Before I post too many more things, I would like to make a few points about transgenderism in SL and about myself.
There are three types of people who "pretend" to a gender in Second Life that is different than the one they were physically born with:
1) People who want a opposite-gender avatar for role-playing purposes (non-sexual)
2) People who want a opposite-gender avatar for sexual purposes (this probably accounts for half of SL's so-called "lesbians." Not knocking my true sisters, just the straight dudes who use their avi for virtual "girl on girl" action.)
and . . . (drum roll)
3) People who are using an opposite gender avatar to explore their own RL gender identity.
For those who may be confused about me, I am #3. I became a "female" upon joining SL initially because I didn't want the hassle I experience in every day life. Within days, I realized something quite different as the behaviors I had always repressed were suddenly unleashed -- that I had discovered something truly wonderful about myself: that I am a woman who just happens to inhabit a male physical body.
I do not "pretend" or "role-play" or try to make other's lives more difficult. I am trying to live a life in this metaverse that I may never get to enjoy in the real.
Saturday, July 7, 2007
Me, Myself, & I
My name. I sign it everywhere -- my job, credit card receipts, deliveries to home and work. It's this thing that I own but am not completely attached to.
It doesn't look like me, it doesn't sound like me -- it's actually quite weird. I'm named after my father, and the name itself is a bit old, a bit long, and it doesn't flow off the tongue very easily. I was embarrassed of it as a child, and would spit it out quickly in hopes that the name-asker would skip over me quickly.
They never did. They would repeat it, looking at it oddly before scanning the room to see what unfortunate bastard answered to it.
But, even more than that, it has always seemed uncomfortable. It is a man's name, and I've never known exactly who that man was. When it slides out of my mouth now, my mind tries to form an image of the man such a name might represent -- and it invariably has never represented me.
Since birth, though, I have been blessed with a very short nickname (my first and last being quite long). It's what I've always answered to as long as I can remember, plus it's much cooler sounding than what's on my birth certificate. But still, when someone says the name, my mind paints an image of a cool, suave (maybe sexy) guy with a tailored shirt, a colorful tie, and a nice head of hair that can combed up into a faux-hawk.
Again, not me.
And, I'm not the only one that thinks this -- when someone new sees me, and my reputation has preceded me; they stand,shake my hand and always seem to say, "Oh, you're (my name)!" as if they were expecting someone else.
But, I don't mention this because I hate myself, or the expanding body that's beginning to spiral out of health -- but just to say the name has not only never fit, it never could.
It's a man's name . . . and I have never been a man.
It doesn't look like me, it doesn't sound like me -- it's actually quite weird. I'm named after my father, and the name itself is a bit old, a bit long, and it doesn't flow off the tongue very easily. I was embarrassed of it as a child, and would spit it out quickly in hopes that the name-asker would skip over me quickly.
They never did. They would repeat it, looking at it oddly before scanning the room to see what unfortunate bastard answered to it.
But, even more than that, it has always seemed uncomfortable. It is a man's name, and I've never known exactly who that man was. When it slides out of my mouth now, my mind tries to form an image of the man such a name might represent -- and it invariably has never represented me.
Since birth, though, I have been blessed with a very short nickname (my first and last being quite long). It's what I've always answered to as long as I can remember, plus it's much cooler sounding than what's on my birth certificate. But still, when someone says the name, my mind paints an image of a cool, suave (maybe sexy) guy with a tailored shirt, a colorful tie, and a nice head of hair that can combed up into a faux-hawk.
Again, not me.
And, I'm not the only one that thinks this -- when someone new sees me, and my reputation has preceded me; they stand,shake my hand and always seem to say, "Oh, you're (my name)!" as if they were expecting someone else.
But, I don't mention this because I hate myself, or the expanding body that's beginning to spiral out of health -- but just to say the name has not only never fit, it never could.
It's a man's name . . . and I have never been a man.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Sim Girls are Easy
We dance together as an old flame of his passes by.
"I think she's jealous . . ." he whispers in my ear.
I smile as I look across at her . . . her anatomically suggestive avatar name dangling over her brown locks.
"Hmmm." I whisper back. "I think she's a dude."
He laughs and I smile again, hoping that he never discovers the same thing about me. I met her once -- she told me that she's left a string of broken hearts across Second Life. She must have lain with quite a few . . . a former sl boyfriend of mine confessed that name when I had his balls to the fire.
The name . . . rather obvious. I don't know how anyone could come upon that voluputious knockout, see the name, and think anything else but "that bitch is a bastard." She had spread the legs of at least two of my bf's before I had even met her.
