In a world where interconnected crises, ranging from climate change and digital warfare to forced migration, reveal mounting human vulnerability, the concept of polycrisis captures the overlapping nature of today’s global risks. Within this context, the Metaverse has emerged as a new digital frontier offering refuge, simulation, and escapism. However, this environment also enables symbolically extreme yet normalized forms of violence, such as virtual harassment and aggressive communication, shaped by culturally embedded systems of value. As immersive tools like 3D interaction, Augmented Reality (AR), or Virtual Reality (VR) devices, and gadgets render the Metaverse increasingly tangible, they introduce new digital infrastructures, power relations, and social participation. This paper interrogates which dominant worldviews and hierarchies are embedded into virtual spaces, particularly concerning structural and historical violence. Building on Judith Butler’s concept of grievability, the analysis identifies three dimensions of virtual violence: (1) unequal access to digital infrastructure and immersive technology; (2) cultural systems that shape meaning and representation; and (3) the influence of platform designers on digital norms and behavior. Case studies from platforms such as VRChat, The Sandbox, and Meta Horizon Worlds reveal how their design and algorithmic systems perpetuate discrimination, especially against marginalized users. The paper also explores how digital exclusion and algorithmic gatekeeping reflect intellectual and institutional violence, particularly through the commodification of data and the reproduction of biases. These phenomena disproportionately affect communities in the Global South, reinforcing digital inequality. This paper argues that virtual violence reproduces real-world power structures within emerging digital environments. It concludes by calling for co-developed digital justice frameworks between governments and developers to prevent the reproduction of gendered, cultural, economic, and racial violence. Ultimately, it situated virtual violence as a central issue within broader conversations on digital governance and the unfolding polycrisis.

As the world enters a period of turbulence in which multiple crises are deeply intertwined, from climate change and displacement to conflict, the concept of polycrisis captures how one issue fuels another. At the same time, digital innovations have created alternate realities, expanding human action beyond physical limits. The Metaverse, introduced in Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash (1992), exemplifies this shift, imagined as a realm of creative, social, and economic opportunities, not limited to 3D environments but also including digital spaces where users express themselves through avatars, virtual representations of self intentionally selected, shaped by media, norms, and cultural hierarchies, carrying deep socio-political implications (Boellstorff, 2015). Massive investment drives Metaverse growth, yet violence persists, beyond physical to structural, embedded in digital systems designed by developers shaped by their real-world social contexts. Ruha Benjamin defines this as the “New Jim Code,” a direct reference to the Jim Crow laws that enforced racial segregation in the United States, but applied to the digital age where neutrality masks discrimination (2020). As an immersive, often unregulated space, the Metaverse reveals digital violence: racialized avatars (Groom et al., 2009), gender harassment (Peck et al., 2013), data commodification ( Zuboff, 2017), and algorithmic bias (Eubanks, 2018), not as mere technical flaws, but as sociopolitical issues rooted in physical and virtual realities. This paper analyzes harassment, discrimination, exclusion, and cultural erasure through theories of power and Judith Butler’s grievability (2016), with case studies from VRChat, Meta Horizon Worlds, and The Sandbox. It explores how social hierarchies persist and examines ethical challenges and opportunities for justice in virtual innovation. In this era of transformation, the Metaverse is not just technological progress; it reproduces structures of power where violence is embedded. Addressing it demands a deeper understanding of virtual environments as battlegrounds shaped by power, vulnerability, and resistance.

