Austrian Pastafarian "Sticking it to The Man"

BBC reports that "An Austrian atheist has won the right to be shown on his driving-licence photo wearing a pasta strainer as "religious headgear"."


Gotta love Pastafarians, they sure do love to piss people off, with their quirky ideas and mock-equalitarian speeches. I know they are against all forms of religion, the "special-treatment" some religions get and the modern plague we call POLITICAL CORRECTNESS.
I just love how they managed to mock the involvement of religion in state affairs (see the burqa/ID card scandal) without being too direct (the pasta strainer reminds more of a Jewish Yarmulke than a Burqa). Hat's (or better said pasta strainer) off to you Mr Alm, and may you continue to be touched by His Noodly Appendages".


Find BBC's article below (edited to remove retarded editor comments):

Niko Alm first applied for the licence three years ago after reading that headgear was allowed in official pictures only for confessional reasons.

Mr Alm said the sieve was a requirement of his religion, pastafarianism.

Later a police spokesman explained that the licence was issued because Mr Alm's face was fully visible in the photo.

"The photo was not approved on religious grounds. The only criterion for photos in driving licence applications is that the whole face must be visible," said Manfred Reinthaler, a police spokesman in Vienna.

He was speaking on Wednesday, after Austrian media had first reported Mr Alm's reason for wearing the pasta strainer.

After receiving his application the Austrian authorities had required him to obtain a doctor's certificate that he was "psychologically fit" to drive.

According to Mr Reinthaler, "the licence has been ready since October 2009 - it was not collected, that's all there is to it".

The idea came into Mr Alm's noodle three years ago as a way of making a serious, if ironic, point.

A self-confessed atheist, Mr Alm says he belongs to the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, a light-hearted, US-based faith whose members call themselves pastafarians.

The group's website states that "the only dogma allowed in the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is the rejection of dogma".

In response to pressure for American schools to teach the theory known as intelligent design, which some Christians favour as an alternative to natural selection, the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote to the Kansas School Board asking for the pastafarian version of intelligent design to be taught to schoolchildren.

Straining credulity

In the same spirit, Mr Alm's pastafarian-style application for a driving licence was a response to the Austrian recognition of confessional headgear in official photographs.

The licence took three years to come through and, according to Mr Alm, he was asked to submit to a medical interview to check on his mental fitness to drive but - straining credulity - his efforts have finally paid off.

It is the police who issue driving licences in Austria, and they have duly issued a laminated card showing Mr Alm in his unorthodox item of religious headgear.

When asked for his reaction to Mr Reinthaler's comments, Mr Alm told the broadcaster ORF: "I didn't know I was guilty of not collecting it. That doesn't alter the fact that it still took nearly a year [to be issued]".

The next step, Mr Alm told the Austrian news agency APA, is to apply to the Austrian authorities for pastafarianism to become an officially recognised faith.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14135523

Holiday bash

Time for some more bashing on our Christian friends. a nice picture of Santa Clause and the Easter bunny fighting to prove which holiday is best.

For more great art like this, go to Tom Shorr's website: http://www.toddschorr.com/

PS: Check out the bottom right corner of the picture ;P

After the Rapture

As you know on 21st of May 2011 Harold Camping predicted the Rapture.
Fortunately (or not) it didn't happen.. but what if it did?

A little poke to our Christian Friends

Chaos Magick - The magic of chaos

Chaos Magick - The magic of chaos

Hello, my darlings, I'm back with a subject I thought might interest you: Chaos Magick.

For a while, everywhere I go, I find Chaos Magick.. it seems to be the most “fancy and trendy” subject. Often regarded in connection with wicca, shamanism and ceremonial magick, feared admired or mocked, the chaos magick path is becoming more and more visible in the aspects of the magickal life.

As such, I started to cultivate myself in the field. I talked to a wiccan friend which also practices chaos magick and who recommended me a series of books for starters.. very good books which I also recommend to you:Phil Hine - Prime Chaos and Peter J. Carroll - Liber Kaos. Ow and a small disclaimer, Hime is a shaman with great knowledge of the Qabalah and taking in consideration my severe shortcomings in that field, I invite you to view with a critical eye, the words below.

