Calling out someone's RL sex in the forums - right or wrong?

I was unfortunately reading a thread that has seriously devolved into something i cannot even follow. And during that thread I noticed someone claimed that a poster in the thread was a different RL sex than their SL sex based on something that poster must have said in previous past threads.

Do you think this is right?

Should a poster be called out like that? Especially when it is not evident to everyone?

Sounds like a TOS violation to me.

Depends. If the person being called out issued the cited statements in an open discussion thread, then I don't see any real "calling out" happening here because anyone can open the previous posts link. If it was something said in a private environment, I don't think it's fair, so in this case I'd frown on it.

Personally, I couldn't care less about a person's sex. I care about the persons.

Well what if a person said things in the past, but perhaps no one made a connection until someone else pointed it out and then maybe PMd the threads around. The information is out there, just not everyone has seen it. So it is fine to call it out then?


This is how i feel now. Though this way of thinking did not happen until early 2005.

it's no one's business and it's also rude. but, i doubt anyone really cares anyway. i would suspect most people aren't what/who they say they are in the first place, but there is no real way to know unless you meet face to face.

i, for one, take an avatar at face value and don't worry about 'who' is behind the cartoon. it just doesn't make a bit of difference unless you are a homophobe AND doing the nasty with said avatar.

this says revealing anything other than the RL information of their profile..
unless they had consent..pointing to thread and saying look here is pretty much pointing out someone..


4.Disclosure
Residents are entitled to a reasonable level of privacy with regard to their Second Life experience. Sharing personal information about a fellow Resident --including gender, religion, age, marital status, race, sexual preference, and real-world location beyond what is provided by the Resident in the First Life page of their Resident profile is a violation of that Resident's privacy. Remotely monitoring conversations, posting conversation logs, or sharing conversation logs without consent are all prohibited in Second Life and on the Second Life Forums.

I guess it depends upon the context but personally I think it's pretty damn close to disclosure, indeed it would be disclosure in certain circumstances.

The only justifiable reason I could see for this would be if person x's point was that it's wrong of a male to play a female or vice versa when they are doing exactly that but I don't really think we should be divulging RL details about anyone generally beyond what the person themself divulges.

I usually address a person in their avatar gender, even if they themself are RL of a different gender.

If a person wants to keep their RL gender hidden, I respect that. I don't care since gender is not the main factor for me to judge a person.

I wouldn't call it "fine". It is an incredibly rude thing to do, but if the statement happened in a public forum, it is certainly not a TOS violation. It is still the person's own choice and responsibility if he/she has revealed information in a previous thread that may now be used against her/him. Person's just lucky nobody made the connection before.

I agree with that.

But the instance the OP brought up involves pointing out that one person's posts in this Forum seem to be contradictory as to gender (or something like that--I haven't looked at the posts and don't recall the wording of the comment about the contradiction, so can't Search it.)

That seems different to me than would be printing the log of an IM or divulging something said in voice or something learned in a RL interaction.

If it is in the forums then it is in the public domain.

And if LL or the mods are going to start taking retrospective action against ad hominem posts then the forums are going to load a lot quicker . . .

Pep (Assuming you believe *anything* anybody says here. )

It's WRONG. Regardless of topic. Regardless of info. If someone wants to repeatedly share their personal info...or offer tid-bits of personal info....fine....they do it ON THEIR OWN....someone else does not do it for them.

There is a particular poster who does this repeatedly....weaseling out chunks of personal information that people have shared....taking it out of context.....and plugging it into an entirely different thread out of spite. Low. Very Low.

Well that does it! Better let LL know that they have to amend the Community Standards to allow for Mickey's morals.

Pep (Just because you are really Queen Juliana of the Netherlands and the press have found out you play sl)

ETA Isn't your last paragraph hysterically self-referentially self-accusatory?

Ah....someone's ears were ringing....

Your grasp of English metaphors is letting you down.

Pep (Lost in translation?)

I'm perfectly fine with all of my comments above.

Ignorance is bliss!

Pep (Oh, and Bliss and I have made up, if anybody is a) interested and b) has a good enough memory.)

Its ok, Pep... to re-balance the universe, the Bells was burning.... whiskey fire!

Are you on the same stuff as Mickey?

Pep (You make as much sense)

It's lame and smarmy way of making an ad hominem attack rather than debating the issue at hand. The most recent example that I assume is being referenced is even more pathetic than most due to dubious logic like "You called someone 'buddy' in another thread, only men say 'buddy'" and the continuining insinuation that no one in SL will be believed by this individual to really be a woman unless they "voice verify" for him.

Whatever. It's just one of many tactics people use on the internet to dismiss the opinions of anyone who don't agree with them.

It makes perfect sense, related to your own comment about mixed phrases.

My comment was not about mixed phrases or mixed metaphors even; Mickey simply used the wrong word.

Pep (At least her sentence was internally consistent, even if it was irrelevant in terms of context. Yours - whiskey burning? - was simply nonsensically incomprehensible.)

I think it depends on the context of it all. If someone makes a plain statement that the RL gender of a person is not the gender of the av, then it would be wrong if the person didn't know it to be true. I see nothing wrong with posting the information if the person knows it to be true, and the person it is said about is somehow making out to be the opposite gender of what they really are. People's RL is often mentioned in the forum and gender is just one aspect of it, and I don't see the need for special consideration of it. SL is for roleplay - the forum is for real people.

I sometimes get a strong impression of the gender of someone in the fourm, and I'm very surprised to find that they have a female av.

If this thread came about because of a post that said something like, "another guy pretending to be female", then I see nothing wrong with such a post. It isn't divulging anything about the RL person, and it can't be taken as such. It's just taking a snipe at someone, and we're used to that here.

Sling Trebuchet enters stage right.
She is carrying a bird cage, within which is a dead parrot.
She looks around, and seeing nothing of interest, wanders off
Exit stage left.



Add:
It didn't. Calm down!

I agree although I admit I have done it before and have regretted it afterward. Pronouns on the SL forum are hell though when you have to remember which gender pronoun to use for the person in public and, if it's acceptable to that person, which one to use in private. That's on top of the already tricky pronoun issues when the gender of people you only see on the forums isn't obvious or declared or can't be be insinuated by past writings or name.