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Free Women - the freedom to utilize the legal system
In the following scene, taking place within the boundaries of one of the Sardar Fairs, the Lady Telitsia attends a play which she finds offensive. As a free woman she has the right to lodge a complaint with the magistrates. “With your permission, Lady Telitsia?” inquired Boots, addressing himself politely to the haughty, rigid, proud, vain, heavily veiled, blue-clad free female standing in the front row below the stage. “You may continue,” she said. “But you may find what ensues offensive,” Boots warned her. “Doubtless I will,” she said. “And have no fear, I shall include it in my complaint to the proper magistrates.” “You wish to remain?” asked Boots, puzzled. “Yes,” she said, “but do not expect a coin from me.” ... “Are you disrobing?” he asked. The men in the audience began to cry out with pleasure. Some struck their left shoulders in Gorean applause. “Yes,” called the Brigella. She was quite beautiful. “I shall mention this in my complaint to the proper magistrates,” said the free woman from her position near the stage. “Are you absolutely naked now?” asked Boots, as though he could not see her. “Totally,” she said. ... “Do you think that all free women are no better than slaves!” she (Lady Telitsia) cried. “I would suppose that women are all pretty much of a muchness,” said Boots. ‘Oh!” she cried in fury. “Take yourself,” he said. “How would you look stripped and in a collar, and under a whip? Do you think you would behave much differently, then, than any other slave? Indeed, have you ever stopped to think about it? Have you ever wondered, secretly perhaps, whether or not you might have what it takes to prove to be even an adequate slave?” “I am a free woman,” she said, icily. “Forgive me, Lady,” said Boots. “I will, before nightfall, and you may depend upon it,” she said, “lodge my complaint with the magistrates. By tomorrow noon, you will be closed, forbidden to perform at the fair.” “Show us mercy, Lady,” said Boots, “we are a traveling company, a poor troupe in desperate straits. I have had to sell even my golden courtesan!” “I do not care,” she said, “if you must sell all your sluts!” Players (Note - FYI - Lady Telitsia does make the complaint and not only does Boots have his license for performing at that Fair revoked but he is also whipped.) (Lady Telitsia during that scene had another freedom as a free woman, the Freedom of Choice) Later, in this scene when the very same Lady Telitsia finds herself now a slave owned by Boots, we see that the right to file complaints with magistrates is very much a right only of free women and not available to slaves. “I refuse!” she cried. “The very thought of it! The outrage! The indignity! How dare you even think of such a thing! I am of high caste! I am of the scribes! Wait until I bring this matter to the attention of magistrates!” “As I may remind you, my dear,” said Boots, patiently, “you are no longer of high caste nor of the scribes. Similarly, as I am sure you will recognize, at least upon reflection, you now have no standing before the law. You are now of no more interest to magistrates, in their official capacities, as opposed to their private capacities, than would be an urt or a sleen.” She regarded him, frightened. “Your days of making a nuisance of yourself are now over,” said Boots. “Indeed, I speculate that those very same magistrates whom you have so often inconvenienced would be quite pleased to learn that you are now, at last, no longer capable of pestering them with your inane, time-consuming nonsense. I doubt that they would wish to see you again, unless perhaps it would be to return you naked and bound to your master, with the blows of a whip on your body, or perhaps, say, to have you serve them in a tavern, helpless in the modality that would then be yours, that of the total female slave.” Players gorean_librarian@yahoo.com 
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