Being a Discordian Daddy

Black Iron Prison, children of Eris, personal, philosophy, society

I’m a little neurotic anyway.  I think I’m also probably just on the edge of being OC.  Anyhoo, ever since I stumbled upon this Discordian thing, I’ve used it to reassess things I do in my little life.  One of those being Daddyhood.

I was a Dad before I was a Discordian.  Or, I was a Dad before I discovered I WAS a Discordian, or at least, a Dad who had inherently shared some Discordian-like philosophies.  I think it was really the discussions that lead to the BIP metaphor and pamphlet where I really started to reassess how I was operating as a Father.  And I’m not talking about the basics of feeding, clothing, providing shelter, that sort of thing.  It’s really more about the guidance I provide her.  I’m well aware that no matter what I do, I WILL be a major factor in how her bars in her BIP are built.  There’s simply no way around it, not that there should be.  The question becomes, how can I best allow her to maximize HER control over her bars? 

An easy example is when she was a young toddler she took a fascination to trains.  I think it started with a free book the pediatrician gave us during one of her checkups.  A basic board book about trains.  Naturally, she eventually became aware of Thomas the Tank Engine and became enamored with the TV show and the toys.  Western societal norms suggest that these would be “boy toys”.  When you see the commercials or ads in magazines, they show little boys dressed in blue playing with these things.  Rarely do you see a little girl.  Now, I know, I know, “big whoop, you let your girl play outside of the gender box.”  And you’re right.  But the thing of it is, there are many parents out there who would steer a little girl towards Barbies and away from Trains and Trucks.  And it can often be an unthinking or unreasoned reaction.  This is what I try to avoid, without becoming anal about it. 

I think this falls under the “picking your battles” meme that is pervasive in many a Parenting book or magazine.  Where this meme falls short, however, is delving into normative behaviors.  It’s great to explain to a Parent how sometimes it doesn’t make sense to fuss over whether or not they eat every single carrot.  But what I would like to see more of is talking to parents about not making a fuss over every time their child acts a little goofy in public.  I think many parents try so hard to prevent their child from becoming Dennis the Menace that they end up unwittingly caging their character.  The joyful anarchy of childhood needs to be unrestrained and allowed to explore the territory of the world.  Obviously, this has to happen within the confines of safety and security. 

Discovering the Discordian philosophies and being a part of the development of the BIP ideas has been a very good experience for me as a Daddy.  I think I have developed a better understanding of just how much I can impact without knowing.  It’s given me a unique perspective on my role as a parent.  As much as I need to keep her physically and mentally safe, I also need to provide the freedom for HER to find out who she is.  It is a joy to see it unfold.

A glossary of terms relating to Discordianism

Discordianism, FAIL, Humour, rant, satire, Trolling

DISCORDIANISM: Like Wicca, it started off as a religion for pot-smoking hippie bums who wanted to pass off their bullshit as a philosophical statement. The key difference was it was full of jokes plagiarized from the Marx brothers. Somewhere along the line, like many obscure things that deserved to stay obscure, it got co-opted by sweaty, anime-downloading computer nerds and has become some stupid inside joke on message boards full of assholes, giving it as much meaning and significance as All Your Base Are Belong To Us.

THE CHURCH OF THE SUBGENIUS: Discordians who get bored of saying “Fnord” and “Hail Eris” and wanted to make up new nonsense phrases and pretend like saying them while giggling was a constructive act of activism.

THE PRINCIPIA DISCORDIA: Between “My First ABCs” and “The Essential Guide to Star Wars Ships” in terms of literary importance

THE BOOK OF THE SUBGENIUS: Like the Principia Discordia, only 100 pages longer, and it costs 20 bucks instead of being able to find it on Google.

THE ILLUMINATUS TRILOGY: A plagiarism of Joyce’s work filled with nerdy pop culture references and pretentious rantng.

SCHR?ñDINGER’S CAT: A plagiarism of Vonnegut’s work filled with nerdy pop culture references and pretentious ranting.

ROBERT ANTON WILSON: A man who has accumulated a small fortune selling plagiarisms of Joyce and Vonnegut filled with nerdy pop culture references with pretentious ranting.

MALACLYPSE THE YOUNGER: Some “wacky” nom de plume of a man who probably wrote The Principia Discordia in a stained tie-dye T-shirt on a bongwater-stained couch while listening to a highly worn LP of Freak Out!, The White Album, or The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Wasn’t smart enough to copyright his work so probably died alone and penniless on a gutter while clenching a Coke bottle pipe filled with schwag, while his buddy Robert Anton Wilson eats steak for dinner in his dining room.

