Re: Lethality of events

On Mon, 7 May 2007, Ed Chauvin IV wrote:
> Granted, but that's a pretty big if.  The deeply immersive players
> around here would argue vigorously that firewalling is certainly
> possible.  And even if it isn't, that doesn't make the activity itself
> any more immoral than acting in a play.

As others have pointed out, the firewalling that most immersive players do

is on behalf of the character, not the player.  I'm not aware of any 
immersive player who claims that they firewall the player from the 
character.  As an immersive player, I think that would probably cross the 
line into insanity.

As for acting in a play, can you really not tell the difference between 
acting and role-playing?

> By standing on the firewall bogeyman, you've backed yourself into a
> corner here.  Either firewalling is impossible and you can't truly
> "become" another character so you're really just playing a role and
> not really committing these "evil" acts yourself, in which case
> where's the immorality?  Or, firewalling this kind of thing is
> possible and it's possible to assume a completely different identity
> with a set of morals completely alien to your own, in which case
> there's a complete disconnect between player and character morality.

How does the player firewall themselves from their character?  What makes 
you think that players can't or don't choose which characters they want to

spend their time ****traying?

> The question really is, if you're Playing a Role and that role is one
> of an Evil Person, does that make you yourself Evil or can you really
> just play make believe and pretend to be someone your not instead of
> just you with a funny voice?

No, playing an Evil role does not inherently make the player Evil, and 
that's not really the point.  The question is whether indulging in 
fantasies of Evil acts in any detail is harmless or not.

> Let's put it this way, if playing an Evil Person makes the player
> Evil, what happens to a player who plays a homo***ual?

Do you believe that people choose to be Evil?  Do you believe aht 
homo***uals choose to be homo***ual?

John Morrow