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August 14 1997As I said last week, those who actually live this philosophy in their lives seem to understand some of these things by instinct. Others, perhaps most online, seem to need to have it spelled out for them, and last week I did so when I stated that a slave always has one choice. That choice is, of course, to stop. To walk away. To leave the relationship.
But what of the consequences of that choice?
First, we must understand the difference between a mistake and failure. Mistakes are inevitable, indeed, they are all but required, for a girl learns mostly through mistakes and correction. Mistakes are unconscious and most times, innocent. Failure, however, is a completely different matter. A girl can truly only fail herself, her slave belly and her Owner in one manner; she can give up. Giving up does not mean simply walking away, disappearing, reappearing under another nick or address. It also includes losing her slave belly, topping from below and running amuck. ( As an aside: time and time again I hear from girls on IRC who are agonized over the most trivial of mistakes, thinking that their owners will send them away - or that they are "bad slaves" and have "failed" - because of them. This kind of thinking, I find, is a product of the "IRC mind" and not the lifestyle mind. On IRC, one can replace a girl (and a "Master") almost with the snap of a finger (it is important to note, however, that some men and women find it much harder to do now, for bad reputations do spread). There are few strong and able men on IRC, who take this seriously, and many women who, being on various places in their own journeys, seek them. In truth, there are truly few who have the courage to live this lifestyle outside of a computer screen. When they find one another, it is a relationship not easily thrown away because the girl served a drink from the left instead of the right side. The numbers of people on IRC who claim to be "gorean", truly overstate the number of those people who can take the responsibility to live this lifestyle.)
So a girl makes a mistake. She is corrected and learns and carries on. She grows. She strives to be kajira. She retains her value.
Or a girl decides to give up. She leaves, never to be seen again - under that nick. Or perhaps, she begins to tell her "Master" what she will and will not accept in their "relationship" ("No, you cannot have another slave, aren't I GOOD enough for you??"). Or perhaps she begins to whisper to him of others, those whom she has run afoul of, whom she dislikes or fears. Or, perhaps as I have seen more times that I would like, she runs amuck - hurting those who once cared for her and striking out with words and actions designed simply to cause others to feel a touch of her own sense of pain over her failure.
Her failure - her one choice.
There are too few who do honor to the Gorean philosophy online. There are many, however, who play with the philosophy for their own reasons, both slave and free. And the damage that they do every day, to one another and to those innocent, is sobering and difficult to watch.
And it is not made easier with the knowledge that such actions are done willingly. For everyone, slave or free, has at least one choice.
I wish you well.