Intermittens Volume 11: Post-Truth
Author: Alana; The Aftermathematics Research Cabal; Comrade Dingo; Elwood P. Dobbs; Pip; Queen Gogira Pennyworth, BSW, AFSS; Saint Angrémonn the Hasty; divynation; Patacelsus; Brother Kr!S; Mavis235; Bwana Honolulu; Cramulus; Milambit the Drained, Seer of Stars; Cpt. Bucky Saia; Saint Tiwesdaeg Twohands
Date: 2021-02-19T00:00:00+00:00
Description: Now for the first time on home video, a historic collaboration of Discordian Authors and Thinkers, loosely orbiting around the idea of post-truth and what to do about it. Includes material from (one of the several) never-before-published prior attempts at an issue 11!
Publisher: House of the Rising Hodge Publishing

Intermittens Vol. 11: Post-Truth

50th Chaos, 3187

Table of Contents

1. Title Page
2. Editor's Note
3. The Color Truthers
4. Tears for the Tyrant
5. Five True Facts
6. There is *A* Moon
7. Some History
8. Discordian Dark Elves
9. Who the Fuck is Eris?
10. Internal Alchemy of Discord
11. Genius Loci
12. ARS
13. Making Gods for Fun!
14. OrMeK – Servitor and Agent of The Goddess
15. Shifting Entropy – Phoolian Magick

16. An Illustration of the Rungs of Thud according to the HBT

17. IMXI.A1: The Problem, As I See It

18. The Swan Versus The Idiot

19. Post-Truth: Madness as a Gateway Drug to Truth

20. The Stone of Rild

21. The Truth about Chemtrails

22. Finding Eris in Pagan Religious Iconography

23. Eris and the Golden Truth
24. Dear Truth
25. Aktion23 Ad
26. Go Check 'em Out!

Guide

1. Cover
2. Table of Contents
3. Start of Content

Editor’s Note

I write this on the 6th of Chaos, 3187. Insurrectionist MAGA terrorists have stormed the US Capitol building. A pandemic rages on outside. The idea that there is such a thing as truth is crumbling, replaced by degraded reality tunnels crashing into one another. We truly are living in the interesting times. God may have abandoned us, but Eris remains — and if any goddx could be our guide now, it’s Her. That rising tide of post-truth and hyperreality was what spawned this issue. We Discordians need an infusion of new blood for the 2020th-century, stat.

When you look at the world today, I want you to ask: “How does my religion work for me? How can I make it work better?” I myself have been guilty of seeing through others’ eyes, of refusing the sacred responsibility of taking Discordianism into my own hands. I remind you, as I have myself, that it is your sacred papal duty to interpret, cut-up, add to, and otherwise push the boundaries of this little experiment we call our own.

In other words, “Think for yourself, schmuck!” And then share with the class, please, so we all may benefit.

So sit up, pay attention, and enjoy this latest issue of Intermittens, and write something for the next one, whydoncha?

This 11th edition of Intermittens (published a whopping 10 years after the previous publication! It lives… It lives!!!) was organized, compiled, and put together by Yours Truly, Alana of the Textual Walls, Sovereign of the Sovereign State of Confusion, Themme Fatale, HRH, KSC, ETC, who has only helped with a magazine once before. Huge thanks to Pope Guilty for suggesting the idea and helping with various decisions, Bwana for drawing the cover and conspiracy theorists, and everyone who submitted a piece and/or tested formatting on various devices.

All work is Kopyleft — released under a CC-BY-SA 4.0 license. Go nuts!

The Color Truthers

Impressions by the Aftermathematics Research Cabal

The Aftermathematics Research Cabal held its meetings in the secret basement underneath the Slice of Life Pizzeria. One day, another cabal found its way into the secret hideout. They wanted to talk shop.

“Did you know,” asked one of them, named Fester, “that colors aren’t real?”

“Ah, yeah, in a sense,” said Cramulus, “Colors are a phenomenon of the brain. Light becomes color when it’s perceived. But when there are no eyes or brains around, there are also no colors.”

“Wrong, idiot,” said Fester with a smug laugh. “You only think colors are real because you’re a sheep that believes everything you’re told. You still believe in shit from children’s books, like Santa Clause and Socialism.”

Veronica asked, “Do you mean the labels we put on different wavelengths, such as BLUE and GREEN, are merely cultural constructs? A social agreement and not something that exists in reality?”

“Fuck no,” said Fester as he brayed in her face, “that’s the stupidest shit I ever heard.”

Doktor Rhizic Natterjacks said, “Do you mean that colors are a subjective experience — there’s no way to know if the RED I see is the same RED you see?”

Fester rolled his eyes, “I’m done engaging this idiotic point. You don’t see Red. You only see shades of Grey.”

“I can see colors,” said Burns. “Can’t you?” Burns thought to himself, “maybe they’re actually color blind.”

“No,” said Fester. “No one can. If you actually think about it, it’s obvious. But you’re a wave slave.”

“Wave slave?” asked Enki-][, raising an eyebrow.

“You’re a slave to wavelength theory. Just another sheep with a closed mind. You dismiss everything you don’t like, calling it ‘conspiracy theory.’ You put no effort into understanding, only dismissing…”

→←

“I am genuinely curious,” said Pope Lo-Fi Study Beats, “What was the moment like, when you became a Color Truther?”

Fester said, “I tried to deconstruct Color Truther arguments, and realized I couldn’t.”

Fester’s friend, Piano Elf, said “Fester taught me to embrace what I’d always felt in my heart.”

Lo-Fi reflected on the double edged swords which are the heart and mind.

→←

Frater Toast was confused, as usual. He came at the Color Truthers armed with a vague memory of a physiology of perception class he took in college, many many years ago. His points were rusty. He assumed he understood what he was talking about, but the Color Truther’s counter-arguments were sharp; they were well practiced at having this exact conversation. Every time Frater Toast made an argument, they deconstructed it with an already-prepared and personally insulting meme.

Fester danced around every point: “Oh really, you think light is a wave?”, “Oh really, you actually think colors have an objective basis and not a cultural one?”, “Oh fuck, you seriously think your culture’s view of the world is ‘right’ and all other cultures are ‘wrong’? How very colonial and racist of you.”

Now Frater Toast was even more confused than usual?

→←

Oannes shook his head sadly at Fester.

“You see, you aren’t going far enough. You’re correct that colors don’t exist. However, it goes much deeper than that. Vision isn’t real. What you naively think of as seeing is really just your imagination. You’re just overreacting to being touched in the eyeballs by light and freaking out and imagining an entire new sense, vision, to explain the discomfort of your eye being poked by all those photons. Very understandable beginner mistake. First day in your new body? Well, in any case, I have an appointment to attend to.”

With that, Oannes disappeared into the bathroom, where Reverend Other Trouble was doing his best handstand in one of the stalls.“It’s way easier when you can rest your legs on the wall,” the Reverend explained to the shadows under the door. “Now to unbutton my jeans… wait FU-”

Meanwhile Doktor Rhizic Natterjacks, with a twinkle in his eye, took another stab at Fester’s boundaries “Surely you’ve seen the great many Cryptids inhabiting our world, take for example the Loch Ness Monster, can they not see the colors?”

“No, you smelly color-brained moron! Cryptids don’t exist! What sort of fool do you take me for? Look for yourself, even if they were real, there is no color for them to see! LOOK!”

→←

Seeing the conversation playing out, Sini Mini decided not to participate and went to the Private Cabal Bathroom and was not seen or heard from for several days.

→←

Excerpt from the Book of Pink, Chapter 17: Versus 4567

4. Saint Tiwesdaeg spake unto the multitude thus: there are many colors and they are joyous to behold. You are participating in a collective disillusionment created to confuse you, blinding you to the greater truth that you are free to become better than you are. Cast off your chains and open your minds, that you may partake in the understanding of the greater universe around you and through understanding gain enlightenment.

5. And the Believers did stir in anger toward these words, for they were rigid in their beliefs and unable to accept the truth. Their hearts were hardened in their bondage to the color fallacy spewed forth by the demagogues and soothsayers, who sought to control them.

6. And it came to pass that Saint Tiwesdaeg was wrought with sorrow for the iniquities of the people of the Believers, for he had compassion for all his fellow man, that he wished all would be enlightened to true understanding.

7. But after a time, he shrugged his shoulders and spake, hey man, I tried.

→←

Fester’s voice blasted like a foghorn at those remaining in the room, “Do you know why the Pope wears a pointy hat and carries a small staff? Or in other words, CONES and RODS?” He bellowed, turning a triumphant pirouette, “The CHURCH is part of the CONSPIRACY and it goes all the way to the TOP!”

In the corner, Dozens Sin-Leche stopped shuffling his papers and stood up. He crossed the room and presented Fester with a single long stem rose. It had five soft yellow petals and five sharp green thorns. Fester sneered as he snatched it from Dozens’s hand, and Dozens smiled and returned to his desk where started dutifully stashing all his loose change.

→←

Doktor Rhizic Natterjacks consulted the porcelain goddess a great many times, and consulted Fester a great many times. A great many questions were asked about frequencies, vibrations, rods and cones, and other details. But little information was actually exchanged.

“Only a degenerate wave slave would ask such infantile questions. None of your facts are substantiated, it’s just a bunch of low-level woman tactics. I’m a pope and I don’t have to take this from you.” Fester festered.

“How can I learn to see clearly like you?” implored Rhizic, but Fester’s reply was the same “Look for yourself. Do your own research.” But everywhere the Doktor looked the colors danced and played, darkening in the shade, blaring in the light. Everything he researched said there is no truth to the color truther’s arguments. “How do I see what you see? Teach me,” he begged.

Fester waved him off, “I’m not wasting my time educating people who don’t put in the basic effort to understand.”

Finding no revelation from this self-anointed grandmaster, Natterjacks went to excremeditate in the Cabal Bathroom indefinitely.

→←

“Okay, dipshit,” said Veronica, “give me three sources—credible sources. Nothing from people who think Jesus is coming back tomorrow, nothing from people who think crystals cure cancer, nothing from your mom. I heard enough from your mom last night.”

“Of COURSE you only listen to what the LAMESTREAM MEDIA tells you. How much are you paid by Big Paint Chip?” said Fester.

“Right, yeah. Fuck off and die,” said Veronica.

When she had spare time, she googled “Color Truthers” and saw this asshole was part of a larger movement. As she found connections, she looked deeper and identified the parts that were connected to misogyny, white supremacy, anti-semitism, and other similar fun disgruntled-white-cis-guy things. Then she wrote a blog post linking to takedowns of the Color Truther ‘arguments’ (if you could call them that), and otherwise just making fun of them, so that people who hadn’t encountered those arguments would have more information about how bullshit they are. She also posted about Fester on social media, connecting his aliases and real information.

Veronica is sort of petty, especially when she’s dieting.

→←

The Pterodactyl Handler had run into people like the Color Truthers before. Their idiocy was fascinating to him, like some rare and contemptible pokemon. Every time they explained a facet of their worldview, the Pterodactyl Handler rolled his eyes so far that it hurt his face. This made him feel smart.

But the Pterodactyl Handler was mindful of a process that seemed to happen automatically: as he listened to each point, a oppositional reaction formed in him. If they said that the cones in the retina were merely the result of a sloppy biologist, he became emotionally invested in the cones’ existence. When they mocked Isaac Newton’s description of a prism, Pterodactyl Handler became instantly confident in Newton (despite only having a 5th grade understanding of his work).

