One of the most frequent questions I ask myself when living my Second Life is whether people look at it as a simple game or an actual extension of their real life.
The most troubling part of it is, in my opinion, sex. Of course, where the Web developed, the sexuality industry was among the pioneers to make photography, payment and meeting opportunities available for its target market. Second Life doesn't seem to escape that logic. Quickly, places such as Xcite offered male and female organs. Many places cooked up sex poses and people started to meet each other.
I can understand that this meets a lot of people's needs, but I do have questions to ask. And I probably don't have the answers for them.
- What is the obsession of men and women to have a penis or a vagina in Second Life? I mean, we do have those in RL, but why would you go to a great extent to get one? Is your SL existence lesser without them?
- Do you feel intimacy with someone when using sexual poses?
And the last but most important question is about betrayal:
- Why do so many people invite you to betray your partner so often?
I've stopped counting the number of times when I've been asked for sexual favors to hear "oh, don't worry, I won't tell your boyfriend" when I said that I had no intention to betray. I don't see such loose principles as often in real life. Do people feel that the link between you and your partner in SL is fiction because we are in a 3D environment instead of flesh and blood?
My time in Second Life shows me that we can accomplish things and go through a meeting-of-the-minds. And I believe such principles apply well to my photo gallery (accomplishment) and partnership with a guy (meeting-of-the-minds).
But is it less real or satisfying because it is in Second Life?