Rant 166: We are Suckered Again!

[Irreverend Hugh, KSC]

Rant 166
Those Damned Fnords! We Have Been Suckered Again!

A lady asked an Irish butcher "How can you be so cruel as to kill little lambs?"
He replied "An' ye wouldn't have me ate them alive, would ye?"

"Those who are dogmatic about not being dogmatic are the worst fanatics of all."

"...people stopped patiently building their little houses of rational sticks in the chaos of the universe and started  getting interested in the chaos itself - partly because it was a lot easier to be an expert on chaos, but mostly because it made really good patterns that you could put on a t-shirt."
-Terry Pratchett (from "Witches Abroad")

Discordianism/Erisianism is a funny sort of irreligion in that it is made up from scratch and actually admits to this (unlike other sorts of religions which are also made up from scratch but then try to say that it was a revelation from God, or that it was really the first religion or such other advertising schemes; sometimes I think that "scratch" could be a useful deity since it seems to be the material that goes into a lot of other things). The problem is when some Discordians or Erisians (which I will just call Discordians from now on for brevity's sake) forget this and try to get Discordianism established as a real bona fide and FDA approved grade A religion. This is not a bad thing in and of itself, but then we get issues like people believing in such absurdities as "Real Discordians" as opposed to fake Discordians and other such Graying of our fields. Unless it is a grand joke, none of us can really stand there (or sit there or fly there) and go around pointing out who are real and who are fake Discordians since we admit that our game is made up and thus as fake (or real, or rather fake-real) as about any other thing in modern human society.

If you don't like the way some other Discordian or some group of other Discordians are going about the whole thing, you are always free to form your own sect and excommunicate as many of those "others" as you can find. This has been the great thing about this "movement" and if we lose this and start getting concerned with legitimacy and organization and policing who is "real" (you can get a lot of "real" on sale at Wal-Mart) and who is "fake," then we pretty much become what I said over a year and a half ago: our own grayfaces. Why blame another when Grayface lives within ourselves?

What part of the phrase "you either get it or you don't" means that we need to go around taking out our frustrations on the so-called normals or pinks or grays that we claim to find showing up online in Discordian forums and such? What part of that phrase means that someone who doesn't "get it" will never get it? What? Have I busted a fundamentalist thought bubble? What? you say? "
But, Hugh," you say, "of course we can label other people and put them into pigeon-holes and categories to make ourselves feel better. Of course we can, Hugh. You see, we are special and not like everybody else." Explain to me why you feel you can't be labeled or pinned down and yet you turn around and try to label or pin down others. Explain to me exactly why you think that being a Discordian is any different from being any other thing? Explain to me how Discordian is not just another pretty label to excuse yourself of any responsibility to live your own life and be your own self. I have run across quite a few free people who never even heard of Discordianism. So what is really in the name? Who should care about it? Why? Does it even matter?

What would some of you do with yourself if Discordianism suddenly disappeared and you could no longer use chaos as an excuse for your lack of social skills? (I would actually be happy because then I could finally 'really(tm)' retire from the ranting business.) Some of you wail about freedom and how we are under threat and all that, but you know that is only so much more advertising. I don't care about DOOM any more than I care about Jesus coming back. (Though, if you seem Him when He does come back, I want the motorbike.) Every period in human history was filled with people going around shouting "DOOM! The End Is Nigh!" and all that blather. It makes good entertainment, but besides personal DOOM or specific places on Earth that got too close to volcanoes and such, DOOM has largely missed the bus. (Even with much of our world leadership trying their damnest to bring DOOM to the globe these days.) DOOM is yet another fnord-letter word.

"Real Discordian" is another fnord bearing title. You may as well say "You don't get it. Fnord." to all those who look at you in bafflement after you explain to them for the fifteenth time that Eris is really behind the insurance forms they have to fill out. Or the fact that when you go to any government agency, you have to wait in a line in order to be given a number so you can wait in yet another line, ad nauseum.

We are as infected with fnords now as the rest of the general population, though that much is no problem. The problem is that we pretend that we are not infected and riddled through and through with fnords. In our speech, our writings, our thoughts, they are all over the place and instead of seeing them, which we used to love doing, we are starting to deny that they are there...bringing us back around to the same sorry state we were in before we saw them and were able to be easily manipulated by the masters and the authorities in society who planted them there in the first place. How do I know that we are infected with fnords? Because of the knee-jerk reactions I see among us all whenever we come across some word or some thought which disagrees with us. Weren't our strings cut? So why are we all still acting like puppets?

