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Welcome to the counter culture

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14:12 / 04.02.05

*sigh* This whole deal about whether particular magical traditions are/aren't counter cultures comes from what was really just an aside comment in one post, and I'd like to try to move away from it. It was never intended to contradict Nina's position that magic is not essentially part of a counter culture, but to qualify the point by offering several examples of cases where it either is or could be - it was probably unnecessary, and seems to have been ill-advised, so distracting has it become. Since then I have tried to move on a couple times, but we keep coming back to it, usually arguing about misunderstandings.

My position in this thread all along has not been that magic is technically and essentially part of a/the counter-culture-as-officially-defined-by-cultural-theorists (because it isn't, or needn't always be), but that magic is problematic in mainstream society, and has been popularly viewed as - if not counter culture, per se, at least being Outside the Norm. Theory-bitching aside, this has practical implications for the magicker who wants to practice openly in their community.

Anyone else have anything they want to say?

~L

14:34 / 04.02.05

Is magick counter culture? I think counter culture is an odd and oft clumsily used word. Certainly several magickal systems are alternative cultures, and I will now be thouroughly damned to the nine hells for using the words magick and alternative in the same sentance, but is it really reminiscent of a failed cultural revolution of 40 years past? Certainly the practice of magick can be thought of as being anti-authoritarian, but I never thought the point of my magick was "stickin' it to the man", but a path of wonder and development. The fact that I'm stickin' it to the man by default is purely inconsequential...

11:59 / 07.02.05

absolutely it's evasive. It's evading being tagged with terms that I find questionable and wouldn't want applied to myself.

Whatever works for you and your own practice. Personally I have no problems whatsoever with the term "magician" as an adequate and accurate description of what I do. I practice magic, I engage with a host of activities that have historically been considered "magic", such as speaking with spirits, 'walking between worlds', divination, constructing charm bags and suchlike, and taking on work for people of a magical nature. It's a profession with a long historical precedent within many different cultures, and I don't find the term questionable or even misleading. It's very much what I do, and I do it on as much of a full-time basis as my other commitments will allow.

You might apply an entirely different criteria to your practices, indeed, you might have a completely different set of practices that you approach from a completely different perspective. All well and good. But for me, avoiding the word magician is a bit like Gary the surgeon insisting that he's not a surgeon, just a guy called Gary who uses some techniques of surgery in his life.

ONLY NICE THINGS

12:25 / 07.02.05

I think counter culture is an odd and oft clumsily used word

So, nothing like magic(k-k-k-kickin'-k), then?

Lepidopteran - would it be interesting to think about when magical practice wasn't outside the culture? Are we talking about the enlightenment? I mean, witches got burned, but you could see that as state magic opposing the uncontrollable (and untaxable) magic of the cunning folk.

These days? Openly practising magic is probably a bit like reading comics or LARPing - it's a minority pursuit that those who don't do may have trouble understanding and may see as pointless or silly, but you're not exactly identified as an enemy of the state. If we go back to Quimper666, he was essentially claiming membership of the counterculture, whatsoever it may be, on the strength of having read the Invisibles...

00:05 / 08.02.05

So is the term "counter culture" the domain of social theorists or of those who count themselves among it's members? Is it more important that someone outside of the sub-counter-genre-culture defines it as such, or that someone honestly feels that their practice is deliberately counter to the prevailing culture?

Do sociologists determine our membership and alliances, or do we as individuals?

07:51 / 08.02.05

i just want to say that rotten amongst us, the selfish who read Crowley and are maybe self-employed, and trying to distance themselves from the herd in an arrogant fashion etc. should simply be rounded up and shot by the righteous ones who care for their community rather than taught a lesson by ostracism and slow starvation. A quicker end is surely a more compassion way to dispose of pseudo intellectual dendritus.

ONLY NICE THINGS

12:36 / 08.02.05

So is the term "counter culture" the domain of social theorists or of those who count themselves among it's members? Is it more important that someone outside of the sub-counter-genre-culture defines it as such, or that someone honestly feels that their practice is deliberately counter to the prevailing culture?.

