GLBT Disappointment in Dreamland

Bisexuals don't have to make a choice because all you people with sexual preferences look alike to us.

I know some gays - women and men - that think that as they now are a bit more ok in society all are getting ”boring” - as they cant get that - ”wow look.. two guys (or girls) holding hand.. and all such things..

But of course I live in a City and then also in Sweden... all are diff in al countries..

AND I hope from all of my hearth - that in SL there a PLACE for ALL of us!!!!

So the ones that dont like a place can go to another.. what I know there are places for narrow minded people to....

I think it's great Anshe put something like this together - regardless of how 'well' it's done, it's still nice that it's out there.

That said, my own personal feelings are that I'd prefer that Straight and GLBT folks socialized more together than they do apart. I understand completely that it's human nature to want to congregate with other people like yourself - but if that's all you do, you're missing out on a pallette of perspectives that make life 32-bit color rather than grayscale.

IMHO, diversity means nothing when you don't diversify

When there is a strong community and people feel comfortable with it - then there is more likely a chance that people will go out and diversify, not less.

Much easier to meet new people when you feel accepted and welcome "at home".

The lesbian community in Second Life has a real hard time becoming closer knit becuase theres a lot of complainers , Lesbians and not who focus on the player gender issue - One side saying Lesbains shouldnt be allowed to care - the other side complaining theres no real lesbians. --- Both stances are not realistic -- neither helps efforts to develop a closer knit community. The Lesbian Second Life group in fact is ending on the 25th - and this is one of the reasons.

The best part about Provincetown is that it was requested and delivered. No one forced anyone to go there.

As a frequent visitor to the real P-town, I felt it was a fitting tribute. All it really needs now is a couple of Bed and Breakfast places to make it feel complete. Oh and a whole bunch of stores, LOL!

Zarf, if you didn't want to change zoning or censor the creator - what is your point of bringing this up? If it is to attempt to educate people on what you find offensive, fine - but lashing out at Anshe is wrong.

I fully understand why equating the GLBT community with public sex if offensive. It's a stereotype that, while it might apply to some members of the community, is not applicable to the entire community.


Yes, she does - and she should. Being upset because she's advertising a sim that contains a build you object to is, IMHO, ridiculous.


I think what you fail to realize, Zarf, is that as a community, there are many different voices to be heard. Some of them may not be to your liking, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be voiced and/or expressed, *especially* considering how the GLBT community raves about being diverse and inclusive.

It has occurred to me that this is mostly about timing.

I suggest it would have been good to wait for a little more of the community to develop before advertising it as "GLBT".

Im also wrestling with how I feel about a brand new are being rolled out for the "GLBT" community. Feels a bit, well ... odd, frankly.

Umm how do you make it a GLBT without advertising for GLBT? And if Anshe had waited, and the Sim filled up, what would be the point of advertising?

It seems to me that Anshe is doing a wonderful thing in offering a zoned sim for the GLBT community. Granted, you can live in whatever sim you want to, but people often like to identify with a particular community of like minded people. At what point should she have been allowed to advertise it? It's kind of a chicken/egg thing - you need people to build there, and to get people, you advertise. Believe me, I am the first person to not let Anshe off the hook for things, but in this case, honestly, I find the criticism of it bizarre.

Plenty of businesses where I live in RL advertise themselves as gay friendly. Nothing odd about it -- those businesses cater to that community.
Those businesses would not have successfully acquired their target audience as customers if they hadn't advertised until they already possessed it.

A lot if this does seem to be about timing. Some guy looks around a new community, sees "an almost entirely flat sim with no landscaping...a barren square" except for a roman bath with a sign of questionable humor, and is disappointed and offended because he interprets it "as the defining marker of Dreamland's GLBT neighborhood."
Personally, I would have waited until more was built there, and less of a barren square before rendering such a conclusion.

wow, that is far too logical an observation.

^^

Maybe that is why Im having problems figuring out how I feel about the idea behind this. Taking a sim and setting it aside to be GLBT ... designating that "here its OK for you to build" ... feels kinda like building gay-ghetto.

Im sure that was not the intention ... and I may be expressing my feelings badly ...

and now Im wandering. I guess my point is that it seems to me that its not a good idea to set out to "make a GLBT community" ... any more than its a good idea to set out to make any other sort of community.

That's just my own opinion. Im glad that Anshe was this responsive to requests from her friends, and look forward to visiting.

I don't know if the person who started the thread waited awhile before posting, but the sim is far from empty - there are multiple homes along the shore, a nightclub, a store going up, plus some other things. At first glance it appears empty because you end up in the middle of an open area when you teleport in, but the sim is actually pretty developed - and the coastline is beautifully done.

Im not sure about comparing RL advertising, where there are innumerable vehicles and all sorts of ways to hit your target audience, and SL advertising, which is severely limited and hitting /any/ audience is good.

I never said anything about "allowing her to advertise" ... I was only suggesting that a different choice in timing might have had a different result.

To totally throw this thread a curve..Ghareth..I LOVE what you did with the falls and the pool. The structure and water design certainly looks more tasteful and artistic than many of the builds I see in SL. Great eye candy. Good job!

