Single-Hood In SL

I'm a single adult in RL. I'm fully aware that being a single female in real life is still viewed culturally as somewhat of an oddity. I do have a BF, and we are happy with our lives as they are. But other people like to stick their noses in our business. Whenever others ask me how my relationship is going, they cannot help themselves, they feel a compulsion to urge me towards altering my relationship, regardless of whether or not such an alteration is in the best interest of the two people who are actually involved in it.

I get told in various ways that I should be using tactics ranging from polite suggestion, to downright blackmail, to "make" my BF "pop the question". And in his case, he gets the suggestion that I should be popping out his kids. Never mind that he tells people we are perfectly happy being childfree and just as we are, no one believes the woman in his life really wants that. Fortunately, we are both immune to social pressure and together we laugh at the world trying to tell us what to do.

So when I got on SL again for the first time in over a year, I started to notice a trend that I considered somewhat "new". Maybe it was around when I was on before, but there wasn't as much emphasis on it as there is now. And that of course is that little box in everyone's profile. The one for you Partner in Second Life.

When I noticed it, I thought: "Wow, that's a sweet idea.". I'm afraid I've begun to change my mind about how I feel about that.

For one thing, "partnering" doesn't mean the same thing to everyone. And I think a lot of hurt feelings could be well avoided if there were some serious discussion between people over how their partnership will be defined before they do it. And for the rest of us, those of us outside the partnership, it might be nice if there was a brief description of how your partnership is defined within the body of your profile, particularly if you have a mutually "open" arrangement with your partner.

Why? Because not everyone defines SL Partnership as romantically monogamous, and at the same time, other folks see SL partnership as "serious" (sometimes even more so) like a real life romance.

The thrill of a SL flirtation gets a splash of cold water on it for me when I look at the profile to find that the person flirting with me is Partnered to someone. Is this person looking to SL "cheat" with me? I don't LIKE drama. I'm quite allergic to it in fact. And the last thing I have any interest in, is getting an IM from a deeply hurt person I've never met, venting their pain and anger at ME when they are really too emotionally attached to their Partner to address the issue directly with THEM.

The other beef I have with the Partner field on my profile, there are folks walking around SL who seem to have a vendetta against that space being blank. It's like the real life equivalent of being asked (back before I was seeing anyone) "Why don't you have a BF?". People can be quite extreme about other people's personal marital status. One time, a former BF of mine who I'd stayed friends with after our relationship was over, was so disturbed by my continued singlehood, he told me if I was still unmarried by the time he returned from overseas, he was going to "make an honest woman of me." *blink blink* What? What the hell was I supposed to say, "Thanks for your sacrifice of bachelorhood to save me from being single?" It seemed totally nuts to me. Needless to say, I made sure I did not run across him after he got back. But not long ago...I've had SL encounters that sort of mirrored this very conversation.

I'd just meet someone, and they say "You aren't Partnered." (I hate statements that make replies awkward). I confirm what they already knew, and these persons volunteered to be my SL Partners. They'd known me for about 1/2 an hour, 2 hours tops.

Okay. I gotta admit, I have a hard enough time remembering to be socially accessible enough to maintain regular SL friendships. I am an introvert. And while I did see Botgirl's blog post showing that RL introverts can turn into extroverts on SL (which is pretty interesting), it seems I'm not one of them. Which I'm actually kind of sad about, because it would be interesting to see what extroversion feels like.

I have to force sociability in SL as much as I do in RL, or I just don't do it at all. I don't think it would be fair to partner with someone who may (understandably) have expectations of spending lots of SL time with me, when I'd just as soon be off exploring sims, or practicing building by myself. After all, just because I'm perfectly comfortable and satisfied with my own company most of the time (not ALL the time, as those of you who know or are introverts understand), that doesn't mean I'm completely insensitive or apathetic to other people needing higher levels of interaction. Just like real life, the needs between Partners need to complement each other. Since I feel no need for a SL partner, to subject another person to what may seem like indifference on my part would be very unfair.

So I have no SL Partner. I imagine other people have had the same problem I've been having, and likely have agreed to "Partner" with someone, or one of their own alts...just to fill the field in, and get other people to not bug them about it. But why should any of us have to resort to that? Why is anything in our profile page open to the criticism of others? Where do other people get off essentially feeling they have a right to imply our profile is somehow "incomplete" (and by extension, so are WE) because we are not significantly linked to another avatar?

I can't say I'm impressed that the real life social pressure to couple up has made it's way into Second Life. People's relationships should be their own business, but society at large (in both Lives) seem to have difficulty with the concept of respecting individual choice.

I'm just waiting for Linden to create a new field in Profiles that tells everyone how many Prim Babies are in our inventory. Why not? One more RL piece of public nosiness that can be emulated in SL to increase "realism".

"You don't have kids? Why nooooot?"

Can't wait!