Untangling Gor, D/​S, and BDSM

by LionHeart

There seems to be a recur­ring con­fu­sion between Gor, D/​s, and BDSM. Some peo­ple become con­fused regard­ing the impor­tant dif­fer­ences between them because Gor does have themes of dom­i­nance and sub­mis­sion, as well as usage of both dis­ci­pline and bondage. It can be chal­leng­ing to keep it in perspective.

Here are some of the more obvi­ous dif­fer­ences between the three.

SCOPE

Taken seri­ous­ly, intel­li­gent­ly, and sane­ly, the Gorean phi­los­o­phy is a coher­ent set of prin­ci­ples and val­ues which offer a prospec­tive way to live every aspect of your life.

D/​S only applies to spe­cif­ic rela­tion­ships, that is it’s scope.

BDSM is an umbrel­la des­ig­na­tion and socio-polit­i­cal move­ment who’s pur­pose is to con­nect those of like-mind­ed alter­na­tive sex­u­al­i­ties, and dri­ve for main­stream accep­tance of those same alter­na­tives. That is it’s scope.

Neither D/​S, nor BDSM, con­sti­tute a phi­los­o­phy which guides every aspect of your life.

MORALITY

The Gorean phi­los­o­phy makes dis­tinct judg­ments of right, and wrong, based on it’s core prin­ci­ple of the nat­ur­al order, and the appli­ca­tion of pos­i­tive val­ues such as hon­esty, courage, strength, integri­ty, etc.

Both D/​S, and BDSM, are based on expec­ta­tions of tol­er­ance and non-judge­ment, so long as the behav­ior stays with­in the bounds of the legal sys­tem. Even the lat­er reser­va­tion is based on the laws of a giv­en nation rather than any moral or eth­i­cal judgement.

The Gorean phi­los­o­phy is ground­ed in it’s moral­i­ty, while D/​S and BDSM are aggres­sive­ly amoral and non-judgmental.

INCLUSIVENESS

D/​S, and BDSM in par­tic­u­lar, active­ly pro­mote an inclu­sive com­mu­ni­ty, the accep­tance of all alter­na­tive sex­u­al­i­ties beneath it’s aegis, active­ly dis­cour­ag­ing judg­men­tal­ism and approbation.

The Gorean phi­los­o­phy insists on not only judg­ing to deter­mine what is har­mo­nious with the nat­ur­al order, and what is inim­i­cal to it, but act­ing on that judge­ment. This results in a com­mu­ni­ty which ratio­nal­ly excludes those who chose beliefs, atti­tudes, and lifestyles which are in con­flict with the Gorean philosophy.

NATURE vs NURTURE

The Gorean phi­los­o­phy is found­ed on the idea that human­i­ty evolved over mil­lenia in response to exter­nal forces as well as inter­nal pres­sures that each gen­der mutu­al­ly exert­ed on one anoth­er to cre­ate instinct-lev­el ‘hard-wired’ gen­der natures. This means that being Gorean is not some­thing that one choos­es to do, but rather, it’s who one is, when the dross of a social over­lay (Nurture) which con­tra­dicts that gen­der nature, has been uncov­ered and removed.

D/​S, and BDSM, are found­ed on idea that sex­u­al­i­ty is a choice, it’s some­thing that one does. Sexuality is an act, not a state of being, and one can sim­ply choose to do some­thing dif­fer­ent with­out any vio­la­tion of nature, since nature is not part of the equation.

SADO-MASOCHISM

BDSM is an acronym for Bondage, Discipline, & Sado-Masochism. As an umbrel­la move­ment, BDSM is fair­ly new, being cre­at­ed in the 1980s. Prior to the 1980s, there were the sep­a­rate­ly con­sid­ered kinks of B&D (Bondage & Discipline), and S&M (Sadism & Masochism), and D&S (Domination & Submission), and each was not nec­es­sar­i­ly linked to the oth­er. Sadism and masochism are inex­tri­ca­bly part of the BDSM move­ment, where they are both accept­ed and even celebrated.

