Girls who like Boys who like Boys – Ethnography of ... - Yuuyami.com

These OOC chats in Yuri’s game are often very flirtatious, and
frequently have a slashy overtone – not surprisingly, as the game is yaoifriendly.
When I asked Yuri how she would elucidate the flirtatious overtone
in the chats, she explained that almost all players were female, and that she
was unsure of only a few players’ gender. Technically, this game’s players are
not allowed to talk about their personal identity in the games and should not
disclose other players’ personal info to the group. The only reason that Yuri
knows more about some players, and even has them as friends on her private
LiveJournal, is that six players who were with the game from the start,
exchanged LiveJournals at a time when the game seemed to be in a slow
downwards spiral. “There was this unspoken fear that we would lose touch
and the game would die.” The reason that there is such a code against sharing
personal information is simple: Some people want to get too personal too fast,
and quickly move from “fun” to “scary.” Yuri narrates how the game’s initial
founder, the person who played Sirius, had a game in which someone was
stalking her – another player who just went too far. A certain level has to be
established, especially in a newer game. The six who exchanged journals were,
after all, part of the game from the start on, whereas others have joined only
recently, after the game leaders switched and the game revived.
In any case, the flirty overtones of the OOC chats are rather interesting,
as is the fact that the players will refer to each other as “he” or with their
characters’ names. Yuri knows, for example that Ron’s player is a girl named
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