I opened my post by saying how difficult it was to read the situation given only the one-sided information provided, but I disagree that there isn't a strong suggestion of bullying here. Why does this keep coming up, when it is so obviously triggering to one of the players? How hard is it to simply not refer to a single PC wearing glasses in the fiction? This is a well-marked path in a field full of land mines, and someone is choosing to step on mines.
This is simply nothing to support the bolded bit.
You're inserting a ton of fiction "between the lines" which absolutely isn't there. The only bullying I'm seeing is the guy throwing a tantrum (IN HIS TWENTIES!) because of choice
he himself has made! The dude is "mad for hours", that's ridiculous behaviour. That itself is aggressive and rude.
Nobody is making his character wear glasses
except him. And if he's doing that, and he wants it to stop, he needs to hand the glasses off to another PC (or throw them down a well or whatever), not keep wearing them and acting like it's outrageous when it's pointed out.
There's no room for "bullying" towards him between those lines. None. He's choosing to fill his garden with rakes, and then getting mad with people when he steps on them. If I were him, I would simply not fill my garden with rakes.
This situation looks ridiculous and like it stems from neurodivergence because it's about glasses. Would it still be ridiculous if the glasses were replaced by a more common trigger?
That he was voluntarily creating himself and could stop at literally any second?
Yes.
Your Hadozee comparison is obviously a poor one. You even know it is. This is a pair of glasses, not a species you're born into. It's kind of sad that you tried to compare the two.
A more common trigger might be, say, spiders. Except, instead of the DM needlessly describing how there are spiders everywhere all the time (which is a valid thing to say "Umm less of that please" or to X-card), this would be like the arachnophobic player having a PC with tarantula familiar, which he constantly had sitting on his shoulder, just to get a game advantage, who then got mad because people pointed this out or accidentally mentioned it. And hadn't even suggested re-skinning it.
It's simply a question of self-image, start to finish, and we consider some elements of self-image more sacred than others. Our characters are our characters, and it sucks to have their identities dictated to us. To me, and in the absence of more information, Occam's Razor suggests Edward is just a socially awkward guy at the end of his rope.
No.
Occam's Razor suggests he's an entitled white male (quite likely upper-middle-class, or the equivalent for his area) who is used to absolutely always having things his way, and knows that if things aren't perfect, he can just throw a strop until they are. I went to school a thousand clones of this guy (I went to very posh schools in the UK). Entitled white men who think it's everyone else's fault that things aren't perfect for them, even when they are the ones directly doing the thing they're mad about. Those people are often also somewhat socially awkward, because they're not used to people not immediately doing what they want. I've played D&D with people like this - people who were not neuro-diverse, but merely entitled, petulant, rude people, who blamed others for their own decisions (some were both of course!). And did
some keep doing it into their twenties? Yes. But that was because they were individuals with very little empathy themselves.
Again he is choosing this by
choosing to wear the glasses.
Let's be real re: our characters - first off, you need little bit of distance from your character - unless you're knee-deep in intense RP, there's no excuse for behaving like described (even then it's questionable). Second off, we've all received magic items we didn't want, which didn't fit with our character's vibe - at that point, we have a choice. Either open our minds and widen/change the PC's vibe, or hand off the item to another PC. I guarantee every long-time RPG player has done one or both.
If this guy is absolutely new to RPGs, maybe he needs it explained to him that the glasses are not soulbound, and they can be handed off to a new PC, but I'm getting the feeling (reading between the lines lol) that he isn't that new. If the other players assigned him the item, then this would be a bit different, but it sounds like the opposite is the case.
With respect, it isn't your place to tell me how I feel, and I'll thank you to not do so.
You literally criticised everyone for "not showing empathy"... that's telling us how we
should feel, which is
even worse as a social sin! So that seems strange.
And this guy is showing absolutely zero empathy or decency himself.
Why should the opposite not be true for some people with naturally perfect vision?
As someone who had 20-20 vision until his early 40s and now only needs glasses for reading (and only if I want to hold the book pretty close), I can tell you that,
never for a second was I remotely upset by the idea of a PC of mine wearing glasses, and I know a fair few other people without glasses (including my wife), and likewise for them. If anything, I kind of found the idea endearing, because a lot of people I loved and liked did wear glasses. In fact that vast majority of people I care about do (I guess because most humans do - 64%, I just looked it up)
Maybe with your vaunted empathy, you can think about that a bit. Maybe process how that might work for someone who does wear glasses to see another person throwing a tantrum about glasses? My brother has kids who are starting to have to wear glasses, and he asked us to be very positive about glasses in front of them - and it does make a difference. Obviously these are adults in involved here, but if you're saying "none of their feelings will possibly be hurt!", that's pure arrogant projection from you. I know adults who are absolutely sensitive about having to wear their glasses and acting like glasses are a horrible fashion crime it's worth being mad about for hours is not kind to them.
Seriously, think about that.
Really sounds like he does, and we'll need the OP to clear this up.
I guess you could interpret this in some other way than, "Edward only uses the spectacles when absolutely necessary," but I don't.
I mean, that's actually not implied either way. There's no reading of that sentence which implies he only uses them when necessary. That's more of your "between the lines" action. The OP can clear it up. What is clear is that his PC is making huge use of these glasses, then the player is getting angry and petulant with others for noticing.
That means he still wears glasses, at least some of the time. It's not unreasonable for an artist to draw the character with glasses on in my view.
In fact it's downright normal.
Because when you draw someone's PC, you usually make sure and include any/all Kewl Magic Itemz that they possess (even ones often in the backpack or w/e - though I bet these are just pushed up on his forehead normally), and this dude has magic glasses. It would be less usual not to.
