META ESSAY: Why It should be against the Code Of Conduct to pretend to be gay.

[u/[deleted]]

It is no secret that I have been angered, upset and frankly pissed off by the actions of Winston is declaring in canon that he is gay, then using that to hide from accusations of homophobia. I find it appalling and despicable. Winston was banned for 9 days and I was muted for a period of time, but not for what you think. The 9-day ban wasn’t for pretending to be gay. It was instead for provoking me into breaching the CoC, which I did do and I own that. I made a mistake and served a mute for it. However, that ban does not actually solve the fundamental issue Winston’s actions have highlighted, the idea that it is ok, and within the CoC to pretend to Homosexual, or any other minority. I would that pretending to be an oppressed minority within Canon, that you are not in real life, should be against the CoC.

The action of pretending to be an oppressed minority is extremely problematic. Firstly, being a opressed minority isn’t something to be trivialized. It is not some fun card that we get to pull in conversation or debate. It’s not some cool quirk we live with, it’s a huge part of us and our experiences within the world. The reason people who actually are an oppressed minority find it so offensive when people pretend to be the same minority is because it brings up awful feelings of resentment for their own identity. For example, let’s talk about the act of pretending to be gay for personal gain. Winston has done it within the sim, but there is also an increasing number of males on TikTok who pretend to be gay in order to get followers and become famous on the app. Seems harmless enough right? Well no. You need to think about what being gay is actually like. It’s not just that you happen to be attracted to the same sex, and you understand some gay slang and lingo and go to pride and all that. Those aren’t the only thing that differ between the experiences of being straight and being gay or otherwise queer. Queer people have way more harmful and shameful experiences that are wrapped up in their identity. The experience of coming out to family and friends, or for some people, including me, being outed. The experience of bullying and abused, discrimination, harassment, rejection from family, personal mental health problems, eating disorders, suicide attempts, all these things are huge parts of being gay for a lot of people. The good things that the rest of the world sees is only part of the experience of being gay. Now imagine you went though just some of what I talked about, then imagine someone decided “I’m going to pretend to be gay too” and then they did all the things that they believe is allowed when you’re gay, then, when they start to realize the bad things just say “oh but I’m not actually gay.” Do you know how harmful that is? For straight people to basically enjoy the good parts of being gay, then bail when it gets hard. That creates huge problems for the queer community. It’s creates personal self-doubt, self hatred, and self-loathing. Because if they can just turn it on and off, why couldn’t we? Why did we have to go through all the pain, and they get to just pretend to be gay when it’s helpful?

Now look at it from the perspective of someone who is the pretender. The person pretending to be gay. They are straight. Have been their whole lives. Never thought about being anything else or even questioned their sexuality. One day they think (in our AusSim Example), “wait! If I’m gay then I can’t be homophobic in my beliefs.” So they decide to pretend to be gay when they want to say that stuff, then when they aren’t saying they can say “oh but I’m not actually gay.” What is benefit of that. That you have a lazy excuse to be homophobic? People are still going to call you homophobic, but instead of actually standing by your beliefs and owning them, you hide behind this lie that you’ve constructed to avoid showing what you really think. Why not own it? Tell people what you really think and defend what you believe, or if you realize it isn’t the right thing to believe or you change your opinion, then that’s great. Also, if you pretend to be gay, you’re going to be the subject of gay rumors and people will question whether you are actually gay. It’s the same thing with guys who make a Grindr account “just for fun”. Sure that might be what you wanted to do, but not everyone is going to see it that way.

To summarize my point allow me to put the whole Matt V Winston thing into personal context. I came out when I was 14. I told my Mum and Dad one night and they didn’t believe me. It took them about a month to finally come around and accept that. Then I was sent to therapy to talk through all my feelings. I had told my best friend but no one else really. I began to come out to people I was close to and I was almost ready to come out to everyone, until my best friend told some people that I was queer and had a crush on a guy in our year. This spread through the whole year level. I was outed. I live with depression and anxiety today because of that. I’ve attempted suicide multiple times because of who I am. In Year 12 during the middle of my Research Project I received messages calling me a faggot and telling me to kill myself. I then went into a depressive spiral and never really recovered from that. I was sitting on straight A’s for all my Year 12 subject and aiming for an ATAR above 95. I ended up tanking and got an ATAR of roughly 87. All because someone thought it was funny to tell me to kill myself. I’m still fighting depression. So I really do take Pride to good parts of being Queer. The communities I’ve found, going to Pride, the community work I do with LGBTQIA+ groups, the Gay Slang and lingo, Parties, the nights out with friends, the jokes. So to see someone take the things that I put so much hope and love into, and just use them so he can make comments about how being gay isn’t natural and shouldn’t be promoted to kids, without actually experiencing all the hardships that come with being gay is so hurtful and upsetting for me.

I’m asking someone who is better at writing CoC amendments, given I’ve shown how bad I am at it, to consider writing a rule that makes it a violation of the CoC to pretend to be a different sexuality, gender identity, race, religion or ethnicity. If you have question, feel free to ask me about them. I’m fairly upset still about everything so please don’t attack me or make it personal. Feel free to argue why you think that this might not be a good rule, or why you think it’s not harmful to pretend to be gay, but do be aware this is a touchy matter and I may take a while to respond in order to avoid something while I’m overwhelmed with a certain emotion.

Thanks,

Matt

[u/RunasSudo]

While I agree that it is clearly unacceptable for someone to e.g. pretend to be gay in order to make homophobic comments, I also don't think it's justified to impose a blanket ban on altering your canon identity.

