in-game flirting vs. guild princess-ing it up

ROUND ONE: FIGHT!

This may get a little rant-y, FYI.

We've all had our own run-ins with in-game flirting, I'm sure. Sometimes you meet someone in-game, and they either assume that you're a girl IRL for various reasons, and they start acting pretty friendly towards you - offer to help you out with things in-game, send you gold or loot, run your alts through instances, etc. For the most part, in-game flirting can be quite innocuous, as long as both people leave it at that and don't expect anything more from it. Although it's not something I do in-game, I can understand why people would find it fun, and I don't think that it's wrong for them to enjoy a bit of attention or to hit on their in-game friends. But there's a thin line to walk here, and it can end badly pretty quickly. (Personally, I'd hate it if someone thought I needed extra help in-game because I have girl-bits, but that's just me.)

First, in-game flirting can progress into skeevy territory fast. My own experience with this kind of thing is tame, I suppose; the worst thing that happened to me was when this guy I had been questing with when I was still leveling my mage in the 20-29 range, out of nowhere, asked me if I was 18 yet. Of course, I stopped talking to him after that. For the record, I was 18, but good God, what a creepy question to ask someone. Also for the record, I hadn't been flirting with him at all, which made that question particularly perplexing - was he being nice to me because he expected that I would give "something" back to him, so he decided to play it safe and make sure I was legal first? Who knows. All I know is that me being a girl IRL does not make it cool for guys in-game to assume that I will want to flirt with them (or anything else, seriously).

(ETA: There was another incident that I totally forgot about until now, and it was after this that I really stopped correcting people who referred to me as "he": this hunter figured out that I was a girl and actually said, within an hour of meeting me, that he wished he could fly out to where I lived to see me. Ummmmmmmmmm. I was not flirting with him, either.)

After this incident I didn't correct people who referred to me as "he" or "bro" (lol) anymore (unless I'm interacting with a guildie, because I will probably interact with them more often anyway), mostly because I've found it's easier when people assume you're a guy. Yeah, I know. It sucks that I have to pretend I'm a guy in order to get people to leave me alone, and I shouldn't have to do this to get respect. But it definitely is easier to deal that way.

As for people from my guild knowing that I'm a girl: my guildies have always been very respectful and kind. They didn't send me loot or gold (which I'm thankful for), and while they were much less crude when they talked to me than when they talked with each other (didn't want to offend my delicate sensibilities, I guess), they treated me very much like I was just a normal member of the guild - which is what I wanted. And the vast majority of girls that I know in-game are like this (off topic: I totally just typed "mast vajority" first. What the hell.) .

And then there are guild princesses - people who take in-game flirting and go way over the line with it. We all know who they are, they don't need much description. I've been in my fair share of guilds and fortunately, I've run into very few guild princesses, but still the brief contact was enough to drive me into a fury. There was one girl who was in an old guild of mine who posted a bunch of pictures of herself in the "Post your picture!" thread on our forums - of course there's nothing wrong with this, but she also included a picture of her ass in very skimpy panties. There was also another girl (same guild) who posted a picture of herself, topless, but with her arm covering her boobs.

Now. As I've said, there is absolutely nothing wrong with posting pictures of yourself. I don't have anything against girls who do this. Yes, it is fun to see what your guildies look like in real life. It's also nice to be able to attach a face to the character. But honestly, what is the point of posting your ass or your boobs? All I can think of is that it gets you loads of male attention (which it did), guaranteed raid spots (which they did), and loot (also did). I have been in a couple raids with one of these girls, and let me say right now that it was not her skill as a player that got her that raid spot in AQ20.

I know that some people justify this behavior by saying, "Who cares, it's just a game, I'll do what I want so I can get my shiny purples," but this (non)reasoning sucks, to say the least. It's important to not forget that there are real people behind the characters, and when you screw them over or mess with their heads (and this can go both ways, I'm not pinning all the blame on girls or all on boys) the consequences can be pretty devastating. I have been in a guild that pretty much fell apart not only because of a very influential princess, but because everyone else could not deal with her properly.

So why do some guilds tolerate this kind of behavior? Needless to say, it's totally unfair for other players who actually are skilled at the game to be skipped over for someone with little to no skill who happened to post a sexy picture. People play this game for fun, and it's obviously the opposite of fun when someone sashays in and gets the loot or raid spot that you worked your ass off for.

So: to the one of you who is reading this right now, what are your experiences with in-game flirting and guild princesses? How do your guilds deal with these kinds of things? How do you deal with them?