Where all the African Americans?? lol

[Treasure Ballinger]

Try Shiloh Jun for skins too by the way.  I've even found some at Redgrave that are better than the standard dark toned white featured skins.  Chic Fashion has some nice hair, there are more but I'm not inworld right now.  Can send you landmarks.

[Ceka Cianci]

---

Pussycat Catnap wrote:

---

Ceka Cianci wrote:

 

have you tried looking under interracial instead of black people?

 

---

That's just a code-word for racist exploitative sex films...

- And is how it gets used in SL.

Walk into those places and its all 'BIG BLACK MF'ers with 14m long prim "attachments" pounding little dainty white female avatars screaming 'Oh help me from the n-word.'

...

Or...

little white boys with 'big chunky black mommas'...

I doubt anyone in any of those sims is anything but white... Or has some serious self-hate issues if not.

 

- This coming from a person who is multi-racial, if you want to know what inspired me to try that search term...

 

 

---

 

no it's a word used in it's meaning as more than one race..

i haven't walked into them in a little bit..but they all sure were not how you are explaining them to be when i was..

i'm full blood in my race and i went to those places looking for other races..i found them..

i have a friends list full of people i've met in a lot of those places..a lot match the race of their avatar..

and they are not all white by no means..and i never saw anyone sporting a crotch attachment in them..maybe times have changed hehehe

now if something has made them popular now to exploit..well thats justpeople in sl exploiting it in sl being sl..but before they were exploited..you can bet they were not full of what you are referring to..sure there were some places like that back then..but  it wasn't a flood of them..

plus those places when going to them opened up the other links to places that were not so mixed..

i'm not ignorant to where i was..i was in the ring for a long time..long before zillions of those groups came along about black men and white women or white men and black women or what ever ones are looking for each other..

a lot of those are cuck places now..they didn't used to be..and they all are not cuck places now..

 

when blackhouse busted up is when you seen the flood of the places you are talking about,.

there wasn't a page full in the search before that..

 

ETA: Also i had told the OP to check out groups to get a more defined search..

still you will have to wade through the sex crap lol

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Ellyn Elan]

@Treasure: I always appreciate LM's, for shopping or places to vist or hang out.

[Ceka Cianci]

---

Pussycat Catnap wrote:

One reason many minorities such as myself often shy away from "games" like this is the over-preponderance of white-dominated stereotypes makes us rather uneasy.

Just breezing through these forums, especially the avatar forum where people posts pics, and its overwelmingly a majority of very pale caucasians of a certain narrow ethnotype. And that becomes a trend everywhere in SL.

One has to work it to find things like skins/shapes that are not that ethnotype.

Conversation / dialog gets so dominated by the assumptions of that cultural group. And reactions can often be hostile when you try to introduce another angle.

When non-white representations come up, they are either stereotypes by and for the whites, or from among the international community (the Japanese sims for example) and unfriendly for similar reasons (the Japanese sims often seem even less welcoming of a non-white PoV than the white sims...).

- This is a general 'gaming communities' comment, and not limited to SL. SL is pretty blatent about it though. And it'd take me more than a few minutes to properly express what I'm referring to.

 

 

---

i can relate to this a lot..especially when i first had gotten here..there was one skin on the whole grid that i found after searching and searching.. i could'nt find any that had any tone to it that was half way even close to what i was wanting..

i was stuck with the evil malibu tanned version for like most of the first year hehehe lol

that and some black hair and people were thinking i was black..it took forever to really find some skins that worked for me..i used some from nomine but i just looked tan..finally found one in CS that worked for awhile..

now there are all kinds on the grid..

even clothes were hard to find..shapes ..bleh forget it lol

i made my own..

one of my roomies that had been living in my house..once she found out i was native..she IM'd me telling me she was african american hehehe

i was just getting used to her being neko lol because i never saw neko's before until all my roomies turned into them..

