Feeling Betrayed by the Lindens

As someone who has had multiple residents in SL for Years, I am starting to feel betrayed by the Lindens. What has always made SL better than anything out there was the ability to be whoever you wanted to be without worries that someone was going to come along and kick you out because they disagreed with your choices. Unfortunately that is changing and it is a betrayal of everything SL has meant to many of its residents.

Despite the performance problems, the greifing, the inventory losses, the inability to maintain a working friends list or teleportation system, Second life was still a place where people were free to be themselves. You had to be more careful after the Lindens abdicated their duties to police the RL ages of its users, but still, that was not really a big issue considering it was true in any other enjoinment.

However, reading about the betrayal of two Second life residents by the Lindens because they had, as consenting adults, engaged in Age Play (which would not have been illegal even if they had done so IRL) has bothered me a lot. I can understand the desire to fight child-porn, and agree that anyone posting real child porn in SL should not only be banned but arrested and charged, but from what I have read there was no child involved.

Many moralists are saying "but...but...but they will go and molest real children". Actually I would submit that the opposite is true...they were less likely to do so because of the outlet of SL.

But to me the bigger issue is where are the Lindens going to stop? When someone complains about bestiality, showing pictures of Furries or one of the Stallions that are available are they going to ban them? Bestiality is illegal everywhere. What about Slavery? Are they going to ban D/s play because slavery has been illegal everywhere for the last century or more? All of these activities are objectionable to someone. If you buy the argument about Age play leading to RL child molesters you will have to buy the argument about BDSM leading to RL rape and then have no reason to argue against its being banned.

After those are gone someone will complain about people having vanilla sex and SL being all about porn unless they ban it. Of course by this time the Lindens will have slit their own throat, because it is not the moralists that support SL, it is the people who need an escape from RL so they can be the people in SL that they cannot be IRL.

Each of my accounts up to this point was premium accounts. I was happy to support SL for allowing me to be who I needed to be, but now that I feel betrayed, I will be downgrading the accounts. SL is still the best place for me to escape RL right now, but I don't expect it to be for long and I will not give any money to a group that would betray there members as the Lindens have done.

"Quote"
But to me the bigger issue is where are the Lindens going to stop? When someone complains about bestiality, showing pictures of Furries or one of the Stallions that are available are they going to ban them? Bestiality is illegal everywhere. What about Slavery? Are they going to ban D/s play because slavery has been illegal everywhere for the last century or more? All of these activities are objectionable to someone. If you buy the argument about Age play leading to RL child molesters you will have to buy the argument about BDSM leading to RL rape and then have no reason to argue against its being banned.

"end Quote"

Not really feeling betrayed but am feeling suckered by the OP, Shai.

There's a ton of other threads on ageplay. If you absolutely must have yet another one on how good it is to look at little kids getting raped, as long as they're not real kids, knock yourself out but put a frickin title on the thread so those of us who are sick of these damn things know to ignore it.

Sorry you feel that way Meade, but the thread is titled. The overal point is a defining issue for me and a number of others.

Yes, I know it's an important topic for you and a number of other people. Half the volume in these forums lately is about this crap.

I'm asking that you put the term 'age play' in the title so that those of us who are sick of it will know to stay away from the thread.

I understand how the topic can get tiresome, but I feel Age Play was a minor issue compared to the overall sense of betrayal and I felt it would be glossed over if placed in an Age Play thread. I stopped using Yahoo when they gave up a user to the Chinese government. If I had an alternative to SL I would be using them, unfortuantely there is none at this time.

/me thwaps Shai with a rolled up newspaper.

It's the thread title and it's lack of warning that this is yet another ageplay topic that annoys me.

Untill there knocking at your door

Öffnen Sie die Tür, bitte.

Seems a perfectly legit title to me.

Meade do you insist book titles and Movies titles reflect exact content as well so you can ignore them? Newspaper headlines? A quick scan of the OP can easily reveal it's content.

And as to the OP...I fully agree!

VB

You mean childsex, ageplay doesn't necessarily involve sex at all and only indicates the person is playing a differing age to their own.

