Discordia and Christianity

[Dr Goofy]

If you guys could teach me more about discordia, that would be great. I am eager to learn, so whatever you can tell me would be nice. Can't be discordian without knowing discordia.

Sure you can! People do it all the time!

Also, take everything we "teach" you with a grain of salt. Unless it comes from The Good Reverend Roger, our spiritual advisor.

:rasieshand:

[East Coast Hustle]

Roger is Omnifallible and has mind-control lasers.

[Paiyaku]

Can anyone summarize the jist of what everyone here has said, I'd like to make it into a word document and read over it and study it more.
I am no troll, just to be sure no one thinks I am.
The first thing I learned yesterday about Discordia is to keep wondering and I am still wondering. Honestly, due to the series of different answers from people, I am still confused, now that I think about it.

I thought a Discordian was someone who emphasized on disorder to balance out Chao and make good use of Operation Mindfuck, and talk random, but with meaning. I know you guys will think of me as a dumbshit when you read it, but I'd rather be seen as an idiot and be corrected than continue another second of my existence misunderstanding.

[Dr Goofy]

it is what you make it! Peace!

[Paiyaku]

lol, so if I make it a philosophy where you cause rampant disorder, that's discordia?

[Paiyaku]

still confused...lol, here I'll try this, in as best as you can explain it to someone who has no idea, fill in the blank.


A Discordian is someone who_______________________________________________________________

[Cainad (dec.)]

still confused...lol, here I'll try this, in as best as you can explain it to someone who has no idea, fill in the blank.


A Discordian is someone who fills in the blanks with whatever they darn well please.

[Paiyaku]

lol I meant for that to be a way to explain it. lol cmon lol

[Paiyaku]

I didn't want to ask this for fear of the answer, but i feel I must...


What does a Discordian do?

[Cainad (dec.)]

lol I meant for that to be a way to explain it. lol cmon lol

That IS my explanation.

Or did you want an all-encompassing, final definition that Discordians everywhere will recognize? If that was the case, it ain't happening. A lot of time and energy has gone into exploring that question, and everyone always comes away with different ideas.

This forum is home to a particular flavor (or perhaps flavors) of Discordianism, and many of us here take great pride in mocking any Discordian (or anyone, really) who claims to know what it really means to be Discordian. Not all Discordians do that.

Ask ten Discordians what Discordians do, and you will get eleven different answers.

[Cramulus]

lol, so if I make it a philosophy where you cause rampant disorder, that's discordia?

yeah that's Discordia, in a sense. It's hard to argue that that's not Discordia.
Personally, I don't think it's useful to split hairs over what is and what isn't Discordian. It's just an idea, and we're more than just agents of it.

Plus, have you ever listened to Christians argue about what is and what isn't Christian? They can't get to the bottom of anything without referring to some book or some dead guy or some pope.

You can determine for yourself what your Discordian values are. I think that's cool.

Everybody's Discordia is different,
collect all 23

I thought a Discordian was someone who emphasized on disorder to balance out Chao and make good use of Operation Mindfuck, and talk random, but with meaning.

For the record, this is large part of my Discordia.

also, I think Order is an important tool to manifest Disorder. Maybe the best tool.






Celine reared back as if I had waved offal under his nose. "Objectivists?" he pronounced the word as if I had accused him of being a child-molester. "We're anarchists and outlaws, goddam it. Didn't you understand that much? We've got nothing to do with right-wing, left-wing or any other half-assed political category. If you work within the system, you come to one of the either/or choices that were implicit in the system from the beginning. You're talking like a medieval serf, asking the first agnostic whether he worships God or the Devil. We're outside the system's categories. You'll never get the hang of our game if you keep thinking in flat-earth imagery of right and left, good and evil, up and down. If you need a group label for us, we're political non-Euclideans. But even that's not true. Sink me, nobody of this tub agrees with anybody else about anything, except maybe what the fellow with the horns told the old man in the clouds: Non serviam."

Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea, Illuminatus!

[Cainad (dec.)]

lol, so if I make it a philosophy where you cause rampant disorder, that's discordia?

yeah that's Discordia, in a sense. It's hard to argue that that's not Discordia.
Personally, I don't think it's useful to split hairs over what is and what isn't Discordian. It's just an idea, and we're more than just agents of it.

Plus, have you ever listened to Christians argue about what is and what isn't Christian? They can't get to the bottom of anything without referring to some book or some dead guy or some pope.

You can determine for yourself what your Discordian values are. I think that's cool.

Everybody's Discordia is different,
collect all 23

[Jasper]

I didn't want to ask this for fear of the answer, but i feel I must...


What does a Discordian do?

Interpret with reckless abandon.

[Paiyaku]

I finally got it, okay, this thread is dead, whatever lol, I am done, no need for further input in this Cheese!

[Golden Applesauce]

You guys say think for yourself and disorder and order is balanced and should be kept in balance. Do Discordians use disorder more than order to balance the Chao?

My take on order/disorder is that they're both subjective descriptions of Reality (whatever that is.)  Certainly, neither is "better" than the other.  Saying that they ought to be kept balanced is kind of like saying that world orange production and world tangerine production ought to be kept balanced - why bother?  If Discordians in general grow more tangerines than oranges, it's because Discordians generally feel that tangerines taste better.

still confused...lol, here I'll try this, in as best as you can explain it to someone who has no idea, fill in the blank.


A Discordian is someone who fills in the blanks with whatever they darn well please.

This is probably the best response you're going to get.  You seem to want Discordja to fit in a neat little box so you can understand it easier.  That's a cop out.

Here's an analogy:
A Brit comes over to America.  (Let's call him "Bob.")  One of "Bob"'s stateside friends takes him to see a basketball game, which "Bob", living in the third-world country of Europe, has never seen before.  At first, "Bob" is confused.  The game just doesn't make any sense.  Eventually, he picks it up.  "This is just like our football!" he shouts, "except the players use their hands instead of their feet, the goal is smaller and ten feet in the air, and there is no goalie.  I understand it now!"  "Bob" watches the rest of the game, and has great fun.  He knows what basketball is, right?

Wrong.  Basketball is like football.  "Bob" may have a great understanding of football, but he doesn't understand basketball.  He understands a little game that is superficially similar to basketball, but basketball is much bigger than that.  If "Bob" stopped joined a bunch of kids playing pick-up on the street, he'd get his ass handed to him.  He doesn't understand the rhythm of a game, the interplay between defense and offense, or any of a thousand other nuances.

You can't perfectly describe Discordja (or pretty much any worldview/belief system I can think of) in one sentence.  If you could, people wouldn't go to the trouble of writing books on the subject.  If you could perfectly describe it in one book, people wouldn't write multiple books and commentaries on books.  We've written books; we have a depository of essays, discussions of essays, arguments in discussions... and we aren't finished yet.  We won't ever be.




On a tangential note: do you know any people who chuckle nervously after everything they say?  Throwing "lol" into all of your sentences gives the same effect.