 

i think SL is a lot better as far as choices for things like skins and clothes and avatars compared to back then.

i was here i think maybe a year before i saw another avatar that had any darker tone to them in the skin..

then one day it all just blew up and mostly in the men you saw the change avatars at first..it was still a while before women avatars really got into tones that were darker..

asian seemed to really be something a lot of women went for..

i used to really get pissed when some people would IM me saying stupid things like..i never had a black women before..

or have you ever been with anyone that wasn't your race? i used to caps lock..i am not black!!! i am Chiricahua Apache!!  your search continues!!

so i wear my feather and have ever since i finally found it..

now i just  don't answer them when they IM like that..

it doesn't happen as much now compared to way back then..i think that has to do with the variety of things on the grid now and more people using them..so thats kind of a good thing in that sense..

and ya it kind of bugs me in the core when i see the stereotyping  in some of these places..native clothes used to be like halloween costume in walmart..now they are so much more realistic..

i don't care how people rp themselves really..i know they are just going off of what they know rather than doing much research into it..although there are those people and places that really do get into detail..

i think more than anything though..i used to really get bent out of shape with people getting mad at women that wouldn't give them some rl pic or cam and or breath heavy for them on voice to prove our RL race or being a women in general..

i pulled being native from my profile because it added to wanting to see and hear me it seemed more than just being a woman in general..

it made me feel like some sort of fetish they wanted to try..

this is a lot of the reason i moved into going to the interracial clubs more..to try and find other races..

there may be more choices now..but i'm not into sl like i used to be anymore..i really don't care where anyone is from or what race they are..

i've met a lot of people from around the world in sl..all kinds of different races..and thats whats cool about it..i like learning from them the differences from my country and theirs..

color i could give two hoots about with anyone else..if they think i'm to dark to hang with ..then they need to lighten up.not me

lol

 

 

 

 

[Pussycat Catnap]

---

Ellyn Elan wrote:

@Pussycat

I'm very curious as to your opinion about a RL white with an avatar of a different ethnicity. Let's stipulate no gross overly simplified stereotypes. Would you, personally find it offensive? Just curious. I'm finding this discussion one of the more mentally stimulating ones in the forums at the moment.

 

---

I could care less about that.

Well that's not true. The opposite actually - I'd encourage people to explore outside of themselves.

SL is not RL so you won't really gain an understanding of another ethnicity - but it -might- make you feel more comfortable talking to one in RL on a 'more than needed basis.' ie: people cross ethnic lines all the time for work or shopping or etc, but a lot less often for solid friendships and social occaisions. Putting yourself virtually in another skin might make you more comfortable crossing the line in RL.

- And even if it doesn't, it might help you feel empathy in ways you did not expect.

And that goes for anyone with any ethnic group, and IMO also with genders/sexes.

 

Oh, and there's a very easy way to avoid stereotypes: Don't act like an 'X person' would, just act like a person would.

- Stereotypes come about when we look at another group as a group, rather than individuals. You can see me doing a bit of that in my hastily typed post above this morning. If that post bothered anyone, consider that as a minority near 90% of the references to what I am in RL are in that tone directed at me. For me, being 'labeled' is something I face more often than being seen as me. I am seen first as what I am, and then only second if at all as me.

Majority race people are usually first seen as themselves, and only second by their 'labels' - for most whites to experience this personally, spend some time in Asia (and if you're in Asia as an Asian, be prepared for a major shock if you ever come to the US). You can get it in small doses in the west - if you visit a minority community. But when you get it here you and those labelling you will be -aware- they are doing it. Go to Asia and people in Asia will deny they are labeling you in one sentence and then do something like tell you to take a longer bath because westerners get dirty more than Asians in the second... (or any other of a long list of suprising stereotypes).

 

Just be mindful when on 'another skin' in SL that its not real... you -will- find some odd biases and different treatment, but it'll be minor - and you always have the luxury of hitting the logout button.

So you can gain empathy, but true understanding is something beyond the reach of SL. Nonetheless, its a good exploration to make. 

[Pussycat Catnap]

---

Ceka Cianci wrote:

---

Pussycat Catnap wrote:

---

Ceka Cianci wrote:

 

have you tried looking under interracial instead of black people?

