I am an ecumenical troll: I will pour salt wherever I can regardless of political, religious, ethnic and gender affiliation, IF what I see is a sheer display of stupidity. This is one of those cases.
As most people will know by now, a certain oddly-colored politician has been reelected into office. Amongst the predictable TikTok meltdowns that were caused by the event, one peculiar trend caught my eye: that of witches sending him curses, either to make him croak or, and I quote, “having him willingly resign from the office so that Harris can take his place.”
Let us pretend for a second that this is how politics works (if it did, most politicians would dread winning an election more than losing it). What never ceases to amaze me is the complete detachment from reality that informs the witchcore scene.
Magic used to be the logical next step on the path to wisdom after mastering the worldly sciences. Now it’s a hobby for people with funny hair who need to unlearn anything resembling critical thinking in order to be able to tell themselves in front of a mirror that they are “witches”.
In large part this is due to the process of specialization and separation of knowledge that occurred after the scientific revolution, which virtually left no space for magic in the curriculum of the wise. This has led to two opposite tendencies developing: the “science confirms our eternal truths” tendency and the irrationalist tendency.
The “science confirms our eternal truths” strategy is typical of many XIX and XX century occultists. It makes no sense. Science is an open and ever-evolving body of theoretical and practical understanding which would survive even if it threw its most well-established theories overboard. If “scientific theory X is actually a reformulation of our eternal occult wisdom”, what does it say about that wisdom when, in 500 years, that theory is disproven and science moves on to the next one?
The scientific path is generally characterized by a flattening of magic onto (pseudo)scientific rationality. The irrationalist path, on the other hand, is characterized by the abandonment of all logic and understanding. It is typical of most milquetoast magical practitioners nowadays. This is the path that leads people to say with a straight face that you can manifest the result of an election and you can substitute sage with a piece of paper with “sage” written on it.1
This kind of irrationalist magic is the variety practiced by the TikTok witches sending curses to Trump. Rest assured that curses do exist. They mostly require some kind of contact with the victim, and even then almost no one can pull them off.
Even from the point of view of sending influences at a distance, Trump is as loved by those who voted for him as he is hated by those who didn’t: from a purely numerical standpoint, these influences cancel each other out, with something left over in his favor.
Finally, whether one likes it or not, the movement he leads has its own well-established etheric egregoric presence, which was created not just internally by those who support him, but also just as much externally by those who loathe him. A simple study of the life of Donald Trump, and even of the last months, shows that it would be very hard–not impossible, but hard–to hurt him, either physically or esoterically. Do you seriously think you lighting a candle and regurgitating formulas from a grimoir you bought on Etsy is going to change the course of humanity?
MQS
- Substitutions CAN be operated in magic, but they are an art in an of itself, and require understanding ↩︎
Discover more from Moderately Quick Silver
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
I believe politicians could also work with people who are skilled in magic and don’t use paper in place of a sage (whatever that means) — in addition to the firm and mighty egregor of their political movement, which protects them.
I’m not really a traditionalist when it comes to magic, but I’m quite rational nonetheless. I haven’t (thankfully) watched or followed popular social networks for about a year now, and it’s been a blessing. However, I was dying (from laughter) inside reading astrology groups on FB about „asteroid death“ — because why bother learning the meanings of houses, corresponding (real) planets, their aspects and degrees? And the „sexuality“ of Chiron. Or treating Pluto as a personal planet, yep.
In all honesty, while I’m generally very patient and respectful of other people’s paths, I believe magic/occultism/esotericism/spirituality is not for everyone (just like sport, or mathematics, or poetry-writing), and it is definitely not fantasy role-play. I don’t know why it is so heavily propagated today or what’s behind this overpopularity (aside from the rise of the internet, fantasy books and games, „you can be anything,“ and the so-called „Age of Aquarius“).
LikeLiked by 1 person
I also usually don’t follow this stuff, but it was pushed in my face and I just had to talk about it because it was amusing to no end. Btw you are right that there are politicians who work with magic, it does happen though no one would admit to it. 🙂 As for why magic is so popular nowadays, I have a couple of theories that I’ll talk about. It’s an interesting topic
Ps: the sage thing comes from the fact that I once read of a witch who didn’t have sage (the plant) for a spell so she just wrote “sage” on a piece of paper. As if I didn’t have tomato sauce for my pasta and I just wrote “tomato sauce” on a piece of paper and ate that
LikeLiked by 1 person
It is definitely an interesting topic, and I would gladly read your theories 🙂 I said I don’t know, but I can venture to say that it might be a way to protect real knowledge in the age of the internet, when everything goes online and is no longer a mystery. So, they create this chaos – make it funny, simple, seemingly ineffective, and even ridiculous – so that only those who are meant to find the truth behind the fantasy, who work hard and discern what is worthwhile from what is not, will be able to discover the door and its keys. But I’m not sure if this isn’t just the sweet conspiracy voice of foil-glistering paranoia speaking through me now
P.S. That’s the reason I don’t want to call myself a “witch,” by the way. Nowadays, it implies something like that—paper instead of sage, rainbow hair with a unicorn tattoo on your back, ATMOSPHERIC AND MOON, frightening clients to death, or telling them whatever nonsense they want to hear just to pull money out of their pockets, while knowing nothing even about a “fantasy craft.”
As for myself, my primary aim in magic is spiritual development – being in tune with the world and the Divine (I’m not a pagan) – not clients (though I’m happy if I can help, but that’s a side quest), not money, not being different (I’m already way too different inside, unfortunately, and I wish I were more normal, more in touch with the general mood of society), not being mighty, and so on.
Still, I don’t really use typical high/ceremonial magic (though I love the philosophy). As I wrote somewhere here before, it’s more of a mixture of quite traditional and/or folk tools and approaches with “neo,” modern, and New-Agey elements – but still in a rational and moderate fashion, I’m not into evidently ridiculous fantasy role plays. Some would call me a „witch“ based on that, I guess, but I don’t, and I probably shouldn’t define myself with labels anyway, as they do nothing but restrict you.
Sorry for such a long reply – I guess I painfully needed a vent.
Have a nice time of your day and thank you for this discussion 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
I actually love to hear from you, no need to say sorry. I don’t think it’s paranoia. One of my teacher always repeated that true secrets always find a way to keep themselves. It’s not that there is a great hidden hierarchy deciding it: it is the nature of things
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you for your kind words 🙂
And agreed 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Pps: I am also patient with others but I also have a rather incendiary side to me 😁
LikeLiked by 1 person
As someone who is mostly earth and fire – astrologically speaking – I can relate 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person