What's so bad about Furries & Goreans anyway?

Phew. At least you're not involved in that crap.

P.S.;

Hey Nimrod, How -are- those white wolf and Light Jogauni avs working out for you?

Pulls up a chair and waits to hear about these strange rituals

I haven't been here long but I read about Furries in SL over a year ago. shocking stuff!!

Many many people identify themselves through their sexuality, but you don't have to define them by it. unless they're handing out pamphlets on new positions or doing it in the road, it's still private.

All the animal avatars I've met in SL have been very helpful and easy-going.

Hahaha, I know, I'm a furry myself. That's why I wanted you/others to pay attention to the comments also.
Also, now we know what Cubey does with his extra time.

Arf?

Confused?

The debate seemed to have died down a bit, so I may be opening up a buried can of worms here, but since I like a good debate, I'll do it anyway. ;)

I'll start with goreans and then move over to furries.
I'll also try to keep things structured and clear, but some mixing and a lot of repetition will most likely occur.

First and foremost: Every gorean I've met have a different notion of just what Gor is.
Therefore, expect goreans to contradict eachother.
That also means that what I write about Gor here is based on my perceptions, and is likely to be considered wrong by some goreans. ;)

Background
The Gor novels encompass some 26 books written by (the pseudonym) John Norman (and in the later books, others) in the 60's.
Some think that Norman seriously expressed his belief on how woman and men should relate to eachother in the books, other consider the books a sarcastic riposte to the extreme feminist movement in the 60's.

I adhere to the second opinion, for reasons I will explain.

Basically, Gor is a fantasy/sf world populated by several human cultures, and three (? correct me if I'm wrong) non-human cultures.

- The dominant human culture on Gor is vaguely based on roman/arabic (byzantine) and indian societies, roughly between the early Roman era and the early medieval era.
- The Red Savages (minority culture) is based on the native americans before or around the time the europeans got there.
- The wagon people are (I think) based on either the mongols or the visi/ostro-goths.
- The culture in Torvaldsland is based on the viking culture around 800-900 AD.

The three alien cultures are the spiders, the wolves, and the bugs. ;)
Seriously though, there's the spider people, who I haven't read much about yet.

There are the Kur (plural Kurii), who are a large (9 feet I think) predatory species, existing on both parity tech level with humans (on the planet), and on a tech parity level with the Priest Kings (on their spaceships). They view humans much as humans view cattle.

Finally there's the Priest-Kings, a race of insectoids resembling golden praying mantises.
They effectively monitor and control the humans on Gor with their superior technology.
Particularly by enforcing a ban on technological development beyond a certain level.

In my opinion, this means that no-one on Gor is really free, but that's another discussion. ;)

Brief look on society/culture
Slavery is legal and the rule in the majority of cultures (but not all) on Gor.
It should also be noted that how the slavery is practiced, and what it means regarding rights/duties for Master and slave varies between those cultures.

For the Free, the dominant culture (the cities) have a fairly rigid caste system.
It's parted into High Caste and Low Caste.
High castes are: Initiates (Priest-king liations), Scribes, Builders, Physicians and Warriors. The Black Caste (assassins) are considered somewhat apart.

Because of the prevalence of slaves, particularly female slaves, in the books, we get a rather skewed picture of how large percentage of the population who actually are slaves.
In general, about 10% of the females on Gor are slaves (might be higher or lower within a specific city), while a lower number of males (3-5% I think) wear the collar.

There are also Outlaws (men without a homestone) and Panthers and Taluna, women who doesn't live according to the norm of gorean society. They are outlaws in a double sense.



Sex and sexuality
It's the point most people focus on, and the most widely discussed.
What I'm going to write here is my own opinion, and as stated before, it will probably differ from what other Goreans think.

The books rather clearly states that females are naturally submissive and and can only "find their femininity" by submitting to a man.
This, I think, is the big flaw of the books, and why I think they were written as a satirical riposte to the extreme feminist movement.
Based on both texts written on the human psyche and my own observations, this simply doesn't fit with reality.
Yes, submissives exist. It is also true that women in most countries in general are raised to be demure and subordinate (note that subordinate is different from submissive) to men.
However, women does not need to submit to a man to find their femininity. It is (to me) empirically proven to be a false statement. Especially as a blanket statement for all women.
It might fit the true submissives, but since true submissives (male and female alike) are a minority, it doesn't fly when you make it a general statement.
It doesn't even fit when you look at the societies the cultures are based on.

My main gripe with it is that it degrades what otherwise could have been a really great worldsetting for roleplay (I'll get into roleplay vs lifestyle later).
It's still enjoyable, but the female sexuality/personality thing and the Priest-kings repression on technology (preventing development and creativity) does take a huge chunk out of the experience.