KERRY THORNLEY/LORD OMAR/A BILLION OTHER STUPID PSEUDONYMS: Wrote ten crazy Xeroxed rants about Libertarianism and thought his friends were agents of the Illuminati, now posthumously considered a genius.

STEVE JACKSON: The poster boy for the official point of transformation of the vast majority (ie: 40) of Discordians changing from hippie slackers to D&D nerds who wish they could have been alive to be hippie slackers like their parents.

FNORD: A word invented to be used in the boring, pointless signatures, “hilarious” spam, and half-hearted graffiti of Discordians. Might have been a slightly funny inside joke between RAW, Thornley, and Malaclypse, but the Internet beat it into the ground like it does everything

23: The fact that that number can sometimes be seen somewhere is proof of an elaborate evil conspiracy/magical cosmic force that protects and strengthens all Discordians

THE BAVARIAN ILLUMINATI: The 19th century version of the Discordians. IE: They had great ideas but we’re too lazy and fuckwitted and unorganized to get anything done so instead they just made a bunch of bullshit. So obviously the Discordian society idolizes them.

THE POEE: 12 members strong.

THE DISCORDIAN SOCIETY: 18 members strong.

WWW.PRINCIPIADISCORDIA.COM: An expensive domain name that somebody pays for solely to host a 60-page book that can be found for a yardsale at 25 cents, or in it’s entirity on the first 13 pages of a Google search. In other word, a nerd who felt the obligation to make a site that wasn’t about what bands they like or how similar to Hitler Bush is.

ERISIANS: Discordians who insist on being called something else to be difficult

ERIS/DISCORDIA: There is a disagreement among Discordians and Erisians as to her nature. Discordians think she’s a cartoon character with magic powers who help them out and who they fantasize to while masturbating, (that is, when they’re too lazy to open up their porn folder or turn to the Dryad page of the D&D Monster Manual) Erisians think the same thing although they sprinkle it with some Taoist metaphysical stuff.

OPERATION MINDFUCK: A way to make the world a better place that apparently involves trolling conservative communities, writing notes on bathroom walls, making up little pieces of paper that say “LOL U R TEH POPE” and being too afraid to hand them out to people, and contemplating all of these brilliant ideas on a message board and being too lazy to do any of them.

JAKE: Like a mindfuck except more childish, if that’s possible

WWW.POEE.CO.UK: A website with a professional-looking appearance and informative content. This makes it’s owner Syntapgjax, a Fake Discordian, since obviously the definition of “Discordian” is “someone who can’t get their shit together”

FAKE DISCORDIAN: A term thrown around a lot for practitioners of a religion that embraces ontological freedom and equality. It’s actually a redundant term.

“WE DISCORDIANS MUST STICK APART”: An excuse for not having your shit together

CHAOS MAGIC: If Wicca is people who need an authority figure to give their minds permission to use magic adopting books form Barnes and Noble as such, than Chaos Magic is the same, only with Google and Alice in Wonderland.

ZENARCHY: A term used by Discordians who have to pretend they’re too enlightened to use terms like “Anarchist” to describe their political belief, so they use a term that sounds deep but is actually an unfunny portmanteau, like “Zenarchist” so they can pretend they’re too cool for politics.

THE LAW OF FIVES: An important lesson in epistemological relativism becomes an inside joke among people who make stupid polls on the Internet to waste their lives away

COPYRITE/KOPYRIGHT/KOPYRITE/COPYLEFT/KOPYLEFT: A term that’s obviously Discordian because of the lame pun. Spawned Wikipedia, which is what sexless nerds use as an authoritative source of knowledge, in the same way imperialist intellectual elitists used the Britannica.

DISCORDIAN SAINT: Someone who the government hasn’t forced to take their meds yet

THE PRINCIPIA DISCORDIA.COM FORUMS: Where you can read jokers bickering like the cast of MASH towards the end of the show and pretending that they’re better than 95 percent of DeadJournal users somehow. Also full of long, drawn out, pointless rants that just reiterate the same uninsightful points. Discordians are nerds who don’t have enough sex.

What Does An Obama Win Mean?

current affairs, politics, society

Who the hell knows?

I voted for the guy.  I have hopes for what he can do for the US of A, but I still have at least one foot on the ground.  The expectations should be kept in check that he can somehow topple The System.  At the very most, we can hope that he can give it the slightest nudge that might cause it to slightly alter its course.  He’s not going to move mountains, he’s not going to part seas, and in his acceptance speech, he made that much perfectly clear.  He acknowledge that it is entirely likely that the major policy initiatives he begins, may not completely bear fruit until after his first term, if then. 

