Mind controller college class

[astuffedshirt_perv]

I’m toying with a ‘mind control college class’ idea—think Hogwarts for mind controllers. The ‘class’ will be small, like 6 people. I am hung up on how they practice. At normal Calculus class, for example, you go to lecture, the professor demonstrates a few problems, you go home and practice the lessons on you homework. With magic you can practice on inanimate objects. With mind control, how would that work?
-MC practice on an animal would seem silly
-MC practice on each other is prone to be problematic, as the other knows what is going on
-you don’t want novices running around town MCing random people to practice

So how/where would they practice their skills?

 

[LupusDei]

So how/where would they practice their skills?

On specially allocated group of fellow students who of course have no idea what's going on. And/or on dorms roommates. Both groups may intersect but not be the same.

Professor demonstrates techniques either on their current classroom pet or directly on one of students themselves, canceling (or not) the effects afterwards. They might also discuss defense and coping strategies; actually should, if that's a world where it's a common enough occurrence.

Probably MC students may have opportunity to suggest and register their preferred test subjects with the professor. Professor may assign test subjects of his/her own choice. And/or there might be pool of student suggested test subjects the professor choose assignments from.

Actually I think all three types might be at work in parallel:

1. Student's personal pet project(s). They have to be registered with and greenlighted by the professor, but are rarely denied. After all, if there's a strong desire to do so, it's better to allow somewhat questionable choices than risk students going at it illegally. Typically long term relationships, those may even be outsiders as long as they can be checked upon by the professor or their staff for results and conditions, including cross examination for playacting/cheating. Given the circumstances it shouldn't be too difficult to set up. They are under student's full personal responsibility and effectively (maybe even legally) property of the MC student, especially in advanced stages of the course. Coursework might be projects of this group.

2. Playthings pool. Students might have limited influence over selection of those people, typically fellow students (in borderline case a special class) and/or minor faculty of the college (in borderline case persons on payroll but little other real functions and responsibilities). They are quasi-randomly selected/assigned per task, and usually aren't associated with only one MC student. They are under full responsibility and control of the professor and/or their staff instead. I imagine them to be used for the very first learning tasks, as they may be specifically selected for being easy or have their natural defenses suppressed artificially.

3. Mission assignments. People and tasks directly assigned by the professor. The very core concept of this group is that students should at least believe those are effectively random people. I imagine this more coming up in advanced stages although some of those may be later revealed to be part of playthings pool, or be recruited into that in result, or in some cases even end up becoming personal projects afterwards, but more often than not those are rather singular interactions. It may include cases when the target is fully informed, have strong defenses and/or actively resist. Exams might be tasks of this kind.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

-MC practice on an animal would seem silly
-MC practice on each other is prone to be problematic, as the other knows what is going on
-you don’t want novices running around town MCing random people to practice

1. Practising on animals strikes me as a very good concept, for starters. Every piano player starts with scales, yes? Control is control - use a dog or a ferret to get the basics down.
   
   
2. Practising on each other is, IMO, good too. Yes, the 'subject' knows, but it's still controlling a sentient mind. Take turns, like first-aid students bandaging each other. Obviously, things would have to progress, but it's a step up from cats and guinea pigs.
   
   
3. How about practising on college servants, ones without The Power, so to speak? The faculty would of course prevent anything too off-the-wall.

 

[UsuallyPresent]

I think both of the last two posts are excellent examples of choice driving world building. IMO both the worlds hinted at are realistic enough not to fall into the uncanny valley.

 

[LupusDei]

About applicability of animals in mind control context, it may mostly depend on the style of the mind control used. If it is pseudo hypnosis verbal suggestions based, animals should be very hard targets. Technology based telepathy-like solutions may not be compatible with anything but human brain, technological hypnosis machines even less likely. If it is more general nonverbal influence, natural telepathy style, animals may be beginner test subjects easily. However distinction against advanced trick-training or just random behaviour remains a problem, but that's equally true about human targets in any case. My favorite pastime while reading mind control stories is to construct advanced motivation for the alleged victim(s) to fake the expected effects.

 

[astuffedshirt_perv]

About applicability of animals in mind control context, it may mostly depend on the style of the mind control used. If it is pseudo hypnosis verbal suggestions based, animals should be very hard targets. Technology based telepathy-like solutions may not be compatible with anything but human brain, technological hypnosis machines even less likely. If it is more general nonverbal influence, natural telepathy style, animals may be beginner test subjects easily. However distinction against advanced trick-training or just random behaviour remains a problem, but that's equally true about human targets in any case.

Great inputs, all!

True, but the other issue is access to animals in a college classroom setting, which would be odd. perhaps they have this class embedded in an A&M school with an animal component?

 

[TarnishedPenny]

... the other issue is access to animals in a college classroom setting, which would be odd. perhaps they have this class embedded in an A&M school with an animal component?