 

---

That's just a code-word for racist exploitative sex films...

- And is how it gets used in SL.

Walk into those places and its all 'BIG BLACK MF'ers with 14m long prim "attachments" pounding little dainty white female avatars screaming 'Oh help me from the n-word.'

...

Or...

little white boys with 'big chunky black mommas'...

I doubt anyone in any of those sims is anything but white... Or has some serious self-hate issues if not.

 

- This coming from a person who is multi-racial, if you want to know what inspired me to try that search term...

 

 

---

 

no it's a word used in it's meaning as more than one race..

i haven't walked into them in a little bit..but they all sure were not how you are explaining them to be when i was..

i'm full blood in my race and i went to those places looking for other races..i found them..

i have a friends list full of people i've met in a lot of those places..a lot match the race of their avatar..

---

If you know of inter-racial places that actually use the word by its proper meaning: places to go to meet others of different backgrounds... PLEASE forward them on to me.

 

Maybe I was extremely unlucky in my searches. It left a very bad 'mood' in my mind after stumbling across the sorts I described.

When I went, every one of the places I landed in was a sex club, and they all sported various 'abuse' themes based around fears of 'black sexuality'...

I felt like I'd stumbled into some kind of bad 1970s blaxploitation-porn, on rerun everywhere I TP'd. But I haven't looked for about a year.

- That, combined with finding that even on alts, anytime I put on a human skin that isn't white, I get mostly ignored (unless I'm in places people know me at like the Forum Cartel, or places like Reggae clubs), has left me a little less social in SL than I used to try and be.

 

Oddly some of the seemingly minority friendly places, like hip hop clubs, seem to instead be full of aggressive people who are either 'posing a stereotype' or perhaps just angry members of that ethnic group.

[Ellyn Elan]

---

Pussycat Catnap wrote: [Edited]

Just be mindful when on 'another skin' in SL that its not real... you -will- find some odd biases and different treatment, but it'll be minor - and you always have the luxury of hitting the logout button.

So you can gain empathy, but true understanding is something beyond the reach of SL. Nonetheless, its a good exploration to make. 

---

Thanks for the considered reply. My job puts me in close contact with people of all races, sexual orientations, ethnicities and economic levels. In RL I don't have a problem interacting person-to-person. I've met angels and jerks pretty evenly across the board! I don't consider myself to be a racist but we are ALL most comfortable in our own skins (ha! so to speak and SL pun intended).

On one level, I just enjoy creating different looks for my avatar and this is one I haven't explored. It is no more and no less than that. 

On another level it is just as you say, seeing how different people react to my avatar when I look like something else, an exploration, and a challenge to my own sense of self. I admit, and I think I've been conveying, that I was uneasy with putting on a black skin in that I didn't know how that would come across to someone once the inevitable happened and they learned "not black". I knew/know that is kind of a weird thought since it is so common to change sex and even species!

Thanks again and I'm so looking forward to the shopping spree in my future!

[Pussycat Catnap]

---

Storm Clarence wrote:

When i go out in my neighborhood I am among every race, creed, and color one can find on this planet.  I have never felt a longing to hang out with just the Irish (you know, one of my own; I am Irish American.)       

 

---

---

Treasure Ballinger wrote:

I KNOW Stormie. I wish I could explain in a way to help u understand the phenomenon on a visceral level, as I do. But I don't know how.

---

 He lives in a society overwhelmingly dominated by interests that cater to his ethnicity on every level, even as that is changing numerically; "entitlement" for north-west european caucasian cultures is in many ways growing in the US. That is why he don't feel the urge for a 'safe space'. Almost everywhere is his safe space.

He will undoubtably not think this is the case, and cite an array of anecdotes - but that only further backs the point, if he is able to isolate the instances where he is not culturally entitled.

 

[Pussycat Catnap]

---

Mayalily wrote:

Yes, the child avi things is weird, but lately it's been some new craze around SL.  When I first joined, almost no child avi's ever; now I see at least one or two a day starting about a month ago. 

