Kajirae have the same rights as other players!

This blog post is a clarification, to be considered as a mood and opinion piece. Because I’d like to come back to the status of players who play a slave girl in goreen roleplay sims, and the unspeakable nonsense I see on this subject in the profiles of many male players.

To clarify my point, and whatever you may think, please understand that your personal opinion and views on this subject are completely irrelevant. A female player playing the role of slave girl is playing a role. Behind this role is a person who is totally free to make her own choices, her own desires, her own motivations and who she associates with. You can’t demand anything of them, nor can you impose anything on them. You can never decide for them, nor ignore their opinions. In short, gentlemen, a player who plays a slave-girl is NOT a slave-girl!

Let me remind you of the rights of all role-players in the world of Gor. EVERYONE! No exceptions:

1. You have the right to be respected. Whatever role you play, everyone is equal OOC.
2. You have the right to actively participate in the role-play and to direct a scene.
3. You have the right not to be punished IC for something that happens OOC. (Metagaming)
4. You have the right to refuse a roleplay that is not gorean.
5. You have the right to refuse, or fade to black in a sex scene. Just because someone wants to use your character doesn’t mean you have to agree.
6. You have the right to take your time writing your emote. If people can’t be patient, you shouldn’t be punished IC for your effort in writing.
7. You have the right to afk, log off, leave town to shop, or leave Gor without asking permission first.
8. You have the right to contact a Moderator if role play is questionable.
9. You have the right to refuse any request for images, voice, cam or real life information.
10. You have the right to express your opinion about Gor and how RP should work in an OOC context.

So, a few sentences I’ve seen passed around in profiles, and which punctuate my point:

– A Kajira is there to serve: NO. That’s what the character is there for, but it’s not an OOC requirement that you can impose. And in RP… yes, clearly. But if the player doesn’t like you and manages to avoid you, you should perhaps ask yourself why? The player doesn’t play that part of her role very well? Well, go elsewhere and ignore her, if you like, but your OOC demands are pointless.

– Refusing sex isn’t RP: hey yes it is… how you can refuse other aspects of role-playing because they may be disturbing, a kajira may not want to have sex, for lots of reasons, which I invite you to respect. It’s not as if there’s a shortage of kajirae who agree to have sex. Are you so hungry or so eager to impose your pixelated virility that it offends you?

– The life of a kajira is no fun: Ok… but that’s a totally cretinous sentence, do you realise that? Because the player who plays Kajira comes to have fun, to be entertained and to escape from her RL life. Not to be humiliated, belittled and treated like a piece of shit IC. Oh, yes, that can happen, it’s part of the social contract inherent in Gor’s role and context. But if that’s the only thing you promise a kajira, you’re being selfish, insulting and contemptuous of the player who’s playing that role. And don’t be surprised if you can’t keep a kajira.

– A kajira keeps her mouth shut: a phrase that was thrown at me in IM, and concerning an OOC problem… need I say that it’s both contemptuous and insulting to believe that, because a player is a kajira, she has to keep her mouth shut? She’s a player like any other, so to despise or deny the player’s right to give her opinion is not respecting the player, it’s just a perfect demonstration of contempt, once again.

– Kajirae are unimportant: so why do you play with them, eh? And for that matter, why would the kajirae play with you? If that’s already questionable logic in Gor’s world, which is partly based on the services and labour power of slaves, it’s absolutely absurd and, once again, contemptuous of the female players who play kajirae. Because it reduces their efforts to play their role to a worthless participation.

To conclude: if you’ve come to Gor to indulge your misogynistic fantasies, gentlemen, please understand that this is really not the place to be, in a role-playing context where, even more so here than elsewhere, everything has to be accepted consensually and according to a clear social contract, between what is IC and what is OOC. So go and spread your toxic masculinity on maledom sims, perfectly suited to your desires. In Gor’s role-playing game, your sexist and contemptuous behaviour and opinions are happily dispensed with, thank you.

And don’t talk to me about the good old days of Gor… because I was there too, and it was already a minority, frowned upon and not accepted, and it was already causing damage and drama. My ignore list has been full of guys like that for over 15 years.

And if, as I often see, you don’t know the difference between IC and OOC… you’re the problem. Not the others.