The first Gor nov­el was pub­lished in 1965, ‘Tarnsman of Gor’, by John Norman. The sec­ond Gor nov­el, ‘Outlaw of Gor’, was pub­lished in , and it con­tained the fol­low­ing quote;

“Perhaps it should only be added that the Gorean Master, though strict, is sel­dom cru­el. The girl knows, if she pleas­es him, her lot will be an easy one. She will almost nev­er encoun­tered sadism or wan­ton cru­el­ty, for the psy­cho­log­i­cal envi­ron­ment that tends to breed these dis­eases is large­ly absent from Gor. This does not mean that she will not expect to be beat­en if she dis­obeys, or fails to please her Master.”
— John Norman, ‘Outlaw of Gor’, DAW page 53

Placing the state­ment in his­tor­i­cal con­text, there sim­ply was no ‘BDSM’ when the sec­ond Gor nov­el was writ­ten, and the author clear­ly con­sid­ered sadism to be a men­tal ill­ness. This posi­tion is cor­rob­o­rat­ed and val­i­dat­ed in the Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders IV, which rec­og­nizes that both Sadism and Masochism are sex­u­al dis­or­ders. It was Norman’s con­tention that these are the sort of men­tal ill­ness­es caused by a response in humans who have been forced to cope with a soci­ety which active­ly sup­pressed and dis­tort­ed their nat­ur­al gen­der pro­cliv­i­ties and ori­en­ta­tion, rather than sup­port­ing them.

LIFE vs DEATH

BDSM prac­tices often begin light­ly, with minor explo­rations, per­haps with a blind­fold or the restrain­ing of wrists. Over time, it’s afi­ciona­dos often progress fur­ther along the plea­sure path, need­ing more intense appli­ca­tions and expe­ri­ences to obtain the same sen­sa­tions and reac­tions they expe­ri­enced in the ear­ly stages. It is not unusu­al for expe­ri­enced BDSM play­ers to engage in very seri­ous beat­ings, ‘knife-play’ and ‘blood-play’, chok­ing and asphyx­i­a­tion, tak­ing place in rooms des­ig­nat­ed as ‘dun­geons’. The BDSM mot­to is “Safe, Sane, and Consensual”, three things which nor­mal sex­u­al prac­tices do not need to use as a mantra because they are usu­al­ly safe, sane, and con­sen­su­al. This strong­ly sug­gests that many BDSM prac­tices are inher­ent­ly dan­ger­ous, of ques­tion­able san­i­ty, and run con­sid­er­able risk of being non-con­sen­su­al. To mit­i­gate these haz­ards, the BDSM com­mu­ni­ty often oper­ates in a group envi­ron­ment where the ‘play’ of it’s prac­ti­tion­ers can be mon­i­tored in the event that the ‘play’ goes too far, as well as the encour­aged prac­tice of a ‘safe-word’ and active mentoring/​training of of it’s Doms (Dominants).

In this regard, the thrills asso­ci­at­ed with BDSM are more akin to a con­trolled threat of death and bod­i­ly harm, cre­at­ing sex­u­al excite­ment by stim­u­lat­ing and express­ing these dark­er impuls­es of human nature. It is par­tic­u­lar­ly note­wor­thy that while it is com­mon­ly under­stood that peo­ple can and do die, or have such major bod­i­ly harm inflict­ed upon them that they end up in an emer­gency room, it’s remark­ably dif­fi­cult to obtain con­crete num­bers on the mag­ni­tude of loss and dam­age to human life, incurred in the pur­suit of this dan­ger­ous ‘play’, due to the per­va­sive atti­tude of main­tain­ing non-judg­men­tal­ism and legal bar­ri­ers inher­ent with­in the per­son­al privacy/​doctor’s con­fi­den­tial­i­ty. However, a num­ber of med­ical experts have con­fi­den­tial­ly informed that that it’s not at all uncom­mon to receive the vic­tims of BDSM games in the emer­gency room or urgent care.

On the oth­er hand, the Gorean phi­los­o­phy is focused on life and liv­ing it. On achiev­ing a liv­able har­mo­ny of gen­der nature with the way Goreans live their lives and engage in their rela­tion­ships, as well as a deep and abid­ing respect for the nat­ur­al world they live in.

