On The Silk Road ... The Concubine's Tale

The romance of the trade routes across Asia and the Middle East often create images of the slave markets and seraglios. The harems with shutters painted indigo and faded flamingo pink ...

Slavers and slaves. We are all enslaved, are we not? In reality, our work, our ambitions, our possessions, our responsibilities, addictions and emotions, children and partners tie us to commitments we have made - often willingly and sometimes unwillingly.

Even our bloodlines carry the reminders of our pasts. I am the descendent of a black Jamaican girl whose parents and generations before them were slaves. Possibly you are, too. In my possession is a "concubine manacle" - a man long ago in Alexandria or Damascus fell in love with a slave girl and gave her this decorative silver bracelet - a copy of a manacle hinged and with its own key. A reminder to her that she still belonged to him but that she had ownership of his heart.

And we have slaves here, also. The slaves who submit themselves for love or excitement and for sexual fulfilment late at night in the darkness of their bedrooms; they declare their submission to another. The doe-eyed Gorean girls and even the young men who grace our screens as we travel in sl. We have bondage; the flagellants and the inflictors of leather pleasure. We have all manner of slaves - are you one, too? My own partnership is, in a very real sense, an enlavement of sorts. For once I can declare submission, admit I am a possession and feel no real obligatory response other than that. Yet I know that I "love" my partner, oddly enough.

But what about you? Are you a slave? What type of slave are you? What circumstances in sl brought you to the slaver's block? Are you the owner of a slave or a string of slaves? What draws you to this human conundrum? I do not condemn here - merely ask.

Is our REAL freedom all the more precious because of our fantasy enslavement in sl?

I is a Pixie... I am not good at following orders, and am allergic to sponsibility. It's a full time job just listening to my own voices never mind anyone elses.

No, I am a free and sovereign individual.

Whoop-te-doo, so really, this thread is not for you then.
And "sovereign" in its sense of Kingship denotes a sense of belonging to a country and its people. Sovereigns are not "free" but under the weight of all the responsibilties that we bestow on them. That is why, in West Afriica, the kings were laden down with gold bracelets - the weight of the gold reminded the king of the "weight" of kingship and the people's ownership of them; they could not "fly up" to heaven.

Even my mother has given up trying to tell me what to do.

Pep (avoids slaves; doesn't understand why this bothers them and their masters so much. )

I'm off to a real busy day (I have a 9am gym and massage date) so I'll leave these forums in your capable and spade-like Welsh hands.

I just have a hard time equating "slavery" and coercion in a system where everything is by consensual choice. You too are a free and sovereign individual.

Did you Jamaican ancestor or ANY of her ancestors enter into their circumstance by choice? For every girl who was given a silver bracelet thousands of others were raped, beaten, and worked to death.

I'm not my *brother's* keeper. I am certainly not yours.

Pep (has said all that he wanted to say here already.)

PS I actually have very small hands; and you know what they say: "Small hands, small . . . . . . gloves." )

I am a curious slave to technology and its advancements. That is why I am here and shall always be drawn to places such as this.

Does this mean we can't acquit?

Yay for Pep, official custodian of the "OMG this could get really ugly" thread!!

/me quietly slinks off, pretending she knows nothing of the existence of this new forum topic . . .

When I first joined SL I had a couple slaves but they sucked the life out of me. There's only so much time in my day to spank people into submission, lead them around on chains, and etc.

I like a bit of servitude and consentual non-consentualism but if I put a collar on someone it's coming off when the party's over

Plus I like girls who are intelligent and capable and assertive most of the day.

As for RL slavery; a lot of us are enslaved to material goods and the corporate machine in the modern day.

Oi! MY ancestor wasnt given the bracelet. Her family were slaves on the Tate estates in Jamaica. Don't teach your grandmother to suck eggs.

I'll try to stay out of this thread, because of the racial and ethnic connotations, for me, and other things, a personal abusive past. What Dances said would pretty much be what I'd say too, 'in general', it's the way that I feel about slavery. I've done ancestry research and actually know the slave ship my father's ancestor came to America on. I know what tribe my dad's family was and where in Africa they originated. My mother is a little more difficult, as her ancestry is fraught with the rape of 'house slaves' resulting in the racial mix of slave and master. Her line is hard to follow, lot of twists and turns there, I'm still working on it. It's a harsh and painful legacy.

Oh, but, you weren't talking about 'those' kinds of slaves, were you? We're talking here, of the beloved, treasured and honored 'SL Fantasy' slaves. Beautiful, pampered and consensually collared. I admit it interests me and even makes me a little wistful. There's nobody in my own life that I'd trust that much. I kind of wish there was. Carry on......

ahh! someone who's clicked into what I hint at.

I will never ever wear silks!

My man'chi is none of your business.

Thanks Treasure! You are absolutely right. I have collected much genuine historical material on the real slave trade - all museum-bound one day. Yes, you know what I was really referring to.

You mixed my two points. But I'll take that under "I should have made myself more clear."

Sovereign means I recognize no authority over my life but my own.

So we should start calling you Chris-aiji?

I've worked with real life slaves in my RL - people trapped in human trafficking.

For me there are NO romantic illusions about slavery.

This.

I am not a slave to Jig's endless appetite for entertainment.

Tell that to the cop who stops you for going through a red traffic-light.
What if you were roaring drunk at the time, and you get thrown in the slammer to wear silks given to you by Bubba?