Can we hear more about that theory?
it's less of a theory and more just derangement, and a specific angle of viewing the story. but smth i think that is crucial to how i see the story and something that i think is too-often deemphasized in the fandom, regardless of how much you buy into the derangement lmao, is that c!discduo is not...really a standalone relationship. i mean it is, but in just as many ways it isn't...and the reason why the finale and you know, an actual conversation between the two of them takes so long to get to is precisely because it was overshadowed by the third component of their whole deal. are you following? does this make sense? i dont know.
c!dream + c!tommy are one side of a triangle that supports quite literally everything abt their whole central conflict and narrative, with the third part being, well, c!wilbur. and the c!wilbur-c!tommy-c!dream of it all is quite understandably easy to miss, but it's also what i think leads to some of the most striking differences in c!dream and c!tommy interpretations, not to mention the story as a whole. c!wilbur's relationship with c!dream and c!tommy separately AND together is critical to the ways that the two characters develop and how their conflict evolves--i'd say that that's more just. canon, than a theory. but how far you extend that is where it kinda delves into different interpretations of canon, you know?
but it's just like ... when the whole fucking point of that last stream, the whole damn crux of it is when tommy says "i thought you were just a villain" and dream replies with "i am and i always have been" and the whole damn POINT is that these viewpoints were never true to begin with, when what dream throws to tommyinnit is a picture of lmanburg, when the shit that they have to dismantle to reach out at the end of the fucking world is the hero/villainisms that have DEFINED THEIR STORY independently AND together, it's like. look . when the story is like dismantling the literal source of their conflict and c!wilbur's fingerprints are all over the damn thing, it feels a Little reductive to see the conversation so consistently happen without even invoking his name, you know?
if i had to be accurate i think exile was not at all obsessive or systematic abuse, i genuinely think it was revenge gone wrong wait hear me out. we have proof that the whole cdream is obsessed with ctommy theory wasnt realistic or canon and if we take into account how weirdly cdream sometimes acted in exile with the whole letting tommy have fun with the trident etc we can kinda make paralels to similar stuff irl which is why i always looked at exile as revenge based bullying gone horribly wrong. like cdream really did act like a highschool bully and you know why it comes across like that? because both ctommy and cdream are hella young. a lot of people wanna make it more traumatic more abusive more horrific or gory or whatever but the simplest explanation is often the first one, it was all bullying. and i find it very very weird how people on the other side did not consider bullying bad enough for it to be taken seriously so they had to invent intestine cakes and whatever the fuck else just to consider exile "bad enough" to be taken seriously when bullying is already more than bad enough.
isolating the victim? check. aking them do something against their will? check. lying to them? check. pretending to be their friend? check. making them believe their other friends abandoned them? check check check.
also the way it was done, like really? literally the trope of no one coming to the party and victim sits alone feeling sad? what is this, a cartoon show about the power of friendship??
exile was neither "not a big deal" nor "horror movie levels of abuse" it simply was a sad arc with themes that do hit too close to home for many. the psychological ramifications that came from it? whole nother issue that needs a seperate analysis because yes, bullying victims can and do develop paranoia and some of the other stuff ctommy exhibited but not all like the whole ctommy still being scared of cdream, following him obsessively even months after it was clear cdream wanted nothing to do with him anymore, etc did throw me off because thats not really regular bullying or even abuse victim behavior??? i digress
tldr exile was bad thats a fact but it wasnt SAW movie franchise levels of bad
sorry for the rant, wanted to get my lore thoughts out
tbf exile being 2 weeks of vengeful peer abuse, also known as bullying, is straight up just canon
the "obsession" take that we specifically had issue with had a lot of issues in the way that it very deliberately rewrote c!dream's entire character to explain ALL of his actions through an obsession with c!tommy. specifically, there was a lot of malice ascribed to him LONG before exile in order to say that c!dream basically wanted to do something like exile from the very beginning to c!tommy, but wasn't able to until exile happened because c!wilbur was protecting him or some other shit. that reading relied on the worst possible faith retelling of everything c!dream has ever done + a good amount of just straight up narrative rewriting to emphasize how young and innocent and vulnerable c!tommy is and how obsessive weird creepy stalker grown ass man who wanted c!tommy to himself c!dream apparently was from day one, a take that emphasizes exile as The End Goal of months of obsession instead of being in service to some other goal as is canon. that's the obsession take that was passed around quite frequently that we specifically took a lot of issue with.
on the other hand, c!tommy being c!dream's victim because c!dream disproportionately blames him and took all sorts of shit out on him and found a degree of vindictive pleasure in hurting him is literally just. canon? that's canon.