The Pterodactyl Handler enjoyed the sport of debate, this allowed a subtle antagonistic process to rule his thoughts. If he wasn’t careful his beliefs would become a simple reversal of an idiot’s thoughts, which would only make him an idiot squared, inverted stupidity is not intelligence.

→←

“I feel bad for this crowd,” said Swami Heart Chakram. “As Discordian High Priestess St. Mae once said—one role of the Discordian Priest is Clergy for the Strange. Lost and lonely lunatics are our flock. The world was not designed for us, we have little control over it, and that makes us all outsiders. But that’s actually a very special place to be.”

“They’re special, all right,” said Pope They-Goat, “Especially dumb as fuck.”

“I feel,” said the Swami, “everyone you see out there in the cold hard world should be considered one of the walking wounded. No one in history has been blasted with so much persuasive information on a daily basis. You are privileged to have brains that can sort everything into True and False in a way that doesn’t upset the people around you.”

Cramulus scratched his chin. “You’re saying that we should view Color Truthers as victims of information overload… kinda like dyslexic people living the early literary world. We call them frustrating idiots but maybe they just have bad wiring?”

“Maybe! But I don’t know about the term ‘bad wiring’ either, it implies that some brains are right and others are wrong… but have you ever noticed how much of our culture was conceived by tortured geniuses?”

Pope Kris tha Wizard stuck out his tongue, “Confusion giveth, and Confusion taketh away.”

“What I’m saying,” said Swami Heart Chakram, “is that we don’t have to get so emotionally invested in all this. Who cares what they believe? Whether they think colors are real or not doesn’t affect me. We’re in a confusing book together and they interpret the book differently. To quote Beckett, ‘That’s how it is on this bitch of an earth.’ It’s okay to draw boundaries, because they are acting like jerks. But let’s not become assholes ourselves.”

→←

Cramulus walked into the bathroom for a moment’s respite. One by one, his Cabalmates had given up arguing with the Color Truthers and left the room. Now the bathroom was full, and the Aftermathematics Research Cabalhouse was occupied by the invaders. Through the slowly closing door, Fester could be heard, still carrying on:

“Every company is in on it, you BETAS. Dulux. Du-Lux. Two Lights! ONLY BLACK AND WHITE. THEY’RE MOCKING ME. They think I’m a CU-,” the door slammed shut, leaving only the sounds of Fester’s muffled shouting and the drip of the leaky tap on the far side of the room.

“Is it still going on out there?”, asked Rev Other-Trouble’s shoe, hooked over the top of one of the bathroom stalls.

“Yup,” Cram replied, addressing the shoe. “Still going.”

“Do they seem like they’re enjoying themselves?” asked the shoe.

“Only sorta? They’re excited, and very angry.” Cram walked over to the sink. “They won’t talk about anything else. We’ve tried.”

“Well fuck me for hoping for a surprise, I guess.” The shoe adjusted itself again, this time a little more violently. “It’s like it says in that book we use to keep the library door open: ‘A man will renounce any pleasures you like, but he will not give up his suffering.’”

“Fester’s stuck like that until he gives up feeling like every question is a violent attack on his very being. His worldview requires him to be persecuted, and us challenging him is part of the persecution. A feedback loop, tied right into identity. They’ve managed to crystallise a permanent ‘I,’ a strong self, like we’ve been trying to do in this cabal. But The Notorious G.I.G. would call it a Wrong Formation or some shit. A big ‘I’ rules over Fester’s being, crystallised, but dead matter.”

Cram grinned, “Yeah, Gurdjieff would call them ‘Hasnamuss individuals’. Strong intellect, but it’s a slave. They have lopsided pineal glands.” He heard a lot of splashing and grunting from behind the stall door. “You seem in a good mood,” said Cram.

The shoe seemed to shrug a little, one of its laces gesturing resignation. “My zipper’s stuck, and talking to it isn’t gonna move it.”

“Have you tried worrying about it?” Cram said with a smirk.

The shoe smirked back, before falling into the stall with a loud thud.

→←

After all that had come to pass, Frater Toast was no longer so confident in his own understanding. He said to Cramulus, “Can I say, for certain, that I am immune to whatever damaged these people? How much of what I ingested as truth is true, false, or meaningless? Hell, I worship a Greek Goddess as envisioned by two stoned teenagers in 1959. Who made me (of all people) the authority?”

“Your doubt,” said Cramulus, “is medicine. We Discordians, we gnostic popes, are at risk. When you understand that you are a genuine pope, that you are the wise master who makes the grass green and the flowers beautiful, it’s very easy to build a fortress out of the facts you want to believe. Once you come into contact with A Truth, the rest of reality reorganizes itself around that truth, and that can make everything else seem made-up and fake.”

“Our world is now full of these little irreality-cults, ideological bubbles which float away, detached, coasting on currents of misinformation and fake news. We are now all in contact with this phenomenon, it manifests at multiple scales. The Color Truthers (color-blind solipsists who reject the reality of color for all people) are just one appendage of a larger body. The body is upset, smug, sure of itself, its emotional state causes facts to be sorted in a bizarre, often harmful way. (those poor Chaos Mages who were advised to ‘fake it til you make it’ — aren’t they part of the same body?)”

Frater Toast asked, “How should we relate to all of this? To Color Truthers and Flat Earthers and QAnon and whatever comes next?”

Cramulus shrugged, “As far as their belief itself? Maybe it’s not about whether they’re right or wrong. Maybe it’s not even about them. Maybe they can serve us in the form of a mirror. I seek to understand. So I observe their patterns, noting the traps that they fell for, trying to recognize these things in my own life.”

“But should we fix them?” asked Frater Toast.

“Can we fix them?” replied Cramulus, “The Principia Discordia says It is an ill wind that blows no minds. I think this means we should only attempt to fix what can be fixed. And I am pretty sure I can’t fix most other people. But I can fix myself. And I need a mirror to do it.”

→←

Finally, Cramulus said to Fester, “We do not reject you because our beliefs are different. Our cabal rejects you because you are bad guests. You are not here to participate in our group dynamic, you have not brought a dish to share at the potluck, you are here to wage some quixotic ideological war and recruit people. And because of this,” Cramulus summoned up his Authority Voice, “you are no longer welcome.”

To everyone’s surprise, Fester quietly bowed and made his exit. His friend, Piano Elf, remained.

Piano Elf had been with Fester for a long time, looked up to him. Piano Elf only saw the world in shades of grey, and for most of his life, he was deeply frustrated and saddened every time someone said “Look at these leaves change,” and “Look at this beautiful sunset.” Was it beautiful? He was skeptical.

Eventually, that frustration became anger at people who were having these remarkable aesthetic experiences. Fester’s ideas had transformed Piano Elf’s color blindness into strength, framed it as an insight, a unique perspective that was missing in this world.

Everyone agreed that Piano Elf could stay as long as he played nice. Piano Elf found that the Aftermathematics Research Cabalhouse underneath the Slice of Life pizzeria was much quieter after Fester left. They spent a lot of time meditating here. As he sat in silence with them, he realized that, despite different techniques, they were now meditating together.

With the weariness of a veteran, Piano Elf looked at the great full moon, bloated with the energy he had unconsciously fed it over the last few months. The moon glinted off Piano Elf’s sword as he tossed it into the lake.

Tears for the Tyrant

Comrade Dingo

O tremble ye man o’ faith; weep ye mighty warrior? The Dragon is dead, the tyrant slain, and you with bloody sword, eyes welling with tears? Why these sobs and sighs? Will you wash the blood off the troll’s angry wounds with salty brine? Will you seek to drown the vanquished giant, already dead from a well placed sling-shot?

Will you talk big, then sob and splutter with woe when rewarded with your heart’s desires? Go forth and celebrate! Drink! Party! Dance! Pound on the drums of history with the bones of your defeated enemy!

The tyrant Truth is dead; will you mourn? Will you dress in black, bow your head, perhaps tap at the corners of your eyes with a little silk handkerchief? You who proclaimed, “Nothing is true, everything is permitted!” You who spat on the putrid corpse of ‘is,’ kicked the rotting bones of ‘I,’ and pushed aside the greening entrails of ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ You who flashed your sword and reduced all modalities down to their barest forms, who flaunted the great death machine of ‘Maybe,’ who plunged your dagger into the back of the skull of Reality and stripped off the flesh until all that was left was Subjectivity and Illusion. Will you falter during a rousing speech, crying out that, “Belief is the death of intelligence,” to break down in childish tears at the sight of the broken body of the Despot Truth?

We have defeated the monster, and the townspeople have emerged in the streets with boisterous jamboree. Will now you regret your heroic deeds, now that you find some of them are ugly, stinky, and have hair in their ears? When they get shitfaced in the streets, yelling about ‘Q’ and ‘microchips in the vaccines,’ and ‘Antifa death squads,’ will you panic and start the dark art of necromancy? Will you now attempt to raise the tyrant from his grave?

Pathetic! Pathetic! If the vile dead god Truth was so powerful, how did we kill him? If the objective heart of the demon Truth beat with pure factuality, how did we ram our lance straight through it, penetrating the bloody ventricles, puncturing the meaty sinew? Even the tyrant Truth was built mostly of muscle and bone. His immortal halo was made of cheap halogen lighting, his glowing golden robes were purchased at Target. Remember that echoing, authoritarian howl? “This is the way things are! This is the world that’s possible!” And his many bladed fingers that danced like spiders: Capitalism, Morality, Authority, Family, Sexuality, Gender, Hierarchy, Health, Progress and Spirituality. These commanding blades, these iron walls, these mighty stone towers and turrets that towered over us and commanded our movements, torn down, destroyed, reduced to rubble. And we, the victorious insurgents, will we kneel down and water the ruins of the tyrannous state with weeping? Will we mark the passing of this monstrous apparatus of control with hymns and dirges? We cannot.

We cannot stand slack-jawed in shock when we break down the stone walls of the dungeon, and shatter the proud iron of the jail, and realise that some of the bent and twisted figures emerging from the darkness are rather unwholesome looking. We cannot be struck with regret when we split open the dragon’s stomach to pull out the bedraggled townsfolk and see that they are not like us. Authority crushes and stomps on all — it does not live only in the monsters and beasts, but in leeches, ticks and lice. It is in the giant who stomps, but also in the petty villager who wished for their neighbour to be stomped. It is in the evil king who raises a great wall, but also in every glad heart that loves the wall. Will we let our hearts falter, and fall to such false love? We cannot!

We must fart with contempt on the despotic face of the dictator Truth. We must hack the raggedy corpse into pulpy meat and feed it to stray dogs, or dump it in the ocean like a wreckage. We cannot mistake its claws and fangs for the authentic glowing grains of light that represent pure power — the truth that cannot carry the name Truth, the greater force — the truth that lives in gravity, that makes a virus deadly and flickers through physics like crackling lightning. We see these grains in the tyrant, but too few to power the whole beast, only arranged apart like a shattered shield, assembled disparately like a fractured sword.

