multiplicity_archives | Some thoughts about multiplicity and human (or otherkin?) rights (Reply)

A few weeks ago, we (amorpha) were talking to a friend who we had recently come out to. She said our coming out had caused her to think about a lot of things-- it seems to have that effect on a lot of people-- and that she had recently been talking to another friend of hers who had mentioned that she sometimes felt like there were other people inside her.

"What do they do?" our friend asked. "Do they ever come out or do you try talking to them?"

"No," she replied, "I just try to push them away because it makes me uncomfortable."

And our friend said that made her feel really uncomfortable, so soon after she had gotten to know us as -us-. She said she was genuinely bothered by the idea that there might be others in there with her friend, but she was denying them their right to exist simply because she was uncomfortable with the idea of not being the only one in her body.

Truddi Chase said she saw integration as being equivalent to murder in their case. I feel that it would be in ours, too (if it would even be possible, which I doubt given past experiences). But it also makes one wonder, if one person insists on being front all or most of the time, is that also a violation of the rights of the others in the system? What if some people are forced into playing a niche role, being able to do one thing only, because psychological dogma says each person in a system can only represent one thing?

I'm curious about how many other systems are out there-- we know at least three other systems who had this experience, but I'm just kinda curious-- who had one person as the main front when they became aware that they were multiple, through whatever means, and that person thought they were the host or the original or 'real' person, and it later turned out that there -was- no such person in the system. We've moved from a situation in which one person was up front 90% of the time (because she'd held the front for three years, and was having difficulty accepting the idea that there had been others before her) into a more egalitarian one where several of us share time equally, with no one person dominant. Azu still has to be persuaded to let go of the front sometimes, but I think that's a reflex that our brain is starting to undo.

I guess I'm just thinking-- even though there really are some systems where one person is central (that was what was behind the median concept we came up with in Pavilion), is it potentially dangerous for a system to try to decide who's the host or the original person when it's just barely becoming selves-aware? Could it result in the suppression of others who could have been full people like anyone else, just because one person who's held the front previously is laboring under the idea that they have to be central to it? I admit I'm pretty biased in this matter because if Azusa had not been able to let go of her view of herself as central and step back, I wouldn't have gotten a chance to, well, be a person, or at least not a very well-rounded one. But still. Is it morally wrong to try to suppress impulses of otherness simply because the dominant front is uncomfortable with the idea of not being the only one in their body? Or to force others away from the front because someone believes they have to be the host or the center of the system? Just some thoughts, and I was curious what others' opinions on this were.

Anthea