Inclusive Communities and Representations of Violence against Women

Oh so why should roleplay be banned then... when you can discuss why it might be wrong... and why it helps? Oh I'm sorry that wouldn't work for you or the ones trying to ban something they dislike.

I noticed you said you didn't buy for your children... does this mean you buy them for yourself




your sexist agenda does matter a lot when it impacts others



I don't own any land... I don't have much money after paying my bills. The manager at my store owns about 120 acres , half of which is residential areas she rents out.

You might want to actually get your head out of the propaganda and look at who actually owns most of the money and lands.

But you're blinded by the sexist views you have, and can't see people as people... only poor females held down by the male thumb... never mind there is far more support for females than males out there...

I applied for food stamps because my hours got cut... nada.. my female coworker gets food stamps and make more than me. she too is single.. and no kids.

now kindly explain how I am ruling the world...

Oh wait...

So if the fight to protect it has no role in shaping reality... then it would have no role in shaping reality

I do suspect quite strongly that a male av would get more respect in such situations. Unless it was like the one femdom sim, in which case not.

I don't get why no one sees it as in any way significant when IRL mistreatment of women makes it into fantasy lives. What are we reflecting here? It's same when other isms make the leap, only sexism is tolerated as nothing to do with real prejudice and handwaved by the minority of reported sexual crimes against adult men.

Dissent would also be protected. People seem to miss that.

*whispers* Gor isn't real...

It's like claiming Disney is oppressing Mickey Mouse.



Well assuming one believes it's even 'apartheid' - which I still think is misusing the word.

Other than the extreme devotees who treat the fictional novels like a religion - I also feel most if not all realise they are playing a part in a fantasy environment and that it is all, again, CONSENSUAL.

Just like someone being CONSENSUALLY tied up during sex isn't the same as a person being tied up and raped. Or IS it, in your view?



Ancient slavery had different roles for slaves based upon gender. There were pleasure slaves of both sexes, probably mostly female. Also, there are slaves of both genders in SL Gor. Also there are groups like Panther Women, who keep male slaves for various purposes. Outlaw women, and slaver women. As well as physicians, scribes, etc. The part about Gor and women I don't understand is that veil. But, whatever. Those who understand and like it participate in it, I choose not to.

It's like someone insisting that Muslim women should not wear a veil in modern life. Some like it and feel naked without it; the Gorean novels from what small excerpts I've seen, claim the Free Women feel naked and shamed without theirs as well.

Again...it's a series of badly written novels, written by a male and it does read like basic hetero male fantasy. But...so does a lot of things.



See, that's another statement that seems to betray a misunderstanding. D/s does not even always involve sex let alone sexual release. And there are elements of it throughout society, just not officially named as such. A boss/employee, a good relationship of same, is D/s. Mentor/pupil. Etc. *It isn't about sex*



Umm, alrighty.

(Yay, he made a joke.)

you missed the point.

If defending the role play has no effect on reality

then the role play has no effect on reality

Gee thanks, how generous. Lol. This control of fantasy is off the flipping radar.

Of course they mattter, but they weren't the discussion. And where is the widespread hatred of men in SL?




CRY MOAR. Jeez, I'm just disagreeing with you. I think these things affect reality, you don't. It's not like I'm campaigning to have you permabanned.





I just want to know *why* it isn't banned when other things are, and what that means about society's acceptance of one or another ism over others.




When they have money they can buy their own. Then we can discuss what they read.




SL is a pleasing exception, probably because it's largely populated by educated 1st world people. It is not like the real world. How many women are ruling countries right now? How many men?




And interestingly those few laws were made by men!

Surely defending it would have an effect? Wasn't that the OPs point?





So why can't I have racial slavery on my sim or ban gay people from it?





If it's not about sex for you then people are even more ****ed up than I realised.

This thread is just depressing.

Why is your definition of a sexuality(that you admit you know nothing about) as a hate crime going to wash with people who know about it and know from their own experience it's not.

