Partial Draft 01 - Mini Essay

After spawing a fair amount of controversy on the internet, a legal matter in Belgium is being further investigated. The charges are for an alleged “virtual rape” occuring in the popular gaming website called Second Life. Although it’s somewhat hard to define, the explination of a virtual rape is basically the controller of another character (Avatar) in the game, creates or purchases a script which will force another Avatar to submit to the sexual act. The second Avatar’s human controller has no power to stop this other than, to exit the game. This leads to the question, is a “virtual rape” grounds for being prosecuted of rape?
Rape is defined by Merriam-Webster as “unlawful sexual activity and usually sexual intercourse carried out forcibly or under threat of injury against the will usually of a female or with a person who is beneath a certain age or incapable of valid consent.” Rape in real life, or “IRL” as the Second Life gamers refer to it as, is something almost everyone is familar with. People are accused of rape everyday in the U.S., and it is taken seriously in the court system. The rape has to be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, and just becasue a girl got “taken advangtage of” after a night of drinking doesn’t always constitute a rape. Going to show that even things that physically happened can sometimes be hard to prove. For a rape to occur, the victim has to say “no”, and then still be forced into the sexual act. How is this possible in a game world where exiting the program, or turning off the computer only takes a simple action? According to WTFsrsly.com, although there are codes that can modify an Avatar to appear to be raping another Avatar, the second Avatar’s controller would need to consent first. So where’s the rape case here? VirtuallyBlind.com goes on to add that, clever scripters could have possibly hidden the code in an object in the game, such as a bracelet or gift. The player recieving the gift would be unsuspecting of the hidden code, and then the first player could take control of them.
Aside from the matter of how the particular coding was used in the game, there’s still the fact that this is a virtual object, doing something to another virtual object. The analogy was used in a blogger’s reply on VirtuallyBlind.com to two children playing with Barbies. If the child with Ken, “rapes” Barbie, even if the child playing with Barbie tells them to stop, is that rape? Everyone would probably say no. It may be a form of sexual harrasment, such as an obscene phone call, or explicit e-mails. But it doesn’t constitue a rape. How would one go about prosecuting that crime? The same question should be asked of the “virtual rape” charges.

39 Comments


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    Quote | Posted September 21, 2007, 6:14 am

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