Proposal: Removing hot tub prohibition from the covenants

[Pelanor Eldrich]

Always tough to define. My feeling here is that commercial porn is that it's explicitly sexual photographs or video being sold in SL. Having said that, no one wants to see a 30 foot tall fisting photo on the side of a house.

Having said that, it wouldn't be illegal per se. However my understanding of medieval Bavaria and republican Rome includes the idea that photos and moving pictures weren't available. As such giant rotating penis photos (or other photos) cannot adorn our shopsigns.

I take it to mean that we're not allowing selling of pornographic photos or movies from vendors. That's my understanding for NFS. I'm not sure what the CDS wide position is and I have no problem with a CDS pleasure island sim or misc raunch elsewhere as long as local law and covenant aren't violated.

I have no problem with period graffitti as long as it fits the existing covenant. (See the Rome miniseries HBO website for examples). Sexual expression in the privacy of your own home or in the public baths is not a matter of gov't concern, IMHO.

"The government has no place in people's bedrooms" - Pierre Trudeau

PS: Ranma, these are my personal opinions. I am supposed to represent my constitutents however. Does that fit with what you had in mind?

[Patroklus Murakami]

[quote="Pelanor Eldrich":eoe7iaq7] Having said that, no one wants to see a 30 foot tall fisting photo on the side of a house.[/quote:eoe7iaq7]Jeez. I was only talking about a *10* foot high fisting photo, now you have to go and raise the stakes

[Pelanor Eldrich]

I had no intention of raising the stakes or anything else. Let the public record show that I meant to refer to a "TEN FOOT HIGH FISTING PICTURE". Not a 30 foot high fisting picture, nor a max hardcore video nor a 3-d interactive felching simulation using fleshlight/teledildonics.

PS: If that doesn't convince everyone I'm not a prude, perhaps a story concerning hampsters and duct-tape?

Thanks.

[Ranma Tardis]

[quote="Pelanor Eldrich":321mq7y7]Always tough to define. My feeling here is that commercial porn is that it's explicitly sexual photographs or video being sold in SL. Having said that, no one wants to see a 30 foot tall fisting photo on the side of a house.

Having said that, it wouldn't be illegal per se. However my understanding of medieval Bavaria and republican Rome includes the idea that photos and moving pictures weren't available. As such giant rotating penis photos (or other photos) cannot adorn our shopsigns.

I take it to mean that we're not allowing selling of pornographic photos or movies from vendors. That's my understanding for NFS. I'm not sure what the CDS wide position is and I have no problem with a CDS pleasure island sim or misc raunch elsewhere as long as local law and covenant aren't violated.

I have no problem with period graffitti as long as it fits the existing covenant. (See the Rome miniseries HBO website for examples). Sexual expression in the privacy of your own home or in the public baths is not a matter of gov't concern, IMHO.

"The government has no place in people's bedrooms" - Pierre Trudeau

PS: Ranma, these are my personal opinions. I am supposed to represent my constitutents however. Does that fit with what you had in mind?[/quote:321mq7y7]

I really don’t see the residents of CN doing the above. I do wonder if the Romans had a festable of Fertility like we do in Japan, it is marked by the caring around of a portable shrine shaped like an erect penis and testicles. I suppose you would consider this porn?
This is the problem with a blanket restrictions. One person’s culture is another’s persons porn. I think that Colonia Nova is going to become a Disney Rome with the RA dictating every aspect of the community. I will not live in a kiddie version of Ancient Rome. The Romans were lots of things and not prudes.
There should be no restrictions as long as it fits an ancient roman theme. This would cover playing of movies on the walls of the buildings. They did not have drive in theaters in Rome. I do wonder if the RA wants to include the interior of the residence and the activities of the residents?

[Ashcroft Burnham]

[quote="Ranma Tardis":22pbw47b]I do wonder if the Romans had a festable of Fertility like we do in Japan, it is marked by the caring around of a portable shrine shaped like an erect penis and testicles. I suppose you would consider this porn?[/quote:22pbw47b]

That wouldn't be "commercial", though, would it?

[Pelanor Eldrich]

I personally would not consider that either porn or commercial porn. I'm certainly not in favor of a Disney CN. I'd much prefer a HBO Rome series CN, which I feel displays Rome with less of contemporary morality lense. As far as I'm aware there was no commerical porn in ancient Rome.

There was explicit graffiti, explicit drawn pamplets all of which are fine and don't constitute porn to me. The origin of the term porn means action which appears off-stage. Anything done privately or even for money is fine with me. My personal understanding here is that people would prefer not to have vendors selling explict photographs or film clips. Anything else goes.

