The problem with the concept of "child-like" avatar
PixelPrinces Resident
Letting the community to decide on this is a bad idea because in a modern society the witch hunting mob justice has been replaced by the rule of rational law for a good reason.
Some people will use your chest size or height as the defining factor and others dont even want to see avatars having a cute round face on an adult body because their definition of an adult face is sunken-in cheeks and manly jaw line. It is all vague and up in the air and the most unhinged voices tend to be the loudest and dominant, so there needs to be some assurance that if an avatar is not an intentional representation of a literal child, it should not matter what it may look like to who, ageplay rules should not apply to avatars who do not have clothing or accessories generally associated with children or expressing child like speech and behaviors that are necessary for to fit the textbook definition of ageplay. As it is now, it makes life difficult for everyone involved, people whos avatar some karen deemed "child-like", pressure and headache for sim owners on who to let in, communities being wholesale banned form places, everyone on the edge about it, this schizophrenic zeitgeist is bad for everyone's mental health.
Anime avatars are sometimes mistaken for something they arent by people that do not understand anime. Anime facial features such as a round face and large eyes or more realistic japanese body proportions such as a more realistic height and chest size are mistaken for "child-like" features when there are no such intention.
Also this needs clarification "Note: Merely having a childlike avatar does not violate this policy. It is not our intent to banish childlike avatars in and of themselves."
So merely having an avatar that some misinformed person deems "child-like" does not violate this policy in in terms of adult activity or general terms of this type of avatar simply existing? Does this mean adult activity is allowed?
During the governance meeting "presenting as under 18" was thrown around in regards to avatar appearances, with no clarification given on what does that mean or who decides if what your avatar is "presenting" to be, is it up to the user or an arbitrary third party decision, and is "presenting as someone under 18" mean the same as "child-like" ? or are "child-like" avatars ok but the "presenting" ones not?
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FantasmoX Resident
The subject has given me headache recently, because I saw a number of
people getting banned for alleged age play, who surely are no pedos.
I would not assume that elderly women (IRL) are highly suspicious for that, and if such cases repeat themselves, questions arise.
The perception is, that one can get banned at any moment, just for a maybe even malicious report, even be tricked into something, and no appropriate right to be heard is granted.
Over night, potentially thousands of dollars invested into growing a sim and roleplay community are gone, a whole social network is gone etc. , and if it is unjust, you have no way to appeal (I heard that from all sources that they never get more than automated replies).
I certainly see a huge gap between what is stated about the appeal process and how it actually presents itself really.
It is difficult to judge "from the looks" if an avatar is "underage".
I would say it certainly is impossible to say, without a legal document, if somebody is a mid to late teen or early twen. One can guess, yes, but that can be completely wrong.
It may be not possible to find wordings that are accurate enough.
The real problem imho is the way the thing is being enforced.
Need it always be the huge life-long ban hammer, for the lightest cases?
Is there no benefit of the doubt?
There is a huge difference between actual age play (I have no problem what so ever with strict bans in such cases) and different judging of appearance or even maybe unawareness of people about the latest developments.
Lets face it, residents don't read the ToS every second day.
I do not understand why the tool of "warning ban" is not used in less severe cases and I certainly do not understand why the right to be heard is not granted.
Its not that SL had too many residents who invest themselves in SL. Why frying those, without real need?
Kobold Fairey
I haz an issue wiff dis all da time.... As a neko, who speaks with an accent, i have on occasion been asked to leave because people or the owner of the sim thinks i am age playing, which i am not. Just living my SL life as a kitten. i just leave. it is their sim their monies. no one yet has reported me to the LL which i guess is my luck.... Anyway this is dangerous on many levels, i truly think that either way things will make people mad.... one can hope though sanity will prevail and the truly deviant willl not find a home in SL
Bleuhazenfurfle Resident
This whole issue is frightening, and hitting
way
more than just SL… I've heard a lot about credit card and payment companies pushing this line, and threatening to not provide payment services to companies that do not hard-line against this sort of stuff. I would be interested in knowing if that's what's going on here, too.Most of the people I know who adopt a little stance, do so because they have been hurt by other adults for a good portion of their life (often including their adult life), and getting to "regress" to a time of comfort and innocence is actively therapeutic, and having their safe spaces stripped away punishes them, when they are doing nothing at all wrong. Another case I know, is an adult who due to physical disability, is consigned to wear diapers, and as part of accepting that, and other deformities that give them a childlike appearance, they adopted ageplay as a way to both self-normalise, and simultaneously riff off of their very real life condition for levity and fun — it's a means to avoid the crippling depression that hits them every time they look in a mirror. And the list of very much sane and reasonable reasons ageplay and littles are a thing, just goes on and on. (And I'm saying this as someone who a decade ago, was in the "burn all ageplay" camp, too.)
The littles I know
all
hate it when someone poses as a caregiver, but all they really want is "sex with kids", but they're afraid to report such people for fear of simultaneously outing themselves as a little, and this all seems to make that a whole lot worse, too. It seems to me that many people who were molested as children, were told by the adult that they themselves would get in trouble if anyone found out, and being a child, they believed it, only later to realise it was the other way around. This nonsense makes such abuse real
, now, if you are presenting as a child, you
are the one who will be punished, not the actual perpetrator.Admittedly, it does complicate issues when at the end of the day, these people are all adults, too, and many (but not all) have the same needs as any other adults, they just chose to present themselves in a way that makes some people a little uncomfortable. And I too often worry about the "caregivers" that are a little overly interested in them, but even there many littles I know of reject caregivers that are overly interested in them purely because they are a child avatar — why is everyone so ready to punish people for having a child avatar, when it's the adults fawning over them that are the ones we should be worried about. It used to be cis people wanting to punish gay/lesbians for "making them feel gay" — kinda feels like this is just more of the same. "I have pedo thoughts that make me scared to get caught, so I want all littles gone so I don't have those thoughts any more". Littles are not the problem, the pedo's are, everyone just wants to ban the littles because it's easier, and who cares about those weird people anyhow, right? Not like their minority deviant needs matter anyhow, right? This feels to me, like gay/lesbian/black persecution all over again. Being non-straight is gradually been accepted, being of colour too, the BDSM community too, so the tyrants and bullies are looking for someone new to abuse, and they found it in the little community — the last bastion of un-normalised deviance.
No doubt the furries will be next, then we'll get back to those gay/lesbian people again, and maybe the colours too after that, until the only thing left is nice normal straight cis white people, and then we can start picking on them for being slightly too pink, or their nose being a little too long, or blond hair being a little too sexy, or… This nonsense never ends until you start going after the perpetrators, rather than blaming the victims.
For the record, I'm a furry, and I still myself struggle with the whole little concept. But I have the good grace to acknowledge that's because of my own past (having been abused some), and the social prejudices I've grown up with, and I for one refuse to allow my own insecurities to be someone else's problem.