Well, that's an interesting question. Speaking as somebody who is not a cultural theorist, I'd say that, for example, it's quite important to have an idea of what "being a cub scout" entails before one starts to claim to be a cub scout, which will also probably involve other people - perhaps Balook, perhaps Akela - also recognising your cubscoutseinheit. So, if you honestly believe that reading the Invisibles, say, entitles you to membership of the counter-culture, then isn't that a bit of a lucky break for the over-the-counter-culture, because it means it isn't actually countered at all and can carry on regardless, while the coin of countercultural status is debased? There's a difference between honestly and correctly believing something, after all...

Unconditional Love

16:05 / 08.02.05

could a member of the counter culture please tell me exactly what is the oppposition to counter culture and describe a society and individual in every detail that belongs to this culture that they are counter too.

and why they would feel the need to be in opposition to this perception they have of other people? or could it be something they recognise in themselves that they feel the need to be counter to, and if so why create a divided self?

17:07 / 08.02.05

Well, say for example that you're born in some small town in Ohio and raised by strict Christians. Everyone you know is Christian, buys American, shops at Walmart and thinks rock music & TV is dangerous and corrupting. Everyone at your school dresses more or less the same way. All of the adults you know seem boring and uptight and are fearful of anything new or different. You start to read comic books about Super heroes but your mom tells you that anyone who can fly is in league with the Devil. Your teachers tell you that smoking pot will make you crazy and turn you into a rapist. But then you try it with your friend's visiting cousin and it's actually really mellow and you don't feel crazy at all. You start listening to new music that you buy from a store in the next town over. Rock music like Jane's Addiction and Black Sabbath. You realize that there are other ways of living and that the trusted authority figures in your life seem to be lying to you. You grow your hair and wear black and, before you know it, everyone in town is afraid of you and thinks you're going to hell. You still get decent grades and really want to learn more about computers so you could some day get a job at ILM.

For you, in this town, you are the counter-culture. What you've come to identify with is everything that your culture fears and sees as wrong. What you believe in makes it difficult for you to integrate with the community.

There are many cultures and there are just as many counter-cultures (probably more). And being counter-cultural in Bumfuck, Ohio might be considered mainstream in Soho or San Fran.

Basically, counter-culture is induced by close-mindedness and diminished by open acceptance.

Tryphena Absent

17:08 / 08.02.05

Is it more important that someone outside of the sub-counter-genre-culture defines it as such, or that someone honestly feels that their practice is deliberately counter to the prevailing culture?

I think that's an extremely difficult question because people often don't understand their own feelings or the behaviour that they're engaging in? I mean, how many times have you been upset without really knowing why or being able to identify precisely what combination of things got to you?

I think we have a problem understanding cultures from the inside and the outside. There are bits of British culture I'm never going to get despite being British and there are things about America that I have even less chance of understanding. The same goes for any practitioner of any art/religion/within any event.

But before we can claim that we're in a counter-culture we have to understand what a counter-culture is. We have to know what a sub-culture is before we can claim we have membership and we have to know both the definitions of that sub-culture in the context of the mainstream and the sub-culture itself.

Do you get what I'm saying? I'm not trying to drag it back but I do think, there's no point in trying to know something without the information that really applies.

Unconditional Love

16:24 / 11.02.05

i dont think sub cultures are counter cultural, i think they are parts of a larger whole, society.

i think there are alot of sold safe rebellions that include drugs and music and certain philosophies/spirituality. these in my opinion are part of society and in no way counter to it, they may appear to be, but as long as your consuming it your still a consumer.

its a nice image and a nice personality prop to be part of that rebellious scene, but in essence its as empty as most other scenes when approached with a discerning eye.

if you want to be a rebel, try stopping. consume as little as possible, turn off all communication, think practicality and not image. if you think consumerism holds any rebellion your a fool, you will be consumed in the images your sold the ideas your sold and generally anything else you have to buy into.

alot of people try adopting other cultures values as an escape plan, and learn,if not selective, more layers of conformity.

try turning society off, every part of it, its a challenge in itself, at some point for me, as a self proclaimed rebel, either i gradually turned off society or i turned myself off. i am still drawn into society but as much on my own terms as possible rather than its terms, for me thats my main fight,and its an up hill fight.

all those scenes that offered escape for me at least turned out to be empty and fake, ive turned my back on them ive belonged to many of them,many you listed,i hope they give you something real.

