Speaker 1: I'm a conspiracy realist. Tonight's classic episode comes from twoenty
Speaker 1: twenty one.
Speaker 2: How long ago was that?
Speaker 1: Several years?
Speaker 2: We counted.
Speaker 1: Uh, this is something Matt that you and I, Noel
Speaker 1: and Tennessee and Mission Control had always been pretty fascinated with.
Speaker 2: But you and.
Speaker 1: I would talk about this way back when we first met.
Speaker 1: Because it's just so strange and esoteric. I'm building it
Speaker 1: up too much. What's this classic episode about?
Speaker 3: Well, you're just making me think about Albert Pike's super
Speaker 3: secret magic necklace thing that we talked about for a
Speaker 3: while there, thinking about freemasonry and secret societies, and then
Speaker 3: a little group of folks that got together and said, guys,
Speaker 3: what if we made an even secret or society and
Speaker 3: we'll call it something really epic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so they got together and what they came
Speaker 1: up with was a I love the phrase, a secret society.
Speaker 1: The secret society is called the Hermetic Order of the
Speaker 1: Golden Dot. It might sound obscure and bizarre today, and
Speaker 1: it is bizarre. But what you're going to be surprised
Speaker 1: to find here, folks, if this is the first time
Speaker 1: hearing about the Golden Dawn, is that I had a
Speaker 1: huge impact on later groups and later systems, and Matt
Speaker 1: for me in this exploration, the biggest question is did
Speaker 1: any of this magic work?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 3: I bet we get to the bottom of it in
Speaker 3: the following episode, do we?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Sure we all.
Speaker 3: We'll at least talk about it every while.
Speaker 4: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies, history is
Speaker 4: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
Speaker 4: learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
Speaker 4: production of iHeart Radio.
Speaker 3: Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
Speaker 3: my name is Noel.
Speaker 1: They call me Ben. We're joined as always with our
Speaker 1: super producer Paul. Mission control decands. Most importantly, you are you.
Speaker 1: You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
Speaker 1: want you to know. And I was thinking over the
Speaker 1: past few days that everybody we meet, to one degree
Speaker 1: or another, participates in something that could be called a
Speaker 1: secret or occulted organization. It may be some like group
Speaker 1: you're a member of during your schooling days. It might
Speaker 1: be some weird, you know, class organization like the various
Speaker 1: orders that aristocrats have. It might just be fandom for
Speaker 1: a particular artist right or something you're interested in. Or
Speaker 1: it might be a bond built upon surviving a particular
Speaker 1: type of trauma. Right, it might be something entirely extracurricular,
Speaker 1: but we're all members of all these various different things,
Speaker 1: and that's that's not necessarily a bad thing. Right. Just
Speaker 1: because a bunch of people are into some like weird
Speaker 1: Cadillac forum on the Internet, doesn't mean they're automatically the Illuminati, right, Like,
Speaker 1: are we all kind of into weird stuff?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I mean, you know, just by virtue of being podcasters,
Speaker 2: we're sort of softly initiated into a weird kind of
Speaker 2: cabal of sorts.
Speaker 1: Right, that's a good point. I hadn't thought of that,
Speaker 1: but that's a good point. Sorry, Sorry who God Anyway,
Speaker 1: today's this will make sense later or not. Today's episode
Speaker 1: focuses on a particular school of thought. It's an organization
Speaker 1: that prizes itself on exclusivity, on the idea of initiation,
Speaker 1: accreating knowledge incrementally, and yes, a form of magic. So
Speaker 1: today's question, what is the Golden on Here are the
Speaker 1: facts full name of it, the Hermetic Order of the
Speaker 1: Golden Dawn. Today we see it as an odd, an
Speaker 1: odd group, somewhat forgotten by the mainstream, but it played
Speaker 1: a fundamental role in today's magical organizations. The weirdest thing
Speaker 1: about it was at the time, in the eighteen nineties,
Speaker 1: eighteen eighties or so, it was well, I think it
Speaker 1: kind of functioned like a social network. I don't know
Speaker 1: what you guys think as you dive in, but you know,
Speaker 1: with magic, right, it's kind of an augmented reality the
Speaker 1: more we think about it. Similar to the Latitude Society,
Speaker 1: they took ideas that were a unique combination of ancient,
Speaker 1: pre existing spiritual traditions and then other stuff that was
Speaker 1: happening right before it in the realm of science and spiritualism.
