"were" here is an example of the subjunctive form in English - quite rare. In the second conditional, it is more correct to say "if I / he / she / this / that were" not "was". But in practice, "was" is so widely used that it is not considered to be a mistake any more.. In your sentence, "this" refers back to a phrase in the previous sentence which you have not quoted so it is impossible to know the meaning. ("character" "born" - typos)

Were is right .. it's the second case of " if" It indicates that this thing is unlikely to be true