---

Hang out somewhere new lately or get new neighbors?

Go here or go there and you can see a sudden spike in what types of people are all over the place.

Just look at the very different experiences Ceka and I have each had looking for multi-racial crowds. Hit the right or wrong sim and you can come away with a very different impression on things.

 

[Pussycat Catnap]

---

Tari Landar wrote:

The ageplay thing isn't new either. It's disgusting, against TOS and a whole lot of other words I can't say here, but unfortunately it's not new. Fortunately, it's something they crack down on and do a pretty darn good job of it (I give LL props when due). Also, thankfully the majority of child avs think the same of that sort of nasty crap, as the rest of us do, and they avoid it too.

---

I've been in SL since 2009, plus a short stint in 2006. I've seen a -LOT- of child AVs, had a few as friends, and a few that seriously bothered me.

In all that time, the one thing I have never seen is ageplay.

And I've been to some pretty disgusting sims, in terms of what their theme is - sometimes I like to open the map and just go. Sometimes a favored LM has something new that is very unappealing to me.

But Ageplay - I think its a LOT RARER than some would claim. You'll notice in the various threads about it on the forums that almost no one can cite an actual provable case. What they do is rant on about youthful avatars that present as adult women, that the poster decides for themselves are not what those people RP and present as...

Mind you I've reported people for Age, as in RL Age, but never encountered Ageplay.

 

 

 

[Pussycat Catnap]

---

Mayalily wrote:

---

Treasure Ballinger wrote:

There IS a SL movement afoot, called 1:1 that wants everyone to scale down and be more RL sized. Maybe that's what you're seeing. These avs don't have child bodies, just small, adult bodies. My Treasure shape is 5'8"which is kinda short for SL but I'm comfortable in it. It no way looks like a child though.

---

Why?  I wouldn't want to join that movement as I'd have to change all the shapes I've already made, and I wouldn't do that, and also the male avi's are NOT scaling down so why?   And all the new people are not scaling down.

Anyhow, most of the avi's who are in this movement then do look like child avi's from far away though, but once close they have boobs, make-up and are trying to look grown up all the while dancing with a giant; however, they still look way too little, imo. 

Why are you doing this?  Start a thread about it.  I'm curious as to why, since I won't be changing my shapes for mesh clothing items, let alone this. 

---

We've had a few hundred such threads already...

Read my blog about proportions to see one good reason. See other threads for a few dozen more.

And if you were to ever think I was a child AV, I'd question your sense of judgement.

[Pussycat Catnap]

OMG I posted, now 6 times in a row... getting through a thread that had its main lifecycle while I was away...

If anybody looked through this and wanted some African skins for an avatar that have African features as well, Look to Lyrical Oh. He's recently put one for each sex up as a freebie - amazingly high quality for a freebie, and his for sale skins are even better.

I'm -not- a fan of some of the other themes of his store... particularly how he themes himself as 'rasta' but has no spiritual elements at all...

(and I think I noted the next point above, but one post I made this afternoon died on me when my laptop's batteries ran out in mid sentence...)

The reggae clubs stand out for me so far as the one place I've found that my choice of tone / features on my avatar doesn't give too negative of an impact for me. Mind you this is because of a stereotype at work there... but it does seem more viable as mixed.

Maybe I need to otherwise avoid clubs... But they're just usually where the social activity is in SL.

I myself am not African, I'm a multi-continential mix of 'races / ethnicities' that can be about evenly split across 4 continents of ancestry. But my avatars have taken on African features and tones of late as it fits a comfort zone for me due to a number of RL factors. That is, when not on a furry.

[Ellyn Elan]

---

Charly Muggins wrote:

Being silver-tongued is a really fun way to kill female vampires . . .

 

. . . and they usually die with a smile on their face, or even a rictus of ecstasy..

---

Good thing I'm not a female vampire . . . yet.

/me contemplates the possibilities for the non-death scenarios!