Yeah, right. I'll start buying the freedom of speach argument for ageplay when you start defending the rights of the Nazi party or the KKK to plant their slogans on 16m2's all over SL. Until then, it's sophistry.


Yes, I do expect a newspaper or blog entry title to give me some indication of what the text is about.

This topic offends many people. All I asked was that the OP have a little consideration so those of us that aren't interested can avoid these threads.

Remember that the two in question were given up because of possessing actual child-porn, not necessarily just because of 'age-playing'. Part of the issue I think is that unlike RL sexual age-play where the two consenting adults are just that; two consenting adults, one or both of whom are dressed to be younger than they are; what happens in SL is we have two consenting adults, one or both of whom visually ARE children.
Now obviously they're not children, but the is that they are generating child-pornography as a result of their chosen avatars as far as many laws can be concerned, ie; they are creating a 'graphical' depiction of child pornography.

It would be a different case if the two adults had chosen adult avatars and had one or more of them dressed to look younger. In RL this is legal, and in SL it would be legal. But the question is when you have one of the participants actually LOOKING like a child, is it any different? And in the wording of some laws it's sounding as though it is different, and very much illegal.

Now I don't like it, not because I support age-play, sexual or otherwise, but because it brings into question how much of "Your imagination" is actually allowed in "Your world". I am still very much of the opinion that you should be allowed to do whatever you like so long as you don't hurt or offend anyone else (by doing it in front of them, not just because they don't like it). That's what freedom to imagine and express is, sure, some people's imaginations are weird to others, but that's diversity for you.
The difficulty is finding how this can be applied to virtual worlds and so-on, because we're talking here about an area into which the law does not properly extend, hell, the internet as a whole is still very much unknown territory when it comes to law, and law just isn't keeping up that well with the computing industry's progress.
And unfortunately for us, lawyers are perfectly happy to tell us we could make a case on X, Y and Z clause purely because they WANT us to so that they get paid just to put the case forward, not because they believe the case will succeed on those grounds. Give me a lawyer who knows their stuff in US and EU law to give a reasonable scope and is willing to give us a legal analysis on how this would hold up legally, maybe then we could get an idea of what is/isn't going to be acceptable.

It is the accepted nomenclature here to equate the term "ageplay" with "sex involving an adult and a child." When you see the dozens of threads on this topic that refer to the term, that specific view is what is being discussed.



I'm amazed at the number of people who make the "slippery slope" argument, then proceed to tumble, kicking and screaming, all the way down the mountain into the realm of the absurd.

At the end of the day, the TOS says that Lindens reserve the right to to remove accounts or content as they see fit. They saw fit. Their explanation wasn't the clearest in the world, but their actions clearly conveyed that that type of behavior wasn't wanted or appreciated. There are no freedom of speech or freedom of expression issues, there are no wrongful persecution issues. This isn't a democracy. When you live under the Lindens' proverbial roof, you have to play by their rules, how clearly defined or morally gray you see them to be.

I really don't see why people are making such a damned fuss over this. The best I figure is that people need continual new drama to obsess over. Add this to the long list of perceived crises.

I have to agree with Meade- reguardless of the context of this thread or arguments for or against - Identifying it as an Ageplay thread would have been the right thing to do.

"Feeling Betrayed by the Lindens (RE: Ageplay)" easy enough.

Im pretty sure you can retroatively edit thread titles.

What is absurd about the thought of Bestiality being as offensive as Age Play between consenting adults? I imagine you will find that at least 90% of people who think Age Play should be banned would agree bestiality should be also. It is not that much farther of a stretch to extreme forms of BDSM.



That is true and I never made the mistake of calling it a free speak issue, since free speech laws only apply to the government. However, Age Play is not new to SL. It has been part of SL for several years. By not addressing it as soon as it started to occur, the Lindens gave implicit approval. That makes you wonder how many other things people are enjoying that they are going to suddenly go 180 degrees on. Suddenly what you are enjoying one day will get you banned and reported the next day. The Lindens may have the right to set the rules, but when those rules changes are the result of the Lindens caving to external pressures and turning on their own customers I think it is fair to feel concerned and betrayed by them.

