Looking to interview African-American players

I actually laughed when Starax replied that within minutes of me posting that. Images of Kunta Kinte came to mind. However, I think that was what he meant, since I did make the mistake to indicate that people should wander around inworld as though it was some sort of safari.

And I agree with you, ignorance is one of the causes of racism. What doesn't help is all the censorship and over protectionism people resort to to avoid being un-pc or offensive. It just increases the potency of slur words and derogatory remarks.

Ok, I bothered to read the entire thread up to this point. I never liked the term African-American. My birth certificate says Black. Brief, to the point, and not a PC buzzword.

When Teeny was created, It was difficult to get the skin tone just right, because her creator is a bit on the light side. Said creator has been accused in RL of not being "black enough" or "yellow". Not light enough to (as the old folks say) "pass", and at times mistaken for Hispanic.

When custom skins came out, I spent over a year looking at demos before I found one that came close to my RL skin tone. I'm not blaming the skin artists of anything, but light skinned blacks are probably difficult to get right. That, and I was looking for a skin with little or no makeup was probably why it took so long.

I can't say that I've been discriminated against in SL. I find that many never bother to ask about race here, and if you behave yourself and treat people right, you will get along fine here.

Sure antipathy! The skin was created by the one and only FABULOUS Starley Therian of Celestial Studios.

She has a whole line/store section of dark skins and many that are modable, so you can achieve the skin tone you want.
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Now for the rest of yall:

There is no such concept of race in the scientific field of Biology, Genetics etc. When I was studying both Bio and Anthropology I found it fascinating that folks who had purple-black skin were the closest (non continental) biological relatives if you will to what we would call Asians. Straight black hair, epicanthic eyefold etc.

That being said. Terms such as Black, White, African-American, Samoan-American and so forth have no bearing on skin color and all that. They are sociological words and concepts that we as human beings have thought up for ourselves.

The only thing that is "PC" is how each individual prefers to call themselves, or have themselves called, if at all.

Example. You can get beat up if you call some folks Latino, in Los Angeles - because they prefer Chicano and some prefer Hispanic.

I really laud antipathy for her bravery in wading into all of this, because aside from all the touchiness, there really isn't any easy way to go about this.

For those who are not American, this whole thing might seem redicoulus, but that's just how our society is these days.

We used to be called Negroes back in the day - and that other N-word too. And then even called Colored People. 0_0 (that kinda cracks me up but ok) Then through the Civil Rights movement, Marcus Garvey and others, there came a renewal of consciousness, and pride in our roots from Africa. We began to love the color of our skins.

We called ourselves Black and we were proud. Then along came the hyphens. I have no clue where all that came from, (The US Census?) but ok there we have it.

We are now called African-Americans or Black these days. I personally don't care what you call me, since I happen to have a name. Use it.

Again for those not familiar - the hyphens are used to indicate the ancestry of various Americans. Which by now is kinda moot with all the mixing and matching thats been going on for yonks. But there you have it.

African-American = primarily means descendants of the slaves taken from Africa who now reside in America

African-American(Hispanic) = primarily means those who come from places like Santo Domingo, Cuba etc who happen to look like me.

Asian-American = those who's ancestry comes from Asia - China, Japan etc

And so on. I know it seems crazy, and personally I think it is. But everytime you have to fill out a government form there are (sometimes) optional categories where you have to indicate your "race". Why I don't know. Perhaps that whole Affirmative Action dealy.

Myself, I skipped filling in that stuff when applying to colleges back in the day - I wanted to get in on my own merits and talents, and not be forever wondering. And so I did, and even garnered myself a scholarship based on the content of my mind and not the color of my skin.

I don't mind being interviewed.

Two comments:

I wonder what would happen if, when asked for "race" information on a form, everyone started filling in the word "Human"?

(Furries and mechs exempt, of course.)

Also, this thread, and particularly Brace's recent response, reminds me of the lyrics of a song called "Colored People" by a group called dc Talk:

Pardon me, your epidermis is showing, sir
I couldn’t help but note your shade of melanin
I tip my hat to the colorful arrangement
Cause I see the beauty in the tones of our skin
We’ve gotta come together
And thank the maker of us all

We’re colored people, and we live in a tainted place
We’re colored people, and they call us the human race
We’ve got a history so full of mistakes
And we are colored people who depend on a holy grace

A piece of canvas is only the beginning for
It takes on character with every loving stroke
This thing of beauty is the passion of an artist’s heart
By God’s design, we are a skin kaleidoscope
We’ve gotta come together,
Aren’t we all human after all?

Ignorance has wronged some races
And vengeance is the Lord’s
If we aspire to share this space
Repentance is the cure

Well, just a day in the shoes of a color blind man
Should make it easy for you to see
That these diverse tones do more than cover our bones
As a part of our anatomy

We’re colored people, and they call us the human race
We’re colored people, and we all gotta share this space
We’re colored people, and we live in a tainted world
Red and yellow, black and white
We’re colored people, every man, woman, boy, and girl...

We're all colors. I happen to be kind of a pinkish-tan. My wife has a sort of greenish tone (olive skin, that is). One of my daughters is about as pale as a caucasian person can be without actually being an albino. Another took a different genetic twist and takes after my wife's father's family, and looks like she's half Native American and half Hispanic. We have friends who are black, Laotian, Iranian, Scottish, British, Welsh, German, Mexican, Filipino, and a son-in-law who is full blood Native American... but we're all the same on the inside.