The Truth is dead! We have killed it, and we should kill again! We should cut every head off the Hydra, raze every walled city to the ground, topple every great tower and dance and play in the ashes and rubble. Truth is dead! We can play now, we can build now, we can explore, we can experiment. Truth is dead! And you, woman o’ faith, who tells tales of Goddesses, of speaking Orang-utans, of Greyface monsters, of magic and mystery, will you now retreat and proclaim a fear of tall tales?

Will you stand at the great mural of reality, the great illusion whose power we have broken, and waste time wagging fingers at they who run around the edges tagging their names? Rather we should spit contemptuously at this great lie, piss on the swirly hyperreal strokes and lines and grin as the paints wash into each other, warping and waving until the deception of the great canvas is rendered naked beneath. We should smile as we see the painted people melt like witches, imagine their screams; “Men are men and women are women!”, “Capitalism is the only proven system in history,” “We couldn’t live without authority,” “What would we do without progress?” Their painted little mouths melt and the words with them, puddling into streams of paint and fluid, the putrid mess of a dead world.

Truth is dead and we are free! All is unleashed, all is possible! We cannot put anything back in the box, we cannot unmake the made. We live here now; we must learn to build beneath the playful sun that tickles the gasping land where no great tower any longer casts its commanding shadow.

Five True Facts

Elwood P. Dobbs and Pip

“You’re saying it’s a falsehood, and they’re giving…alternative facts to that.”

— Kellyanne Conway

“And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

— John 8:32

Truth is truth, right? But in this day of post-truth “alternative facts,” rampant hyperbelieved no-evidence conspiracy theories, and a maga-popular serial liar whose favorite phrase is “believe me,” what can we believe? Worrying about what’s true or not can keep you awake at night, hiding under the covers lest the vampiric jackalopes get you.

Well, worry no more, friends. You don’t have to rely on Big Media for the truth anymore. And you don’t have to turn to bitchy, conniving, unreliable, treacherous Goddess Discordia either. And you certainly don’t have to send all your money to the Church of the SubGenius (just send $35). We’ll tell you what to believe for free! (Donations accepted).

Here’s Five True Facts You Must Know. See if you know which of these are true and which are false.

1. Australia is a Real Country.

FALSE

Yes, we know you’ve heard that. You’ve read the claims that it can’t be real because the Earth is flat. If Australia existed, it would be on the bottom of the planet and all the Aussies would fall off. Which wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing.

But you can know it’s not real for two much better reasons: it has kangaroos and duckbilled platypuses.

Kangaroos, really? A deer-headed creature that stands on its hind feet like a penguin yet hops around like a four-footed coney? Oh, and it sometimes has two heads, one on its shoulders and another, smaller head sticking out of a slit in its belly? (No, we don’t mean that slit.) Talk about a really stupid myth that nobody in their right—or left—mind would believe.

And platypuses? Sure, a web-footed beaver with the bill of a duck? Oh, and it lays eggs and, get this, has a poisonous sting—in its ankles! It sounds like something cartoonists Robert Crumb, Jenny Coopes, Al Capp, and Laura Park invented together while visiting Squishface Studio and smoking Cracked.

2. Lee Harvey Oswald Killed President John F. Kennedy.

FALSE

All right, this one seems pretty obvious. All True Discordians know that Oswald-impersonator Kerry Thornley aka Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst shot Kennedy from the grassy knoll after being mind-controlled by the CIA and the Secret Service through the MK-ULTRA affair, right? Wrong.

After Kennedy’s death, there were reliable reports JFK had an affair with Playboy’s first bunny Marilyn Monroe, right? Close. The fact is, John F. Kennedy IS Marilyn Monroe! JFK was a closet female impersonator. That’s why there’s not a single photo of the two of them together (if you don’t count the one by Cecil Stoughton, but that’s obviously a coverup and a fake. How could it be a real photo when they’re the same person?)

3. Vaccines Cause Autism.

FALSE

Actually, the reverse is true. Autistics create vaccines! In turn, vaccines create killer T-cell responses and anti-bobbie immunity, and work much better than that terrible Rabbit test. Autistic SubGeninuses invented the shots to protect themselves from anti-SubGenius Pinks and proto-SubGenius Bobbies. Vaccines carry incredibly tiny people who migrate through the bloodstream (see the documentary Fantastic Voyage) and finally enter the pineal gland where they commune with Goddess Discordia. When she’s not feeling bitchy.

4. The Illuminati are Behind Everything.

FALSE

The truth is, the Illuminati are behind in everything! Don’t believe that nonsensical fairy tale, “The Tortoise and the Hare.” The Illuminati tortoise, hiding in its New World Orderly shell with its slow, long-term, secret plans, didn’t win anything. When’s the last time you saw “slow and steady” win the 100-metre dash?

By the story, the news of the race was reported by a “fair fox” judge. Can you really trust a fox with the news? The fox claimed the hare was far ahead, then egotistically showed off by taking a nap before finishing. The tortoise, in its slow, methodical, orderly, conspiratorial way, supposedly crawled quietly past the sleeping lagomorph, and won the competition.

The fact is, the hare first won the race, then took the nap. With the tortoise still not there when the hare woke up on the winning side of the finish line, it got tired of waiting. It went to an organic carrot juice bar, and had a good time with Fiver, Flopsy, Sheba, Peter, Max, Buster, Ruby, Marlon, Mr. Bun, Bugs, Lola, Honey, Brer, Babbitty, Roger, March, White, Jessica, Janet, Harvey, and Quicky. OK, truth is they had an orgy.

5. Yeti are Dimension-Hopping Aliens from Planet X Who Live in the Flat Hollow Earth and Once Stored Nuclear Waste Hidden on The Dark Side of the Moon Guarded by the Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog which Exploded Due to the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch which Sent the Moon out of Orbit which is Why the Moon We See Now is a Fake.

TRUE

Obviously.

About the Authors: “Elwood P. Dobbs…is one super sweet boy — he’s bonded with his buddy Pip so if you desire 2 bunnies these boys would love to live forever together. But if you promise to love and cuddle him — he’d be your best buddy too!” — 2nd Hand Ranch & Rescue

Our Lady of the Wet Volcano has services every other Setting Orange at 02.02.02 hours UTC (that’s 10.02.02 local Malaysia Time). Services are open to all card-carrying members of the Church of the SubGenius. Admission is absolutely free (with a required donation). Find us at 2020 Fuch Chow Lane, Shathead, Malaysia.

For more information, visit our website at ourladyofthewetvolcano.com

There is *A* Moon

Queen Gogira Pennyworth, BSW, AFSS

Holy Nonsense

Somebody is going to come along and tell you you have to Question Everything because what you perceive and what I perceive are two different, potentially completely unrelated things. Because *your* headache might not be *my* headache and all attempts at empathy are delusion and there are no shared public objects, only consciousnesses bumping into each other talking nonsense about things that we can’t possibly understand or even agree on. They will make you question the existence of the moon.

Fuck that guy.

There is A MOON. There is not a moon for each and every one of us, JUST. ONE. MOON. It hasn’t been here forever and it won’t last forever either, but here and now, as you and I are breathing THERE IS A MOON. It is not painted on the background. It is not an allegory. It hasn’t been replaced with an identical duplicate while you weren’t looking, and they didn’t swap it out for a different model in the international release. THERE IS A MOON.

It EXISTS, and existing is a thing that objects are capable of because THE MOON IS THERE. It has properties we can measure and when you measure them or I measure them or Xinglbratt from the Marcabian Empire measures them those properties are CONSTANT because THE MOON IS A THING THAT EXISTS. It has pock marks from old collisions where it EXISTED SO HARD SOMETHING ELSE STOPPED. It’s covered in dust that will give you MOTHERFUCKING MOON CANCER which is a THING that is REAL and can FUCKING KILL YOU DEAD.

It EXISTS, and it EXISTED. It taught your ancestors about measuring time and sloshed around the tide pools when life was small and weird. It shone on Kingdoms and Empires and FLATWORMS, and it shone on them ALL THE SAME.

There is A MOON and it is made of REAL THINGS and you can point a laser at it in just the right spot or send a piece of REALLY REAL EQUIPMENT into MOTHERFUCKING SPACE to take pictures of it and send them back, and as long as you know how to send things into space you and everyone else who looks will see the same pictures of the same places because THE MOON IS A THING THAT EXISTS.

SONGS are SUNG about it, TIDES HAPPEN because of it, BUZZ ALDRIN put his GODDAMNED FEET ON IT.

There is A MOON because the stories we tell about our own memories of that particular piece of rock may vary but they do not affect the THING THAT EXISTS and doesn’t give a shit what you say about it. There is A MOON because there was a moon for every single person of every single tribe before we got together and shared a name for it because it’s A BIG GODDAMN ROCK IN THE SKY and you can’t exactly miss it. Nobody infected us with the moon.

There is A MOON because it doesn’t change when you say “the moon is orange” and just because you see it one color through the filter of the atmosphere and your eyes and your idea of what “orange” is doesn’t change the fact that it is a THING made of atoms and those atoms are arranged in mineral structures and most of it is anorthosite which is just another type of feldspar and feldspar is so bloody common the name literally means FIELD STONE. You can tell stories about it ALL DAY LONG and it won’t change at all, unless the story you’re telling is HEY ROGER LET’S DICKBUTT THE MOON in which case lasers get involved and the moon gets a dickbutt and EVERYONE SEES IT because THERE IS ONLY ONE MOON.

And it matters that there is A MOON not because I am your oppressor and you are the oppressed, but because WITHOUT A MOON YOU CANNOT AFFECT ANYTHING. The realities in your mind are all well and good and entertaining, but the existence of THINGS means that you have the capability to ACT ON THOSE THINGS. That you can interact with others and leave behind a world subtly changed by your presence. That when your meatsack fails and your consciousness with it, THE STORIES YOU TELL CAN SURVIVE.

You are not pointless, you are not incapable. There is a moon.

It is REAL, and so are YOU.

Some History

Cramulus

Young Kerry Thornely hated conspiracy theory.

He thought conspiracy theory was how the People in Power got you to bark at cars and shadows, instead of them.

Kerry and Greg Hill concocted the “Illuminati is behind everything” conspiracy, and propagated it through letters to Playboy magazine (at the time edited by their buddy Robert Anton Wilson). They wanted to create a conspiracy theory that was SO RIDICULOUS AND OBVIOUSLY IMPOSSIBLE that it would shed its aura of fakeness on OTHER conspiracy theories, thereby dispelling them.

Young Lord Omar wanted us to be upset at the ACTUAL PEOPLE who hold the power, and not fictional/theoretical boogeymen. Then the world got weirder and more complicated, and the ridiculous became plausible.

Robert Anton Wilson’s Illuminatus! trilogy kinda went in a different direction — it indulged in the ecstasy of conspiracy theory. The truth is five sided, but we only get to see one side at a time. In this complexity, Lord Omar slipped into the darkness. He was haunted by Garrish specters, and wandered, lost in the mountains, for many many years.

Now we’re far out there too.

But it’s time to come home.

Discordian Dark Elves

This illumination brought to you by Saint Angrémonn the Hasty, KSC, Indirector of the Old Illusionated Seers of Bonn.