[Ranma Tardis]

[quote="Pelanor Eldrich":1n49pgjd]I personally would not consider that either porn or commercial porn. I'm certainly not in favor of a Disney CN. I'd much prefer a HBO Rome series CN, which I feel displays Rome with less of contemporary morality lense. As far as I'm aware there was no commerical porn in ancient Rome.

There was explicit graffiti, explicit drawn pamplets all of which are fine and don't constitute porn to me. The origin of the term porn means action which appears off-stage. Anything done privately or even for money is fine with me. My personal understanding here is that people would prefer not to have vendors selling explict photographs or film clips. Anything else goes.[/quote:1n49pgjd]

That is the problem, what consitutes "comerical porn" to you. It might mean something completly different to another. As for selling "dirty" pictures, comericial activity is already limited to a few lots. What makes you so upset over someone selling a "dirty" picture? Perhaps if they go to the baths before being photographed? Laugh!
A HBO Rome is the same as a Disney Rome to me! One is for the entire family and the other is PG or perhaps a R rating. The ratings of American movies are hard for me to understand. It is alright in an American movie to show the worse sorts of violence in the worse sorts of ways but the gentle act of making love or a baby breast feeding is the worse sort of porn and has to be stopped by the full force of the law.
I would like those two lines to be removed.

[Beathan]

I would propose substituting a ban on public objects or commercially sold objects inconsistent with the Sim theme. (I am considering Neufreistadt as well, because this is CDS-wide restriction.) We should strike "commercial pornography" and substitute "objects inconsistent with the Sim theme, except inside personal dwellings."

Thus, in CN all pornography must be Roman; in NF all pornography must comport with the Lutheran/Catholic moral code of Bavaria; and the Lutheran/Catholics don't impose their moral strictures on the Romans; and the Romans don't expose themselves to the Bavarians; and we all live happily and in peace.

Beathan

[Aliasi Stonebender]

[quote="Beathan":1d0xg57e]I would propose substituting a ban on public objects or commercially sold objects inconsistent with the Sim theme. (I am considering Neufreistadt as well, because this is CDS-wide restriction.) We should strike "commercial pornography" and substitute "objects inconsistent with the Sim theme, except inside personal dwellings."

Thus, in CN all pornography must be Roman; in NF all pornography must comport with the Lutheran/Catholic moral code of Bavaria; and the Lutheran/Catholics don't impose their moral strictures on the Romans; and the Romans don't expose themselves to the Bavarians; and we all live happily and in peace.
[/quote:1d0xg57e]

I disagree. Certainly, the commercially sold objects is a non-starter - and it would be a new restriction - and I'm unsure tying things to the sim theme is so desirable. There were slaves in ancient Rome; should we now welcome all Goreans and hardcore D/s lifestylers?

[Beathan]

Aliasi wrote [quote:1pwilazd]There were slaves in ancient Rome; should we now welcome all Goreans and hardcore D/s lifestylers?
[/quote:1pwilazd]

Why not? Surely a democracy can welcome wide differences. I'm not sure that the inclusion of "slaves" would be at all disruptive. Presumably, people who wish to be "slaves" would not own property and would, therefore, not vote in the CDS. "Slave Owners" might vote -- but I'm not sure that the participation of such people would necessarily be disruptive.

Personally, I am for diversity -- and I believe that democracy is resilient enough to absorb such diversity and do so in a nondisruptive way.

I think that focussing landuse restrictions on the real aesthetic of the community -- that is the theme -- is both the most liberating and the most sound way to do it. Ranma is responding to the strictures of Northern European morality -- and is right to do so. I don't have a problem with having a place for such morality in our community, but we should not let that morality expand so that it pushes people out of our community.

The strength of local empowerment is that it creates a space for all kinds. People offended by a certain activity can live in places where that activity does not occur; people who wish to involve themselves in the activity can live in another place where it does occur; democracy expands to include both groups of people in civil discourse. Surely this is better than trying to make our world in our own image to the exclusion of others.

Beathan

[Ranma Tardis]

[quote="Aliasi Stonebender":21mibsdr][quote="Beathan":21mibsdr]I would propose substituting a ban on public objects or commercially sold objects inconsistent with the Sim theme. (I am considering Neufreistadt as well, because this is CDS-wide restriction.) We should strike "commercial pornography" and substitute "objects inconsistent with the Sim theme, except inside personal dwellings."

Thus, in CN all pornography must be Roman; in NF all pornography must comport with the Lutheran/Catholic moral code of Bavaria; and the Lutheran/Catholics don't impose their moral strictures on the Romans; and the Romans don't expose themselves to the Bavarians; and we all live happily and in peace.
[/quote:21mibsdr]

I disagree. Certainly, the commercially sold objects is a non-starter - and it would be a new restriction - and I'm unsure tying things to the sim theme is so desirable. There were slaves in ancient Rome; should we now welcome all Goreans and hardcore D/s lifestylers?[/quote:21mibsdr]

Oh where to start?

