Being a DIK: The Hypocrisy of Isabella Roberts

Previously we looked at Jill's Episode 12 hypocrisy, and Sage's Being a DIK hypocrisy. Now we look to the supposedly serious and morally strong character, Isabella, who appears to have the highest hypocrite score so far out of all the characters in the story.

1. Professional Ethics vs. Personal Boundary Crossing

Isabella, even if you do everything right with her, still likes taking risks to screw up her relationship with the MC.

Isabella is an established faculty member at B&R, teaching College Research Skills and English, who repeatedly stresses professionalism, discretion, and the weight of her position.

Her contradiction lies in that she repeatedly blurs academic/professional boundaries with the MC, a first-year student. She allows romantic and physical escalation to build in private, attending and eventually hosting parties with students or getting involved in student-group drama, while hiding behind her faculty status when convenient.

Isabella finally revealing that no, students can't date teachers, or faculty in B&R. Which she and Jill already knew.

In Episode 10, over lunch, she finally reveals to the MC that the faculty handbook is blurry on fraternization, and that it's okay if they keep to themselves. She reveals to Jill in Episode 11 that she rationalized the blurry policy, as she didn't want a handbook to dictate her happiness. This is finally revealed later in Episode 11 to the MC during Christmas decorating that the policy is actually an explicit, zero-tolerance ban on student-faculty relationships that would result in her immediate firing if discovered. She lied/omitted the full truth because she wanted time to explore her feelings without the rulebook shutting it down before it started.

2. Using the MC to Handle Tybalt

Repeated smashing of Tybalt at tennis.

As a staff member in her mid-30s, Isabella holds direct authority over students in the library and her classroom. She explicitly loathes Tybalt, due to his obsession over Jill.

Instead of using administrative channels, her own authority, or law enforcement to shut Tybalt down (on blackmailing Jill), or to simply have a conversation about his problem with faculty or family, she frequently relies on the MC to step up as her and Jill's physical and social shield (e.g. the Tennis Doubles match against Tybalt in Episode 7). She lets the MC take the social/frat risks for her. During the tennis match, if the MC doesn't hit Tybalt in the face with a tennis ball, she does it anyway at the end when he leers at Jill. The drive home conversation is either her telling the MC off for hitting Tybalt instead of playing mind games, or the MC telling her off for being violent.

Tybalt always gets smashed in the face by a tennis ball. This is Bella doing it purely out of spite, when the entire match is over.

This continues on Jill's route when Isabella calls the MC to interfere with Tybalt's final blackmailed date to save Jill. Instead of helping Jill by confronting her, Tybalt, or talking to faculty or family, she just calls the MC to "do what you will" which involves him running through the city at night to go confront Jill; upon which, Jill has dealt with the problem herself.

3. The "Ice Queen" Moral Shield vs. Private Flirting

Bella, snapping at students in the library, over her frustrating emotions over the MC.

Known on campus as the unapproachable "Ice Queen," Isabella maintains a cold, stern, hyper-moral exterior with the student body.

While judging others for being reckless or unrefined, she engages in mixed signals, heavy emotional reliance, and private romantic intimacy with a freshman, using her unresolved trauma over her missing husband James as an implicit pass for her hot-and-cold behavior.

This behavior causes her to lash out at students in the library due to her frustration over her own desires over the MC, and ends up giving into her emotions when the MC shows up at the library; only for her to have a panic attack and stop him from showing her affection.

Isabella's first of many panic attacks when being with the MC.

4. The issue regarding Jade

This is an issue for all the circle of Main Girls, except Maya, in Episode 12. They shut down the MC at the end of Episode 12 if his liaison with Jade occurred in Episode 4.

This is ironic, since Isabella cuts off the MC's route with her if she discovers Cathy's underwear in her car. (And we can argue that's some rather bizarre writing for that to happen). While Isabella doesn't break up with the MC over Jade, though she dresses it in saying his "moral compass is broken", and that she needs space. Considering her behavior with a freshman at this point, there's very little difference between what Isabella had done with the MC, and what Jade has (both flirting and having potential sexual relations with a freshman.)

Both are married, both are faculty, and both are his teachers. The difference being the MC chose Isabella and dedicated himself to her, whereas he simply had a fling with Jade, and it's understood their relationship is purely sexual. The MC at that point in the story could have flings with multiple characters, while Bella has not imposed or expected serious fidelity to only her. This was when she was still unsure about her relationship with the MC, and where and when no one was being hurt.

A younger Isabella going through hell week where she had to confess to a teacher.