Speaker 1: So like the Kabbala, Egyptian, Greek mysteries, several strands of
Speaker 1: early Christian thought, all these esoteric traditions combined in the
Speaker 1: late eighteen eighties. And the story of the Origin, I'll
Speaker 1: let you be the judge. The story of the Origin
Speaker 1: feels a little sketchy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, indeed, the hoot God, okay, right? Who God? Sorry, Ben,
Speaker 2: you gotta help us out here. What is this acronym?
Speaker 2: I love the way this is.
Speaker 1: That's me be lazy in the notes. It's just shorthand
Speaker 1: for the hermetic order of the Golden Dolls.
Speaker 2: That's the one.
Speaker 1: They didn't call themselves whot God.
Speaker 2: Well, we talked off Mike, how that would be a
Speaker 2: fantastic name for likely a Florida rapper. Perhaps Golf Coast,
Speaker 2: I believe is what you said.
Speaker 1: Ben, Yeah, I think so, Golf Coast, Golf Coast out there.
Speaker 1: It's a great idea.
Speaker 2: Okay. So the who Got Hermetic Order of the Golden
Speaker 2: Dawn was founded in eighteen eighty seven by a Freemason
Speaker 2: by the name of William Wynn Westcott. Www, that's a
Speaker 2: fun alliteration there. Also in this group of founders was
Speaker 2: Samuel Liddell McGregor Matthews and William Robert Woodman, the least
Speaker 2: impressive of those three.
Speaker 3: And all of them were Masons.
Speaker 2: Yes, indeed correct, a group of Masons, and allegedly they
Speaker 2: based their founding of this group on a series of
Speaker 2: writings that were collectively known as the Cipher Manuscripts, which
Speaker 2: is definitely the name of the first album from Whot God,
Speaker 2: no question about that. So these Cipher Manuscripts are a
Speaker 2: group of sixty different folios. I guess you could call
Speaker 2: them outlining a series of magical intention rights or rituals right.
Speaker 2: A ritual is something that is intended to produce a
Speaker 2: result through synchronized incantations or something or movement. Various things
Speaker 2: can go into a ritual. This podcast contains quite a
Speaker 2: few rituals. In fact, you might not even realize it,
Speaker 2: but these things were corresponding to the spiritual elements of air, earth, water,
Speaker 2: and fire. Yeah. No, it was I ought to say
Speaker 2: their powers combined. They are in fact captain planet.
Speaker 3: Yeah. And you can think about these rituals and rights,
Speaker 3: the things that were contained in these manuscripts somewhat somewhat
Speaker 3: like a mixtape. Really, it's it's it's an anthology. We
Speaker 3: already mentioned it above, all these varying thoughts and schools
Speaker 3: of thought kind of going together into one thing, all
Speaker 3: types of different what you would call magical theory, either
Speaker 3: with a C or a K, mostly with a K,
Speaker 3: and a lot of it is just steeped in symbolism.
Speaker 3: So when you when you're looking at these things. The
Speaker 3: reason why hoot God is so interesting and funny to me,
Speaker 3: it reminds me of Minerva and representations of the owl.
Speaker 3: And we were just speaking about this on a listener
Speaker 3: mail episode Esoteric Wisdom, Right, Yeah, and and really this this,
Speaker 3: this manuscript, the cipher manuscript, is kind of like a
Speaker 3: beginner's manual, but it's also the advanced stuff kind of
Speaker 3: all together in one. It's just everything you need to
Speaker 3: operate as a member of the Hermitic Order of Golden Dawn. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So if you look at the watermarks on these folios,
Speaker 1: on the actual text themselves, it looks like they were
Speaker 1: created back in eighteen oh nine, So that's one theory.
Speaker 1: They are written in code, and like you said, Matt,
Speaker 1: they contain diagrams, symbols, but they also contain this written text.
Speaker 1: It's not a particularly difficult code to crack. Numbers are
Speaker 1: substituted by Hebrew letters, so for example, a left equals one.
Speaker 1: According to the order's own records, Westcott himself discovered slash
Speaker 1: decoded the text in or around eighteen eighty seven. Like
Speaker 1: we said, when the Order was founded. It's important to
Speaker 1: note that these founding members, they all had day jobs.
