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Puella Magi Adfligo Systema

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Oriko has been setting herself up as a cartoon villain for Sayaka and Hitomi because it serves a purpose. Beneath the beneath though, what gets achieved from us walking away? We are incredibly powerful and incredibly idealistic. We want to help everybody. We have aspirations to state craft. But even with the resources of a first world government, suicides happen. There's a reason utilitarianism is the greatest good for the greatest number. She may be playing up her own condition to harden our hearts. To stop us from becoming the magical girl equivalent of Scion because somebody forced us to choose. If that is the case, talking is meaningless here. I don't see any means of countering that that wouldn't make a villain of us.
 
The Narrator said:
And I don't say that. But I also don't validate her suicidal ideation by agreeing with her. WE can just not dignify the statement with a response.
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Telling somebody that yes, they are, ultimately, one and only person who has the final say on whether they should die is not "validating", it is one of most basic human rights. If you don't even have a right to die, what do you have at all?
Or at least, that's how Oriko may well see it, if I interpret her last words in the last update right.

Another big problem I have with your vote is that despite "Don't antagonize" line, rest of it is quite confrontational.
 
DrZiztah said:
Alright, been a while since I've done anything here... And I'm not even going to pretend to have any idea what has been going on :lol.

But let me start with something: don't get into an argument with people seeking suicide by telling them that suicide is wrong or hurts people. Even with Oriko here, I'm getting the impression that she's fully aware how she's going to hurt people. She knows all the implications of what she's doing, and has most likely already justified everything to herself several times over during her time in the safehouse. Antagonizing and pushing forcibly against her will only make her justify them more, which makes it more difficult to pull her out of it later.

Furthermore, shouting won't achieve anything. Don't escalate. Zingers are bad, and only make you feel accomplished for a short while before you realize you've most likely just hurt the trust of a person already on thin ice. Plus, Oriko seems to be digging trenches because of this and preparing the hill to die on. So no guilt-tripping.

With that said, I rather like where @Muramasa's vote is going, but I think we should build it a bit to offer the alternative rather than give a speech. Not by throwing it in, but by aiding Oriko in coming to that conclusion too. Change needs to come voluntarily, though we can help the process along. Frankly, I think we'd need Kirika's active effort for that in conjunction with our own... But now, let Oriko talk.

Granted, we're on damage control mode now, but eh...

[x] Calm down a bit before continuing. Tone: Gentle, but firm. Don't raise your voice. Don't antagonize.
[x] But why does it have to be Oriko?
[x] Your powers showed you what you wanted. A way to die meaningfully. But that's not what you wished for.
[x] Politely request her to put it all out and tell you everything, no hiding, no single-line answers. If she tries to circumvent the question or leaves out details in any way, gently call her out on it, and swerve back to the topic. "It's necessary" is not an answer.

The problem with speeches is that they assume things about Oriko. Let her speak instead about how everything needs to go, and speak out well, so maybe she can actually confront any. The first two lines are good for leading into this, in my opinion, but the rest makes me go "Meh". If there's need, important questions can be asked about the things she says, but not in a guilt-tripping or confrontational manner. Only Oriko can change Oriko's mind.

Heads will roll later.
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I think that I probably agree with this line of thought the most. Yeah, we could quite frankly say a lot in response to Oriko. But should we? My mind also goes back to our confrontation with her after we caught her. Getting all angry and snippy nearly screwed us over. Also, I've kind of gotten sick of arguing with her. Right now, I would just rather know "why". She seems absolutely certain and convinced. I want her to say for herself where her conviction comes from if she's so confidant in it.
 
Tiroth said:
Have we tried pointing out that Oriko's pre-cog is actually pretty useless for long-term planning? We keep taking her by surprise. Why does she think 'my pre-cog says suicide is the best option' is anywhere near a valid argument?
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Again, she wants to die. If we point out that her precog is wrong to say she has to , it won't matter, because she'll still want to.

landcollector said:
Therapists work too slow to make any difference in the In-setting time frames we're working under.
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Firstly, therapists are trained to deal with people literally about to commit suicide. Secondly, they'll do a lot better in the timeline we have available than anything else. The fact that they won't finish isn't relevant, because nothing else will either.
 
These two lines

Muramasa said:
x] It's true, you have the right to throw your life away, if you wanted. And Kirika would follow you all the way to the bitter end because she loves you. But it's such a waste. I don't believe that's what you really want.
[x] Yes, you have the right to die. But you also have the right to live. You have the right to pursue happiness. You have the right to rebuild your life and have a future after all of this. If you want it.
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Are like 100% trigger material for her. Stuff she's used to lashing out at. Time and again I've said we should precog spiral her and the pick up the pieces... And some of that will be exactly what you're saying, "you have the right to pursue happiness," this can happen, it is real, there is hope. But yes, Ziztah's argument that, essentially, we should precog spiral Oriko and then let her build from there rather than forcing things on her is a legitimate one.

