Alrighty then, I'm just about ready to rattle off the email, but I might as well put this thread to more use and let you people nitpick improve my words. Thanks for the input, all, especially Cram (you can probably see I put in your shortform definition towards the end). I'm especially worried about my wording of the origin of Discordianism as MAL2 and Lord Omar "looking to explain chaos." I know that's part of the reason, but is it a tad...reductionist? I dunno. Feel free to add on to those defining ideas if you think I'm missing some big aspect of the PD there.
Here's the body as it stands, sans introduction, link to the PD (from this site, of course), and closing:
Like I mentioned after class on Tuesday, I'd love to hear your thoughts on joke religions; I suppose a more accurate name might be "parodic belief systems," as not all are necessarily theistic. I digress. As I mentioned to you, at the core of these belief systems is the desire to poke fun at theism, often done by taking its many tropes, adding a dash of humor, and either subverting them or taking them to the extreme in order to highlight the absurdities and silliness that often goes unnoticed in religion. Many of the more well-known joke religions are young, born just before or during the advent of the internet, and vary in complexity. Jediism and Dudeism are Buddhist and Taoist beliefs with coats of Star Wars and The Big Lewbowski-themed paint, for instance. Pastafarianism and The Invisible Pink Unicorn were created to criticize Christian intelligent design and creationism on one hand, and the arbitrary, unfalsifiable nature of religion in general on the other.
What I think you'll find more interesting, meanwhile, is the "joke disguised as a religion or religion disguised as a joke" that is Discordianism. It was founded in the '60s, a time where two young Americans looked at the world around them and wondered to themselves where all the strangeness and confusion, in their country of rules and order, came from. Their answer, as you might surmise from the religion's name, lied with the Greeks; they wanted a deity to help explain chaos, and Eris was a perfect fit. So, working from their central problem, the story of Eris throwing the golden apple into the crowd of the gods, and the anti-authority hippie counterculture of the '60s, the pair went and published the Principia Discordia.
Some of its defining ideas include:
"Every man, woman, and child on this Earth is a genuine and authorized Pope," whether they know it or not, and the fact that one is a Pope does not save one from criticism.
There is order in the world, as well as chaos, and both are an illusion of the mind that only mean something because we give them meaning.
Adherents are encouraged to believe what they want, and not let anyone's beliefs, even their own, be pushed on anyone else.
All of this, combined with subtle jabs at organized religion, including the use of numerology without a reasonable explanation, mocking the repetitive text in the Christian Bible, including absurd and vulgar phrases in its initiation rituals, and satirizing holy symbols (the Holy Chao is a very blatant Yin-Yang), makes Discordianism into a rather unique parody religion. Where there is basically one way to be a "proper" Pastafarian, there is no "proper" Discordianism; modern adherents say they have "their own" Eris/Discordia to worship as they see fit. For some, this actually does make Discordianism a religious experience. For others, it's "a collection of attitudes about beliefs, including skepticism towards organized religion, and a recognition of humor as something truly transcendent, which helps protect against rigidity, zeal, and ego." For others still, it's just a good excuse to make jokes. None of these viewpoints are necessarily "wrong" or necessarily "right."