And what's with all the sectarian squabbling among some of us? You know the deal. It happens about once every 2.3 months. The latest crop of "Real Discordians" goes after all the "Cookies and Pie Discordians" and instead of sharing perspectives and learning how to tolerate the fact that YES IN FACT OTHER INDIVIDUALS ARE DIFFERENT from both you and the way you think they should be, we attack one another. Nice play this is, huh? Eris plays another fucken joke on us at our expense, all of our expenses. And we fall right on into it. Again and again. Suckers. That's what we are. We can't even see past our own denial of our inner grayfaces or the fact that there are fnords, and instead of perhaps helping one another, if only for the laughs, we are falling for the Golden Apple Trick, AGAIN! (She snickers at us even now. I can see Her there with that evil grin. The grin that says "I keep making thousands of apples, I even teach you all how to make them for yourselves, and yet you still fight over each and every one that rolls your way." Eris is, BTW, a devil of a cognitive therapist. Though you may not want to trust the course of therapy since Her idea of healing has nothing at all to do with sanity.)

I find it funny that I have fallen for Her joke yet again. Especially since it is basically the same joke with few variations each time She plays it. I find it funny that the rest of you have fallen for it again right alongside me. Are we really THAT fucken gullible despite all our appeals and promises to the contrary? Damn. We have been punked, all of us. The whole damned Discordian Society. Punked. Played. By our own Goddess by all gods' sakes! Heh. I mean, you can say that it was bound to happen seeing as Eris is a deity and deities have certain advantages over us and all that, but come on now. That's just an excuse. Especially because each and every one of us knows the story of the First Golden Apple Trick, so we should have known better.

Remember that Grayface is not inherent in any system of organization, it is in our attitudes. Grayface does often use disorder and "chaos" as often as "order" and "law". So long as something gets hurt, maimed, killed, or destroyed, anything is useful for Grayface. The little Grayface inside each one of us has convinced us that yes, "I am the best, the prettiest one," and we are still willing to fight over it. In the meantime, the rest of the world keeps on doing the same damned thing. The difference is that we should know better, right? So I ask you again, what makes us Discordians any different or better or worse or distinctive? And does it really matter? Does it really amount to anything that each one of us feels unique and individual when every other person on the planet feels exactly the same way about themselves? Every one goes around saying "I'm not like every one else," while going around being like every one else. Then Eris comes along, laughs at us, Her supposed co-conspirators and drops in a shiny apple and we immediately set to proving that we are in fact quite like every one else. From the first Greek gods who fought over the first Golden Apple, right up until nowadays with Discordians going around trying to prove who is "real-fake" as opposed to "fake-real." And the fnords still jerk us around and we still get afraid of all those things we have been obediently trained to fear. We lash out in hatred and intolerance all the while claiming to be more open-minded and chaos-positive (or whatever the newest jargon words are).

The Grayfaces in charge of our societies have no need to worry about us, seeing as we never can take a joke ourselves, not even when it is specially wrapped, signed, and hand-delivered by our own Goddess. Instead of subverting the dominant paradigms we are fighting one another for the right to be recognized as the best subverters or the realest Discordians. Or some other such drivel that won't matter as the years go by, because (DOOM advertising follows) the Christian Fundamentalists will take over America and march all of us to our own nice camps with walls, barbed wire, and electric shock treatments where we can fight and squabble all we want amongst ourselves about who gets to go to the gas chambers first. "How," you ask me, "can you live with that prediction?" I don't know. Belief in reincarnation helps, I suppose. It's not over until it's over and is it really ever over? Maybe the next incarnation of the Discordian Society, (probably another 3 thousand years in the future) will get it right. Who can say? I am starting to have my doubts.

Discord 64th, 3172 / May 17th, 2006

-Irreverend Hugh, KSC;
Episkopos of the DSSS/PMM, Arch-Drunk in the Church of Eris, Sub-Underling of the Hoshi Church, Chairperson of the Dept. of Pigeon Evangelism for the Gerfrickdan Sect,
and (Con)Founder of the Flaming Church of Baby Jesus on a Motorbike.
(Failing these, there is always witchcraft. You know, pins and dolls and odd-tasting stews.)

