An Experiment, Updated

[ecosophia]

Earlier this month I posted a few words here about a curious effect I'd discovered -- that sharp points of iron or steel seem to have the same power to dispel addiction to television, the internet, and cell phones that they traditionally had on faery glamour.  I wasn't expecting anything like the passionate response I got -- that entry got more comments than anything else I've posted here, including the very lengthy debate over the inept attempt at anti-Trump sorcery I critiqued a month ago, and a great many people agreed to give it a try. 

At this point some of the results are in, and I've been able to draw some tentative conclusions and draft a hypothesis on which further experimentation can be based: 

1) The effect seems to be real, and not just a matter of the placebo effect. Quite a few readers have reported immediate effects, not only on themselves, but on people who had no idea that the experiment was being tried, and who suddenly lost interest in television. 

2) The effect isn't guaranteed. Not everyone noted effects. In particular, when someone else in the household was using television, the internet, or their phone as a drug to avoid dealing with personal problems, that person's addiction was pretty reliably not affected by the presence of sharp iron. 

3) The effect can generate opposition. In a significant minority of cases, people who weren't in on the experiment found the sharp iron objects and removed them, even when there was no obvious reason to do so. 

My hypothesis is as follows: we're dealing with a genuine effect here, but the glamour it appears to counter is only one of the factors in the phenomenon of television addiction. Some people watch television or use other electronic media obsessively for personal reasons unrelated to the glamour. There may also be other variables that influence whether a sharp iron point will decrease the hold electronic media has on people.

At this point, I'm going to propose a few changes to the experimental protocol. First, if you have housemates who aren't in on the experiment, use an X-acto knife blade or a steel pin taped to the underside of the television, internet router, or other object, rather than a knife -- the knives are too visible, and can get noticed and removed. Second, try to assess whether your housemates' addiction to electronic media may be a way they use to avoid major issues, and keep that in mind when assessing your options. Other than that, if you feel inspired to join the experiment, give it a shot and see what results you get. 

Comments

What comes after

[syfen]

Archdruid,

I suppose this is a good lead in to a question I wanted to ask. What comes after you've freed the person from the glamour? Something needs to fill the gaping void left by digital obsession. Are we supposed to help the ex-cons find something meaningful to fill their new lives?

Regards,

Syfen

Re: What comes after

[ecosophia]

That depends on the nature of your relationship with them, but it would be courteous, at least, to help them find other activities, and to take part in those if that seems appropriate.

Re: What comes after

[(Anonymous)]

Yes Syfen, exactly! It was immediately clear that my wife needed more of my attention with the TV off. The effect was clear and immediate but if I wasn't available to talk about her day or the kids and grandchildren she would spool up the box and watch soaps or Gilmore girls reruns. The TV filled her need for family interaction.
Now we sit on the porch and talk or read books together. I'm ashamed to say, I was content to let the TV babysit while I did what I wanted.

[(Anonymous)]

Only just got around to trying it on my wife, who didn't know. We don't have cable, and she rarely watches tv, but sometimes streams shows on her laptop. Particularly when she is stressed with other things and needs to "be mindless" as she puts it. I placed a knife on the router.

I wasn't in the same room, but the shows did not stop for a while. I would say it probably had no effect. That said, I'm not sure to what degree she paid attention to them. I note that she often wanders off with it on to do other things and returns, which may not be glamour, especially since she goes days between watching shows.

Next I will try it when she is browsing pointlessly on her phone, which may be more of a glamour case.

[ecosophia]

One thing worth experimenting with is whether the effect is cumulative. Put a sharp object in place and leave it there for the long term, and see if changes build over time -- some people have reported this.

[(Anonymous)]

For those suffering from mild EM sensitivity (the sort that prevents focus while a TV is on nearby), I can report that sharp iron near the TVs seems to have a positive effect on that. I used to find it impossible to meditate if a TV was on anywhere in my house, but placing sharp metal near them has reduced TVs to just an ordinary distraction. Annoying, but not impossible to work around.

[ecosophia]

Okay, that's a useful data point. Has anyone else who practices meditation noticed anything similar?

[fluiddruid]

The real question - why is there faery glamour in television and the internet in the first place. Is it coming from nature spirits? Is there a cabal of dark wizards controlling the media?