You did say, “Hogwarts for mind controllers.” That would imply that this is not your average a Aggie institute of higher learning. It’s your call, of course.

I seem to remember a number of instances in the Harry Potter series involving animal subjects in the classroom.

Using another example, consider Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series. The Lancre witches, Granny Weatherwax in particular, used to ‘borrow’ animals, a spell giving them not only control of the animal, but also access to what it was seeing and hearing.

But, again, it’s your story. You can do anything you wish.

 

[astuffedshirt_perv]

You did say, “Hogwarts for mind controllers.” .

Hogwarts was a hidden, self-contained school for hundreds of future wizards and witches. I am envisioning a very small group of potential MCers embedded among normal people. If you have boatloads of MCers running around things get too silly.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Hogwarts was a hidden, self-contained school for hundreds of future wizards and witches. I am envisioning a very small group of potential MCers embedded among normal people. If you have boatloads of MCers running around things get too silly.

Point taken. In which case, every psych department has rats, every biology dept mice and rabbits.

Obviously, scratch practising on servants, but I can envisage an MC class looking out a window at people down below. “Allison,” the professor said, “the woman in the red coat - make her drop her purse. James, do you see the couple quarrelling over by the bicycle ramp? Make them kiss and make up.”

 

[Hypoxia]

Maestersin College, good old MC, is conveniently located near men's and women's medium security prisons, maybe those in Chino and Norco, California. The prisoners are NOT volunteer subjects. For each practice session, a student penetrantes a prisoner's mind and an advanced tutor takes an adjacent mind to observe and advise. Murkiness ensues, and fun.

 

[CeasarBoobage]

Maestersin College, good old MC, is conveniently located near men's and women's medium security prisons, maybe those in Chino and Norco, California. The prisoners are NOT volunteer subjects. For each practice session, a student penetrantes a prisoner's mind and an advanced tutor takes an adjacent mind to observe and advise. Murkiness ensues, and fun.

This is exactly what I was thinking the whole time. Max-security types, not the cheesy single strand of chain link fencing and a bored guard with a tazer. Anyone on death row is fair game. Nothing is off-limits.

Push the limits maybe, and use a mental hospital, insane asylum type, teaming up with the doctors to see if you can cure mental issues. Or... Maybe... Not. Maybe you can have fun so they won't remember, or the target will think it was their 27th personality that made them do those things. This one is mean, picking on the disabled, but it is a tangent.

Of course, some pretty lady in a red dress (Matrix anyone?) would be a lot more fun, but if you want chapters out of this idea, you can always have a different location each time.

Depending on how far you want to take this, maybe the local school's PTA meeting could get spicy. So could a political rally. The local sperm bank? The 'away team' cheerleading squad?

 

[Hypoxia]

This is exactly what I was thinking the whole time. Max-security types, not the cheesy single strand of chain link fencing and a bored guard with a tazer. Anyone on death row is fair game. Nothing is off-limits.

Push the limits maybe, and use a mental hospital, insane asylum type, teaming up with the doctors to see if you can cure mental issues.

Many jails and prisons in USA are essentially holding tanks for the, er, mentally challenged. Telepath students probing prisons will encounter many loons and dims. Some of those minds may be too convoluted or gluey to escape. How many MC students are lost that way?

Or... Maybe... Not. Maybe you can have fun so they won't remember, or the target will think it was their 27th personality that made them do those things. This one is mean, picking on the disabled, but it is a tangent.

Against all rules, MC students stealthily fuck with their targets, wiping and overlaying personas. Sometimes it's sadistic fun and sometimes it backfires. How do the miscreants shield their mischief from MC faculty?

Of course, some pretty lady in a red dress (Matrix anyone?) would be a lot more fun, but if you want chapters out of this idea, you can always have a different location each time.

Depending on how far you want to take this, maybe the local school's PTA meeting could get spicy. So could a political rally. The local sperm bank? The 'away team' cheerleading squad?

Chapters imply sequence. Try episodes, with fresh, independent fun every week, like MORK & MINDY. Getting away from the academic setting, Failed or expelled MC students roam the land seeking illicit thrills. Do heads explode?
_____

EDIT: MC students are assigned to scan (X) for manías, vulnerabilities, idiocy, resistance etc where (X) = religious, political, and sports gatherings; entertainment and recreation sites; shops and eateries, etc. Are mystics, MBA fans, McFood eaters, and xMart shoppers prime zombie material?

 

[UsuallyPresent]

-snip-
Obviously, scratch practising on servants, but I can envisage an MC class looking out a window at people down below. “Allison,” the professor said, “the woman in the red coat - make her drop her purse. James, do you see the couple quarrelling over by the bicycle ramp? Make them kiss and make up.”

I like this quite a bit, but I'd also add, "Pete, stop Allison directly. Geordi, Jen, without affecting the couple at the ramp directly, find some way to stop James."