Theoretical Lens

Understanding violence in digital spaces requires engaging with how power is constructed. Violence extends beyond physical harm to include control, coercion, and the restriction of thought and action. Michel Foucault  stated that power is embedded in knowledge, language, and norms we accept as truth (1995). In regard to virtual spaces, Judith Butler introduces the concept of grievability in her book Frames of War (2016); this term can be used to understand how those in power exercise violence to govern, decide, and control. Grievability highlights how power determines whose lives are considered worth protecting and mourning. Some are erased or ignored, while others receive recognition, reflected in avatar design and user experiences in the Metaverse. Marginalized groups experience discrimination, neglect, or delayed responses, particularly women, ethnic minorities, and gender-diverse communities, further reinforcing digital hierarchies. Foucault’s concept of knowledge as power applies to the Metaverse, where power and knowledge operate through user experience, platform design, and algorithmic visibility. These structures determine what users see and believe, shaping discourse and action, especially against vulnerable groups. Shoshana Zuboff extends Foucault’s ideas by incorporating a concept of surveillance capitalism, which explains how corporations commodify human data, violating consent and privacy (2019). In the Metaverse, identity becomes a product, revealing new forms of economic violence and digital class distinctions. Critical race theory views race as embedded in digital realm systems. The Metaverse replicates racial bias via default system settings and white avatars, biases embedded even at the coding level, resulting in algorithmic exclusion. Ruha Benjamin  notes that technology is never neutral; the design and usage of digital environments reinforce social, political, and economic hierarchies. Inequitable access to immersive tools further deepens digital inequality (2020). Postcolonial theory, with Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (1988) as its leading figure, critiques how English-dominated digital design constitutes a form of violence by erasing local values and identities, despite much content originating in the Global South. Binary gender norms persist in avatar design; male avatars appear muscular, female avatars soft and pink, excluding queer and non-binary users. Avatars coded as feminine are often objectified. Judith Butler  argues that denying recognition is itself a form of violence (2015). Virtual violence is not incidental but systematically constructed, embedded in design, code, infrastructure, and visual systems. Through the insights from critical race, postcolonial, and gender theories, the Metaverse reveals patterns that reflect global class, racial, and gender hierarchies, perpetuating patriarchal norms in both the virtual and real world.

Forms of Violence in the Metaverse

While the Metaverse represents a new digital frontier for human experience, it is also a space of apparent freedom that is saturated with diverse forms of violence. These include symbolic violence, structural social violence, sexual violence, and intellectual oppression, all of which reflect deeper systems of inequality and domination embedded within the digital infrastructure.

• Symbolic Violence: Racialized and Gendered Avatars, Body Norms

Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of symbolic violence (1991) is key to Internet and critical race studies, explaining how representations of race, beauty standards, and gender norms shape digital violence, especially in the techno-utopian Metaverse. Originating in the physical world, traditional and digital media reinforce hegemonic standards of attractiveness and worth, normalizing hierarchical systems that privilege dominant groups (Bourdieu, 2002; Nakamura, 2013). A study by Cyan DeVeaux et al. (2025) on VRChat, an online virtual reality social platform, shows racial bias in through digital avatar designs. Users of color often report exclusion due to default system settings that fail to reflect their identities. Resorting to Do It Yourself (DIY) avatar creation, they face unstable systems that harm their well-being, inclusion, and immersion. Whiteness remains the default, and people of color must work harder to represent themselves authentically. Without physical force, symbolic violence becomes the dominant mode of harm in virtual spaces. Lisa Nakamura’s Cybertypes (2013) describes racialized digital stereotypes that counter early internet ideals of liberation. Alongside Sarah Banet-Weiser (2018), Nakamura shows how digital aesthetics reproduce offline biases in design, advertising, and user experience based on race, gender, and age. This results in sexualized representations of women and hyper-masculinized males coded through tone, body size, and expression, limiting diversity and reinforcing class divides in a supposedly liberating space. The Metaverse thus becomes another site for constructing “us vs. them” dynamics. Through a gender lens, symbolic violence includes the rise of both feminism and misogyny in digital culture. Although feminism challenges bias, it is often co-opted by commercial interests, weakening its critique and undermining genuine efforts toward equity. Sarah Banet-Weiser warns that commercial feminism allows patriarchy to endure (2018). This is evident in practices like slut shaming and cyberbullying of outspoken women, where assertiveness is framed as immorality. Feminism must remain political to dismantle gendered power structures. Without this critical stance, symbolic violence will persist in digital spaces like the Metaverse.

• Intellectual Oppression and Violence: Limited involvement of Non-Western Languages and Identities