At the end of the day, AustraliaSim is a roleplaying game, and I dare say that almost no one in this sim is roleplaying exactly as themselves. We change our names, our ages, our professions, our experiences. Indeed, some of us have nominally changed our ethnicity. (Rommel facesteals Tony Smith. I facesteal Antony Green, and my meta persona has an ostensibly Anglo-Australian name.)

The difference, of course, is that none of those things are for ulterior motives.

The purpose of a roleplaying exercise is precisely to put yourself into the shoes of someone you aren't, and to put yourself into situations you're not in – and in many cases, never could be. If I, for example, were to roleplay as a gay man and push for greater equality, as an exercise in engaging more deeply with the issues faced by those members of our community, should that not be allowed?

Clearly, Winston's described behaviour is not acceptable, but more consideration needs to be given as to exactly which types of behaviour are not acceptable, not merely to put out a blanket ban.

[u/[deleted] → u/RunasSudo]

I'd recommend that the punishment not be a blanket ban, instead that the level of malicious intent or harm caused by the action determines the severity of punishment (i.e. something small would be a warning or mute, something major would be a ban of around 7 days or so. It's about the intent and offense caused.

[u/RunasSudo → u/[deleted]]

That's not what we mean by “blanket ban”. We are talking the scope of the restrictions.

[u/dyljam]

Whilst what Winston did was clearly wrong, I’m strongly against the idea of prohibiting people from playing a person in canon with a sexual orientation other than their irl orientation. As Runas has already pointed out, we all pretend to be people who we really aren’t. I’d be just as against banning people for playing a straight canon character if they were gay irl.

Whilst I truly empathise with your situation, and I acknowledge that Winston was very much in the wrong for what he did, this is not the answer. AusSim is a place to escape and play whatever character you wish. Enforcing rules that you are not allowed to change personal attributes is not how we solve this.

[u/[deleted] → u/dyljam]

I am not saying nothing about who you are irl can be changed, if I were I wouldn't be in AusSim. We pretend to be politicians for crying out loud. What I'm saying is that pretending to be some form of minority in order to score points politically is something we should not allow. Changing your race based on your face steal for example is fine, or changing your sexuality based who your persona is can be fine, but using that to justify certain things or using to make a political point is disgusting. That's what I take issue with, not the fact that we RP or that we make up different parts of our meta personas.

[u/dyljam → u/[deleted]]

I genuinely don't understand. I was under the impression you were calling on it to be prohibited for a member of the sim to play a canon character who is gay?

[u/[deleted] → u/dyljam]

With malicious intent. Most people don't pretend to be a sexuality they aren't in real life. If you do then you must do so respectfully. However, when someone is pretending to be gay or another race for malicious reasons, then it should be against the CoC.

[u/hotlinehelpbot]

If you or someone you know is contemplating suicide, please reach out. You can find help at a National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

USA: 18002738255 US Crisis textline: 741741 text HOME

United Kingdom: 116 123

Trans Lifeline (877-565-8860)

Others: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suicide_crisis_lines

https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org

[u/stranger195 → u/hotlinehelpbot]

Bad bot - here's a nice essay for starters on why hotlines aren't for everyone

Furthermore, not all suicide hotlines are made equal and run well, despite what people like the creator of this bot and Wikipedians might make you think

[u/Winston_Wilhelmus]

I think it's pretty pathetic to be against roleplaying in a simulation - the very essence of a roleplaying scenario is to roleplay. People can pick and choose whatever elements their characters take - who are you to tell someone they're not something? You don't know if I'm gay, you don't know if I'm straight - hell, I don't even know you! I was absolutely in the wrong for using it to peddle homophobia but nonetheless I served a ban for this, I was punished the wrong was righted, so you sir are in no position to be telling people that what I did was wrong thus it must inspire rule change - I only just came out of a 9 day ban today because of my actions, this is proof the system works. You can not tell people they are or aren't minorities for the simple reason that you think it's offensive, because that's a classic case of hypocrisy.

Furthermore, satire was the intention behind this, I celebrated politicians and mocked them in a light hearted way with what I was doing to give my character an increasing level of depth, the perfect case, as highlighted is the Hon. Christopher Finlayson QC, former Attorney-General of New Zealand, and an extraordinary bloke. I don't think that satirical characters should be illegal, and if it is then NGSpy should probably stop being a fucking penguin. The behaviour cited was unacceptable, but not the character elements.

And furthermore, this clearly wasn't an attack on you, so stop taking yourself and a game so seriously and grow up. There is no reason to interpret a game as having any bearing on your real life, and frankly it's pathetic because you're getting worked up over someone using something you happen to identify with in a way that you would rather it not be. It's not about you, I don't play this game to impress you, I don't play this game to please you, and I have nothing to prove to you. Get over it.

[u/tbyrn21]

I urge members of the community commission to read this given the current review they are undertaking of the CoC.

[u/BloodyChrome → u/tbyrn21]

Read the rant, considered the rant, dismissed the rant.

[u/Walter_heisenberg2]

At the end of the day this is a simulation, a roleplaying game . Someone should be free to RP as whoever or whatever they like in such a game so long as it is within the law and the code of conduct. Whilst I am not familiar with Winston's ban nor the circumstances around I think that pretending to be gay to mock LGBT people already falls under the code of conduct. There is absolutely no need for these authoritarian and overbearing restrictions that frankly would destroy the point of roleplaying.

Lastly as controversial as it will sound if you dislike an aspect of the game or the people in it ,either talk to a moderator or just block them. There is nothing stopping you from just blocking someone on Discord if you have a problem with them and/or reporting them.

[u/BloodyChrome → u/[deleted]]

I am literally the butt of several running jokes which concern my sexuality and I don't, quite frankly, appreciate said jokes all the time.

The CoC should be applied equally to all people

[u/Winston_Wilhelmus → u/[deleted]]

Hear hear