Griefing and gender

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Permalink Reply by Joe Clark (SL: JS Saltwater) on June 3, 2008 at 10:29am

I have a female-gendered alt in SL and have experienced harrassment that my male-gendered alt has not experienced. One was an overly amorous young male who kept wanting me to change into sexier clothing and kept violating my personal space, while the other was an initially friendly person who became verbally abusive and condescending when I disagreed with him on a political point, and whose behavior clearly suggested that women didn't have valid opinions.

Both were my first (and only, so far) experiences with muting someone.

My male avatar has been shot at, pushed, covered in flames, etc. But he gets around more. No, that's not true - the fem alt is pretty well-traveled as well, but she is more careful about her surroundings and will often just avoid social contact if things seem dicey. Though I do have the occasional Lucy Lawless Avenging Angel fantasy about giving some sexual harrassers a taste of their own medicine -- but that seems like trolling and probably violates the ToS.

Some of the griefings have been disturbing, at least initially. Some were actually funny in retrospect. I can imagine how some people would be really hurt or weirded out by sexual griefers, especially.

I am not entirely certain how to approach this with students. Part of me (the male, maybe :) says it's not unlike visiting dicey places in RL, except that no one can be killed or physically injured. I mean, it's that silly virtual reality computer game, right? But I also think it's a great opening to talk about immersion, social reality, etc. when preparing students for an in-world experience. And I would want to arm them with anti-griefing tools and info about reporting, muting, etc.

It's a trite observation, but being in-world as a female really does give this RL boy a taste of the other side of male behavior (nice and not-so-nice) that would be difficult otherwise.

It's too bad Linden doesn't have genderless avis as part of the default set. But I wonder if you could create a sort of student starter avi pack that looked like, say, Aragorn or Iron Man...? Or would that just reinforce the idea that women are at risk?

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Permalink Reply by Sharon Collingwood / Ellie Brewster on June 19, 2008 at 12:21pm

Joe,

How do you keep the balance between facilitating student exploration in SL and calming the nervous administrative types who think our students will be captured by Gorean pirates and never seen again?

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Permalink Reply by Joe Clark (SL: JS Saltwater) on June 30, 2008 at 11:55am

This is something I have no good answer for. I realize the responsibilities that nervous administrators have to legislatures and insurance companies, but that's what they get paid the big bucks for. I get impatient with them when it seems that too often they say No because it is simpler--doesn't require any complex understanding of the phenomenon.

That said, Rosemairta's suggestions below are good ones. It's really ironic--on the one hand, we have the "SL is just pretend" stereotype, which suggests that fears about Gorean kidnappings are awfully silly. On the other hand, we have "SL is Sodom and Gomorrah" suggesting that it's actually pretty real, practically. And of course SL (and RL) is both: much that seems terrifying should be taken with a grain of salt, but there are also real dangers out there. So rather than Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (to which one might add Homeland Security), pragmatic steps like Rosemairta's are great antidotes.

As our local police say on their bumper stickers: Don't be Afraid. Be Alert!

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Permalink Reply by Rosmairta Kilara on June 16, 2008 at 7:09pm

I have only been griefed a couple of times. I haven't noticed a difference in my male and female alts. When the John Edwards headquarters was near us we got weird political ranters and particle spam alot. That led me to learn all the various things one can do as a landowner. :-)

Mostly recently some idiot tried to cage me and a friend and demand Lindens. *rolls eyes* I sat away, he caged me again, still demanding to be paid. I tp'd out and then came back. My friend and I each submitted an abuse report. I don't understand why some people find this fun!

There are some simple things you can teach your students.

0. Don't panic - they can't hurt you or your avatar.

1. Sit down - you can't be pushed if you are sitting.

2. If you are caged you can often get out by sitting on an object outside the cage. And you can often tp away.

3. Spam. Turn off particles so particle spam doesn't show - and tell them. It spoils their fun. If they are sound spamming - mute them.

4. Take their snapshot, save the chat log and file an abuse report.

5. Log off and come back later.

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Permalink Reply by Sharon Collingwood / Ellie Brewster on June 19, 2008 at 11:39am

Those are really practical tips, especially if you add Joe's last point -- you can shapeshift into anything, and it's not as much fun to sexually harrass a robot, a turkey or a hot dog stand. I tend to over react to these things, because I am thinking about my students. A down-to-earth list like this would go a long way in setting out safe guidelines for students.

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Permalink Reply by Joe Clark (SL: JS Saltwater) on June 30, 2008 at 11:58am

I have one of those anti-griefing HUDs that rez a sittable object, and let me tell you it's satisfying when some bozo is griefing you and you just sit there, all Teflon. Biggest problem sometimes is resisting the urge to counter-grief. :-) "That's not a knife -- THIS is a knife."

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Permalink Reply by Annette Pohlke (SL: Max Bergson) on July 11, 2008 at 4:58pm

I completely agree with Rosmairta on this. Keep in mind and make clear to your students that no one can hurt them in SL. In the very worst case you can always log out.

The worst part about RL sexual harassment - at least for me - is the implied threat and the fear: Will this guy take "no" as an answer? Will he become violent, if I turn him down? Will anyone be brave enough to help me, if it comes to the worst? Will the police believe me (again if it comes to the worst)? All this just doesn't exist in SL and it makes me very, very much relaxed, especially in the face of sexual harassment. I can take a good laugh at this idiot where I would be really, really scared IRL.

Griefing and harassment have rarely been a problem for me in SL, as long as I stayed out of newbie areas. Especially sexual harassment was targeted at me almost exclusively from newbies, sometimes even when I was working as a mentor (and wearing an appropriate group title). I think this may be another interesting twist to the harassment and newbies problem. I tend to think that newbies behave like this, because they are not socialised into SL yet and lack a sense for decency, e.g. it took em a while to feel naked when my avatar is naked, so I can understand why other newbies don't see it as harassment when undressing in front of me. So I usually don't take it hard, even if it can be annoying. I assume that the image of Second Life in public media (everyone is in Second Life to have wild sex all the time) contributes to it. Contrary to what people believe, I was hardly ever harassed when spending time in questionable places like clubs with erotic dancing and escorting service. Of course being approached wouldn't count as harassment in those places, but if it happened it was always done in a polite way and a polite "no, thank you" was always accepted. So from my experience it is mostly the newbie places that you should avoid, if harassment is a problem for you.

About male and female avatars: I choose my first name in SL ("Max"), because it was one of the more gender neutral names I could come up with at that point, but I understand that most people rather see it as a male name. My avatar is more often female than male, but I also spend considerable time in Second Life in male form. I didn't notice much of a difference how people react to me in male or female form. I was surely never sexually harassed as a male, but my male avatar gets kicked off someone's land occasionally, something that only once happened to me in female form.

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