Discordianism celebrated its first heyday in the sixties and seventies in the period in which the postmodernist ideology was still new. It celebrated its second heyday in the late nineties, that is the time when the post-modern ideology had reached a new peak in about five years after the collapse of Eastern European totalitarianism. The Discordianism of these two episodes was therefore imbued with similar mindsets. Very often, the Discordian action was largely understood as a symbolic act, and it was hoped that through interventions of ultimately purely symbolic nature, ie within the symbolic order itself, which did not really touch the substance of this order, but rather represented small oddities, one could expand people’s thinking. In its second phase this belief was additionally fed by the new “deviant” cultures of hackers and programmers who actually believed to cause substantive changes with pure symbolism in their daily work. Many of these folks are today well-paid, productive and integrated members of the symbolic order of capitalist society, for which the word Discordianism means mostly a sin of youth, similar to other people’s ouija sessions or telling urban legends around the campfire. At best, they see him as a pseudo-spiritual New Age parody to which they laugh off at lunch as they do to funpics and lolcats without really being affected. Of Hagbard Celine’s saying “Nothing is true unless it makes you laugh, but you don’t really understand it until it makes you cry,” they only want to know the first part: Discordianism without substance, spiritual diet cola, comparable with books like “Zen for managers.” All this shows the fundamental failure of their approach.

The Discordianism of this past is in a coma from which it will not wake up. Its own timidity and lack of substance in combination with the suction effect of the post-modern ideology has brought it down. We should be so gracious as to shut down the life support and to reinvent ourselves. We, the Discordians of today, can not be the cute, funny and transparent ELFes of the past. We have become dark elves who wander in the dark places of the world to bring their repressed truths and fundamental fantasies to light again. We walk in the shadows where no one else travels. We also make use of symbolism and ideology of the ruling order where we consider it appropriate. But we use it to show people their repressed and concealed dark shadows. Our will to create shock and confusion and arouse are unbroken. We have only corrected our ideas of how it was reached. By nice speeches stating facts which are already clear to everybody anyway, you reach no one. A leaflet that just whines about existing conditions, the ones about which everybody else already complains, will not be distributed by us! A leaflet, a sticker, a word, however, that tells us that repressed truths and what fundamental ideologies are associated with these conditions, we will carry in all directions with the unbroken, indestructable enthusiasm of those who have no hope.

In this situation, it is time to emphasize the darker side of Chaos and the Goddess more. Eris is not a New Age goddess, no gender-normed post-modern career woman, She is not Gaia or a mother goddess, who would pretend equal validity and diversity while letting any distinction drown in the fog of indifference at the same time. Eris is rather militant, pugnacious, almost stubborn, and insists to the mere sake of insistence on Her positions and ideals, even if no one understands it any more. The other Greek goddesses are no incarnations of various aspects of Her, and to say something like that is bordering on blasphemy. If you want to compare or associate Her with other gods by all means, then you should compare Her to the ancient creatures and elder gods from the sick fantasies of H.P. Lovecraft which are lying and lurking in the shadows of the World: Ancient, inscrutable, unfathomable and incomprehensibly terrible. To look Her straight in the eye is not a good idea if one values his own physical, mental and emotional health, and when the Discordian does so anyway, he does it so as to find new ways to deal with it. So today, he stands as “vanishing mediator” between the pure, psychotic madness and a late capitalist normality which is less and less distinguishable from madness.

In a way, the Discordian of today is the only one who is still sane.

Who the Fuck is Eris?

divynation

Let me tell you all about our dear Godess I know at this Time. Actually the correct Things about her for sure you just have to believe! ^.^

I like the Thought that Eris is a Godess of Richness and Fertility because the Apple is in his global Meaning a Symbol for that. Maybe she was exactly this in her Beginning or it’s just the Part of her called “Eris,” the other Site “Discordia” is this lovely sick Queen of Chaos and Discord that brings more from all this weird Stuff that she should bring they say. I’m no big Fan of it. She is so much more than this malicious Bitch, searching for Revenge or whatever they want lay on her. It may be right, but it’s still wrong, Eris in all her Beauty to ignore. She is a Godess from the Stars, she is the Beginning and she is what ever you wanted to see. Because she is One of the very first Beginning, out of the deepest Chaos. She is the Law and she is the Nature. The very first Lady and she goes beautier and beautier. Like a Star she shines brighter and brighter to light up all the Way to her Fairytale for all Discordians out there. It’s no Secret, never trust all to 100%, just make your own Opinion. There are Truth’s like Pumpkins and each Pumpkin is his own little World with a Variable of the Truth and they have all their Reason to be. So how can you say you knew the absolutly Truth when every Pumpkin has a real Truth from a Truth and that is her. She shows you all these confusing Theorys about the Truth and at the End you don’t even know more than a Pumpkin. Still Smiling in the Dark with her Light in your Heart.

My Judgement is, Eris is for me more Eris than Discord. I have the Feeling since I saw her in all her Beauty she saved me more and more from all this Disorder in me and in my Life. It has a Reason why I’m on her Path. She is my great Witch-Godess. The Mother of everything. Of fucking everything. She gives us the Power to wake the Forces that are in us. That’s what happend. She is Godess of Love, she is the Beauty, the only One. And now she got you too! ^.^ For me she is Life, also because the Addiction to the Five. Witches know the Magic of the five Elements and so for me was it so clear what they mean, this clever Discordians. Eris is so to say the Essence of the Five (western) Elements. Five is Life, simple as that. It’s a very good Value for everything imaginable, her Numbers are pure Magic. I’m a little discordian Witch! I want to rule the World! And she helped me. What you want more? I owe my life to her. My Life get’s more and more better with her. Perfect Match so to say. I had a long Time Issues to find my Pantheon and i’m glad to going forward with her, so they said she is also the Strength that push you to Success. All the Anger and Discord changes, she took it from me and I wish to share this Wonder with others. So I create a Lot of Things to honor Discordianism and it feels good. Sometimes it was a little too weird and absurd, but i’m still on the Way.

Since then I call me in Duty of the E.D. When I could I would build her a Temple and maybe I can call me a Priestress of the great Godess Eris Discordia. Can I? ^.^

The following coloring pages and accompanying texts are excerpts, used with permission, from Patacelsus’ Fnord O.M. Putz. Print, color, enjoy!

(You may want to visit the PDF version for higher-resolution pages)

Internal Alchemy of Discord

Whenever you find the scene getting too heavy out there, try this out. Ancient Atlantean Discordians would often use their own subtle bodies to take in the authoritarian order vibes of Greyface and radiate back happy discordant egalitarian vibes in an alchemical purification. It works like this. You take a seat, close your eyes. Breathe in through your nose, and as you do, imagine a grey, black lined, smokey material entering your lungs. It is all of the regressive, reactionary, authoritarian energy and ill will in the world going into your nostrils and into your body. Hold it there for five seconds, and then blow out transmuted rainbow vibes of discord that encourage free thought, love, blessings and creativity through your mouth with an audible sigh.

Genius Loci

The ancient Roman Discordians knew that sacred geography is where it is at. Locally sacralized geographic locations can reinforce local power structures. Less reified sacral locations, usually placed in some distant holy land or perhaps Nowhere, the city that is home to the Invisible College, can challenge authority. Is it possible, you think, to create local sacred geography that challenges power? Can we bring the City of Nowhere out of the imagination and drop it on the map?

ARS

This is the secret of magik. ARS. The word itself is Latin for art, skill, technique, proficiency, science, handicraft, and accomplishment. ARS also means “way and means,” and is both the way of, and the means to success in magik. Chaos magicians taught that there was an altered state of consciousness to be achieved, the so called “Gnostic State.” Utter bulllshit. It is by making art, ARS, that one achieved magick, “The Art.” It is literally that, the secret spoken plainly by the ancients! When one does art, one has meditative focus, being in the “zone,” and therefore achieves an altered state. For one also has inspiration, is involved in an act of creation or a performance, and makes offerings to those who watch, be they community, ancestors, or the Gods. The Chaos magician does not go far enough, and this is why ARS is superior!

Making Gods for Fun!

Here’s a fun project! If you haven’t done this before, try this out. Make up a god or goddess, or a genderless divinity if you like, go total free-form; and then worship it on an alter. Many reading this I imagine will already have an alter. Draw a picture or make a clay figure or whatever, and add it to your alter. It doesn’t have to be a major god, unless you want that, it can be a minor god, a house god, the spirit of your family’s Genius, or a tutelary spirit. Again, go total free-form. And then…, nothing. It’s Art. Keep doing it, or stop. Or go further with it. Create a whole pantheon. Write horrible fan fiction about them.

OrMeK — Servitor and Agent of The Goddess

Bruder Kr!S dem hocherhaben-schwererleuchtet-und-leicht-benebelten & Matanga la Changa aka The-constantly-changing-and-permanently-elusive Mavis235

Edited by Jean Jacques de Fault

The creation into being of OrMeK

The year is 3183 of our Lady of Discord, the entire collective and individual consciousness of the humanoid habitants of Earth is dominated by the demons from the region of Thud1. All of the consciousness? No, in the depths of cyberspace, a small discordian cabal of the auspicious name Aktion 23 remains in unflinching resistance! Hail Eris! All Hail Discordia! According to the Board’s AI log, on the 37th day of Boomtime in the season of Chaos, an event of possibly aeonic scope took place in the headquarters of said cabal. During a philosophical discourse on entropy, five discordians realized at the exact same moment, that the amount of entropy in their respective hangouts had passed the acceptable critical threshold by far.

So, they came up with the idea to create a network servitor in a chaosmagickal ritual and task him to aid with cleaning and ordering stuff. The result was an entity of in the class of broom-beings; his representation looks like a walking broomstick with eyes and arms. The name of this being is OrMeK (Ordne meinen Kram – german for: organize my stuff). OrMeK is a master of housecleaning. His character is defined by his helpfulness and obedience and as his names suggests, he just loves to assist in any sort of cleaning and organizing work.

OrMeK has some sort of access to the dopaminergic System of his creators and of those to choose to connect to the servitor network2. This allows him to provide his caller with the necessary initial motivation to start the ordering processes. As he can influence the secretion of some neurotransmitters, especially from the group of endorphins, he rewards successful clean-up action immediately with feelings of happiness and satisfaction. By regularly working with OrMeK an automatization of this behaviour sets in due to the principle of operational conditioning.

Sounds good right? But OrMeKs potential reaches far beyond bringing order into your cave! He also has the ability to collect entropy, save it and dump it to some place specified by the magician. This means OrMeK is far more than a willing housekeeping helper. He can be used as a powerful weapon for the precise spreading of entropy and confusion on a target like… the headquarters of a conservative party, the tax offices or other potential greyface3 institutions like the local police station. The more input he gets, the mightier his potential as a chaosmagickal weapon will be – so hook into the network, feed OrMeK with the entropy in your room and consider well marking some targets to have him dump entropy for you.

From servitor to flying monkey

In the following months after his creation we worked on the memetic spreading of OrMeK. He was introduced to different circles of magicians and has won a notable amount of practitioners working with him. His inverted sigil has been positioned on different strategic targets to mark points for the unloading of collected entropy. With all this attention and the increased traffic of his network, OrMeK has gained even more power.

And so it came to pass, that Cpt. Bucky “Saia” Sterntänzer, the servitors name giver, saw some remarkable development in his dream. An energy vortex in all the colours of the rainbow manifested and from it emerged a flying monkey with a mohawk.

On his chest he had a shining tattoo of OrMeK’s sigil and in his left hand he was wielding a weapon, which upon closer looking revealed itself to be some sort of a big broom. The flying monkey formally saluted and then disappeared again into his colourful vortex.