Speaker 1: That's going to be a complicating factor. In just a bit.
Speaker 1: Westcott claimed that he had just found these been given them.
Speaker 1: He did not say that he had written them, though
Speaker 1: later historians would suspect indeed some of his colleagues would
Speaker 1: accuse him of just writing them himself and then claiming
Speaker 1: some more prestigious authorship. It could have also possibly been
Speaker 1: written by Edward.
Speaker 2: Litton, who was.
Speaker 1: A popular author at the time associated with some of
Speaker 1: these occult beliefs, or a lot of fans of his
Speaker 1: work were also fans of these sorts of magical practices. Today,
Speaker 1: you'll recognize Bulwer Lytton most easily as the inspiration of
Speaker 1: one of my favorite contests, the Bulwer Litton Fiction Contests.
Speaker 1: Have you guys heard about this?
Speaker 2: No Never another great name, though.
Speaker 1: I suggest we all consider entering the contest just if
Speaker 1: you're bored of an afternoon one day. It's an official
Speaker 1: annual contest to write the worst opening sentence of any
Speaker 1: possible novel. And I haven't won yet. Like you try
Speaker 1: to imagine what the worst novel ever would be, and
Speaker 1: then you write the first sentence.
Speaker 2: For that novel.
Speaker 1: That should give you a sense of the kind of
Speaker 1: writing bull wherre Lytton did when he was alive.
Speaker 3: Wow. Do grammatical errors count toward the badness of it?
Speaker 3: Or does it? Do you just have to get that
Speaker 3: stuff right it's just the arrangement or no I guess
Speaker 3: the the words that you put in there grammatically correct
Speaker 3: just need to be terrible.
Speaker 1: You know, sky's the limit. I say, get creative with it. This.
Speaker 1: The winner of twenty twenties contest was Lisa Klueber of
Speaker 1: San Francisco. This is the winning sentence, her dear John
Speaker 1: missive Flapp, done ambiguously in the windy breeze, hanging like
Speaker 1: a pizza menu on the doorknob of my mind, I
Speaker 1: thought that was all right. It wasn't anyway, that feels.
Speaker 3: More exciting than it should.
Speaker 2: I disagree with like the one of the things with
Speaker 2: the little doorknob holes in it, right, okay? Got it?
Speaker 1: Also completely unrelated. We were talking about proprietary eponyms. Learned
Speaker 1: that doorknob is one, dornob is like a brand name.
Speaker 2: Anyway.
Speaker 1: So back to these texts. We don't know who really
Speaker 1: wrote them, but there are some guesses. We're going to
Speaker 1: give you the version of the order itself, and then
Speaker 1: we'll give you some of the critics ideas. So Wescott
Speaker 1: told his compatriots that not only had he decoded these texts,
Speaker 1: which illuminated various mysteries, but in the process of deciphering
Speaker 1: this stuff, he found the address of a German aristocrat
Speaker 1: and Rosicrucian named Anna Sprangle. Anna Sprangel was not your
Speaker 1: average aristocrat. Wescott believed that she had the ability to
Speaker 1: contact some sort of supernatural and or extra dimensional entity,
Speaker 1: which they were collectively referred to as the Secret Chiefs,
Speaker 1: which is a term I had never heard before. Like
Speaker 1: we've heard Machinel, Right.
Speaker 2: There's a band called the Secret Chiefs, like kind of
Speaker 2: a weird almost like mister that was actually related to
Speaker 2: mister Bungle, but kind of like almost like a metal
Speaker 2: jazz band called the Secret Chiefs. I never knew where
Speaker 2: that term came from. I always thought it was the
Speaker 2: oddest name. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So the Hidden Kings, this is very interesting. Hmm all right,
Speaker 3: So allegedly the Hidden Kings are the ones who wrote
Speaker 3: this thing.
Speaker 1: Or inspired the guided the hand of the person who
Speaker 1: did write them.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: And this isn't necessarily a new idea, the idea of
Speaker 1: divinely inspired written texts, right, This is this is something
Speaker 1: that dates back to religions of old. It continues today
Speaker 1: with various organizations. The Secret Chiefs themselves are specifically mentioned
Speaker 1: in earlier works, like one called The Cloud upon the
Speaker 1: Sanctuary back in seventeen ninety five by a name that Noel.
Speaker 1: I will defer to your German in pronouncing.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm gonna give this my young gem and boy.
