Virtual Sex

I attended part of a one day conference on 'Learning in Virtual Worlds' last week held at Sunderland. The event was run by the Northern Regional Centre of JISC A report on using virtual technologies in teaching and learning can be read here. Whilst according to some media reports, Second Life seems to be less popular it is apparently growing in educational significance. I played around with SL a couple of years ago and was enthusiastic about the possibilities for educational use but I have confess I quickly became bored with the programme thinking "what's the point", last logging in to the Republican and Democrat party events on election night last November (CNN was covering them and I got curious OK?!).

What the hell as this got to do with law and sexuality? Well one of the issues that continued to rumble was the degree to which this virtual environment was safe space. The site has rules which should limit people stripping off their clothes in front of you (our constructed on nudity is an interesting issue to explore) or to start performing sexual acts at random. According to one speaker at the conference last week, SL is now trying to further 'clean up' the space.

Potentially, this means that those wishing to explore gender, species, and most controversially, age, roles will be pushed out. Where to go? Well I came across (if you pardon the phrase) Red Light Social Center via a tweet and although I've not been into the space it sounds interesting. The main website has a intro video but it may be a little racy for some readers so I've put the alternative YouTube video below. The site describes itself as:

'Red Light Center (RLC) is a privately owned Massively Multi-User Reality (sm) site that was made available to the public early in 2006 by Utherverse Inc. Its tag line is "Live Your Fantasy".

Red Light Center is modeled after Amsterdam's Red Light District. The online community site offers users virtual nightclubs, hotels, bars, movie theaters and stores. There is a virtual currency called Rays, which members can earn and use for services in the community.'

Interesting stuff. The chances of someone accidentally coming upon a scene is removed given the clear focus of the site but the barriers between the domestic and the sexual, perhaps broken down by the SL site are back. You go to Red Light Social for a wank or voyeuristic content and SL for the educational and 'legitimate' activity. A lot has already been written on technologies and their impact upon sexuality but this seems another avenue worthy of further exploration, particularly from a legal vantage point.

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