Scylla Rhiadra

Well, by default, all friends are in the "Friend Zone," right? In this instance, it doesn't make any sense, really, to even use that term because there is no one among my friends in SL who isn't in the "Friend Zone." There isn't any other zone into which my acquaintances might belong!

Um . . . why? Because men and women can't enjoy nonsexual relationships? They haven't "applied" for a position because I haven't advertised an opening. I'm not available, they know that, and they're fine with it because *gasp* they might actually value my friendship for reasons that have nothing to do with sex?

Yeah. Beware of people who believe that all self-representation in SL is "role play." It tells you an awful lot about their own approach to personal interactions here.

The video clip and song are adorable (passing in silence over some rather dated attitudes, of course), but . . . . . . am I the only who sort of started panicking by proxy about one minute in? Girl, what are you doing???? You said 20 minutes!!!! YOU'VE GOT STUFF TO DO!!!!! EEEEK!

Again, this is all anecdotal, and every one's experience is going to be different. But I, personally, have NOT found "good ones" to be rare at all. On the contrary, I have probably 10 men friends in SL, some of them pretty close, who are really just . . . wonderful. They are respectful, kind, and generous. At least two of them that I can think of offhand I met at clubs where they IMed me out of the blue. And what followed were lovely, interesting, and pressure-free conversations that led, eventually, to my befriending them. Now, none of them are sexual or romantic partners. But that's sort of the point. They could be, and I think they'd still be respectful, kind, and intelligent, because that's pretty clearly who they are as people. I'm not going to tell other women that they are "wrong" because their experiences have been different. And I've certainly also met my share of jerks. But I don't think that nice men are rare at all, because I run across them all the time.

Totally. These kinds of "expectations" are not even "natural": they're pumped out by the media, and we're meant to soak them up without question because . . . well, you can be sure that money is involved somehow. Proof, in part, is the fact that preferences about body types change every decade or so. Women are every bit as much prone to buying into this garbage as men. In fact, maybe more: I think women are more likely to feel inadequate because they've been told that their butt is too small, their boobs not perky enough, etc. I am sure men are prone to such pressures as well, but there's a ton of evidence to suggest that women's views of their own bodies, as well as their response to men's, has caused immense damage and suffering. Instagram even did an internal research study that determined that the platform's algorithms, which favoured particular kinds of women's self-presentation, was harming young women. (And of course they quietly shelved the research, because money.) But if you're a man who is being told that you are somehow "not up to scratch" because you don't look like Hemsworth, then you're every bit as much a victim of popular culture as a woman who is rejected because she doesn't look like Rihanna or Scarlett Johansson. It's all crap, and the sooner we all see it, the better.

What I like about him is not his muscles -- I like "fit" rather than "ripped" -- but rather the mischievous look in his eyes, and the impression that he is good humoured.

So is wet hair. (Ooops. Am I oversharing?????)

"Unrealistic expectations" is really a pretty value-neutral term; it's not at all the same as "unreasonable expectation." One's partner can disappoint because they have failed to master the basics of interacting in a sensitive and generous way with one, or because one is asking of them more than they, or perhaps anyone, are capable of giving. To be disappointed is not automatically to be in "the right." I think, personally, that there is a baseline for all human engagement, and that is to treat the other person in a manner that acknowledges that they too are a human being, and deserving of basic civility and respect. (Unless of course they've done something that justifies a different approach.) The tricky part, and I think this applies to all relationships to some degree, and not just hetero or romantic ones, is negotiating through communication what one's expectations are, and determining if they are compatible with what the other person can provide. Sometimes . . . they just can't. Lovely to see you back, Caer, even if only a flying visit!

Thanks Cinn. They're fun shots to do. It's certainly a theme I'm running with at the moment, but I don't know if it will be subject of a show. Maybe? Some of these will likely make their way into my show in November on "Memory Love Loss." A couple of years back I did a pic called "What Do You See?" which asked the viewer to interrogate their own assumptions about an image of a "sexily" dressed woman walking alone down a dark street. A sex worker? A foolish woman putting herself in danger? These pics sort of build on that: I want to insist that the dark, and the night, can be claimed as a woman's spaces too.

Oh well, if we're showing off vintage photos of Malts . . . Here's Richard Parkes (or "Dick" as I like to think of him) being angry about something or another. Furries, I think it was. Here's a more recent pic of Dick, expressing his . . . um . . . "admiration" for @Eva Knoller (Honestly, don't ask me. I just work here.)