Well, now you know so you can stop reading it.

One has nothing to do with the other. For one, I never said it was a freedom of speech issue. Secondly, hate speech is designed to denigrate others in a non-consensual way. Such behavior has never been tolerated by the Lindens.



This post is about my sense of betrayal by the Lindens. The Age Play ban is only the vehicle. The title is accurate.

Actually there is nothing in the blog entry to indicate that the two banned residents were in possession of the offending pictures. It just states that they were banned for engaging in sexual Age Play. If they did possess such pictures then I agree they should be not only banned but criminally charged. But that is not what the blog says and the ban on Age Play is something apart from a ban on the possession and passing of pornographic pictures of children. The difference being that the latter is illegal, the former is merely perverted and outside the mainstream interest. It is disgusting to a large group of people, but as far as I know it is not illegal to have virtual sex with a toon, no matter what their apparent age or species.

First, there are two Ageplay threads and they're already closed, no sense in beating that dead horse even more to pulp.

Second, I voiced my opinion on sexual Ageplay, no need to do it again.

Third, in Germany child pornography is illegal, of course. But the law goes to that extent that pictures where a participant just looks like a minor are deemed illegal as well. So regardless wether they actually swapped Childporn pictures or not, the in-world action and the resulting imagery is enough to get them a lawsuit.

Fourth, LindenLab didn't 'betray' someone, they just took sensible action as they got informed of the lawsuit against those two residents directly related to in-world activities.

My observation on this is, how is age-play on SL different legally from the many many parties you get in real life where women will dress in school uniforms but with short skirts and stocking tops showing - very obviously making a sexualisation of a schoochild? I have never heard anyone being upset by that, presumably because everyone knows it's an adult woman wearing the uniform. Isn't it equally obvious it's an adult playing the part of the child in SL, since all players must be adults anyway?

And everywhere I look on the internet these days there are these "Japanese schoolgirl" zwinkies and dolls and anime which are also sexualised schoolchildren. And no one seems to mind those either.

Actually the more I think about this, the more I am thinking the whole thing stinks.
You can do just about anything in SL. Many people do, but people like privacy too.
I have a hard time imagining that two people would have done what they did with a reporter standing there. Even people engaged in normal adult activities usually use discretion. Even the escorts have their own private areas.

Perhaps they should be banned not for their ageplay activities but perhaps for their stupidity and not keeping their sexual affairs of any kind in a private place. I think this was a setup for a slime TV news show based on sensationalism. This is not normal SL activity and puts a bad spin and light on all the rest of us who are not exhibitionists for TV reporters.

After careful consideration I do think they should be banned for having incrediably bad taste and flagrant in your face look and see how disgusting I can be sex. I also think the reporter should be banned for just being a general scum and making it look like we are all perverts in SL. These people allowed a TV show to make us all look bad, including Linden Labs. These people should not be defended.

The whole age play thing when it is sexual disgusts me almost as much as actual pedophilla.
But I have to agree with the where will Linden go next part.
Already herard from CNN international that Linden are going to introduce have a third party verify who you are for transations ect.

To keep the people who have been afronted by imprecise labelling happy, I propose that Second Life be relabelled First Life.

Perhaps not just yet, but fairly soon, seeing as LL is boldy striding down the road of applying ever more restrictions from the old and weary real world to what was once heralded to be an exciting new virtual world, and one of limitless possibilities.

Apparently the vision has changed, and for descriptive precision, the name should too.

As I've said in past thread, Linden Labs actions in regards to the ageplay community is simply unacceptable.

Linden Labs has continued the stigma that ageplay is associated with real children. Until Linden Labs acknowledges the clear distinction, they will continue to wind up in these no-win situations.

You cannot oppose intolerance, and then choose to Thought Police sex between adults. There's no children involved in ageplay, and Linden Labs needs to step up and admit before they get sued for defamation when they "out" the next adult involved in it. If they did it to me, I would do nothing less.