The manifestation of OrMeK in the form of a flying monkey is of historical scope for erisian mysticism. The bowling alley revelation of the Sacred Chao to Omar Ravenhurst and Malaclypse the Younger in the 60s (according to the Gregorian calender), was also given by a monkey. OK, the Principia doesn’t say anything about any wings on the monkey, but this detail could have as well just have been forgotten, which is only human considering the magnificence of such an event.

But those are just details. What do we know about flying apes or Ser-Apes4, as they are also sometimes called? Not much, to be honest. Most of what we know is hear-say or wild speculation. According to the law of fives, there should be five of them. Each of them should represent one central principle of Discordianism and probably they are each ascribed to an element and a season.

Aside from the Ser-Ape from the Principia Discordia in the bowling alley revelation5 and OrMeK, we know about Billbob Cipherpants6, who represents the principle of foolishness of the season of confusion. According to one of our legends, something great will happen, as soon as all five flying monkeys have manifested. We also believe that the flying monkeys are some sort of intermediaries between us and the goddess. The Ser-Apes have the ability to intervene in the worldly affairs and to manipulate them in according to their will. Probably not always according to HER will, though. An affinity to St. Gulik is not likely, since he doesn’t represent a core principle of Discordianism and is merely a messenger of the goddess. Since the knowledge of the Ser-Apes is more recent, this field of study is very young and speculative, so far.

What principle does OrMeK represent? Behind his ability to help with creating order, he has the potential for shifting entropy and negentropy at his own will. He could represent the very principle of the Sacred Chao, which on all levels supports the structure of “reality.” His duty to balance out order and disorder in the universe, guaranties the possibility of existence itself while maintaining the flow of Chaos. Would the flow stop, the universe would reach a perfect order and become static, life could not continue to exist. Life is anarchic.

Therefore OrMeK can be seen as an agent of the Sacred Chao, his task being of maintaining the balance, the push and counterpush of the Hodge and the Podge. There is some similarity to Ubik, a concept from a novel of Philip Kindred Dick7. Ubik is a force that functions as the glue of reality and prevents it from losing coherence and structure. If there isn’t enough Ubik, the time-space-continuum alters and things from the past or future appear in the present. Everything sinks into “chaos.”

Does that sound familiar? Maybe dear uncle Phil’s hand was guided by the same intelligence as our wands when we created OrMeK? A difference between Ubik and OrMeK remains though. Ubik can only create order. Our flying monkey can work in both directions. Sure, we mostly use him to ban the entropy from our rooms, but at the same time, he can store that entropy and dump it at some target spot instantly or later on. If OrMeK shifts order or disorder is therefore dependant on which side one is on. OrMeK can support and maintain structure as well as bring about change in gridlocked situations applying some entropy to disrupt static structures. Applied to the inner workings of the mind, confusion can be used to break up patterns of thought that limit our thinking and therefore our reality.

So what does this have to do with Eris? Well, Eris disengaged from worldly affairs to give us freedom in development. Maybe she realized though, that we people still suck at keeping the dynamic balance of the Sacred Chao, maybe she saw that the aneristic saturation has become overwhelming and she has send us OrMeK as a flying monkey to help us out in maintain the cosmic flow.

Does this mean we are entering a new aeon? Being in contact with OrMeK, we can establish some influence over the cosmic flow, or at least we can ask for his assistance in doing so. Is that not a helping hand from the goddess? It is the aspired goal of the chonk8, to be her playful partner instead of just being her plaything to poke around. OrMeK might be something like the prototype of the phool9, charged with maintaining the balance of the Sacred Chao.

Shifting Entropy with OrMeK

To begin working with OrMeK you first need to hook into the OrMeK network. It is an open network without any special security mechanism. We strongly advice against trying to use this network in any anti-discordian endevours. OrMeK has advanced to an agent of the goddess and he has his own consciousness and will. If you don’t believe so and don’t take our warning seriously, your apartment and your life could end up as a cosmic trash dump in a very short time.

So, how do you hook up into the network? The only “passcode” you need is the very name of the flying monkey and his sigil. After a proper discordian banishing ritual, get into gnosis with your preferred technique. Focus on the sigil either using its drawn form or by visualizing it and repeating the mantra “OrMeK, OrMeK, OrMeK, OrMek, OrMeK” for 5 to 23 minutes. You can also use the flying monkey or any kind of broom-being for visualization instead of the sigil. After that, you can enter into direct communication with OrMeK through words, visualizations, chants or mudras and ask him for assistance. Afterwards you should place his sigil on typical focus points for entropy like the kitchen or your desk. The rest is a no-brainer. It is useful though to chant his name for a couple of weeks at first while doing the clean-up. Once you feel well connected, you can consider choosing targets to dump the entropy on. You can do this by commanding him to dump your entropy on a certain point or by placing an inverted sigil on that place and thus marking it as a dumping place that may be used by other magicians as well or by OrMeK whenever he feels like it. Dumping entropy can take the form of creative disorder and inspire people or of confusion in the surrounding environment. Confusion allows the mind to be opened to new ideas by dissolving blockages of thinking.

OrMeK will highly appreciate if you celebrate his birthday on February 6. by doing a thorough spring cleaning on this day.

We encourage you to experiment with OrMeK and the shifting of the entropy using the principle of the Sacred Chao and shift around some Hodge and Podge! And let us know about any results you get at the Forum of Aktion2310.

HAIL ERIS! ALL HAIL DISCORDIA!

Sweetmorn The Aftermath 4th, YOLD 3183

References (in some order or not):

Principia Discordia or how I found the Goddess and what I did to her when I found her: The Magnum Opiate of Malaclypse the Younger & Lord Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst. Ronin Publishing Inc., Berkeley, 2006, (The edition number of this particular copy of the holy book is unknown).

Kerry W. Thornley and Roldo Odlor (2017): “Goetia Discordia — The Book of the Demons of the Region of Thud,” Bathtub Books, Durango Colorado.

Adam Gorightly (2014): “Historia Discordia: The origins of the Discordian Society,” RVP Press, New York.

Philip Kindred Dick (1969): “Ubik” Doubleday Press, New York.

Footnotes

1. Thud: The Region: “ruled by an oligarchic dynasty of domesticated primates descended from the Alpha Primes of our shambling and pelted ancestors and they impose a shadow of Illusion over it that allows them to continue their rule. This shadow and Illusion are the region of Thud. The inhabitants of Thud, save from a few believe that Thud is ‘The real World’ and programmed by the Illusion not only to accept it but get very agitated and upset if anyone suggest otherwise.” Furthermore: “It’s the ultimate trap-cage combo – you are born into it and even if you see through it, there’s nowhere to go. Most people stay in Thud because it’s too much effort to escape and unless everybody gets out, nobody does. This situation has created a permanent state of war but not the noisy, messy kind….. this is a Reality War, where one side imposes an Illusion that gives them the illusion of power, the opposing side attempts to locate and install Reality. This has gone on since before the primates of Thud even began to get domesticated and after all the crawling centuries all the con has done get slicker.” (Kerry Thornley and Roldo Odlor: “Goetia Discordia”, p. 9-11) ↩

2. How to go about that and what do to with OrMeK once you do, we shall explain in a following chapter. ↩

3. Greyface: A person that sometimes consciously but mostly unconsciously emanates aneristic vibrations. ↩

4. More about Ser-Apes: https://wwwww.aktion23.com/wniki/doku.php/diskordianische-taeologie/milz/serape_englisch ↩

5. Principia Discordia, pages 13 and fnordward. ↩

6. Billbob Cipherpants: https://aktion23.lima-city.de/wniki/doku.php/diskordianische-taeologie/milz/erismorphing/billbob_cipherpants ↩

7. Philip Kindred Dick (1969): “Ubik” Doubleday Press, New York. ↩

8. Chonk is a neologism of the words chaos and monk. The female form is chun from chaos and nun. A chonk or chun is someone that has dedicated his/her life to the goddess and propagates her jolly message of chaos, confusion, freedom, creativity, life, anarchy and laughter into the world. They are constantly trying to better their relationship to her and advance from being her playball of chaos to being a conscious playmate of the goddess in the game of the cosmic flow. ↩

9. Phool: A discordian magician who is aware of the existence and impact of oscillatory instability (eristic and aneristic vibrations) and knows how to manipulate it to use the released energy for discordian magick. ↩

10. Aktion23: Is one of the biggest online discordian cabals in Germany, a think tank for Chaos and other non-sens. The Fnorum can be found here: https://wwwww.aktion23.com/fnorum/. ↩

Shifting Entropy – Phoolian Magick

Bruder Kr!S dem hocherhaben-schwererleuchtet-und-leicht-benebelten & Matanga la Changa aka The-constantly-changing-and-permanently-elusive Mavis235

Edited by Jean Jacques de Fault

Discordian Magick is a relatively new field of study as well. Captain “Bucky” Saia developed some thoughts on it based on an Essay by Lord Falgan1. Some of the basic concepts for Discordian Magick are well documented in his Book “Discordian Magic – The magic of the phool or how to wrack ones brain without snapping.”2

Central for Discordian Magick is the dynamic balance of the Hodge and the Podge represented in the Sacred Chao. Order and disorder are no absolut Truth. They are filters through which we perceive and make sense and no-sense of reality. The phool knows this and is able to manipulate this states to gain energy to perform magick. Shifting the Hodge and the Podge creates the necessary energy for any magickal operation, furthermore, the friction of this process can create a flicker in the time-space-continuum, in which the magick can unfold.

This process can be internal or external to the phool – if one can even make a distinction there. If a phool happens to find themselves in a very eristic mind-set, enjoying the chaotic flow the goddess provides in such a state, but somehow needs to master a task corresponding the region of Thud (like making your tax declaration or writing a job application), this can be difficult to accomplish. Here is where one can make use of the Sacred Chao principle to get the required structure into the cognitive process. This process however does not release much energy through friction, more likely it harnesses energy that’s already available into more ordered patterns to get the intended focus. The energy released in this process is comparable to the energy released in the transition from one phase of matter to another.

If the phool is in an eristic mind-set in an eristic environment there is also not much usable energy released through their interaction, there is just not enough friction, although it is always fun to ride that flow. Bigger amounts of energy can be harnessed through interaction when contradicting potentials of mind-set and environment encounter each other creating friction similar to the one of a bicycle dynamo, only that we are not talking about electromagnetic energy here. The energy released from this friction we call the dynamochaotic friction potential or dynap. The five fingered hand of Eris represents this pretty well. It depicts two contradictory forces clashing.

This is the case when the phool interacts in an aneristic envirorment with an eristic mind-set or in an eristic environment with an aneristic mind-set. An accomplished phool will always be aware of the dominant principle of the Sacred Chao in their environment and of the state of their own mind-set. They have also all sorts of techniques to shift from the Hodge to the Podge or vice versa in their mind-set as well as influencing the direction in the surrounding environment and thus creating the necessary release of dynap for the magickal operation at hand. The big advantage of this kind of magick is that the energy required is not from the magician, he can access the energy released during the shifting of entropy.

Discordians, chonks and phools are used to this kind of energy clashing, to some extent we seek this interactions to recharge or to gain inspiration. The central nervous system of a greyface can have adverse reactions to noticeable amounts of dynap though, since they are not yet equipped with the techniques to process and harness this energy. One helpful reaction to a load of dynap would be loud mad laughter, a sign of being close to Eris.