However, I think it is entirely appropriate to label his Presidency as one of a Transitional nature.  And this isn’t solely because of the man and his makeup.  To be sure that is an element of this transition.  The other, of course, is the time.  We are at a transitory moment in our history.  We are at a transition point in terms of demographics.  The baby boomers are retiring and beginning to take the geriatric perch at the top of the American lifespan.  The White Man will soon be in the minority, when compared to all of the other creeds and ethnicitys that make up the American Populous.  We are at a transition point in terms of energy.  It is quite clear that Big Oil’s days are numbered.  Unless we go into “Shock and Awe” exploration and drilling, the inventories will dry up in our lifetimes.  It is time to find that next thing that will power our homes and our automobiles.  With just these two huge landmark shifts, it is imperative to have leadership that can help us get from Point A to Point B.  This will be part of President Obama’s charge.  And of course, it will be our charge to make sure he keeps his eyes on the road while he is steering. 

What is known is that a significant majority of the electorate has recognized this time of transition that we are in, and that it is time for a newer and more modern perspective to guide the way.  The paradigms of yesterday were rejected in favor of the possibilities of tomorrow.  The palpable sense of needing to move on is pervasive.  But equally as prominent is the uncertainty of the unknown.  And so he needs to be as reassuring as he is realistic.  To be as certain as he is seeking.  To be as commanding as he is collaborating.

And so, what does an Obama win mean?  As of now, all we know is that it means a new story will begin to be written and told.  But it does not mean we just sit and watch the events unfold.  He has said he will ask and expect our support in his efforts.  He will make a call for service in the redirection of America’s path.  Some will answer, some will not.  But what is clear is what has always been so.  This is OUR future that he is attempting to shape.  This means it is OUR time to make sure we are a part of that. 

Because the reality is that when someone asks “What Does An Obama Win Mean?”, we will have a big influence on how that is answered.

I am totally sure this technology will never be abused

Articles by others, Drugs, Illuminati, Science

Via Livescience:

Scientists have successfully selected and safely erased specific memories in a mouse’s brain, leaving others intact, it was announced today.

The erasure can be done while a mouse tries to retrieve an individual memory, said Joe Z. Tsien, brain scientist and co-director of the Brain & Behavior Discovery Institute at the Medical College of Georgia School of Medicine.

Fortunately, this appears to be within its early stages and hard to adapt to humans.  But believe me, people all over the world will want something like this.  Oh the things you could do…

Colbertgasm Update

Adam Weishaupt Society, bizarre, children of Eris, conspiracy, counterculture, Discordianism, Illuminati, Law of Fives, media culture, omgasm, Propaganda, surrealism, television, Tin-foil hats

For those of you that haven’t heard, COLBERTGASM was an amazing success. I’ve also been a lazy ass about spreading word of the Discordian Society’s immense and total spagtacular victory. Recently, I became motivated to give the project wiki an overhaul – check it out:

ColbertGASM

I’ve included many video clips of Colbert’s Discordian references – if you know of any more, let me know!

Let ColbertGASM stand as a flag that you can do crazy cool stuff by organizing people over the web. The OMGASM is a great way to organize people and find help for zany projects. Are you missing an artist, web designer, editor, idea machine, whatever for your mission? Want to create a mission for other Discordians to go on? Use OMGASM to amass an army of net Discordians waiting to do your bidding. If it’s fun, they’ll actually do it. And with an army of spags, you can do a lot of unbelievable stuff. Proof is in the link above.

Don’t just read about fun — GO HAVE IT — RIGHT NOW!

HAIL YES

Pirate Pass Off

download, ,

This game works best at parties, conventions, concerts, club meetings, college campuses, or any event at which people are gathered.

The fun thing about it is that the card will go through cliques very quickly as people ask their friends if they’re pirates. Then, once your social network is exhausted, you’ll have to find someone else, maybe a stranger, who hasn’t been pirated yet.

If you want, have people write their names on the back of the card when they get it so you can keep a log of where it went. You could also include “Please return to [your name here] at the end of the day”.

Once you’ve played once, you’ll be able to avoid getting handed a card. So once your pirate cards have made their rounds, throw this one in:

Download a PDF sized for business cardstock (I use Avery 5376 cards).

Download a PDF with larger cards in the “Magic Card” style. This set also contains the infamous NINJA card.

Another card that’s been suggested is the “BIG GAY COWBOY” card, where if someone asks you if you’re a pirate, punch them in the stomach. But if anyone uses the word “Buckaroo”, you have to give up your cowboy card.

I like how the introduction of variant cards modifies the rules and strategies of the game as it plays out.

Any other ideas for cards, or ways to twist the game midstream?

Bird and Fortune bring the damage

Humour, The Dismal Science, Youtube

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What it means to “think for yourself”.

Black Iron Prison, Discordianism, philosophy, Principia Discordia

Ah… what it means to “think for yourself.”

