Eris, the Goddess of Strife

[Cramulus]

What does it mean when we say we Discordians venerate Eris as a Goddess of Strife?

Look, the world's a rough place. I am not cheering for suffering. I do not want violence and disorder in of themselves -- I only want them if they are in service to a genuinely better world. But it's the better world I want, not the strife.

(they say -- in a world of whoop whoop shirtless screaming anarchy, the discordians would be writing laws and building bridges)

I want to discuss the role of strife in service to evolution. This is, I think, how we Discordians can relate to Eris in the world of trump and fake news and extreme polarization and cats and dogs living together, mass hysteria.


Dialectics - the way things evolve:

1. Something is asserted or created
2. Something else reacts to it, usually based on a flaw in that thing
3. From contact between these two forces, the original something is revised, adapted, fine-tuned, or better expressed



A few quick examples-----

1. I explain some point or position
2. Somebody points out a flaw in my reasoning
3. I revise my position, taking into account the thing I didn't understand before

1. Slavery exists
2. Sensitivity to injustice leads to abolitionist thinking, which leads to civil war
3. Slavery is, for the most part, repealed (except the parts we tolerate, like it's fine for criminals I guess?)

1. Government implements some policy
2. The people who hate it protest, revolt, etc
3. Reforms / revolution / the old way is replaced by the new way

1. I'm hungy and I suggest that we get takeout AGAIN
2. My fiance reminds me of how much I spent at the bar last night
3. We eat in

1. A hypothesis is asserted
2. It is tested, its flaws are exposed
3. The hypothesis is defeated or revised, becoming closer to truth

1. I do something shitty
2. eventually I perceive that shittiness and feel genuinely bad about it
3. I become the person that doesn't do that thing anymore

1. Thesis
2. Antithesis
3. Synthesis


I conceptualize these three steps as three "forces" present in the universe.

The third force, the reconciling force, the revised position, the inner truth, the holy part, will only appear once the first two forces are in sufficient STRIFE. They must come into contact and really war with each other.

Most of history can be understood as the interplay of dialectical forces. And I'll go out on a limb to suggest that all of your personal moments of evolution are the product of two forces coming into contact within you and something else emerging.

Consider the drunk, caterwauling through the streets at night. Someone opens a window and shouts SHUT THE FUCK UP. But the drunk does not hear it, or does not care, becuase of Jack Daniels - there is no contact. The strife has not yet reached the level to affect the original position. But down on the street level, someone confronts the drunk directly "GET OUTTA HERE OR I'LL BEAT YOUR ASS LIKE EGGS" - something gets through to him and he calms down or clams up. Or maybe he's too drunk to comprehend even that--and instead, communication must take place using the ancient language of pushing and hitting and saying "Oh a wise guy, eh?" and three-stooges style whackbonk.

You can visualize this exchange as two forces in opposition - only when they are evenly matched will the drunk recognize his own behavior. Too much sauce, and the drunk will not become self aware. Too much opposition, and we enter a cycle of provocation and violence with no introspection.


And so when we praise Eris, Goddess of Strife, perhaps what we are really saying is that we want things to Get Real.. We want the confrontation between the world that is and the world that could be. We want the flaws in What Is to be demolished by truth, evolution, understanding, introspection. We want the truth that's been tested, the self that's been in the crucible, the reasoning that's been picked apart and scraped clean, the society that's been reconciled.

[The Johnny]

Speaking of the mind: the only state in which the mind achieves "peace", "calm" and "lack of inner conflict" is death. So we can aim for a reduction of conflict as a goal of mental health, but seeking to eliminate it is a flawed ideal for the aforementioned reason.

What Im getting to, is that conflict will always exist where there's diversity and where people play different complementary roles - even within a totalitarian society where all opposition and diversity has been exterminated, their inner bureaucratic instances will conflict each other in some way due to their respective assigned roles and objectives. Or simply put, the extermination process of diversity and DIFFERENCE will go on until nobody is left.

True conflict only exists between equals, otherwise it just devolves into slaughter.

[minuspace]

This reminds me of something I read this morning in the NYT.

An eminent Lithuanian rabbi is annoyed that his yeshiva students devote their lunch breaks to playing soccer instead of discussing Torah.
The students, intent on convincing their rav of the game's beauty, invite him to watch a professional match. At halftime, they ask what he thinks.
"I have solved your problem," the rabbi says.
"How?"
"Give one ball to each side, and they will have nothing to fight over."

[altered]

For me, Strife is in the sense of Striving, because I do not know how to stop and I need a Goddess who can keep up.

Fortunately, Eris isn't just able to keep up, but to run laps around me.



This isn't a clever joke, I am completely serious. I just can't think of anything else to say about it.

[Cramulus]

Speaking of the mind: the only state in which the mind achieves "peace", "calm" and "lack of inner conflict" is death. So we can aim for a reduction of conflict as a goal of mental health, but seeking to eliminate it is a flawed ideal for the aforementioned reason.

What Im getting to, is that conflict will always exist where there's diversity and where people play different complementary roles - even within a totalitarian society where all opposition and diversity has been exterminated, their inner bureaucratic instances will conflict each other in some way due to their respective assigned roles and objectives. Or simply put, the extermination process of diversity and DIFFERENCE will go on until nobody is left.

True conflict only exists between equals, otherwise it just devolves into slaughter.

Yes, this is the holy strife --

May we always challenge and be challenged.
May we always be uncertain and need to weigh something within ourselves.

Eris, please help the universe act as a mirror, that I might notice and become sick of my own bullshit.
Eris, please help me act as a mirror, that others might notice the shit they're caking up around the mouth, and wipe.

[Cramulus]

I'll add that what makes this a spiritual matter is that we can seek it both inside and outside. It applies to every level of the fractal: the microcosmos & the macrocosmos.

What the world needs is the same as what the self needs.

If we participate in the strife within ourselves, it helps the world.
If we participate in the strife within the universe, it helps the self.



I also want to note that I used the word Evolution in the OP very purposefully - the "third force" is not just a term for natural selection & adaptation, but development, advancement, positive growth. Becoming higher. Getting closer to truth.


I'll close with a few aphorisms from the Chaos Marxism Primer:

• 28. The only antidote to mass-produced identities is an Identity of Opposition which is combined with a practice of effective opposition.
• 36. Dialectical materialism is the process of seeing which futures are possible, based on the contradictions of the present, and what kind of pressure on what kind of points right now will bring about which future.
• 126. To defeat an enemy you must become symmetrical to it - then we need some kind of "egregore" (or cultural metaphor for struggle) equally strong on our side