What is Chaos Magick

“Chaos”… brr… sounds ”chaotic” right? Sounds of evil and demons and blood rites? Sounds of a lacking dogma and lacking logic, of magic created by hallucinogen-fried brains? It sounds of random rituals created by anarchists and slackers with a bone to pick with „traditional magic systems?

Chaos Magick is none of these, even though it probably is a bit of of them. It is in short words: „Chaos magic is a school of the modern magical tradition which emphasizes the pragmatic use of belief systems and the creation of new and unorthodox methods.” (and yes, I was quoting from Wikipedia ;-)

Chaos magick's inspiration comes from various sources, from fantasy books, from video games, from everyday life, from the magician's dreams, from his imagination. I chaos magick, the shape is less important than the intent, the process is not pivotal, but the practitioner is. Seeing this, you could think that the practitioners are of chaos magick are childish and lazy, but generally it not the case. Most have passed from other magickal paths to chaos magick and have greater understanding of the magical act than they let on.

By using his own imagination, the power of his will. The chaos magician alters reality according to his wishes.

Chaos Magick and the Old Gods

Does Chaos Magick have Gods? Is it a religious system? The short answer is no… Chaos Magick uses Gods as entities and especially Lovecraftian ones such as: Cthulhu, Shub-Niggurath, Yog-Sothoth – heads up for tentacle-pron fanatics, and a warning for those who got nightmares after reading Lovecraft's books and for the fluffybunnies who are afraid to interact with anything dark....

Chaos Magick and Ceremonial magick

Chaos Magick is nuts! I'm not kidding... the first chaotic spell I ever read was called “the skullfuck spell”, while the second was derived from the Starcraft videogame “the taro adu’un spell”. Beyond the funky names, the hidden ideas are profound, chaos magick is strong and works and most practitioners are experienced ceremonial mages or wiccans.

Chaos magick has strong roots in ceremonial magic, in qabalah, in Crowley's teachings, but as a major difference, it renounces the objects, the glamour, the strict rules, focuses on each person's imagination, on the magician's power, on the power of his intent, not on the power of the magical objects or of the formula used.

Chaos Magick and Wicca

Chaos Magick and Wicca have many things in common.. which explains why it is drawing in more and more wiccans. It is, just like wicca, an intuitive form of witchcraft which combines low and high magic, it is a mish-mash of diverse beliefs and rituals, it is often practiced solitary and is based on imagination and belief and not on objects or fixed formula.

Despite of this, there are a few major differences:

• Wicca is a religious system of beliefs, Chaos Magick is a mystical path

• Wicca prides itself on its tradition, its simplicity, its relationship to a mystical past, while Chaos Magick is oriented towards the new, towards progress and technology.

• Wicca is an Earth-bound religion, Chaos Magick is closer to high-magic.

• Wicca has a major rede, a powerful ethical system, while Chaos Magick revels in working with dark entities.

• Wicca manifests itself through a transformation of the perception in order to include the world, while Chaos Magick assumes a transformation of the material due to the force of willpower.

The major advantage of the wicca/chaos pairing is that the two paths are complementary, it is easy to be both a wiccan and a chaos mage in the same time without contradicting ideas.

Regardless if it will draw more people in or not, Chaos Magick is an interesting and complex path, which deserves to be studied, at least superficially, for a better understanding of the complexity of the magical world.  

The Violet Flame – Between Magic, Parapsychology and PR

The Violet Flame – Between Magic, Parapsychology and PR

For those who do not know this, for the loss of Romania's loss of the presidential elections in 2009 was blamed the „violet flame”, as an occult instrument for manipulation and influence, which lead to a national media scandal.

I tried in the following words to make a small chronicle of the event, from a neutral point of view, seeing the situation from both a magical point of view as well as from the point of view of its psychosocial implications.

The violet flame.. What the hell is that?

I thought scratching my head... I rummaged through my limited knowledge of magic and the only similar thing was the violet flame, used for cleaning the magical space – and I thought what does the poor witch sweeping away negative energies with her trusty broomstick and mass manipulation?

