Is that even possible?

What the hell is that?

So here’s another draft that may or may not make it to publishing, but recently I’ve done a little roaming through a few RP Sims and people just like to point things out to me.  Often times there is a little scoffing involved, ’cause c’mon… ya know?  So it brings me to this post.

First I want to mention that I did cover “Plausibility” in one of my workshop pages here:  “Plausibility”

But this might point out other angles.  And while I don’t wish to scoff at my scoffing friends, this time my rant is towards the nay-sayers.

So there we are walking around an RP sim and some dude is dragging a chick around by a leash.  She’s wearing nothing but a leather harness, a ball gag, and a collar.  Almost immediately the IM’s start, and I can’t even imagine how they were flying amongst other friends at the place–because yes, the place was full of good RP’rs, and Mary Sues and their Marty Stu boyfriends (or the other way around).  “OMG, you see that?  Why do that here?”

You could argue that it was neither the time nor place.  No, this was NOT a BDSM sex sim.  This was not some BDSM embellished RP sim.  BDSM was NOT part of the storyline in this sim–but it was a somewhat dystopian environment–and face it, BDSM exists in the real world.  I HAVE seen RL people on a leash walking down Duval Street in Key West.  I haven’t seen it in San Francisco yet (would help if I got out there), but I’m told it’s not unusual.

Does not happen IRL at all! Right?

 

What these RP’rs are completely missing is that, instead of OOC whispering in IM’s about this, they could be whispering IC’ly about this and completely missed the opportunity to add color to their RP and environment.

Was this scenario “plausible” (worthy of belief)?

Yes.  Inappropriate perhaps, inciting, conversation worthy.  But do we not have those incidents in real life?  Because folks are ALWAYS well-behaved and appropriate in real life, right?  I don’t even know where we get such ideas for RP, I mean we are all just…

Perfect!

 

I’ll tell you what isn’t plausible.  What isn’t believable is that everyone would ignore it.  I mean sure, in real life, presented with such a situation many would try to pretend it wasn’t happening, but they would not be able to NOT sneak a peek.  There is always an ass that would say something snide, or perhaps someone who was involved in the “lifestyle” that would approach and say something.  Someone might say something about indecency, someone might cover their child’s eyes and run away, someone might scream about morality and call the cops.  And of course, authorities might come by and issue warnings/arrests for public indecency or whatever.  After that, folks could have gone home and whispered about it to their friends and family members.  “You’ll never guess what we saw today”  Not to mention the whole mess of legalities and crap that would come after if the cops were involved.

Instead we focus on the fact that this person is “looking for attention” and how adamant we are in not giving it to them.  We are just going to RP drinking another cup of coffee because we don’t like it when someone draws attention to themselves and away from us, huh?  I’ve heard that complaint many times.  Anytime someone tried to make a big ongoing scene in which they were center/victim/star it was allegedly all for attention–even if this person was doing it as a way to provide RP for a larger group of people.  Chief of Police gets kidnapped by Mafia.  Police involved, bounty hunters involved, criminals involved, a house gets blow up, firemen involved.  She gets beat up, doctors and nurses and hospital involved.  But… nupe.  So many would still whine about how she did it for attention.

Whatever!

So what if we rp’d this out?  Whispered IC’ly amongst ourselves?  “What the hell is wrong with these people?”  Added one more thing to our character’s experiences “I once saw a girl on a leash…”  Tried to interfere and caused a commotion?  Face it, not all RP scenarios have to be about you (they are about ME dammit!).  What would be the harm and playing along?

Yes, this character scenario was most definitely “plausible”.

 

Okay, so maybe that song is not the same, but the post reminded me of the title and I wanted to hear it.

Another sim I was in allowed furries… in a totally non-plausible way.  Plausible would have been that we were in an alternate universe and furries were a part of our lives.  But in this sim they tried to appease furries and furry-sympathizers by letting them in provided it was understood they were humans wearing a costume.  So in essence, we had a city that had college football mascots running around in costume 24-7.  Some were cops.  So we had a few guys, in furry costumes, with their police uniform over that.

 

Totally plausible to have this walk up to your door when you call the cops over a break-in.

 

Look, all I’m saying is before you write it off, work it out in your head.  Could this have happened?  What would my character do?  How should we react?  How involved do I want to get?

Just quit it and flippin’ RP already.

