Chaos MagickChaos Magick
The 8 Colors of Chaos Magick
Chaos Magick is not free from ideology
Non Paradigmal Magick
Chaos Magick is Modernism applied to Magic
operators often seem to think of themselves as being "above belief" and that they are able to use belief as a magical tool.
This then tends to turn into a sort of smug superiority:
What rather frightens non-chaos magicians is the ability for chaos magicians to get results while treating the paradigms in which they dwell with such a cavalier attitude. Nothing frustrates a 'true believer' more than someone who acts like a 'true believer', because he has to do it in order to get what he wants; and then is no longer a 'true believer' once he gets what he needs.
The above quote typifies the general attitude of most chaotes.It is a sort of confidence that I am sure is not meant in ill will but comes across as smug arrogance. The chaos magician believes they understand other systems and cultural expressions of magic so well that they can simply take the important parts and leave behind the "belief" when they are done.
While in some regards I personally agree with the conceit that we can choose what we believe Private or Broken Links
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, there is something more sinister happening with this "cavalier" attitude towards magical systems.
Because Chaos Magick is Modernism applied to MagicChaos Magick is Modernism applied to Magic
I previously said Chaos Magic is Post Modernism applied to Magic. I think that is incorrect. I believe that Modernism in the magical world is the quest to simplify and to cut out all the unnece... we see Modernist values at play here, primarily we see an attraction towards utilitarianism and the desire to sand off the aesthetic "non-functional" parts of a magical system so that it can be applied to one's own personal practice
This is dangerous because the "non-functional" parts of magic are often those cultural expressions which are not aligned with the Chaote's own cultural- this leads to cultural erasure. In my opinion it is deeply arrogant to look at another cultural expression of magical practice and assume that from outside that lived experience of culture we could understand the full meaning of the practices and extract them from there cultural context.
This is the heart of the Chaos Ideology: Magic exists for the purpose of completing some function or goal. That all magical practices across history and cultures contain aesthetic elements that are "non-functional". Any magical practice then, can be extracted from its cultural and historical context and can be instrumentalized by removing the "aesthetic" elements.
This is indeed an ideology. In fact, even the idea that there is a fundamental and universal purpose to magic is a deep assumption. This is fine and there is nothing wrong with attaching oneself to an ideological framework, but it is simply arrogant to do so while simultaneously deriding others for their own convictions and beliefs.