Speaker 2: All let's see.
Speaker 5: This would be Ka von ekott Schausen, Kaul von Ekottshausen.
Speaker 5: Maybe it's more of an Ekotzhausen. Maybe I may be
Speaker 5: doing too hard of an sh but I've given it Mile.
Speaker 5: That's is the best I can do.
Speaker 1: I like both of them, sex man, so I love it.
Speaker 3: So this gentleman allegedly wrote this thing way way before,
Speaker 3: well not that far before, if it was, in fact,
Speaker 3: you know, written in eighteen oh nine, but it was,
Speaker 3: as we said, discovered in eighteen eighty seven. So he
Speaker 3: wrote this work The Cloud upon the Sanctuary in seventeen nineties,
Speaker 3: seventeen ninety five, something like that, exactly.
Speaker 1: So we see a rough timeline that we can trace
Speaker 1: through the use of these particular phrases. Right this Secret Chiefs,
Speaker 1: Hidden Kings, stuff like that. The Golden Dawn did differ
Speaker 1: from some earlier, arguably similar groups, and even differed from
Speaker 1: some groups that would exist around the same time period
Speaker 1: because it did not restrict membership along the lines of gender.
Speaker 1: Unlike Freemasonry, women were treated as equals and allowed into
Speaker 1: this order. It's progressive for its time. So things started
Speaker 1: going wrong pretty quickly. Spoiler Westcott had to leave leadership
Speaker 1: of the Order when he literally lost some papers in
Speaker 1: a cab. He just forgot to take them. You know,
Speaker 1: it's like leaving your phone in an uber, but you
Speaker 1: have the necronomicon with you on your phone or something.
Speaker 3: Or your phone. Your phone is the necronomic.
Speaker 1: On your phone is the is the necronomicon. So the
Speaker 1: Secret Chiefs did not appear to help him out as
Speaker 1: far as his day job goes. Because word got to
Speaker 1: his employers. They discovered his connection to this group that
Speaker 1: at the time would seem pretty odd, and they gave
Speaker 1: him a choice. They said, look, you can keep working
Speaker 1: here and stop around with Magic WW, or you can
Speaker 1: leave because you will be fired. So Westcott thought about it.
Speaker 1: We don't know too many of the specifics. Ultimately he said,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm going to stick with my career as
Speaker 1: a coroner, and i am going to still be associated,
Speaker 1: you know, low key with this group, but I'm not
Speaker 1: going to be an active, prominent member because I got
Speaker 1: bills to pay.
Speaker 3: He was a corner and he was dabbling in magic.
Speaker 2: Does that mean he was was he stealing organs and
Speaker 2: other gutty parts from black magic c k rituals?
Speaker 3: I mean, if you wanted to be a necromancer, that's
Speaker 3: a pretty good place to start.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, one's going to miss an errant spleen here
Speaker 2: and there.
Speaker 1: That's true. You know, I thought the same thing too.
Speaker 1: I couldn't find and tell us if you have an
Speaker 1: inside scoop, folks, but I couldn't find any reports to that.
Speaker 1: Of course, we're joshing a bit. We don't want to
Speaker 1: just accuse somebody of necromancy.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, no, I know. No, I'm just look just
Speaker 3: stating the fact that if there are corpses near your
Speaker 3: person as part of your day job, that it would
Speaker 3: be helpful if one were interested in some of those
Speaker 3: dark arts. That's all.
Speaker 1: Yes, well said, and it's a very good point.
Speaker 2: Also.
Speaker 1: I just love that, in the context of this episode,
Speaker 1: it sounds like we have in the past ruined someone's
Speaker 1: lives by accusing them of being a necromancer, and now
Speaker 1: we're taking pains to make sure that's not the case.
Speaker 1: But you're right, You're right, circumstantial if nothing else, it's
Speaker 1: definitely the pieces are there, right, We just don't know
Speaker 1: what sort of picture the puzzle makes.
Speaker 3: Last thing, it would just it would be a headline
Speaker 3: in like the Mirror or something. A local area person
Speaker 3: accused of necromancy loses job over kerfuffle and no one
Speaker 3: would ever think about it again.
Speaker 6: Just say yeah, yeah, first paragraph, it's like local corridor
Speaker 6: was discovered after leaving magical documents and grimoirese in Uber.