 

On The Scale of SL

Pet Peeve No. 9

9.  People that argue about their AV height.

I told you I would eventually get through all my pet peeves, and I wanted to do this one because of some things I saw this week, but it’s been hard to stay on topic while writing it.   I think mainly because there are a few ramifications on this issue that bother me, especially the suspicions surrounding WHY someone would argue this and the places where I’ve seen these folks.  So I’m going to do my best to stay on track here and completely block out the other creepy stuff that tickles my brain and makes me really want to get on a soap box.  Because frankly, after doing a little research I realize I’m not the only one that feels this way, and the forums are full of people that feel the same.

And before you hunt me down in SL and flame me and point fingers at me, I want to say that I do dig the DDBG scene, and I have no issue with a full-grown, adult-looking avi dressing/acting cutesy.  My avi is not super-tall, certainly shorter than the guys.  I am short in real life (5′ 2″), and I like being short.  And for the record, I’ve seen plenty of short or petite avis with small boobs that dress and look mature and I would never question their character’s age.  I also don’t have beef with someone playing a child in a child-friendly environment.  Aaaand, if I ever went anywhere where my avatar’s height/age was questioned, I would NOT argue, I would adjust or LEAVE.  It’s their fucking house!

But this isn’t supposed to be about the ambiguity of the apparent age of an avatar… right?  So, let’s not go there, shall we?  Let’s stick to this “scale” argument that people so like to use to explain WHY they have a short avi–which in a lot of cases is just an excuse for the apparent age of their avatar, but right… not about that!

Every now and then we run into a profile that has some long-winded rant about avatar height.  Chances are that it’s there because they’ve been questioned and accused on several occasions on their character’s apparent age,  (or a shit-ton) so they are tired of explaining themselves.  The person often times argues that being 7′ 0″ tall is “unrealistic” or “freakish”.  They stomp their Mary-Jane shoes  (oops! sorry, I wasn’t going there, huh?) and pout, and adamantly deny being a “child avatar” , and then they add to that that just because they don’t have ginormous boobs and ass it doesn’t make them a child.  They also go on about how they want to be more like their real life selves, have their height be more like their own.  If the pick was this short… eh.. but it’s not, the page is often FULL of excuses, explanations and mathematical calculations on scale and what-the-fuck-ever.

So, lets agree with this person for just a moment, they do have some quasi-valid points, so let’s just humor them, huh?

1.   A foot is a foot, a meter is a meter.

2.  7′ 0″ IS unusually tall for a human female (or male for that matter).

3.  5′ 6″ – 5′ 8″ is a more average height for a human, AMERICAN, female.

NOT an accurate depiction of a female Avatar on Earth

If you ask me, and you didn’t, but you are reading my stuff, and well… yeah, I get to say what I want,  but if you ask me the point that these people are missing, like completely, like… by a few meters/feet, is that “scale” is about perception and necessity.   Different ethinicities/gene pools have different “average heights”.

Check out this table of average heights around the world.

The “average height” of a male in the Netherlands is 6’0″, but the average height of a man in Guatemala is 5′ 2″, for females it’s 5′ 6″ and 4′ 6″ respectively.   So, a woman from the Netherlands visiting Guatemala is “freakishly tall” compared to the local women.  A foot is a foot, a meter is a meter, but that doesn’t matter here, does it?  They are being measured with the same unit.  They say the ideal kitchen counter height is one that you can rest your bent elbows on comfortably without having to bend.   If this is the case, then they would be much much shorter in Guatemala than they would be in the Netherlands.

So… if we see that Second Life isn’t ANYWHERE on Earth, or maybe treat it like  its a different country–why not?  It has it’s own currency, and if we see that avatars are NOT human–they appear to be humanoid, mostly (lots of other stuff out there) but they are not flesh and bone, they have a completely different genetic make up (pixels!), you’ll realize (or not, because well, you don’t want to), that your argument on avatar height is invalid.  “Average height” in SL is different than “average height” elsewhere, just like average height in the Netherlands is different than average height in Guatemala.  Our furniture, cars, and other items in SL, are  “scaled” to fit an avatar’s “average height”.

So, like a Guatemalan visiting the Netherlands, YOUR avatar is freakishly short among the other avatars.  YOU look like a little girl sitting on a California-King size bed, especially when you wear your plaid skirt, Mary Jane shoes and pigtails (sorry, went there again!).  So, if we were to translate scales from SL to RL, with the ‘average’  7′ 0″ male avatar comparing to average 5′ 11″  male human, that would make you maybe 3′ 5″, or 4′ at best, and would be charged the kid’s price at Golden Corral–every time, without even being asked (my daughter is 4′ 11″ and she was still asked at 18), and would not be let into any clubs without your Driver’s License, Birth Certificate, Passport, an affidavit from the doctor that birthed you AND a carbon dating test.