I'm living alone at the moment, but when I do get to visit my relatives, I will try this experiment.

P.S. That's beside the point, but you say sharp iron and steel objects will cause pain and damage to etheric body, if not protected by flesh, but I am fairly certain that being poked by sharp metal objects does not feel good even if you are in flesh. :-)

[ecosophia]

That's a fascinating question to which I have nothing like enough information to offer a definite answer. My guess -- and it's no more than that -- is that there's some degree of overlap between the electromagnetic and the etheric, and something in TV technology is accidentally replicating the effect that appears in tradition as faery glamour. But I could certainly be wrong...

As for sharp points, sure, but in that case they disrupt the material level rather than the etheric level!

[(Anonymous)]

Self-assessment:

1. My own internet addiction has taken two forms, which have both gotten worse recently. I spend a great deal of time reading news and politics from a far-right perspective. I have also, over the last 3 or 4 months, been spending a great deal of time playing a computer game while listening to lectures on YouTube on various topics, including politics, conspiracies and theology, often from a Roman Catholic perspective, including a traditionalist Catholic perspective that condemns the kind of occultism I practice. Why? I don't know. I found it very disturbing, how I would struggle to clear video game images from my mind after several hours of playing, but I felt powerless over it.

I suspect that anyone who met me would be rather surprised by both of these obsessions. There was a time when it was radical left-wing politics, but that sort of thing no longer produces in my mind the sense of struggling desperately against impossible odds.

After your original post, I placed a small dagger under my router. Since then I have not played a computer game or felt the need to. And I've also stopped compulsively checking political websites. I've been scanning one or two news aggregators for a few minutes for headlines and then going about my day. The more aggressive political sites, associated with the Alt Right, I've not looked at at all and have removed from the suggested websites in my phone. Interestingly, I don't feel a need to look at them when I'm away from my home internet router either.

My internetting has largely been limited to reading this and the main site and participating in a couple of discussion groups that I value. Thinking about reading some of the more strident opinion-spewers that I used to consume makes me rather repulsed... and confused as to how I might ever have taken them seriously. I also still read Rod Dreher's blog at The American Conservative, but he leaves me rolling my eyes half the time-- which didn't used to be the case.

It seems like a rather short time for this kind of change to have occurred. I am afraid that talking about it will jinx it.

2. Then this morning I turned my computer on, and felt myself starting to go down the internet rabbithole. Two things are noteworthy, or maybe three: 1. I noticed I was doing this immediately. 2. I was also immediately aware of the reason: I had been squabbling with my partner, and was deliberately avoiding my feelings about the relationship. A few minutes later, I read this post of yours, and the part about why the effect isn't guaranteed. One of these "coincidences." 3. I didn't end up going down the rabbit hole. Instead I talked to the service provider and negotiated a reduced bill for a slower speed.

3. My use of my cell phone for purposes unrelated to the internet has not been affected. I have a number of people in my life who enjoy text messages, including my very large family, and, having been raised in the days of AOL Instant Messenger, I find this an easy and agreeable way to communicate. So I've actually been using my phone as much as ever-- just for different purposes. Better purposes, from my perspective, though this may be a glamour of another sort.

Either way, thanks for the suggestion, which has helped me a great deal already.

[ecosophia]

Many thanks for the data points! If you're using text messaging deliberately, to do something you want to do, that's one thing; it's the obsessive, almost unconscious nature of television addiction that made me think of glamour, and seems to be the thing that's disrupted by iron. I suppose I could summarize by saying that the point of this working isn't to abolish the technology, it's to make it a servant rather than a master.

Glamour

[(Anonymous)]

Can you please provide your definition of Glamour? I recall the concept/term from my study (many years ago) of Theosophy but would appreciate knowing your meaning. Thanks.
JW

Re: Glamour

[ecosophia]

I don't have a strict definition in mind. In the faery lore of northwestern Europe, faeries are believed to have the capacity to confuse, delude, and project illusions onto human beings, and this capacity can be disrupted by cold iron or certain other things. My hypothesis is that some similar effect seems to be generated by television, and so it's worth trying to disrupt it in a similar way.

[(Anonymous)]

I taped pins to both internet routers in my home and so far... I do notice a slight effect on my Internet habits. I don't get lost in browsing so much, and (right up until today) had no interest in playing video games. It's like being online feels like a waste of time to me now, aside from using the 'net for necessary tasks.

