So I’ve started watching Peaky Blinders for the first time (because of Blades in the Dark) and I noticed that a major part of the show (specifically in the first season at least) is about how the characters deal with trauma (mostly) inflicted upon them by the horrors of WWI and the social situations that it created . In game, most of these characters trauma’s are accounted for (Tommy would be cold, Arthur would be unstable, and so on) by the stress and trauma mechanics of the gang. Except for one I think, Freddie Thorne – the committed communist. Freddie, even being a ‘good’ person (in my opinion) who lives to help the poor and downtrodden and who is a relatively good lover, ultimately puts everything and everyone in his life at risk for the sake of his ideals. His trauma is his idealism, it is what put’s him at odds with the social order and those who love him, and it is where he went after being abused and then discarded by the state he probably once felt a patriotic love for.
Idealism could fall under being obsessed, but the feeling of being obsessed is a very internal and individual thing, where as idealism is much more directly social and pertains to effecting the social order itself.
What does everyone here think about adding this to list of trauma’s that a character can suffer? How do you think it would play out?
Being obsessed with an ideology is still obsession, imo.
I’d ask how his idealism manifests. Has it made him reckless? Has it made him paranoid? Has it made him vicious?
Obsession to me aptly implies blind spots or tunnel vision that presents as small-mindedness in certain contexts. The same could work to anyone falling into an inability to see alternative perspectives, whether on issues of economic structures, political/social ideologies, religious zealotry, or any other kind of bigotry (as defined as “intolerance toward those who hold different opinions from oneself” Sorry I realize that’s a very loaded term these days).
Having said that, Taylor, adding a new trauma condition is totally fine as a custom rule. Feel free to add “idealism” if that suits you!
It’s interesting to consider the difference between Vice and Trauma. Vice is the means by which people cope with stress and trauma. While it seems that in Blades at least, trauma words are dispositions that grow in you that you can’t quite cope with or recover from.
(as an aside: I was taking obsessiveness from the point of view of OCD over obsessiveness about a singular object, which I had forgotten about, so thank you for bringing it up!). Ah, I know why Freddie’s idealism was puzzling me, he is a character who successfully managed his vice to avoid taking trauma. Sorry about that!