Isabella's Own Past Conduct: In Episode 5, Isabella admits to Jill and the MC that during her own college years, she was dared to confess to a random teacher that she had a crush on him and loved him, while going through Hell Week hazing from her OMG sorority. She actively engaged in inappropriate student-faculty line-crossing when she was young, yet holds the MC to a standard of absolute moral perfection and acts shocked when he engages with Jade as a freshman.

5. Still in love with James

Though Bella is still in love with James, this scene is actually a hallucination. Bella has problems.

In a talk with Isabella privately, it's revealed she's still in love with James. Later, both the MC and Isabella state their love for each other. It is difficult to believe her words since we already know she still has feelings for her missing husband.

If Isabella is so straight and narrow about relationships, what is she even doing with a freshman?

If worried about the existence of her absent husband is causing her grief, what is she trying to accomplish? What does she want? How much more time does she need to figure that out? Due to frustration and trauma of losing her husband, she's had problems committing to this new relationship. Even talking about him in a safe environment causes her to hyperventilate, implying a host of psychological problems she still hasn't dealt with over years.

Isabella having another panic attack, while feeling awkward on a date. Simply walking toward a library that was her old workplace causes her to run away.

Isabella hyperventilating in bed, just trying to talk about her wayward husband. It's been 3 years, Bella. Get over it.

This all comes down to Episode 12's "doing everything right" with Bella, where the two sit down and figure out their relationship. Her statements of romantic love to the MC are hollow as she's still in love with someone else.

Isabella is hard to take seriously when she's still in love with James, her 3-year-long wayward husband.

6. Cathy's Underwear

I am Cathy's underwear scene, destroyer of Isabella paths.

While constantly claiming she must remain impartial and purely professional in academic spaces, she immediately allows personal jealousy to dictate her behavior. Finding Cathy's underwear in her car leads her to instantly cut off or penalize the MC route-wise without applying the logical, evidence-based inquiry she preaches as an academic/research professor. She judges the MC on implied personal conduct while claiming their dynamic is strictly professional or "pending".

"Hey MC? What happened in my car that Cathy left her underwear there?"

The route just completely stops, which implies Isabella demands 100% romantic notions to only her, without making that demand to the MC, or even bringing up the concept of their relationship (if you could call it that at that point in the story) to be immediately committed and 100% monogamous and how it should work, even though no conversation took place.

7. Gatekeeping Jill's Autonomy While Secretly Crossing the Same Line

While actively telling Jill to pursue the MC, the MC pursues Isabella, and she accepts. But forgets to tell Jill...

Isabella acts as a protective, moralizing mentor toward Jill, constantly worrying about who Jill surrounds herself with, her safety, and her emotional choices (especially regarding Tybalt or the MC).

Yet, Isabella secretly pursues the exact same guy Jill had feelings for, while suggesting Jill befriend and date him as well, while breaking university ethics behind Jill's back. She lectures Jill on making wise, safe decisions while making highly volatile, career-threatening decisions herself, to the point where she nearly loses Jill in the process when Jill catches them intimately involved at breakfast.

8. Complicity in Cover-Ups vs. Demanding Transparency

Asking the MC about his personal life at lunch.

As a university official, Isabella expects total honesty, transparency (i.e. telling her about Zoey at lunchtime), and propriety from the MC. However, when it comes to family or internal drama (such as Jill's blackmail situation, contract disputes, or her own policy violations), Isabella actively participates in secrecy, deliberate omissions, and cover-ups. She demands absolute moral integrity from the MC while operating entirely in the shadows when her own comfort or position is at risk.

The only time her past is forced to come into the open is when she simply forgot to lock her nursery room door at the end of Episode 11, which becomes an entire backstory on her tragic life, which now the main circle of friends is made aware of. Instead of talking directly to the MC about it as a mature and serious partner would, it's brought about by pure chance where she forgot to lock a door during Christmas decorations. This involves her confronting her past with the Main Girl circle of friends, and now Derek involved.

Isabella forgot to lock the room that has the spirit of her dead daughter, dead parents, and giant photo of her husband? That's just bad writing.

Conclusion

Isabella Roberts is not only the most hypocritical character in the Being a DIK story, she's also the most psychologically damaged one; a lost husband, a miscarriage, and a suicide attempt later certainly changes a person. However, after 3 years of waiting for her absent husband to return, 2 years of working as a librarian at B&R, one must wonder what exactly is causing her not to move on from her grief while contradicting her own ideals when it comes to interpersonal relations.