Honesty and emotion on Roshar

[+Oltux72 he/him]

Roshar is full of spren drawn by emotions and mental states. They are harmless outside of Shadesmar. They are, however, quite revealing. "I am not afraid" is kind of ridiculous while you are surrounded by fearspren. So, how do they deal with it? Is it polite to ignore somebody's spren? Are Rosharans unusually open about their emotions? And how do they play poker?

[Innovation]

8 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

Roshar is full of spren drawn by emotions and mental states. They are harmless outside of Shadesmar. They are, however, quite revealing. "I am not afraid" is kind of ridiculous while you are surrounded by fearspren. So, how do they deal with it? Is it polite to ignore somebody's spren? Are Rosharans unusually open about their emotions? And how do they play poker?

Yeah, I can imagine it would be somewhat difficult to have a dishonest conversation. Maybe you could suppress your emotions somehow? And I’m pretty sure Vorin Rosharans don’t typically play betting games like poker. 

[I Am A Fish he/him]

Maybe Vorinism is just an excuse not to play gambling games.

[KandraAllomancer he/him]

There's a WoB about that:

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holdencaufld

I feel like society on Roshar would develop a bit differently because of emotion spren. You'd have to be very careful talking/ interacting with people since you can't hide things like fear, anger, awe, anticipation, joy, passion and shame. Imagine going through high school having to deal with them...

The_Bravinator

I have to imagine it alters things like, say, the concept of masculinity. Obviously the Alethi have very strong ideas about masculinity, but attracting fearspren/feeling fear doesn't seem to be a negative within that like it would be in our culture. Men attract fearspren all the time, and it's totally fine.

It also seems like it might be taboo to mention someone else's emotion spren. People are constantly noticing internally that other people are attracting them, but they NEVER EVER comment on it (until the part in OB where they're investigating it in Kholinar). There must be a really strong boundary around commenting on other people's spren.

It's one thing I did want to ask Brandon about if he does another AMA--how emotion spren affect Rosharan culture.

Brandon Sanderson

This is some good theorizing here. I'd agree with what /u/The_Bravinator says.

The effects are all over the place, but they are just how life is on Roshar, so I rarely point them out. For example, the classic Alethi sort of idolizing being "straightforward" with people. No assassinations. (Well, supposedly.) You're used to being able to see people's emotions, so you take it for granted that only hyper untrustworthy people do things in ways that don't expose emotions. Emotions aren't bad, they simply are, and everyone has them. Views of masculinity are certainly changed.

The_Bravinator

Is it taboo to mention emotion spren that other people are attracting, or do people just not generally think to do so?

Brandon Sanderson

Depends on the situation, really. Not exactly the same, but note how in Earth societies the different responses to something like passing gas, depending on context, culture, etc.

General Reddit 2018 (Feb. 3, 2018)

 

[+Harrycrapper]

I wonder how emotional Allomancy plays into this. Do spren still get attracted by suppressed emotions or does that keep them away? Do even more spren get attracted when emotions are inflamed by Allomancy?

[Elsecaller_17.5 he/him]

Another note. Shallan finds it interesting that Tyn could draw anger spren when they encountered Kaladin. This suggests with practice one can artificially summon spren. Perhaps it is also possible to drive them away.

[Darth_Hel]

On 8/31/2020 at 8:05 PM, Elsecaller_17.5 said:

Another note. Shallan finds it interesting that Tyn could draw anger spren when they encountered Kaladin. This suggests with practice one can artificially summon spren. Perhaps it is also possible to drive them away.

Perhaps, but it could just be that Tyn is really good at making herself angry. So, not really artificial because she'd really be feeling that emotion, but doing it on command.

[ftl]

I guess on Roshar, making your intended emotions authentic enough to draw the appropriate spren is a good skill for a con artist.

Or an actor! I bet actors who can actually feel the requisite emotions strongly enough to attract spren are pretty high-status.

[Hoidolasium he/him]

It seems like spren are often drawn to internal displays of emotion - if you can keep yourself from panicking, you draw fearspren less, regardless of how you're acting on the outside.