Larp and harassment
Mar. 14th, 2015 10:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
janestarzThrough the Drachenfest forums I stumbled upon something that quite shocked me although I might have guessed it happens on larp too: harassment.
In 2014, a Swedish all-female Facebook group was started and slowly the women found the courage to speak about their experiences with sexual harassment in a larp-environment.
Although from what I read, the Swedish larps are very different from Dutch larps, the scale seems to be larger and the terrain you play on too. Still, already on the Drachenfest forum I read about drunk larpers harassing a female player, so it's closer to home than you might expect. And it doesn't have to be limited to female players.
I've played in some confrontational larps, sometimes with clear dominance issues. But as best they could, the organisers tried to create a safe sandbox for us to play in, using a safe word if a person really didn't want to continue.
Whenever we cross into that kind of play, we take a risk. It's a risk to play such dangerous games, it's a risk of running into a barrier we didn't know we had, it's a risk of finding out that maybe we like to be in complete control. But let us try to limit the risk of it running out of hand.
I would like to link to the article a Tsunami of Testimonies so other people read about this. Awareness is the first step.
And let me emphasize: whether it is drunk guys going too far or someone actually abusing someone: it is not OK.
We need to step in, and ask if the victim needs help.
We need to tell the SL and Orga about the incident.
And if necessary, we do need to involve the police so it can never happen again.
In 2014, a Swedish all-female Facebook group was started and slowly the women found the courage to speak about their experiences with sexual harassment in a larp-environment.
Although from what I read, the Swedish larps are very different from Dutch larps, the scale seems to be larger and the terrain you play on too. Still, already on the Drachenfest forum I read about drunk larpers harassing a female player, so it's closer to home than you might expect. And it doesn't have to be limited to female players.
I've played in some confrontational larps, sometimes with clear dominance issues. But as best they could, the organisers tried to create a safe sandbox for us to play in, using a safe word if a person really didn't want to continue.
Whenever we cross into that kind of play, we take a risk. It's a risk to play such dangerous games, it's a risk of running into a barrier we didn't know we had, it's a risk of finding out that maybe we like to be in complete control. But let us try to limit the risk of it running out of hand.
I would like to link to the article a Tsunami of Testimonies so other people read about this. Awareness is the first step.
And let me emphasize: whether it is drunk guys going too far or someone actually abusing someone: it is not OK.
We need to step in, and ask if the victim needs help.
We need to tell the SL and Orga about the incident.
And if necessary, we do need to involve the police so it can never happen again.
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no subject
Date: 2015-03-19 06:45 pm (UTC)Maybe some types of larp are higher risk, but in general in those types of larp there is more awareness for limits and boundaries. For example with Exit 3, we talked about boundaries, fears etc before starting to play. I could not remember everything people said, but it was already said once which makes repeating it easier. This really helped with creating an atmosphere with intense play where there was still room for the OC persons with their OC feelings. That might have helped more than safe words. Knowing the safe word is something different from knowing when to use a safe word.
In the Dutch larping community a lot of hugging and touching is going on. Especially young people who want to be liked find it hard to object. Or someone truly likes hugging someone, but doesn't want to take it further. I'm quite sure a number of romances started with some shared warmth under a cloak on a cold night, but at least as many of these encounters resulted in hurt feelings in some direction.