00:17 / 12.02.05

if you want to be a rebel, try stopping. consume as little as possible, turn off all communication, think practicality and not image. if you think consumerism holds any rebellion your a fool, you will be consumed in the images your sold the ideas your sold and generally anything else you have to buy into.

that path leads straight to the commune in the woods where everyone wears clothes they make themselves and sustain themselves only with food that falls from the trees of its own accord. the problem with living on the commune is that the rest of the world can neatly put you in a nice box marked "weirdo" and safely ignore you, and since you've chosen to remove yourself from their world, you can't affect it at all.

this is the monastic path, whereby someone keeps hir hands clean of corruption from the world outside, but the trade-off is that they severely limit their impact on the world. one could argue that the best you can do in life is to limit the damage you do, but, personally, i think this path is selfish and egotistical. it's the path for someone who values hir own purity over the ability to make a difference in the world. "hey, the world's going to shit but i'm still clean. none of this is my fault. i'm still holy and pure unlike all you dirty fuckers actually going out in the world and muddying yourselves with the icky business of compromising with reality and, you know, living in the world."

it's important to stay critical and re-evaluate constantly, but i think the cost/benefit balance strongly favors engaging in the world. that means engaging in commerce, fashion, pop culture.

Unconditional Love

18:31 / 12.02.05

perhaps the perspective and life of the hermit are nessecary, i am not saying they are permanent, but i think they are nessecary, monasticism has its value as much as libertine ecstatic pleasure has its value,each seems to create a different evolution, i dont think they are mutually exclusive.

i think whatever you do you are engaging with the world, but engagement with society can be formulated on certain terms, by the behaviours you exhibit. the world isnt just the sphere of human endeavour, thats a very small part of it.

the more you close yourself off to the human sphere the more open you become open and aware and attractive too other influences, thats one of the main points of the hermits life style, and in that i consider that its main teaching.

the perception broadens beyond the social, and eventually the interaction broadens beyond that sphere.

i guess eventually the hermit becomes a lover, perhaps.

Boy in a Suitcase

01:00 / 14.02.05

I would like to chime in here on a related note and second Gypsy's statement that he has no problem with the word "magic."

People have been talking about renaming magic something more polite and innocuous for a long time, but I think that's bullshit. Embracing so "unreal" of a notion seems to be the primary initiation itself and the cognitive dissonance produced by being a "magician" and practicing "magic" – by making something unreal into something real - seem to propel one's journey for the first several years on that power alone.

And, ultimately, if you're doing something that can be explained away or called anything other than "magic" – then you just ain't doing magic. Magic is - as our buddy K. G. said once - the "acme of the absurd and the reification of the impossible" or somesuch.

And so it is.

As for counter-culture - fuck it. Fuck it all. Magic + Revolt Against the Established Order by Surpassing It = Ultraculture, so make way for it.

10:41 / 14.02.05

My posts were not about a rebranding exercise for magic to give it a shiny new label. It was mainly to do with what is more often than not the delusional application of a contentious term. It makes me extraordinarily careful about how and to whom I choose to apply it. Having done virtually nothing in the better part of a year that can particuarly be called inexplicable, I choose not to self apply.

To an extent my issue is the same as with the term counter culture. They've been devalued by woolly definitions and shoddy application, reaching a point at which their usefulness is dubious in many contexts.

For many people who have experience with magic it's been the result of a hard won perspective which has been formed from years of experiments with techniques and ideas. It's a something which is extraordinarily hard to communicate to people, as it should by its very nature challenge basic assumptions. I favour the approach of only applying terms when that is what I specifically mean, because not all of what I practise falls into the category of magic. While I understand that there are a lot of people here who would describe everything as magic, that's about as helpful to most people as the NLP fanatics who describe the whole sphere of human communications as NLP.

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