Welcome to Gaia! ::

This topic was inspired by the ridiculous response this avatar generates any time I enter Towns or Town 2 with it.

With this avatar I have:

a) Been accused of being a *****.
b) Being a stalker.
c) Been accused of using this account as my "cyber mule."
d) Had people tell me they can't be around me, "because."

In general, I think I have achieved the dream of making an avatar that actually, for whatever reason, makes people actively uncomfortable (I'm not saying you're one of them of course).

Of course, this thread isn't to discuss my personal experience. On the Internet, as in real life, one's appearance is the first and probably the last thing, that people see about you. Sites like Gaia, where the whole point is to dress up your avatar and show it off to others exacerbate this phenomenon quite a bit.

But... Even though it's only human nature to judge people based on the physical, and almost everyone does it to some extent, you would hope that our home-away-from-home, when we want to escape from the harsh reality of daily life... That this place would be different. Most of us already deal with this s**t in our daily lives, some of us to an amazing extent. We don't then want to turn around and have to deal with the same kinds of behaviors in the leisure activities and hobbies we chose for ourselves, am I right?

God damn human nature. I know I'm expecting too much from you guys. emotion_facepalm

I try not to judge anyone by the way they dress their avatar, or in general because sometimes when you get to know someone they're the exact opposite of their outward appearance. I'm pretty strange and very shy but I try to be kind to everyone I meet. I'm sorry to hear about your unfortunate experience.

I don't really have a single avatar style but I do notice that the interactions I get with strangers tend to differ based on what my avatar is wearing/presenting as. It's especially striking when I get into debates or arguments. Guys seem a lot more likely to respect my opinion (not necessarily agree! it's all in the language used) if I have a male avatar, girls are a lot more likely to get aggressively condescending if I have a female avatar, and...well, I think everyone is just mildly entertained to see a small animal cuss at people, so the Paw base gets a free pass every time.

But you know, I think the whole point of avatars is to ~express oneself~ with the kind of freedom we don't have irl (read: unlimited wardrobe budget aw yeah!!), so it's normal to be "judged" by others on that basis, to some degree at least. You're making a statement and that's going to reflect on the first impression people have of you. Which, in your case, should be "lol nice butt".

Oh yeah, it's hard not to be tempted to "group" people and users with similar looks. gonk

But that's bad, mmmmk? emotion_yatta

Man, I have people tell me my avi must have taken a grand total of five minutes to think up. But of course, then I ask them, "Ok, then why aren't you wearing it by now?"