The differences between her and I are enormous. She is a brazenly promiscuous ball-bouncer, and I am discreet -- preferring to take my men one at a time. She dresses "all-out" to broadcast her exaggerated femininity -- I try my best to look like an actual woman, and while I'm working on projects in-world, can be as dressed down as a T and a pair of capris.
But -- on the other hand, are we really that different? My boobs are still Pamela Anderson-big -- long after the look has disappeared from the fashion mags and from Pamela's own pectorals. My lips aren't enormous -- but are surprisingly similar to those plumped up life-jackets found on many a mouth in Beverly Hills. I seem more like a real girl that the one with the phallic name . . . but, we are one in the same: two men with varying degrees of gender dysphoria trying to fill our hearts and arms with the virtual representations of real men.
Some of these real men don't seem to mind. The man I was dancing with has had the same suspicions of this woman -- but didn't immediately bath his avatar in a disinfectant/bleach bath after he'd has his fun. He's secure in his sexuality, and as far as he's concerned -- if you're a woman in SL, it's not his business what you are in RL.
Are we both so desperate, though, to go through such lengths for male love? I don't know her intentions, but I think she's a gay man with a straight-man fetish. I don't think she gets her kicks from any sex that results from her virtual encounters, but from the scorecard she most likely keeps for bagging what's essentially unbaggable for gay men in the real world -- well, at least unless you have a lot of cash and your target is someone with military fatigues in their closets.
I've wondered about my intentions for a while -- and I still haven't got the gender thing straightened out. For me, it's not about tricking straight men. I simply want to be loved by a real one. I've never wanted to be a "man," but the reality of being a sissy-fag has meant I would never be viewed by one as anything but an object of ridicule. Second Life has not only allowed me to explore my own sexuality and gender ID, but to discover the beauty of masculine and feminine relationships for myself, to bask in the flirtations of iconic men, to hear their sweet whispers of love in my ear.
The great sadness is that it will never translate into real life. Even in the kingdoms of faggotry, effeminate men are like the exceptionally dark-skinned among African-Americans -- a virtual outcast among their own kind. So, the closest this queen will ever get to the arms of those men I've loved in SL is . . . well, it won't happen, especially if ever I decide to transform myself into a 6'1" balding transexual.
So, I will continue to love my men in-world . . . one at a time, as we each pretend to start a new long life together completely in ignorance of the near-rule that SL relationships rarely last more than 3 months. It will be the best I ever have, and it sure as hell is cheaper than hiring a real one for a few hours.
Though I've never completely ruled that out . . .
"I think she's jealous . . ." he whispers in my ear.
I smile as I look across at her . . . her anatomically suggestive avatar name dangling over her brown locks.
"Hmmm." I whisper back. "I think she's a dude."
He laughs and I smile again, hoping that he never discovers the same thing about me. I met her once -- she told me that she's left a string of broken hearts across Second Life. She must have lain with quite a few . . . a former sl boyfriend of mine confessed that name when I had his balls to the fire.
The name . . . rather obvious. I don't know how anyone could come upon that voluputious knockout, see the name, and think anything else but "that bitch is a bastard." She had spread the legs of at least two of my bf's before I had even met her.
The differences between her and I are enormous. She is a brazenly promiscuous ball-bouncer, and I am discreet -- preferring to take my men one at a time. She dresses "all-out" to broadcast her exaggerated femininity -- I try my best to look like an actual woman, and while I'm working on projects in-world, can be as dressed down as a T and a pair of capris.
But -- on the other hand, are we really that different? My boobs are still Pamela Anderson-big -- long after the look has disappeared from the fashion mags and from Pamela's own pectorals. My lips aren't enormous -- but are surprisingly similar to those plumped up life-jackets found on many a mouth in Beverly Hills. I seem more like a real girl that the one with the phallic name . . . but, we are one in the same: two men with varying degrees of gender dysphoria trying to fill our hearts and arms with the virtual representations of real men.
Some of these real men don't seem to mind. The man I was dancing with has had the same suspicions of this woman -- but didn't immediately bath his avatar in a disinfectant/bleach bath after he'd has his fun. He's secure in his sexuality, and as far as he's concerned -- if you're a woman in SL, it's not his business what you are in RL.
Are we both so desperate, though, to go through such lengths for male love? I don't know her intentions, but I think she's a gay man with a straight-man fetish. I don't think she gets her kicks from any sex that results from her virtual encounters, but from the scorecard she most likely keeps for bagging what's essentially unbaggable for gay men in the real world -- well, at least unless you have a lot of cash and your target is someone with military fatigues in their closets.
