FAITH

Faith as defined by the Webster dictionary, is loyalty, fidelity, allegiance to duty or person, as well as a firm belief for something for which there is no proof, hence requiring complete trust. When it comes to second life, there are many places or people where we generally place our faith; this being a lover, a family, a social group, an association, a bloodlines clan among many others and no matter how much we claim to know about something or someone, being the way that it is, things in second life require at least some level of complete trust, as we do not always have proof .

I've seen good friends manipulated, cheated on, mind fucked, lied to while the truth is bent beyond recognition; even have suffered it myself and there have even been times when due to this sense of misplaced loyalty, some people have seen fair and fitting to grief and destroy anything on their wake. Recently I have decided, after a few changes here and there, to simplify my life in hopes to improve it, or at least to make it more pleasurable, which has of course required a bit of spring cleaning, namely muting, defriending and removing those who I think are no use or are simply put, not worth the grief or extra effort.

I have gotten into the habit of heading over to spurts at random moments of the day, whenever I have time to kill or am working on article drafts or designs for the shop that require next to none attention - funny place this beach, people don't really IM you, most come to look pretty or go semi afk like I do-. Most of my visits here an rather uneventful, unless I run into a familiar face or a good friend decides to ask for pics for their blog -check Ryce's and you'll see what I mean- either way, something that does happen often when I am IMed on here is that at least on every other visit, I get IMed by someone from bloodlines telling me about the wonders and benefits of their clan and how I should totally join.

Somehow the fact that I lead my own bloodline seems to escape their notice, but they still get extra points for efforts. I do not see much harm from this form of clan PR -being a part of one myself- some people indulge on, but did make me realise why bloodlines is not exactly popular in some circles. Bloodlines players in second life have become SL's Jehova's witnesses "you should totally visit our clan", "we will make you a King", "I have a room full of virgins" and so on.

When I kindly mention that I am just not interested, am in fact semi retired and that my clan doesn't hunt, and that we are in fact closer to a family or sanctuary for those who just don't want to live under any drama, clan pressure or expectations and that we are all happy it works this way, they generally gasp in horror or walk away, as if I were some sort of a BLs heretic -sometimes I even get insulted, which of course always amuses me-

I am happy that your chosen way of life is working so wonderfully for you, but I have decided to simplify and call family only those who act like such, life is too short and second life too varied and extensive to focus on minor things that only benefit a chosen few. Remember that faith is like a Penis, is good to have one, is good to be proud of it, but don't shove it down my throat or expect everyone to think or say that yours is the most wonderful and perfect one that has ever existed.

https://www.facebook.com/spikecls

Rape

I have been sitting on this article piece for a couple of days trying to get the right angle going and I have come to the healthy conclusion that the title, although offensive to some, is nothing short to fitting to what is going on inside (and outside with management of it) of our virtual platform.

Let's get started with Linden Labs and the recent and surprising removal of Oskar Linden, safe to say one of the most hard working and approachable patriarchs of the company, one who made his mission while in the labs and inside second life, to make it a safer, better place for us all.

The official statement would be that he got fired after dealing with a griefer that threatened to crash the region he was working on, while harassing other users present (sound familiar?) shortly afterwards he got the "skype call", which is now how the labs gives the axe to their employees. "To be quite honest this has all come as a surprise and a shock. I have known for a while that this would happen eventually though. All Lindens fear ‘the skype call’. The old Linden culture is long gone. Many Lindens are disappeared in that way when the Lab no longer has use for them. It has been difficult working through the changes at the Lab the past few years. I could have left, perhaps I should have left on my own. I would have been better off. I did not choose to do so because I was dedicated to the wonderful residents I have met during my 4 years working on SL. I was committed to all of you and committed to making Second Life and Linden Lab a better place. I felt I was fighting the good fight and didn’t want to just run away. I felt that I was making a difference. I hope that I did."

It is truly saddening and heartbreaking to see for yourself that, griefers, copy botters and other criminals get to violate TOS with the patronizing help of the labs themselves, who only apply these afore mentioned to those victim of abuse and attacks of all sorts.

Then there is another platform inside our virtual world that does seem to be trailing on the same path and that is one that is close to my personal interests and which affects me somewhat directly and that would be bloodlines. A good friend of mine and former bloodlines liaison Magdalena Fotherington, recently also got the axe, and yes you did indeed guessed it, by dealing with griefers and violators of BLs TOS who not only had been banned from BLs but had been removed as active liaisons.

When approaching the issue at hand which not only involved Merlin Swordthain and Magda's personal issues, but BLs issues past and present, Lyle himself decided to unban Merlin and eject Magda as he wished to not get involved. Now this procedure has me very confused, if you do not wish to get involved, the reasonable thing to do would be to remove and ban them both and let them sort it out outside "office hours"

Lyle Maeterlinck did inform Magda of her ejecting and termination, but after several offliners, no further statements have been made regarding this topic from anyone inside bloodlines.

Guess in the end is the good people, the users and the hard working SL citizens who get raped by those who are supposed to be working for us and not griefers and bullies.

The petition to stop griefers and protect users in SL is still available http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/linden-labs-punish-criminals-on-your-platform/ , if anyone reading this feels that they need to voice their concerns regarding how griefers and BLs TOS are being handled, do send a notecard to Lyle Maeterlinck in-world; how does this affect me? you'd ask, well it may not affect you now, but the next victim could be you and there is obviously no one out there to protect us, that is unless you are a griefer or a thief, in which case do carry on.

https://www.facebook.com/spikecls

Perspective

Reading a few posts from family and friends who have decided recently to follow in on the wonderful adventure which is blogging, I got slightly inspired by making a detailed yet entertaining -if possible- account of my SL story and how Spike came to be the avatar / person he is nowadays.

I opened my account after updating my PC following my RL birthday, I had heard all sorts of things about SL and since I had always been an avid online gamer, decided to give this one a shot. I did do some research on it first to really know what I was getting my hands on, despite the fact that I had dabbled with virtual worlds way back in 2001 and onwards on other grids.

The first few days I invested my time in what most gay noobs do when exploring SL, lots and lots of sex, until that eventually got old and I stopped using the account for a few days, seeing that apart from sex, no one ever offered me the help and guidance I was seeking to maximize my experience whilst in SL; when I decided to log back and give the whole thing another go, is when I met what would become many things for me, my teacher, my liege, my lover and soon to follow my husband, Corbin.

As the many men that had the pleasure or misfortune to bump into him, I was very unaware of the past and baggage he was carrying, but none of that mattered to me at the time, he was offering me exactly what I needed and was seeking, purpose, guidance, a group of friends and family -Yu among them- I still keep around, and very inadvertently he turned me into a hunting weapon that he would soon use to revitalize our limping vampire community.

I was fascinated by the whole bloodlines concept, I did love hunting and I prided myself to be really good at it, I knew what to say and when to say it in order to convince anyone to join us and it was not all that bad, I did meet many great friends that way and was even given 3 precious gifts a father can have, my sons. I often look back and ponder on my options when I decided to join our family and my only regret would be not having explored life as a "human" on the platform, as I do sometimes feel I missed out on many experiences.

Eventually things went south with Corbin, when my bond with Yu became so strong that no person could break and he saw this as a threat for his power stance and our "marriage", but that's a tale for another post. What are the things you didn't get to do while you were a noob in SL and wish you could go back to?

Perspective, usually gained by looking back before making your path ahead.

Thanks to Ellie for providing the inspiration to write this piece: http://elliecfrose.blogspot.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/spikecls