P2

Thank you x 2.

Brave? I don't know. I am just interested in the experiences of marginalized groups -- which is one reason why I took the class for which I am writing this paper.

I have seen in the forums that some people have mocked my inquiry. No matter. I am not here to deal with their personal problems. Actually, they are unintentionally helping me by demonstrating a facet of the very issue which I am exploring. Their mockery of my inquiry is a mockery of the people whose experience I seek.

Cool. Can you send me a private message and I'll give you more info?

Thanks

Antipathy,

I am curious why you chose only to focus on the black experience in SL - perhaps you explained already in this thread, if you did I apologize, I didn't feel like wading through the drama so I thought I would just ask.

Because I took a class called "Philosophy of the African Amercian Experience" and I am writing my final paper on the African American/Black American experience in a *virutal* world (hence my seeking the opinions of only this group of people).

I'm all for sillyness, as you know, but there's a time and a place for everything...and serious discussions about race are neither the time, nor the place. Starting mock threads over something like labels used to describe skin color is in pretty poor taste. Some people prefer to be called black, some people prefer to be called African-American; I usually try to remember to call people what they want to be called.

Regards,

-Flip

LOL that would explain it, thank you

By the way, I wrote this blog entry awhile ago, but it is is on the topic at hand, I thought it might be useful to you for some insight:

http://www.sluniverse.com/edition/2004/05/silent-racism.html

It is about a black player's experience in SL - she had some pretty horrific runins with racism, and SL was much smaller then so I cannot imagine the problem has improved - if anything, it has probably worsened.

Why would you be insulted? Is it insulting to call somebody African-American? If they made a mistake and called you Hungarian would you be insulted too? What if they called you Canadian? Would you find that insulting?

If somebody called me Danish I might be amused, but I wouldn't be insulted. Is it that you find being African-American insulting or is it that you are easily insulted?

Oooh ooh, I get the same feeling when I see a country western event! What are these people thinking? LOL

What I really find funny is the people who won't use the term African-American because it is PC. LOL. Guess what people, Black was the PC term for Negro. Caucasian is the PC term for white. Do you think that Caucasians originated in the Caucasus? Most likely not. Caucasian sounds more scientific than white and doesn't have the baggage that Aryan has. And that's Aryan before the Nazi's hijacked the word and made it synonymous with Nordic.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that nearly every word we use to connote a race is the result of conscious political correctness. So saying you won't use one word because it's PC and then using another that started out PC is just silly.

Thanks Ewan!

For those that have never seen it, you can find a pic of it here.

Not even close, bud.

Your post is a good example of what I am talking about. Someone comes in here and makes a sincere attempt to learn more about the black experience in Second Life and you see fit to make a joke of it.

Except for the fact that you quoted my response to you and not to the original post, yeah sure, of course. I didn't make a joke about the original post, I made a joke about your post. Specifically this:



I was trying to point out that white people do things that make other white people shudder. Just as I'm sure there are Maori who shudder at the behavior of other Maori.

So to clear this up, I wasn't making a joke about the original poster's sincere attempt to learn more about the African-American experience in Second Life, I was making a joke about how each group has it's own version of embarrassing bumkins.

To add further complication to an already over-complicated subject, in the UK Asian means something totally different. Asian, to us, means you come from the Indian sub-continent. What you would call Asian we would call Oriental - which I gather is an insult over there!

It is really sad that we all tie ourselves in such linguistic knots over what should be a non-issue.

Phoenix,

It is a wonderful ideal, but we do not live in that ideal world, unfortunately. The reality is that race is still a huge barrier in RL, and even in a world where we can be giant blue bunnies, it is still lurking beneath the surface. The ideal of one humanity makes for great speeches, but we are very, very far from that place.

The problem isn't the SL culture. The problem is that popular black culture still portrays these images in music, films, and television. The change has to come from within. Until such things are no longer glorified, it is not surprising to see them reflected in SL, which for all its freedom really often just mirrors a carbon copy of RL. One only has to look to popular rap music to see the stereotypes in full view. How is making assumptions that these are white people doing this in SL any less stereotyping than what you are speaking about?

Very well said. Arguing over what to call something is how religious wars get started, heh. It also completely avoids talking about the issue at the core while glossing over it with an argument over what shoudl really be a non-issue - semantics.

Regards,

-Flip

That's a great skin, Chip! Do you mind if I use that picture in my project? To show one way black is represented in SL? (If you missed it, I am writing a paper on the black American experience in SL.)

Do you know if you have made the only photo-realistic black skin in SL? And do you know if there are any that are darker than this?

Very interesting, Cristiano. If I wanted to cite your entry, would you be alright with that?

You're more than welcome to use the pic, Antipathy As far as I know that's the only photorealistic black skin in SL, but there may be others out there I haven't seen. Partly I imagine that's because photoreal skins aren't everyone's cup of tea. I personally haven't seen any darker skins but a lot of skinners offer a wide range of skintones so I'd be surprised if there isn't a darker one floating around. There's so many great skin makers these days it's hard to keep track.

I haven't followed the whole thread so pardon if this has been mentioned before but Hamlet did a story recently about the experiences of a caucasion friend of mine who wore that skin for a couple of months. It's very interesting. You can find it here.