The more unconventional, innovative, unusual or unfamiliar the interaction, the more dynap will be released and the stronger the magick. This creates a temporary overload of the frontal- and neocortex. For a greyface this is a state of probably uncomfortable confusion. Phools know how to use this moment of confusion to manipulate the target in any direction to the Hodge or the Podge. Or to manipulate their own mind structures to free themselves from constricting concepts and narratives and move forward on the path of illumination.

Masterphools have the required empathy and tact to prevent the target from closing up to new ideas and thoughts with an aneristic block. The aneristic block happens when the central nervous system of the target overloads, it is a protection mechanism of the CNS to maintain basic functionality. If this happens, the possibility for magickal manipulation is obstructed and the phool should retreat. The amount of dynap that can be released in any given clashing interaction obviously depends on the number of phools and greyfaces involved.

There is also the possibility of creating an eristic or aneristic focus. Such an object will constantly emanate the respective energy waves into its environment, thus releasing dynap. An eristic focus can be any object that makes no sense in its environment, one that has apparently no function at all, like an empty can inside a jar. An aneristic focus can be an object that usually represents order, like a paper clip. Creating such a focus can practically allow a phool to harness dynap for a magickal operation from the distance.

A good example of this technique was given to us by Eris herself. The golden apple she threw into the banquet at the wedding of Peleus and Thetis had no place there at all. Therefore it created a bigger amount of confusion. The engraving reading “kallisti – to the priettiest” focused this rather unspecific confusion into a discordant path thus ending in a big fight manifesting into the Trojan War on earth. The engraving worked as a lightning rod and steered the released dynap into a predefined direction. It is important to define a target for this energy to get better magickal results. Also this will help to discharge most of the energy thus preventing an aneristic block.

Sweetmorn The Aftermath 4th, YOLD 3183

References (in some order or not):

Principia Discordia or how I found the Goddess and what I did to her when I found her: The Magnum Opiate of Malaclypse the Younger & Lord Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst. Ronin Publishing Inc., Berkeley, 2006, (The edition number of this particular copy of the holy book is unknown).

Captain “Bucky” Saia (2017) “Discordian Magic – Die Magie des Phools oder wie man sich das Hirn verrenkt ohne Durchzudrehen”: https://magicbook5.blogspot.de/p/discordian-magic.html

Lord Falgan, F.M., K.S.C. Mu Cabal, Novus Ordo Seculorum Erisium (1991): “The Principles of Discordian Magick – A Very Loose Discussion” A Document to be included in the forthcoming Confunomicon, Pineal Research Lab: http://heru-ra-ha.tripod.com/library/discord.html

Adam Gorightly (2014): “Historia Discordia: The origins of the Discordian Society”, RVP Press, New York.

Footnotes

1. Lord Falgan, F.M., K.S.C. Mu Cabal, Novus Ordo Seculorum Erisium (1991): “The Principles of Discordian Magick – A Very Loose Discussion” A Document to be included in the forthcoming Confunomicon, Pineal Research Lab. ↩

2. Captain “Bucky” Saia (2017) “Discordian Magic – Die Magie des Phools oder wie man sich das Hirn verrenkt ohne Durchzudrehen,” from the depths of the fnorum of the Aktion23. ↩

An Illustration of the Rungs of Thud according to the HBT

The Bwana Honolulu

There are 7 prefectures, descending to Thud Proper. From the top: a drained-feeling cave of bones with a black dragon watching from a hole, then a bright shoreline with a blue dragon waiting in the water, then a verdant forest with a green dragon watching from behind trees, then a firey hellscape with a red dragon, then an impossibly-geometric gate reading NOTHINGNESS, then a meadow with a yellow dragon covering their eyes, then a desolate inkscape with thin, running, oil sprites, and finally a snowscape, peaceful, with a white dragon underneath the warm snow.

IMXI.A1: The Problem, As I See It

:: Alana, HSP, KSC, ETC :: 35 CHS 3187 ::

Listen for optimal reading experience: Once in a Lifetime (Vaporwave)

CW: Description of how depersonalization/derealization feels

The Realization

We’re all the same person in two senses — the sense in which the fingers are all part of the same hand, and the sense in which we’re made of the same stuff, a blank slate differentiated by experience. Holding this in mind, think about anti-vaxxers, flat-earthers, and people who take 40 items to the 15 items or fewer lane. Shit, we’re them! They’re us! “There but for the grace of God go I” my ass. There go I!

Whatever social strange attractors you’d never fall for, you already have. The “at least I don’t believe that” thought? They have it about you. The homogeneity of human experience means the same mechanisms at work in climate change deniers are at work in you. I know for a fact that I could become a flat-earther. Or a “scientific” racist. Step back, look at this picture, see the web of beliefs and counter-beliefs. There’s no bottom to the world, just signs pointing at signs. The simulacrum has achieved liftoff and taken us all with it, blind moles digging reality tunnels in an asteroid headed into deep space. To eat this reality spaghetti, we’ll need a fork of cosmic proportions.

Immediate Responses

You wander infinitely shifting sands, constantly re-arranging themselves, ephemeral, with no bearing. Every step takes you to a new room in the Library of Babble. What’s real?

Advance or retreat. Dive into the morass, entangle yourself with the memeplex and fight for it, care about the discourse, let this small slice of quasi-fictional metasocial diatribe become not only worth having opinions on, but worth arguing for, a staunch defender against a raging tide, righteous and just. Rinse, repeat.

Or sequester, delete, disengage. Turn gray. Fantasize about life on a commune in the woods. Pick a hobby and don’t ever discuss it online. Feel guilty you don’t know who Rude Julian is or that you haven’t read Deluze and develop a meek learned helplessness to engaging with complex topics. Become so disconnected from consensus reality you once again ask “what’s real?”

Derealization

One and a half years ago, something happened that left me with intermittent derealization. You know how when you’re driving, you become the car, and when you park, the locus of “you” falls inwards to the body driving it? For me, dissociation is like going half a step further in and getting stuck. Your mind slows and cottons. The world becomes a singular entity, with you the sole observer. Nothing is real; everything is wrong. You’re caught in the fault line of existence and nonexistence, the shearing forces tearing you apart. You stare into space blankly, shoulders hunched, teeth clenched. You’re in a beige office after closing time, and throwing up in the bed at 3pm. You want to escape (this place, this feeling) but can’t. It’s hard to move. Your mental spotlight is wide in space and narrow in time — present in the forever-now moment constantly through all-encompassing fear.

You’re a foreigner in your own body. You can piece together past thoughts, motivations, actions, and explain how you got here, and who and what these people and things are, but it’s unsatisfying and hollow. Nothing feels real, like your field of vision could come crumbling down like a powerpoint transition any moment and you’ll either die, wake up as an alien, or float disembodied in nothingness forever. You settle into a passive, hopeless disarray and wait for it to pass.

“What’s real?” This is the refrain of modern life. Burnt out from news and socials, cynical, we cash our reality check — and check out. It feels just like dissociating, losing faith in all the threads that tether us to the world. If I could come to believe the opposite of everything I do currently, what’s the point?

The Chaos Magicians Have Entered the Chat

The idea of reality selection is not new. “All models are false, some are useful.” Chaos magicians bandy about paradigm switching and belief as a tool, but I’ve not seen much about staying grounded. The chaos model is more relevant and dangerous than ever. It correctly points out that what matters is results, and not the inner forms required to reach them. However, this comes at the cost of a severe leveling of belief, where every belief is as good as every other to the extent that it helps you achieve your goals. This can be a joyful playground, or a twisted labyrinth.

So where do we Discordians fit in? Eris is sitting on a cloud somewhere, laughing at all the cosmic schmucks jousting below, and throwing glitter on the dumpster fire. Look at just the year so far! Gamestonks and an insurrection — proof of Her existence if there ever was any. Do we laugh along from on high? Delight in our schmuckitude, and fling shit with the best of ’em? I can’t believe the answer is to hide in a cave and wait for it to end. These are the interesting times, and as the wheel turns further into an age of Hodge, things are only going to get more interesting, mark my words.

The Problem Is Gross, The Solution Multi-Pronged

The first tine on our diamond fork is Wonder and Curiosity. We must always hold our wonder, whimsy, and curiosity for the world close to our hearts, and increase the amount of Wonder in the world through any means necessary. As Discordians, this is our divine mission of the strange times. Don’t take yourself too seriously, and stay kinetic. When I’ve been dissociating, being able to look at the situation with curiosity and openness has helped. Wonder is the other side of curiosity. May we carry both in our daily lives, and remain unjaded.

The point of all this, from my perspective at any rate, is to increase the amount of Wonder in the world — to make people Believe in something again, and ultimately to reconnect the ley-line web which has been sorely damaged, reclaim lost sacred sites, and carve out new ones to empower the world with Possibility and imagination once more. It is my aim to bring the magick back, whether it ever was or not. The Mundane has held us under its sway for far too long, the Age of Reason did its job and it is time for the pendulum to swing back the other way.

— Arjil in Ellis: The Assault on Reality

The second tine is Belief in Skeletons. Er, I mean The Belief Skeleton. This is your anchor and lighthouse, that which you know to be true. In my dissociative experience, this was asking if “the world is real” is a True Fact and if it was going to change, and then caching the response. When creating the skeleton from which to drape decorations, pick your bones wisely.

The third tine is Logging Off. What’s real is what can affect you, and what you can affect. Touch a tree. Eat some dirt. Find your baseline, and return to it as often as possible. “Logging off” means more than just closing your screens, it means ceasing the back and forth debate in your head, and breathing. Thinking is not doing. (And thinking "what a nice fork" but not eating anything with it is useless.) Go on a walk and name the plants. Express gratitude to people in your life. I find solace in cooking.

The fourth tine is Narrative Eristicism. The stories we tell about ourselves have voice, and Discordianism offers a powerful participatory storytelling language uniquely suited to the Strange Times. We can laugh at the schmucks, but must remember that we, too, are schmucks, not divine priestesses, enlightened in our reality-selection and immune to harmful beliefs. It is no good to wallow in the fractured waters of our time. We must surf, but watch for waves that could drag us down. What is your religion doing for you? How could it be better? This, for me, has been deciding that I am not irreparably broken because of my dissociation, but just a little between worlds. Empowering narratives support growth.

The fifth and final tine is Allowing For Ignorance. We cannot see the whole picture. We cannot ascertain with certainty whether our reality cult is right. We don’t have the time to systematically interrogate every belief we have. The human brain is limited in its processing power. And all of that is okay. For me, this presents in the anti-dissociative strategy of Just Vibing. I don’t really know what’s going on. I’m just vibing, fam.

With this fork, we shall eat the heavens!

The Swan Versus The Idiot

Cramulus

The Post-Truth Era Trolley Problem

An article once said that if you don't pull the lever, nobody will die, which really coincides with your desire to do nothing, so you're going to accept that premise.

There are so many different truths out there. How do we select one?

If you choose wrong, you become some soggy middle aged prick who hides in a reality tunnel from decades ago, and is angry at anything that doesn’t belong in it. We watched our parent’s generation become the exact thing they rebelled against. Mark my words: this process has already begun in you.

