I agree with a lot of the sentiments here, honestly. "Bleed", "blending", whatever you like to call it aren't inherently bad. When I'm RPing, I definitely experience some degree of it. When a scene has devastated my character, I hurt for them. When my character experiences joy, I'm happy for them.Â
In my opinion, there is little difference here between feeling evoked by RP and, say, crying at a particularly sad scene in a book or getting a stupid sappy grin on your face at the happy resolution of a romcom movie. You create a connection to the character(s), which is usually the point. These are all avenues of art meant to imitate life, and life is full of different emotions. If you don't feel anything, then.. Well, in my personal opinion that others may not share, the point has been missed.Â
But I think the problem isn't so much the bleed itself, but comes in when people have problems properly managing it. I'm not going to claim that I'm some paragon of this. I've made bleed mistakes before, and still do on occasion when I'm not careful. I've sat and cried after particularly sad scenes, and I've allowed a negative scene to put me into a bad mood that had been taken out on others around me.Â
It's largely about knowing your limits IRL, and when something has become so intense and real to you that you have to take a step backwards. This is especially true, I think, for people who play out scenes in both the Romance and/or Dark/Mature genres. You can apologize to someone for snapping when a scene leaves you in a bad mood or for having to walk away and stop crying in the middle of an RP with (usually) little fanfare from your partners. But romance bleed makes thing very emotionally complicated and awkward, and a dark/mature scene can have a serious, lasting, traumatic psychological effect on you.Â
So to sum up my two cents.. Emotion isn't bad in an RP. It's meant to evoke an emotional response, I think. You just have to be careful not to let it overwhelm and consume you.
In my opinion, there is little difference here between feeling evoked by RP and, say, crying at a particularly sad scene in a book or getting a stupid sappy grin on your face at the happy resolution of a romcom movie. You create a connection to the character(s), which is usually the point. These are all avenues of art meant to imitate life, and life is full of different emotions. If you don't feel anything, then.. Well, in my personal opinion that others may not share, the point has been missed.Â
But I think the problem isn't so much the bleed itself, but comes in when people have problems properly managing it. I'm not going to claim that I'm some paragon of this. I've made bleed mistakes before, and still do on occasion when I'm not careful. I've sat and cried after particularly sad scenes, and I've allowed a negative scene to put me into a bad mood that had been taken out on others around me.Â
It's largely about knowing your limits IRL, and when something has become so intense and real to you that you have to take a step backwards. This is especially true, I think, for people who play out scenes in both the Romance and/or Dark/Mature genres. You can apologize to someone for snapping when a scene leaves you in a bad mood or for having to walk away and stop crying in the middle of an RP with (usually) little fanfare from your partners. But romance bleed makes thing very emotionally complicated and awkward, and a dark/mature scene can have a serious, lasting, traumatic psychological effect on you.Â
So to sum up my two cents.. Emotion isn't bad in an RP. It's meant to evoke an emotional response, I think. You just have to be careful not to let it overwhelm and consume you.
