A Code of Commitment

“The freedom to be your best means nothing unless you are willing to do your best.” - Colin Powell

If your codes were put to the test, would you die defending them?

Committing to a code of conduct defined by a lifestyle of choice is part and parcel of understanding the ethos of a Philosophy you are applying as a way of life. If you have already decided you are able to meet and exceed the ideals of Gorean Philosophy, then by action and verbal acceptance you must acknowledge, resolve, live, and actively contribute as an individual and as a community to follow through with your pledge.

Committing to follow the codes of the Gorean Philosophy to the best of your ability is an absolute obligation. We must address and identify our choices because commitment is not only a complete freedom, it is a fundamental drive to ensure we live according to a fact-based reality. It is a requirement in life skills to always act responsibility and with absence of malice. We commit ourselves everyday to projects, children, spouses, and employment. Why would we not commit to our own Philosophy?

“If a man does not have an ideal and try to live up to it, then he becomes a mean, base and sordid creature, no matter how successful.” - Letter to his son Kermit, by Theodore Roosevelt 1915

As individuals, we must take steps to understand and to live the essentials of Gorean thought. In order to have an understanding of how to live under this mantle called “Gor”, we must read and then educate ourselves by using the information we are provided. This would include Norman’s books and lectures in regard to Philosophy and Gor. Remove the fantasies such as characters, plants, drinks, and animals, and base your decisions on the knowledge that comes as a third and fourth step. Those steps are knowing, and therefore living. It is in mastering these skills that we better understand a gender-based order of ideals. This set of ideals is neither a fantasy game nor a cult. It cannot be accessed some of the time, to be rewarded all of the time. Instead, it must be taken 100% in whole, to benefit 100% in return. Strength, Courage, Integrity, Responsibility, and Truth are all part of the steps a Gorean idealist will live daily. These rules of thumb enable us to make choices for our families, options for employment, and expectations from our peers around us.

What brings us collectively as a community to commit our time, our contributions, and our concentration to a venture of our choosing, successfully?

We believe in this ethos within a group environment and act upon the ideals we live individually each day, and in that belief we stand unified to build a truth as a community. Supporting and monitoring by beliefs will enable us to encourage our friends and family to make sound choices that they can and will commit to. These choices have to be reachable by each individual without distorting the original belief system. In order to share a set of ideals in the midst of a group that draws likeminded people, each human being must commit a talent, a strength that will be a benefit to a working order, a plan. In a group, five people cannot shoulder the work that implies 15 people. Each person must take a piece of this axiom effectively on as his or her own. In doing so, we enable the entire population to participate in community. A community must not suffer those who would lean on the stronger members; in fact, each person is responsible for his or her own contribution, no matter how slight. If those contributions are not forthcoming, the outcome should mirror their actions. They would not be entitled to enjoy the merit of others within the community, thereby banning them for lack of action and commitment. The word to those who defy responsibilities and accountabilities is very simple: don’t expect to gain anything from nothing.

“Truth not won is not possessed. We are not entitled to truths for which we have not fought.”

Americans have committed to teaching countries that they are entitled to democracy and that they need not be led by terror or fear. Americans have committed monies, time, and men who have died, and by these sacrifices they have shown unwavering support of this mandate. They did not cower when the world didn’t agree. They didn’t waiver when their own died in a foreign country far from home. They did not lie for profit of war. They did not buckle under the masses of spite. No, they stood strong and said, “yes.” By action, women and men are entitled to human integrity and the right to freedom. America as a country committed to a better world.

In 1982, we Canadians designed and worked for our freedom from England. The result of this action was a Constitution Act. It defined fundamental freedoms, rights such as democratic rights, mobility rights, legal rights, and equality rights, and the application and enforcement of all charters. In doing so, we have become a formable country on our own merit. We can participate in world events and voice our beliefs to those who do not have these liberties. We are free. We as a country committed to freedom.

The Nuremberg Trials were commitments. From 1945-1949 a group of men were committed to prosecuting Nazi leaders that were accused and tried for war crimes. There had never been a trial of this magnitude prior. The United States, France, the United Kingdom, and what remained of Germany proceeded to convict those who would by malicious intent genocide nations for the sole purpose of ruling a country. They committed to a higher ideal of living. They committed to the legal rights of a country and its people. Freedom from tyranny was won.

Other commitments that changed the history of the world include:
-- The Treaty of Westphalia (1648) ended the Thirty Years’ War, forged lasting peace between Europe’s Protestants and Catholics, and diminished the power of the Holy Roman Empire.
-- The French Revolution (1789) popularized the democratic concepts of liberty, equality, and fraternity and affirmed the power of the people to overthrow both monarchy and church.
-- The adoption of the U.S. Constitution (1789) established the first nation explicitly based on the Enlightenment ideals of individual freedom and self-determination.
-- The abolition of slavery in the United States (1863) ended the world’s largest system of legal slavery.
-- The opening of the first birth control clinic by Margaret Sanger (1916) pioneered the idea that family size should be a woman’s choice, opposed religious control over reproduction, and promoted decoupling reproduction from the sex act.
-- The formation of the United Nations (1945) inaugurated the first enduring world body to provide a forum for social services, economic development, and the resolution of international conflicts in a thoroughly secular setting.
-- The U.S. Civil Rights Movement (began mid- 1950s) has sought to extend the human rights defined by Mill, Locke, and Jefferson to African-Americans in fact as well as in theory.
-- The Nuclear Disarmament Movement (began 1980s) has sought - and helped to win - decades of forbearance from the use of nuclear weapons in anger.
-- The collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (1980s - 1990s)
-- The response (began 2001) led by America when it faced terrorism by loss of life and committed to bringing the malicious activists to justice, separating their religious beliefs from their actual motives.

These are commitments that we have made in order to live in our world freely. These historical acts were committed by men in disparity, death, and war. Against the odds, these participants promised they would do something by action. These events changed lives and resulted in a higher plateau of morally right behavior for the many. It is up to you, the individual, to commit to this Philosophy called “Gor.” Only then can you move to a higher commitment of community. We have the right to live and believe what we want in this new world. What I have never understood is why we do not take that risk to simply do so.

“A man who won’t die for something is not fit to live.” - Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

And finally, I believe in Gorean ideals, and nothing will take that passion from me. It is mine, and I have by my actions and contributions followed through. I have freely given my time and my patience to educating and standing to answer for this Philosophy. I would die for my ethos because it is a definition of who and what I am. This is my nature, my personality; it is a definition of me. I also know it would impact those around me to believe it is workable and successful. I would gladly take that chance for those who do not see the truth of this matter. They do not understand this is not a game, not a roll of dice. I almost pity them for this is life, and we live it freely.

Ask yourself now what your commitment and answer would be to my original question. I know my answer. I’ve given it to you. What is your answer to this call? Would you die defending your right to live a Gorean axiom, exercising the right to live by set standards of codes?

I know men who have died for their rights, and so do you. This level of commitment is not for the weak or for those who lean. Perhaps it is as simple as this: I am; therefore I can promote us. If we are in fact by action, conduct, and commitment, Goreans that live a Philosophy, then based on these unmovable codes, realism, and the uttermost respect for freedom, there is only one answer.

I wish you well,

Nyre

Copyright 2004