If you choose the option that feels right, you will find confirmation of your own assumptions. In the attention economy, preference is a magnet. You can become trapped by the gravitational pull of Confirmation Bias. The Law of Fives is never wrong.

If you choose the option that is the most reasonable, intelligent, well researched — there emerges a blind spot hiding the world’s emotional realities. You will come up with solutions which people hate. You will gnash and weep that people do not behave the way they “should,” and this disharmony can lead you to a place of toxic cynicism. You may end up in an emotional reality anyway, one in which everyone is dumb (but you, of course.. you know better).

If you believe that all swans are white, when you see a picture of a black swan, your preference is to say “that’s not a swan,” instead of “I misunderstood what swans are.” The Black Swan dwells outside of our reality tunnel, it brings disorder to our internal map of the world. It is concealed by our assumptions and our ignorance of our own ignorance.

The Black Swan is Eris’ pet. Swans are vicious creatures. They bite. They are pissed about the original snub—that is—they were not included in your map of the universe, and for this, they seek REVENGE.

Old Bob knew how to make friends with the black swan. He knew that Eris is a prankster, and that in the comedy-bit which is everyday life, his role was to slip on the banana peel and get a big laugh. The universe has trained us wrong, on purpose, as a joke. Maybe the only way to stop being the butt of the joke is to accept this. We are all Cosmic Shmucks.

This openness — to seeing yourself as wrong — is also one of the only things that can save us in the post-truth era. We need to be in a state of doubt and able to learn & accept new info. We can’t do that from a place of complete certainty and confidence.

The post-truth era is in full swing because the lie feels differently than the truth—it’s attractive, seductive, “feels” right. Our intuition and our intellect are both running for reelection but the district is heavily gerrymandered.

And this is part of why the Discordians celebrate Confusion. The Confused mind is trying to make sense of reality — and that’s the best mind, most active & engaged. It can be unattached, free. It can learn. The Beginner Mind dwells in confusion. Thrives in it, even!

Let us become the Ordinary Idiot again. We have been pretending we are more advanced forms of idiots—the square idiot, the zigzag idiot, the enlightened idiot—but in truth we are the same kind of stupid as everybody else. Let’s go home to this place of mundane stupidity, where everything has to be taken in small pieces because we are very dumb and the world is very complex. Let us taste each bite individually, perceiving but reluctant to pass judgment, because we do not have all the data.

If (as St. Gulik suggests on the Emerald Tablet of Hermes) the little universe (the inner world) and the big universe (the outer world) are really the same thing at different levels of magnification, then we have a secret key — the study of ourselves can lead to the realization of those fundamental laws that make the world go round. Maybe we can be momentarily free of the Cosmic Shmuck principle by seeing our own Shmuckitude. One day, we may even become an advanced form of idiot, reaching heights of idiocy only theoretical—until now.

Post-Truth: Madness as a Gateway Drug to Truth

Milambit the Drained, Seer of Stars

SOAK, SOAK, SOAK, THE SPONGE

Following untruth to its root leads to a path parallel to truth. Knowing you are parallel to truth means you can more easily figure out how to get to the truth. It’s a hop, skip, or jump away. Eris allows us the gift of meditation to dig for truths and clear our inner vision so we can interpret reality better – Eris loves little more than those who are in on the joke. It even gets Aneris giddy because scheduling time aside for a mundane task does as much for the “orderly.”

WRING AROUND THE ROSIE, NOBODY MINDS OVER THERE

Meditation is why Sisyphus is happy all the damn time. It’s absolutely hysterical. And also because: what better mode of mind is there to fuck with someone? When somebody is in the lotus position you can just walk up waving your hands around them going “I’m not touching you, I’m not touching you, nyah nyah nyah” and how quickly their peaceful position becomes one of warfare! That’s why probably only Discordians can find basically true peace in meditation, unraveling untruths, to weave them into probable-truths, definite truths, bewildering stories, or even puns. Because we are the few, the brave, those chosen by Eris to be totally cool with the bombardment of chaos that meditation beckons.

IT’S SAID “EVERYTHING HAPPENS FOR A REASON”: IT’S THE OPPOSITE IN FACT!

We, the diasporad collective illuminators historically excommunicated vanguards of post-anarcho-psychology, invented running meditations just to figure out you can’t run from your past, or into the future – unfortunately the present just keeps up with you, relentlessly without particular rocket propulsion. The shamans we launched at highest possibly velocity to escape their problems, they achieved nirvana, however. The launch team watched as the wisest of our peoples disintegrated instantly into the stratosphere. Baba Willinilly, perhaps the wisest to go, when asked if they should return after enlightenment to teach mankind, like Jesus or something, they said before he left “Ha! I’m just going out for smokes!” Nobody got the joke until the live footage hit TV screens. “Why did we think this would work?” because! People go to extreme lengths to *attempt* to meditate, with false premises and cartoonish inspirations.

INTENTIONAL DISHONESTY SUCKS SOMETIMES, SOMETIMES IT’S FUN

Meditation means: Your head is filled with fucking lies, loads of them! Like a sponge you let sit in toilet water just by going through with the day, everything you read. Including this! All that ink, all those pixels, coating your brain like a soggy syrup that smells like some kind of bad fungus mold smell. It’s not good. If you’d meditate you’d realize how totally weird that all is. How badly you need to air out your filthy, deceitful, disgusting mind.

WRING A DING DING, BELLS A CHIMIN’, REALITY IS A CAVING IN! HALLELUJAH!

So you need to shut the fuck up for a minute, calm down, take some breaths, access your pineal gland, and think about your thoughts. Without judgment, practice self awareness and let your opinions come and go. Just give it 15 minutes a day and you’ll find yourself thinking clearer, with wisdom straight from the bosom of Eris into your third eye like some kind of celestial prescription strength Visine™. This isn’t some fetishist nonsense, either, nobody’s talking about any nipples, so get your perverted thoughts about our perverted deity out of your perverted head!

THE TRUTH OF PLATONIC KNOWLEDGE

This is factual lore! Athena sent the enchanted tomb of all knowledge to be copied by humans, but she loaned it to Eris who had decided to make a smoothie but forgot she had but not enough apples in her apartment and didn’t really feel like going out to get more that day. So the book became a smoothie, not without mishap as which always follows the best Goddess. The lid was on the blender, but not like all the way on, so the lid clicked, but the top flew off in any case. So there all of possible knowable knowledge splattered across the goddess’ shirt with bits of kiwi and banana and crap like that. When she tried to scrape it off at first it was flicked and flucked into our orbit, where only the wisest may absorb it through their astral connection. Clarity is the key, through meditation you will understand bits of the Common Knowledge Athena tried to plague us with, to torment us with her “Project TMI™.” This event started a great falling out between Athena, her owl, and Eris Discordia because Eris accused Athena of intentionally staining her favorite bugs bunny shirt with book smoothie, and Athena has since been too flustered to interact with us again let alone bestow any more knowledge. Eris Discordia isn’t the only god, but she’s the best one because she runs the show.

FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU

People say all the time, with the ritualistic bow I’d only have to mention to outsiders who come upon this text of wisdom, “Oh Milambitus the Drained, Seer of Stars… If Meditation works, then why are you so angry all the time?” And it’s because people ask stupid fucking questions like that, what the fuck. What the fuck is wrong with you people? Now I’m even more pissed off at my own stupid question! Fuck! I’m shaking my head as I write this in retaliation to such ignorance, and have gone through three keyboards, shaking with rage at such denial of the innate insanity in the workings of the universe. Enlightenment is to embrace the madness, and I am mad, gods dammit! I’m livid! There’s all these enlightenment insider jokes and so few people to share them with! Do you realize how frustrating that is?! Every one of them already knows all the punchlines to the best jokes of universal truths! Then the unenlightened peons have no clue what I’m even talking about!

THE PASSWORD IS “CLARITY”

So the gnomes drip out of the wizard hat made of tree bark floating around a spacial void of fractal colors when a hyena says with an incredible reverb effect words which feel like satin caressing your brain “never be afraid, we are one, decay is an extant form of life, and death is an illusion” in the form of a loud latin yelp before deforming into various pokemon-like creatures until what was formerly “I” was covered in centipedes, unafraid of the impending decay: immortal despite not existing to begin with. The Goddess (nipples shifting shape into various mythological figures, until finally settling on Moss from The IT Crowd) lifted the essence of my consciousness into her heart, reverberating in scattered rhythms to show me the mechanization of all of what is. There’s a vending machine with astral tendrils reaching to earth through a wifi router on the moon, each unseen connection is what we’ve mistaken for the “soul” since history began. When Eris wants a cool refreshing beverage, she pops in about a dollar and twenty five cents into it (she’s doesn’t drink the cheap shit!) it retracts the consciousness of one of the wisest into the can until the essence is then liberated into the oneness of the universe when our gracious Goddess finally belches. But, see? Every enlightened person knows this stuff, it’s basic common knowledge. And it’s hilarious. If you’re not laughing you’re probably just too enlightened, filled to the brim with madness without deception. Good job. Or, I’m sorry. I’m not sure.

The Stone of Rild

As told by Cpt. Bucky Saia

A guide, told in fairy tale form, to the creation of a powerful artifact. Also a popular Discordian bedtime story.

The Text

There was once a wise man (why always man?)…

There was once a wise woman who lived high up on a mountain as a hermit and was admired by many people. One day it happened that a young girl climbed the mountain in search of enlightenment and knowledge and at the top of the mountain the girl met the wise old woman. "Say" said the girl "can you show me the way to knowledge and enlightenment?" and the old woman picked up a fist-sized stone from the ground and said "Here, my child, this is the magic stone of Rild. That stone which comes from Atlantis itself and was once a part of its walls. And such is its power that it is able to create but also to destroy and always it shall be helpful in everything you do in life." The girl gazed in disbelief and was astonished that the old woman wanted to give her a stone of such boundless power just like that, and yet she took the stone and the old woman spoke again: "So then go into the world and wander for three days, and in these three days you shall gain the knowledge for which you are so thirsty. The girl went there with the stone in her luggage and as she wandered it began to rain and she became cold. So she took the stone from Rild and drove 3 branches into the ground with it, which she covered with leaves and twigs. And in front of her shelter she built a fire which she was not able to light. Then she took the stone of Rild and struck it against another stone of admittedly less magical magnitude, and lo and behold, sparks came out and the fire blazed brightly. The next day the girl felt very hungry, but except for a bush with nuts hanging from it, which were not so easy to open, there was nothing that could alleviate her hunger. So the girl took the stone and hit the nuts with it, opening nut after nut, and her hunger was relieved. Soon after, a scoundrel roamed the forest in which the girl lived and that scoundrel wanted to transgress against her, but in her distress she grabbed the stone of Rild and threw it at the scoundrel’s head so that he fell down dead. There the old woman appeared and the girl ran to her and scolded her quite terribly where the enlightenment was after which she longed so much and when the old woman wanted to have the stone back the girl said "No in this stone is so much power I want to keep it! So the old woman said to her "My child, this stone is quite ordinary. I took it and gave it to you and told you about the miracles it was able to achieve. But were it not you who built the shelter, and were it not you who cracked the nuts, and were it not you who threw the stone and killed the scoundrel with it?" And the elder laid her hand upon the head of the girl and said "The essence and magic of the stone springs from your spirit. You yourself are the stone of Rild." Some people say that the girl was enlightened by this…others say that she smashed the old woman’s skull with it because she had deceived her, lied to her and put her in danger so much that she retreated into a dark cave with the stone of Rild which was now her greatest sanctuary and she killed everyone who got too close to the cave.

