One quite frequent discussion on all Gorean groups and channels in Second
Life is, if there is such a thing like one true Gorean role play or not.
Normally the people then take two main stances.
- There are the people who want to play as according to the books in Second
Life as possible and dislike so called onlineisms. An onlineism
is something, that is simple not there in the books, but became quite common in
certain sims of Second Life.
Examples for it are: there is a common phrase in
the book in the region of Torvaldsland called Jarl, which is
the way to adress a leader of them instead of Ubar. Bondsmaids address all free
men as Jarl, but in the books there is no such phrase as Jarla
to greet free women, but this is something that is quite common on certain sims
in Second Life, so this is a good example. The people who dislike onlineisms
don’t ust this phrase at all.
Another example are female warriors. There is
no such thing in the books, even the author itself stated there is no such thing
on Gor, but on quite some Gorean sims in Second Life there are indeed female
warriors. So the people who really play by the books don’t acknowledge them at
all as being valid.
- The other party of people is the crowd, which takes the stance, that while
the books are depicting the daily life of the planet Gor, they are only able to
depict small aspects of the whole culture at all, and, while not really
mentioned in the books, quite some stuff is still possible to be there in the whole setting and most likely is there, if you
come to think about it, and therefore should be considered a possible part of
Gorean role play even while not being mentioned in the books at all.
Those
are the people, who don’t bother using onlineisms then like "Jarla", perhaps also female
warriors and such.
So these are the two main parties, which constantly discuss on Second Life about what real
Gorean role play should be or not, what in it might be or not, sometimes also might engagne in flame wars. And because of this fact alone already, there is not just only one true Gorean role play, but every sim or alliance of sims makes up their own rules about what they consider valid role play or not. So what you get in reality in Second Life is quite a broad range about what real Gorean role play is about and what not, and coming with that, big, different rule sets.
While there are also some, which complain that there isn’t such a thing just like one, big, unified Gorean Role Play at all, most other people tend to be at peace with that and just take it pragmatically, meaning playing at that sim which comes most near to their own ideal about what Gorean Role Play should be about and that’s it at all, then, so with those two main parties you got in the consequence the opportunity to choice. And if there’s no such thing like your ideal then, until today, you also got the opportunity to found such a sim, like all of us have. 🙂
Bartholomew Gallacher