Considering in-world violence as a Quaker pacifist

Catherine Linden posts on the official SL blog that the Linden Lab PR department is looking for "folks who are using Second Life in the pursuit of religious or spiritual ends."  As some of you know, I'm a Quaker. Not a great Quaker, but still a member of the Religious Society of Friends. After the fold is the missive I sent to her.

(REMINDER: the first in-world Quaker service will be held this Saturday.  See my previous post for all the details.)

Hi Catherine,

In my real life, I am a member of the Religious Society of Friends, or Quakers as we are known, and have been very interested in the intersection of my spiritual journey and the path that my avatar Rik Riel is traveling.

One spiritual issue I have confronted has to do with in-world violence. Quakers are by-and-large pacifists, for hundreds of years refusing to take up arms for any cause or country. That said, in Second Life there are many opportunities to engage in what appears to be violence and combat for entertainment purposes.

I'm not much of a gamer, but I have been intrigued with the Samurai culture in SL, and the somewhat refined form of stylized combat that takes place on Samurai Island. I recently purchased a katana sword and have been enjoying learning the fine art of SL dueling.

In real life, for a Quaker to take up armed combat as a hobby would seem, well, not in the spirit of our faith. But in the virtual world, the consequences of what appear to be "fighting" in-world seem to be in large part positive. There is a camraderie and a generosity among those who I have crossed swords with that does not fit neatly into the Quaker traditional belief that conflict begets more conflict. Entire guilds of samurai combat enthusiasts meet and help each other become better duelists and presumably form new friendships. In this case, mock conflict seems to beget community.

In the bigger picture, the actual in-world violence seems to be those who grief other residents. To take pleasure from bringing lag, annoyance and harm to others seems to me to be a new form of violence. Finding the Quakerly response to these actions -- to love the griefer but not the grief -- seems to me to be the moral challenge for pacifists. I.e. to reach the human being behind the pixels.

Quakers believe that there is that of God in every person. This informs how we have responded historically to the quest for slave emancipation, women's suffrage, the civil rights movement, and currently the gay marriage issue. Perhaps it is time we extended that consideration to finding that of God in every avatar.

I will be attending the first ever Quaker meeting for worship on Saturday. I hope other Friends can help me traverse this space ethically and with a clean heart.

In Peace,

Rik Panganiban / Rik Riel

The Katana-wielding Quaker