ayatollahessay4

The boards will certainly not dissappear or become less popular as a consequence of the death of board gaming: they will remain an integral part of sissyfightv2002, as the playground remained important in 2001. (A similar situation to that brought about by sissyfightv2002 would be when the boards mediated games on the playground in sissyfightv2000). However, the boards, like the playground in 2001, will no longer be the sissy game site (can I hear Ramona breathing a sigh of relief?). The cool game will have moved again. Board "Eyebrow-raising", and "socking" will still go on, as does multisessioning and cloning on playground, although RamonaQ has been getting more restrictive with these both kinds of activities, as will sissy art and icon making and other non-disruptive games played over the last two years. All the old game sites therefore, will simply mediate the new class wars, the new "eye-brow raising", the new "socking" of the more personal style disputes and controversies that might well "absolutely sicken" the old school sissyfighters as being "anti-community", come December 2002.

Autumn 2001 saw an early taste of the personalised gaming to come. On the disruptive side, people have been called "loons", "pillowbiters", "attention (i.e. deficit) seekers", "druggies", "sluts", "perverts" and alcoholics" and there has been an increase in posts debating real-life issues surrounding these terms (sex, mental health, sexuality, drugs, alcohol etc, in comparison to RamonaQ's old boards where one can see posts were nothing like as heavy, focusing largely on playground games, and, lately, board games).

On the more constructive side, in 2002 people may post more personal pictures as icons and more personal images (pets, schools, life events), an increase we have also witnessed towards the end of 2001 (yellowgirl visits Whitehouse, GuardianAnu's bit of fluff). There will also be an increase in lots of personal games that I just can't think of right now, that haven't happened yet, and that I've not the imagination to predict and list as I have the games for sissyfightv2001 and sissyfightv2000 (albeit incompletely). However, I do believe these games when they occur, will involve sissyfighting over personal identity and community spirit.

The "Legislature?" post in Office by Perdita is an aspect of sissyfightv2002. Concern for fostering community spirit is increasingly becoming the game�s highest moral ground; it is no longer a polite posting manner or funny personality, and long past being one�s grace, skill or sportsmanship on the playground.

So the location of the game sissyfight has moved from the playground in 2000, to the boards in 2001 and on to community (or real-life) in 2002. The continued growth of sissymeets will be at the hub of the new game: rooms / threads will become pubs and clubs and posts / points real-life conversations. These sissy meets will also provide a fresh source of "scandal" for the community to chew on. If such sissy-meets explode further and acquire larger gatherings, as they look like doing, there is likely to be disruptive and non-disruptive knock-on effects. I'll only talk about the disruptive because its easier to predict and they concern scandals.

As the numbers of people attending sissy meets grows and the time people spend together increases, the "sissy-meeters" as groups will become less "close-knit" and consequently the overall probability personal arguments and frictions will develop between attendees, is sure to increase. Disputes if and when they do occur will no doubt spill over onto the message boards. In addition, as the sissymeet rooms increase in size further mischief makers might feel safe to turn up to meets "cloning" another player on the board (who'd have thought of that?) or even "socking it". Real Jet setters could multisession, by turning up to a London meet as one sissy, then fly to New York to another meet another as someone else. Once scandalised for the community to endorse or reject, perhaps then the original sissymeeters - the "old school" - will begin "longing" for the glory days when sissymeets were populated only by "pioneer sissyfighters" who had great "community spirit" and weren't so damn disruptive. Others may disagree. This process occurred in sissyfightv2000, and sissyfightv2001 (with Ramona's old board having elevated status) so there are reasons to believe this might not be a daring or fanciful prediction.

All the above anaylsis also indicates sissyfight conflict in this "community" will not be eliminated in 2002 version of the game, as hard as some people will always try. Like slippery goo, the firmer one has a grip on it, the quicker it will squeeze out in unanticipated directions. Even those not attending the sissy meets will be sucked into the new game's sissyfighting. Old �board gaming� insults and methods will simply look lame and dead in comparison. General discussion that will fill the board and playground talk of 2002 will thus inevitably revolve around events that occuring on sissymeets (or other real-life news-topical or personal issues); what potentially could occur on sissymeets (ditto); or analysis of sissymeets (ditto).

The question is now, perhaps, is this all worth hanging around for?