Lindens define ageplay!

This is a very complex and difficult issue which regardless of what some people here think, cannot have easy solutions. There are lots of confusing terms - ageplay, moral and legal - which to different people mean different things. Morally wrong does not mean illegal necessarily. What is morally wrong also can differ widely between people and what is legal in one place may not be legal in others (although almost certain US law would apply). However LL has the right to ban anything that it doesn't like in a system that it controls and owns.

I think most would agree that having underage people in the main grid where there is precious little control of what content is out there even in PG sims is not a good idea and that they should be redirected towards the teen grid. How exactly LL will verify this as there is no system at present is another matter...

To add to a point made by someone before. Paedophilia is an adult's sexual preference for (strictly speaking pre-pubescent since pederasty covers pubescent kids) children and no more than that (regardless of how wrong it is), and unless they actually act that out they have committed no crime that they can be tried for (i.e. if it remains in the sick privacy of their own mind). This is where the morally wrong is not the same as the legally wrong. BUT that also includes not only physically molesting children but also grooming them to be molested - which occurs for example on internet chatrooms and forums. And let's face it, SL is a giant chatroom if you boil it down to basics - hence LL are right to try to act (belatedly) on verification of RL age.

In my post, I'm going to leave those two issues aside from now on (so let's leave aside RL children since if age verification worked it wouldn't be an issue and since it is probably the case that most teen kids on SL would rather masquerade as adult avies doing adult things). Let's consider the various scenarios (and I acknowledge they are not the only ones possible and that they are *my take* on them). I'm also going to avoid the term "ageplay" since it's confusing and broad, open to interpretation.

The following assumes all avatars in the main grid are played by RL adults (since I covered the underage player above): -

SCENARIO ONE: RL adults roleplaying as children in a totally "adult-content" free context, eg playing in a playground doing normal kid things without any sexual content or being in a "family" comprising of adult avies as parents and child avies who are RL adults. I personally do not see anything wrong in this and I note LL are at pains to say they will not ban this. It is simply innocent roleplay, acting if you will. Some might think there is something disturbing about an adult playing a child but it is not illegal and I'm sure a lot of people would not find it offensive. After all, a children's author e.g JK Rowling has to RP as a child to some extent as her characters are her creation. Is she either legally or morally in the wrong to be portraying a teenage boy?

SCENARIO TWO: Two RL adults roleplaying as children engaging in sexual activity. Eyebrows raised? Perhaps. Would this be illegal in RL in most countries - technically yes. Would a court send two 14 year olds to jail for having sex "consensually" (and yes I know they technically cannot in most countries including the US) - I hope not. Written text of underage sex and even visual depictions of the overall scene (minus the actual act of penetration) are allowed certainly in the UK. Whether it's content that LL want to have on their servers is another matter.

SCENARIO THREE: Clearly adult avies wearing kiddie clothes (diapers, schoolgirl uniforms etc) engaging in sex. Kinky - yes. Disgusting? Depends on your moral standpoint (not my cup of tea lol but I don't want to ban it necessarily). Illegal - hell no.

SCENARIO FOUR: This is the tricky one. An RL adult playing an SL adult engaging in sexual activity with an RL adult playing an SL child. I personally find this unappealing and certainly would not be involved on either side of the "exchange". That's my personal moral viewpoint for myself. Do I want to restrict other people's right (or not) to partake in such activities? Tricky. I'm very tempted to say yes, for the reasons people have listed above. But here's why I think it's not quite as clear cut as that.

There are lots of books, films etc depicting "inappropriate" or illegal relations between adults and children and they are allowed to be broadcast in many countries - albeit with viewer age regulations - as long as no sexual act is shown as such. This is on the understanding that it is a fiction not a reality.

But then remember "Y Tu Mama Tambien" clearly depicts full frontal nudity and sexual intercourse of two young men supposedly aged 17 (in RL older than this) with an older woman; and going back to my Harry Potter analogy (loosely) - Daniel Radcliffe (at the RL age of 17) playing a 17 year old is allowed to stand on a stage in London stark naked in all his glory having stimulated sex with an adult woman.

How are these any different to scenario four? To everyone's tastes, surely not, morally wrong, perhaps. Illegal in some countries, yes - but not in all.

To be clear I'm not going an opinion on what should be the standpoint with this last scenario because it's not quite clear cut in some ways. I'm just highlighting these difficulties for people to see that it's not quite as easy as saying "this is wrong" (perhaps possible to do as it's a viewpoint) or "this is illegal".

the confusing thing is when she talks about people going underground..is she talking about sneaking children in or is she talking about adults interacting??i took it as them looking for loop hole to either get into adult areas or being brought in..
as many times as the question was asked she could have been very clear on it as to what they were actually going to do..not how this place or that place looks at it..

god this can give a girl a migrain..
in one breath it is the depiction then it is about children reaching that content..to me she is saying keep it out of site in your own home but then after reading it again it's hard to say
which or if both are going into affect..i read on even lower and started to realize it's not her answers that are confusin it was the people asking them lol..
they need to just get her in a room with some order in it so someone could ask the right questions in the right way..

i myself am not into all the age play role play but i do know that rules made do open up for a wider area after they go into affect that this may only be a steping stone to other areas..
i sure know this whole thing from that transcript needs to be edited down some to show the questions she answerd and her answers to make this topic less confusin..

