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How do I write a dumb person?



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Fri Mar 18, 2016 10:21 pm
KayleeMorgan says...



June Porter's mother died when she was sixteen, she overdosed on alcohol and diet pills. Her father who was remarried and had another daughter, takes her in. She didn't even know him or that he was her father. June's new-found sister May, is seemingly perfect. She's sweet, nice, smart, pretty, and popular and hates June with a passion. June slept with her boyfriend a couple years ago and May branded her a slut. From that point all that's all June was to everyone at their school. Guys constantly flirt with her thinking that she'll be an easy lay and because June can't recognize the difference between positive and negative attention she responds to it. She just throws gas on the fire. Soon enough even she starts to lose respect for herself and just let's the slut label roll and indulges it.

When she's fifteen, ending her sophomore year, May's boyfriend approaches her at a pool party. They start flirting even though they both know he has a girlfriend. May's boyfriend doesn't have a condom with him but he says that she can't get pregnant if they have sex underwater and because she was fairly drunk at the time she goes with it. A month later she finds out she's pregnant.

The father is of course May's boyfriend, Dennis Thompson. Dennis is my dumb person.

He's a sweetheart most of the time but so dumb. Even though he generally has good intentions his downstairs brain is used much more often than his upstairs brain, and had a much stronger hold on him.
His character is secondary but strong and integral. So far I've written him misusing a lot of words and thinking stupid things like, girls can't get pregnant if you have sex underwater. I imagine his character to be very similar to Andy Dwyer's from Parks and Rec, only a horny teenager.

I would really appreciate any tips on how to write a dumber person but keep him likable.
  





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Tue Mar 29, 2016 12:47 am
Prokaryote says...



You keep him likable by making him pitiable. Read Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck and you'll get the picture.

If you want the reader to empathize with your character, you show that character suffering.
  





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Tue Mar 29, 2016 5:26 pm
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Kale says...



Well, I think the first thing you should do is stop thinking of him as "dumb". All of your problems arise from trying to fit him into what your idea of "dumb" is, and it's not working because as such an integral character, he needs to be a fully-rounded person who has flaws rather than a giant walking balloon of stupidity.

For example, some of the things you cite as proof of him being dumb are common cases of ignorance. A lot of people know very little about how sex actually works, and there's countless rumors and pieces of common knowledge that are straight-up wrong, yet lots and lots of otherwise intelligent people believe these wrong things.

You also focus exclusively on the negative side of his traits rather than also view the positive. People also generally don't misuse words unless they're trying to sound more intelligent, which might be a stupid thing to do, but it takes effort to learn those words in the first place, so it shows that he's at least willing to go out an learn things to better himself, even if he's bad at learning things on his own.

Now, a lot of people cheat on their partners, and these people usually have reasons, so I'd recommend looking at other cases of cheating and seeing what the reasons were. Sometimes, especially if there's alcohol involved, they don't remember the reasons or even doing the cheating, so how they rationalize what happened is also good to look into.

But the main thing blocking you, I think, is trying to Dennis into a set mold when he needs to be a more rounded character.
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