Gor on SL
The first thing you should be aware of is that Goreans on SL comes in (roughly) two groups.
Lifestylers and roleplayers.
The lifestylers immerse themselves in the gorean culture to a larger degree, and doesn't go out of character (OOC) even when they talk about things that doesn't fit the gorean worldsetting (such as lag, car breaking down IRL and such). It is worked around or incorporated without much fuss.
It's frequent that they practice a gorean lifestyle IRL as well as online (though not all do so).

Roleplayers do just that. They play a role as a gorean, and divide their SL time into IC (In Character) and OOC (Out Of Character).
When roleplaying, they (or at least the good ones) stay inside the worldsetting and don't mention things that has to do with RL or lag. If they need to talk OOC they do so either in IM or by using double parenthesis.
Example:
Warrior1: "Tal brother."
Warrior2: "Tal"
Kajira: "Greetings Master"
Warror1: /me nods at the kajira.
Warrior2: ((Is it just me, or has lag been really bad since they upgraded?))

Because SL can't fully picture the worldsetting, some compromises are made. You roleplay deaths, and slavery has to be consensual, you can't actually force collar anyone (yes, I know. I'll get to that later).

Issues between goreans, and between goreans and non-goreans
Because goreans differ in what they consider is properly gorean, the rules of the sims often differ in the details (though the general is often the same).
This frequently lead to drama between citizens of different sims, and a number of individuals/cities have something of an ongoing vendetta.
Fortunately, most admins/owners seem fairly immune to this (though sadly not all), if nothing else because they are both tired of having to meet again to sort out some trouble their citizens has started in the other city.

Then there's goreans and non-goreans.
Many non-goreans I've talked to think the goreans come across as rude when they enter the sim.
This is both true and not.
They do often come across as rude, but that is often not personal. It is the gorean being in character (assuming the person isn't wearing a visitor tag).
Goreans are pictured as being wary of strangers, and indeed, the word for 'stranger' is the same as the word for 'enemy'.
They are also frequently described as arrogant (sorry, I mean 'supremely confident' ;)), especially warriors, which again might be the gorean being in character.

Then there is the rules issue. If you enter through the teleportation point, you should in most gorean sims get a notecard stating the rules of the sim, and what behavior is expected of guests and participants alike.
I speak from experience when I say that all too many doesn't read those notecards.
Since I know the owner of one sim quite well, I've witnessed firsthand how it goes from her informing people in polite terms of the rules, to informing them curtly, and finally just banning them straight off.

When people for the 15th time doesn't want to change or wear the visitor tag, and then IM you and whine about being kicked/banned of the sim, trust me, your patience would be wearing thin too.
And that's not taking into account all the OOC whining done by the goreans themselves...

However, not all rudeness has these fairly legitimate explanations. Some goreans are assholes. If you encounter them, it's sad, and we only hope you won't judge all of us by their behavior.

A note on force-collaring: Force-collaring can be played out by using bows with a caging arrow (it rezzes a cage around the person hit). However, as far as I know, using it against non-goreans, or against gorean in a non-capture zone, is against the rules in all sims. If someone persists (particularly against a non-gorean) they should be reported. To the admin of the sim or if they aren't available or if they won't deal with it, another admin or a Linden.


Goreans and problems between Masters and slaves
This is, unfortunately, a problem.
While the majority of slaves know what they are doing and are ok, even happy, with it, some are insecure or get manipulated by an unscrupulous Master, or both.

Because of the extreme polarization of the roles on the Master/slave relationship, I think you should be either a natural Dom/sub, or very secure in who and what you are, before you enter such a immersive worldsetting as Gor.
Unfortunately, lots of people doesn't think about this. They just see "Female slavery? Cool, I wanna try that." or "I'm curious about being submissive, I'll think I'll try out Gor.".
Neither is a very good basis to enjoy roleplaying in a gorean worldsetting.

As for lifestyle, unless you know a lot about gor and/or has been into BDSM for a year or more IRL, I strongly suggest you restrict yourself to roleplaying Gor.
You should wait **minimum** a year of having played Gor before you become a lifestyler.
It would be best for both you and the lifestylers.

Anyway, unless you know the person IRL beforehand (or are an experienced lifestyler): Never, ever under any circumstances take Gor to RL or give out RL information.
Break with your Master if you have to. Report him to the sim admins if nessecary, or if they won't handle it, to the Lindens.

A Master/slave relationship is very intense, requires trust between the Master and slave, and often affects the people involved profoundly.
This is even stronger IRL than on SL.

You should also bear in mind that you will not get a complete picture of someone when you see them on SL.
If you really want to take the Master/slave relationship to RL, then first get together at a neutral, public location and start getting to know eachother IRL.
Only after you know your presumptive partner IRL, and in a non-Master/slave context, should you even begin contemplating taking the Master/slave relationship to RL.