I've wondered about my intentions for a while -- and I still haven't got the gender thing straightened out. For me, it's not about tricking straight men. I simply want to be loved by a real one. I've never wanted to be a "man," but the reality of being a sissy-fag has meant I would never be viewed by one as anything but an object of ridicule. Second Life has not only allowed me to explore my own sexuality and gender ID, but to discover the beauty of masculine and feminine relationships for myself, to bask in the flirtations of iconic men, to hear their sweet whispers of love in my ear.
The great sadness is that it will never translate into real life. Even in the kingdoms of faggotry, effeminate men are like the exceptionally dark-skinned among African-Americans -- a virtual outcast among their own kind. So, the closest this queen will ever get to the arms of those men I've loved in SL is . . . well, it won't happen, especially if ever I decide to transform myself into a 6'1" balding transexual.
So, I will continue to love my men in-world . . . one at a time, as we each pretend to start a new long life together completely in ignorance of the near-rule that SL relationships rarely last more than 3 months. It will be the best I ever have, and it sure as hell is cheaper than hiring a real one for a few hours.
Though I've never completely ruled that out . . .
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Second Life Leads to Genetic Engineering
Several years ago, I discovered a game at the local movie club for rent . . . Sim City. I hated most video games (and still do), but this one seemed intriguing . . . the chance to build your own fully functioning metropolitan area from the ground up. After playing it and its successors on Nintendo systems and the PC, I wondered aloud to myself one day . . . "Hmmm. Imagine if they came up with a 'sim life' -- where you could build a person, their day-to-day existence, their struggles and loves, etc."
And they did . . . no, I don't claim to have come up with the idea first, but one idea certainly begged the next, and apparently the logical conclusion wasn't lost on a few people at EA . . . and a few years later at Linden Labs.
So, after starting my fifth month into my chronic addiction of being a woman in Second Life, the same weird feeling comes over me. Why? Because nearly everyone I come across in SL wants to look like Barbie or a tag team from the WWF. Give anyone a magic wand -- and they seek to make improvements, and the virtual world of Second Life is doing that for millions of users. Sure, we see the cyber-geeks who write articles on the net about SL and who've tediously recreated their geekiness without succumbing to the latest skin offerings of RaC or Naughty Island. For those totally immersed in the experience like me -- you can't help but wonder -- seeing all the sexy gods and goddesses running around -- do even these net-nerds have sexy alts? They certainly aren't fooling me.
I keep an eye on news coming from the world of genetic research. There isn't a lot, and sometimes I miss the first run, but in the not-too-distant future (though possibly not in our lifetimes) the answers to many things will be unlocked. As we speak, there are teams looking into the keys of aging, to find out why some forms of life can live for hundreds of years (some tortoises) and other for thousands (some trees), while others are doomed after a few dozen (humans) or even a few weeks (mosquitos). Other things they're unlocking are the secrets to musculature -- they've found a way for mice to bulk up without lifting weights and without hormones -- but it also makes them docile, and the scientist involved are only interested in using it for patients with wasting disorders.
A few decades from now, civilization and economy providing, the genetic code will be completely unlocked, the secrets to healing the unhealable, growing the amputated, and restoring that which was near death is itself relatively near. And will it be used for just the sick and injured, the prematurely dying, or the patient with MS?
Sure . . . only as much as a surgeon's scalpel never touches the skin of of one wanting an elective reconstruction, as long as surgical suction device is never used to slurp up pre-pulverized fat cells out of someone too lazy to diet, and as long as the industry of medicine itself never takes money from or treats someone who doesn't need its services to continue living. This is a capitalist society, folks -- and when the bag of tricks come, so will the not-so-necessary procedures. Methinks this will be the only way to pay back the gargantuan R&D.
So, as in SL, the geeky shall grow into giants in real life, the flat-chested shall develop natural bosoms, and the envious shall acquire inches. The bald shall be bountiful and the old shall be ageless and the flat shall once again be filled to the brim. Oh, yeah and the deaf will hear again and all of that.
How do I know? Check out Second Life and see the future clientele of genetic-code vendors pay hand-over fist to have the body style of Brad Pitt or Kate Moss. There are reasons residents pay nearly as much money on looking sexy in SL as they for having sex in SL.
I just hope they figure it all out before Mother Nature calls me back into the ground. In case I'm deaf, blind and dumb from age . . . I'll go ahead and place my order now: I'd like to be a girl, so make me look exactly like Robin Wright Penn -- back in the Santa Barbara days. And, if there's too many of her running around (or if she's copywrited her gene-code), a Kristian Alfonso will do, except with a rack and without the requisite anorexia.
