Virtual world "families" are a subculture that is both fascinating and decisive -- it may seems strange to many why people want to roleplay as a "Mom" or "Dad" of other players who in turn roleplay as "kids". In many cases, they are roleplaying social roles that are impossible to them in real life. As one virtual mom puts it to me:
It has always been a big deal to me that I haven’t been able to have children. In fact, it sent me into a depression for a long time after I found out that it just wasn’t going to happen for me. And adoption, unfortunately, is not in the cards for me in RL for various reasons. Also, my immediate family is very small. I have never had a sibling close to my age because my sisters were quite a bit older than me when I was born, so I was basically raised as an only child. It’s just my parents and me now, and the rest of our extended family all live very far away.
As for adults roleplaying as kids, it's often a response to difficult real world conditions. As one virtual kid once put it to me:
I am an abuse survivor, and also had other experiences in my real life childhood that SL allows me to overcome. I'm able to create a better childhood than what I had the first time. Also, when I first came into this world, I had two friends here who were already playing kids, so I was introduced into the "kid culture" fairly early on, and found it appealing...I mean, in the real world I had good parents, but they were really too busy to really listen to me or do things. In here, I have two wonderful parents who, while they also have their own interests outside of my and my siblings, they do always listen, and care, and will be there for me when I need them most. That's big for me. Also, my experiences in school here in-world has allowed me to feel a bit more comfortable within that sort of group environment. I was regularly beaten up in elementary school-- so here was a chance to recast that experience. For me it was healing, because it showed me that those experiences don't have to be painful ones.
The healing, cathartic aspect is most fascinating to me; I hope academics study this in detail.
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