We cannot argue against her precog as-is. It's too much like trying to convince somebody that the chair they're looking at isn't a chair. That's obvious.

But there's no way to tell where she'll go if we precog spiral her, because we have no context for that.

So, yeah, I'm all for precog spiral and then see what Oriko comes up with.

[X] DrZiztah
 
Tiroth said:
First step in fixing a problem is acknowledging there is one. Remove her justification and see what she does.
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Except that she doesn't care if she doesn't have to die. That isn't the problem. She wants to die. Even if you convince her, she'll still say, "It's still my right to die." We have to make living more attractive than dying for her. This doesn't.

Look, "But why does it have to be Oriko?" doesn't help. She doesn't care if it has to be or not. Because she wants it. She thinks, "I get to have my cake and eat it to. Why bother looking for alternatives?" We have to tempt her with something better.

"Your powers showed you what you wanted. A way to die meaningfully. But that's not what you wished for." Doesn't help either. She'll think, "Well, if it gives what I want even more than what I technically wished for, that's a feature, not a flaw".

Again, we need to show her that she can aim for better than she is. That she can get something she'll lie to have more than what she'll get by dying.
 
DrZiztah said:
[x] Calm down a bit before continuing. Tone: Gentle, but firm. Don't raise your voice. Don't antagonize.
[x] But why does it have to be Oriko?
[x] Your powers showed you what you wanted. A way to die meaningfully. But that's not what you wished for.
[x] Politely request her to put it all out and tell you everything, no hiding, no single-line answers. If she tries to circumvent the question or leaves out details in any way, gently call her out on it, and swerve back to the topic. "It's necessary" is not an answer.
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I like the beginning and ending, but the middle seems weak, and is written in first-person form. In contrast:
Sereg said:
[]You understand. Sometimes you feel like the world will be better off without you to.
-[]And sometimes, the world looks so hostile, you don't understand how you could possibly fit in it and be happy in it.
-[]And sometimes, you feel like you are a product of that world, so how can your presence mean that the world is fixed?
--[]So, you understand why she wants to die. And yes, it's her right.
[]But will she really be satisfied with that? Isn't that a really low bar? Is she really ready to give up before achieving more?
[]Tell her that we believe in her. That we saved her because we knew she could be more than what she had decided to be. Tell her that she can aim far higher and we will propel her there.
[]Remind her that Kirika can be so much too. That she knows how special Kirika is. Why does she want to rob the world of someone she knows is wonderful?
[]Tell her that her existence does not make the world a worse place, contrary to what she believes. She has so much potential and has helped so much already. Tell her to dream big, because we can make t a reality.
[]Tell her that punishing herself punishes the world as well, because it robs the world of those dreams. Tell her that just because her father was different from what he claimed, that doesn't mean she has to go down the same path. That she can go beyond even what she believed he was.
[]Tell her that if she wants to pay the world back for what her father did, she'd be so much more effective at that while alive.
[]Tell her that believing in her father's ideals isn't a crime.
[]Tell her that you know she doesn't believe this, but the world will be diminished with her loss. Does she really want to steal such a treasure from the world?
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This is a bit stronger, but a little too restricting. So, pseudo-gattai?

[x] Calm down a bit before continuing. Tone: Gentle, but firm. Don't raise your voice. Don't antagonize.
[x] Show a little empathy, that sometimes you feel like the world will be better off without you too.
-[x] But will she really be satisfied with that? Isn't that a really low bar? Is she really ready to give up before achieving more?
[x] Her constant refrain is that "It's necessary," that her powers showed her this path, and so that's how it has to be. But her powers showed her what she wanted, what she's been asking them for: a way to die meaningfully. But that's not what she wished for. It's not the best of all possible worlds; it's just the best ones where she ends up dead.
[x] Politely request her to put it all out and tell you everything, no hiding, no single-line answers. If she tries to circumvent the question or leaves out details in any way, gently call her out on it, and swerve back to the topic. "It's necessary" is not an answer.
 
ctulhuslp said:
Just imagine Mami's reaction at this line. :V
Actually, does Sabrina feel this way? Because lying to precog's face is...possible, given that we bluffed with Kirika witching blackmail, but still dubious.
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It's not entirely wrong:
  • There's sure to be a big conflict (or rather several) over access to Sabrina's infinite Seed-free cleansing, now that our ability is going public.
  • We have been causing Mami a lot of heartache. Sure, it's better than her being short a head or Tetris-ing, but we haven't handled that at all well.
  • We're overbearing a lot of the time when we don't have to be, and passive a lot of the time when we should be more overbearing.
  • If we didn't exist, Madoka would have gone Madokami, and no meguca would be suffering infinite levels of pain right now as Witches
There have been a few people in this thread who have been quite vocal about the last one, claiming that we really can't do better than having Madoka make her canon Wish and likely invalidating our existence. The difference is that we're recognizing that the world will be a lot worse off if we suddenly killed ourselves, and that's something that Oriko is not seeing.
 