But -- you guys will be making the rules, so if I must be a guy, an Eric Bana (circa 2003) will do just nicely, and if that's who I end up looking like, just dump me in an empty apartment with plenty of aloe-based lubricant for about a year.
Believe me, I won't be coming out for a while.
And they did . . . no, I don't claim to have come up with the idea first, but one idea certainly begged the next, and apparently the logical conclusion wasn't lost on a few people at EA . . . and a few years later at Linden Labs.
So, after starting my fifth month into my chronic addiction of being a woman in Second Life, the same weird feeling comes over me. Why? Because nearly everyone I come across in SL wants to look like Barbie or a tag team from the WWF. Give anyone a magic wand -- and they seek to make improvements, and the virtual world of Second Life is doing that for millions of users. Sure, we see the cyber-geeks who write articles on the net about SL and who've tediously recreated their geekiness without succumbing to the latest skin offerings of RaC or Naughty Island. For those totally immersed in the experience like me -- you can't help but wonder -- seeing all the sexy gods and goddesses running around -- do even these net-nerds have sexy alts? They certainly aren't fooling me.
I keep an eye on news coming from the world of genetic research. There isn't a lot, and sometimes I miss the first run, but in the not-too-distant future (though possibly not in our lifetimes) the answers to many things will be unlocked. As we speak, there are teams looking into the keys of aging, to find out why some forms of life can live for hundreds of years (some tortoises) and other for thousands (some trees), while others are doomed after a few dozen (humans) or even a few weeks (mosquitos). Other things they're unlocking are the secrets to musculature -- they've found a way for mice to bulk up without lifting weights and without hormones -- but it also makes them docile, and the scientist involved are only interested in using it for patients with wasting disorders.
A few decades from now, civilization and economy providing, the genetic code will be completely unlocked, the secrets to healing the unhealable, growing the amputated, and restoring that which was near death is itself relatively near. And will it be used for just the sick and injured, the prematurely dying, or the patient with MS?
Sure . . . only as much as a surgeon's scalpel never touches the skin of of one wanting an elective reconstruction, as long as surgical suction device is never used to slurp up pre-pulverized fat cells out of someone too lazy to diet, and as long as the industry of medicine itself never takes money from or treats someone who doesn't need its services to continue living. This is a capitalist society, folks -- and when the bag of tricks come, so will the not-so-necessary procedures. Methinks this will be the only way to pay back the gargantuan R&D.
So, as in SL, the geeky shall grow into giants in real life, the flat-chested shall develop natural bosoms, and the envious shall acquire inches. The bald shall be bountiful and the old shall be ageless and the flat shall once again be filled to the brim. Oh, yeah and the deaf will hear again and all of that.
How do I know? Check out Second Life and see the future clientele of genetic-code vendors pay hand-over fist to have the body style of Brad Pitt or Kate Moss. There are reasons residents pay nearly as much money on looking sexy in SL as they for having sex in SL.
I just hope they figure it all out before Mother Nature calls me back into the ground. In case I'm deaf, blind and dumb from age . . . I'll go ahead and place my order now: I'd like to be a girl, so make me look exactly like Robin Wright Penn -- back in the Santa Barbara days. And, if there's too many of her running around (or if she's copywrited her gene-code), a Kristian Alfonso will do, except with a rack and without the requisite anorexia.
But -- you guys will be making the rules, so if I must be a guy, an Eric Bana (circa 2003) will do just nicely, and if that's who I end up looking like, just dump me in an empty apartment with plenty of aloe-based lubricant for about a year.
Believe me, I won't be coming out for a while.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Second Life to Lose 25% Members in 2 Months!!!
It's true . . . Second Life is about to kill off a quarter of it's membership in a misguided attempt to make their virtual universe more real. It's been coming for some time -- voice chat in SL. But, a recent article in SL's PixelPulse Magazine reveals how it's going to affect a great deal of its membership: RL males who are women in SL.
I.E., me.
I use the word "male" because I am most decidedly not a man, and I don't say that in a self-deprecating way. Right now, sexualities of all sorts are re-evaluating their core identities and differentiating themselves from the big-tent categories they've been placed into since Eden. First, there was man and woman, then a few years later, we added "eunich"; most recently were the additions of gay men and lesbians, then transgendered persons, then queers who didn't like any of those titles, and the "questioning" who didn't want to associated with any of the above until their real life experiences were more aligned with their wet-dreams.
