Duck and cover: it's one of "those" threads

Okay, so I'm startin' one of them threads. Apologies in advance an all dat, but recently I've had a couple encounters that have left me with a question.

First was a issue I believe I wrote about, at Burning Life, when a nicely dressed German man came up and started circling the camp, taking photos of us all. I asked him to stop. He claimed to be taking them for the police and press. You can guess how well that was going. Thankfully, a trio of rangers did show up for my call, and one in particular talked this person into finding someting else to do with their time.

This weekend, a guy showed up in one kid store, initially trying to get a child avvie to go back to his land for sex. I was contacted and he tried to lure me with the ol' "I have candy at home" thing. He quickly got the blunt end of th' banhammer (that sort of stuff, whether RP or roleplay or whatever, dun fly with most kid avvies). I followed up with him in IM (as did other SL kids) to find out that he thinks all kids in SL are "peds" and he wants to get rid of them all. Kinda a mixed message, but okay - smells of entrapment.

Finally, last night I was given a recent notecard regarding a fairly well known furry. I'm not giving any more details than that, and am not inviting speculation. Said notecard was a conversation transcript where the person in question claimed that it was their belief that all kid avvies are (to paraphrase) male pedophiles. I know that the majority of kid avatars I know – and I know a great many, as you might suspect – are nothing of the sort.

Note that I'm talkin' stuff well beyond "I dun like ikklespeak" or "they kinda seem creepy to me."

The seeds of all this were planted back in '06 and '07, thanks to Report Mainz, Sky News, and – to a lesser extent – Faux News an SL's own blog postings. A lot of the anti-kid stuff those whipped up has gone away over the ensuing months, and by and large kid avvies do alright. I know that a lot of very positive stuff came the way of kid avvies in the wake of the initial content ban at SL5B, for example.

But these three stores above, amongst others (another's recent experience with an AR comes to mind, as well as some other tales) make me wonder if there is anything that can or should be done to let folks know what kid avvies are all about. With the new "ageplay" (possibly to become "sexual ageplay" abuse report category in the Release Client and some promised further clarification in the TOS/CS, I could see things getting worse before they get better.

I feel like I've gone over this a bajillion times (as anyone who reads these forums an the Metaverse Messenger will attest), an there's still cases like this. I feel like I'm doin' all I can on this – and, to be honest, I would rather spend more time inworld havin' fun, and building, and exploring than havin' t'deal with this sorta stuff, ya know?

Anyone have any thoughts of ways to reach people who can't seem to get past such opinions?

(Also, I hope this thread can stay at least a little a little respectful. I ask f'r a lot, dun I?)

You never will be able to get through these knuckleheads, Mari. If you of all people can't explain it to them , no one can. LL has to start stepping up and dealing with this sort of stuff, they need to be more proactive on protecting the majority of child avies, and getting out the perverts. Or else they may be forced to do what most don't want, and disallow the Little People all together, and that would make SL a sadder place for us all.

just a stray thought really a ponder so to say....thinking out load even

i just wonder if all these high and mighty types who are ARing and cousing greif for normal people, are not unlike the gay bashers who arre closet homosexuals themselfs?

Thing is, I really sincerely doubt there are many pervs out there. In my 2 1/2 years on SL, I've known of less than a handful locations with sexual ageplay with human avatars (I heard of a couple amongst the cubs and babyfur). The most well known of them (just ask Sky News) went through three name changes before all-but-abandoning SL and going to Open Sim. There may well be one other out there, if the rumor mill is correct. In the course of my time on SL, I've been solicited three times, including the one this weekend which was, in essence, entrapment.

But yes, I would love to see LL do some sort of statement some day, like the one a certain LL VP promised me over a year ago. It doesn't need to even be kid specfic, jes a message of universal tolerance and respect. Something not too far removed from Dusty Linden's "Maturity Policy" for Burning Life, but maybe with a dash of the Lewis PR statement in my sig, ya know?

I dun wanna be a protected class, but I sure wish I could get people to see what's really here sometime.

Gah, Mari...I'm so sorry and irked you kids are still going through junk like this.

I never really knew about kid avatars until I met you and a few others via the forums then had the pleasure of meeting in world. Now I love the fun and energy you all bring to SL (and I had a lot of fun being a "kid for a day" at SL5B).

The only thing I can think of offhand is word of mouth by those of us who are informed and if we encounter someone who starts off on an anti-kid or "all kid AVs are peds" talk, we can at least try to educate them a bit.