[LMNO]

Hold on a sec. This is how I see it:


Discordian 1: Hey, let's write some stuff and try to get other people in on these ideas we've been kicking about.

Discordian 2: That's a good idea! I think Discordians 3, 4,and 5 would be interested in this, too.

Discordian 6: Stop getting organized and telling me what to think!

Discordian 1: What?

Discordian 6: I mean it! You're repressing my expression of Eris [threadjack threadjack]!

Discordian 1: Hey, stop threadjacking, asshat! We're trying to create something here.

Discordian 6: See? You're just like the Greyfaces!

::entire creative process falls apart amongst internal squabbling::

[East Coast Hustle]

And what's with all the sectarian squabbling among some of us? You know the deal. It happens about once every 2.3 months. The latest crop of "Real Discordians" goes after all the "Cookies and Pie Discordians" and instead of sharing perspectives and learning how to tolerate the fact that YES IN FACT OTHER INDIVIDUALS ARE DIFFERENT from both you and the way you think they should be, we attack one another. Nice play this is, huh? Eris plays another fucken joke on us at our expense, all of our expenses.

I don't think one person counts as a sect.

[AFK]

Do you suppose a one-person sect. needs to use a magazine?  

[eighteen buddha strike]

I think it is implied that a discordian should think that all other discordians are wrong.

[Shibboleet The Annihilator]

ZOMG! SUXORED AGAIN!

I think its time for more scotch, maybe a 23 pinealglandlolmix

[ñͤͣ̄ͦ̌̑͗͊͛͂͗ ̸̨̨̣̺̼̣̜͙͈͕̮̊̈́̈͂͛̽͊ͭ̓͆ͅé ̰̓̓́ͯ́́͞]

If Discordia exists and some people are more familiar with it's intricacies and history, and some people are less familiar,

then isn't it rational to be honest about your familiarity?

If you front, you're gonna get found out.  And disparaged for it.



Who specifically is fighting who in this fight to be the Realest Discordian, Hugh?

[LHX]

If you front, you're gonna get found out.  And disparaged for it.

in case anybody missed it

[Lord Daddy Lombrosis]

word

[Irreverend Hugh, KSC]

Hold on a sec. This is how I see it:


Discordian 1: Hey, let's write some stuff and try to get other people in on these ideas we've been kicking about.

Discordian 2: That's a good idea! I think Discordians 3, 4,and 5 would be interested in this, too.

Discordian 6: Stop getting organized and telling me what to think!

Discordian 1: What?

Discordian 6: I mean it! You're repressing my expression of Eris [threadjack threadjack]!

Discordian 1: Hey, stop threadjacking, asshat! We're trying to create something here.

Discordian 6: See? You're just like the Greyfaces!

::entire creative process falls apart amongst internal squabbling::

You said it better than me or anyone else.  I think we should nominate you as something.

[Irreverend Hugh, KSC]

If Discordia exists and some people are more familiar with it's intricacies and history, and some people are less familiar,

then isn't it rational to be honest about your familiarity?

If you front, you're gonna get found out.  And disparaged for it.



Who specifically is fighting who in this fight to be the Realest Discordian, Hugh?  

Appromimately three pigeons, four cockroaches, a cat, and several strains of flu virus are fighting currently. Why you ask?

[LMNO]

Hold on a sec. This is how I see it:


Discordian 1: Hey, let's write some stuff and try to get other people in on these ideas we've been kicking about.

Discordian 2: That's a good idea! I think Discordians 3, 4,and 5 would be interested in this, too.

Discordian 6: Stop getting organized and telling me what to think!

Discordian 1: What?

Discordian 6: I mean it! You're repressing my expression of Eris [threadjack threadjack]!

Discordian 1: Hey, stop threadjacking, asshat! We're trying to create something here.

Discordian 6: See? You're just like the Greyfaces!

::entire creative process falls apart amongst internal squabbling::

You said it better than me or anyone else.  I think we should nominate you as something.

DON'T YOU TRY  TO PUT LABELS ON ME!!1ONE  I AM TEH INDIVIDUAL!!!ELEVENTY!!11!!

[East Coast Hustle]

this thread alternates between "LAIL!" and "tee hee" on a post-by-post basis.

[LMNO]

what point are we at currently?

[Irreverend Hugh, KSC]

LAIL.