The comment about using TV and the 'net as a form of drug is interesting, and unfortunately I believe that applies to my daughter who plays games to distract herself from her anxieties. Perhaps over time there will be a stronger effect. My father-in-law just moved in as well and he's on his laptop all the time. I will watch to see what effects, if any, this experiment has on his computer use.

Thank you for organizing this, JMG! If other natural magic experiments come up I'll be happy to participate.

Tim

[ecosophia]

Many thanks for the data points!

[(Anonymous)]

The results so far have been subtle. My girlfriend still uses the TV to provide background noise after work, and while she's making dinner. But it's no longer blaring while we're eating, and in general it seems to be quieter.

The one exception was this past Sunday, when she put on a Fox channel special about British royalty - which caused a reaction in me similar to a cat being carried towards a bathtub full of water.
That night, after she went to bed, I stuck a few needles around the offending devices, to hopefully bolster the effect.
-Cliff

[ecosophia]

Many thanks for these data points as well.

[elf]

> In a significant minority of cases, people who weren't in on the experiment found the sharp iron objects and removed them, even when there was no obvious reason to do so.

"Here is a sharp object in an unexpected location" is generally reason enough for removing it, especially in any household with children or pets. Even if the sharp thing is unlikely to be encountered, without a reason to leave it there, many people will remove sharps just so nobody accidentally gets hurt by it later.

This applies to both neat and messy households; neat households don't like the irregularity, and messy households (like mine) put effort into noticing the difference between "clutter; can be ignored" and "potentially dangerous clutter; make sure this won't hurt someone who doesn't notice it among the other clutter."

[(Anonymous)]

Agreed: https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2010-02-19 . (I'd made the similar post below.)

[amritarosa]

Hello there!

After just a little more than a week with an xacto blade under the television set, I've noticed the following results:

1) My partner's tv viewing habits have not shown signs of significant change. He prefers comic book inspired shows and a little sci-fi, never news or other kinds of programming. He'll often practice the guitar, or do other tasks like change strings or catch up on musician discussion forums while the tv plays. The only noticeable change is a slight increase in attention to the latter kinds of activities while the shows are on, that I've observed.

2) I've been getting sleepy early, sometimes up to an hour before I normally would before bedtime. I usually see about 1.5 to 2 hours of whatever he has on tv between the time I get home from work and bedtime. I almost always bring a book into bed and read it. I'm pretty good at blocking out the "noise" - like I can turn the distraction dial down in my head. Partly from living with a musician for nearly 30 years (he may need to actively listen to himself go through "In the Mood" or somesuch 500 times, but I certainly don't), partly from working backstage in theater (after seeing and hearing a show a dozen times one learns quickly to simply listen for the cues for the other 32 or so performances 6 nights a week, unless it's really, really good). I'm sure it seeps in at the edges, though. My sleepiness is a new thing since placing the blade.

FWIW, past habits around night time tv viewing (the only time it's turned on in our house) vary from night to night. A good one third of nights, he will be out on a gig until bedtime, so no tv. Unless there happens to be a good British mystery on PBS or something like that - that's aboout I'll watch of my own volition. Or a nature show featuring crows or insects- I'll turn the sound off and just watch those!

Now putting a blade on the router...I'm encountering some interesting internal resistance to that! Which probably means I should do it.

[ecosophia]

Many thanks for the data points!

My attempt, and some considerations

[packshaud]

My personal experiment with this did not have the expected results, at least in the first day. Internet access for me comes from my cellphone plan, which I can't simply abandon at the moment because I get called to my temporary work via some instant messenger app.

I was already slowly going away from Internet. I have left from almost everything online, very influenced by the data transfer limits of my plan ("data caps," as these are called). Here in Brazil, it is quite common it is quite common for poor people (yours truly included) to stay "sem internet" (Internetless) for days until the data allowance cycle restarts. Collapse Now and Avoid the Rush is fine and dandy, but unfortunately I'm the kind of person that slowly learns the hard way.

On the etheric side of things, I should also mention I got a vinegar bowl inside my sleeping room.