*opens a bottle of asprin*

One problem with the notecard is that all it really says it that

"Linden Lab chooses
not to allow the advertising or promotion of age play or
related activities in any public forum -- including in-world
textures, classified ads, the Second Life forums, or parcel
descriptions.
"

Yet the two people on the german news, both legal adults, weren't advertising or promoting as far as I can tell in the highly orcestrated video, they were on thier own land, doing thier own thing, yet they were banned because some 'news team' just happened to be in the area. Witch hunts, anyone?

The REAL problem is, you could substitute anything that may be illegal somewhere in the world or that any majority of people find broadly offensive for the words "The depiction of sexual activity involving minors" in that notecard, thus making the notion of "Your World. Your Imagination" one MORE step further from the truth.

Great post, but beg to differ with this one point.

I can't speak for other countries, and the laws in the US vary from state to state. A number of states have an explicit "near in age" exception, so that it would not be a crime for two 14 year olds to have sex in such states. (Whether it's a good idea is another story.) A typical range might be 3 years, so that it might be legal for an 18 year old to have sex with a 15 year old, but not a 14 year old. The usual IANAL disclaimers apply.

I really think that was a matter of them finding out about it. LL is probably being realistic in the fact that they aren't going to be able to have cops walking the virtual beat looking for ageplay, but they CAN shut down establishments that promote it.

They're trying to be police without being police which is a tough (and perhaps impossible) balancing act. They need to save face as a business yet still allow a certain level of autonomy of it's residents as advertized. How effective they'll be is another story...

Assuming you are referring to *sexual* ageplay, it's in the below:
http://blog.secondlife.com/2007/05/09/accusations-regarding-child-pornography-in-second-life/#more-952

On Thursday May 3, we were contacted by German television network, ARD, which had captured images of two avatars, one that resembled an adult male and another that resembled a child, engaged in depicted sexual conduct. Our investigations revealed the users behind these avatars to be a 54-year-old man and a 27-year-old woman. Both were immediately banned from Second Life.

and, from the same page:

We simply will not tolerate the depiction of sexual or lewd acts involving minors in Second Life.

If Linden Lab learns that someone is engaging in, advertising or promoting locations or activities involving the depiction of sexual or lewd acts involving minors, their account will be terminated, and we will fully cooperate with all appropriate authorities.

The "engaging in," btw, seems to be the main addition between the March notecard and the recent blog entry. Note also that the above paragraphs are set separately from those discussing the passage of *actual* child pornography in-world.

Hope that clarifies it for ya.

Mari

Sure, I think it's the common sense approach. I come from the UK and if you read the actual letter of the law, all underage sex (and my example would be one) is illegal. But a court would exercise common sense with two 14 year olds unless one forced the other or was violent. And your example of an 18 year old with a 15 yeah old would probably also not be resultant in charges.

[Sigh.} Marianne is right, they added "depiction" to the list.

Even a short review of the "ageplay" threads makes it clear there are plenty of people out there motivated enough to appoint themselves Vigilantes-for-the-Children and start following child avs around nonstop and camera-viewing every two green dots they see close together on the map: Now they have a justification.


Of course - doh! - the people running child avs for sexual purposes will walk around all day in adult avs, and only switch over when it's time to do "business," and the nosy parkers will miss most of them. Bet they linger a while, though, on some of the adult-adult encounters they find. ; )

And so if you are a married couple, sharing a tender moment together in SL because one of you is away on a business trip or something - better watch out for those little cross marks that mean somebody is watching, because I'll bet there are going to be a lot more of them prretty soon. O.O

That's quite a huge leap in assumption there. But then again...that's what the forums are for!

yes very much so thank you..my head is feeling better already hehehe..this is about the only thing i have read that gets right to the point..
i hadn't seen this before..=)

Ok, I have not read the whole 20 pages of this thread but I have read many of the post made in threads on this topic since I joined a few weeks ago, and honestly I am still a little confused. Is "ageplay" simply roleplaying a character that is underage, or is it roleplaying an underage character in a sexual context? I really think this needs to be defined clearly.

Playing a child in a roleplaying sim (Meaning areas residents should be In Character.) without any sexual context be it interacting with another child Av or a trusted adult Av is not wrong or illegal, it is mearly a manner of creative expression. It adds dimention and a sense of dynamic realism as adults don't just pop out of the ground. Those that play characters to seem authentic often have them grow up, either in their back history for the character or within roleplay it's self.

