Not long ago it was suggested to me that there seem to be groups of men online who, rather than taking the time and effort to train inexperienced girls, instead just pass their favorite slaves around within the group, exchanging the ownership of such girls with the click of a collar.

     I would suggest that a good slave is hard to find, especially when one is dealing with the limitations and difficulties of interaction via the Internet. Duplicity runs rampant. Therefore, when one discovers an online slave whom one finds to be genuine and honest in her desire to enter into a meaningful slavery, it is wise to hold onto her.

     As she progresses in her slavery, she becomes more valuable to both her owner and to the greater community. Therefore, if it becomes necessary for her to be released due to unforeseen complications which arise, to whose care does one entrust such a creature?

     It seems to me that it would be better for her to be sold or given to a trusted comrade, one who shares the same philosophy and practices the same Gorean customs and discipline as her former owner, than to allow her to fall into the hands of one who has not proven himself to be a capable Master for a highly skilled girl. One does not sell a trained pleasure slave into the drudgery of service in the public textile mills, unless it is to punish her. If one does so, her skills and training are wasted upon the unknowing and undeserving.

     And rather than lose skilled slaves to the strange morass which comprises much of "Gorean" IRC these days, it makes sense to collar such a girl and keep her in service even to a Tavern or such institution frequented by her former owners, where she will be recognized and forced to serve to the utmost of her ability, than to cast her out among the HNGs of the Internet.

     It strikes me that, as I have often suspected, most of those who follow the philosophies set forth in the books are actually very much in agreement with one another. It is only that often communication, and the limitations of such communication via the Internet, get in the way and muddy up the mix.

     I have, many times, read posts and writings from men whom I consider to be my friends, which literally infuriate me. Later, however, upon my speaking with them at length, I discover that we are actually in complete agreement on the subject. In that case, it is simply a matter of miscommunication and my own inability to define the actual meaning behind their words.

     As Gorean men we tend to speak in "absolutes." We make statements which might seem, at the outset, to be narrow-minded, if not downright dogmatic. It is only when we explain our position on such subjects at great length that the underlying logic behind our belief system becomes apparent.

     I tend to take whatever anyone says to me, or writes to me via IRC, at face value until the matter is proven otherwise. If someone says "So-and-so is a coward, the books say so!" I will simply research the matter and report my findings to refute the argument, if I learn that person is mistaken. If someone insults me or the institutions I support, I will consider the source; and then research the matter to be certain that the insult is not justified. In such a way I maintain an even-keel despite all of the high-handed statements which invariably appear on Gorean message boards, newsgroups and in chat channels. Plus, it keeps me honest.

     To what degree must a man master himself before he can master a slave?

     I would say that he must have mastered himself to the point where he is willing to take up and effectively shoulder the responsibility of assuming control over another human being, and has developed the courage and stamina to see to it that his will is enforced, no matter the outcome.

     One must have developed the mental strength to dominate and control the owned, and be willing to take whatever measure is necessary to see to it that one's will is obeyed.

     And one must have arrived at the point in one's life where the long-term goals and good of the community, as well as the natural emotional fulfillment of those involved and their return to some semblance of biological order, take precedence over the selfish whims of the moment and the easier path of simply "letting the slave get away with it." In order to effectively Master a slave, one must LEAD that slave. And no one can be a leader who does not have a pre-existent goal in mind, or a definite path of forward motion along which to lead them.

     First of all, there is no creature which I despise more than I do a thief. I simply have no use for such an individual. If you can't afford something, or are not talented enough or intelligent enough to create something, then in my opinion you simply do not deserve to possess it, or to take credit for it.

     However, though I despise such activity, I take a bit of comfort in the fact that when my work, that which involves Gor, is stolen and reposted elsewhere, that at least it has been well-researched and is fundamentally correct. If there are people out there hitting websites which have bastardized versions of my work on them, at least those visitors are being spoon-fed information which is, though stolen, accurate to the Gor books.

     It annoys me more when my graphics and sound files etc., are stolen... that is because those are applications of my artistic license being ripped off, not just my opinions about a book series which is already in print.

     I add that, despite the fact that I have authored three full-length novels and a number of short stories and novellas, I generally do not place my original fiction on the net in any form. That is because if those were plagiarized I would be incensed at having someone sign their names to my own original work, which I created from the whole cloth. Whereas my Gorean commentaries and research are helpful to the community (at least in my opinion), my original fiction is for my own use, and that of my publisher.

     I have also encountered people who argue that it is perfectly all right for them to scan or type in the entire text of a particular Gor book and send it off in a text file to someone else who does not own that book. There have even been websites which offer such unauthorized copies of books, available for downloading. This practice is blatantly illegal. By doing so, you are affecting the legal market of those works, i.e the book selling industry, and are taking money directly from the publishers', and the author's, pocket.