No, those aren’t children, and no, that’s not a giant, and no it’s not Guatemala, and they are NOT SL avatars either.

And I haven’t even touched on the fact that you know what?   Part of the argument is how they want to be more like their real life selves–and I don’t see any acne, saggy boobs, flat butts, bow-legs, crooked noses, thunder-thighs, weak-chins, etc, etc on these avis.  You made your height more like your real life self, wanting realism, but… is that a puppy dog tail butt plug and ears you are wearing all over SL?  You do that in real life too?

The advantage that you have in SL over RL, is that while you can’t stop people from offering you the kids menu in real life,  you can stop the people of SL from pestering you, accusing you, and banning you.   You can delete that pick off your profile and use it for something more useful, and you can stop arguing by simply adjusting the sliders on your appearance editor.

It’s fantasy.  Get over it.

Avatar Snobbery

Pet Peeve #4

I have a list of Pet Peeves on my SL Profile, and I’m guessing that I’m going to eventually dissect most of them here in my blog.  Maybe it will serve as some sort of therapy.  Maybe after talking them out with myself I could say… ” eh.. that’s not so bad, I can delete that one.”    So today I’m going to tackle #4:

4. Guess I am an avatar snob. So people that hit on good looking avis, but don’t do anything about their own and scream ‘shallow’ at those that do.

I want to point out that the key thing here is that ending part “…scream ‘shallow’ at those that do.”    If you don’t want to do anything about your avatar, or want to sit there and claim you want to be liked for your brains, that is perfectly fine.  But don’t shun me (or other people), or call me shallow because I do fix up my avi.  So for the record, I am not shunning a less than perfect avatar, or a noob avatar, which by the way have come a long long way from what us SL Old Timers called a “noob” avatar:

 

Meet The Noobs, ca. 2006

 

Yes, I spend L$ on my avatar, it doesn’t mean that you have to.   I want to say that I have personally experienced this more than once, making it a valid rant and pet peeve, but the first time is always the best (unlike some other things in life), and the most memorable.  What had happened was that some noob in a freebie tux IM’d me to hit on me.   He looked JUST like the guy in the picture above, only in a tux.  No biggie, no harm.   I tend to respond to these things as a way to break the ice and don’t necessarily respond to the “hitting on” part.   I sorta field that type of thing and often pretend “I just didn’t catch that”.  At first it was okay.  The conversation seemed entertaining enough, casual, easy.  SL blah blah blah, do you know of places that blah blah blah?   That type of stuff.   I’ve also put in quite a bit of time at Help Island in my day, and, despite my rants, I enjoy SL very much, and do not pass up the opportunity to help someone new gain their footing in this vast prim wonderland.

Now, this a RANT, so you know that things did not remain pleasant.  Far from it.  Things got pretty silly.  Correction, things got pretty STUPID when this “gentleman” (What? He was wearing a tux!) began to demand that I address him a certain way and adopt certain poses while in his presence.  Like WTF?  We were having such a nice conversation and out of the blue, BAM, I’m supposed to call him “Sir”, emphasis on the capital “S”.

Okay, some of you might be thinking that I really should to stop going to these places, but we are not here to discuss my penchant for going to “inappropriate” places.  Focus, people!

So, at first I tried to laugh-off these things as if he were just joking. The guy was obviously new and had spent all his noob days in some BDSM hang out and all he had managed to learn about SL was online BDSM Lifestyle Protocol, so I didn’t want to just jump down his throat, ya know what I mean?  With this in mind I tried to kinda nudge him away from that and simply chat.  Well, that was just not going to work.   I was reminded that I was being disrespectful by not addressing him as “Sir” or giving in to his demand that I drop to my pixels knees in front of him.  Needless to say he blew a prim gasket when I told him, in the clichéd ‘no uncertain terms’, that I was not his submissive nor did I intend to be, and that if he was incapable of simply having conversation with me then I would close the IM and he could go on his merry way.  The “gentleman” got so bent out of shape that he went on this long, wordy spiel in which he ACCUSED ME of being shallow.  He CLAIMED that I thought myself some sort of SL Princess (THOUGHT?  Obviously, he did he not know who he was talking to) who would not kneel to him because HE ‘looked like a noob’.  I was a disgrace to all submissives and women everywhere (Be Still My Fucking Heart).