I think your the one with the hate issues here.

Tolerance is not the same as acceptance.

Actual non-consenual assault is neither tolerated nor accepted in Second Life.

No, I am not particularly concerned about how the roleplay of juvenile literature might be shaping RL attitudes. I don't believe Second Life roleplay is any more harmful than a screening of "Silence of the Lambs".

1- I was replying to you miss sexist

2- You can

3- If you see the world as only being about sex, then you are more messed up than you realize

I disagree with the first statement there and I think it does the forum posters a disservice.

Well, 'respect' might be defined a bit differently depending upon the viewer. I do know that, especially with the subs in SL far outnumbering Dominants, the males in a femdom would make short work of anyone trying to take their Dommes away. ;p



Again you are leaping from your own assertion and your own assumption *that others agree with it.* What many respondents here KEEP asking, is for the OPs and/or their allies in thought/agenda, to support their contention that there IS a connection. Until that is done in some real, simple, to the point way (not unrelated real life studies) this thread will go in circles until it's finally locked.

Some - many - women have fantasies of being dominated - which is what a 'rape fantasy' is actually about - pursuit, submission. What I'm not as clear on is why some of the men participate in it. I've never asked them. I have known some men who participate in that type of roleplay though and they tended to be very brainy. My main guess would be they were trying to exercise their more carnal side, in a no-apologies way.

My main guess as to both participants would be a basic reaction to feeling sexually repressed, for various reasons...but that is wayyy oversimplifying it, is more to answer your/the OPs/their pack's apparent confusion and pegging it solely as dysfunctional, and is in no way at all meant to speak for let alone claim it represents, roleplay participants. It's an "if I had to give you a quick answer," is all.

I never said "for me."

You painted it as "getting rocks off." I pointed out that it often has nothing to do with sex. I'm very unsure what type of leap you made that you now consider it NOT being about sex - which seemed to be the part troubling the OPs here - is somehow worse!?

Sighs...please go and educate yourself about the (D/s) topic before continuing to characterise it publicly.

I second that.

Ain't never gonna happen. We've got rights built into our covenant.

If ThomasJefferson Hax and SallyHemings Midnight visited or rented a townhouse they would both be considered and dealt with as free people. Regardless of whatever either of them personally thought or how they acted toward each other.

* * * * *

We do have simulated violence, though.

There's a navy that both men and women can join, and on Thursday nights there are sea battles.

You'll have plenty of chances to cause grievous harm, or send someone to a watery grave in glorious 19th century style from the deck of one of our dreadnoughts.

Or get virtually maimed or killed yourself. Great thing about steampunk, you can get really stylish mechanised prosthetics in nautical brass...

I suppose technically, it qualifies as violence against women at least some of the time (our Fleet Admiral is female) though it's all 100% consensual.

You did claim that women are raped 'far far more often' and 'to claim otherwise is ignorant' - that's a very big statement, and it is highly insensitive to any male or child victims of sexual assault that may be reading that post. How do you know it happens 'far far more often'? Personally I have the feeling males and children would tend to report it much less often, even, than women do. I know victims in all three categories in fact who never told authorities.



Reread it, a little satire never hurt anyone. And...er...why would you make a leap to having ME banned? (Even in jest, it represents a thought) Lol. Rut-roh.




Okay. Fair enough. So finally someone on 'that side of the debate' *actually says in plain and clear terms, what they *actually want*! Yay. *exhales*

Ask the Lindens. As I stated a long time ago to one of the OPs - we have the same resources you do. Go to a brown bag meeting with a Linden and ask THEM. We simply cannot give you that answer. It's a privately held corporation. We do not set the rules.



See, I don't see men as natural oppressors, so it doesn't bother me whether a man or a woman rules or holds a particular position. I think society has (generally) evolved (at least in modern cultures) beyond that. I do realise that humans tend to relate better to people they've shared experiences with. But I have more faith in humanity than to think a male cannot lead fairly or well.