While earlier discussions focused on visible harms like symbolic violence, intellectual oppression demands a deeper analysis of digital systems. This occurs when the knowledge of certain communities is rendered silent or insignificant through structural power arrangements. In digital spaces, such erasure is embedded in systemic default settings. Academic critiques highlight how narrative production is predominantly controlled by Western creators, embedding intellectual violence into digital environments. While some see cultural context as natural in design, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (1988) and Ruha Benjamin (2020) identify intellectual violence in English defaults, Western worldviews, and Euro-American storylines that shape digital narratives and perspectives. Moderation systems often prioritize Western norms while neglecting linguistic, cultural, and spiritual diversity, reinforcing intellectual marginalization and weakening global pluralism. Spivak’s subaltern theory defines intellectual violence as exclusion from dominant power structures. In virtual worlds, minority identities are rendered inaudible and absent as leaders, replaced by tall, white, masculine avatars rooted in European history, filtered out by dominant systems. This is not exclusive to the West; state power also erases voices. Indigenous mountain communities are misrepresented as ecological threats under assumptions of ignorance, ignoring their historical role as environmental stewards. Intellectual violence intersects with racial discrimination, expressed through exclusion from power structures due to differences in race, culture, and belief. Ruha Benjamin shows how data, algorithms, and automation embed inequality under claims of neutrality (2020). Her “New Jim Code” reveals racism encoded in facial recognition, credit scores, and predictive systems; discrimination masked as objective efficiency. These systems reinforce bias through hidden structures. Benjamin calls for abolitionist, community-centered technology, ethical design, and digital social movements to resist systemic inequality. As the Metaverse evolves, it must confront these embedded hierarchies. Without intentional intervention, colonial knowledge systems will continue shaping digital architecture in invisible yet pervasive ways.

• Economic Violence: Access Barriers and Data Colonization 

Economic conditions drive inequality and violence, especially in capitalist systems where power and capital control access. Virtual worlds, constructed atop real-world socio-economic foundations, replicate structural violence through scarcity and unequal distribution of resources. This includes inequitable access to virtual resources and the commodification of user data. Zuboff  calls this surveillance capitalism, where companies extract data without consent, not only to predict but also to shape behavior (2019). A key example is digital land speculation in the Sandbox. Corporations like Adidas, PwC, and Gucci invest in high-traffic zones, where value is tied to location, social status, and income potential, benefiting capital-rich early adopters and reinforcing wealth disparities. These markets favor capital-rich actors, often from the Global North, excluding many from the Global South. Though platforms promote decentralization, control remains with developer-backed investors who originally secured key land, reproducing hierarchy and power concentration. Axie Infinity, a blockchain-based online game as part of the broader Metaverse ecosystem, once provided income to low-income users, especially in the Philippines, but market crashes left many in debt after entering with limited knowledge and high risk, driven primarily by hopes for economic mobility. Economic violence in virtual spaces mirrors real-world inequalities through unequal access to land, tools, and internet infrastructure. In the Global South, poor access to reliable, high-speed internet limits knowledge and participation. User data is extracted and monetized without true consent, disproportionately affecting marginalized users who often remain unaware of the commodification. This phenomenon, known as data colonization, masks exploitation under the guise of free digital services. Nick Couldry and Ulises A. Mejias  call this data colonialism: the systemic appropriation of life through data extraction for capitalist gain, where data is the new gold to be seized and commodified (2019). Profit motives and speculative land grabs reproduce corporate violence. Despite the rhetoric of decentralization, Metaverse platforms remain dominated by capital-backed developers and early investors, reinforcing exploitative structures under the illusion of freedom and equal access.

• Sexual and Psychological Violence: Harassment in VR Spaces

The Metaverse enables users to present alternate selves through avatars. Embodiment in VR allows users to feel and perceive actions as if they are happening in a physical world. This proximity to reality intensifies emotional and psychological engagement. Although VR doesn’t replicate physical reality, its psychological impact is profound. In late 2021, SumOfUs (current Ekō) reported a sexual harassment incident in Horizon Worlds, where a researcher’s avatar was subjected to unwanted contact. At the time, there were no protective measures. This led to the 2022 launch of a personal boundary feature, a design mechanism that creates virtual space between users to prevent unwanted proximity (Ekō, 2022). Reports show that users who identify as female or gender-diverse disproportionately experience virtual violence, including assault, sexualized comments, and non-consensual touching driven by online misogyny and what Emma Jane  terms e-bile, or digitally-expressed sexual hostility (2017). This contradicts the Metaverse’s inclusive vision. Jane calls upon platform regulators to prioritize safety and urges society to recognize the structural nature of virtual violence. Supporting this, Jesse Fox and Wai Yen Tang found that repeated exposure to online harassment normalizes harmful beliefs, including rape myths and victim-blaming, especially among youth in unsafe digital spaces (2014). These patterns expose the unpreparedness of immersive platforms to regulate harm. Existing frameworks lack preventive systems and legal protections tailored to VR, placing responsibility on users instead of developers and overlooking the psychological depth of virtual experiences. Safety and belonging must be built through ethical design. Without it, the Metaverse risks becoming a digital extension of real-world sexual violence, replicating harmful dynamics rather than transforming them. In VR, psychological harm can be as real and damaging as physical harassment.

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