SBing in a way mirrors the psych backlash against multiplicity, doesn't it?" Fictive was occasionally shortened to "fic."

In May 2002, DeadJournal user dende listed their interests as including "fanfiction, fictives," and "plushies named after fictives." The LiveJournal muse community wildfictives was created in October 2002 and is titled "The Fictional Characters in CK's Head." Individual characters had their own blogs and the description states that they are "all fictional" but "each have our own distinct personalities." They would have long discussions, seemingly between the fictives, about their organization and leadership. One post reads, "Y'know, I'm aware I'm fictional. All the things I've known and done and thought are just a dream someone's dreamt, no more tangible than a few pieces of paper, and some binary data... but I still retain memory." This community may be one of the first existing usages of the term fictive in a plural sense, but there's no way of knowing how much of the content was simply roleplay.

The term was later adopted by other plural groups, but it is unknown when exactly. It is now widely used beyond its original coinage. Some members of the multiplicity LiveJournal community discussed terms describing fictive and adjacent experiences in 2004, describing "fictives" as "oh, media people in your head." One soulbonder using the tag "fictive" in 2005, and a few followed after, and if it can be counted, "fictivity" was used in a comment in 2006. There are records of similar concerns about "faking" fictivity in LiveJournal communities as have been prevalent recently. A multiple on LJ in 2006 said that "there were places online where people didn't talk about multiplicity strictly in terms of trauma," but "other worlds, walk-ins, fictives and the like were rarely discussed at all." In 2009, an introduction in the pagan_multiples community identified many members of a system as fictives, clarifying that they "started as soulbonds." It was added to Fanlore's soulbonding page in October 2010, stating that it was used because soulbond "devolved from its original meaning into something casual and flippant."

Empowered Multiplicity
Pavilion added fictive under their definition of soulbond in mid-2008, which was mirrored on Astraea's Web. At the same time, Astraea's Web altered their page on controversies to include the term fictive, which was defined as "a serious connection to a real presence with a fictional source" and pitted against soulbond. The first archive of Ex Uno Plures's glossary in 2009 redirects fictive to soulbond. An essay archived from 2008 lists terms related to soulbonds, naming, "Soulbonds, Fictives, guests, non-humans, Furries, Otakukin, Otherkin, Therians, imaginary friends, archetypes, in-sourced, out-sourced, characters, role-playing, muses, and whatever else," but notes that fictive is reminiscent of "a fake person." Kasiya's personal site listed it in a 2008 archive as a recent synonym of soulbond that "we personally feel [...] is even worse." It was listed separately on Pavilion by 2009, based on Astraea's mirror, where it was defined as a "person from fictional sources, who is adopted into the mindspace of another person."

Tumblr
Dreamwidth user Tidepools said in 2010 that they were a multiple system with soulbonds/fictives. "Non-fictive" was being used alongside thoughtform on LJ in 2011. Tumblr user solipsistful identified their system as having fictives in (c.) 2012. Fictive was used in an October 2011 fanfic on Archive Of Our Own, which was also tagged with plurality and multiplicity. A 2012 article about Draven (infamous in some fandom spaces) defined fictive as "like an otherkin where the true, internal identity is a fictional character," with Draven identifying as a "fictive singlet." A Tumblr conversation about soulbonder terminology considered "fictive" to be from the multiplicity community and showed preference for terms like outsourced and insourced, which they said were used by soulbonders. Uses on Twitter existed but were primarily mocking and insulting. The Tumblr tags fictive and fictives were seeing usage by multiples and fictionkin in 2011. One early usage of the word on the PsychForums occured in 2012, in a list of terms taken from a glossary page of a DID site, used the term "fictive alter," but its first appearance seems to have been as a noun in December 2011. It seems to have been introduced to the (unrelated) CwDID forum in 2015 and it was appearing on Quora by 2016.

A multiplicity glossary on Tumblr in 2011 defined fictive as, "A member of a system who originates from a work of fiction. This is a controversial term, and some find it offensive and prefer the term 'soulbond.'" The LivingPlural Tumblr account had a "fictive directory" in 2012 and had defined it as "a headmate based on a fictional character" by 2015. Also in 2012, a Tumblr user referred to fictives as being "common among multiples." The Magneton System defined fictives as "just what they sound like: headmates who originated elsewhere and moved in here" or "a headmate based on a fictional character." The blog Fictive Talk, to which fictives could submit messages reaching out to each other, was probably created in 2012. One Tumblr blog, which had a daily DID term definition, explained that, "a fictive is an alter that’s based on a fictional character. during trauma the mind will cling onto all possible positives and it isnt uncommon for fictional characters to jump to mind and influence the creation of an alter."

