What about runts that managed to survive, Alicorns assuming there is a stigma or deformed fluffies? Would the suffering breed empathy? I’m geniunely super into this and honestly you’re the first person who made me understand abuse if viewed through that lens, they’re hypocrites. Inbuilt hypocrites but awful hypocrites all the same. Still if they act more like real animals that talk or humans, exceptionally loving or otherwise then I tend to find the abuser morally repellent.
1 Like
I think myself that if a runt was taken away by a human and raised correctly and given the right diet, exercise etc kept as fluffy should and the rest of its family weren’t, they’d be really confused by why the runt is now healthy but also feel some sort of jealousy and spite that the ones that were healthier in the first place weren’t privileged enough to be treated that way to begin with.
I think alicorns, I always put down that fluffies fear them but they won’t recognise it’s an alicorn except from spite as it would just taste like any other foal in the litter.
Admittedly in my own headcanon, I treat alicorns just like any other fluffy. They’re rare and that’s it. If a mare visually sees the horns and wings she will reject it out of fear except if it’s had conditioning training.
If an alicorn foal was healthy to begin with it would taste just like a healthy foal but if it had a defect it would taste like a runt would.
1 Like
What about empathy towards humans how real is that? Using dog empathy as a barometer.
1 Like
The way I see it is that fluffies are programmed to love us no matter what.
As they were made for us and to be kept by us the bond between human and fluffy would be more important than between other fluffies.
They have an inbuilt belief that Daddehs love all fluffies and take care of them. So they will view us in a far more positive and biased light than they would other fluffies.
I’d say myself that both healthy and unhealthy fluffies would seek empathy from a human more just from the belief alone that they can take care of them better anyway.
Even if we caused the problem we’d still be given an easy ride. A fluffy would be willing to forgive us for anything because Of the Daddeh saviour complex whereas a dog would be more weary of injuries and would treat us with caution.
Admittedly I think fluffies would see us as perfect and I don’t think they’d worry about us all that much because in their eyes we are there to look after them and not the other way around. I do think they may be capable of it but i don’t think they could grasp the concept of stress or worries. It has to be physical like a cut for them to even begin to worry about us
I think they could emphasise with a dog though but only if it shows obvious signs of distress like whimpering or it’s been hurt.
My take is that they believe huggies cure all hurties. They believe it because it’s programmed into them. As they were meant for small children, if a child grazed his or her knee the fluffy would be around to at least give Huggies for the boo-boos.
But as they’re retarded, they believe huggies can cure all hurties as they feel good no matter how severe the injury.
1 Like
The last part makes me question if they’d be very good pets in the first place like my dog knows when I’m stressed and worries about me, unless Hasbio was really intent on selling toys and not pets. Like I think most kids would want what’s intended to be their bestest play pal to care when they’re sad.
Honestly at this point it sorta seems like a realistic but very poorly thought idea. Besides, it’d be easier to just make them super empathetic to the point where others suffering hurt them.
1 Like
Oh definitely, the humane thing would be to kill any feral you see (quickly and painlessly) and have 90 percent of them neutered and fixed.
2 Likes
I kind of agree with the idea that fluffies would be intended as toys first and pets second, but the intention is not necessarily the result. It’s easy to throw around varying degrees of understanding from fluffies but the thing I’ve always considered when I was writing them is that a fluffy can be sad, and the ones that have been sad know what sad is in humans too. So a fluffy can be completely oblivious and joyful if it’s living to Hasbio standards and was raised in a perfect, corporate-friendly environment, or if it’s had a rough time it’d have developed a bit more emotionally and be able to recognize and want to help sadness in others.
2 Likes
Shit, so you have to kinda break them for them to be worthy of loving, that’s actually really tragic.
1 Like
Maybe not breaking, but I would think fluffies need to have a bit of hardship to understand that it exists at all.
2 Likes
So basically a fluffy raised in a perfect enviroment would most likely reject foals and friends for a bunch of reason and be rather unconcerned with human suffering that didn’t effect it.
2 Likes
Pretty much, it wouldn’t have context to understand what hardship or negative feelings even are, and that kind of empathy needs to develop young in order to be processed in a healthy way psychologically.
1 Like
I’ve always wanted to emphasise how artificial they are and that they were intended purely as toys rather than pets because if they were pets that would require commitment, whereas these things seem disposable.
I’m with turboenculator on this one, a fluffy that has at least had hardship or even some kind of injury or problem would at least have some level of empathy. I think complex problems would be too much for them but they could at least grasp simple problems…
I always think that their programming hinders them a lot and their simple minds aren’t able to process negative emotions or complex problems efficiently or at all.
But I do think they can at least have empathy. Why else would they give huggies for hurties? They can only understand the world on their own terms and through their own eyes.
I always take the idea that they’re toys and people view them as toys. Though realistically they are pets, Hasbio released them and they became something they weren’t intended to be.
But would they deny those huggies to a foal missing a leg?
2 Likes
honestly, I’d say its up to the kind of fluffy. How they were raised, what kind of things theyve experienced, stuff like that.
1 Like
I think that they’d be able to process negative emotions, but perhaps not know how to handle them. Problem solving I’d say is a matter of learning just like in anyone else, though fluffies definitely don’t have as much mental horsepower (ha) as humans.
1 Like
Depends on how the fluffy was raised. If the fluffy is taught that all foals need huggies for hurties and is encouraged to be empathetic then I think they would.
Again it would be down to good parenting on our part to foster that sort of behaviour.
Left to their own devices, they’d probably treat the foal like a broken toy and shun it as it’s not in perfect condition
2 Likes
So that explains the feral vs domestic disparity then.
2 Likes
I think that’s probably it tbh they’re just not mentally or emotionally mature enough to handle such emotions.
I always think that they’re programmed to be happy and cheery and they act like that all the time. But when faced with an actual problem for the first time or any time after they just don’t know how to process it or deal with it.
Be kind of like if they lost something they’d only feel sad for a little while but would instantly no longer feel it if it was replaced there and then.
I’d never expect these guys to be sep thinkers