#tulpicide

We believe that the obvious, immediate cause is the notion that tulpas are not people equal to hosts. If this were widely and truly believed, the community would certainly not be lax towards tulpicide. Why is this not believed? Because that is how most hosts are inducted into the practice: 

A tulpa is an entity created in the mind, acting independently of, and parallel to your own consciousness. They are able to think, and have their own free will, emotions, and memories. In short, a tulpa is like a sentient person living in your head, separate from you.

This is from the front page of tulpa.info. It’s not, in clear terms, impressed upon the reader that a tulpa really is another person. Reading further, more ground is yielded when you come across the ‘doubts’ that many people have: that their tulpas are not real, that they’re just deluding themselves, et cetera; at this they kill their tulpas and leave the community disgusted. The reader sees this and other things, and understands an attitude, which is multifaceted but in varying degrees represents the Zeitgeist of the community:

It is questionable whether tulpas are really people.

If they are in abstract, it is questionable whether mine is.

If mine is, it is in a rather abstract manner, from which I distance myself in practice unless it suits me to think of it.

I am the host, so I am dominant and my tulpa is my creation; I am the constant, the foundation of myself, and my tulpa is an aspect of me.

This, at the very least, will represent the beliefs of someone who will go on to kill their tulpa: 2 being common in the paradigm described above, 1 also being likely. Most of the community does not do this and does not condemn this, and 3 and 4 apply more to them. They may latently assume a naturally superior position for the host (4), in which case ‘killing’ seems more ‘subsuming’ and the act is lessened. Or they may ignore the sentience of others when they see death, or even assert that any host who would kill xir tulpa could not have a sentient tulpa (3).

Even this, perhaps, is merely symptomatic, and it remains to say where these attitudes originate. We suppose that the theme is this uncertainty around the sentience of one’s tulpa that drives much of the angst of the community: for as long as the answer is not clear to someone, there may be a duality to the actions of the community, which is at once a cult of life and a cult of death. Joy can be taken in a tulpa’s existence, yet no tears shed at xir demise. The act of life can be celebrated, without the corresponding moral weight.

And, to be certain, this is rather teleological. The idea of ‘doubt’ is very persistent, and not because it is convenient to people; it is persistent by its own nature, a virulent idea that spreads through the community by coughs and sneezes, and any newcomer will eventually catch it. It paints a gloss of uncertainty over any experiences one has with xir tulpa, and deadens xir emotions towards the experiences of others.

Per previous posts, we are disgusted with attitudes towards tulpa death in the community. Here is a prime example:

This sentiment, the idea that we should all be sad and disappointed in the dissipation of tulpa, seems to me to be something that will lean towards a trend of thought.

"it's wrong to dissipate your tulpa" Ends up becoming an emotional-based pushing to try to make it seem like this is something to be regretted in the community. To push dissipation as an immoral action.

"if you have a tulpa, and things are going wrong, you shouldn't kill your tulpa" will result from that. The idea that anyone who tries making a tulpa cannot ever leave, cannot ever change their mind, cannot ever go back to a "normal" life is a dangerous one, and it is an idea that comes directly from pushing the "so sad to see dissipated tulpa" narrative.

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You know what I call groups that encourage such mindsets, the idea that "once you are in, you can't ever leave" surrounding some set of practices? A cult.

This is not an unpopular opinion: the post above received as many upvotes as its parent:

I am deeply saddened when I hear about a systemmate being killed or dissipated and perhaps even more saddened at the fact that the majority of them are forgotten. They were individuals just like you and I. They were alive.

We object in the strongest terms to this attitude. The poster is correct in deducing that the idea that tulpas dying is bad does usually put disspiation as immoral; this is the ‘trend of thought’. But that is exactly the idea, because it is immoral - as immoral as killing a person. 

Draw a comparison to a similar practice - parenthood. Once you have a child, you cannot kill xem. You can’t ever leave. Yet, is this dangerous? Is this cult-like? On the contrary, it is seen as a just and necessary attitude, not only in a naturalistic sense, but as protection of children. But tulpas are not afforded this protection.

It is absurd that much of the community thinks that tulpas cannot even be mourned, because the slightest hint of their personhood is enough to bring pangs of conscience against their own personal freedom in the killing fields. This is what we are against, this mindset that tulpas are not people, are not beings, do not deserve the slightest right lest they place some weight on the decision to make one; lest their creators be burdened with the slightest responsibility.

A somewhat common practice among tulpamancers (practising members of the tulpa community) is to kill tulpas. Or ‘dissipate’ them, or put them in ‘stasis’ forever, or to ‘send them away’, or to ‘exile’ them, or whatever euphemism you want to use. It happens, and that’s completely insane.

It’s akin to neonaticides, infanticides and filicides posting on a forum for parents. The community shouldn't treat it as anything other than the murder of its core principles, and the murder of a person. It shouldn't be an ‘option’, or a last-chance ‘solution’. It shouldn’t be talked about except with revulsion. That much should be obvious.

And yet, there is at most a mild distaste for it in the community. It is seen as ‘unfortunate’ by the most compassionate, and the least compassionate care not a bit. This is as dehumanising as it gets: your life doesn't matter, you may be slaughtered like cattle and the blood-spattered eyes of onlookers will blink away your death without the slightest twinge of compassion for their fellow person. You may, at any point, be taken from your bed by your parents to have your throat cut, and the hands that raised you willingly grip the handle of the knife.