The gist is, the people in Iran who couldn't protest and foreign media was blacked out, they went to Second Life. They did their protests there. And raised awareness to people outside Iran.
Paying particular attention toSLdemonstrations against the Iranian government's post-election crackdown against opponents of the Ahmadinejad regime, Burns writes:
"The active Iranian protest community in Second Life is more than a curiosity, and downplaying the importance of virtual societies in our political and social lives... understates the power of synthetic worlds in creating viable social movements...
Authoritarian governments that repress real-world demonstrations have difficulty doing the same in the synthetic world. Virtual rallies are so hard to shut off because the mechanics of virtual protest are fluid..."
(Game Politics source)
Read the whole story here,it's fascinating.
The next story is abouta guy and a genocide awareness group in Second Life, "Better World". Username "KallfuNahuel Matador" was part of a Green Lantern Core, a bunch of superheroes who protected "Better World". He went from protecting Better World in the virtual gamespace of Second Life, to where you can see him above lifting heavy truck supplies from a truck in Africa, outside a community center in Swaziland.
He remembers the time he served 500 school kids what would be their only meal of the day, a thought that staggered him. "Looking out at their faces," he remembers now, "feeling overwhelmed and helpless. Then seeing the kids, playing and smiling and shoving each other, one group even had a soccer ball. . . it hit me, they're just kids! There's nothing different here but their circumstances. They still want to play and run around and they didn't need me feeling sorry for them. So I got back to work."( New World Notes source)
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