Getting a little ticked...

Our reading this week struck a cord with some of the other reading I've been doing for our group. We're looking at personality, obviously, so a simple search on avatar personality led me to a book written by David Bell. Bell talks about embodiement, or lack thereof, and of some of the history of the "gender rights movement" for lack of a better term. He mentioned that in the late 90s, a movement developed to keep female gamers out of these online worlds. Women responded by creating groups of girl gamers that used terms like geekgrrls and others. They fought back much like we saw in Ada's story.

Bell also talks about the "cross dressing" aspects as well. He mentions some specific cases of female lesbians being seduced by homosexual men believing the female avatar is actually a man. He then speaks of the sterotypes of maleness and femaleness. The idea is that you must exagerate the sterotypes in order to be a believable avatar.

Up until this point in my reading, Bell had only ticked me off to a mild extent. Then he pushed me right over the edge. He began discussing race and computing. He classed individuals into 3 groups, the Information Users, the Information Used, and those that lack information. By information, he of course meant lack of access. His whole thesis apparently revolved around this point. Apparently minorities and women LACK the needed skills to effectively use the internet and VWs, and it is another ploy by those in the upper tier to keep us all in our proper places. His book was published in 2000.

I growled a few times, skimmed the rest of the work and chalked it up to the hairbrained schemes of the moronic, until I found he's actually published several works on this subject. That really made me angry. While I can see his viewpoint about access, I do not accept his idea that some people (mainly women in his opinion) lack the skills to participate flly in the digital age. To me it is akin to an article in a gaming magazine from several years ago in which the author suggested to his male readers that they should introduce thier girlfriends to gaming through things such as Spiro, or other cuddly, easy games. The author was inundated with enough letters from angry female readers that even he had to admit that perhaps he was wrong. In the year 2000, when Bell was published, I was teaching 7th grade life science at an at-risk in Virginia, where my students were far more technologically savy that I was. Even in 2000, most families had a computer in the home. Though Bell does admit that he graduated from grad school when computer took up several rooms.

I believe he is right that in some cases gender is over exagerrated to be believable, however, I found that usually this is a case of when someone is attempting to project an avatar they are uncomfortable with (ie man project female or vice versa). We won't even get into his thoughts on "furries" as he calls them, and those that would chose them.

Now let me move abruptly to my next topic of frustration for the week. Obviously, since Thursday, much ahs been discussed about violence in the media, ie violent games, movies, tv shows. Everytime some horrible tragedy occurs it's back to the theory of desensitation that causes the young (and not so young) to "lose it" and harm others. I've spent much time in conversation about this lately, and this is not my first post on the subject. But as I watch the things occuring in our world and the increase in technology being blamed for it I feel outraged. I have yet to find a single long term study that links violent media to violent behavior in the young. What I have found are studies that indicate that the "me" attitude of parenting has caused the young to feel isolated and powerless. Obviously there are many good parents in the world, many realize the committment required to parent. Others do not. When the incident at Columbine was blamed on video games and music I (as young as I was) asked why his parents weren't monitoring what they were doing? I find myself now wondering why, even at the age of 27, no one noticed that this young man had gone off his medication, or that something was wrong.

Some discussion in our class has revolved around whether meeting online is truly meeting, whether it is social. Forming friendships online can be just as vital as forming them in RL. No man is an island, why didn't anyone notice? I think again it leads back to the "me" attitude. Well, he stopped showing up to work at the prison, so he's fired, end of story. Why didn't someone go to his home and check on him? It would seem to me if the playing of violent video games is "making" children react violently, then why are parents allowing the games to be played by thier children? While it's not easy to monitor every aspect of what your children's lives, there is quite a bit that can be monitored. I knew most of what was going on in my classroom when I was teaching. I knew who thought they might be pregnant, who was taking drugs, who was living with someone other than thier guardian, who was reading what, and what games they played. I knew which girls braided hair for extra money, and I knew who was "dating" who. I was thier teacher and saw them roughly an hour a day. How can we live in a world where it is SO easy to stay connected, and yet no one knew this young man was about to snap, just like no one knew the young man at Virginia Tech was about to snap. How can no one know?

I think we're living in a time where everyone can be connected. I don't feel that there are classes. While my mother typically uses the internet for shoping, she also knows how to log onto a library system, retrieve materials, and do what she needs to do. She taught herself. Some of the greatest computer users I've met are women and minorities. These are the people that not only can do anything online, but when thier computer is broken, they know how to take it apart and repair it. Not because they had opporunity to learn as children, but because unlike those that have the resources (According to Bell), they cannot replace thier system when it breaks, they fix it. I once epoxied a telephone jack onto my computer when my modem port had broken. It worked that way for years. I've also helped one of my friends reduce her computer to parts in order to find that broken card and replace it. Remember, we are the people that Bell insists have no ability.

I know that this blog has been rambling, but of course during the course of writing it I've had three seperate conversations with my son, taken water to my husband that is recovering from Strep, and I've taken a second to feed my aged cat canned food. But hey, maybe it should be all about me? Come on folks, especially the ladies and minorities, please prove Bell wrong. And remember to take care of each other. Those of us in Grad school know what its like to be far from home, with no one to look in on you. I remember thinking that when I arrived here, 12 hours away from my family and my fiance that the only people that would miss me would be GRU and maybe Cox. Ironically, I quickly made close friends of several cohorts, and we have always taken care of each other. It's not hard. When someone is strapped for cash, take them leftovers from dinner, or invite them over. I can't count the number of meals I've taken to my friends, and how many I've gotten in return. When someone you care about is down, take them out for coffee, watch a movie together, it's just a couple of hours, and can mean the world. The night I called a friend and told her that I was miserable, she picked me up and we drove for three hours talking. Several weeks later, when her sister had an ear infection that sent her to the hospital int he middle of the night, I drove. It's not the things we watch as adults, or the games we play, it's the fact that no person is an island and we all need each other. SL gives us a chance to make connections to people, to keep in touch, and to take care of those, even when they are hours away.