#system responsibility

Funny that like. Some people can just. Use plurality as an excuse for their actions?

Amnesia barriers aren't an excuse.

"Violent" alters aren't an excuse.

For us, nothing just Happened for No Reason. Our brain responds to percieved threats in the moment. Whatever the fallout is, we take accountability together.

I went down that path of excusing actions due to alters and it got me in a Lot of trouble, and I lost a Lot of friends. It's not a fun path and it's definitely not a Vibe you should go for.

Whatever transpired and whether you remember it or not, if it hurt someone or made people uncomfortable, take fucking responsibility.

Don't just go "oh, that was [x]", "oh it was because [x] doesn't like [y]", etc etc etc

If one person messes up, it's up to you, as the main host and essentially frontman for the system, to take responsibility and apologize for whatever damage was done.

Don't blame it on amnesia barriers. Don't blame it on alters. And absolutely don't try and sweep it under the rug and go about your business.

That's just cowardly. And we do not have sympathy for cowards.

Let's say headmate 1 does something abusive to someone outside the system. Then headmate 2 apologizes and outwardly takes responsibility. The problem is that headmate 1 still doesn't see themselves as having done anything wrong, and didn't need to apologize for it themselves. There's not much incentive to not repeat the behavior.

Meanwhile, where headmate 2 apologized, that doesn't necessarily mean they feel responsible for what happened. They don't feel like they did it. They're still dissociated from the initial event. They're apologizing in the same way that a parent might apologize for the behavior of their child.

Syscourse can be incredibly triggering. A lot of discourse can be. Some topics will hit a nerve, will touch on some trauma, and you'll not always be able to keep yourself regulated. This is normal. This is okay. Especially in syscourse, a lot of us here are traumatised. A lot of us here are in very different stages of recovery, if we're engaging in recovery at all. We'll all be able to manage this kind of thing to different extents.

So, if that happens, try to take a step back. Breathe. Count to five, or ten. Use any coping mechanisms you need to, to look after yourself and get yourself regulated again. That step back, the time you take, can be as long as you need it to be. Once you've done that, if you want to try and re-engage with the topic that triggered you, then do so - but also consider that if you can't do so without becoming too affected by it to reasonably interact with it in a productive manner... then maybe it's best to not engage with it at all.

Maybe write out your feelings in a private post, if that will help you, but don't post it. Look over it again when you're calmer and rewrite it into something more productive later, if you can, and if you still feel like you want to engage with it. But remember, you also don't have to engage with it at all. Syscourse is a discussion space, but it's also one that you should be careful with how you engage with it, to minimise the harm it does to you, cause it can be very stressful and there can be a lot of hurt and pain that comes out of it.

If you don't manage to keep yourself from engaging with topics while you're dysregulated - such as when you're deeply triggered - then you have to be ready for how your actions, your words, how you end up interacting with the topic while in that state of mind, will be received, as well as the consequences of that.

It's not uncommon for people to lash out while triggered - it's one of the Four F's of trauma responses - Fight. Sometimes, we hurt people when we're triggered. We mess up. We say things we (probably) wouldn't normally say when we're feeling regulated. Or we say things in a way that is hurtful, etc. - this can vary a lot. And yeah, you're traumatised, you're triggered, in that moment. You may not truly mean what you're doing or saying.

But that's a reason, not an excuse. It might soften the blow, a little. But it doesn't change that it still hurt the person or people on the receiving end. And they have every right to respond in the way they feel is best for them. They themself/ves may be triggered by your actions, and they will be in the same position as you were, as far as whether to step back to regulate themself/ves or to respond while still dysregulated - and they'll be in the same boat as you if they react in a harmful manner.