Addendum: In any case, it is still common today to give a Discordian a Stone of Rild as a symbol of the magical abilities inherent in each of us. Besides, there are always some morons who pay a fortune for such stones.

The Truth about Chemtrails

Bwana Honolulu

Have you also noticed that planes spray strangely greasy streaks in the sky that just won’t dissipate?

It didn’t used to be that way, did it?

What could they possibly want from us?

What sinister intentions are behind them?

The answer is obvious:

Chemtrails
turn normal people into
conspiracy theorists.

Facts:

Since the advent of chemtrails, the number of conspiracy theorists has been proven to increase steadily

Chemtrails contain substances such as aluminum (promotes dementia) and barium (promotes paranoid delusions)

Chemtrail conspiracy videos on YouTube are only uploaded by people who have been exposed to chemtrails

Also, did you know that chemtrail fluids are highly flammable and burn at high temperatures? What do you think caused the steel beams in the World Trade Center to melt? Certainly not the jet fuel. And let’s think further: Who actually profited most from the 9/11 attacks?

Surely the authors of conspiracy literature!

Finding Eris in Pagan Religious Iconography

Saint Tiwesdaeg Twohands, Grand Librarian of the Bureaucratic Order of Obtuse Kodexes

Religious syncretism is a time honored tradition among all religions. Why build your religion from the ground up when you can borrow bits and pieces from other, already established religions? Not only does this make founding a religion so much easier, it can be quite a lot of fun shopping around for those beliefs and practices that you can adapt to your own devices. Discordianism is no stranger to this practice. Now, you may be asking yourself, “How may I too practice in this religious syncretimibob?”

Let’s focus on the visual aspects of other religions and how you can adapt them to your own practices.

- Symbols
- Statues
- Jewelry

Symbols

Symbols have been important to religions since time immemorial. We, as humans, seem drawn to symbols. We can’t stop creating them and identifying with them. The great thing about symbols is that their meanings can change, based on the viewer’s own interpretation. This can also be a bad thing as symbols are appropriated by some real grayface fascist types.

Why let one religion hog specific shapes, like the christians their cross or the muslims their crescent moon? Maybe the cross represents Eris’ telephone pole that sits outside her house? This most wholly of telephone poles allows Eris to ignore robo calls and shitpost on the internet.

Feel free to make a symbolic mashup when you’re feeling frisky. Just beware of going overboard and ending up with a coexist bumper sticker as your finished project. That’s just tacky.

Statues

Statues are fucking terrifying. Are they watching us? Do they move when we aren’t looking? Thanks Dr. Who.

Jewelry

People like shiny things. We decorate ourselves for many different reasons. Pagan religions have been pumping out jewelry in the name of their silly pagan gods for thousands of years. Discordians are at a bit of a disadvantage when it comes to nice jewelry to show off our affiliation with our lady of chaos. You can find a couple random items on etsy, but who really needs another laser engraved wood object? Any religious jewelry can have as much or as little meaning as you put into it and there are many options to choose from. It can even act as camouflage if you choose to go undercover to add a bit of chaos and discord to some unwitting pagan’s lives.

I personally wear a St. Barbara pendant that I feel represents an aspect of Eris. If you are familiar with the story of St. Barbara, it’s utter bullshit made up to prop up an already bullshit religion. It’s full of towers, lightning, and grumpy fathers. Through bullshit I find my goddess chucking apples at the spags.

Eris and the Golden Truth

A villanesque by Galerson

Eris contemplated on the Truth;
It was all so vestal golden yet so plain,
Like mixing ambrosia and nectar with vermouth.

Eris was amused when a mother goose
Laid some golden dung on a pipe-mouthed swain;
Eris contemplated on the Truth.

Eris was inspired by the piping youth:
“Bob” sold the golden goose turd in champagne,
Like mixing ambrosia and nectar with vermouth.

“Bob” said the world was just a sales booth,
And it was time to start thinking less humane;
Eris contemplated on the Truth.

Eris then took action most uncouth
And marked a golden apple with a bane,
Like mixing ambrosia and nectar with vermouth.

Eris snuck the golden apple like a sleuth
Into a wedding party for the vain;
Eris contemplated on the Truth,
Like mixing ambrosia and nectar with vermouth.

Dear Truth

The Good Reverend Roger

Dear Truth,

I know you and I have been together for a very long time, but I cannot keep living a lie. I have found someone else… Well, more than just one someone else. This is that polygamy thing you wouldn’t agree to when I brought it up in 2016. So I am leaving you for three others.

The first is named “Confirmation Bias” and she’s wonderful. She supports me in everything, and never argues with me.

The second is named “Cognitive Dissonance,” and she doesn’t nitpick at me or remind me of every little detail of any given subject.

The third is named “Revisionism,” but my pet name for her is “Gas Lighting.” She tells me that I wasn’t wrong when it seemed like I might have been, and what’s more, she tells other people they were wrong or mistaken or just plain crazy when they bring up things I allegedly said or did.

While I feel bad about leaving you like this with so little warning, at least I’m not dumping you for someone younger. These three have been around forever, and they do things for me that you never could. I don’t have to face any ugliness anymore, because they will dispose of it for me. I don’t have to do any soul-searching, because they tell me all the time that I’m certainly not the problem.

So I have to go.

It’s not me, baby, it’s you. You and your nagging ways.

Farewell,

America

Aktion23 is Looking for you (maybe)!

A transcription of the ad:

You are good at: Living, doing things, clapping your feet while standing on your head, psychonautics, mental avionics or neuro-mantics? Then you should watch out for us, we might want you.

We need well-trained specialists in the following professions to implement subversive activities:

- Classically trained spaßgeriljeras
- Antiterrorists
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- Knights cobblar
- Exdoctrinated chaos magicians
- Really high priests
- Mindhackers
- 'Pataphysicians
- Zenarchists
- Psycho-logicians

You should bring along:

- Well-trained five senses (there was a German pun right here about senses like Wahnsinn, Unsinn, Blödsinn, Schwachsinn and Irrsinn, but it was nonsense)

- High kenacity

- Faith in the goddess Eris (will be contributed by us if necessary) Faith-jumpers possible (preferably SubGenii, Pastafarians, Dudeists, also other obscure sects welcome)

- Craftsmanship (Bavarian fire drilling, spinning yarn, pulling strings, digging reality tunnels) — no must-have, but welcome

- Ambitious dilletantism (desenrascanço)

- Total confusion or equivalent expertise

What we offer: (not much, but still...)

- DisOrganizational resources

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- A lot of experience in carrying out half-baked actions, and the Ultimate Illumination™ or something. ...which is still more than nothing.

Brainwashing on demand. If you are interested, please fill out the questionnaire or personally show up at one of our virtual fivline presences. Should we deem you qualified, one of our agents will visit you shortly. https://wwwww.aktion23.com.

Go Check 'em Out!

Aktion23 (See previous page.)

The principiadiscordia.com forums: https://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php

The r/discordian Discord (Discord Discord): https://discord.gg/xzXmQd9

The r/discordian subreddit (there’s a subreddit?): https://www.reddit.com/r/discordian/

The Disorganised Body of Eris server (a convergence point of Discordianism and Deleuze) https://discord.gg/pX375cRVrz

D.I.S.L.I.B — The Discordian Internet Society’s Library of Interesting Books: https://dislib.lima.zone/doku.php

The Great Library of Eris: https://www.libraryoferis.org/

Quinaria Discordia: https://qd.discordian.de/

If you’re interested in joining the Aftermathematics Research Cabal, a group of mystics and philosophers on the cutting edge of wackadoo spirituality, find and contact Cramulus. They’ve got reading groups, a potluck cult, and are currently writing a book.

Read past Intermittens issues at any of these locations:

- http://principiadiscordia.com/readinglist.php

- https://dislib.lima.zone/doku.php?dataflt%5Bseries_serie*%7E%5D=intermittens

- https://www.libraryoferis.org/cgi-bin/periodicals.cgi

Editor’s note — there is an alternate Intermittens 11 (and just now, 12), but due to some highly problematic issues surrounding the author, we do not consider them valid. For more information, read this article: http://historiadiscordia.com/standing-in-the-shade-of-love-by-brenton-clutterbuck/

The PDF linked in the article has been removed numerous times via legal threats. The following are censorship-resistant methods of access. View the PDF on one of these links:

1. https://ipfs.sloppyta.co/ipfs/Qmcq6gfbnAzXvvwbkf7RnNu4o3XfQJfs3RwuzebJ3Dk4Sv

2. https://ninetailed.ninja/ipfs/Qmcq6gfbnAzXvvwbkf7RnNu4o3XfQJfs3RwuzebJ3Dk4Sv

3. https://ipfs.mihir.ch/ipfs/Qmcq6gfbnAzXvvwbkf7RnNu4o3XfQJfs3RwuzebJ3Dk4Sv

4. https://ipfs.k1ic.com/ipfs/Qmcq6gfbnAzXvvwbkf7RnNu4o3XfQJfs3RwuzebJ3Dk4Sv

5. https://jorropo.ovh/ipfs/Qmcq6gfbnAzXvvwbkf7RnNu4o3XfQJfs3RwuzebJ3Dk4Sv

(If this doesn’t resolve, try an alternate gateway — select a working one, and append “/ipfs/Qmcq6gfbnAzXvvwbkf7RnNu4o3XfQJfs3RwuzebJ3Dk4Sv” to the URL. If this STILL doesn't work, you can download the IPFS desktop app and connect to the network directly. If you do so, pin this!)

Also available on freenet. Install the software, go to “Filesharing->Downloads,” and paste the content hash key below:

CHK@BL-~Ek7QX4UvJPv2y3tGuDX5Vwq~bG0XBUa3ny1v54c,MizTI-VZOwA5GpHGLmw-mMiFfNFy6Jp5LFhpvrSjO~g,AAMC--8/Alden_Loveshade_Biography_FINAL.pdf

And say “yes, I actually want this pdf, even though some pdfs are harmful.”

If neither method works, ask around. Someone’s got it. Save it and pass it on to others.

To Alden: May you be nowhere and your house be nowhere. May you be one proscribed, one who eats himself.

Now, let's try and forget this nonce and get on with our lives, eh?

Table of Contents

1. Title Page
2. Table of Contents
3. Editor's Note
4. The Color Truthers
5. Tears for the Tyrant
6. Five True Facts
7. There is *A* Moon
8. Some History
9. Discordian Dark Elves
10. Who the Fuck is Eris?
11. Internal Alchemy of Discord
12. Genius Loci
13. ARS
14. Making Gods for Fun!
15. OrMeK — Servitor and Agent of The Goddess
16. Shifting Entropy – Phoolian Magick

17. An Illustration of the Rungs of Thud according to the HBT

18. IMXI.A1: The Problem, As I See It

19. The Swan Versus The Idiot

20. Post-Truth: Madness as a Gateway Drug to Truth

21. The Stone of Rild
22. The Truth about Chemtrails
23. Eris and the Golden Truth
24. Dear Truth
25. Aktion23 Ad
26. Go Check 'em Out!

Guide

1. Cover
2. Table of Contents
3. Start of Content