I want to note that I do realize now that perhaps this was not his first attempt at picking up  his own little virtual sex-slave, and he had probably been turned down for his appearance by someone (or 2 or 3 someones) a bit more callous and not as nice as I (WHAT? I am nice!).    I also want to mention that his appearance was never brought up during OUR conversation–at all, nor whether I considered myself submissive or was entertaining the notion of latching myself to a Dom so he could get me a nifty, scripted, prim collar.  (Being such a Princess, any of you entertaining this idea need to keep in mind I need one that’s at least L$600, a freebie just won’t do).

I then proceeded to tell him that if anyone was shallow in this conversation it was he.  That he had IM’d me first, and he had done so because he had been attracted to my avatar’s appearance.  He did not know me, and had no way of knowing if I even spoke enough English to hold a conversation.  My Avi was HAWT, period.   She had long, flowing, expensive, red, flexi-hair (from Sirena, I might add, all the rage in that day), had an amazing premium skin with freckles and all (Celestial, thank you very much), and a top-of-the-line AO that made her stand and walk all sexy and stuff.  On top of that, I added, I did not see him going after the poor noob chick in the purple sweater (see picture above), the one with the AOless-constipated-penguin-walk and system hair, and demand that SHE kneel at his feet.  He responded with a lengthy rant that I can’t remember because frankly, I did not read it.

By the way, I rarely mute someone.  I’d much rather let them wear themselves out and waste their time typing and typing and typing and attempting to CAPS LOCK me to death, and wondering if I’m even reading it because they are not getting a response from me.  When the IM tab stops flashing I simply close it.  Oh, you told me, huh?

Sometimes, like now, I think back in a not-so-fondly-manner and wonder what happened to him.  I wonder if maybe, feeling so shunned by me, SL Princess, he just took his constipated-penguin-default-walk-pixel-ass (and he was in a tux, so all the better), and simply walked off into the sunset never to be seen again.

So let me say this.  I will be honest.  I like eye-candy as much as the next person, I am not gonna lie and be all hypocritical and act like I’m better than anyone else because I say I look beyond that Belleza skin.  And while there are some really great “freebie” skins, hair and clothes out there and there is no reason for anyone to walk around looking broken, premium skin is not a pre-req for RP with me.  I have mentioned before that I come from chat room RP–we had no visuals beyond the imagery that formed in our head according to our fellow rp’rs descriptions and bios.  I later RP’d in The Sims Online, which looked like The Original Sims (not the new nifty Sims with appearance sliders) and if any of you have ever played the Original Sims or were in TSO, you would know that you really didn’t have but a handful of avatars to chose from, and the only thing that made you unique and set you apart from all the other cookie-cutter sims/avatars was your name, what you said, and how you said it.  We all LOOKED THE SAME.  So I will say it again:  what works for me the best is the written word.  A HAWT looking avi perks interest, no lie, but then they go and type something like “U got a fine a$$”.  Then it goes something like this:

 

See what I did there? Capital “S”!!

 

 

On a side note,  here’s a challenge for all you fashion bloggers out there, a great freebie look.  Everything on your avatar must be free, off the marketplace with links on the blog. If it’s already been done then link me please!

So now that all that is said, I hope you realize that my rant is about true snobbery, and that goes two ways.   The noob-looking avatar looking down on the premium one who gave in to the SL peer pressure to look hawt, and the ones that think themselves so hot that they WON’T RP with someone because their avatar is not premium.  Or maybe what it really is about is someone transferring their RL insecurities and feelings of inadequacy to Second Life, and taking them out on others, which to me is true snobbery.   Fuck if I know.  I don’t claim to be a psychologist (just an SL Princess).  Just sayin’ have fun and don’t hate on me because I made a pretty avi that you obviously liked looking at it and now you can’t touch it because you are a douchebag or an asshat–not because you didn’t have a few thousand L$ to splurge on a skin.

And you know what?  I’ve had some great RP with noobish looking avatars.  So you lose again.  Give it a shot.  It only feels kinky the first time.

In conclusion, I’m not deleting this Pet Peeve from my profile.   #4 stays.

But what happens when an avatar is purposely not hot?  That, gentle readers, is the subject for another rant.