Most of us don’t, most of the time. 

I would include most of PD.com in that, sometimes.*  Because this gets wrapped up in one of the problems many of us have found to be a core issue of Discordia: the Filters, the Grids, the Prison Bars, the vital and trecherous habit of compartamentalizing.

If you start at the raw state (not the RAW state, mind you), you get an assload of sensory input.  So, the brain, all by itself, starts putting things in categories.  “This is like that, so we will associate these with those.”  Eventually, we work our way up to a rough understanding of the world.

This process tends to work pretty well, so we start using it in other ways.  But this is where we really start running into trouble.  Our compartamentalizing turns into generalizing, and slips into “All A is B.  This looks like an A, so it must be B.”  We look at new experiences as if they were old ones, so we can put new things in established compartments.

Essentially, without knowing it, we tend to fall into the habit of trusting people, or things, or ideas that are comfortable to our brains.  They get inside our bullshit detecor perimeter fence.  So when something happens, or someone says soemthing that falls within our trust zone, we accept it as truth without question.

Mind you, this is a fairly useful habit if you actually want to get things done.  There is much in this Universe that doesn’t affect you, and that doesn’t need to be parsed in fine detail.  I would guess that 95% of the shit that gets thrown at you every day isn’t really worth your time to fine tune.

But it’s that 5% that gets you.

So, back to that original point.  What is “thinking for yourself”?  I’d say it’s the art of going back to your assumptions, categorizations, habits, and tendencies, and breaking them down.  Figure out where you got your opinions.  What influenced you?  Do you trust them?  What are the counter arguments?  Which works best for you right now, not when you were 13?  Is “just because” a good enough answer?

You break down your opinions, and sniff out where you just went ahead and trusted something without a second thought.  That doesn’t mean you have to reject it; many times, you end up agreeing with it.  But now you have a more solid foundation of what you think.

*Do you like how I’m E-Priming the shit out of this?

Why Discordia is more relevant in 2008 – Discussion

current affairs, debate, Discordianism, Humour, Internet - a series of tubes, Law and Disorder, Law of Fives, media culture, Occult, Operation:Mindfuck, personal, politics, slack, society, Technology, terrorism, Trolling, war

Ripped this discussion, built on Cram’s earlier post and musings, from the forum.  Enjoy.

LMNO:  Because so far, nothing else seems to be working.  Because Discordia is about models, not absolutes.

Baron von Hoopla:  Bingo.

Cramulus: [to LMNO] that’s a great angle.  Could you expand on that a bit?

GA:  I don’t know about more relevant, because I wasn’t around 50 years ago.  It seems to me that the Cold War was in pretty dire need of some lightheartedness, even more than our current War on Terror.

It just seems relevant to me because I personally had (have?) a problem with taking things far to seriously.  And because many of the people around me have concepts like ‘mandatory’ and ‘forbidden’ and apply them to things that are really optional.

I makes me sad when people tell me that things like religion are to important to joke about, or old propaganda posters too offensive.  It bothers me when I get suspended from school or hauled before Loss Prevention for reasons like “I know that this is just a misunderstanding, but we must follow procedure.”  It hurts when I look around my infosphere and see nothing but advertisements, especially when those ads are meant to make people feel bad about themselves.

The world is ruled by an endless morass of strictures and convention, and no one wants to take responsibility for them.  People are perfectly content to let the train follow its own momentum down the tracks, even though they don’t like where it is or where it is going, because this is Policy, it’s what Everyone (the everyone in “everyone knows that…”) has Decided.  Rules and traditions might be annoying, but it’s Not In Our Power to do anything about them.

LMNO:  In today’s so-called “Information Age”, most of us are constantly bombarded with stuff.  Perhaps not with ideas, so much as pure input.  While for the most part this input is pretty much bias-neutral, an increasing amount of it is being supplied by people who have an angle.  What’s more, to get through to the growing population of Jaded Couch-Dwelling Fuckheads, there has been a new approach of making the stuff more-or-less self referential, as in, “we know you know we’re trying to manipulate you.  See how cool that makes us?”

So, what do you do when you are flooded by 50,000 points of view?  The old way was to have Rules and Tradition and Procedure and Black and White. To take that stuff and cram it into a narrow worldview, distorting what little information you actually notice.  Which only serves to hold you back, slow you down, and shut you up.

Our way, the Discordian way, is to make Temporary Models, make new Game Rules, to grab hold of the stuff and ride it out, making connections as you see them.  You do your best not to have your views manipulated by stuff, and you do your best not to manipulate stuff to fit your views.  Which serves to keep you on the Edge of What’s Going On.

At least, that’s the general idea.

Continue reading Why Discordia is more relevant in 2008 – Discussion →