Pffft. It "proves" nothing. There are greater variations in taste and preference between individual women than there are between women and men. Stop trying to reduce the enormous complexity of gender identity, and how that is expressed by individuals, to handy little sound bytes!

Yeah, what @Love Zhaoying said. This one . . .

Thank you! I can't speak for Cinn, but my Malts need to look as good as I can make them because I'm going to be featuring them in photos. So I keep half an eye out when shopping for good looking stuff for men. They have to look as "good" as me, or they'll drag down the pic. Other than that, trial and error and a lot of tweaking!

lowhut?

But what DO women really want?

Absolutely nothing wrong with this one, Cinn.

One I've posted before. I have several male "alts," although only one actual male alt account -- Richard Parkes. Most of them are just different bodies/outfits I use for pics. This is my favourite, I think. I'd do him. (Did I say that out loud?)

Very much. I'm so tired of people treating social justice as though it were an arms race, or a contest with winners and losers. The stakes for all of us are the same: a more civil and just more livable world. And this does apply to SL. One frequently hears both men and women "strategizing" about relationships, especially romantic and sexual ones, as though bargaining from "a position of strength" were key to happiness. It's not. Constructing an in-world culture in which openness and trust rather than wariness is.

I think that's exactly right -- bad for both men and women. Something that some people don't appreciate is that social, legal, and political reforms that bring about equality are as beneficial to men as they are to women. It's not actually most men who benefit from patriarchy, which merely provides the illusion that they are "empowered" because they have more rights than someone else. Laws around marriage have always, in the West anyway, been predicated upon control over property and wealth. And for that reason, they have been written with the wealthy in mind. Follow the money, as they say. Who benefits? It's not the vast majority of men. In a more SL-related context, although the same kinds of outdated conventions don't apply, I DO think that those men who are NOT willing to treat women as equals in every respect are also cheating themselves. SL is a better place for everyone if it is a more civil and just place.

In the west, the process by which women have gained "personhood" -- and an associated freedom from being considered someone else's property -- has been a very slow and gradual one. While married women were theoretically "persons" in their own right legally, it wasn't until the 18th and 19th centuries that laws granting women the right to possess their own property, earn their own money, etc. were developed. Until the mid-18th century in Britain, men had the right to literally lock up their wives indefinitely. In the US, women were only granted equal rights to file for divorce in the 1930s -- before that date, only men could effectively "escape" a marriage; women were trapped. And laws against marital r*pe, based on the apparently revolutionary idea that a woman's body was literally not the property of her husband to use howsoever he desired, whenever he wished, are astonishingly recent: in the US, marital r*pe was only recognized by all states in the mid-1990s, and some states still do not classify it as a crime of the same seriousness as non-marital r*pe. And don't get me started on reproductive rights, and the loss of control over their own bodies that many women are suddenly facing, or have had to deal with always. In other words, it's complicated: "equal rights" can exist on paper in a statute somewhere, but be effectively nullified by another, usually much older law, still on the books somewhere else. There are a great many different elements involved in ensuring that women are actually and in practical terms "owners of themselves." (This post is a duplicate of one currently being held awaiting "moderation.")

Like . . . "wondering"???? 😏

Yeah. This is a half-step away from Incel-type castigation of "Stacys."

Well, I was, although I'd argue that my generalization applies to both RL and SL -- with the caveat that the pseudonymity and relative safety of SL means that women are likely somewhat more sexually adventurous here. And this is very much why I couched my language so carefully. Sexual habits are changing. I have friends my own age and even a little older who use Tinder for one-time hookups. And younger women certainly do. So, generalized as it is, I suspect my characterization of this gendered difference is becoming less and less pronounced. One minor point, maybe: "relationship" need not mean "romantic relationship." "Friends with Benefits" abound these days, and maybe especially in SL. The virtual booty call is definitely a thing. It is entirely possible, and indeed probably very common, to have sexual relations with someone with whom one has a "relationship" that is not recognizably romantic. Indeed, I have many friends in SL, men and women, who do this. My sense, with all of the usual qualifications, is that women probably value the other, non-sexual aspects of those relationships somewhat more than the men do. This at least is my impression garnered from my conversations with them. I get that. I don't do the sexy time thing: my interactions are, at most, flirtatious, so I don't have those kinds of aesthetic standards, nor do I care so much about their language (because, after all, I'm not going to be emoting with them anyway). Because of the limits that I place upon my own relationships, I value someone who is, well, "nice" -- kind, generous, empathetic, etc. -- far more than I do looks or eloquence.