I think in terms of relationships, maybe it’s hard because often the emotions end up being real… and thus all of the confused things that go along with romantic relationships. I stick to giving good friendship as I am hopeless at compartmentalisation even in my real world the lines of many of my relationships and places and spaces are blurred… overlaps all over the place. Even then, I still get close to people but I’d love them just the same if they suddenly turned out to fall under some other… um… “label”.

I also was constantly asked my age, expecially when I first joined SL and was meeting a lot of new people. I had the horrifying experience of discovering a guy I dated was underage, so I put my FL picture in my profile after that, hoping to avoid people who were hung up on my age and gender.

While I enjoy trying on different avatars, I find that I am most comfortable being somewhat close to my FL appearance. Making my avatar fatter helped me begin to accept my FL self rather than wishing I could still be a skinny teenager. I also felt uncomfortable wearing a black skin – I wondered if it was insulting to black people for me, as a white woman, to “play” at being black. I’m still not sure about that issue, because being black or gay or whatever in SL that I am not in FL could open my eyes to what people unlike me experience in FL.

For instance, one time I wore an old lady avatar, and I was taken aback by how vicious and mean people were toward me, making jokes about sagging skin and incontinence. There is such pressure to look beautiful in a Barbie way, that anyone looking “normal” is seen as a criticism.

I have a male avatar, but I hardly ever use him. I feel very uncomfortable trying to pass as male, even though the idea intrigues me. I, and many other women I’ve talked to, say that being male in SL is a freeing experience for them, that they feel less judged on their sexual attractiveness and are taken more seriously as men.

In RL I’m nowhere near the look of my av, it’s just how I like him to look. Of course, I’d love to be very handsome and super fit. The only thing we have in common is our height (I am taller than most people in RL too), and our clothing styles (I really do wear a lot of what Gahum does, and I’d wear everything else he owns too). He is an idealized representation of me in a virtual space.

It is ironic for Prok to question Vint’s RL gender especially since Prok is a male av with a female owner (you can easily see photos in Flickr). I suppose the interest comes from Prok being called out a couple of years ago as really a woman.

@ Loaf: Yeah! I know not all the men using a female avatar uses that kind of female appearance! Just wanted to play a bit with stereotypes (the bad part is normally stereotypes are not fair). Actually the RLmen using SLfemale avatars “publically” use to have quite nice avatars, Torley is one example… and some others.

@ Chesnut: Personally i don’t know if all the girls with big boobs and oily skins are men in RL, but i think most are (i used the words “think” and “most” in the post). And i think that becuase normally that’s more a masculine model of female beauty than a femenine one. Of course there are women who may like this model of beauty, and that’s totally respectable.
As i said in the blog i think everybody can choose his/her appearance in SL, just wanted to remark that question regarding the “gender issue”. If you feel more comfortable i can change “I think most of the bimbo-giant-boobs-oily-skin-a-bit-too-flirty girls in SL are men in RL. for “Possibly some of the bimbo-giant-boobs-oily-skin-a-bit-too-flirty girls in SL are men in RL.”, that will work the same for what i tried to mean. As i said to Loaf, stereotypes use to be not fair.

Sincerly, with that sentence was not pretending to insult nobody, anyway i’d like to apologize and of course, correct the sentence.

It would be a happier world if people didn’t associate deception or some peverse fantasty with having an avatar that doesn’t look physically like the RL person, but that will probably stay for as long as people discriminate by race, sexual orientation or the many other excuses for distrusting each other.

Remember though, not all guys who make a female avi have the boob slider at 100% and look like they’ve stepped out of a vat of oil

Good post Raul, and a Happy New Year to you!

That is more than stupid, that would be like getting upset because people using furry avatars in SL are not cats in RL.

Best. Sentence. EVER!!