Anti-Gay Attack on My Pickerel Land : (

OK. This is un-ac-ceptable. No way am I going to tolerate harassment of this nature based on the perception of my sexual orientation or anybody's orientation who is renting or buying in my communities.

These numerous, scattered, clearly anti-gay signs appeared sometime this morning on my homestead land in Pickerel, a large 16000-meter tract open to residential/educational/low-impact builds. Already people had responded and a donation was being made to a women's educational center.

These signs also spilled over to another property that was formerly mine and had sold and then been resold to someone who found the signs later and was disturbed by them.

Somebody decided that this community had GAY stamped on it and put up these nasty signs with the rainbow and the stars, a symbol of the gay nation, and a big NO x-ed over it.

The person who did this has been abuse-reported (they are some kind of dormant alt) and the Lindens came promptly to the scene and documented and reported it.

Just like SL, our rental and homestead communities are open to persons of all lifestyles who abide by the TOS and the community's simple rules like low-impact builds.

This particular homestead in a PG land doesn't have any kind of explicit GAY thing as such, so those getting their shorts in a bunch can kindly back off.

And just to pre-empt the attacks from the other end of the fucktard spectrum, just because there is a church going up in my community in Grace next to this land in Pickerel obviously doesn't mean that there is some kind of Republican/anti-gay/zealous/hate thing going on -- which is so often how people in the game treat even the mildest, and even merely architectural expression of religion. It's just a non-denominational church. Now move along, show's over.

And for those who are gloating and saying, hah, Prokofy gets to feel what it is like to be name-called. Ahem. I don't name-call. I don't attack people on the basis of their ethnicity, background, religion, nationality, economic status, or sexual orientation. If I say someone is the unfortunate product of the American educational establishment and can't understand how communism and Nazism are equivalent, well, that's not name-calling, that is statement of a fact, IMHO. If they believe it to be opinion, not fact, that's the debate. People would be very, very hard-pressed to come up with a single post that singles out an individual for name-calling -- "fuck-you hedonists" are a group with characteristics, important to expose as harmful to the freedoms of others playing the game, but it's not some kind of "name-calling" because it is not singling out one person, harassing them in the game, and putting up a sign saying "you are a fuck-you hedonist". I think there is an order of difference between terrorizing someone whom you believe is gay with signs with a big GET OUT sign, and calling groups of people on the forums the fuck-you hedonists. There is a big difference between me responding to a direct-attack-dog kind of post saying essentially I am crap, and should "lead by example" by "doing something in the game," and me calling that person in retaliation a "dumbass," and a different order of attack all together, trying to instill fear in them in the game with a GET OUT sign.

A Linden there used the phrase "chilling" to describe these signs precisely because the motive wasn't entirely clear, but I think it is clearly a response to forum posts, and clearly a move to try to discourage gays and lesbians from feeling they have a safe space in SL.

Anyway, we are not going to be intimidated from doing this homesteading and anyone is welcome who would like to do low-impact builds, i.e. not laggy malls or clubs.

And no, I am not playing the victim, and no, I'm not building a WHINESCRAPER again, I'm just taking a stand, as I always do. This type of behaviour is not going to fly on my properties or in my communities, and I will not accept any kind of harassment of tenants or neighbours on these issues.

And in general, I would kindly thank all the board fucktards so indignant about my views here to back off me in the game. They think it's open season to IM me and harass me and try to destroy my business. If you can't make your case on the forums, please don't be so lame as to try to harass me in the game. I don't pick up my cudgel to report every one of you, but on something like an anti-gay bias attack, I pull out the stops. The Lindens said "watch the police blotter" on this one.

As far as I am concerned whoever did this committed a hate crime and I sincerely doubt the Lindens, are going to go easy on this perp. The good news is, they are only a right click away from discovering whodunnit, so this is going to be an open and shut case.

This kind of crap makes me puke and the offender needs a nice little life time ban. Some idiotic moron burned a cross on some land I own and I don't think the fact that I am "openly Jewish" was merely a coincidence. Other people reported the halfwit's action and I heard through the grapevine that he got the life sentence that he was begging for when he performed his cowardly deed.