Even more recently, the more macho dick-divers have dropped their bar-bells and electric body shavers long enough to declare their independence from the world of "gay" -- insisting that they are Same Gender Loving or Men who have Sex with Men (SGL and MSM). Yawn. Just because some "metrosexuals" are arching their eyebrows and getting away with it does not assign masculinity to the lispy-voiced fem-hater.
Perhaps it's time that the rest of us disassociate ourselves as well -- those of us who emerged from our mothers' vaginas asking where she bought those heels never had the luxury of a closet: everyone knew we'd eventually be on our hands and knees before we could even pronounce the word "homosexual."
Second Life has made me further evaluate my own sexuality -- I'm beginning to realize that I'm not a highly-subcategorized queer, but a female brain inside a slightly male body (most of the sexual characteristics are appropriate, except for the slight shoulders, the wide-boned hips, and the twice-a-week sex drive). Everything's in working mechanical order -- except that there's no such thing as "pre-cum" from this queen's dick.
After many sleepless nights created by this realization, I've just accepted it. No cutting, no cross-dressing. I don't need that drama -- trying to assimilate as a woman in a highly-Christian pre-fascist society is more than I can handle right now. It's not that I'm a wimp or a coward -- but I'm most definitely not a man.
The requisite harassment if I did would be nothing unusual. My life growing up was no less cruel than a black kid in suburbia, a Jewish kid in Biloxi, or an Afghan at Guantanamo. I was unusual -- so, I was humiliated, tortured, stripped, dehumanized, and ridiculed on a daily basis. And somehow, I managed to not end myself before learning how to transcend that cruelty. I'm still the biggest sissy I know, I still attract attention, and -- honestly -- I don't even perceive when I'm being mocked anymore.
I've learned to move on, I've forgiven the male gender -- god bless them, they know not what they do -- and I've tried to make a life for myself. Something still didn't sit right -- and as I mentioned in the previous blog posting -- it wasn't until SL that it all clicked.
And now, SL wants to take it all away from me by introducing real-time voice chat. How? Because of it becomes extremely popular, the pressure will be on for all to conform: speak up or get the fuck out. Of course, other residents can't kick out those real male-powered females, but we could certainly lose a lot of friendships and relationships when RL prejudice prejudges our preferred existence in this new world.
I have a bf in SL. I love his spirit and his soul. He has asked me twice if I was a man -- early on, mind you, because "as everyone knows," a great deal of SL women are indeed biologic males. As the linked article explains, some are people like me acting out transgender fantasies, while others are just guys who are into lesbian sex and want to engage in it themselves. If voice-chat takes off, he'll want me to join him and the millions of others to get with the program, and "I don't have a mike yet" will only work a month or two at best. Eventually, I will have to tell him. And, I will most certainly lose him.
I thought about this a lot today -- it kind of bummed me out. The best I can hope for is that voice-chat will be as popular as it has been in chat rooms and IMs around the internet -- which is to say it will be an enormous flop. Chats -- particularly in large rooms (on the web and in SL) are organized in chronological order -- even if 14 people are talking at once). If you're a quick read, or archive your chats, you can literally "hear" everything in the room. With voice-chat, that will be impossible. In the dance halls of SL, you wouldn't be able to hear the disco since I've never been to a popular one where no one could keep their digital mouths shut.
And it's not just the transgendered or lesbo-posers who will feel shafted by this. MOST residents are living a fantasy existence in SL -- whether they want to be samurai warriors or Elizabethan princesses, these illusions will be busted by their asthmatic wheezing and Bronx accents. Sure, the ordinary avatars powered by those without imaginations won't mind the transition to sound . . . but it's entirely possible that half the residents won't use it at all.
Or they could . . . except for most of the ladies who have penises in RL. Our fantasy lives could be destroyed . . . and if so, look for us to leave en masse.
I.E., me.
I use the word "male" because I am most decidedly not a man, and I don't say that in a self-deprecating way. Right now, sexualities of all sorts are re-evaluating their core identities and differentiating themselves from the big-tent categories they've been placed into since Eden. First, there was man and woman, then a few years later, we added "eunich"; most recently were the additions of gay men and lesbians, then transgendered persons, then queers who didn't like any of those titles, and the "questioning" who didn't want to associated with any of the above until their real life experiences were more aligned with their wet-dreams.
Even more recently, the more macho dick-divers have dropped their bar-bells and electric body shavers long enough to declare their independence from the world of "gay" -- insisting that they are Same Gender Loving or Men who have Sex with Men (SGL and MSM). Yawn. Just because some "metrosexuals" are arching their eyebrows and getting away with it does not assign masculinity to the lispy-voiced fem-hater.
