Why's It Still Hard to Find a Good Ethnic Avatar Skin?

Days before the inauguration of Barack Obama, this is a vexing post to read:  After a year of holding back from writing it ("because I felt I was overreacting") Nexeus Fatale discusses his frustrations in finding good ethnic avatar skins and accessories. African-American and Hispanic in real life, Nexeus is one of Second Life's oldest Residents, an established live music DJ, and a lead organizer of the SL Community Convention. Despite that, he recounts fruitless searches in top SL fashion emporiums, finding skins that are just darkened versions of light ones, or come without hair selections popular in black/Latino communities. 

"I’m not claiming racism" he notes up front; instead, he sees the problem as a lack of research among the SL fashion community. "I believe designers need to re-evaluate what they have and work on creating more items and content that is more diverse and of equal quality or don’t do it at all." It's a post well-worth reading, including the extensive (and sometimes heated) comment thread. I personally suspect a chief culprit is lack of market demand; nightlcub owner Eboni Khan, for example, once told me that most fellow African-Americans she knows prefer lighter skin avatars.  The solution may require crossing the language barrier.  You have to believe Brazil's extremely large Second Life community are doing a much better job at creating and selling ethnically varied avatars-- but if they are, it's difficult for the non-Portuguese speaking world to learn about them.

Comments

[Eirik Haefnir]

I really liked the darkest Abyss skin for men on my black avatar.

I'm hoping mostly though that Sezmra someday makes her male skins opensource as well like the female skins she already has available.

[Sisou]

I keep putting off a post about skin too. Could be wrong about it but I bet there is a demand. It was a hard search for me to find a suitable skin. It not just about there being dark skins. Sl is seriously lacking in good medium *black* skins and latino skins. Skin lines go from tan to super dark. If it was a demand issue why not make More medium brown skins ( there are just more ppl who are medium brown). But Sl fashion makes the same mistake as RL Fashion & ads as *Portrays* us as really super dark. Just look outside people do we really look like that?

[Nexeus Fatale]

One of the things that frustrated me to no end was the Abyss skin! It's a great skin, but their darkest line has features that I would love to have on their lighter (Tan) lines. It's a suggestion I sent out, however it's one of those things that causes a lot of frustration.

One thing I did not take into account was the language barrier. Although I have mixed feelings about that dynamic.

[Veeyawn Spoonhammer]

I would also add that it's nearly impossible to find a good selection of non-human colored skins. I used to be orange...when I first rezzed and before I wore a skin I was a bright orange. I enjoyed being orange. Now, I'm grey as it's the best skin I've found that isn't typical flesh colored and I have yet to get around to creating my own.

This may lead to other conversations about avatar identity but I'm not the only one who doesn't want to look like a person in SL.

[Catero]

TheAbyss does have a great dark skin. But does every dark male in SL want to have a "signature" skin and look the same?

Options are limited. And this creates an environment in which any skilled skin designer can fill the niche by create an appealing product based on feedback and research.

[Aliasi Stonebender]

I have to agree, it's a problem I've noticed myself. I usually wear a caucasian avatar (on those occasions I'm human), that being my RL situation. However, I love to dress up - and I think it's absurd I can be a coyote or a clockwork automaton, or a woman made of stars and light... but if I want to be a good-looking dark-skinned person, I have very few options, and let's not even get started on the limited hair available.

On the other hand, it's not actively racism. Most designers in SL are designing things they like, it's a hobby for them. Most SLers are from middle class or better backgrounds, since SL requires a fairly decent computer and a good internet connection. Poor shouldn't equal 'black' in the US, yet the demographics slant this way for historical reasons, making a minority look even smaller online. While there's probably a good bit of non-US stuff available there's a language barrier. There's plenty of wonderful things on Japanese, Brazilian, etc sims that I just can't easily access because I don't speak those languages; what little I find is from word of mouth or using a random teleport.

All this adds up to people looking for any of the major 'subculture' stuff being more populous than English-speaking designers with the ability to make a decent dark skin or urban clothing. The majority you see is the parodies and stereotypes of these by upper-middle class whites - just look at all the 'mafias' and 'gangstas' that used to be so popular on SL.

[Angie Mornington]

Catero I agree, positive feedback and sharing ideas would be a great start. I'm sure there are skin designers out there that would be open to listening.

[skribe]

=RAC= used to have a huge range of ethnic skins for both genders. When =RAC= became Laqroki they reduced the number of skins they were selling, but IIRC they still had different ethnicities.

[Nyoko Salome :)]

to contribute a perhaps silly, but valid reason for some design cases/decisions: i keep my screen brightness cranked down quite a bit usually, just to save my eyes a little strain. obviously though, that greatly affects perception of sl world and designs! :\ (and since rediscovering this simple little fact, i've been reviewing some of my past designs... and as flawed as i'd come to perceive them anyways, i now groan as i look at them again in a literal new light...)

for everyone who ever told me that even the 'light' bodyoil wasn't light enough, lol now i understand... ;) and have launched 'bodyoil soft' now to try to rectify a bit, although the original texture really doesn't ramp down very nicely to that low of a sheen. :\ it's daunting (and a bit redundant) to try to rectify this deficit along all my current item lines, especially when i don't think it looks particularly good anymore as is... ;0 i hope to bring my current lines to a good 'finishing point' soon and move on to fresh stuff (and probably perhaps a new 'bodyoil 3', as i try to incorporate all the stuff i've learned along the way).