Speaker 1: So yeah, you know what, maybe we should write for
Speaker 1: the Mirror. But look, this is a true story. And
Speaker 1: the rest of it, the rest of the story of
Speaker 1: the group's origin and its evolution, quickly descends into a
Speaker 1: story of obscure conspiracies, wheels within wheels, competing motivations, competing
Speaker 1: magical philosophies, secret societies forming like within secret societies, and
Speaker 1: then a study of just good old fashioned backstabbing. But
Speaker 1: what actually happened to the Golden Dawn, and perhaps most importantly,
Speaker 1: did any of the magic work? We'll dive into this
Speaker 1: after a word from our sponsors. Here's where it gets crazy.
Speaker 1: Let's tackle those two questions separately, Right, what actually happened
Speaker 1: to the organization and you know, how did the organization work?
Speaker 1: And then we'll get to we'll get to the magic.
Speaker 1: We have to get to the magic at some point.
Speaker 3: So yeah, let's talk about how popular the Old Golden
Speaker 3: Dawn was in its heyday, if you will. It was
Speaker 3: a big part of Victorian society. Strangely enough, you wouldn't
Speaker 3: imagine that magic was running wild in regular society. Well, yes,
Speaker 3: somewhat not fully, but somewhat right. There are all kinds
Speaker 3: of notable members from the top of society all the
Speaker 3: way down to the bottom. There was one member named
Speaker 3: Annie Hornieman. This person actually built Ireland's Abbey Theater. Have
Speaker 3: you ever heard of that? That's a famous theater that exists.
Speaker 3: This person built that. She was also a member of
Speaker 3: the Golden Dawn. Pretty cool, huh.
Speaker 1: And then there were poets and authors involved, like William Butler.
Speaker 1: Yeats is probably one of the most famous members of
Speaker 1: the Golden Down, or one of the most well remembered
Speaker 1: in the modern day. And he is on record saying
Speaker 1: that other than writing poetry, which he's kind of known for,
Speaker 1: the other most important pursuit of his life was his
Speaker 1: membership in the Golden Down, which is a big thing
Speaker 1: to say. Other authors like Algernon Blackwood were also members,
Speaker 1: and then well to do people scientists, folks who were
Speaker 1: practicing forms of meditation, things like that, Folks who are
Speaker 1: just interested in hanging out and talking about this stuff.
Speaker 2: Well, really quickly, I just wanted to mention, I believe,
Speaker 2: correct me if I'm wrong, guys, that Alex, our buddy
Speaker 2: Alex Williams podcast Ephemeral did like a special Halloween episode
Speaker 2: where they did a reading of an Algernon Blackwood story.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and we were literally talking about that a few
Speaker 3: hours ago, about how influential Algernon was and is still
Speaker 3: on like.
Speaker 1: Horror writing essentially, right, m hmm, yeah, Yeah, a tremendously
Speaker 1: influential horror writer. So it makes sense that in his
Speaker 1: non authorial time he would be interested in these sorts
Speaker 1: of spiritual philosophical explorations. But of course, there is one
Speaker 1: other person associated with the Order of the Golden Dawn
Speaker 1: in a controversial way. This is a guy who you
Speaker 1: are doubtlessly familiar with if you've listened to our show before.
Speaker 1: He's occasionally referred to as the Great Beast.
Speaker 3: That's right, Alistair Crowley. I'm saying Crowley on purpose. You
Speaker 3: could call him Crowley if you want, but after the
Speaker 3: comments on YouTube, we I will forever see his name
Speaker 3: be traumatized and then say Crawley. It's Crawley. But you're
Speaker 3: aware of that name, and you're likely aware of the
Speaker 3: Golden Dawn because of him, at least I certainly was.
Speaker 1: And we'll dive into his association, which I think gets
Speaker 1: a little bit exaggerated sometimes given the rest of his
Speaker 1: other work post Golden down But the downfall of this
Speaker 1: organization or the troubles it would have in its evolution,
Speaker 1: these were all present in the early days, in its formation.
Speaker 1: For the first few years, it was just that it
Speaker 1: was a single group of people studying the Cipher manuscripts together, right,
Speaker 1: and they were reading this stuff saying, hey, what do
Speaker 1: you think about this philosophy of air?
Speaker 2: You know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Or this passage about fire. This group, this initial group,
Speaker 1: would later be called the Outer Order or the First Order.
