Free The Kanshou (Earthkeep) by Sally Miller Gearhart Page A

not violent by nature.  It's men who've got violence in their genes!"
    "Jezebel that's-- "
    "I know, I know!  ' Any offender is only a temporary harmer,' says the holy Kanshou Code.  But if I don't believe that, how can I be a Kanshou?  And I don't believe it about men, Zudie.  Men are totally at the mercy of their biology!  Look at wars and crime.  Look at who is in the bailiwicks.  It's men !"
    Zude's lips tightened.  She focused on the toe of her boot.
    Jezebel waved her dartsleeve.  "They can't help it," she shrugged.  "It's hard-wired into them.  At rock bottom they love cruelty and dominance."  Jez paused, her eyes like cold stone.  "They're killers," she said slowly.  "Maybe we ought to just drain the testosterone out of them the minute they hit puberty!"
    "Jez!"  Zude stood and flung her arms into the air.
    "Why not, Zudie?"  Jez was calm now.  She pulled the sweatband from her head. 
    "Because we don't know that's true, Jezebel," Zude roared as she paced, "because there's not a shred of scientific evidence to support that crazy idea, because-- "
    "Then let's find it, Zude.  Let's find that scientific evidence!"  Jez catapuled off the bench and stood toe-to-toe with her lover.  "Let's do some hormone control on the men in the bailiwicks, on the killers and the rapists and the abusers, like they used to do on alpha males in the baboon colonies.  Let's find that little spot in the male anatomy that secretes the testosterone and-- "
    "You won't find it, Jez!  You won't find anything in the male anatomy any different from-- "
    "We'll find it, Zude," Jez shouted, "and when we do we can damp it out in all men!"
    "Jez!" Zude's voice topped her lover's.
    The volume of the confrontation brought two concerned cadets to the edge of the weaponsyard.  When they identified the scene and its familiar participants, they moved on, shaking their heads and smiling.
    Zude was incredulous.  "What an act of violence, Jezebel!  You want to invade the very identity of a human being and force him into being like you, maybe even making a zombie of him!  Don't talk to me about men's history of cruelty and violence!  Look to yourself, Jezebel!"
"Wrong!  It would be violence maybe, yes!"  Her voice softened.  "But only once, only for right now, until the chain of violence is broken!  Zudie, it may be the only way.  We're women, and we'd do it with love and with full understanding of what we're doing!  We'd be forcing men to give up their violence only until we get the initial cause eradicated.  After that, social conditioning could take care of it all.  It would be worth it, Zudie!  One act of violence that ends violence forevermore!" 
    "Never, Jez, never."  Zude stepped away from her lover.  She ran a hand through her hair.  "The whole idea is wrong from the start, wrong all along the way." 
    "Violence for a Greater Good, Zude," Jez said quietly.  "Like the Kanshou are violent when they restrain an offender.  Violence for a Greater Good." 
    Zude turned.  "Touché." 
    Jez sank to the bench again.  "I feel better."
    Zude let her breath settle.  "That's good," she whispered, dropping to the bench beside her lover.  She pulled out a cigarillo, reconsidered, then folded it back into her pocket.  They sat, again in silence.  "We'll never agree on that one, Bella-Belle," Zude said.
    "I guess not."  A moment later Jez added, "Zude, did you wonder why Ciab forfeited when she had me pinned?"  Before Zude could reply she went on.  "I was so scared because I'd realized I could hurt her that I just I surrendered to her.  Gave up my power.  I mentally held out my arms to her."
    "And she rushed into them."  Zude shifted and stretched. 
    "She got off me.  Same difference."  Jez gave a wide pinch or two with her thumb and forefinger to Zude's trapezius.
    Zude closed her eyes, dutifully practicing the unfamiliar art of receiving.  After a moment she managed to observe, "To make that work, you risk