Though roleplaying a child in a sexual situation is wrong and in some places illegal. Two underaged children consenting is morally ambiguos, but for the sake of current arguments I would place it on the NO GO side. I would have no remorse for anyone routinely engaging in these activities, or engaging in them at all. I would feel no remorse for them being investigated farther for any forms of RL child abuse either.

I do not, nor do I intend to do any form of serious roleplay in SL, I am more around for socializing than anything else. However I do seriously roleplay VIA forums, Guild Wars and have plans to extend it to HellGate: London as well.

"Ageplay" in the context in question is RPing a minor in sexual situations. Just RPing as a child for non-sexual situations isn't (or shouldn't be) the issue here.

Why give it a cute PC name like Ageplay. Call it what it is -

Simulated Pedophilia

If you people would have grown some nads and called it that in the first place all these damn child molestors wouldn't be posting to define it.

Here let me help Linden Labs.

Hey all you Fuckinging perverts stop getting your rocks off pretending your having sex with children. Is that clear enough you perverted fucks.

As always the voice od reason

Xavier

/me braces for the thread lock...

hahahahahaha
i am so glad i was done setting my drink down before i read this..

No way to misinterpret this comment at least.

Is that "voice of reason" or "voice of odd reason"?

we still miss the point.

The point is that last time i checked simulated crimes are not illegal. No special cases either.

child porn is in any form in the U.S and i think that is where they are going with it..

From my experience in over a yeare of playing a kid in SL yes, there is no end of tin-star vigilantes.



Thankoo!



This has long been one of the issues at hand, yes. It breaks down like this:

All sexual ageplayers are ageplayers
Not all ageplayers are sexual ageplayers

Unfortunately, LL has opted to use "ageplay" as only meaning sexual ageplay, and has so far refused to change their use of the term. Semantics, perhaps, butr when most folks who call themselves ageplayers IRL are not into anything sexual, well, it becomes an issue.



While that may well be true in the U.S., there are cases in other localities where it is not. Likewise, LL can make their own decisions and policies regardless of how "legal" a thing is. In-world, by and large, they are judge, jury, and executioner.



Pardon me while I snip all your ranting and profanity. Really unescessary, especially with virtual children present.

Mari

As far as I know beastiality, prostitution, sexual harassment, and walking around in public with an erect penis sticking from your pants are also illegal in most countries.

Apart from the whole censorship debate, we still don't know how immersion in virtual environments may influence RL behaviour.

I think the legal issues are also very difficult. Everything is not always fine if it happens between "consenting adults".

The recent PR blitz that LL has undertaken will have opened SL to a whole new level of scrutiny. I should imagine they are also looking very closely at gambling, RL tax, and copyright infringement issues before investigators and lawyers get into it.

However apart from all that, LL is trying to grow a business. For that they need investors. Investors are notoriously conservative when it comes to placing their money.

I have to say that I've never seen a business float successfully on the NASDAQ who's name is linked with "ageplay" - which may or may not be a good thing.

This is unfortunate, from my experiances roleplaying two underage characters in Guild Wars, they can add a lot to a roleplay in a non-sexual way and in them selves should not be a bad thing. What make child characters bad is when they are perverted to sexual perposes.

Thats not really the issue - though its an offten (mis)used argument, {made by you and countless others - Im not singling you out}

The VIRTUAL dipictions of Child Sex are illegal in the countries they mention. In other words what is actually happening in Second Life is illegal there.

Thats considerbly different than "things that are illegal in the real world too"

Its not LL's fault that for a Huge chunk of the Userbase Sexual Ageplay is illegal - Its just a fact. Its simply not in LL's control.

Edit: outdated, thought it was new information. LL's current policy might be different.

As for the rest of this thread: what people roleplay in computer games doesn't necessarily reflect their RL desires and preferences.

If someone roleplays a battle axe-wielding orc who collects human skulls, no one could possibly assume that he acts the same way in RL. Most roleplayers with a good imagination are very sensible persons who wouldn't hurt a fly.
If someone roleplays a werewolf who feeds on his victims, he will most likely be disgusted by the thought of really sinking his teeth into human flesh.
If anyone plays a pimp who slaps his hookers around, it tells you jack squat about his RL fantasies. He may only play this role to fullfill the desires of submissives who want to be humiliated, forced and maltreated (also only within a game of course).

Finally, a person who engages in sexual ageplay is not a pedophile. If that was the case, the person behind the orc is a serial killer, the player of the werewolf a cannibal and the virtual pimp a sadist and misogynist. Better be very, very sure that you personally know a person and have profound knowledge of what is going on in their head before you make any accusations.