Criticism of your actions, doesn't mean a criticism of you as a person. Someone setting a boundary, blocking you, not wanting to talk to you, for something you did while triggered, is a completely fair decision for them to make - it doesn't mean that you're a bad person, but your actions hurt them and they don't want to continue interacting with you. They have that right. You being triggered does not absolve you of consequences, nor can it be used to force someone to change their mind about the boundaries they set as a result of your actions. They may choose to change their mind, but that is their choice, not one you have a say in.

We've talked about it a bit in our post on persecutors, but this is part of being responsible for your mental health and the way that affects the people around you. You are not at fault for what happened to you, or the conditions that affect you. You may not necessarily be at fault for the actions you take as a result of those conditions - we aren't always in control of ourselves. But you do have to take responsibility for what you do, regardless of whether you're in control, regardless of whether it's your fault that you're struggling with your mental health. And part of that responsibility is to respectfully accept the consequences of what you do. Apologies are a good idea, but sometimes you don't get a chance to make them to the people you hurt. Sometimes you do, but they don't always change the consequences that are faced. Maybe you'll get to make amends, maybe not. You have to deal with that, accept that.

And, importantly, part of taking responsibility is doing what you can to work on things. To try and avoid causing harm. Taking steps to reduce that risk. This will look like different things for different people and the struggles they face.

In the context of syscourse discussions being triggering, sometimes that might be taking a break from syscourse until you can better manage your reactions to triggers. Sometimes that might be just learning to step away from syscourse in the moments you get triggered, rather than reacting. Maybe a friend can be a "spotter" for you, where you only engage in syscourse when they're around so they can help you disengage when you're getting too upset. As long-term things, maybe that is working through the trauma that's being triggered, or finding ways to lessen the effect of the trigger specifically. Maybe you might find that you just need to avoid certain topics altogether, while still engaging with syscourse overall just fine - in which case you might need to curate your experience - block certain words, or tags, or blogs. Find an approach that works for you.

And while we're still in the context of a very system-focused space - responsibility applies to others in your system as well, of course. If someone else in your system is triggered and reacts harmfully, you still need to accept the consequences for their actions. You can apologise on their behalf, try to make amends, too. System responsibility is important.

Remember, you have a choice on whether or not to engage with syscourse. Please do so responsibly. Look after yourself, and also be considerate of those you interact with.

I also dislike conversations about things being anti-recovery because there's always nuance where you simply cannot definitively say something is or isn't anti recovery in a way that applies to everyone. I have decided, however, that this topic might actually be dangerously anti-recovery for a lot of people and I'm probably just being a pussy not wanting to poke the hornets nest by avoiding it. So here goes.

A huge complication of this, is of course, the dissonance between therapeutic and community settings. The two will never line up, they will never wholly agree with each other, and there will always be conflict. You can never seamlessly take advice from one, and apply it to the other, not least of all because neither the community nor the therapists we see make up a cohesive hive mind. There are different goals, different methods to achieving those goals, and disagreements on what those goals should be.

That being said, let's at least explore these ideas in their correct contexts and see if it can at least expand our perception and understanding of them. You don't need to relate to these scenarios, simply try to see the topic from the hypothetical systems point of view.

Therapeutic Setting

The host of a system presents at a therapists office. She is aware of her alters and has good relations with many of them but struggles to manage her day to day life. She suffers from an intense fear of abandonment and has incredibly low self esteem. There are several alters in her system that she is deeply concerned about that have created conflict in her life. One is sexually promiscuous and has ended relationships by sleeping with people other than her partners, one that harms the body and is hostile towards her including strongly negative critical thoughts, and one that is dedicated to permanently ending friendships and relationships by being extremely cruel and harmful to the people she cares about. She is very scared of these alters and wants nothing to do with them, she resents them for what they have done and is scared of what they might do. Her goal in therapy is to create greater harmony within her system, to have better collaboration with her alters and reduce the amount of internal and external conflict in her life.

