Sexual harassment

[Melichoir]

Welp, this stuff always finds a way, like a weed.

Ok, so to get down to brass tacks, theres a few issues here.

Your avatar =/= you. You cannot sexually harass a non living entity. The idea of a random person sexually harassing your character in game is making the same argument of "Her barbie doll is sexually harassing my ken doll (or vice versa)." I think an issue people need to learn and understand is that while we can immerse ourselves in a video game, we need to be adults about this and realize "Its a video game". If someone is doing 'lewd' stuff to your character, or being like "show me your 'x'", we need to acknowledge "hey, thats immersion breaking" and stupid. Afterall, very few people refer to their character as I. We typically say "My Dark Knight is...", "My scholar was," or "I ran Byakko EX with my Bard...". Most people in talk, talk about their character as a third person, not as themselves.



It becomes sexual harassment, in my estimate, when they begin targeting you, the actual living breathing real deal person. When its no longer about your avatar but about you specifically, the actual end user. This takes some level of discretion and awareness of course. But if they start saying things to you in private, trying to get real world info about, wanting to take chats to off game, etc. Then you can start raising flags about it.



At that point, fine, you got a real issue we can discuss. Report them, then proceed to mute/block them, and move on. If its an FC member, talk to FC leadership about it. Dont get pissed, however, if they have a healthy level of skepticism. Taking your word alone without and followup should be frowned upon. Take screenshots to back up your claims though. If they refuse to help or what not, then you either cope with it or leave the FC. Sucks but thats life. If the group isnt right for you, stop associating with them. You have control over that. Do whats best in your own interest and own it. Dont stay in a situation that sucks ass and is not getting resolved. If you do, complaining about how 'unfair it is' means little. You make the choice to stay in an unfair situation. And yeah, these kind of situations tends to spoil things. Make things difficult, but thats life sometimes. Sometimes bad things happen and nothing can be done about it except take your leave. Own it and run with it.

But going back to the first point, your avatar isnt you. Its an avatar. A 'doll' you created. Thats it. People running up to it and being stupid (using lewd emotes or what not) isnt sexual harassment. Its just people being stupid. Gross, sometimes sure (admittedly its funny sometimes how stupid they are). Ridiculous, sure. But is it you? No. Its a thing you project on. And so long as you have the mind to understand that, its not going to 'break you'.

"But what about the children!!!!"

I saw someone argue that, saying the 'damage is done'. Well first off, MAYBE you shouldnt have young children playing this game unsupervised. Just saying. If theyre a teen, as long as its not sustained direct harassment, theyll be fine. Teens arent fragile things thatll break the instant someone unpleasant happens. As a parent, they should be talking with their kids about that. You know, the whole being an actual parent thing. And before someone says "Well they dont know!", thats just lazyness. Your job as a parent is to be aware. Get knowledgeable about the things your kids are into and do.

If that FAILS, be a big sister/brother to other players. Be someone that can keep an eye on them and be there for them if they DO have an issue. This doesnt mean being a parent, it means being an adult and keeping an eye on things. If you think something is up, ask and investigate. Do your part, particularly if you feel its a huge issue. Dont be mother hen, be big sister.

TLDR: People need to start being adults more about a lot of things. Youre not receiving sexual harassment if someone is being stupid to your avatar. Youre not your avatar. Think of hte children is a stupid argument. Parents need to be exercising responsibility, and if they fail and your an adult, be a stand up person and just keep an eye on things and make sure younger players know youre someone they can talk to. Be rational about solving issues, not emotional.

[Galaktica]

TLDR: People need to start being adults more about a lot of things. Youre not receiving sexual harassment if someone is being stupid to your avatar. Youre not your avatar. Think of hte children is a stupid argument. Parents need to be exercising responsibility, and if they fail and your an adult, be a stand up person and just keep an eye on things and make sure younger players know youre someone they can talk to. Be rational about solving issues, not emotional.

I see where you're coming from, and I don't think you're necessarily wrong in your sentiment. I do think, however, that we can debate the nature of avatars.

They more or less represent you. It's how you choose to express yourself. For some people, that attachment is flimsy at best. They would be just as at home playing one race as they would another. For others, that expression means a lot more. They care about the work they put into their character so much that it feels like they're putting a piece of themselves out there for the world to see and judge. If the world responds negatively to that piece, it often feels personal. Some people choose to be a Miqo'te or whatever because they don't give a shit and it's just kinda cute to play as. Some people look at Miqo'te and think "this is how I'm going to choose to represent myslelf in this world. A fun-loving adventurous cat." Then some creepy dude comes by thinks "I know one Miqo'te who is a slut! This one must be too!" and it just puts a damper on the whole thing.

Is it as bad as someone slapping your ass in real life or calling you a slut to your face? No, but it still stings because it feels like that part of you that you put out there is being misconstrued.

Think about it like this: say in your free time you enjoyed making music or painting. Then let's say, you decided to upload your work to deviantart or youtube or whatever. Now, that work isn't necessarily "you" either, but it's still the part of you that you chose to put out there. You go, show off your work, and everyone shits on it. Now, it may not mean much to you for any number of reasons and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. However, for some, it may sting a lot. Again, they're choosing to put a piece of themselves out there in some form and it may not be easy enough for them or they just might care a whole lot more. Nothing wrong with that either.

This isn't directly entirely at you, but the thing I dislike about all these "snowflake" and "get over it comments" is this seemingly underlying thought process that everyone is the same. Or like we should all be connected to some weird hivemind. People are all different. That's like a kind of important part to being human. For some people, it's the painting and music is their choice of expression. For others, it's FFXIV (and video games in general).

[Melichoir]

Snip

In game avatars are, ultimately, just that. An avatar. A 'doll' you can choose to model. Whether that is after you or not, matters little broadly. Because its not you. There are men and women who play characters who look nothing like them in real life. There are those who model htem as closely as possible. That is fine either way, but at the end of the day, it is not you. Its a puppet you control. People need to actually understand this. The game isnt the real world, but a stylized fantasy setting which we can interact with through our characters.

Thats what I mean by people needing to be adults. We can all have fun playing make believe, but at the end of the day, we need to still keep our feet (and our heads) in reality. If someone is running up and slapping your avatars butt, our response shouldnt be "OMG SEXUAL HARASSMENT!" but "Hey, stop that, youre ruining my experience here."

If the conversation becomes "Hey show me your 'X'" and "send pix" and the like, ok thats no longer dealing with the avatar, but you.

As for that 'sting', yeah, thats what happens when we place 'ourselves' on things. Its actually not a 'good' thing. We take criticism of something we made or a part of as criticism of ourselves and our worth. Its one thing to say "Hey youre character looks like hot garbage" and naother to say "You are hot garbage." One is criticism of something we made, but not ourselves, and the other is, well the other.

And to be clear, telling people to grow up is gonig to be a part of the discussion. Yeah there is oversimplification of legit harassment, but on teh same token, there are people becoming bent out of shape about things that really, as an adult, should not be something you should get bothered about. I get it, that it can be annoying. But if someone in a video game is like "Nice butt" to your toon, that isnt something worht getting worked up over. Smile about it, shrug it off, ignore them, slap them in the face, tell them to suck a butt, whatever you want, but it shouldnt be something that is 'scarring' you. And it wont, if you have some backbone to be unphased.

Or more simply put, people think that becoming desensitized is a terrible thing, but it actually has purpose. Becoming desensitized to small things so they roll off you will serve you much better than becoming upset and mentally disturbed at every little comment and provocation. So when people say "Grow up snowflake," there is a touch of truth to it, especially if its over a non issue.