In other words, if there are nontrivial numbers of kids being trained simultaneously, offense and defense will be taught, I'd think.

There'll also be classes trying to 'attack' each other, to prepare the students to some degree for 'real world' attacks - a MC catspaw is a helluva insulating fuse for bad actors. I'm thinking an 'Ender's Game' like scenario, singles or very small groups given tactical goals thrown into nonlethal combat.

 

[UsuallyPresent]

Many jails and prisons in USA are essentially holding tanks for the, er, mentally challenged. Telepath students probing prisons will encounter many loons and dims. Some of those minds may be too convoluted or gluey to escape. How many MC students are lost that way?

If they don't practice against such gluey issues, what happens when they first encounter them outside school? If all they're getting is abstenance training - 'just say 'no' to MC' then maybe they wouldn't get that exposure, otherwise they'd be coached through such an encounter w/ an experienced MC onhand to pull them out if need be.

Against all rules, MC students stealthily fuck with their targets, wiping and overlaying personas. Sometimes it's sadistic fun and sometimes it backfires. How do the miscreants shield their mischief from MC faculty?

Or do the faculty even care? Perhaps they're happy with the 'expenditure' of non-MC 'assets' to ensure their MC next gen are up to the task, and subtly encourage such behaviors, slowly ramping up thepressure and making painful lessons of those they 'happen' to catch being naughty.

Chapters imply sequence. Try episodes, with fresh, independent fun every week, like MORK & MINDY. Getting away from the academic setting, Failed or expelled MC students roam the land seeking illicit thrills. Do heads explode? -snip-

I think I prefer the Babylon 5 model, where episodes = chapters and lead to a denouement. Ad-hoc-ium chapters are fine, too - I'm reminded of the 70s Batman series - just a different flavor of fun.

 

[CeasarBoobage]

The 'insane asylum' thing is a big stretch, using mentally disabled people for naughty MC stuff is bad. BUT, using them in a productive way, and helping them, or figuring out why they are broken/bent (including alzheimers sufferers), would be a benefit to society.

Fuck the death row inmates though, the serious criminals. Sure, some science and mental health research, all that can be a benefit too.

If you do want multiple chapters, like how Hogwarts was referenced, they can have a similar overall theme and the same characters, but every story has a different plot and direction. The PTA meeting and cheerleaders are way different than the rapists and murderers, but with the right mental flow, it can still all work.

And the budding genius of the class gives himself homework. The neighbor's babysitter looks bored, so...

 

[CeasarBoobage]

Many jails and prisons in USA are essentially holding tanks for the, er, mentally challenged. Telepath students probing prisons will encounter many loons and dims. Some of those minds may be too convoluted or gluey to escape. How many MC students are lost that way?

<snip>

EDIT: MC students are assigned to scan (X) for manías, vulnerabilities, idiocy, resistance etc where (X) = religious, political, and sports gatherings; entertainment and recreation sites; shops and eateries, etc. Are mystics, MBA fans, McFood eaters, and xMart shoppers prime zombie material?

YEEESSSSS. It's extra credit to take on the psychos and survive the encounter. Some people hate guns, but Jim Jones killed scores of peple with fucking Kool-Aid. Why? Jump into the river of crazy and try to keep your head above water. Squish those brain cells that make the crazy.

To reward the students for making humanity safer, they are assigned to visit the local soccer moms that are having a get-together in the club house while the game happens outside. The tables for the bake sale are all set up, and the hot apple pies are coming out now. With a half hour before the doors are unlocked, what could possibly happen?

 

[Hypoxia]

Obviously, scratch practising on servants, but I can envisage an MC class looking out a window at people down below. “Allison,” the professor said, “the woman in the red coat - make her drop her purse. James, do you see the couple quarrelling over by the bicycle ramp? Make them kiss and make up.”

I'm reminded of this cartoon. Spoiler: patent attorney pointing a device out his office window tells the hopeful inventor, "Death ray, fiddlesticks! Why it doesn't even slow them up." See, it's not suited for its purpose. Thus I wonder: what's the purpose, the application, of MC training? Where do graduates go?

History may give an answer. Psychology was a woo-woo subject until cheap pictorial mass advertising led to mass marketing, and marketers discovering that psychologists studied what influenced people. Some of the first college psych departments in USA were sponsored by consumer products companies.

That raises the question: Who funds Maestersin College, good old MC? Jobs awaiting MC graduates give a hint. Online influencer; propagandist; political, religious, artistic, media, or financial 'advisor'; (para)military interrogator. Which nefarious agency of which gov't or cartel benefits from these wizards?

It's all a plot!

 

[UsuallyPresent]

It's all a plot!

If it ain't a plot, we ain't doin' our job right. OK, ok, our avocation. Not many of us make a living out of this hobby...