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TheEyes said:
It's not entirely wrong:
  • There's sure to be a big conflict (or rather several) over access to Sabrina's infinite Seed-free cleansing, now that our ability is going public.
  • We have been causing Mami a lot of heartache. Sure, it's better than her being short a head or Tetris-ing, but we haven't handled that at all well.
  • We're overbearing a lot of the time when we don't have to be, and passive a lot of the time when we should be more overbearing.
  • If we didn't exist, Madoka would have gone Madokami, and no meguca would be suffering infinite levels of pain right now as Witches
There have been a few people in this thread who have been quite vocal about the last one, claiming that we really can't do better than having Madoka make her canon Wish and likely invalidating our existence. The difference is that we're recognizing that the world will be a lot worse off if we suddenly killed ourselves, and that's something that Oriko is not seeing.
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This. I can accept those changes.

[x]TheEyes
 
Idle thoughts:

Check to see if simply skipping town would have been enough to save her from Feathers, and -if it was- if there was a cut-off date of some sort. I believe some people have claimed that she has said this before, but at the same time she's also said that every future she could see had her dying, so confirmation would be helpful.

Speaking of therapy, Bennouna, being a traveler, might know of someone with experience in dealing with magical girls; they may perhaps be a magical girl themselves. Cost of services is obviously not an issue, even less so if they're a magical girl.

If skipping town would still work, and the services of an appropriate therapist can be secured, see if you can convince Oriko to at least give it a go for a few months. Bonus points if the therapist is, or can be convinced to temporarily locate to, somewhere outside of Japan so she can't just take a taxi back when Kirika's not paying attention. Hawaii's probably nice this time of year.

Edit: Might help to point out that she's not going to be able to do much more even if she insists on staying.

General reminder: Kirika's wish is about what Oriko needs, not what she wants. It's an important distinction.


Personally, I suspect Feathers will leave her alone if she ever manages to get herself into Homura's "Not a Threat" list. Sayaka managed to do it due to the maturation she underwent through her ordeal, and I imagine that'll be how Oriko manages to do it as well, albeit with several orders of magnitude more effort. The first step, of course, is convincing her to at least make the attempt.
 
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........ said:
General reminder: Kirika's wish is about what Oriko needs, not what she wants. It's an important distinction.
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"I want to be someone useful to Oriko! I want to help her whenever I can, and I don't want to ever have to stop!"

Kirika's a tool. She's useful, she's not what Oriko needs overall. If Oriko wants to kill herself, Kirika helps her.
 
Best as I can recall, her canon wish was something along the lines of "I want to be someone Oriko would like."

The wish she made in-quest, while similar, gives her a fair amount of wiggle room compared to that.
 
[x] DrZiztah

We need to be attacking her precognition, otherwise everything we do, including love and support, will bounce off it. We need to not be making megavotes or literal votes, otherwise we'll write ourselves into a corner or lose control of the situation. This isn't the time for long arguments to reason, or for heartfelt appeals to emotion. Keep it short, start picking apart her beliefs.
 
Kaizuki said:
The middle is only as weak as the precog spiral theory itself. I don't know what you mean by first person form but it's certainly not in quotes or anything.
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What I mean by "first person form" is that it's phrased like something we would say, rather than an objective that we would talk about. The big giveaway is how "you" is referring to Oriko rather than Sabrina; changing that is necessary but not sufficient.

As for why it's weak:
DrZiztah said:
[x] But why does it have to be Oriko?
[x] Your powers showed you what you wanted. A way to die meaningfully. But that's not what you wished for.
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The first statement is so ambiguous as to be meaningless. Why does what have to be? Why does she have to have the right to die? Why does she need to die to save the world? Why did she choose this route to killing herself? It could mean any of a dozen things, and I'm not sure knowing the answers to any of them are going to help the situation. And the second statement is practically the weakest way we could have presented the precog spiral theory. Oriko's response to "But that's not what you wished for," is going to be the utterly predictable (because she's practically said it several times now): "But it's what I want."

That's what this vote is leading Oriko towards: an reaffirmation that she wants to die, because she is convinced that it's going to make the world a better place. She just told us this; we don't need her to say it again. What we need is to get Oriko to admit that she is not even looking for the futures in which she survives, because with her current depression and suicidal ideation she is caught thinking that those futures are inherently less valuable because they have her in them, and this vote does nothing to even steer in that direction.
 
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