Too aggressive, graphic, or gay for the lobby?

Too aggressive, too graphic, too gay for the lobby?

This month one of our visitors got into a debate in the lobby about Lesbian girls being overly aggressive, or showing too much PDA in the main chat lobby, and some issues around that. This ‘SexyGentleman” sent in an email, and publicly commented that he would be okay with sharing the email publicly to discuss the issue and show more of his side of seeing things. So I am going to post some snippets and some commentary / random thoughts – and open this up for discussion with the community here in the comments om this post.

I am not including the whole email here, will try to show edits with a … – but please don’t take what I post here as the entire picture or set of thoughts that was originally sent. These are just the parts that I felt could use some public commentary. Please realize there is even more to this email story and do not judge the person who wrote these thoughts as if what is shown below is a complete work, or shown in complete / original context.

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(bits from the email complaint sent in)
…lesbians hang out in main chat … and hit on all the ladies that come in there, including those that have said over and over that they are straight
… have enough respect to keep it in PM so that those of us that are straight don’t have to see it. Some of us are uncomfortable with gay action but nobody says much because they don’t want to get hammered like I did Tuesday night, it is a very touchy subject.

Hitting on people over and over again if it’s been stated it’s unwanted becomes harassment. We have rules about this, it would be the same if it was not girl on girl – and even if the people involved simply use the iggy / block user button, if it’s a consistent problem with someone, I’d like to know more about it – as it sets a bad example in the room as an acceptable behavior and may need to be dealt with. Depending on how it’s done, how much, etc.

Keeping it in PM

My first thought is that pms are off by default so they don’t work most of the time for initial contact, so open room discussions are normal and not really discouraged. My second thought is that there are certain subjects that are off limits for the main lobby, and should not be broadcast to everyone, like a hardcore BDSM session. However the lobby is a place to meet new people. There should be more vanilla ways to let others know if they are interested in a taboo or non-mainstream discussion, you are here for that, and that Person A could pm you or you’d be happy to join them in a room YZ where Activity X in the open room is discussed without issue.

So maybe suggesting lines like “I’m a girl that likes to play with other girls, if your interested pm me or we can..” – and discourage more graphic things like ‘My pussy lips are ready to kiss yours, let me start by massaging your tits in a homo-erotic shower scene” – or something.

Too Gay (Lesbian) for the lobby?

Gay stuff can be a touchy subject in the room, in the real world, anywhere really. I don’t want people to just accept whatever they see in the main because everyone else is letting it go, and not in cases where a MOD might be engaging in something that may be crossing some lines even. People should feel they can message the mods or me directly about anything that makes them uncomfortable so we can consider things. Sometimes we don’t know how others are perceiving whatever activities in the main – like ‘a mod spanks person B’ – is that hardcore BDSM or even abuse? What if others add in to that conversation and it gets more and more BDSM like. So not everything is black and white – okay or not okay – sometimes its like links in the main – some here and there okay – too many is too much.

I’m not one to say ban all gay talk in the lobby, but I’m also not one to allow bad behaviors because a girl is into lesbian action and that’s cool or that’s special. Gay, lesbian, bisexual – we all have the same rules to follow really.

We have many rules and content guidelines for what is allowed in our chat rooms here. A few things are banned (most age play) – and some things are not allowed in the main lobby at all, and are only permitted in certain side rooms. Some subjects (like bdsm) may allow for a few things to be brought up in the lobby, but other more graphic things including screen names are not allowed.

…it would be disrespectful for me and a straight lady to go in either of the gay rooms and start a public display of affection…

Yes, this is true. I think I brought this up on the content guidelines page. So this is something that makes we think we may need to consider this whole thing.

Years ago, when gay and lesbian lifestyles were not so popular / accepted, I wondered what the line was for gay couples who wanted to kiss in public here in my city. Decades ago, two guys holding hands around here would stir up more than stank eye stares with most of the residents in my area. In other parts of the world that kind of thing has been normal for hundreds of years right?