~ ~ ~

Remember the experiment a group of us did awhile back to wear an AV completely different from our own for a week to experience life "in someone else's shoes" be it culture, race, kid, furry, etc.?

One person in the group chose to be a child avatar. The night we all went on a field trip we made a stop at the Ahern hub. The child avatar was actually frightened and kept saying to us "Please don't leave me alone." My partner and I stood by her and told her we would keep an eye out. Of course we were furries at the time and having our own issues at Ahern.

I mention that as an example of the actual fear some people may have of wearing a child AV when they truly want to innocently explore that and not be considered a perv.

good thoughts Mari and the only way I feel the kid avs make a difference is in our sticking together.

Youve made it clear many times, as many of us kid avs have.

There's a old Frank Zappa quote..... "One of my favorite philosophical tenets is that people will agree with you only if they already agree with you. You do not change people's minds. "

I do believe that we are becoming more ummmm tolerable(?) by many now. I dont feel the unwarranted hatered from before, so I simply guess its the small steps are helping

technically, LL doesn't have to do a thing about it.
Since this is AGNI (adult grid)
not the teen grid. (for minors)

In AGNI, one always do roleplay... (being a furr, a child, anything different than an adult human being)
And to be frank, i stumbled into something the opposite long time ago..
a child av, asking me to have sexual activity... (i was shocked, untill i realized it was RP, and i happend to be a guest on a RP sim, where appearently they allowed that...)
ofcourse i said NO! *the thought alone, brrrrr*

But nevertheless.. RP is RP... and mean playing/action on fantasies, for most it just is fantasy, not real.

It might sound harsh, but facts are facts.. and therefor Lindens Cannot do a damn thing about it.

If you don't like it, AR them (if outside the roleplay areas), or leave the premises.

Like Toy (an I) said, it's not nearly as bas as it had been -- but those few examples that do come up tend to be particularly bad.



Ya, I fly over Ahern more than I stop there, an let's face it, I'm *pretty* fearless (or foolhardy) about where I go in SL. All the racist/sexist stuff I recall from Waterhead seems to be there now too. An people say kid avvies are childish!

Mari

oh for pete's sake!!!!!

AR,ban,mute....AR,ban,mute... especially Mr. Entrap what's good for the goose and all. After all, he was *asking* for it!

If these people can't get past their own hangups, they aren't worth the time to reason with.

Every time I hear about an incident like this, I want to run around as a kid for a week just so I can thumb my nose at kidophobic twits, and scream "Nya Nya Nya" at them.

Grrrr.....stuff like this just burns my boots!

Oh ya, he was ARed and then banned from about a bajillion kid places. We all kinda talk to each other a lot.

This just makes me sick and depressed. After almost two years in SL I finally(maybe) settled into a persona and backstory that fits the way I work and explore here and it just happens to include being a kid half the time. Maybe it’s not worth the bother. I run into friends who don’t know me as a kid and feel obligated to grow up into my adult av. Oops! There’s a sign with bewbies so I grow up again. Wanted to post on a thread here that was somewhat adult—didn’t feel I should because now I have to keep my distance from any of that lest someone read my profile. I haven’t encountered any trouble as a kid mostly because I hardly get in-world anymore and when I do I’m rarely around other avs, much less kids, meaning I’m not in “target areas” for lack of a better term.

Sorry, I guess I’m not really contributing anything to answer your questions.

Brenda’s right; you’ll never get through to all the knuckleheads. And Toy may be right about sticking together, but as I mention above, it seems like any group that has a presence as a group just seems to make a bigger target.

Yes, I’m bordering on cynical today.

I know there is an element somewhere who perv on kids,....and yes it is totally disgusting to me...

but i also know that a lot of ppl just like the freedom of being a child..

in japan its no big deal, we even have a name for them and theyre part of mainstream.. noone thinks theyre particularly weirder than anyone else wanting to be something else..
adult children

free and asexual...

myself .. i see a child .. and i see just that, a child. wouldnt one have to have a predeliction to see a child who is in a totally innocent setting and think of sex and perversion?

if every child in SL was a pedophile then we should be calling the RSPCA for the furries,,,, who HAVE to be zoophiles, and the vampires who MUST be necrophiles... and heaven forbid we should even begin to imagine what goes on in tiny brains, or robot hearts or...

and hell.. what about all the men in women avatars?

not everything, thank god, is about sex....