Perhaps it's time that the rest of us disassociate ourselves as well -- those of us who emerged from our mothers' vaginas asking where she bought those heels never had the luxury of a closet: everyone knew we'd eventually be on our hands and knees before we could even pronounce the word "homosexual."
Second Life has made me further evaluate my own sexuality -- I'm beginning to realize that I'm not a highly-subcategorized queer, but a female brain inside a slightly male body (most of the sexual characteristics are appropriate, except for the slight shoulders, the wide-boned hips, and the twice-a-week sex drive). Everything's in working mechanical order -- except that there's no such thing as "pre-cum" from this queen's dick.
After many sleepless nights created by this realization, I've just accepted it. No cutting, no cross-dressing. I don't need that drama -- trying to assimilate as a woman in a highly-Christian pre-fascist society is more than I can handle right now. It's not that I'm a wimp or a coward -- but I'm most definitely not a man.
The requisite harassment if I did would be nothing unusual. My life growing up was no less cruel than a black kid in suburbia, a Jewish kid in Biloxi, or an Afghan at Guantanamo. I was unusual -- so, I was humiliated, tortured, stripped, dehumanized, and ridiculed on a daily basis. And somehow, I managed to not end myself before learning how to transcend that cruelty. I'm still the biggest sissy I know, I still attract attention, and -- honestly -- I don't even perceive when I'm being mocked anymore.
I've learned to move on, I've forgiven the male gender -- god bless them, they know not what they do -- and I've tried to make a life for myself. Something still didn't sit right -- and as I mentioned in the previous blog posting -- it wasn't until SL that it all clicked.
And now, SL wants to take it all away from me by introducing real-time voice chat. How? Because of it becomes extremely popular, the pressure will be on for all to conform: speak up or get the fuck out. Of course, other residents can't kick out those real male-powered females, but we could certainly lose a lot of friendships and relationships when RL prejudice prejudges our preferred existence in this new world.
I have a bf in SL. I love his spirit and his soul. He has asked me twice if I was a man -- early on, mind you, because "as everyone knows," a great deal of SL women are indeed biologic males. As the linked article explains, some are people like me acting out transgender fantasies, while others are just guys who are into lesbian sex and want to engage in it themselves. If voice-chat takes off, he'll want me to join him and the millions of others to get with the program, and "I don't have a mike yet" will only work a month or two at best. Eventually, I will have to tell him. And, I will most certainly lose him.
I thought about this a lot today -- it kind of bummed me out. The best I can hope for is that voice-chat will be as popular as it has been in chat rooms and IMs around the internet -- which is to say it will be an enormous flop. Chats -- particularly in large rooms (on the web and in SL) are organized in chronological order -- even if 14 people are talking at once). If you're a quick read, or archive your chats, you can literally "hear" everything in the room. With voice-chat, that will be impossible. In the dance halls of SL, you wouldn't be able to hear the disco since I've never been to a popular one where no one could keep their digital mouths shut.
And it's not just the transgendered or lesbo-posers who will feel shafted by this. MOST residents are living a fantasy existence in SL -- whether they want to be samurai warriors or Elizabethan princesses, these illusions will be busted by their asthmatic wheezing and Bronx accents. Sure, the ordinary avatars powered by those without imaginations won't mind the transition to sound . . . but it's entirely possible that half the residents won't use it at all.
Or they could . . . except for most of the ladies who have penises in RL. Our fantasy lives could be destroyed . . . and if so, look for us to leave en masse.
Friday, April 6, 2007
I'm not a real woman . . .
. . . I just play one in Second Life.
Second Life (google it): that fantasy playground in cyberspace, the holodeck in 2D, those dreamscapes in pixels and LCD screens.
I found SL during the holiday season -- and was immediately hooked. It has been a pleasant addiction, one I've tricked myself into believing is "healthy" because I indulge in a bit of capitalism on the side.
But, it isn't the trading that's got me down -- it's who and what I am.
When I joined, it was automatic. No conscious choice . . . no deliberation . . . no game of deception. I just pointed, clicked, and "poof!": for the first time in my life, I was a girl. There were no second thoughts about it either . . . I went about learning how to navigate, how to build, how to fly. My psyche merged itself with its new feminine identity like we had been separated since birth; or in her case, since before the account became premium.
Within a matter of hours, I was trading newbie hair and newbie skin for flowing and delicate -- and within a matter of days, I had my first boyfriend . . . who thought I was a girl in real life . . .
Again, no act of deliberate trickery -- "She" was me, and when he failed to pay me enough attention to she-me, I proceeded to acquire more and more boyfriends . . . until I had a stable full -- enough to keep me feeling needed and wanted, and more importantly -- beautiful and feminine.
