Act III, Interlude: Queerness, VR and Perspectives

From the perspectives of non-queer people, queerness is just a concept, from the perspectives of mainstream queer people, the queerness of the marginalized ones is just a concept. Constraints always exist as long as there’s no empathy (Bowring, 2004).

There’s an old Chinese saying “Huan Wei Si Kao” which means the ability to change roles and walk in other people’s shoes. “Can we use VR technology to realize ‘Huan Wei Si Kao’ and even trigger people's empathy?”

Scene I: Current VR and Queer Accesses:

There is no doubt that VR technology has penetrated every aspect of daily life, as to Current VR with Queer content, Oliver has found several expressions as follows:

1. VR Chatrooms: Most Chatrooms are LGBTQ+ friendly and there is a huge community on Reddit full of people looking for gay VR chatrooms. 2. VR APPs: Alternative ways for queer people to make friends and feel connected. 3. VR travels provide an immersive platform for those to experience gay events and spots including pride parades etc. 4. VR Arts: for/associated with queer people such as Virtual Drug features 3D scans of drag queens. 5. VR Porn: most of the content that people are looking for.

Figure 14, Gay VR Chatroom Posts on Reddit Figure 15, Top Rated Queer VR Porn Sties

Scene II: The Machine to Be Another

Neuroscientific research has developed ways to create fascinating cognitive illusions. These illusions can generate the feeling of having a different body or of being the body of another person. In these neuroscientific experiments, the psychological and physiological responses of research subjects suggested that they felt as if they had a different body (Petkova, Khoshnevis and Ehrsson, 2011). It didn’t matter if the “new body ” was of a digital avatar or a plastic mannequin. Neuroscientists call this phenomenon the Body Transfer Illusion (or the Full Body Ownership Illusion (De Oliveira et al., 2016). Curious about the psychological consequences of experiencing oneself as a different body, the scientists used VR technologies for many different experimental setups and designs. In one famous study, neuroscientists could demonstrate that research subjects with white skin revealed a significant reduction of implicit racial bias after seeing themselves from the firstperson perspective of a digital avatar with dark skin (De Oliveira et al., 2016).

The burgeoning field of neuroscientific embodiment research got Oliver excited: “How can translate these potentially beneficial effects of laboratory science into pro-social interventions available for everyone?”

The neuroscientific research suggests the great potential of Embodiment Virtual Reality (EVR) for a more positive sociality (Petkova, Khoshnevis and Ehrsson, 2011). Embodied VR systems could help to overcome negative stereotyping between groups and improve pro-social behaviour by encouraging active perspective-taking, or empathy. Empathy is commonly defined as an individual’s ability to feel another person’s emotional state while being aware of that feeling’s origin (De Oliveira et al., 2016). In this way, empathy is an active perspective-taking, which can be linked to mutual understanding and prosocial behaviour, such as altruism and compassion. The importance of empathy for a positive sociality has been discussed not only in scientific studies but also in applied fields of education, conflict resolution and therapy (Petkova, Khoshnevis and Ehrsson, 2011). BeAnotherLab is a design laboratory based in Barcelona, they strongly believe that empathic concern can contribute to a better society in which individuals care for each other, no matter their differences and backgrounds. BeAnotherLab’s goal is to co-create and apply technoscientific knowledge critically to foster human connection, mutual understanding and kindness. Body Swap is an installation by BeAnotherLab last approximately 10 – 15 minutes and consists of a series of interaction protocols for two users to exchange their embodied perspectives in real-time. It is an EVR that credibly facilitates a body swap. The Machine allows individuals to experience the world through the eyes and body of another person. By combining virtual reality, cognitive sciences, and performance

Figure 17, Body Swap

art, the system enables users to perceive themselves in a different body while moving and interacting with realistic tactile feedback from others in space.

Now the questions are: can people truly transcend empathy and understanding for others? Can this be applied in dealing with the queer issue mentioned above and resonate with queer people in some way? Can it possibly transcend our understanding of gender, identity, and queerness through this specific method?

Scene III: Take a Chance to Be Another

Inspired by Be Another Lab, Oliver started his experiment starting off with the idea that people are not swapping bodies to experience others in a binary (Petkova, Khoshnevis and Ehrsson, 2011), people are approaching it with whatever their sense of where they are and whether they even believe in a binary or a scale.

“Instead of the notion of A directly can feel like B, maybe people can get more sophisticated together about a liminal space in which we can have a healthy relationship between gender and queerness.”

The whole process of the experiment lasted for two days.The participants in the experiment were two queer and two straight people. Each time, Oliver set one queer person and one straight person as a pair and by using drawn goggles and Go Pro, he created a simplified version of the body swap experiment.

There are four attempts he used to organize the experiment (The test subjects are two people, hereinafter referred to as No.1 and No.2. The experimental site is a 5Mx5M square): 1. Look at Oneself from Different Angles. In this part, he asked subject No.1 to stand in the center of the field with a headset, and subject No.2 was in eight directions, three distances (0.5m, 1m, 1.5m) beside him, holding a GoPro look towards him. Exchange identities after 5 minutes.

Figure 17-18, look at oneself from different angles

2. Movements with Voice Instructions In this part, he asked subject No.1 to stand in the center of the field with a headset, and subject No.2 to hold a GoPro in front, left, and back to look at him, and issue action commands, such as “hold your head in both hands” and “point to the pillar in front of you” . Exchange identities after 5 minutes.

3. Maze Walking In this part, he asked Subject No. 1 to stand at the entrance of the maze with a headset, and subject No. 2 to fix the GoPro's field of vision in a position where Subject No. 1 and the entire maze could be placed, After Subject No. 1 reaching the end, exchange identities.

4. Body Swap In this part, he asked Subject No.1 (queer) to be back-to-back with Subject No.2. Subject No.1 needs to place the GoPro on their forehead, autonomously performing body movements, and instruct Subject 2, who is wearing the headset, to change movements

simultaneously(Changes in movementsinclude touching one's own body parts, movements of hands and feet, body movements, etc.)

Figure 19-20, Movements with Voice Instructions

Figure 21-22, Maze Walking

Figure 23-24, Body Swap

What are the people’s initial thoughts after the experiment?

Participate A (queer): “The feeling of being outside ourselves, feeling that I am not myself but in the game with insecurity.”

Participate B: “The authenticity of the experience depends on whether there is corresponding feedback. ”

Participate C (queer): “I think a new feeling/rule of space needs to be established. Unfamiliarity slows down the intuitive process of distance/direction judgments.”

Participate D: “I have a feeling of being watched, I was exposing my insecurities.”

In addition to these intuitive feelings, after conducting a more in-depth one-on-one interview with the experimental subjects, Oliver also found that the four experimental subjects indeed all had a deeper understanding of the unfamiliar body of others after the experiment, that is also to say, for non-queer people, this experiment can probably allow them to enhance their knowledge of queerness, identity to a certain extent.

“What if there is an unconscious physical constraint, is it still possible to gain these feelings, as well as a sense of self-liberation?”