Social Fraud in Second Life (European Citizen)

[Salome]

Sal, you've got a good heart. Unlike the rest of us vipers.

I really, really, really don’t.

But I do have a lot of experience of knowing people are being unethical/cheating others and (for whatever reason) being the one victims come to/complain to and feeling really frustrated and helpless about it.

Also? When I came to SLU for help with one of the most egregious of those circumstances, I was accused of being unethical and any number of other things because I was not in a position to provide proof or explain how what I was trying to do was not a violation I was accused of.

But, I also didn’t ask from behind an unknown name or forum avatar. I was willing to stand behind whatever reputation I’d earned in SL to help the person I was trying to help.

So, I get why people are suspicious, but, on the off chance the OP is legit, I also deeply sympathize with the position.

 

[Salome]

Coming back, reading all these insults, I could have spent my time differently, thinking that people have a more objective take on justice.

Most of the responses you got, especially early in the thread, were objective. Being objective doesn’t mean assuming you’re here in good faith. Being objective doesn’t require people to ignore similar experiences with previous circumstances. Being objective doesn’t mean ignoring the potential harm your inquiry could be seeking.

Granted, I only skimmed, but at no point did I see you acknowledge how suspicious your inquiry is, or state that you understand it’s a leap of faith to take you and your story at face value.

You were probably going to get some people who wouldn’t believe you regardless, but, like many new posters, how you present yourself in a new environment has a lot to do with how you are regarded and received. Blaming all of that on others and not seeing where you also made missteps makes you less credible the more you dig into that position.

IAgain, thank you very much for the time and effort to write this post and I will do what you suggested. There is evidence already but I feel that it has to be rock solid and it's better to have more proof, rather than having less.

You’re welcome. Just keep in mind that even if your evidence is rock solid, authorities are still going to take it less seriously because it’s happening in a virtual environment and because the amount of effort necessary to even establish jurisdiction is a rabbit hole. Having rock solid evidence doesn’t mean you magically win. Trust me.

I also think that none of the other commenters here actually got into a situation like you did or I did, so it all ends up in "Newbie Bashing" here.

You’re wrong, full stop. Many of the people here have been screwed by far worse scammers. They’ve also seen, repeatedly, people claim to be victims that actually turned out to be predators. You wren’t experiencing “newbie bashing.” You we’re experiencing what happens when a group of knowledgeable, experienced individuals recognize a potential pattern. If you cannot handle the pushback you got here, you’re not prepared for what’s going to happen when you try to take this situation to authorities.

My post to you was not objective. It was weighted heavily in your favor, giving you maximum benefit of the doubt despite the high potential for other possibilities. You should be aware of that.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Can we discuss the side issue of how shitty it is social welfare programs have limits of what you can earn/save?

It basically ensures poor people can never attempt to get ahead at all. As soon as they start to get ahead, then their basic support system will fall away just making the worse off or at best the same as they were. I mean I don't have a problem with it eventually falling off, but it's so rediculously low it feels impossible.

If you want to discuss that, let's keep it simple: if you are poor in the USA, then you are screwed. Period. One of the most unique "features" of welfare in the USA is the 60 month lifetime limit, which you will find not in other civilised countries.

There's also other strange stuff going on in the USA, for example there officially are only 500.000 homeless people or so. When asking Amnesty International though in 2012, they estimated though over three million homeless people (so didn't trust the official numbers), and the number of vacant houses back then by 15-18 millions.

And if it happens that you live in California, there are slums of people near they bay, which work in Silicon Valley in low range to normal jobs - so no computer/science stuff - and cannot afford the rents there any longer, which then gives views like this:


A good general overview about the different approaches, just look at Canada, can be found at the BBC: How US welfare compares around the globe

 

[Pamela]

Welcome to the hive mind.

The trolls/snowflakes have the hive mind. Their posts are interchangeable. They are not interested in solving a problem they have with someone, but in punishing them. For example, they really don’t want to hear that they should just block and ignore someone sending unwanted IMs to them, or just not look at the despicable lies someone wrote about them on their profile. That would just solve the problem, and they want blood.

There must a secret club where they share templates that they just fill in the blanks on and post them to the official forum and this one. This thread, for example, is the popular “[someone/ LL] was mean to me [description] for no reason. I would like them to be punished in one or more of the following ways:

Smear their name
Smear their business
Agree with me that they are evil
Boycott their club/business/rentals/grid
Sympathize with me
Help Think of some other way I can make them suffer “

And finally, when offered helpful, reality based advice on how to solve the problem, the troll launches into a tirade on how mean forumites are. ALTHOUGH sometimes they preemptively insult the forum in the first paragraph.

ETA Oh and they frequently add this flourish: “And this is why SL is dying!”

 

[Kaimi Kyomoon]

TankWorld, naturally you're angry that you were swindled out of a lot of money. You took a leap of faith with this person with no proof about their real circumstances. And it was a mistake that any kind person might make. You won't fall for *that* story again. But you seem to have no proof at all about who this person is in rl or how they might be living. Or do you? You might have to chalk this up to experience and let it go.

