Also, this got me thinking about simulated sex. If there really were a way to have sex with my ideal partner, I would 100% do it, precisely *because* they are hyperreal. Real sex is scary and requires me to bare my soul; it touches the very being that I am (even though Baudrillard would think I have no self). Fake sex, on the other hand, is not so scary but still pleasurable. It's better than real.

I remember my first introduction to the term hyperreal. My friend explained it to me after I was publicly having some brainrot over the V-Tuber Regis Altare, calling him the 'ideal boyfriend' and saying that the appeal of V-Tubers is basically basking in the parasociality of the relationship. Obviously, he was extremely right to characterize this as hyperreal. Still, there are two things I want to point out about Regis Altare/V-Tubers.

(1) The thing is that V-Tubers, to me, are better than 'human' streamers. Again, precisely because of their hyperreality. With human streamers, the real slips through; you cannot deny the existence of the person behind the streamer. The streamer John is also the person John. The streamer Regis Altare, on the other hand, is not the person Regis Altare; whoever is behind the screen has a life completely separate from Regis'. Both Regis and his audience know this.

The fact that Regis is animated, *visibly* unreal, makes it *easier* to establish a parasocial relationship. With V-Tubers, there is no pretense, because there is nothing real hiding behind the hyperreal.
(2) This makes V-Tubers (but also anime/manga characters and the like) prime candidates to become a person's "ideal partner". Indeed, given the chance, I would enter a simulation to have sex with Regis Altare, because he is hyperreal. The ideal partner is ideally not human.