Hundredth Monkey Revisited

I have always wanted to start a blog to write about, process, and share my thoughts.  It has taken me a while to actually act on it because writing doesn’t always come easy for me.  I have to be deeply inspired, and the timing has to be right.  Recently, I found events I wanted to dig into so I could understand what my feelings about them were trying to teach me, and what I could learn from it.  I hope to draw readers who feel the same, but if not writing alone is therapeutic enough.

For those of you who don’t play Second Life (SL) and breed KittyCatS, here is a little background for the motivation of this first blog entry.  Second life is a virtual reality game where the players are given the tools to create. Most everything in SL is player created.  An ingenious player/players came up with a product called KittyCats.  KittyCats are what they call breedables in SL. They are creatively animated, grow up, and can be bred to have kittens. These cats are bred for traits.  New traits are introduced several times a year, and some traits are retired.  It is a creative process for breeders to use these traits to create their own version of the cats, and resell them.

Another creative player (Rene) came up with a product that could be used to buy and sell these cats on the secondary market.  Buying this player’s profiler would allow you to list your cats on his website.  The cats can then be searched by trait or a combination of traits.  Rather than wasting countless hours searching secondary markets for cats with the traits one is looking for, a buyer can quickly search for specific traits, teleport directly to the cat, and compare pricing. 

Rene had a substantial amount of power in the KittyCats secondary market at first being the first with this type of product, and used this power to ban breeders from listing their cats on his website for whatever reason he chose.  Rene would make, what most of the KittyCats breeding community considered, unreasonable demands.   If breeders did not comply, he would disable their profilers even though they paid a considerable amount of money for them.

Some of the community, who had been banned from listing their cats on the only profiler site that was available, persuaded another player (Torgon) to create a rival profiler to give people an alternative to the original profiler.  This split the market between the two profiler users.  Some breeders who just wanted to sell their cats chose to advertise their cats to both markets.  Rene began making the use of only his profiler part of his “TOS” (for the majority of users these TOS were introduced after buying the product).  Rene continued to disable the original profilers for those breeders who refused to take down the alternative profilers. There is a lot more to this story, but that is enough history to introduce this blog.

I recently had my profilers disabled and started a thread about it on the KittyCats forum. Several other breeders were experiencing the same thing. In fact, there is an extensive history of threads about this story in the KittyCats forum as this story has unfolded.  The other threads eventually got closed because the conversation became so contentious and caustic. Rene was banned from the forum due to negative personal attacks of other forum participants.

When I was personally forced to choose between the two profilers and chose the alternative, I felt free to speak my mind about the original creator’s tactics.  Another player, wrote a very poignant comment in response that struck home and inspired the true motivation for this blog entry.

Here are her words

” This guy has been bullied people for over 3 years now and still people act like it is a surprise. Most of you are aware of that but not before he turns on YOU there is a reaction. If people would have been more loyal towards each other this would never have happened. This maniac has been let loose for years and years and only because the ones that uses his profilers are enabling him to do so. When money is involved the community feeling and compassion goes out of the door. Lick'n and a few others DID take a stand very early ( thanks Lick'n ) but most sim owners and users did not care at all...and still don't.

I hear a lot that we have a fantastic community. I don't see that. A great community would never had let this crazy person continuously bullied it's members. We are responsible for what kind of community we create. We all are and Rene wouldn't have stood a chance without you guys.”

When I first read this it upset me. I had to reflect on it, and contemplate what my discomfort was trying to tell me.  Here is what I came up with:  I have not been breeding KittyCatS for three years, but I was aware of the bullying a year ago when I encountered Rene’s tactics for the first time.  A friend tried very hard to persuade me not to use Rene’s profilers, but at the time I believed a lot of my sales were coming from them.  Torgon’s profilers had just been introduced, and I wasn’t sure if he would outlast the challenges of creating and supporting a product that would give us an alternative.

I tried to reason with Rene, hoping he could learn from the negative experiences. I do believe he truly believes he has been wronged.  When I read his comments in the spring about unbanning people, I believed him. 

My father has Narcissistic Personality Disorder.  I have struggled for years to overcome the negative influence my father has had on me. I tend to find myself still trying to be the optimist about people who are inflicted with it.  Perhaps, it is something that still needs healing in me that believes people with this disorder are capable of change. I am sure I am not the only one that has experienced this.    I recently had a conversation with someone who still uses Rene’s profilers and she said to me “I am used to men acting this way in my life.” 

I recognize the better part of me should have turned off Rene’s profilers a year ago, but another part of me just wanted to sell cats so I could afford to continue to breed them. Breeding is an escape for me. It occupies my mind and gives me dopamine shots whenever I finally breed the cat I have been trying for. 

I have spent a good part of my life fighting for social change and awareness. I became politically active in college trying to open people’s minds to the need for college level education to be accessible and affordable for the general population, I joined the Occupy movement to try and raise awareness of the impact of putting profit over people, I joined an animal rights group and created a video to help raise awareness of the tragedy of dolphins being slaughtered in Taiji, and I fought hard to try and get Bernie Sanders  elected only to find the primary election for the democrats was rigged so that Bernie could not win.

Truthfully, the bottom line is sometimes I am tired of fighting social injustice.  I come to SL to escape, and to try and find some enjoyment in the time I have for myself now.   I am not offering this as an excuse, just and explanation.  I believe this story is a reflection of the bigger picture.  We need to keep trying to create a better community, and strive to create a better world. When one person gets tired and drops the ball, someone else needs to pick it up.  I hope we get there someday, and I commend those who stood up to Rene from the beginning.  

Have you heard of the story of the 100^th monkey? I am still optimistic that we can get there.  Hundredth Monkey Dancing