 

[Aribeth Zelin]

I thought I was objective. I could go into a rant about just how wrong the OP is about 'newbie bashing' but just don't want to dwell on the negative, because it just makes me depressed.

 

[Kaimi Kyomoon]

If you want to discuss that, let's keep it simple: if you are poor in the USA, then you are screwed. Period. One of the most unique "features" of welfare in the USA is the 60 month lifetime limit, which you will find not in other civilised countries.

There's also other strange stuff going on in the USA, for example there officially are only 500.000 homeless people or so. When asking Amnesty International though in 2012, there estimated though over three million homeless people (so didn't trust the official numbers), and the number of vacant houses back then by 15-18 millions.

And if it happens that you live in California, there are slums of people near they bay, which work in Silicon Valley in normal jobs - so no computer/science stuff - and cannot afford the rents there any longer, which then gives views like this:


A good general overview about the different approaches, just look at Canada, can be found at the BBC: How US welfare compares around the globe

This explains everything about what's wrong with us in the US. Homeless workers abutted against mini mansions.

 

[Kaimi Kyomoon]

... which by itself is a joke as a refugee, muslim, would not strip nor escort in SL ...

So why did you give them money?

 

[Casey Pelous]

Am I understanding this correctly? OP was burned by a virtual hooker, and now proposes going to the RL authorities with his/her grievance?

Seems like a brilliant plan to me, assuming the objective is to provide said authorities with the best laugh of the day.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

And since Tankworld had no luck in trolling here any longer, he moved on his burning crusade with the exact story to a German SL forum, and started there a thread with exactly the same content; of course its now in German and again people don't believe him at all. Seems you guys have nailed it quite fast.

 

[Sid]

I just scanned through that thread you pointed out. It is heading in the same direction as here.
Long term SL people ain't stupid. We've seen it all.

 

[EmpressOfCommunism]

I enjoy seeing exact terms like personal vendetta get posted on both forums

 

[Soen Eber]

There's a far much better word for this: Blockwart-Mentalität! And this is by no means an accolade, quite the opposite.

Let me break it down for you: Mentalität is the mindset, or mentality. So far, so easy.

Now to the Blockwart - Block or block is just this, a block of houses/apartment buildings. And a "Wart" is a person, who is responsible for this block. So a Blockwart is responsible for a small area of houses.

More specifically - he was. Because what was the Blockwart? The Blockwart was the lowest rank in the hierarchy of the NSDAP - Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands -, so the original Nazis. He was responsible for having an ear on everybody in his area and keep everybody in line with the ideology of this party, suppress smaller tendencies against the party, and notify it of heavier opposition. So in short most of the time they've reported most of the time every trifle to their authorities, just to be sure they didn't make any mistakes.

So in short he's not even this guy [Hauptman Gerd Wiesler]

He's the guy Gerd would commend with: "Thank you, Citizen, for your information on Hans. The state is proud of your bravery", but then would privately ask his coworker "I wonder if he'll break into the apartment if we bring Hans in?".

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Thing is, I'm being charitable calling the OP a troll. Because the alternative is that they are an asshole.

 

[Free]

Thing is, I'm being charitable calling the OP a troll. Because the alternative is that they are an asshole.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Christopher Walken Monologue

 

[Free]

 

[Spirits Rising]

All I can say is: Welcome to third party forums, bucko. We're not required to be nice or to pull many punches.

You insinuated you had evidence to back your statements up (no, you really don't) while also trying to make several more claims which you simply cannot prove through legal means - at all.

At least one user here humored you. The rest, not so much. You're lucky that anyone humored you at all.

Grow up and grow a thicker skin.

 

[Da5id Weatherwax]

Look on the bright side. It's a new day.. Maybe today he'll put both feet down one trouser leg when he gets up in the morning and achieve a synapse...

 

[Noodles]

If you want to discuss that, let's keep it simple: if you are poor in the USA, then you are screwed. Period. One of the most unique "features" of welfare in the USA is the 60 month lifetime limit, which you will find not in other civilised countries.

There's also other strange stuff going on in the USA, for example there officially are only 500.000 homeless people or so. When asking Amnesty International though in 2012, they estimated though over three million homeless people (so didn't trust the official numbers), and the number of vacant houses back then by 15-18 millions.

And if it happens that you live in California, there are slums of people near they bay, which work in Silicon Valley in low range to normal jobs - so no computer/science stuff - and cannot afford the rents there any longer, which then gives views like this:

A good general overview about the different approaches, just look at Canada, can be found at the BBC: How US welfare compares around the globe

It's probably not a coincidence, but it reminds me of how unreliable the number that if "Unemployment" is in the US. Because it doesn't count people who fall out of the system over time.whonhave simply "given up". Eventually they stop collecting unemployment and stop looking for a job, so when figuring the statistic of Unemployment you could have half the population staring at the wall doing nothing and still have 4% Unemployment Rate.