Perhaps you’ve heard of Akihiko Kondo before. He’s the Japanese man who “married” the Vocaloid character Hatsune Miku, a computer-generated pop singer in a formal – though not strictly official – ceremony in 2018. He wore a tuxedo, she a handmade dress and veil, and 39 guests turned up to watch.

Kondo’s marriage has been covered in the media dozens of times and it’s often treated as a one-off human-interest story – the kind of thing published so readers can gawk at it and say, “Oh, that’s weird.” Kondo’s story isn’t unique, though. Romantics have fallen in love with fictional characters throughout history and they continue to do so, both in Japan and elsewhere.

Kondo is part of a broader community of people who identify as “fictosexual”: 3D human beings who exist in our physical world and are attracted to, and sometimes maintain relationships with, fictional characters. The fictosexuals’ primary tool is in their imagination. It can’t be explained away as manipulation by an engagement-seeking, human-like AI or mental illness. In fact, researchers in Finland identified something they call the “fictophilic paradox.”

Fictosexuals aren’t asking the world to conform to or validate a delusion. They don’t need you to think their lovers are “real” – they don’t even think they’re real. What is real, though, are their feelings. For some fictosexuals, this dynamic is deeply painful, especially as the love increases or they realize that this is their orientation and........

© The Spectator