The therapeutic approach in this scenario would be to remind the host that the alters she is afraid of are the result of traumatic events, and formed as part of a defence mechanism to protect her younger self, but that these defence mechanisms have likely gotten stuck and may no longer be appropriate to help with the problems they seek to solve. These alters may also feel alienated from the rest of the system, they might feel like they are being unfairly punished for trying to help and resent the host for pushing them away and punishing her back. Therefore, the path to resolving this issue is to accept these alters for who they are and what they're trying to do. To be grateful for the help they provided in the past and how much they must care for her to do what they do. To work on the fear and apprehension, because everyone in the system is part of the same brain and so will know if she doesn't really mean it, so that everyone can be brought closer together and work collaboratively towards common goals. After all, they all share the same brain, the same body, and must live the same life and what affects one will affect the other.

Community Setting

The host of a system enters the online system community. They are not the original host of the system, and do not go by the bodies name. They join system discord servers as well as follow many systems on social media platforms such as TikTok. They feel at home in these spaces as they are very alter centric. They, and the rest of their system are encouraged to share details about themselves, write lengthy bios, and differentiate themselves from each other. This works well for everyone in the system because it provides a freedom of self expression that is absent from their real world life. The alters find it very validating to establish their own identities and be treated as their own individual selves. These feelings are reinforced by sentiments shared in their communities that no one should force them to fuse, that fusion is equivalent to death, and that parts language is dehumanising. The system does not feel the need to seek therapeutic support as they are happy as a system and have heard accounts that made them wary of being invalidated by a therapist.

There is one alter, however, that likes to get up to mischief and create drama. They often front momentarily to leave inflammatory remarks, don't abide by community guidelines, and keep getting them into trouble. They post to Reddit to ask for advice on how to stop them when they're someone else and they can't control what they do and are told "your alters aren't different people, they're part of you and so it's up to you to work with them to change their behaviour". Well that doesn't sound right. The alter isn't them, that's the whole point of being a system. They decide instead that there's simply nothing they can do about it, that alter has nothing to do with them and controlling their actions would be like trying to control a random person on the street

Now it's completely understandable why two systems from these two settings would come away with completely different perceptions of what being a system is like. Why one would find the other anti-recovery and the other would find the other invalidating. But there is a key commonality between them, and that is both systems are distancing themselves from the alters causing issues, one through fear, and the other through absolvement.

System responsibility in both cases, therefore, is to accept their role in the conflict as an active participant and seek to resolve it. In the therapeutic setting it's to recognise that the hosts fear and resentment, if understandable, is contributing to the furthering of conflict and reactionary behaviour from the alters in question. For the latter system, it's to accept that as individual and different each person within the system is, they still share one body, share one life, use the same phone or computer, and have the same accounts. That they do not get special rights as a system that singlets do not. That if they want access to spaces where they can all be themselves then they all need to agree to abide by the rules or none of them will have access to protect the other members of the community.

Neither of these are nice or enjoyable or easy things to accept, but, and this is the really crucial bit, if you don't take responsibility for your system or your role in an alters behaviour, then you are consenting to the behaviour by your refusal and whether you accept it or not, others will hold you accountable for doing so.

okay, so how we see interest is this:

there is a risk of any media to cause a fictive. Here’s some things to think about:

Are you willing to help them heal if they have trauma from their source?

what would you do if they act like their source?

and finally: Does this media make me happy and is not negatively impacting my mental health? Am I willing to risk the possibility? Even if it is impacting my mental Health, am I okay with risking this possibility?

These things do happen. In our own experience we have a fictive from the book Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (which is where those two characters come from, although in the book it’s about addiction and the duality of a Victorian Gentleman, not a split personality thing, still a lot of bad stuff in it.) because of how much impact that book meant to us as the time. (This is way before we knew we were plural) They formed as a persecutor and that was something we had to deal with and work through.

You cannot change the past, you can only improve for the future.

So yeah, just keep in mind these things. It is okay to have alters from bad sources but if they do something bad, then you and everyone else will have to take responsibility.

also keep in mind, not all introjects (fictives, factives, ect) are like their source, or even like their source.

