Make love, not war

My RL friend Anna has a wit that surprises me sometimes. Anna is a proponent of World of Warcraft. She prefers it there than in SL.

So, when I told her that December lover used to spend more time in WoW but has recently spent more time in SL with me, she gushed, "Awww... the poster children for the 'Make Love, Not War' campaign."

:-D

I wonder if Linden Labs Marketing is listening....

Carpe diem

I wasn't supposed to take on a lover this month. I was planning to take a break. It's a short month anyway, because I would be offline over the holidays.

But, then, during a live music event at the Hideaway, he appeared at the doorway. And he stood there for a long while, looking like a newb who didn't know what to do. Ever helpful little me, I IM'd him to come in and gave him directions on how to start dancing. And we started chatting. After the show, we spent hours dancing at the Blue Note. That night, he didn't get much sleep. Nor the next three nights.

I told him about my history in SL, about how I tend to have a new lover every month. He agreed it would be better to wait until I returned in January before starting an affair. But on the third day, he said it: Carpe diem. And with that, he became my December lover.

He was born more than a year ago, but he rarely came in-world. A gentleman who respects women. A kindred soul who makes me laugh without even trying. A lover who understands what a drawn-out foreplay does to a woman. And, surprisingly, a SLirgin. Well, at least, until last night. ;-)

Someone called him simpatico. I agreed. He is sweet. He said women don't fall for sweet guys. I said women stay with sweet guys. I don't think he believed me.

But maybe he'll break the one-lover-a-month cycle I've been on since I came to SL. Maybe this sweet guy will still be around for January too.

Meanwhile, like him, I, too, seize the day.

Trophy avatars

I've noticed that a lot of men use the Picks tab in their profiles, not for landmarks of their favorite places, but for pictures of their favorite women. And I mean WOMEN; that is, in the plural.

I don't get it. What are these men trying to say? "Here are my conquests"? And that makes them attractive to other women how? As a woman, would I want to be just another trophy to be displayed in a man's trophy case?

October lover once tried to put my picture in his Picks tab; I said no. For one, it's like putting a claim on me and saying, "She's my girl. Hands off!" which would have been fine if we were exclusive, but we never were.

Maybe, that trophy display was meant for other men. But how do we know that the guy actually slept with those women? Heck, a guy can take any random woman's picture and add it to his trophy case. And she may not even know he exists!

So, c'mon, guys. We're not fooled unless you actually invest L$25 and she agrees to put YOUR name on HER partner text box. And if you want to have more than one confirmed partner to display in your profile, then talk to Linden about multiple partner text boxes. They'll appreciate the extra income.

Or, at least, get the girl to put YOUR picture in HER Picks tab, so we can confirm that you actually know each other.

Me? I'm renting out space in my Picks tab -- L$500/week/picture. Of course, the description would have only your name and a link to this blog entry. :-)

Any takers? ;-D

Into the fourth

Maybe it's because of the history of computer gaming that people behave the way they do in SL. In the first generation of computer games, we competed with the machine. In the second generation, we played with other people by shooting each other down or slashing each other with a sword. And here we are, in the third generation, where we use each other.

I understand that it is easy to forget that we are not the only thinking and feeling souls in SL. Sometimes, it's as though we're interacting with machines. And, even if we do keep in mind that there are other souls in here, we behave as though they are exactly like us, that they think the same thoughts and feel the same emotions.

But they don't necessarily. In fact, we encounter more diversity in SL than we do in real life. In real life, most of us have learned to blend in with the communities we live and work in. To a degree, we share the same culture, the same language, the same customs, even the same beliefs and principles. And we rarely encounter people who have nothing in common with us, because we don't frequent the same places that they do. But, in SL, all of humanity's diversity is thrown into the same pot.

Yes, after we get tired of exploring all of SL, we finally settle on a number of places that we enjoy. Still, the likelihood of meeting people who are very different from us is much greater than the likelihood of meeting them in real life. And for that reason, we need more tolerance in SL than in real life.

And an integral part of that tolerance includes respect for the other person as a human being. We may not agree with their views. We may not approve of their actions. But they deserve some respect anyway. Respect for their humanness, respect for their free will.

I have, in fact, met very many good souls in SL. So, in spite of one or two bad experiences, I still have hope about SL and MMORPGs in general. Maybe we're coming into the fourth generation of gaming, where we really are creating an ideal virtual world, not just ideal in the visible and the auditory, but also ideal in its soulfulness.