Plan B was of course to take my dusty grimoires from around the house, to see if I missed anything about this violet flame. The only interesting quote I found referred to a description of the violet colour in magic: ”strength, well-being and luck. Considered to be the colour of royalty, it represents judgment, diligence and religiousness. Violet is the colour of the spirit, of eteric lands, of superior esoteric learning, of ancestral learning and of profound mysteries. Use violet as specific focus for spiritual concentration and meditation, as well as extended forms of cosmic knowledge and conscience”- hmmm.... it says nothing about political manipulation.

Plan C – let's see what the great oracle of Google has to say (please note I only used foreign websites as references). I have seen „the violet flame” in many places: in magic, parapsychology, alchemy and even in reiki. The surprise was the way this was presented:”it is a unique spiritual energy, which can help you in various ways, it can purify, heal emotionally and physically, can improve inter human relations”or ”the violet ray is an instrument that can help our lives: physically, mentally and emotionally. Called via mantras and visualizations, the spiritual fire reestablishes the energetic flow of the body”or a third definition „the rhythmical invocations of the violet flame can immediately transform negative energies. If you are feeling sad, depressed, scared or angry, the violet flame can help you immediately”.

What did we learn from this? The consensus seems general, the violet flame is an instrument for healing, for purification., for self dedication. I do not deny there can be diverging ideas in this case, but I was interested in the general, global tendency. How did we arrive from these ideas to a highly popular instrument for political manipulation in 2010's Romania? Let's put on our tinfoil hats, out Scientology manual and let's carefully view the situation.

Why was it created?

The first question that needs answering is: „was this situation created deliberately?” is it a fine backstage game, meant to distract from a difficult political defeat or a humongous goof, a spark on which firemen sprayed gas on?

My opinion is, after a careful analysis is that it all started from a random, but sincere remark, meant to be lost in the labyrinth of Romanian sensationalism, but which took unexpected proportions and which various forces try to manipulate, to direct it on a path favorable for themselves. The most important part of this episode is that ir represents a first mix of politics and magic, after hundreds of years, it makes a precedent and only time will tell if it will give birth to other similar episodes.

How close are the Romanians to Magic?

Another interesting element highlighted by this situation is the closeness of the Romanian people to magic and superstition, the fine line that keeps us on scientific grounds and which can always throw us back to the mystical past. N the same discussions, the Americans laughed and mocked, while in Romania it was considered a national problem. What does it mean? Are Romanians more stupid? More illiterate, more primitive? No. I think that Romanians are more in tune with the secondary plains, more receptive to the mysteries of the worlds, that the cold and rational mask is but a facade and that in its essence, this country is still lead by its soul and not by cold logic.

Another thing we discovered through this situation is the plethora of „specialists”, all-knowers, glad to be ”on screen” and state their opinions. From small shrinks, to carnival witches, from exorcist monks to ufologists, all the paranormal fauna came out, everybody has an opinion. I am just glad that I do not know anyone from the ”community” to be drawn in by the flash of the cameras and to pervert his beliefs by taking part in this carnival of ludicracy. Shocked by the discovery of the huge number of holders of the ”absolute truth” which came up in mass-media, I will soon dedicate to them a special column.

Does believing in magic equate to political suicide?

And now we get to the major question: Does believing in magic equate to political suicide? I do not mean the current situation, but in general – I know some of this country's pagans and I want to tell you that they are extraordinary people, young, intelligent, strong, streetwise and charismatic. Does their faith automatically disqualify them from any political position? Must you hide your beliefs in order to prove yourself in from of the public? Why are parapsychology and astrology regarded as sciences, while magic is a subject for mockery, must the belief in the universal energies be hidden beneath scientific terms, easier to digest by the public?

We will only get a partial reply wen we find out how this story ends and how will Mircea Geoana stand.

Regardless, my advice is, if you have political ambitions to keep your beliefs hidden, in the ”broom closet”, until the world grows up enough as to accept us, because regardless of the end result, admitting the belief in magic will bring both unwanted attention and ridicule.

PS: To avoid any ”witty” remarks... I voted for the witchy-est choice: Remus Cernea, of the Green Party .. call it a wasted vote, but I voted for an ideal and not for a person.