     Many people assume that everything posted on the Internet is public domain, probably because our law formerly protected published works only if they displayed the proper copyright notice upon publication. The law, however, has changed: neither publication nor a notice of any kind is required to protect works today. Simply putting the pen to the paper or in the electronic medium, putting the fingers to the keyboard creates a copyrighted work. Once expression is committed to a tangible medium (and computer media is considered tangible), copyright protection is automatic. So, postings of all kinds are protected the same as published printed works.

     The scope of the implied license to copy, print and distribute:

     Whenever an author posts anything to the Internet, he or she should reasonably expect that it will be read, downloaded, printed out, and perhaps forwarded on a limited basis. The author impliedly grants a limited license to users to utilize the work in this manner. Think about the rights a newspaper editor has to publish a "letter to the editor." The author of the letter probably did not include a line in the letter giving the editor permission to publish the letter, but anyone who sends such a letter must be presumed to understand that this is what happens to letters to the editor.

     On the other hand, most authors would not think that posting a work gives consent to any commercial use of it without permission. This is not part of what one reasonably expects, and so not part of the implied license.

     So who is liable for posting infringing works?

     Plaintiffs in several recent cases have alleged that commercial network service providers were responsible for the infringing activities of the network's subscribers. Individuals are less likely to be sued because they do not generally have the money to make a suit worthwhile, but universities have considerable funds and could easily be held liable for the actions of their employees doing their jobs and possibly students who access the Internet through university machines. This means that universities have to care about what their network users are doing, take effective measures to inform them about their responsibilities, and promptly investigate complaints of infringement.

     There is little likelihood that those who browse the internet will be held liable for infringement for merely reading a work online, even if it was posted without permission of the author. Possession of an infringing copy by a person innocent of the infringement is not actionable. BUT, WHEN A BROWSER BEGINS TO USE A WORK BEYOND THE THE SCOPE OF THE IMPLIED LICENSE, for example, downloading an item and REPUBLISHING it commercially, he most certainly is commiting a copyright infringement.

     Therefore, though it is normally recognized that one might make one copy of a work which one has purchased for personal use, that the moment you begin to distibute copies beyond the scope of the implied license, in a way that supplants the work's actual market, i.e book sales, you are breaking the law.

     Can you get away with it?

     Probably, unless Norman and his lawyers decide to come after you.

     Is it immoral and illegal, and does it deny Norman of his "actual market," i.e, booksales? Is it theft?

     Yes, yes, yes, and yes.

     Steal all you want to. But if you do so, do not try to weasel your way out of the fact that you are committing copyright infringement, and are therefore a thief.

     A hypothetical: I'm crossing the street with my slave and there is a bus coming. Do I, as a Gorean man, "demonstrate the (annoying) traits of nobility and chivalry toward slave women" and push her out of the way, or do I get out of the way myself and let the bus hit her?

     Assuming that the decision made by the hypothetical Gorean male was a split-second one, made in the heat of the moment in response to sudden danger...then who is to say that he would even make a conscious decision about the matter at all?

     He is, as we have all read numerous times in Norman's work, highly attuned to his own masculine nature. The instinctual response of such a male would be to protect the female from harm, no matter what her social status might be.

     Therefore, does it not make sense that the male would immediately respond to the natural and biologically-embedded compulsion to defend a female of his species from peril, even at the risk of his own life and well-being?

     He is a Gorean male...but he is still a male.

     The books are full of examples wherein Tarl and others, many of them born Goreans, leap to defend helpless females from iminent destruction. Often these females are slaves.

     Now, AFTER the female is saved, the male in question might exact any number of Gorean penalties against the female for endangering his life during the rescue, including keeping her for his own use. But these decisions would be made after the fact, once the female was safe.

     Slavery and social class are social institutions, nothing more. While they may in fact emulate the natural biological states of those involved, they rarely supercede inborn drives such as self-preservation, and, in the case of the male, the compulsion to protect the female.

     If the male had to choose between his own death and that of another, and chose to die in that other's defense, that would be perhaps noble and chivalric behavior. If he had to choose between allowing a helpless female to die or acting to save her, and he had no reason to wish that female dead, and there were no extenuating circumstances involved (such as guys with crossbows ready to shoot him down if he moved, or a city magistrate enacting a sentence of death upon a recalcitrant bit of property) then my vote is that he would act to save the female's life, if for no other reason than the unwillingness to see such a valuable creature wasted.

     Recently it was suggested to me that there were a lot of characters in the Gor books which we might classify as being "HNGs" if we were to encounter them online.

     Certainly there are Gorean HNGs.

     There are also, I add, Gorean traitors, thieves, liars, murderers, despots, and free-thinkers who allow their slaves to drink from the high bowl at the public fountains. The books are full of such references.

     That does not, however, mean that such Goreans are generally well-liked, or long tolerated by their neighbors.

     "No, I would not try to reform man by pretending that my wishes for him were the wishes of Priest-Kings, even though this might be effective for a time, for the wishes that reform man, that make him what he is capable of becoming, and has not yet become, must be his own and not those of another. If man rises, he can do so only on his own two feet."