Monthly Archives: April 2013

Why Witchcraft Makes Sense

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If a positive attitude is so damned beneficial, why shouldn’t a negative attitude be capable of harm?

It’s only fair.

Even if it’s foul.

Everyone wants the upside–that a good attitude brings about better performance results–but no one wants to acknowledge the equal and opposite corollary whereby a foul attitude should be able to bring about some shit.

Of course, positive attitude alone isn’t enough. Positive attitude is just a performance enhancer–there’s got to be effort or action to enhance.

The same should apply to negative attitudes, and so even the hocus-pocus of witchcraft makes sense in a general way–just having a foul attitude is not enough. Some kind of action must accompany the bad mindset.¹

But that is a digression–the main point is that the philosophical attitude of modern people towards the power of positive vs. negative thinking is more contradictory and thus more “illogical” than the nearly universal belief in witches and witchcraft among pre-modern peoples.

The pre-modern view–that there is power in both positive and negative thinking, positive and negative symbols–is much more consistent.

Another serious anthropological mystery solved in jest.²

JOKE NOTES:

1.  Society normally prohibits the kind of “action” or “effort” or “work” that the foul-minded want to undertake. So direct, logical action is precluded from the start by Society.

Therefore, indirect, illogical actions are the only choice–symbols and movements and utterances and thoughts–things that literally “don’t matter” but are often (figuratively) much more important than material things–these are the only sphere of action allowed by Society, or at least not easily controlled.

But for every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction and this also applies to Society’s actions and normative pressures. Therefore Advanced Witchcraft takes advantage of the reactive force that inevitably results from the “positive actions” undertaken by Society. What Society taketh away–the option of direct physical harm–it must also give back even if in modified form.

In fact, truly advanced witchcraft makes use of the latest data and theory from sociology and anthropology and carefully integrates them into its hocus-pocus symbol systems with woopty-doo results.

I myself have witnessed talismans representing the unemployment rate used in conjunction with more traditional representations for casting curses upon intended victims. I saw a Tarot deck where the Devil had been replaced by Patriarchy, and the Tower was referred to as the World Capitalist System.

They say it improves the accuracy of their forecasts by 16% of a suggestive metaphor. That’s a two-thirds savings on your wasted money.

It can also bilk an extra big tip from an unsuspecting businessperson.

2.  Obviously there are other factors besides logical consistency that help explain the nearly universal belief in witchcraft among pre-modern peoples. A classic sociological explanation is that group cohesion is reinforced by having a flexible scapegoat system wherein anyone can be accused of engineering misfortune through witchcraft.

Carlos Castaneda Was Lying But His Jimsonweed Lizards Accurately Predicted His Future

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castaneda_booksFrom The Teachings of Don Juan: a Yaqui Way of Knowledge (1968):

“The paste [datura or Jimsonweed, aka loco weed] had dried up and scaled off my temples. I was about to rub some more of it on [using a live lizard’s head as an applicator] when I realized I was sitting on my heels in Japanese fashion. I had been sitting cross-legged and did not recall changing positions. It took some time to realize fully that I was sitting on the floor in a sort of cloister with high arches. I thought they were brick arches, but upon examining them I saw they were stone.

“This transition was very difficult. It came so suddenly that I was not ready to follow. My perception of the elements of the vision was diffused, as if I were dreaming. Yet the components did not change…

“…the next thing I noticed was that I had moved. I was at the top of a stairway and H., a friend of mine, was standing at the bottom. Her eyes were feverish. There was a mad glare in them. She laughed aloud with such intensity that she was terrifying. She began coming up the stairs. I wanted to run away or take cover, because ‘she had been off her rocker once’. That was the thought that came to my mind.

“I hid behind a column and she went by without looking. ‘She is going on a long trip now,’ was another thought that occurred to me then; and finally the last thought I remembered was, ‘She laughs every time she is ready to crack up.’

“….The scene changed abruptly. It was night-time. I was in the hall of a building. The darkness inside the building made me aware that in the earlier scene the sunlight had been beautifully clear; yet it had been so commonplace that I did not notice it at the time.

“As I looked further into the new vision I saw a young man coming out of a room carrying a large knapsack on his shoulders. I did not know who he was, although I had seen him once or twice. He walked by me and went down the stairs. By then I had forgotten my apprehension, my rational dilemmas.

” ‘Who is that guy?’ I thought. ‘Why did I see him?’ “

“The scene changed again and I was watching the young man deface books; he glued some of the pages together, erased markings, and so on. Then I saw him arranging the books neatly in a wooden crate. There was a pile of crates. They were not in his room, but in a storage place. Other images came to my mind, but they were not clear. The scene became foggy. I had a sensation of spinning.

“Don Juan shook me by the shoulders, and I woke up….”

THE INTERPRETATION:

Both components of the vision are about Castaneda’s ultimate destiny. The stone edifice or structure symbolizes both academia and the world of money and comfort. Carlos’s “colleagues” in this edifice are a bunch of “wild-eyed” women, deranged with laughter and nearing total breakdown. They come after him and he must hide–this obviously symbolizes the “witches” etc. (see links below)

The final component–the man tearing out pages from books, someone Castaneda had seen around campus, but did not know–symbolizes the total rejection of Castaneda’s work by academia. In anthropology, Castaneda is now un-quotable except as a foil, a counter-example, which is a fate worse than death to a scholar. The geeky nobody in Carlos’ vision that he barely recognizes symbolizes the diligent academic scholars who went on to less sexy careers than Castaneda, but who in the end collectively decide whose writings are in and whose are out of the un/official libraries of modern anthropology.

As don Juan told Castaneda afterwards:

“The lizards are never wrong.”

POSTSCRIPT:  For background on Castaneda’s deceptions here are two links:

print:   http://www.salon.com/2007/04/12/castaneda/

video:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXl95ZaYe3Q   (part of the Tales from the Jungle Series–British documentaries on anthropology’s dirty laundry)

Advice for Animists and the Superstitious

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Never taunt an egg, just because it didn’t make it.

Don’t trust lizards–they’re much too talkative (Carlos Castaneda).

If you see a squirrel spitting out a nut, you better look behind you really quick.

Never use the same noose twice.

Whenever a bird shits on you, immediately buy a lottery ticket–don’t even pause to clean the mess off your shoulder and hair or you’ll ruin the magic.

Just as learning braille will cause you to go blind, and learning sign language will make you go deaf, and using a wheelchair when you don’t have to will cripple you, so too oral sex causes impotence.

A peach that talks back is usually not a blessing.

Pomegranates are the most reliable of the talking fruits.

Apples are the least, but they’re still much more reliable than lizards.

If a cloud starts to take the shape of an animal, you need to stop whatever you’re doing and stare at it. You’ve got to.

Don’t let the blue-jays steal your soul–why do you think bird shit is such good luck?

If you fall in love with Nature don’t let the god of Mammon and money find out about it–keep it on the down low.

If you really loved Nature you wouldn’t talk about her age all the time.

Don’t disrespect the other planets and never fart in the ocean when the tide is going out.

Sex during lightening on an exposed hilltop can put a new charge in your love life.

Masturbation during lightening on an exposed hilltop, however, is just asking for an ignominious death. Thor’s hammer is for lovers not loners.

If you scoff at a superstition hard enough, it will come true for you, even if it was never really true before. That’s how these things get started–not by believers but by the hyper-skeptics who get zonked.

Never taunt an egg but don’t over-empathize with them either just because you were one once–you need a good breakfast.