The Amorpha System on Tumblr made a few posts looking back on the perspectives on fictives, then called other things, in the early 2000s. "Actually, we had some longrunning debates in email in 2000, when we were still in the closet and trying to hide ourselves in the soulbonding community, about whether fictives (though they weren’t called fictives then) could be parts of 'real' plural systems." Some plurals expressed concern that plurality was being equated with fictivity and being otherkin. Fictive ask blogs existed in 2013, leading to critiques about stereotypes around fictive roleplaying. Some Tumblr users criticized fictives as "roleplaying extremely hard" and being "uncreative at best." Fictionkin and by association fictive identity has been accused of being based on theft. A 2013 kin manifesto was noted as being for "Otherkin, Fictionkin, Otakukin, Fictives, and all and sundry." A short essay was posted to Dreamwidth titled "are therians, otherkin, and fictives real?"

A conversation about a "Tumblr nutcase" referenced "crazy tumblr otherkins and 'fictives'," specifically a definition more accurately labeled as fictionkin, although other conversations had more accurate definitions, and at one point fictive and factive were called "new words for otakukin." Members of the otherkin community in 2012 and 2013 referred to the term fictive as a "new way" to refer to soulbonds, as did some FFA members. A Tumblr blog called "fictives against fictives" accused other fictives of being illegitimate. Tumblr users associated fictives with "DID faking" as early as 2014. The term was criticized for its association with the natural multiplicity (from which it was identified to have originated) and otherkin communities and for creating a distinction between fictional introjects and other kinds of introjects.

It's on the first Plurality Resource glossary archive in 2014 as "a headmate who identifies with or believes they are, spiritually or psychologically, a person, creature, or race from fiction," and it's been on the r/Plural glossary since its inception in late 2014, defined as "a system member who arrives in the system with the form, personality, and possibly psychological backstory." A definition on Tumblr blog did-confessions said that fictives are "a type of alter that are influenced or taken from fictional works or places." Also in 2014, claims were made that fictive was a fictionkin term for someone who was kin with a specific character, as opposed to a species in general, seemingly based on earlier Tumblr definitions that they perceived as being replaced by a plural definition. A survey on Tumblr that began in May 2014 and was taken by 82 systems found that 51% of responders had fictives in their system. An archive of a glossary from 2015 includes a definition of fictive, "A headmate who identifies with or believes they are, spiritually or psychologically, a person, creature, or race from fiction," and the first glossary archive from WikiPlural in 2016 defines a fictive as "a systemmate who believes that they are, in some way, from a work of fiction." An anonymous user with DID in a FailFandomAnon AMA in 2016 provided the following explanation of fictives: "fictional introjects (alters that appear as specific characters from pop culture and may or may not act like them) -- can happen, but a system can never be made up of all fictives. Furthermore, most fictives are earlier splits because a child is more fantasy prone. Splits that happen later tend not to produce fictives because the mind, however split it may be, has a grasp between the difference of reality and fantasy."

The term had a small presence in tulpamancy spaces. Discussion about Tumblr communities included a comment that "you can hardly find a multiple who doesn't also have a soulbond(or 'fictive')" A few forum users referred to their tulpas as being fictives and a conversation in 2014 about soulbonding included a comment that "a lot of tulpas are also fictives," but a member of the r/tulpa subreddit claimed they never saw fictive when they lurked in Tulpa spaces in 2013 and 2014, so it was likely not a common term. Some tulpamancers on Tumblr used the term, though, with it being applied to tulpas a few times, which some members of the multiple community disliked. Tulpa.io's glossary referenced fictives under their definition of walk-in in 2015. It didn't seem to appear on Reddit until 2015 and 2016.

Modern
A September 2013 work showed that the usage of fictive as a type of muse was still surviving. "Outspacer" was coined as a synonym for the plural term by Lightrayes in 2014. By late 2014, the bastardized term "fictivekin" could be found on Tumblr, as could claims that fictive was coined by the early 2000s multiple community. An attempt to make a distinction between fictives and fictionkin stated that, "Fictives are walk-ins. Fictives appear in an already living body in this world fully aware and conscious of their identity as a certain character." In 2017, concerns arose around claims that "non-traumagenic systems aren’t allowed to use 'fictive'." Now, fictive has even entered the medical sphere.

Related Terms
Introject is an umbrella term which includes fictives and factives, which can be considered medical and avoided by certain types of systems. Though some systems consider the term to be open for use in a non-medical context, this term should not be used for systems without their consent.

Factives are headmates based on a non-fictional source, like another person.

Walk-ins and soulbonds can be some types of fictives and were formerly more synonymous.

Fictionkin can also involve considering oneself to be a fictional entity, but can be experienced by singlets. Fictives may identify as fictionkin if they choose. A fableing is a headmate within a median system who is identifies as both, or somewhere between, a fictive and a fictionkin.

Fictive-flux is when a headmate's connection to their source(s) varies over time. A post-fictive is someone who no longer identifies as what they were originally a fictive of.

A semi-fictive is someone who is partially a fictive in some way, while polyfictive or multifictive is someone who is made up of multiple fictional entities. Polyfictives and multifictives could be considered composites.

A system with many, or mostly, fictives can be called fictive-heavy.