LOL, how cute!!! Never heard that expression before

Ashe

Even if you do get through to people, people come and people go. You have a neverending stream of new people to educate - an impossible task to "complete." And the media is the media, complete with the need to drum up a story if one isn't apparent. And lets face it: anything to do with appearance of sex with minors is going to make headlines, because they know full well that people will react emotionally as opposed to intellectually. It's a hot button issue in our society. People will generally have the view of, "better safe than sorry," and too bad for anyone who that stomps on. That the good outweighs the bad as it were, regardless of the actual facts of the situation.

No, the only way you as a person can make a difference is to campaign LL directly, and to try to get them to make clearer statements and have better defined policies. Until that day happens, children avvies will always have to deal with day to day ignorance and maliciousness. Of course, nothing worthwhile comes easily.

Most here know about my own point of view, style, and sense of appropriate/inappropriate behavior. I have enough information about my AR incident a couple weeks back to be completely clear that it was a griefing incident, I wasn't the only one targeted, and in all practical terms I know the name of the person and group directly involved in the event. (=_=)

I don't know what this is working into becoming, but, I see what Mari is seeing. I was called by some friends to show up in Hanja in kid form to help straighten up some people who "didn't get it" and it wound up being a very informative discussion for them. BUT! There was a stranger in the crowd, who just happened to IM me, and just happened to feel the need to want to let me know how "sexy" I am. (=_=)

Mind you, I really don't have an aversion to flirting, but seeing the same pattern that Mari mentions in her OP I felt it was my place to put this guy in his. When the boogerhead persisted, I decided to pull out my old tactic of copy/pasting his best choice statements to be shouted in open chat. Needless to say... He didn't make any new friends last night. (^_^)

All I would ask is for some Linden awareness. Make sure the "ageplay" rules are worded to note that it's the sexual aspect that's restricted, including the title in the AR tool... And, PUT THE BLOODY THING IN THE TOS!!! (>_<

Mari, you are right about there being so few true pedophiles in SL. I'm sure they know the chances of meeting an actual child are fairly slim. That's why LL has to take on the problem, it is a small issue in the grand scheme of things. I would have orbited the morons, and risked getting dinged for it. If orbiting is an Arable offense, it should be removed as an option. Better yet, they should investigate all AR's and they would see that most orbitings are probably justified.

Child avs have rules to live by in SL that NO other group has. We, for the majority, accept these rules as they needed. However, as Immy stated, these rules have to be in the TOS or CS, right now they are in a blog entry, word of mouth, partially in a AR but!!! They HAVE to be in the TOS or CS. For the most part kid avs know these rules and accept them, the problem lies in the ones that dont live under the special rules dont take the time to find these elusive rules and just AR.

Rant over hehe who has the cookies????

[/IMG]

I sometimes watch what threads I post to, too. The searching for a penis thread was one I held my fingers on, for example. But I pass signs with breasts on 'em often enough. Hard to avoid in this world sometimes!

Thing is, I think it would be great if you did not feel you had to accommodate others' biases. Regardless, you can be whatever you wanna be 'round me.



Ya know, this almost reminds me of Ghandi. “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.” I never thought I'd use such an important statement to refer to what is, at the heart of things, a simple avatar choice, and feel a little presumptious for doing so.



Great post, Eku. And yes, it's funny because one of the biggest false assumptions about Second Life is that it is all about sex. The German guy I alluded to kinda was in that mindset. To him, the only reason he could see for having a child avatar was for illicit sexual practices. It was morally repugnant to him – but also speaks heavily of that view of SL as a place for cybersex. I suspect most of us who've been here for any amount of time know that that is only a *part* of the whole.

Mmmmmm

"nahm nahm nahm nahm"

oh god now i made myself hungry
and the cat ate all the pringles

Ya know. Maybe I will....

Where is a good place to start setting up a kid avvie?

If nothing else, I'll have it ready to go when the mood strikes.

I figure I can keep a separate profile in my notes, and just copy/paste when in kid-mode.

Mari, there's an old saying in bureaucracies: "No issue is ever TRULY resolved."

You deal with something, think you have it nailed down, and turn your attention to other problems...and a few months or years later, it rises up again like Dracula coming up out of his coffin.

Persecution of child avs is one of those. You're going to see flare-ups...sensational news stories, solicitations like the one you experienced, and just plain old misunderstanding and intolerance.

There's no final solution. You just have to get the word out, and keep getting the word out. By official means, by word of mouth, by talking one on one, and by living your SLife as an example. You are doing all the right things. You just have to keep doing them.

I wish I had some grand advice but I don't. All I can say is to try to not let it get you down. In my opinion Mari is the perfect example of why there should be "kids" in SL.