What I find particularly ironic about this is that nobody seems to have actually READ the cards and such in Provincetown, which specifically say that it is open to everyone, GLBT or not. It is an ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLES SIM, not exclusively a GLBT one. Those of you who are claiming it is 'advertised as GLBT', although it is natural to presume it as such (being named after a gay hotspot!), may wish to consider seeking more information about it before jumping to conclusions.

I'm staying out of this one...history just repeats itself, over and over and over.

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Paolo, thank you for posting those threads. Truly we some of us have been over this ground before - or terrain much like it - but there were a lot of really well thought out ideas put forth in them that we haven't looked at in a while.

When you name a sim after a real location, it comes with certain expectations that it will resemble its namesake in some way, shape or form. For me, the lack of Commercial Street, the A-House, the Monument and the throngs of tourists and day-trippers just off the boat raised my eyebrow, not the sign. But then again, this is SL. As much as I would love tp TP to my favorite spot on the real Herring Cove, it ain't gonna happen!

As far as the sign itself, I do believe it reinforces a stereotype for those who are not part of the community. But for those of us who are part of that community, it's certainly humorous given that used condoms probably outnumber cigarette butts on the tip of the Cape these days. And who knows, I may drop a condom prim in the Roman bath just to be funny the next time I am in that sim!

I see nothing wrong with her timing. If you want to get a sim to develop a certain way why not advertise it before and when it just goes up to draw the type of crowd you want. And having it go up around Pride Week is good timing because many gays are thinking about 'community' more at that time then the rest of the year.

And why is Ptown the only sim getting attention like this other than Zarf whining about the pool? As I recall about 3-4 OTHER gay-oriented sims came up around the same time, and Athena sim hosted Pride and was much more stereotypical than Ptown is. After all I know many non-gays who view of gays isn't public sex and bathhouses, but flamboyant outfits and rainbows all over tied to Pride events.

I know many gays who despise Pride because for them its become a way to 'show off' and 'shock the breeders' and isn't really about the history behind its origin. But that's a sign of a living community, traditions become traditions and younger generations forget or never learn of that traditions origins and meaning.

And what's wrong with a 'gay ghetto'? I've seen other sims dedicated to a community. We've got 'vamp ghettos', 'goth ghettos', 'furry ghettos', 'elf ghettos', 'D/s ghettos', and 'gambler ghettos'. I see nothing wrong with sims being themed for a segment of the SL community. Neighborhoods develop in RL like that all the time, some unofficially and some officially.

Boystown in Chicago is an example of an 'officially sanctioned' gay ghetto. Capital Hill in Seattle is an example of an 'unofficial' ghetto. Both serve a similar purpose but have a different 'feel' due to exactly how they formed. Hell my small hometown had 'the project', 'Sin Hill', and 'Main Street'. Each of these neighborhoods attracted a certain type of resident or business over time and as more of one type gathered there it drew more of the same type. Only Main Street was planned by the town, the others just developed through human nature. ANd Sin Hill was the name those of us in 'the project' termed the section of town, on a hill, where all the upper class lawyer/doctor types lived. We were looked down on but there was more crime and scandal among those on Sin Hill than you find in most soap operas.

Hey would a Rocky Horror Picture Show themed sim be OK?

Cristiano, I think you and some other people make some very fundamentally wrong assumptions about my person.

Let me, for sake of opportunism and ass-licking in order have land sales in one mostly American game, do some more advertising:

I am tired of one organization that was formed and financed by American CIA in the 1980s bombing innocent people all over the world. I am talking of so-called "Al Quaida".

I am tired of thousands of innocent children been blasted by bombs and their photos and fate censored from western media. I am talking of Iraqi, Sudanese and Afghan children killed by American cruise missiles.

I am tired that everytime some "Al Quaida" bomb explodes somewhere, the net result of this event after the dust settled seems more business for American oil companies, higher popularity scores for American president, American soldiers stationed in yet another country, yet another pro-Russia regime replaced with one pro-America regime and more power to American spy agencies to control own people and spy on foreign people.

Now 90% of my customer live in USA or Britain. But I don't care and smear this right into your faces because, quite frankly, this all sucks. I have my idea what is right and what is wrong and what happened in the world during past 4 years is very fundamentally wrong. And every day I ask myself if people in some countries just don't realize they are lied to or if they just want to be lied to.

Please never ever again call me opportunist. I feel insulted when people assume my lifestyle or principles could be "bribed" by land sale. I'd rather go out of business tomorrow than subdue who I am and what I believe in to some marketing.

Ack - I was going to stay out, but I just can't stand it!



Actually - what is ironic is that you didn't read the advertisement in question. In the in-world classifieds, Anshe advertises Provincetown under the title of "GLBT Neighbourhood":



So, yes, it is advertised as such. And it is advertised as the GLBT community.



Yes! Though it reminds me that the last time I saw RHPS in a theater, I realized that everyone else in the theater wasn't even born when I saw RHPS in a theater the first time: It was during its debut run in the Village, NYC!

And for the record, I think gay-themed sims are a wonderful idea. I think the more the merrier. And that goes for goth, furry, geeky, etc.... too. And I'm for gay-sims with primarily sexual themes. Just don't advertise to the world that by moving into a gay-sex sim you are "joining the GLBT community".

ACK! I'm going to shut-up now. Honest. Really. Sewing my lips closed. Cutting my fingers off. Smashing my keyboard with a hammer.....