Some ignore this, usually with mental anguish as the effect.
Master's who want to take things to RL quickly are mostly new/insecure/ignorant, or experienced, manipulative bastards. Both should be avoided.
The first should be educated, the second, banned. Or shot.


A trouble the owners/admins of the gorean sims faces are that many want to get into Gor to try it out, without really knowing what it is they get into. This goes for both Masters and slaves.
The slaves however, usually get trained in what their role is and how they should behave, which at least gives them some preparation for what is to come.
The Master's on the other hand get very little training, or none at all, and despite most of them (not knowingly at least) not being abusive, their lack of both knowledge and (often) maturity is very noticeable to those that have played a while.
Those people degrade the enjoyment of the roleplay, and can in the worst cases turn into the kind of ignorant Master that abuse his slaves or want to take it to RL too quickly.
Most sims have a probation period for those that want to join, which is good, but not, I think enough.

I have no perfect solution to this, but some things I'd like to see is:
1. Masters/Mistresses are required to be schooled as well as the slaves in the deeper meanings of what it means to be a Master/Mistress.
2. Recommend goreans-to-be to start out with just roleplaying it.
3. Every sim should include a welcome-notecard that lists the gorean sims and whether they are a lifestyle sim or roleplaying sim.
4. A guide for curious and goreans-to-be, with information and advice, including what traps to look out for.
5. Some kind of help for those (gorean or not) that gets into trouble.
(I saw posts about such a group in earlier pages. Sounds good.)



Furries
From my personal experience, I have found furries to be among the more tolerant and friendly people on SL.
Except for a few assholes, those that have been rude have usually been so because they have been badgered or hassled because they are furries until their patience has snapped.

Most people who regard furries with suspicion or disgust seem to do so based on a lot of misconceptions.
Among the most common is that furries all are sexual deviants, based on news reports (who, true to form, almost exclusively report on the events that raise the rates, i.e. the acts practiced by the minority) and/or the misconception that being a furry = bestiality.

Ironically enough, the furries I know are among the most decent and balanced people I know, and know much better who and what they are (and aren't) than the average joe.
Probably because most furries (and therians) have done a lot of soulsearching to discover and/or confirm who and what they are.

There's also the fact that the furry avatars have helped enrich the world in SL, a fact that cannot be denied even if you dislike furries (actually, some people would probably argue against that too, but meh).

Also, no other group has shown better how little looks (and species ;)) really means. People are people, whether they are a hovering robot, an anthropomorphic cat or a "regular" human.


PS. Goreans (besides for a few assholes) doesn't prosecute furries, at least not intentionally. The purpose of the rules that says no furry avatars (or child usually, because of the mature theme) are allowed is because it would clash with the worldsetting. It would be like bringing a space marine in powered armour into Gondor*. Hence you are asked to wear a human costume while visiting a gorean sim. Think of it as a masquerade. ;) DS.



(*Sauron would probably recruit the Necrons :P)

Suny is right.

Alot of people view gor and furries differently (it does not mean either side is wrong, as noone can say what is right, even majorities can be wrong).

While I still consider a furry to be half human/half animal mix - I would say I would not perceive 'yiffing' as beasiality. Hell I'm even seeing a furry on a semiregular basis now.

Mostly, respect what others believe, while making up your own mind.

Reads... and reads... and reads...

Wow! That was a long post, Sunny! But over all, it was a good one. Quite informative!

I have to laugh when people make a blanket statement that "Furries and Goreans hate each other". My own experience has not been that way, really. I'm a female furry, yet several of my friends and business customers are Goreans. We get along just fine. We simply 'agree to disagree' on certain points.

As a furry, I understand completely that an anthro furr doesn't fit with the Gorean world that they are trying to reproduce. Having a furry walking around in an all-Gorean sim would be like a person in a Star Trek uniform hanging out in Colonial Williamsburg. It's the wrong world... On the rare occasions when my business takes me to a furry sim, I have no problem assuming a male Human form for that visit.

A lot of furrs do 'get their fur ruffled' over the ways Goreans run their Master/slave relations. While many Furries accept the idea of "Pets", which is a Dominant/submissive relationship, most furries also dislike things that are non-consensual, or that appear to be. It is a difference in perception of how a Dominant/submissive relationship should be. But for myself, as long as the Goreans don't try to enforce their practices on me, I won't try to enforce my views on them.

A little tolerance on both sides goes a long way.

I wonder how many people who have a negative view of goreans do because of what they are in SL... or because they have actually read the Gor books by John Norman.

I seriously doubt half the goreans in SL have actually read the series of books, which include the enslavement and rape of countless women.

