Gender stereotypes in SL: "Real" women

What a lovely post. Thanks, Seven.

Given my own ambiguous gender situation (in RL) I am equally a contradiction of gender stereotypes.

On the one hand, I like art and culture, I can't script to save my life, I'm not interested in pixel-bumping and dirty talk but I do like the erotic/sensual/romantic side of SL sex. I don't do voice (though that's not for lack of trying). I've no interest in guns or combat roleplay, or any kind of computer game. I'm not attracted to the skinny female avatar with enormous boobs and booty. And I know what that torture-looking device is that Oryx posted a pic of (although I've never used one in RL), but I have absolutely NO clue what goes on underneath the hood of a car.

On the other hand, I love sport, especially watching it live. My favourite genre of movies is the action movie. My favourite place to spend the evening is my local pub, where I drink real ale in pints. I love military aircraft and one of my favourite summer pastimes is visiting airshows. I hate shopping, I especially hate shopping with other people. I am a hopeless cook, and I try to avoid domestic chores if I can possibly get away with it. I hate soap operas, chick flicks and "reality" TV, and I don't even pretend to begin to understand the concept of "gossip".

I also cannot abide grammar-nazis.

Do you mean they have big hands? I disagree with that. A lot of avatars who I'm very sure of are RL females, care a lot about their avatars look. Some of them want RL proportions. A hand should be roughly the same length of the face. Very many avatars has small hands, but if their avatar has a more proportional look, it doesn't mean they are male RL. I also start to dislike my size zero feet more and more, especially in ballet flats. I want feet that look like they can hold my body up. So I have some shoes that I can change size on, and if I have medium feet and size 22 hands... I am male RL? *shrug*

Doesn't matter much to me. I have male friends who have the most sexy, adorable and stylish female avatar. Prim lashes, elegant dressed, changes clothes all the time. I talk to "her" as a woman all the time when the female avatar is on. When the male avatar is on, I am more flirty, in a teasing way. I know both are played by the same, but I react a bit different.

But I don't look for a RL partner/love so I am much more relaxed about it. I'm not going to meet them in RL, so I treat them as they appear in SL. I even think about them as their SL gender.

I've a serious bone to pick with someone here, and I don't care who knows it.

I've become addicted to ferret photos.

Argent, would you kindly find and post some that are a lot less cute?

Ah thankyew kindly.

I don't know how to do that!



Maybe I can dilute them.



Does that help?

Pep (Sorry, I have taken your quote completely out of context, but I did laugh out loud in rl when I read it and wanted to bring it to the attention of others. Oh, and I thought your post was much too sensible for this forum.)

Ahhhhhgghhh!

*goes into rehab*

I just want to clarify this a bit. A hand should be roughly the length of the face (assuming you want normal human proportions, but that's a whole 'nother thread). But it takes two hands to cover the width of the face.

I didn't want people to start making their hands huge all of a sudden.

Actually (IRL) my hand just about covers whether the width or the height of my own face. I do have long slender fingers...but I don't know if that is true of everyone, that there is one measurement.

I go by eye but that's one reason if people don't have the eye for it they should buy their shape. At least in SL you *can*.

Oh and if I see big hands I think "someone bought a demo shape and was too cheap to pop for the real one."

I had hands on my av that were a bit big until one day I noticed it. Then I changed it. (I prefer to make my own shape. And it's cheaper.) Generally, for an av around 6' tall I'd say under 20 hands for a female. But it depends.

Y'know what is worse in a way are those teeeeny tiny hands. Again, it takes an eye.

Thank you for clarifying. I will edit my post .

Are you guys talking about RL or SL? And are you counting fingers or just the palm? Cos that's one wide face if it's two hand lengths wide!

Demo hands can't be mistaken. They are so big!

Yes - it's amazing how the wearer doesn't notice, when they are THAT big! (The feet too!)

My hands are size 50 and they're about right for my face, but then again my head's size 70, and that's accurately in proportion with the rest of my body (total height = 8 heads high). And I'm only 6'4" which is pretty short for a guy, so I dunno how people hope to get everything in proportion when they crank their height up to 100. I guess that's why there are so many muscle-bound, pin-headed men in SL.

I wonder if I just mess up here and should tiptoe out.

I quoted Lolita who meant she could see if a female avatar was played by a man RL, on the size of the hands. Did she mean that men who play females in SL has too big hands on their avatars?

http://www.ehow.com/how_2213390_keep-face-hand-proportions-realistic.html

"Keep the fingers roughly the same size as the palm of the hand. When sketching the hand, bend the fingers at the knuckles for a more natural look.
Check that the hand is roughly the same size as the face. The hands and face should be close in size if they are correctly proportioned. The length of the face is the same as the length to the longest point of the hand."

Lewis: those sound like really big hands. I've had an av with a close to 70 head before (I just like big heads, I have to work against that) and 33 or so hands. But that was female. Maybe on males it's different? But I don't recall your hands seeming outsized in the pic you posted of your av, so maybe it depends on overall musculature as well, whether they 'appear' big or not.

I don't know that going by exact human proportions is ideal for an avatar in Second Life. Despite the vaunted '3d' it's still on a 2d screen, etc. People perceive toons differently than they would a real-life person, and there is some creative license.

Marianne: No that quote sounds right. It was two hand lengths being the same as the face's WIDTH that I wondered about.

FWIW, I interpreted Lolita's post about big hands on an av that way too.

Btw about hands; it's supposedly something a lot of people have trouble drawing but I always loved drawing hands. Maybe it's one thing that it was always easy to find a model for! Plus they're so telling, and often so graceful.

Maybe in future versions virtual worlds will have more refined hands/feet, while we're on the topic.

Wasn't the hand-size comment a joke?

.

Only the person who wrote it can say. I took it as a joke based on a hint of truth...or hint of opinion.

And then others took the conversation from it - as often happens. People think of something and the conversation takes a turn.

LOL! Okay now it's time to clarify MY post. The face is one hand length long, two hand widths wide -- more or less.

Incidentally, I really appreciated Marianne's smiley face. She must have understood I wasn't trying to be a grammar Nazi. I'm just a geeky old illustrator who is finding this thread very interesting.

Never said or thought anyone was correcting grammar. I was trying to understand what was being said, that is all.

Two hand widths = one face width seems to bear out in my own home test. Lol. Thanks.

(Assume smiley face by default!)

Could NEVER think that about you! The more I think about it, it was probably a joke that started it. I took it damned serious, the "hand size" thing.

Weston, my "grammar-nazi" comment wasn't aimed at you.

It probably would look weird on a female avatar, and yes my avatar isn't tall but is a bit on the "chunky" side (more thickness and body-fat rather than muscle and shoulder width though). More the soft and cuddly type

Well, I didn't, exactly. The correct human proportion is 7 to 7.5 heads high, but that just made me look too squat, so I went for 8, which is the comic-book standard and actually looks MORE realistic than really-realistic. Go too low in the numbers and you start looking like a child.

Isn't SL one big giant Anime?