Rant 67: Strife and Discord

[Irreverend Hugh, KSC]

Rant 67
Strife and Discord

,ÄúThere must be as many different types of Discordianism as there are Discordians.,Äù
-Tequilarius Malignatus (,ÄòCaracalla,Äô)

,ÄúAnd he said, G W Bush will protect the nation from terrorism, if elected again. He will continue to keep the nation safe.,Äô And I said ,ÄòOh really? Like he did the last time[9/11] we were attacked? Bush,Äôs track record in the War on Terrorism completely sucks when compared to Clinton,Äôs.,Äô This shut him up, though his face reddened.,Äù

,ÄúT?° an Ghluaiseacht Eriosa?? ar ?©ir?? anois. D?©an comhar linn.,Äù
-An Chraobh ?öll ?ìrga / The Golden Apple Branch

Yesterday I was waiting for my connecting train at the big transit center, sitting and smoking when the thought came to me,Ķ,ÄòEris doesn,Äôt bring strife and discord to all, She just brings strife and discord to those who snub Her.,Äô Like many other things in life that could wake you up and set you free, if they are ignored they will cause all sorts of problems. Eris uses the habitual competitive tendencies in many people to provoke them to discord. Strife and discord are the price one pays for rejecting Eris. And it,Äôs not Her fault at all, now is it? No. It,Äôs your fault if you reject Her and snub the freedom that She is trying to get you to realize. Instead of learning who the prettiest ones are, people will instead compete with each other, and even aspects of themselves in order to call themselves the prettiest, or the best, or whatever else is the catchphrase of the day. Then they whine and complain about their lack of connection with their life and with others around them as if THEY themselves had nothing to do with it. They,Äôll blame Eris for the strife and discord, even as THEY themselves continue to fight in their self-righteous causes against any who see things differently, or against anyone THEY feel opposes their claims.

The Gods and Goddesses at Mount Olympus fought each other tooth nail and claw for the Golden Apple with ,Äòto the prettiest one,Äô written on it. Then they blamed Eris, as usual, for causing all the trouble. But She only rolled the Apple in. They themselves set to fighting over it. This sort of behavior is in evidence everywhere you look today. Even those people who claim to have the sort of peace that Jesus gives, are out arguing and fighting and provoking all sorts of mayhem. (Of course such people deny that that,Äôs what they,Äôre in fact doing. It,Äôs an old con-job that even the Romans were in on,Ķbringing peace and enlightenment to ,Äòdark, barbaric,Äô peoples, while really slaughtering and enslaving them. A cursory look at American foreign policy shows this same con-job today in operation.) I asked Eris about this and She agreed saying that people who snub Her fall into all sorts of strife and discord. They can,Äôt the see Golden Apples of Discord for what they are. (And besides, snubbing deities is not generally a very sound practice, especially when such deities are offering you things.) Hell, it seems that the only bunch of people who claim to be living peaceful lives and yet cause no wars, strife, or discord are the Buddhists, though they may argue healthily about certain things. (A good case for investigating Buddhist ideas and practices if ever there was one.) And look at us Discordians. We go around claiming to cause all sorts of discord, confusion, and chaos, or what-have-you, and yet we produce happiness, peace, and freedom as a result. (That,Äôs only a paradox when one doesn,Äôt understand both the meaning of the ,ÄòGreat Original Snub,Äô and the radical idea of free will that is probably the central focus of Discordianism.)

At some point imposed harmony gets oppressive because it is full of pretension and exclusion. It then needs to be shaken up a bit, otherwise it will eventually explode like a pressure cooker with the heat turned up too high. That,Äôs where we Discordians come in. We try to pop the lids off of the pressure cookers, failing which we then get as far away as possible. Does this mean we stir up shit? Of course it does, when shit needs to be stirred up. But sometimes we just simply wait it out without doing a damned thing as THEY, as opposed to us, are damned effective at causing their own strife and discord on their own. (Hell, we know that THEY are just as capable of causing all sorts of strife and discord as we are. We just do it for the hoots and hollers and for pressure release. THEY do it in some vague and deluded stupid notion that it will lead to more control, which THEY have mistaken for peace.) We like to strip away the pretensions and prejudices inherent in beliefs and ideologies and show just how absurd they can be. It makes us laugh to see how stupid we can be, though THEY are often horrified at the realization that beliefs and ideologies could be the mental manacles that they usually are. THEY don,Äôt want to see that their beliefs, notions, cherished assumptions (called common sense, though there is no ,Äòsense,Äô implied), and ideologies are imprisoning their hearts and minds. THEY would rather kill and die for their mental prisons because THEY succumb to the fallacy that such acts make their mental prisons right or true.

You don,Äôt see us Discordians killing and dying for any beliefs we come up with, now do you? (Though we love to argue about them and contradict one another- we even love contradicting ourselves for bobsake.) Because we know that we are the creators of our beliefs and we can change them as readily as one changes the channel. Remember that freedom of choice (,Äòheresy,Äô) is only a sin to those who are absolutely bound to their beliefs, convinced that such beliefs and perceptions are not only right for them but that they are right for all others. THEY aren,Äôt really trying to figure out what the hell is really going on. THEY just want to squeeze the world to fit their preconceptions. It vexes THEM that others exist in the world with different beliefs, opinions, and perceptions. It doesn,Äôt vex us Discordians now, does it? (Though the idea that there are as many Discordianisms as there are Discordians does vex some of the so-called Real (and Serious) Discordians,Ñ¢ . But we can help those sorry Serious people, if we wish, and that,Äôs what the Great Discordian Jihad is all about.)

You don,Äôt need to believe what I am saying, nor agree. Just look around for yourselves at what is really going on and come up with your own responses. Keep your minds fluid and shifty with as much access to various beliefs and opinions simultaneously. (Well, it,Äôs hard not to do so when the pineal gland is glowing and keeping you up all night.) Strife and discord are the fruits of the continual snubbing of Eris and all She represents (including us Discordians, by the way), and our mission, if such a thing could be said to exist, is to throw those Golden Apples all over the place. (Except, possibly, for when we need them for making pie.) Or something. (Okay, Eris. I finished another rant, can I have my bagel now?)

(Bureaucracy 33rd, 3170)

[namu]

The people of Earth (a deformation of "Eris") must help the people of Sirius.

[cyberus]

There are no people on Sirius, only dogs!!

[namu]

What ? Me mistaking cabbages for dogs ? Never ! Fir I have tasted both, and they are similar in the same way that two completely unrelated things share little in common.

[Irreverend Hugh, KSC]

What ? Me mistaking cabbages for dogs ? Never ! Fir I have tasted both, and they are similar in the same way that two completely unrelated things share little in common.

I have good barbecue sauces or curries that could help you actually enjoy tasting truth/s.

[Schweinepriester G.]

There are no people on Sirius, only dogs!!

I always took them to be some kind of dog-people.
Wise dog-people even as they spent far more time licking their own gonads than
waging war as opposed to some other people on a certain third planet in a system roughly
4.3 lightyears off alpha centauri...

[Horab Fibslager]

yet again, ii haven;t acutlly read this article, buit nonetheless, strife is great. i breath of fresh air in th emurk. few of you know, not beinjg cursed with incredible charisma, but nonethless, strife, its' what's for breakfast.

[namu]

There are no people on Sirius, only dogs!!

Last time I checked, the people of Sirius (Nommons) were fish-people, not dogs.