Many highly prominent and powerful world leaders have been female. I'm still not sure what talking about any of this - things most of us know very well - has to do with Second Life? Or Resident Answers? I'm just asking.

I also think you might be a bit more open minded to the experiences the males are sharing with you, in this thread.

Hold on. You admit you don't understand something. Yet you go on to say it's harmful on the premise that anyone witnessing it (who also almost certainly don't understand it), will be inspired to abuse women?

And what the hell is the obsession with anything and everything sexual being abusive to women? The very act of penetration is considered violent to some people, and used in an anti male way. Yet there are women who before the dawn of porn must've cried out "Harder, faster, make me scream, pin me down!". Or is it only men who see sex as something other than a means of procreation, that should be performed as delicately and unobtrusively as possible? I would argue not, given rl as well as sl experience, but I guess all those women were just suppressing their disgust in order to fulfill my male urges (even the woman who went halves on the hotel room, after being the one to approach me for a sordid evening of fun).

Of course, I'm blathering on about REAL LIFE, when actually the hugest stumbling point for the protectionist, sexist, emotive hand wringers is that SL IS PIXELS. The manipulation of those pixels is by adults, who have the option to break off the scenario they are in with the merest click of a mouse. Anyone with a functioning frontal lobe should be able to deduce any "forced" role play witnessed is within a fantasy situation in a virtual world, and not necessarily a shining example of behaviour in the flesh and bone world.

If you change basically a few words in your own advise to someone else - it amounts to what someone said to the OP and SLLU earlier in the thread. As such:


'We don't actually live in a free world. There are plenty of freedoms you might want to look into defending instead of complaining that fantasy has a role in shaping reality.'

Funny thing, irony.

I think the other half happened when I blinked. But Brenda's stockings may still be at large.
O let us prevent womyn from role-playing victim fantasies. Unless we protect them, they'll lose respect by shedding their burkhas--even in public.

And this has what, exactly, to do with SL?
An SL escort is NOT by any means equivalent to a RL prostitute. She is not subject to being "hunted, dominated, harrassed, assuated and battered". She is not subject to "economic servitude". She cannot be recruited, enslaved, or hooked on drugs. She is not subject to STDs.

Everything she does is completely consensual, and completely safe for her physically and socially. (We may argue that there is the potential for emotional or psychological damage, although I've seen little evidence of that in the escorts I know personally.)

Far from being on the bottom of the job skills totem pole, a successful SL escort is skilled in the art of real time, interactive, erotic storytelling, and is adept at reading people from limited cues. As a writer myself, I salute them.

The escorts in SL *are* in it for the money. And most of them *do* enjoy it.

These differences between SL escorts and RL prostitutes illustrate the point that many of us have been making from the start of this thread: SL is *not* RL. "Violence" here is consensual, pretend playacting. Nobody is hurt. It is PLAY, at an adult level, with adult language and situations.

If you don't like that sort of game, fine. SL is big, there is plenty to interest just about everyone. But don't tell the people who DO enjoy those games that they must stop, just because YOU don't agree with them.

Qie, the other thing she (?) missed in this statement



is that not everyone agrees that it is abuse, that it represents disrespect, or that it is anywhere near 'powerful' enough to "normalise" or even impact, anything in real life.

For someone studying Violence Against Women as a social phenomenon, the gender of the target of the violence and/or the gender of the perpetrator of the violence would have to be some sort of salient factor in creating the violence. The mere fact that the target of the violence, without more, doesn't bring the violence into Violence Against Women, when one is speaking of the social phenomenon.

It's an important point.

We have had people from bdsm and feminism... victims, male and female, people left wing, right wing come on this thread and say the op and her mates approach is wrong or unwelcome in some form.

Try studying violence against people.

You might find out that humanity is full of monsters of all colors and genders.