If two girls kissed on the street they may get horny happy stares, if two guys were french kissing in a restaurant it would likely be considered wrong place for that and may get people to say something. Although a guy and girl doing it might be more accepted – I still think that most restaurants are a bad place for rubbing, frenching, intense PDA, no matter what sexes the couple is.

So we do need to consider what is being said in the lobby exactly, and consider that some things are okay and some things may cross the line of what should be taken to a more appropriate location. I have not read through chat logs showing exact examples of what has been said or heard specifics about has bothered some people, and this is a situation that like likely requires specifics in order to comment on better.

We’re not going to say you can’t be gay in the lobby. However, gay anal fisting should not be happening in the main chat room, and hetero anal fisting in the main room is not really appropriate either.

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Whether we agree with all or parts of what is mentioned here, I would like to thank this person for having the will to consider a viewpoint which may be different than the majority of vocal regs, and for sharing it with me via email. Having an open discussion gives us the ability to consider changes or to explain further to those why we won’t change. When someone has a different view and is silenced by the vocal majority, we lose the chance to grow. Apparently some of this flared up in the lobby, and policy discussions are better done in the blog areas / emails not in the lobby where they often come off as combative and turn into flame wars.

Anyhow.

Bits from a chat log that day

I read through a chat log sent, and rather than post the whole thing, I’m going to cherry pick a few things from the chat and make some comments.

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[23:59:57] SxyGentlmn59: look to the left, nash made a lesbian action room and a gay room so that those of us who are uncomfortable with that kind of action don’t have to be exposed to it

No – the main lobby is not the “straight room”, and no the gay and les rooms were not made to avoid gay exposure in the main. These were made to help people who were looking for homo chat find each other faster, and to setup a safe place for les girls to not be exposed to non stop dick offers. Now that I think of it, it almost seems unfair to have safe places for gay action and not for hetero. Now I realize this discussion could turn into the 100 ways I’ve seen people try to explain why it’s not needed to have a white lives matter movement, so lets not go there.

[00:28:33] SxyGentlmn59: well, if I go out hoping to hook up with a girl and I find 3 bars side by side, a lesbian bar, a gay bar, and a regular bar and go in the regular bar then I wouldn’t expect to see guys kissing each other or girls kissing each other

This is an interesting analogy. I have thought about my experiences with gay and lesbian bars in an effort to consider how things could be around here sometimes. However I think we need to look at our place here a little differently sometimes.

Perhaps we need to think of it more like a multi story hotel.

Most people enter through the lobby – things are pretty casual in most hotel lobbies on most days and nights. Many hotels have a casual bar on the main floor as well. I don’t think it would be too shocking for people to see other people holding hands or kissing each other goodbye in these areas. A full make-out session in a main lobby would likely be considered inappropriate and might get some intervention from hotel staff if it lasted a long time or got too outrageous. Certainly a bit more intimate behavior would be ignored in the hotel bar, but people running around with their tits or dicks out offering to lick other people would likely be cause for getting thrown out.

Our lobby probably would not get anyone bothers if someone said they were walking around with their boobs showing, someone getting forceful about exposing or playing with other people’s tits is something that is likely not going to be universally accepted. People may something and they may just remain silent about things they feel are not right / make them uncomfortable. Yes, the block button / iggy button is the easiest way to eliminate seeing that kind of thing, however we may need to be more aware that many actions are more appropriate for other rooms. We do ask that several things are taken out of the lobby, and tell people they can stay in the lobby if they tone certain things down.

People could debate reasonably that things might be different if it were hetero or gay or lesbian action in these places, and that would certainly vary by location. However i don’t think it would be outrageous, although it may make some uncomfortable if a bunch of flaming gay guys or girls were hanging out in the lobby of a hotel. It may even cause groups of hetero people to move along to a different area if the lobby was taken over by a scene like one of the gay pride festivals in some of the big cities. I’ve certainly been in some hotels where guests were visibly bothered by the particular convention that was drawing a certain crowd, be it furries and other cosplay people or a porn star convention or even a group of officers for a convention. People do tend to feel a little awkward when surrounded by groups of people they are not expecting.

