[Opinion] Irony and Magick

[Xenophon]

In the thread about drugs and magick, I mentioned some people getting into it with mixed agendas. This topic was inspired by that one...

Irony is more or less the expected tone in these times. Older folks take (or spew) their irony neat. Younger ones typically follow it with a "just kidding" chaser. In any case, in the West, it seems to be the default mood, having pretty well nosed out the grammarians' indicative one. Really. Mention Tantra and even the "seriously interested" snigger. Mention mushrooms and the knee-jerk response is "Party with the priestesses!" or some such.

We all know that doubt is a deal breaker when it comes to magick workings. So too for irony? After all, if irony is my reflex response, my default setting, it is highly probable that I am NOT "just kidding" when I flash my fully erect irreverence in public discourse. I might not really intend that to be so, but like Pervy Pete the Flashman, I can no longer control my responses.

Your thoughts, all? What effect has ingrained irony on magicjk?

 

[8Lou1]

Sometimes all one needs is metalworkers.

Xeno, The Wise, was alone in ironing the clothes.

The rest went dancing on metellica and had a vampire head as meal.

My sincere thanks goes to ozzy, my brothers cat.

Al hamdullillah...

 

[Robert Ramsay]

Your thoughts, all? What effect has ingrained irony on magicjk?

In the interests of not fooling oneself, one has to ask why one is using irony to deflect, and what from?

I always try and approach magic, like most things, as straightforwardly as I can. As attributed to Mark Twain: "If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything."

 

[Xenophon]

Sometimes all one needs is metalworkers.

Xeno, The Wise, was alone in ironing the clothes.

The rest went dancing on metellica and had a vampire head as meal.

My sincere thanks goes to ozzy, my brothers cat.

Al hamdullillah...

Eh?

Post automatically merged: Jul 5, 2024

In the interests of not fooling oneself, one has to ask why one is using irony to deflect, and what from?

I always try and approach magic, like most things, as straightforwardly as I can. As attributed to Mark Twain: "If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything."

Twain himself was often a very Hephaestus when it came to irony, no? In any case, whether Morty Mage might use irony because he wants to sleep with Dad and slay Mom does not greatly interest me here. (Freud's posse were rather nonplussed to find out that awareness of a problem's origins does not itself work a cure. Though---happily---it can highlight a need for "further analysis.") My query was simply irony's effect on the magick Morty uses to work his nefarious way. L

 

[beardedeldridge]

In magic your word is a potent tool, if you always degrade your word by saying one thing and then immediately reversing it your word is weakened and a much less effective tool (not unlike disrespecting a wand or other tool by using it in a mundane/profane way).

Not to mention if using those types of statements is really just a symptom of doubt then it’s also an indicator of the other hinderance to effective workings that you mentioned.

*sarcasm is a native tongue of my generation

-Eld

 

[Yazata]

I know you like to joke and I wonder if you wrote this because of the idea that iron (as the metal of Mars) is said to banish / frighten spirits

 

[Xenophon]

I know you like to joke and I wonder if you wrote this because of the idea that iron (as the metal of Mars) is said to banish / frighten spirits

Fair question, but no, I didn't think of that. I was just recalling recently how I once left a job, another time ended a friendship because I wearied of the persistent irony of my contemporaries from the West. This while being a carrier of the malady myself, a regular Typhoid Larry, if I may.

Interestingly ( interesting to pedants, anyway) "irony" has nothing to do with iron. It's from the old Greek ειρωνεία, "ironeiuh" "to dissimulate." (Iron is σιδριονος "sidrionos" or some such.) But, as your suggestion shows, often false etymologies are more enlightening than the prosaic "factual" ones. That sounds like plagiarism from Arthur Machen, but there it is.

 

[IllusiveOwl]

It's hard not to be ironic, that nasty habit has caused me trouble too, especially around folk that struggle so hard to be serious and to do their best. Maybe it's an impulsive act to show dominence, a chimp-like power move, linguistically running loops around your learned logical peers. I do it when I'm bored

Magic's all business though, that's science and work, actions have exact reactions. I don't see irony helping with anything outside of you being the recipient of getting what you want in a Macbeth kind of ironic way. When working I'm too busy maintaining full awareness and keeping cool to make a pithy 1-liner; its like playing around with the guys vs playing around with a gun.

 

[Xenophon]

It's hard not to be ironic, that nasty habit has caused me trouble too, especially around folk that struggle so hard to be serious and to do their best. Maybe it's an impulsive act to show dominence, a chimp-like power move, linguistically running loops around your learned logical peers. I do it when I'm bored

Magic's all business though, that's science and work, actions have exact reactions. I don't see irony helping with anything outside of you being the recipient of getting what you want in a Macbeth kind of ironic way. When working I'm too busy maintaining full awareness and keeping cool to make a pithy 1-liner; its like playing around with the guys vs playing around with a gun.

I meant the effect of an habitually ironic attitude on magickal workings. To continue your metaphor, the guy brought up as a passy-fist might have trouble bringing his gun into play at the Dead Dawgs Drive-By Decathlon. So too with ironic tics subverting sincerity while working magick. (In a certain type of individual, stress tends to induce a tendency to seize on irrelevancies.) Just like a calcified pineal gland is said to inhibit meditation and psychic abilities, so too---one fears---a jaundiced and jaded attitude does the same.

 

[Anziel_Merkaba]

In the thread about drugs and magick, I mentioned some people getting into it with mixed agendas. This topic was inspired by that one...

Irony is more or less the expected tone in these times. Older folks take (or spew) their irony neat. Younger ones typically follow it with a "just kidding" chaser. In any case, in the West, it seems to be the default mood, having pretty well nosed out the grammarians' indicative one. Really. Mention Tantra and even the "seriously interested" snigger. Mention mushrooms and the knee-jerk response is "Party with the priestesses!" or some such.

We all know that doubt is a deal breaker when it comes to magick workings. So too for irony? After all, if irony is my reflex response, my default setting, it is highly probable that I am NOT "just kidding" when I flash my fully erect irreverence in public discourse. I might not really intend that to be so, but like Pervy Pete the Flashman, I can no longer control my responses.

Your thoughts, all? What effect has ingrained irony on magicjk?

The world runs on movie logic. Well, really it's that movie logic reflects the logic of the world, but in this case, let's just say the world runs on movie logic to make it easier to understand.

I've found that a lot of the common tropes found in movies and other forms of fiction and literature are just as applicable to real life. Because fiction follows the patterns that the creators can imagine, and what they can imagine is based off of their own experience and knowledge. Movie rules are the rules of the world.

"Why shouldn't truth be stranger than fiction? Fiction, after all, has to make sense."

 

[Xenophon]

If you want to live your life according to Hollywood's indoctrination, I have one humble request. Put my name as beneficiary on your life insurance policy, ok?