I have to admit, I find the idea one could be bored on Second Life extremely perplexing.
I'm not a person who needs interaction with others a lot of the time. I enjoy it, overall, but also find it exhausting. There's so much to track, so much to do, and so often I'm being the sympathizing listener who offers reassurance and care. I also, well... to put it simply, I enjoy my own company. Part of me wonders if the very differing responses they have had to me comes down to the difference between introverts and extroverts. When I'm bored in Second Life, I log off, or I do something else. Usually when I'm caught up in IMs, there's no one present where my avatar is - or I'm in a place where I don't know people, so I'm not expected to respond.
I commented in a previous post that I was usually alone, in avatar, while on Second Life and a friend was horrified, apologizing to me. It took some explaining to get across that I preferred it that way. On my own I don't need to check with someone before I teleport to the next place, or worry that they're bored while I'm chasing things around a sim, or check with before I teleport home to sort through some of my enormous inventory. On my own, if something catches my fancy I can linger, or if it bores me I can move on. With someone else present, there is always the thought in the back of my head that I need to check with them, make sure they're ok, communicate and be connected in a way I don't feel I need to when they aren't present. IMs are more like text messages or emails - if you drop one for a while, an apology suffices. Ignoring someone present in avatar, by contrast, seems much more rude.
And so often I'm alone, chatting with people in IM or Groups but physically heading all over the place. For example, when I was taking these pictures I was in several conversations, but there was no one around - and indeed no one in sim until someone teleported in far below me. Most of my pictures, even if there are people in sim, are aimed so they won't show up. There have been a few times when I've been taking a long shot and waited impatiently, for what seemed like a long time, for people to move out of the damn way!
In the end, especially for photography, I prefer an empty sim.
Sometimes I'll listen to other people's conversations - text or voice - but that's relatively rare. Often I find the conversation insipid or boring, and my tendency is to not remain doing things I find dull in the hopes something more interesting will trip over my toes. Recently I had an ex-acquaintance complain to me about a conversation he found boring, only he felt the need to coach it in incredibly sexist terms - making claims about the self-esteem and sexual orientation of the women he was listening to based on their gender and topic of conversation (breast physics). What struck me later, reflecting on the exchange, which did not end amiably, was how he had seemed almost trapped by the location, judging those around him based on a conversation he found boring, and yet remaining to be bored for some unknown reason.
There have been times I've had inane chatter scrolling past me, but I was almost always ignoring it. Likewise, I can't imagine remaining on Second Life when I felt bored. I often, however, change what I'm doing when I feel bored. While watching movies, I'll sort my inventory. When I get tired of inventory sorting, I'll go to a new sim and take some pictures, or go to one of the sims with active games and try to solve them. If I want to interact with people, I'll start trouble in one of my chattier groups, or go in character in a roleplay. If I'm feeling neglected or ignored, I'll poke a good friend or two that I'm reasonably certain will want to pay attention to me. There seem to be so many possible options to me, that the idea of becoming bored rarely occurs, and when it does it's almost always me being in a snit.
Which is a long-winded way of saying, I guess... check through my blog. You might find fun things to do it you're bored. If what's boring you is your choices, though, there's nothing I can do about that.
( More pictures here. )
Credits:
Eyes: De La Soul, RooMee Eyes - Rainbow
Ears: Illusion, Mystic Fairy Ear
Skin: De La Soul, Charlie - Cream Sparkle
Wings: Fancy Fairy, Azarelle
Hair: Truth, Kalia - driftwood
Dress: LeeZu, Aimee Gown - champagne
Necklace: Wicked Dolls, Pearls & Diamons
Poses: Glitterati
Location: The CLockwork Kingdom
Light Settings: [TOR] SCIFI Blue Sun Warmed
Photographed by Deoridhe Quandry
Post processing: Cropping only
In my defense (and I'm not posting this to /grief/, but to /clarify/) it was not sexism. My comments were based off a number of persons whom I had observed for some time, and a cultural phenomenon I see in /both/ genders, but which in this case happened to be exemplified by female avatars (god knows what their gender was out of game). What I was critical of was people developing a /hubris/ as a result of shallow flatteries given to them about their physical appearance. And yes, people siting around bragging about their "physics", the degree of skin revealed, and their incessant love-affairs, and how supposedly "easy" it is to seduce the male gender, I think warrants some criticism. If you disagree with me, that is one thing. But to call me /sexist/ or a /bigot/, and have that become the focus of your disapproval, is grossly fallacious.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, as a male on Second Life (or in the Western world in general), I find myself constantly subjected to sexist comments and expectations, ie., stereotypes of me being, by sheer virtue of my virility, someone who is easily seduced, lustful, stupid, and who is expected to flatter women. Or, if none of these are seen in me, stereotypes begin to surface that qualifies me as a homosexual. These stereotypes are born from certain cultural phenomenon that I had seen exemplified in the Sim I happened to have been visiting at that moment. I thought you may have been a good interlocutor to discuss this, as you usually are with many other subjects, but apparently I was wrong, or was I?
Mind you, this is not to say that physical appearance is unimportant, or that I don't appreciate it aesthetically, or as a means of expression/creativity -- but to develop hubris from sheer flattery (as I mentioned above), is what I was pointing to in our discussion.
And yes, it was /incredibly/ rash of you to rush into a decision to call me "sexist bigot", and interpret everything in that conversation within that context, (then flip the bird? I mean really, Deo.) Also, for reference to our conversation -- there is significant difference between caricature and character. I'm really surprised, having known you for nearly three years, that you would resort to such strawmanning.
However, in the heat of passion, I understand interpretive mistakes are possible. Contact me in-world when you are feeling level-headed.
Oh for the gods' bloody sake (just pulled this out of my spam filter).
ReplyDeleteI'll just repeat the entire conversation and people can decide for themselves, though I must say I'm impressed by how quickly you went from "I'm a good, liberal man" to "sexism is worse for me because OMG it is".