There is an article in the current issue of The New Scientist about a person who is testing her MtF transition with a character that she has created in Second Life. I’ve cut and pasted a short segment of the article below that describes some of her life in virtual reality.

My question is whether or not there are any EUNUCHS in Second Life? If not, why not? It would certainly be a location to try out various possibilities with no penalties attached.

I would, of course, be interested in hearing about any experiences that any of you have had there.

WILLIAM WISE had always felt he should have been born a woman. A year and a half ago, he finally got the chance to live as one. He chose a provocative new look: a cute, contemporary hairstyle with bangs, a tank top with spaghetti straps and a plunging neckline, and bare midriff. There was one twist, however. He had to live inside an online virtual world called Second Life.

This alternative persona [pictured in the original article], which goes by the name Jani Myriam, allowed him finally to understand what it was like to live as a woman – something he felt unable to test out in the real world, but which gave him immense fulfilment. “I liked myself so much better as Jani – she was fun, happy, even bold and witty, while the real-life me was overwhelmed with fear and self-doubt,” he says.

The realisation sparked a personal transformation. Wise came out as a transsexual to his family and friends, and is now preparing for several operations that will change his gender in the real world too, where he will soon be known as Rebecca. “I eventually discovered what a transsexual was and that I might well be one,” he explains.

The New Scientist

23 August 2007, pp. 26–27

Hi Jesus,

The default male characters in SL have no genitalia. So they look like smoothies. If a male wants to have genitals they have to buy them, make them or get some one to gift them. There are also quite a few characters with non human genitalia. Horse penises and stuff like that.

Another thing you can do in SL is change your gender at will. I have a male and female of my self which I use according to how I feel at the time. Interestingly I prefer to be one or the other at any given time, as opposed to being nongendered. That fits in with how I see myself as being bi-gendered as opposed to nongendered.

For those not familiar with it, SL is a pain in the ass to play. It is very connection-intensive and requires a pretty fast machine to run, along with a very good video card. Most of the cool stuff is run by scripts. I have no clue how to do any of it, and the learning curve is very high, I think. It's more work than it's worth; no fun at all.

Jema is right, though. Every avatar there comes "out of the box" with no genitals and the choices are male or female. However, if you remove clothing, you don't find genitals! Building the avatar is a pain, too. Took me days just to get the hair right.

The next thing was that every time I logged on, it seemed I had to download a large update, if not the whole program again, which took so long I lost interest in it.

But I suppose if you've got the time and patience for it, you could have some fun experimenting with gender there in SL.

I have a friend in the UK who is soon to be transgender. she already has breasts and isn't sure when her surgery will be. i say she because that is how i always think of him, anyway she plays second life alot, apperently has a lil club in there she's always DJing for. i'll have to ask her what her name is on there see if any of you who've played have met her

I tried to do the same thing too in a few of those avatar places but my problem was that I'm just not old enough to have a credit card. Knd of.