So I proceeded to install two needles inside the cover of my phone, one vertically and one horizontally. I think they are sharp enough, I punctured one of my fingers during the installation. In the same day I fell to a common trap, a Wikipedia binge. It works like this, you open an article, then you start to open related ones in the background, and suddenly you have read several ones and you have dozens of other ones opened in other browser tabs waiting for reading. This phenomenon is also known as the TV Tropes Effect (don't ever go there, it will suck your life).

I will admit here that I have several personal issues that are making this addiction worse. But avoiding Internet is being easier lately.

I would like to present, though, some ideas on the technology replicating the effects of glamour. Television sets changed drastically in the last thirty years or so, going from CRT and analog signal encoding to the current LED and other systems to display the images, together with the much more complex digital signal encoding. A current TV set is so different from one made in 1990 that there are very few, if any, common systems where the electromagnetic effect could reside.

None of the considerations above says that etheric disruption is not in place. I just think it may not be related to the electronic systems. My guess is that the glamour is a side effect of advertisement and propaganda, which is a work with magic effects that gets into subtler planes, that accidentally gets focused in the delivery systems, cellphones, Internet routers and TV sets. The etheric disruptors we are trying to install interfere with this, much like a vinegar bowl. Due to the different forms the magic ends having, an attack on the etheric component of the addiction has more or less effects depending on the user.

At least for me, there is a huge factor for addiction on forums. It affects other people, because I have seen it mentioned in many places, specially on 4chan, which I somehow managed to no longer visit. There, it is called (You), between parentheses. It is the marker the board software puts in posts to let you know you got a reply. People sometimes reply to posts considered stupid or trollish, "Have a (You)." Waiting for a reply to your comments in social media is a huge factor in Internet addiction. But again, this does not apply to the passive television.

Re: My attempt, and some considerations

[ecosophia]

Thanks for the data points, and also for the reflections on the underlying technology. What generates the effect is a fascinating question which I haven't even begun to explore yet -- ascertaining whether cold iron has an effect on television addiction is the first step, and from there any number of further investigations can proceed. As for the waiting-for-comments effect, that's fascinating -- I suspect my Aspergers syndrome shields me from that, as I don't experience it.

[(Anonymous)]

I'll say that the presence of an unknown-purpose pointy iron is itself pretty obvious reason to remove it. Double so for any taped pin, triple so for a taped knife blade (!!!) that gets noticed - eventually it will, no?

Not quite

[(Anonymous)]

If the sharp, pointy object is loose, yes. If it's taped to something, it's pretty obvious that someone put it there intentionally, so I'd expect anyone finding it to ask around a bit before removing it.

[temporaryreality]

I put an X-acto blade under our router on the first day and spent the rest of the week observing my daughter who tends to get sucked into her phone, mostly Instagram and mostly because school life is miserable but sometimes I see she gets sucked into popular fervors that go around.

I'll call the data here kind of muddied - mostly the universe conspired to give her a very busy week, between sr. year of HS responsibilities and those of two part time jobs. I wouldn't put it past the forces accessed in this experiment to come up with unusual and appropriate ways of 'dispelling" (haha, I see that!) the glamour.

I figured I'd just keep things the way they were and observe more with a future change being a change made to the way I taped the blade (current: the blade is stuck completely to the tape and obscured by it when viewed. Next option: allow the pointy end to stick out from the tape while the shaft would be taped/secured to the router bottom).

But then - and this is where it really was an eye opener - on Tuesday I remembered that we have a wifi extender installed in the midpoint of our house to boost signal to the far end. I immediately taped a needle to the bottom of it, point exposed.

Within a few hours my daughter came out of her room and sighed. She said, "I can't watch the math video I wanted that explains this stats thing I need to know for my exam." When I asked why, she said, "The kitchen wifi [with X-acto blade] is super glitchy and the extender [with needle] is too slow."

Oops! I went and removed both implements from the routers so she could access all the internet stuff she needed to study for her exam. I told her I had just re-set the extender and a while later when she emerged again, she said she'd had no problems after that.

Wow.

I'll be re-applying the sharps in the next day or two - she's done with exams but is definitely in need of decompressing from the challenge of day to day public school and while we've got some outdoor and social things planned, I'll grant her a little downtime and see how much she choose of her own accord before tweaking with it again.

[ecosophia]

I've had a few similar reports -- sharp iron causing the technology itself to malfunction. Whether it's a related effect, or some other confounding variable, is a question I can't yet answer!