Except, that I'm none of those. I'm a middle-aged gay man slap-ass in the middle of an existential crisis that's been boiling for several years. Okay, I'll dumb it down -- "mid-life crisis" -- same difference, except that it's worse for smart people.
Instead of just worrying about the small things like whether we could ever attract anyone other than the one we tricked into pseudo-matrimony, we choose "since I now understand that there is no God, what is the point of anything?" - or - we amuse ourselves by watching people who overly concern themselves with news and politics, as if the extra ulcer will actually slow global warming with the all-encompassing power of its acidity.
That's the good thing about SL -- I've stopped watching TV altogether: not only the news, but HBO (and that's not even TV) and Showtime and Logo and Bravo . . . I've even stopped blogging and reading my favorite blogs. Who gives a flying fuck if Keith Boykin writes another self-indulgent "weight training" entry, or if malcontent finds even more common ground with Newt Gingrich than I ever could? I realized the moment Kos opened his mouth on Bill Maher that the pretense of bloggers affecting politics was mostly a sham -- as if Kerry's defeat wasn't proof enough. Sure, they can "find things," but so do church ladies -- and you have to search through tons of cushions and nooks and crannies, turning up nothing more than a lot of lint and a handful pennies before ever finding that rare twenty-spot, or a Franklin.
But, let the hair-splitters continue grinding gears behind curtains . . .
As for me, I've gone somewhere else . . . trying to find my own truths in the nooks and crannies of a virtual world.
About halfway through my second SL boyfriend (also straight and doubly clueless), suddenly . . . it hit me. And, it was hard realizing this -- the fear of being discovered and possibly slaughtered for the crime of having virtual sex in a multiple-animation bed powered by a Grade A premium mam-beef on the other PC was enough to prevent a lot of things.
But, it hit me one night . . . I wasn't pretending to be a girl. I was one. I am one. At least . . . in my head. Suddenly, it all started to make sense: my inability to relate to my own gender, my inability to relate to other gay men or homosexuality in general (although I've functioned as a well-adjusted gay man most of my adulthood), my own desires, my frustrations . . . things that seemed so disordered before seemed to be rearranging themselves on the puzzle table -- almost without my assistance.
By boyfriend number three, I decided that I was "a woman trapped . . ." as the cliche' goes. And so, I dreamed and imagined how i might be transformed, and of course -- how I would get rich and famous in the meantime so that my fake boyfriend would want to be with me (instead of killing me when he found out) . . . and other assorted delusions of grandeur.
And then I researched transgenderism, the "surgery" and all that -- and realized that the most possible outcome would be this: if I bankrupted myself to have this surgery, I would not only lose my real-life boyfriend (who is most definitely not straight or bi by any stretch of the imagination), but I would most definitely estrange myself further from finding lovers among all members of my gender -- gay or straight. Getting your dick wacked off does not make straight men like you. The creme of the pie was this: I would also (and most definitely) lose the only dick I would ever get from there on out -- making the situation more hopeless than it already seems.
And so, I've become more rational about my Revelation from On-Line: emotionally, I am a woman. Physically, I am a guy. So, until that great and final day when they come up with GirlTron3000 Genetic Transgenderizer, I will follow this moral: If you're not going to get more dick when you trade in your old ones . . . you gotta keep the ones you have.
Second Life (google it): that fantasy playground in cyberspace, the holodeck in 2D, those dreamscapes in pixels and LCD screens.
I found SL during the holiday season -- and was immediately hooked. It has been a pleasant addiction, one I've tricked myself into believing is "healthy" because I indulge in a bit of capitalism on the side.
But, it isn't the trading that's got me down -- it's who and what I am.
When I joined, it was automatic. No conscious choice . . . no deliberation . . . no game of deception. I just pointed, clicked, and "poof!": for the first time in my life, I was a girl. There were no second thoughts about it either . . . I went about learning how to navigate, how to build, how to fly. My psyche merged itself with its new feminine identity like we had been separated since birth; or in her case, since before the account became premium.
Within a matter of hours, I was trading newbie hair and newbie skin for flowing and delicate -- and within a matter of days, I had my first boyfriend . . . who thought I was a girl in real life . . .
Again, no act of deliberate trickery -- "She" was me, and when he failed to pay me enough attention to she-me, I proceeded to acquire more and more boyfriends . . . until I had a stable full -- enough to keep me feeling needed and wanted, and more importantly -- beautiful and feminine.