Sorry, I'd have to say that is not a true statement. Go to most any Gorean sim as a Priest-King, Spider or Kurii avatar and see how fast you get kicked off. Priest-Kings (intelligent insectoids), Spiders(another race of intelligent insectiod) and Kurii(furry Sasquatch-like aliens) of Gor are quintessential furries, the very definition in fact. I agree that a carebear avatar would clash but a barbarian tiger-man from an unexplored region of Gor would not. Also, the Nest contains unknown numbers of sentient non-human creatures and the possibilities are endless.

Much like religion, most practitioners have not really read the source material and rely heavily on what others tell them. I can't really blame them as I have and as far as fiction is concerned, they really aren't all that good, basically Conan with aliens and brutality towards women. Most will pick and choose what they feel fits with what they think, often missing the big picture message.

It says volumes that Norman's former publisher cancelled his contract because, and this is a direct quote from the publisher, Norman had gone "batshit crazy".

Men too. Whats your point? In fact they make the men who are enslaved and raped look WORSE.

Having read SOME of them. I mean, that many books....it begins to get a bit like sitting through church.

A church where the minister flogs the deacons, shoves horsetail batons up their asses, has the entire soprano section of the choir in Nadu singing Gorean poetry, has the youth group orgy in the balcony while the youth minister sections each of them to their caste, and keeps the Sunday School classes in Tower instead of fold-out chairs. The Alto section, however, is just too free for the rest, so they name themselves after a predator and hide in the gymnasium. For sport, the Deacons sometimes attempt to rape them, and when that fails, they rape the youth group.

Batshit. Crazy.

True to an extent. The Kur certainly can be classified as furry.
Hoever, all three races are considered NPC's in the Gorean sims (that means Non Playing Character btw).
The unexplored areas of Gor does indeed leave room for being creative. However, the current gorean sims choose not to explore this and stick with having humans as the only PC's (Playing Characters).

I know some furries who would like to be goreans though, so it would be nice if someone made a sim where one or several anthropomorhic races had been discovered, or shipped, to Gor.
(It would probably catch a lot of flak for "not being truly gorean", but hey, like people are so fond of saying, if it bothers you, don't go there.)


Burnman, it's true that many hasn't read the books, but most are aware what the Gor worldsetting includes. If not, they will be informed about it when they read the numerous notecards available.
Also, Gor is hardly unique in having slavery and rape as an element in the worldsetting.
Many roleplaying games have it, though I don't think any outside the XXX-rpg's center around it.

Personally, I find the rapes and sex-slavery going on IRL more upsetting than the roleplay among the SL goreans.
That doesn't mean it should be taken lightly. It can be an uncomfortable thing to play out, and if someone feels uncomfortable with it, they should break RP and talk it through OOC in IM's before deciding how to continue.

Don't forget the atrocious sentence structure and grammar!
That's a pretty horrible punishment in itself.

I'm willing to build a "church" and stage a Gorean "ministry" parody if someone else will fraps it.

I'd say it's about as much "beastiality" as people who like to think about having sex with an orc or something. A fur isn't really the animal they're based on any more than a human is a monkey, after all!

Yes, but isn't that like having a Star Wars sim and declairing Wookies as NPC's? As I said, pick and choose.

To say "yiffing" is beastiality....technically you'd be saying that ageplay is child molestation.

Since neither a beast nor a child would be involved in either, both suggestions are bullox.

(Awaits Lewis Nerd to hijack the thread)

In a way, yes. The gorean books center around the human culture though (it is after all what Norman comented on), while Star Wars cheerfully mix human and non-human culture on a regular basis.

On the other hand, I never said excluding the bugs, wolves and spiders from being PC's made sense, now did I?

I still consider ageplay, in some cases, a clear sign of the potential for child molestation. You don't get sex with a 12 -15 year old in sl without having those thoughts ahead of time. Go younger and Its even worse.

As I said though, I changed my opinion on 'yiffing'

My point was, that it is my experience with goreans in SL is that many of them have never read the books, which include the rape of countless women... and men. That's it, wasn't trying to make anything more than a simple statement.

Oh I won't say it isn't a sign for POTENTIAL child molestation. However, sexual issues are usually satisfied by "outlets", not encouraged. If ageplay is in any way linked to child molestation IRL, it probably prevents it by giving sick bastards an outlet.

Not to say all ageplayers are sick bastards. I think many are either curious, or have the attraction but would never actually follow through IRL. Since these are both silent conditions, it's safe to say that there might be many, many more people who fit those conditions than one might assume.

I used to feel more secure about ageplay being an outlet in most cases on SL..but now the barrier is practically gone with no verification at all. Now I fear for the real kids...