Speaker 1: And all you did in the First Order was get
Speaker 1: graded by fellow members and superiors in terms of your
Speaker 1: understanding of the arts and philosophies explored in those initial
Speaker 1: texts we mentioned Earth.
Speaker 3: Air Fire Order.
Speaker 1: You began as a neophyte, you eventually progressed through several
Speaker 1: ranks to become a kind of intermediate. Why is there
Speaker 1: an intermediate thing if the outer order is like complete, Well,
Speaker 1: it's because in eighteen ninety two a secret society kind
Speaker 1: of begins. In this secret society, it calls itself the
Speaker 1: Inner Order or the second Order, the cool part of
Speaker 1: the cool kids club. And this second order is entirely
Speaker 1: composed of people who have who have literally passed a
Speaker 1: written examination about the stuff from the first order, and
Speaker 1: you can you can join up with the first order,
Speaker 1: but getting into the second order requires social approval. The
Speaker 1: other people that are already in the order have to
Speaker 1: dig you. They have to think you're on the same page,
Speaker 1: and that's where you start learning what we as outsiders
Speaker 1: would probably call practical or applied magic and ritual. But
Speaker 1: it doesn't end there. They have three ranks Adeptist, Minor, Major,
Speaker 1: and at the top Exemptist. There is a third order. However,
Speaker 1: this is really where it gets really weird. If if
Speaker 1: the third Order is real, then Matt I was thinking
Speaker 1: of our conversations about that excellent video game control that
Speaker 1: you would recommend it a while back. If the third
Speaker 1: Order is real. It's composed of things that are like
Speaker 1: those extra dimensional monsters in control totally.
Speaker 3: It's it's what do we call the secret chiefs, right
Speaker 3: like they they exist in another realm, in another place,
Speaker 3: but that they are the power structure that is above
Speaker 3: even the adept in the EXEMPTUS.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and if you are exemptists, or if you are
Speaker 1: high enough in your understanding and your membership in the
Speaker 1: second order, then you can function as an intermediate for
Speaker 1: these otherwise unobservable entities. And this horse wrinkles some feathers,
Speaker 1: especially when Mather, the guy we mentioned earlier, when he
Speaker 1: starts being a very strict leader, and he's like the
Speaker 1: he's like the voice of these entities and no one
Speaker 1: else can communicate with them except for him. He brings
Speaker 1: the divine knowledge.
Speaker 3: Oh, he's got the hotline or what was it called.
Speaker 3: He's like in that room that's separated from everything, and
Speaker 3: you can you pick up the phone and you can
Speaker 3: talk to the board that's him.
Speaker 1: So as you can see, this tendency for in groups
Speaker 1: to create even more insular groups within themselves eventually led
Speaker 1: to tension, distrust, internal conflict, and ultimately these conflicts led
Speaker 1: to the downfall of the organization after it's wait for it,
Speaker 1: golden age. It did have a golden I'm sorry, I'm
Speaker 1: sorry we had to. It did have a golden age though,
Speaker 1: because at the time, you know it, it was something
Speaker 1: that people accept like it was controversial at first, but
Speaker 1: eventually it became an accepted thing in society. It wasn't
Speaker 1: seen as necessarily in opposition to the status quo, if
Speaker 1: that makes sense, like it would be. It was no
Speaker 1: longer something you would necessarily get fired for. In fact,
Speaker 1: it might have made you look kind of cool and
Speaker 1: the thing. Despite these earlier problems, the Golden Dawn, some
Speaker 1: version of it exists today in the modern day of
Speaker 1: multiple places. It is possible to become a member, and
Speaker 1: we can tell you how towards the end of today's show,
Speaker 1: Oh can't wait.
Speaker 2: Ben, Is this like really magic or is this sort
Speaker 2: of symbolic magic, like for the sake of a club
Speaker 2: and camaraderie, Like do they really think they're affecting outcomes
Speaker 2: of like world events or like how deep did this go?