The fact of the matter is, it's an alt, and the Lindens explained to me in detail how difficult they find it to link various alts up with their main account, or to link all the alts used to one person. That seemed strange to me -- can't they just see the ISP of one person using all the alts? But in fact, with all the sharing of accounts going on, all the different credit cards, different families in different states using each others' accounts, husbands and wives and boyfriends and girlfriends and everything else, they can't always match up all the alts -- so they say. I would think ISP tracking would be easy but maybe they don't have the resources to do it on a wide scale.

Sometimes you can discover alts and track them and sometimes they out themselves, then you can tell the Lindens to get on it. They Lindens don't seem to be very happy about alts, as are the FICs. I personally heartily endorse alts. I don't understand the oppressive attitude toward them. Seems to me that tracking the ISP numbers from a log-in should be as easy as pie and they shouldn't fuss about alts or different names and cards on accounts, they should look at the ISP. I'm aware this can lead to mistakes, as sometimes people near each other with the same Internet company can appear to be the same, we saw that on SLH when they tracked ISPs. You can be mistaken, I guess.

I'm sure that whoever did this, if they are banned, is not going to care a whit because they have their alt. And that's OK with me in the sense that alts are OK with me, but when they are used for malicious attacks they should be subjected to discipline.

Aimee, I love ya, but honestly, Linden Lab's response to this kind of stuff has been pathetic at best. Here is what will happen. Alt account will be banned for a couple of days, though the other accounts will be able to sign in. In a few days, they will be back and will probably stay dormant and then do it again and hurt someone else. It's a cycle repeated over and over again in SL, and Linden Lab seems to give more care to billing problems than griefing. God knows you will be locked out if there is a billing dispute - but feel free to harass and threaten players, and you'll be back in a few days, if gone at all. I may seem harsh about this, and God knows I am a supporter of both Linden Lab and Second Life, but when it come to handling this area of their terms of service, their response has been both disappointing and maddening.

Prokofy, I am sorry that this happened to you. It has been quite the week for hatred in SL. A member submitted a KKK photo to Snapzilla, replete with prim clansmen costumes and a burning cross two nights ago. Hell, it even had custom animations. Hatred has gone high tech - they are even moblogging now. Such an expression is cowardly, and it cannot receive enough negative attention.

I hope the ignorant fucktard who did this gets all of his accounts banned. And picks up a nasty disease that rots his dangly bits. LL will find his alts.

Prokofy, this occurence is unacceptable.

I really hope LL does not just give the person(s) responsible a slap on the wrist. This type of behavior should not be tolerated ever, period.

I don't think the "fuss" is about the use of alts in general, most SLers have one or more. The fuss is about the fact that some folks use them for nefarious purposes, hence protecting their main account. They are purely and simply cowards.

in sharing so much as you did. i could easily spill out my own feelings that we are all the same just some packaged a lil differently than others, but i wont (= its horrible beyond the ability of words to contain that we treat each other as we do. i wish folks just loved a bit more. its much more fullfilling and rewarding than when we bite and devour )=

ty for shining light on what happened. thank god not all of sl is like that! thank god the lindens dont tolerate it!

hugs
a lilone

I feel bad for that guy, because he probably isn't very loved. Because if he was, he'd certainly love more, wouldn't he?

ABSOLUTLY!!!

It is my sincere hope that whoever it is that is responsible for this is NOT able to get off with a "slap on the wrist." This kind of behavior really is unacceptable.

While I understand wanting to be sure that the INDIVIDUAL responsible for these actions is the only one to suffer the consequences, I can not help but recall that in other games that I've played where alts were allowed, the rules clearly expressed that anything that happened on an alt account was the responsibility of the master account. I always felt that that was understandable and perfectly acceptable.

If you are going to choose to be responsible for the creation of extra accounts, then I honestly feel that you need to be prepared to be responsible for the actions committed by anyone using those accounts. If something happens "in your name" as it were, understand that you may very well be held accountable for it.

Of course, this is just my L$2, and what do I know?

Thanks for the show of support for the gay community, Prokofy. Although I've seen and/or experienced worse, those signs indicate just how mis-informed some people are about human beings who happen to be gay.