[Ceka Cianci]

---

Pussycat Catnap wrote:

---

---

If you know of inter-racial places that actually use the word by its proper meaning: places to go to meet others of different backgrounds... PLEASE forward them on to me.

 

Maybe I was extremely unlucky in my searches. It left a very bad 'mood' in my mind after stumbling across the sorts I described.

When I went, every one of the places I landed in was a sex club, and they all sported various 'abuse' themes based around fears of 'black sexuality'...

I felt like I'd stumbled into some kind of bad 1970s blaxploitation-porn, on rerun everywhere I TP'd. But I haven't looked for about a year.

- That, combined with finding that even on alts, anytime I put on a human skin that isn't white, I get mostly ignored (unless I'm in places people know me at like the Forum Cartel, or places like Reggae clubs), has left me a little less social in SL than I used to try and be.

 

Oddly some of the seemingly minority friendly places, like hip hop clubs, seem to instead be full of aggressive people who are either 'posing a stereotype' or perhaps just angry members of that ethnic group.

---

when i go online i'll look through my LM's and see if they are around still..i can either post the links here or just send them to you while in there =)

also we may have been looking at the rings at different times as well..i remember when i started going to those places that we still had a pop list..and i wanna say i probably stopped when blackhouse left..that may have been about a year maybe year and a half ago..it had like i wanna say 6 sims maybe..one for the club and stores and the others were all kinds of other rp..

when it did go down..you saw like 3 places trying to use the name to pick up their traffic..then you saw a boom of places starting up..

what i notice right now..cause i did a search yesterday..is a lot of cuck stuff..

i mean you had places that were sex places when i was going..but that was mostly just for the keywords..everyone was usually in the clubs hanging out or dancing..

one place you may want to try..and i don't even know if it is still around is the las vegas club..

that place used to be packed..almost too packed..that was just a straight up club if i remember right..

i'll take a look at my lm's and check them to see if they are still around..if they are i'll send you some =)

 

[Genesis Montagne]

We're out here, hangin' everywhere and anywhere on the grid. A lot of the difficulty may be around finding quality skins of color. I personally dread when it is time to upgrade my skin because I know it will likely take forever to find something I want to wear. Especially for black males, while there is no shortage of "gangsta" or "thug" skins on the market the selection dwindles down to a very few if you are looking for something less "hardened" and stereotypical. I'm not a gangsta irl, I don't want to look like one in SL. 

I have also met a number of people who play avatars of another race in SL. Whether it be asian, black, indian, native, pacific islander, or white. SL is a place where we can be whatever we want any race, sex, or fantasy creature we can dream up. I spent three months getting to know a neighbor on a sim where I rented only to find out "she" was a "he" down the line. I thought I had a lesbian couple living next door only to find out they were straight, he just enjoyed having a female avatar on SL.

So, what does this tell us besides you never know who you've already met? That SL is truly a place where looks can be deceiving.

 

[Ceka Cianci]

---

Genesis Montagne wrote:

We're out here, hangin' everywhere and anywhere on the grid. A lot of the difficulty may be around finding quality skins of color. I personally dread when it is time to upgrade my skin because I know it will likely take forever to find something I want to wear. Especially for black males, while there is no shortage of "gangsta" or "thug" skins on the market the selection dwindles down to a very few if you are looking for something less "hardened" and stereotypical. I'm not a gangsta irl, I don't want to look like one in SL. 

 

---

I am constantly looking at skins..i think i'll start making a notecard of the good mens skins i see when i am looking..

i am always coming passed them in my searches..

i always hear how men have the hardest time finding good skins..a lot are tucked away in stores where the creator makes both male and female..

i'm curious..when men look for skins do the mostly look in the mens only stores for them more than they do a store that would be for both male and female?

i always see a small selection of them compared to womens skins in most of the stores..i'm wondering if that just turns men away to larger selection stores? or do they look at all the options..

i know you can't answer for all men..it's something i end up asking just to get a good idea..because i think you guys could benefit from  some of us hard core shoppers..we are in every nook and cranny of these places..

and i'm sure the creators would enjoy you finding them as well hehehe *winks*

 

[Ceka Cianci]

---

Genesis Montagne wrote:

We're out here, hangin' everywhere and anywhere on the grid. A lot of the difficulty may be around finding quality skins of color. I personally dread when it is time to upgrade my skin because I know it will likely take forever to find something I want to wear. Especially for black males, while there is no shortage of "gangsta" or "thug" skins on the market the selection dwindles down to a very few if you are looking for something less "hardened" and stereotypical. I'm not a gangsta irl, I don't want to look like one in SL. 