TRUST

The typ­i­cal BDSM encounter often relies on a ‘safe-word’ in an effort to ensure that the per­son being played with is ful­ly con­sen­su­al, and to give the that per­son a way to con­trol the ‘play’. While this is an under­stand­able pre­cau­tion, it stands in stark con­trast to the Gorean interaction.

The typ­i­cal Gorean sex­u­al inter­ac­tion abhors any con­trivance which sug­gests a con­tra­dic­tion of the nat­ur­al order. Instead, it relies on absolute trust between the man and the woman. The man trust­ing that the woman knew what she was doing when she sub­mit­ted to his will, and the woman trust­ing that the man in who’s hands she has placed her­self, is a man who will not abuse or dam­age his woman.

HONEST EXPRESSION

In the Gorean phi­los­o­phy, most men are nat­u­ral­ly dom­i­nant over women, and most women are nat­u­ral­ly sub­mis­sive to men. This isn’t a mat­ter of choice, as much as it is the expres­sion of that fun­da­men­tal gen­der nature, con­so­nant with the truth and real­i­ty of what humans are.

In BDSM, the afore­men­tioned ‘safe-word’ enables the Submissive to main­tain total con­trol of what­ev­er occurs in the ‘play’ with the Dominant. This cre­ates a dynam­ic where­in the per­son who is sup­posed to be in con­trol, the Dominant, is in fact, under the com­plete con­trol of the Submissive, who is pre­tend­ing to not be charge. While this does assure con­sen­su­al­i­ty, if not safe­ty, it also con­sti­tutes a fun­da­men­tal­ly dis­hon­est dynamic.

BEAUTY

The author him­self has been extra­or­di­nar­i­ly clear in his stead­fast repu­di­a­tion of BDSM and in keep­ing Gor sep­a­rate from BDSM. This is not a mat­ter of inter­pre­ta­tion, the author lit­er­al­ly owns Gor and it’s copy­right, he knows bet­ter than any what the pre­cise mean­ing and pur­pose of every word he pub­lished. He con­sid­ered BDSM to not be beau­ti­ful, and count­ed that as a final dif­fer­en­ti­a­tion between it, and Gor.

“I know noth­ing about “real-life Gorean slav­ery among some peo­ple in the BDSM com­mu­ni­ty.” The “BDSM” ref­er­ence wor­ries me. I dis­so­ci­ate myself from BDSM, at least as I under­stand it. I may, of course, mis­un­der­stand it. I won­der if one would set­tle mere­ly for “real-life Gorean slav­ery,” because, as I under­stand it, BDSM is not Gorean. If some­thing is not beau­ti­ful, it is not Gorean.”
— John Norman, excerpt­ed from the I09 Interview

This should be sim­ple to under­stand and it’s not sub­ject to either moral rel­a­tivism nor per­cep­tu­al rel­a­tivism in sane, intel­li­gent crea­tures; The inflic­tion of pain, the threat of death and harm, are not acts of beau­ty with­in the non-psy­chot­ic pop­u­la­tion of human­i­ty. The mea­sure of beau­ty in Gorean terms is based on truth, which is itself, ground­ed in reality.

“A good max­im to keep in mind is that if it isn’t beau­ti­ful, it isn’t Gorean.”
— John Norman, after­word in ‘Witness of Gor’

SUMMATION

While Gor may include the aspects of D&S with­in it’s phi­los­o­phy, even those are based on the Natural Order rather than choos­ing and switch­ing. In many ways, Gor is the polar oppo­site of BDSM, and mix­ing the two is a recipe for Bad Things to occur. BDSM and D/​S have things like the mot­to of ‘safe, sane, and con­sen­su­al’, and ‘safe-words’, because those are the only way to ensure con­sen­su­al­i­ty and a rea­son­able degree of safe­ty. Gor has none of that because it needs none of it. If you mix the two, you like­ly will end up with a BDSM Dom who lacks the inher­ent safe­guards of the Natural Order and high char­ac­ter, and ALSO lacks the soph­ic con­straints of ‘safe words’ and a mot­to, to keep him from stray­ing into actions which are nei­ther safe nor sane, and quite pos­si­bly are criminal.

What did you think of this?