I was somewhat surprised when I read of this story which reported that the Police are investigating the first case of rape in the metaverse after a girl under the age of 16 whose digital character was raped by a gang of online strangers.

Whilst trying not to be too controversial I have to state that I wonder why anyone would want to venture into the pretend world of avatars in the first place let alone stay there long enough to be gang raped when presumably one could leave at any moment by switching off and removing the headset.

The Police stated that the victim had suffered no injuries as there was no physical attack, which I rather thought was stating the bleeding obvious but said she had suffered the same emotional and psychological trauma as if she had been raped in the real world.

Hardly surprisingly, this is the first time Police have investigated a virtual sexual offence which leaves me wondering how long will it be before we hear the Police are investigating a crime of murder in the virtual world as I know from experience of watching my grandchildren that it is quite common for there to be absolute carnage in some of these virtual games with dead bodies strewn about all over the place.

In similar vein I see that the British Film Institute in London has placed trigger warnings on a number of James Bond films in their current season, stating that they contain language, images or other content that reflect views prevalent in its time, but will cause offence today (as they did then). I have to wonder if the statement in brackets (as they did then) was added by the writer of the article as I have no recollection there being an outcry at the time of the films release.

One would have thought that an audience who would be going to the British Film Institute would be sophisticated enough to have some idea of what a James Bond film might contain, or at the very least have the intelligence to research the film for themselves without the need of trigger warnings from the Institute.

Rather sadly I’m surprised to find a 2021 survey conducted by the British Board of Film Classification found that almost two-thirds of teenagers polled supported trigger warnings on films which might negatively affect their mental health.

The research showed that anxiety (50%), stress (38%) and depression (34%) were the key issues of concern for the 13-18-year-olds, followed by body image issues (30%), suicide (20%) and self-harm (20%).

Now, I’m no mathematician but if you add all these issues together it comes to 192% so I assume vast numbers of the youth of today must suffer with two of these conditions which I have to say seems exceedingly sad when I compare it to my youth and the joy and excitement we had growing up.

Rather like today it was a time when everything was new and ground-breaking from fashion to music to technological inventions. Unlike today especially with fashion and music, Britain was at the forefront, the Beatles ruled the world, Carnaby Street was an Underground tube trip away with all the modern fashion at our fingertips.

The first man took a rocket ship to space, a satellite went up too and we watched on television as the first rather crackly television picture was sent by it, then later men on the moon and the discovery which debunked the nursery rhyme that it wasn’t made of cheese.

Then getting our first job, a motorcar and freedom of the road, the first wage packet at the end of the week in a small brown envelope, the chance to learn how to budget for once the contents of the small brown envelope were gone there was no more money until next week, it was not common practice to visit the bank of mum and dad as is the practice nowadays.

We had the ability to be punctual due to the lack of a mobile phone, so if we were meeting our friends to go to the pictures (cinema) we didn’t have the chance to phone to say we were going to be late, so should you turn up at the meeting place and your friends were gone you would have no idea which cinema they were in, was it the flea pit or did they plump for the Majestic? A very good lesson in punctuality here.

Another major advantage we had and this will seem strange to modern youth was not having the internet, we learnt of fashion and music from a weekly magazine aimed at teenagers, for anything else we had documentaries and pop programmes on the television or the local library for serious research. We were not exposed to whatever the youth of today are exposed to that make them full of anxiety about so many things, we may have at some time become involved in a fracas with another youth but it would generally have only involved fisticuffs, this was not a time when vast swathes of young men went about carrying a machete down their tracksuit trousers, nor were girls in danger of being drugged and date raped after leaving a night club.

Sadly, I can see where a lot of the anxieties of the young people of today come from but I have to say, that being the question with all the real dangers they are exposed to why on earth would you enter into a virtual world where far worse things could happen?

Lastly, should any young person happen across this post, (unlikely as it is) please heed this advice, enjoy the real world, I’m sure there are more than enough things to amuse yourself contained within it and this may seem obvious but it seems not to some; should you venture forth in the virtual metaverse and you are feeling anxious or afraid, remember it is not the real world you do not have to stay there, please take off your headset and turn off the machine.