I find it so sad how often, the cycle of anger and hate continues on. Like the victims of bullies becoming more bullies in the future, or the tendency of violence to escalate when the people involved can't let go and make amends. I find it horrifying when someone is mistreated yet continues to lash out at others and make the world a worse place.

Too often in the world, there is a silent frustration of wanting to express yourself openly but not knowing how you might be treated -- this is certainly the case with homosexuality, transsexuality, etc. as well as other lifestyle elements (BDSM comes to mind) and preferences and more. Some people are in denial and in deep pain, not because of any great psychological analysis, but because the ability to feel and dole out hurt, opposite of healing and love, is quite the universal experience. *pats heart*

I have noted discussion in other threads why SL isn't even more fantastical right now, as Andrew Linden put it, a "Dali-world". I'm convinced it will be, but sometimes, I wonder how we can even begin to reach to the heavens above when there are some who sadly and foolishly try to tear down the love others enjoy.

I have been asked why I seem so overly happy. I'm not. If you had seen the sadness and suffering in my years prior, then you'd know why I am this way today. I wanted to turn my life around. So, I made a conscious decision to break the really redundant loop of negativity in my life and to share the love.

I have no issue with a man loving another man. I do, however, have many problems with a man hating another man.

Whoever did this needs to be banned, plain and simple. Bigotry has no place in Second Life. If the Lindens are reluctant to do that, I'd like very much to hear their reasoning. I can't see how this sort of thing does anything but damage the community, hurt individuals targeted by these hatemongers, and ultimately, harm LL's bottom line.

Torley, I don't know you (well ... yet? One can hope... can't one? *grins*) but, as I told you before, the more I read/see of you - the more impressed I am.

Ok, back to the regularly scheduled post - I just wanted to say thanks, Torley, for always having really good words.

For once ill agree with you prof, the person/s who did this need to wake up to moden day.

What an Idiot

finding the alts of a character should not be a problem at all... I work as a mod in another game (which shall remain nameless for my privacy and enjoyment of both games) and I have access to account information. I can just simply type in a name of a character and all their info comes up including IPs connected from and all other accounts linked in any way to that one name.

As Aimee said, they should be basically a right click away from tracing who the hell did this and smacking down everyone involved

maybe one day people will learn that hiding behind an alt works against other players, but not against "Teh Man"

The very concept of hate crimes seems ridiculous to me. If a gay man gets beat up, I don't want to catch the perp just because the victim was gay. I want him in jail because beating people up is wrong, plain and simple. Changing the victim doesn't change the crime.

As for these flags... well, I wouln't have known what they were if I'd seen them before this thread. But clearly they were made by some jackass who was out to hurt someone's feelings. Violation of TOS right there, but no worse than if I had been singled out personally. It's bad either way, and it's wrong either way.

I can understand Prokofy's reaction though. If I'd found stuff like that on my land, I'd be pissed off too. I don't log in to hurt people's feelings, so I wouldn't want anyone using my land for that purpose.

Free speech being what it is, we'll always have jerks running around. But if tracking alts is so difficult, then how about this? If someone is such a jackass that the Lindens have to ban his alt, why not tag that credit card for another five bucks or so? In my experience, bullies and cowards rarely attack when they can't do it for free.

My 72yo grandma's theory is that men who are homophobic are deeply closeted gay men who lack the strength to come out and stand tall.


She especially liked to bring that up whenever one of grandpa's friends would make some 'fag' remark.

The person who made those signs is terrified of his own homosexual tendencies and desires, and what people will think of him if they find out. He posted the signs in an effort to distract his 'normal' friends who have been beginning to suspect he is gay.

Yes that is the most common explanation for homophobia - it is often called "the fear is the wish".

Or maybe he's not gay at all. Maybe he's just a plain-ole jackass. This is the same sort of person who knocks people's mailboxes over at night. He probably thinks it's funny.

I know it's fun to think that he is what he hates, but I'm just not willing to give the guy credit for being that complex.

Lame.

I'm happy, though, because I read about this earlier today.

On the blotter.

The perp and his alt nailed. gg LL