Heyo, and as you can see from the title, I have a bit of a bone to pick clean and make all shiny and stuffs.
Now, we've all seen the sad, sad illiterates, and chances are, we've ALL been illiterates. Having been one to prefer borders to roleplay with upon joining from Animal Jam, I'd been oblivious towards literate roleplayers. Oblivious to the fact that they exist, and they are VERY discriminatory. It's in all of us. But wait. [recordscratch] This term SUCKS. Literate?
What does "Literate" even mean? Well. It means being able to read or write. You may not be able to read or write very well, or are dyslexic, but you're still literate. You HAVE to be able to read to play a game like this. You don't have to write cursive or fancy crap, but type. Heck, I use hunt-and-peck typing.
But that's another point. My proposed system is rather different.
Beginner
(the male wakled helo)
Amateur
(*the male wabdered* hello)
Experienced
(The male wolf roamed aimlessly in the woods. "Hello, other wolf.")
and Professional
(The male wolf roamed aimlessly through the woods. He greeted the other wolf, "Hello, other wolf," before treading past. He sniffed the air for rabbits, hoping to get food to feed himself and his family. Greeted with no rabbit scents, he sighed and kept wandering.)
This last one is like what you see most of the time in FP or pokemon roleplays, usually much longer and divided due to the chat limit. You should notice that these match up to common divisions of "literacy" and are, as such, a better choice.
The sad thing about literacy is how "illiterate" can feel offensive and condescending to beginner and amateur roleplayers. And how badly the word Literate doesn't match up.
Sadly, many people don't want to accept this, so they keep using the word for the wrong thing. It's like Wolfspeak, but that's a different thread.
I'm done now.