 

---

I am constantly looking at skins..i think i'll start making a notecard of the good mens skins i see when i am looking..

i am always coming passed them in my searches..

i always hear how men have the hardest time finding good skins..a lot are tucked away in stores where the creator makes both male and female..

i'm curious..when men look for skins do the mostly look in the mens only stores for them more than they do a store that would be for both male and female?

i always see a small selection of them compared to womens skins in most of the stores..i'm wondering if that just turns men away to larger selection stores? or do they look at all the options..

i know you can't answer for all men..it's something i end up asking just to get a good idea..because i think you guys could benefit from  some of us hard core shoppers..we are in every nook and cranny of these places..

and i'm sure the creators would enjoy you finding them as well hehehe *winks*

 

[Genesis Montagne]

---

Ceka Cianci wrote:

I am constantly looking at skins..i think i'll start making a notecard of the good mens skins i see when i am looking..

i am always coming passed them in my searches..

i always hear how men have the hardest time finding good skins..a lot are tucked away in stores where the creator makes both male and female..

i'm curious..when men look for skins do the mostly look in the mens only stores for them more than they do a store that would be for both male and female?

i always see a small selection of them compared to womens skins in most of the stores..i'm wondering if that just turns men away to larger selection stores? or do they look at all the options..

i know you can't answer for all men..it's something i end up asking just to get a good idea..because i think you guys could benefit from  some of us hard core shoppers..we are in every nook and cranny of these places..

and i'm sure the creators would enjoy you finding them as well hehehe *winks*

 

---

As you said, I can't answer for all men but when I shop for skins I am extremely picky about what I purchase. I, like many men, do not change my skin often. I believe I've done a hand full of upgrades in 6yrs on SL. From a pure cost perspective I've noticed that there tend to be fewer low cost/high quality skins available for men than women. My most recent skin cost me over 2,000L$ for one bald, one hair base set, no shape or frills. In comparison I have seen several high quality female skins on the market for 800-1,200L$. I think that many skin designers know that men upgrade less frequently and thus the cost penalty.  

As for where or how I shop, I did what many do, I asked for suggestions from friends (usually female friends). Researched popular skin designers on the Marketplace along with conducting my own searches (for ebony, black, african american, african, ethnic, etc.) as well. I also check to see if some of the popular designers of female skins also serve male customers. Once I found a designer that seemed to produce quality products I'd visit their store to try demos. I also searched in-world using much of the same criteria until I found something that I liked. 

Hope that helped :smileywink:

[Zakira Seaside]

right here

[BothamFidor]

In African America maybe?

Fidor

[SchMoke Seelowe]

...psstt..... if you REALLY want to know where they are, add me inworld and i'll show you  

 

 

but once you find out, you cannot tell anyone because its a secret

[LoLadipendenza]

They are not hiding but there are urban friendly sims.

Anaconda is by far the best members only though but has tagless tuesday

Gucci

Poly interracial

Black cat's

 

[Coby Foden]

 

(Hint:  ...you just replied to a post which was made 2 years, 8 months and 30 days ago.) :matte-motes-asleep:

 

[MarquisWilson]

hello everyone. im new to second life. i was wondering if someone  can help me change my avatar into an african american because that is what i am in rl.  not on no racist stuff or anything. also looking for some cool folks to teach me the ropes of second life. hit me up under marquiswilson 

[Darla Hadisson]

My avatar is an African-American, and I am a white male in real life.  I use Second Life on a daily basis.