#other people seemed to tolerate c!Wilbur as a peer but c!wilbur couldn't tolerate himself as a peer

[enneamage]

Speaking as another 3w4, I’d say love and achievement are never fully separate since achievement is the means by which this type feel they become deserving of others’ love, so “presidency” (guidance, competence, control, responsibility, protection, authority, role model, moral compass) could be how Wilbur perceives he earns his place in Tommy’s life, in and out of character. Sure is curious that the finale has him leave because others DO expect him to fulfil that role and vilify him for not reaching its high standard, even for “not being there to protect them” aka killing himself. You’d expect a story like his to end with a realization that others don’t actually value him for shallow conditional reasons and see him for the human beneath, but he really *is* living in a world that detests him for suffering and only cares about him to the extent it can expect the impossible of him, so he has to leave that reality and get far away from all its inhabitants to stop beating himself up for not reaching their expectations and for all the times he crumbled under them. Is Wilbur is crumbling under the pressure of being Quirky White Boy or does he really think people view their friends like this

The DSMP really was a callous place, I won’t deny that. Lot of gamers trampling over each other, it was the fandom who rose-tinted those glasses and made a CN show out of a Rick and Morty episode /pos. If you had to learn that love exists, I wouldn’t have chosen there as the destination spot to do so.

I do generally get the sense that C!Wilbur felt the need to do something in order to earn a place in his environment. He seemed anxious about being underwhelming or irrelevant, that did turn out to be the seed of a lot of grief down the road. The question of how rational or irrational the concern was is up in the air, but it was definitely magnified by his nature; soon only positions of power seemed tolerable to him to overcome his shame and anxiety. He wouldn’t (couldn’t?) experience what was in front of him as good enough because everything was already wrapped up in the pretense of his impulses, so he felt he had to keep them up in order to hold onto what he had. He never really gave himself the chance to explore another option, and maybe that was the feeling of needing to be ‘worthy’ before he could be satisfied with what was around him.

If you put Wilbur (and his neurosis) at the center of the narrative of the world, he can be sympathetic, he even makes sense. The issue is that putting one single person at the center of the world can never be the source of a sustainable, or just, plan. Everyone is part of a natural exchange, the world is give-and-take on the micro and the macro level, and in a big network of people that matters. Most of the characters wound up afraid of the destructive road that C!Wilbur went down with his mental spiral, because he turned to mass public violence and then suicide. The latter could have been a delicate and private matter, but the former made it real personal to everyone involved, and they reserved the right to feel that the TNT was at least unnecessary.  

In this scenario, is the high standard being Tommy’s or everyone’s ‘President’? And are the characters in-universe holding him to that standard, or the audience? If I remember correctly the thing that made C!Wilbur afraid was that people didn’t give him the defference of a leader and things weren’t happening on his terms, not that the people around him were calling him to be something greater than he could be. Maybe those two things blended into being one and the same, but that connection would have been made in his head. I’m trying to figure out what the impossible standard that he can’t meet is, why he wouldn’t be able to meet it on more modest terms, and if it comes from inside or outside. It’s probably both (Input ->interpretation->narrative->output->input again) which is why it feels so inescapable.

I feel like you've discovered a thread here that I hadn't thought of before—Few people are consciously holding him to a standard of greatness, but if that's what it takes to get attention and results, they may as well be, because he finds the apathy intolerable.

There’s probably a depression reading here (the fear of sadness making one unwanted) and that’s something that Main is more willing to go into with their metas. Feeling like you have a larger need for attention and respect and love than there seems to be in the world is probably terrifying, especially if you feel like who you really are is the thing that’s keeping you from getting any.

You know that question that gets passed around by internet dwelling couples, “Would you still love me if I was a worm?” For the most part it’s a meme to throw at someone to see their reaction, but it’s known to create some strangely intense conversations. The premise is goofy, because nobody is at serious risk of being hit with the wormification ray, but it has something strangely vulnerable underneath it; If I suddenly lacked all human output and was basically helpless, would you still love me? It’s a hard situation to size up, both in yourself and other people—would you still love me if I was a worm? Would I still love you if you were a worm? The caretaker instinct says ‘yes’ but how long would that last? Much to think about.

I feel like the seed of neurosis, deep down, is that he feels he is that worm. He wants to be everything except that worm, but the vulnerability is always close behind, and his instincts are wrapped around protecting it. We’ve had the Age Regressor talk here a couple of times, so sometimes he even acts like that worm, or at least tests people to see if they could handle it. In the end you’ve got to zoom out again and look at the bigger picture, harsh as it can be to the one perspective.