Racisim in Second Life

Well I thought I would blog about it as I have shared in the forums and its an adventure of Distilled1 in a way.

I recently decided to create an Alt Avatar that was ethnically black or African American, not just an over tan Caucasian. I started out with the newbie avatar available but had already looked and found a decent ethnic skin that wasn't just tinted. so first thing was to TP from the orientation island after a bit of small talk and helping a few, I have to say here at orientation isle I was welcomed and talked to by everyone like I was any other Avatar. It started when I hit the Welcome Area in Korea, now this was just a few second stop to open and goto the LM I had sent to myself. I was called a Nigger no less than 3 times within 1 minute of landing. I went on my way to pick up the skin I wanted, as well to grab some decent hair and one nice set of clothes/shoes/assc.

well I was out about 30 min all set up went and did the shape painstakingly making the facial features ethnic without exaggerating them, and made the avatar a health looking body. got dressed and decided I was ready to take on SL in a minority human avatar.

I clicked HOME and went back to Korea (I always forget Alts homes are set to the first welcome area until I change them) immediately again two lovely bling whores started talking about my color or race, I was sent an I'm to go find my own place, I was shouted at with the Nigger name again and again. I didn't say anything I just walked a bit closer to the two that were I assumed talking about me. Well they were talking about me and as I sat on a wall near them they started talking to me and how I should be "WHITE" because no one wants nigger avatars around. knowing I would get myself in trouble being rude back, I proceeded to log in Distilled1 on the old can rez anything PC and TP close by as well, as to start logging the chat as well as the alts log as I knew I was going to be ARing soon.

they went on and on about how I didn't belong and used every derogatory name you can think of, now I have seen greifing even rudeness but never such outright racism. And the kicker the leader of the name calling was an SL MENTOR yes I checked yes it was a real tag and yes she was saying the things, I would actually post the logs here maybe I will..
Any way I ARed both of them with the local chat log and then had the Alt AR with the local chat and IMs.

Now Distilled1 Gets even, this is when I can hit on my alt, talk in open chat and pretend to help the alt and call the Bling Whores (both of who were dancers/escorts as well, at least belonging to a few of the groups, and hey that's fine I assume they are afraid my alt can take all there business lol) cheap blingy cunts.


well I TP'd both of us out after I had my name calling spat. and I can take the names I know who I am, but what worries me with things like this, and I know SL is world wide and there are going to be all kinds here, but what worries... no what really pisses me off is what if my alt was a true newbie, who worked very hard to make the avatar represent them in RL (I know many say well its SL you should be who you want, but many as myself try to make a representation of RL us) what kind of welcome is that? and from a SL MENTOR no less! I t hurt me I can't imagine how it would hurt someone of that ethnicity that was really exited about SL and all it has to offer. And so what if that newbie wanted to go dance and have fun or maybe teach or build or learn or share in a world wide virtual world where things shouldn't matter like avatar color, race, size, look...

Well I just think SL is getting worse from when I started in 06 and well I was there in 05 but not as Distilled1 and only for a trail week. as More and more log in there is going to be more and more of this going on... its sad. Remember 6000 users logged on and you could almost find everyone? I do SL was a happier place then and so much more fun and others were so much more accepting.


what do you think? can SL still be a open accepting virtual world or is it becoming a segregated bunch of bigots?