I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the Gorean novels and what they actually say about slavery, devotion, and desire, especially when compared to how parts of the Gorean Lifestyle sometimes get practiced or spoken about today. This is coming from my own heart, from a place of submission, reflection, and love for the philosophy as I understand it.
In the books, it is very clear that most often there is one slave for one Master. That bond matters. Many kajirae become love slaves, deeply cherished, deeply wanted, and deeply seen by their Masters. Even when the text explores darker or more controversial elements, such as Masters who genetically created slaves with deformities because they found them exotic. It still reinforces one powerful truth, every slave was unique. No two were the same. No two were desired for the same reasons. Slaves were not interchangeable objects, they were individuals, shaped by purpose, temperament, body, and spirit.
That’s why it truly troubles me when, in the Gorean Lifestyle, I hear kajirae tearing each other down. “She’s not obedient enough.” “She’s not pleasing.” “She doesn’t have this skill or that skill.” As if there is a single mold we are all supposed to fit into. As if worth is measured by a checklist instead of by presence, intention, and devotion.
The books never supported that idea. Quite the opposite. Masters celebrated their slaves. They delighted in their differences. One slave might be prized for grace, another for fire, another for softness, another for endurance. Diversity wasn’t a flaw, it was the point. It was what made ownership meaningful and desire specific.
As a kajira at heart, I believe this deeply, I do not need to be like any other slave to be valuable. And neither do you. We are not meant to mirror each other. We are meant to be ourselves, offered honestly and fully, for the Master who desires exactly what we are.
So please, do not berate another slave for not being you, for not serving the way you serve, or for walking a different path of obedience. She is not you. And honestly? Her Master likely prefers it that way.
Submission is not sameness. It is sincerity. And diversity, in all its forms, is a beautiful thing worthy of celebration.
Some quotes from the books. That either reference specific types of slaves, or how the Master's will and pleasure controls them.
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It is a beautiful moment when the woman realizes that the man who owns her is her love master, and the man realizes that the girl he bought, looking up at him, tears in her eyes, is his love slave.
Then the only danger is that he will weaken. One must be strong with a love slave. If one truly loves her, he will be that strong. The slavery in which a love slave is kept is an unusually deep slavery. She must serve him with a perfection which would stun and startle other girls; if she should fail in any way, even in so small a way that the lapse would be overlooked in the case of another wench, or bring perhaps a mild word of reprimand, she is likely to be tied at the slave ring and whipped; there is a good reason for this; she is, you see, a love slave; no woman can be more in a man's power; and with no woman must he be stronger. Beasts of Gor Book 12 Page 236
Though any Gorean male might make me, in spite of myself, a panting, orgasmic slave in his arms, I knew it had been only he, Clitus Vitellius, whom I had truly loved, and yet loved. In his arms I had always been the most helpless. He was my love master. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 358
Lara's lips had been rich and fine, sensitive and curious, tender, eager, hungry; the lips of Vika were maddening; I recalled those lips, full and red, pouting, defiant, scornful, scarlet with a slave girl's challenge to my blood; I wondered if Vika might be a bred slave, a Passion Slave, one of those girls bred for beauty and passion over generations by the zealous owners of the great Slave Houses of Ar, for lips such as Vika's were a feature often bred into Passion Slaves; they were lips formed for the kiss of a master. Priest-Kings of Gor Book 3 Page 53
Ho-Hak's right ear twitched. His ears were unusual, very large, and with extremely long lower lobes, drawn lower still by small, heavy pendants set in them. He had been a slave, doubtless, and, doubtless, judging by the collar, and the large hands and broad back, had served on the galleys, but he had been an unusual slave, a bred exotic, doubtless originally intended by the slave maters for a destiny higher than that of galley bench.
There are various types of "exotics" bred by Gorean slavers, all of whom are to be distinguished from more normal varieties of bred slaves, such as Passion Slaves and Draft Slaves. Exotics may be bred for almost any purpose, and some of these purposes, unfortunately, seem to be little more than to produce quaint or unusual specimens. Ho-Hak may well have been one so bred.
"You are an exotic," I said to him.
Ho-Hak's ears leaned forward toward me, but he did not seem angry. He had brown hair, and brown eyes; the hair, long, was tied behind his head with a string of rence cloth. He wore a sleeveless tunic of rence cloth, like most of the rence growers.
"Yes," said Ho-Hak. "I was bred for a collector."
"I see," I said.
"I broke his neck and escaped," said Ho-Hak. "Later I was recaptured and sent to the galleys."
"And you again escaped," I said.
"In doing so," said Ho-Hak, looking at his large hands, heavy and powerful, "I killed six men." Raiders of Gor Book 6 Pages 15 - 16
Ho-Hak had been bred a slave, a degraded and distorted exotic, Raiders of Gor Book 6 Page 88
I have not mentioned exotics, incidentally, slaves bred or trained for unusual purposes. Fighting Slave of Gor Book 14 Page 164
Another slave, an exotic, bred for stripes, put more laundry beside her. Prize of Gor Book 27 Page 136
[More Quotes On Exotics and Bred Slaves, Both Male, and Female]()
"You will learn to
wear tunics, and silks, and bangles," I said. "You will be taught to kneel and move. You may be perfumed and painted. Swordsmen of Gor Book 29 Page 383
Just as, in our world, it is not uncommon to seek the advice of an interior decorator in obtaining and organizing the appointments of one's own dwelling, so, too, in the Gorean world, it is not uncommon to call in a trainer and beautician to appraise and improve a girl. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 216
Men are so vain. You should see how some of them lead naked, painted, bejeweled slaves about on leashes, put them through slave paces publicly, make them dance in the open for tarsk-bits, put them up as stakes in the dicing halls, and marketplaces, and such. Prize of Gor Book 27 Page 154
This was the day of my collaring. I was not permitted cosmetics. Captive of Gor Book 7 Page 269
How incredibly, and yet rationally and justifiably, I felt at his mercy. He was my master. He owned me. He could do whatever he wanted with me. He could trade me or sell me, or even slay me upon a whim, should he wish. I was absolutely his, his girl. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 108
I would allow Vika to share the great stone couch, it's sleeping pelts, and silken sheets. This was unusual, however, for normally the Gorean slave girl sleeps at the foot of her Masters couch, often on a straw mat with only a thin, cotton-like blanket, woven from the soft fibers of the Rep plant, to protect her from the cold. If she has not pleased her Master of late, she may be, of course, as a disciplinary measure, simply chained nude to the slave ring in the bottom of the couch, sans both the blanket and the mat. The stones of the floor are hard and the Gorean nights cold and it is a rare girl who, when unchained in the morning, does not seek more dutifully to serve her master. Priest ings of Gor Book 3 Page 67
How incredibly, and yet rationally and justifiably, I felt at his mercy. He was my master. He owned me. He could do whatever he wanted with me. He could trade me or sell me, or even slay me upon a whim, should he wish. I was absolutely his, his girl. Slave Girl of Gor Book 11 Page 108