But, if it leads you to dissociate that "You're just a part of me, we're connected and disconnected, we're the same person" and spiraling over and over at that point, that's bad. I've done that before, trying to talk to some fragments.

As a polyfragmented system, and so my alters aren't completely disconnected from one another, many of us are made up of fragments. For example, the main host has several fragments that connect her together, they're all her, even if they're technically different alters, they're all fused/connected together. Trying to decipher via parts language isn't helpful, because they're not individual alters. That's common throughout our entire system.

I wish we didn't have to justify our feelings and opinions on this. Our posts are supposed to be for people like us, people who agree or find hope and positivity and resolution in our posts. It wasn't even the point to completely disregard parts language, it was just saying that it wasn't always helpful. We are not that clear, but we're trying our best. Also, we're not trying to attack anyone with different opinions, we're just making space for our own. (Seriously, make your own post if you're just here to argue.)

So basically, repressing those parts because you feel like there's no control, is not a good idea. It just leads to more dissociation and rejection of them. So I really recommend you allow yourself to be, let them front in a healthy manner. Make a space for them. You need a space for other alters in order to have healthy communication. You can't just expect to have a conversation if you want ultimate control all the time.

Lessen dissociation by enjoying life as you, not shaming yourself because you exist. It's okay to just let it be and ignore all the technical parts of being a system and just be you. It can help, especially if you struggle to make decisions, and feel overwhelmed by the constant "proper/factual" information in the community. Like sure, that's great to learn about this, but it can hinder progress massively. Just log off this site and be yourself once in a while.

And being yourself isn't simple or easy, especially if you're many rats stacked up in a trench coat. Allow yourself to experience a degree of dissociation and enjoy being a different person, or letting other people front. It's going to have to be that way, if you're a system. Don't reject other alters or "parts" of you, if you truly want to work together or to integrate, then you need to accept that they exist, and not as people you can remove or ignore. It feels really good being ourselves, it feels really good to speak our minds. Please remember that. It's a good thing.

Also, whatever you do, don't punish your alters for doing things that you as an alter, regrets. You need to respect each other's feelings and opinions, and come to a civil conclusion or compromise. We usually vote on things and take it case by case. Or what priorities matter most. Attacking yourself for past decisions is silly. Attacking each other for past decisions is silly. It's okay to forgive yourself and let it go. And it's okay to discuss and ask why they did that. Being a system isn't perfect and that's okay.

Just be kind, patient and gentle, even if you see each other as just parts. You don't blame your arm for spasming out, if you tried to do something taxing. So why the hell do we blame alters who made "bad" decisions? Learn to forgive yourself and forgive other alters. You're going to have to learn to give yourself a break. And letting alters be themselves, creating a space for them, is important.

Your system is collectively responsible for the actions of any alters within your system.

Any alter within your system is a part of the whole unit of the system

If one alter does something bad or hurtful, it may not be your fault, but it is still your responsibility.

Just as the owner of a pet is responsible for the pets actions, even if the owner themselves did not commit the action or direct the pet to do so (I will admit this is not the best comparison but it still illustrates the point).

Within the system, you must work out your own communication and guidelines for what is appropriate.

Outside the system, you must take accountability.

Refusal to do so is irresponsible and immature. It can cause further hurt and ultimately lead to more severe consequences and potentially abusive situations.

Being a system is not an excuse to avoid responsibility for actions, and it is definitely not an excuse to be abusive to others.

If you find yourself interacting with a system who refuses to collectively take responsibility for individuals alters actions, please be cautious.

If you as a system struggle with alters acting inappropriately and/or communication between alters leading to potentially causing harm, seek help to try to improve communication and work with the specific alters to reach a mutual understanding within your system.

Nobody is perfect, everyone makes mistakes, and sometimes we all need help figuring it out. Pretending that you are not responsible for alters in your system is not the way to go.

Much love,