Scattered Thoughts Warning: This Post May Make Less Sense Than It Should
Second Life is an 18-and-over world, and There has an age category box on the sign-up page that says "click here if you are under 13." I'm not sure what happens if you click the There box -- maybe the pre-teen falls into a cyber-oubliette. Some youngsters are very well-behaved people, however, that doesn't change the wishes of the virtual world denizens, who just want to be able to do whatever catches their fancy at the moment without needing to worry that they are corrupting minors. Plus if you're an adult minors are .... annoyingly immature. There's enough annoyingly immature behavior on the part of grown-ups, but at least no one has to ammend their behavior for fear of corrupting them. Anyway, of course people lie about their ages and get in where they aren't wanted. Because I've been in There over a year I've had all kinds of experiences with kids begging. I recently had my first Second Life experience with someone wanting something from me. Someone hailed Ozymandias (I doubt she would've hailed Osprey) and explained that she wanted to open a "bondage club" but needed $500. I said I was unlikely to be a patron of her club, whereupon she asked, "Don't you LIKE bondage?" Uh... no... I think ms is wasted on me -- it should go to someone interested in bondage, so they can be happy. You like bondage? You think you know what it's like to be bound? MS will take you to a new level, dude. I'm selling my ms at the rock-bottom, bargain price of $500 Linden. Anyway... I just tried to look her up as I swear to god I remember her as saying she was 15 in her profile... but she no longer exists :)
It's been true throughout much of my life (although not throughout history) that the state of adulthood is not looked upon as desirable: there are no things that children can't do that are looked upon as desirable. The state of adolescence is, seemingly, regarded as the peak in human existence. Look at fashion magazines: the models, who used to be women, then were women who looked like children, are now very, very young oddballs who don't in any way represent the human life-form, although they are undoubtedly related to coathangers. If SL is striking a blow on behalf of adult human beings, I have to applaud it.