Slavery in Rome was done for economic reasons. Also since nobody can force anyone to do anything in second life and that includes logging on there are no slaves in SL. Some residents call themseles such but this is a self pronounment.
The convent of CN was forced apon the residents and would be residents. I object to the two sentences and will not own property in a sim with this sort of restriction. For your infomation Caledon does not have this restriction and Desmond Shang has done it again! The latest sim is going to be a PG one. Yes PG! Caledon II where I live is mature. The new capitial sim which is going to stand up soon as PG.
About the Goreans and hardcore D/s residents like Desmond says there are sims for them.

[Diderot Mirabeau]

I find the alleged protest over the ban on commercial porn to be rather vague and ill-defined. It seems to me that the explanation of what grievance the ban actually causes shifts from one moment to the next. First, the poster wants to be allowed to carry out sexual conduct in the privacy of the home and when being told that is indeed allowed next the alleged grievance seems to be over a lack of the possibility to carry around ancient Japanese fertility symbols in a Roman themed sim. Then when it is pointed out that this is indeed also allowed the discussion goes further along a new bend ..

Would it not be easier if the discussion focused on a _concrete_, borderline "decoration" that has been explicitly declared to be in violation of the covenant by our executive office? Under the new judiciary system the offended citizen would presumably be able to appeal against this ruling and an open, transparent process would ensue during which everybody would know exactly what was being claimed and what the justification would be for possibly not allowing it.

I am quite sure that it will be impossible to press on with this issue without settling on a concrete, in-world case and asking "is this allowed" since the alternative of an indiscriminate criticism of the general prohibition is sure to entail in many citizens the counterreaction of remembering the many cases of griefing on the mainland that have taken the shape of spawning pornographically photo-texturised particles with very vulgar motives and reacting to preserve the ban.

We can stay in the hypothetical corner and issue broad condemnations over covenant provisions with speculative consequences but personally I would much prefer a dispute over the legitimacy of a particular item of decorative and historical value to one or more landowners of the Colonia Nova sim. The item in dispute could for example be a small prim sculpture depciting a couple in an explicitly erotic moment being offered for sale from a vendor in the Forum.

Most people that I have met in CDS appear to me to be generally quite reasonable individuals so if it is found through some transparent process that a covenant provision has some unintended consequences I am quite sure that a majority could easily be assembled in favour of remedying this.

Similarly, I am sure that once we learn of the negative and more or less unexpected consequences of the judiciary act there will assemble a majority in favour of acting to alleviate these effects through reform efforts.

Just for the record I cannot see there being a place for playing out slavery or any other kind of roleplay that involves robbing the individual of his/her own free will being permissible in any sim of the CDS and if it were to happen I would immediately advocate legislation against it.

[Diderot Mirabeau]

[quote="Diderot Mirabeau":3hanqgae]Did anyone here actually bother to assess the argument that a covenant provision banning outdoor hot tubs was intended to reduce lag?[/quote:3hanqgae]

[quote="Chicago Kipling":3hanqgae]Gwyneth's first post asserted that this can be controlled much better by building hot tubs differently and setting limits on scripts, which can be added as need be in addition to the general things we already ask of people. In my mind at least that was a straightforward, logical point.

..

So yes, I think a number of us did.[/quote:3hanqgae]

I am sorry Chicago but I cannot see from your reply how the assessment I am seeking has been performed.

Gwyneth wrote that the ban on [b:3hanqgae]outdoor[/b:3hanqgae] hot tubs must have been aimed at reducing lag.

I submit that if the framers of the provision had intended to target laggy hot tubs it would not have made much sense to only ban them from being used outdoors.

My claim is therefore that the original intention of the ban was to discourage aesthetics of a nature with which most of us are already familiar from many first land reservations on the grid.

It therefore is insufficient to claim that since more efficient hot tubs have since been invented and that there are more effective ways of addressing script-induced lag that outdoor hot tubs should be allowed as it does not address the possibility that the original intention of the ban was to avoid a certain taste in decoration from festering in CDS.

[Ashcroft Burnham]

[quote="Diderot Mirabeau":2l5cuaah]Most people that I have met in CDS appear to me to be generally quite reasonable individuals so if it is found through some transparent process that a covenant provision has some unintended consequences I am quite sure that a majority could easily be assembled in favour of remedying this.[/quote:2l5cuaah]

Actually, the Chancellor could remedy such a defect herself, under her power to waive the covenants in specific instances.

[Chicago Kipling]

With respect, this conversation has been overblown. I was trying to toss a few comments in to help provide some clarification and perhaps refocus on immediate, productive, practical solutions. Perhaps I've failed in all of that. I have no rebuttal.