I don’t know if hotels warn people that they have booked a room during an unusual convention weekend, and I hate to think that normal ‘vanilla’ people who are accustomed to seeing groups of business travelers in suits acting prude / cordial at convention hotels would be shocked and end up spending their entire stay hiding in their room when they would prefer on most stays to spend a couple hours in the hotel bar or lounge. At the same time I think it’s great that we have enough freedom that people don’t have to worry about their physical safety expressing who they are in public places like hotel conventions.

Too Gay? No. Too aggressive, too graphic / sexual? Maybe.

In short, I think it’s reasonable that we ask gay, lesbian, straight, uni-sexual, non-sexual, pan-sexual, whatever people to not get overly sexual in the lobby, or overly harassing. I don’t think we need a blanket ban or segregation system where we say if you are lesbian you must stay in room X Y or Z. However we do enforce certain rules for the lesbian room that are not rules in other rooms – so there could be some give and take here or something.

This is not a set of rules for lgbt (and Q! 🙂 – we have the same rules for hetero harassment and graphic lobby sex / other niche things like bdsm and water sports.

I have seen some things like this become an issue on a much smaller scale in the past. Because it was just a random occurrence it was easy for people to block or otherwise ignore and life went on. What is being described here is a group takeover of sorts on occasion, and it’s a different situation due to the way out systems have evolved and split and taken some of the numbers of the niche rooms down. The good news it that I’m pretty sure our numbers of chatters will be going up more and more in the near future. We did not have to worry much about these kinds of things in the past since most of the gay guys would be drawn to the group of gay men in the gay play room, and most of the lez girls would be hanging out in the room that not only catered to them with specific anti=harassment rules, but more so because there was usually several others girls in there to chat with. Hopefully this will be more of the norm in the future.

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Part of me wants to post the whole chat log I was sent that went down about this time. The debate is actually really great. Some of the statements were a bit combative – but for the most part, I think people on both sides had reasonable things to consider. In a way it’s very reflective of our society in general, and how things are changing, but also that things are different for different people in different places.

It’s almost funny that I can think both side are mostly right in this debate. People should have the right to be in the lobby no matter their orientation, people should be able to be in the lobby without being grossed out by something. We do have rules that certain bdsm names and other actions must be taken out of the lobby. So we already have some rules about certain things that are okay within the system, but should not be in the lobby at all – so maybe we need to more clearly define certain things in regards to exact phrases and terms that should be reserved for other rooms when it comes to bisexual or gay activity – and we should also apply that to hetero action. I’ve seen times when “lobby sex” was enjoyed and encouraged, and other times when it was basically shunned and discouraged by the group in the lobby. So maybe we need to get into rules about those kinds of things as well and ask people to take the more graphic things to a more risque room – and have a warning – what goes on in the risque room may be offensive and do not enter if you are gonna complain – something like that.

I’m always open to reconsidering how we do things, and glad to get some different viewpoints from other people. Glad to see this issue brought up actually.

Thoughts appreciated in the comments below.

Before anyone’s feathers get ruffled by the title of this post, I thought to make it “Too Lez (or other extremes) for the lobby?” – but changed it. Most people that have been around the community here for some time probably know that I am pro LGBT-Q-BDSM-A-YZ – pretty much open to others doing their own thing so long as it includes adults and is consensual.

Before anyone thinks I am taking or siding with anti-gay kind of things, please be sure to be familiar with some of the other gay and lesbian posts that have been made over the years,
When do guys cross the line in the lesbian sex chat room? (2013)

Lesbian chat room issues and suggestions (2011)

and understand that the gay and lesbian rooms were created here many years as a show of support and to encourage people to enjoy whatever orientation they like via chat, I’ve never been anti-gay, or uncomfortable being around gay / lesbian / trans / non-sexual / pan-sexual – people just because of their orientation. I have been made uncomfortable for various other reasons – but that’s a different post – lol.