Except, that I'm none of those. I'm a middle-aged gay man slap-ass in the middle of an existential crisis that's been boiling for several years. Okay, I'll dumb it down -- "mid-life crisis" -- same difference, except that it's worse for smart people.
Instead of just worrying about the small things like whether we could ever attract anyone other than the one we tricked into pseudo-matrimony, we choose "since I now understand that there is no God, what is the point of anything?" - or - we amuse ourselves by watching people who overly concern themselves with news and politics, as if the extra ulcer will actually slow global warming with the all-encompassing power of its acidity.
That's the good thing about SL -- I've stopped watching TV altogether: not only the news, but HBO (and that's not even TV) and Showtime and Logo and Bravo . . . I've even stopped blogging and reading my favorite blogs. Who gives a flying fuck if Keith Boykin writes another self-indulgent "weight training" entry, or if malcontent finds even more common ground with Newt Gingrich than I ever could? I realized the moment Kos opened his mouth on Bill Maher that the pretense of bloggers affecting politics was mostly a sham -- as if Kerry's defeat wasn't proof enough. Sure, they can "find things," but so do church ladies -- and you have to search through tons of cushions and nooks and crannies, turning up nothing more than a lot of lint and a handful pennies before ever finding that rare twenty-spot, or a Franklin.
But, let the hair-splitters continue grinding gears behind curtains . . .
As for me, I've gone somewhere else . . . trying to find my own truths in the nooks and crannies of a virtual world.
About halfway through my second SL boyfriend (also straight and doubly clueless), suddenly . . . it hit me. And, it was hard realizing this -- the fear of being discovered and possibly slaughtered for the crime of having virtual sex in a multiple-animation bed powered by a Grade A premium mam-beef on the other PC was enough to prevent a lot of things.
But, it hit me one night . . . I wasn't pretending to be a girl. I was one. I am one. At least . . . in my head. Suddenly, it all started to make sense: my inability to relate to my own gender, my inability to relate to other gay men or homosexuality in general (although I've functioned as a well-adjusted gay man most of my adulthood), my own desires, my frustrations . . . things that seemed so disordered before seemed to be rearranging themselves on the puzzle table -- almost without my assistance.
By boyfriend number three, I decided that I was "a woman trapped . . ." as the cliche' goes. And so, I dreamed and imagined how i might be transformed, and of course -- how I would get rich and famous in the meantime so that my fake boyfriend would want to be with me (instead of killing me when he found out) . . . and other assorted delusions of grandeur.
And then I researched transgenderism, the "surgery" and all that -- and realized that the most possible outcome would be this: if I bankrupted myself to have this surgery, I would not only lose my real-life boyfriend (who is most definitely not straight or bi by any stretch of the imagination), but I would most definitely estrange myself further from finding lovers among all members of my gender -- gay or straight. Getting your dick wacked off does not make straight men like you. The creme of the pie was this: I would also (and most definitely) lose the only dick I would ever get from there on out -- making the situation more hopeless than it already seems.
And so, I've become more rational about my Revelation from On-Line: emotionally, I am a woman. Physically, I am a guy. So, until that great and final day when they come up with GirlTron3000 Genetic Transgenderizer, I will follow this moral: If you're not going to get more dick when you trade in your old ones . . . you gotta keep the ones you have.
Ola!
Hello, cruel world.
This blog isn't my attempt to understand the world . . . just a place for me to explore myself, my thoughts, my memories and everything else.
I've done the blog thing before -- tried to make it entertaining and enterprising . . . this time, it will be just about what's in my head. I won't try to swap links or post ads -- this isn't my shingle on the internet freeway.
If you want queer politics, queer religion, queer news, queer opinion, or just queer "queer," -- go somewhere else. If you just like reading about me . . . you need serious help, but you're invited to keep reading.
This is just about queer me. If you like . . . post a reply. If you don't . . . do the same. Don't take it personally if I don't reply -- again, this isn't an intentional blog.
Welcome to my reality.
This blog isn't my attempt to understand the world . . . just a place for me to explore myself, my thoughts, my memories and everything else.
I've done the blog thing before -- tried to make it entertaining and enterprising . . . this time, it will be just about what's in my head. I won't try to swap links or post ads -- this isn't my shingle on the internet freeway.
If you want queer politics, queer religion, queer news, queer opinion, or just queer "queer," -- go somewhere else. If you just like reading about me . . . you need serious help, but you're invited to keep reading.
This is just about queer me. If you like . . . post a reply. If you don't . . . do the same. Don't take it personally if I don't reply -- again, this isn't an intentional blog.
Welcome to my reality.
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