[(Anonymous)]

This isn't directly related to this post, but rather to your earlier post about the attempt to place a binding spell on Donald Trump. Do you think the threat to the President from what you've described as incompetent magic was serious enough to make what Griffin and McQuade did necessary?
http://www.watcherofthedawn.com/2017/07/09/golden-dawn-leader-griffin-donald-trump/

[ecosophia]

Nope. As Dion Fortune points out in The Cosmic Doctrine -- and she could have had an enjoyable discussion on this point with any competent student of taijiquan or aikido, or for that matter any decent boxer -- direct opposition is the weakest way to face a hostile force, as it locks the force in place and gives it strength. Given that we're discussing an incoherent working that uses bunny-slope techniques, it needed the opposition of something like Griffin's "battle magic" to give it any coherence and effect at all, and Griffin and his wife then took the brunt of that. Mind you, he succeeded in his intention, as that would have discharged a good deal of what energy the anti-Trump working had -- and you'll notice that right about the time he and his wife had their accidents, the Trump administration started really getting the upper hand on its opponents.

There are many other ways to mess with hostile magic. Given the way that the opposition to Trump seems to be running around in self-referential circles these days, shrieking about Russians under every mattress until even liberal humor mags like The Onion are making fun of them, while Trump's approval ratings rise and Democratic prospects for the 2018 election sink alarmingly, I have every reason to think that those other ways are getting a thorough workout just now.

experimental protocol

[(Anonymous)]

(Deborah Bender)

I'm observing this experiment without participating. I just want to say that I approve of trying magic with a specific result in mind and collecting reports on the results, in order to figure out whether the magic worked and whether some change would make the method more effective.

That sounds obvious to the point of being lame, but I've participated in a lot of healing spells where there wasn't any way I could tell if the outcome was affected by our efforts. People who are more psychic probably could tell but for me it is like drawing without looking at the paper, which is a good technique to learn how to observe and loosen up, but in the end you do want to see if you drew something recognizable.

[(Anonymous)]

It's possible I got resistance from the equipment itself. I noticed the positive effect had stopped and I'd sunk back into the zombie state, but it turned out the nail clippers were laying in the floor away from the modem and looked just like the modem had shrugged them off. Obviously the modem has wires coming out of it and one would only have to be accidently pulled to create the same effect, but it's an interesting thought. The nail clippers have now been reinforced with a needle taped to the casing and the effect seems to have come back. One thing I've noticed is if I deliberately try to zone out while the effect is going, I can do it but I don't seem to be able to go quite as deep and part of my brain stays alert to what is happening.

[ecosophia]

Hmm! That's interesting. Many thanks for the data points.

[(Anonymous)]

I've had a knife hidden under the TV since JMG suggested the experiment.
There has been no observable change in my family's TV watching over that time. We don't watch a lot as a rule and have regular teaching moments with the kids over what the adverts are trying to or why such a such a show adds no value to the world. But there are times when it is on and they seem to be sucked into a vacant zombie like state - I usually leave the room at this stage.

[ecosophia]

Fair enough -- that's also useful data.

Some results

[(Anonymous)]

I put blades under the router, the TV, and pins in both phone cases. I've been withdrawing from the great Time suck Facepalm anyways, and continue to do so. I don't watch much TV, although I followed the PBS Sunday night shows. I think I'm less interested, though that may be a placebo. My wife still religiously follows St. Rachel of Maddow. I have noticed less of her waking in the middle of the night, endlessly scrolling through Facebook. maybe I sleep through it, maybe she does less.
I'll comment more as time passes

Not much to say, right now

[(Anonymous)]

I've put an open, sharpened, Opinel garden knife with a pretty sharp point and a keen edge on the shelf underneath the internet router and modem. It seems to have had absolutely no effect on my partner's excessive facebooking and social media intake. On the other hand, I was drawn to finally delete my accounts completely and walk away from them, but I'd been contemplating that for a long time and hadn't used them in over six months - I never liked the glamour aspect to these services and once they stopped being a useful source of information (I'd find out about events the day after they happened, quite reliably) I gave up on them wholesale already.

Sorry, but it doesn't seem to have accomplished anything here.

Hi Volt TV Hisses

[(Anonymous)]

http://www.anagramgenius.com/archive/hi-volt-tv-hisses.html