Speaker 1: That's a great question. Let's get to the magic, right
Speaker 1: this is so we've got we've got the background, all
Speaker 1: the stuff, we talked about did really happen? But what
Speaker 1: kind of magic were these members? Practicing magic can mean
Speaker 1: a million different things. If you read up on the
Speaker 1: history of the group, it's easy to get deterred because
Speaker 1: it falls into a lot of talk about structure organization.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of foreign phrases, a lot of
Speaker 1: jargon terminology, things like that, So it's easy, it's easy
Speaker 1: to get turned off by that, but it's crucial to
Speaker 1: note again, like Matt said earlier, the Golden Dawn did
Speaker 1: borrow heavily from earlier spiritual belief systems, but it was
Speaker 1: not in itself a religion. When we define magic, we're
Speaker 1: inherently our definition is inherently relying upon a specific cultural lens.
Speaker 1: Like there's practical magic, right, Can I make that? Can
Speaker 1: I make this thing float? Can I have precognitive dreams?
Speaker 1: Or send my consciousness away from my body? And then
Speaker 1: there's the more metaphorical stuff like who are we in
Speaker 1: the universe? And what is this whole reality thing? So
Speaker 1: they had we start with the metaphysical stuff. They had
Speaker 1: a number of metaphysical pursuits at play.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. So the idea is that through ceremony
Speaker 2: and ritual like we were talking about, an individual might
Speaker 2: be able to achieve kind of that esoteric knowledge, that
Speaker 2: knowledge of the of the gods perhaps or like of
Speaker 2: the spheres that otherwise would be completely out of reach
Speaker 2: for mere mortals, right, the kind of stuff that would
Speaker 2: like blow your mind up if someone that was not
Speaker 2: prepared to receive it did so. That includes things like
Speaker 2: being able to leave your body, or leave your body
Speaker 2: spiritually and project your consciousness into other places, a process
Speaker 2: known as astral projection, clairvoyance, you know, psychic powers, being
Speaker 2: able to read people's minds or see the future, or
Speaker 2: very specific to this belief system, communicating specifically with those
Speaker 2: secret chiefs, you would reach on another plane of existence entirely.
Speaker 2: Then you get into more abstract kind of philosophical ideas
Speaker 2: that are wrapped up in it, things like hidden truths
Speaker 2: that there's a unity within all the things as well,
Speaker 2: those interconnectedness and things that might at first appear to
Speaker 2: be a little contradictory.
Speaker 1: Right, yeah, just a bit. Yates talks about it when
Speaker 1: he says he describes it as tapping into the single
Speaker 1: energetic mind or the single memory of nature.
Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
Speaker 1: It's we see This reflected in later ideas about Earth
Speaker 1: as a super organism, right the guy a hypothesis and
Speaker 1: so on and similar to that. But really, then, from
Speaker 1: the abstract lens, what they are saying is that magic
Speaker 1: can be defined as the process of removing limitations and preconceptions. Right,
Speaker 1: so the alchemy that takes place is in alchemy of cognitiate,
Speaker 1: you shit, more so than an alchemy of metals, right
Speaker 1: of base metals to gold.
Speaker 3: You know. It really makes me wonder if they had
Speaker 3: a specialist mage that could, let's say, remove all the
Speaker 3: water from your body, or another one that could infect
Speaker 3: your brain with all of the known and unknown things
Speaker 3: that could possibly happen to your brain. You know, just
Speaker 3: if you ever come across i don't know, some kind
Speaker 3: of ancient octopus entity like you could get it removed
Speaker 3: from your body, and you'd need a specialist like that.
Speaker 3: I've been watching too much Sabrina. Sorry, I didn't mean
Speaker 3: to watch it.
Speaker 1: It just happened Sabrina the teenage Way.
Speaker 2: Sorry, jeez, wait, it was really good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, sorry, let's move on. Yeah, having flashbacks. It's the
Speaker 3: production value this season is really quit.
Speaker 1: All right, I'll check it out, man. Uh, Yeah, So
Speaker 1: if we if we take these claims of extra sensory
Speaker 1: persons and maybe even supernatural powers aside, if we just
Speaker 1: bracket that for a second, then some of the descriptions
Speaker 1: of what people are doing here practicing sounds kind of
Speaker 1: like therapy, right, It's kind of like a self inventory
Speaker 1: or what's that great quote describing magic weaponized psychology. So
Speaker 1: it's maybe not so much changing your external reality as
Speaker 1: it is enhancing your ability to perceive reality as it
Speaker 1: always was. It's allowing you to experience things in a new,
Speaker 1: more conscious way. And I was thinking about this like
Speaker 1: as far as an analogy, remember back when we were
Speaker 1: doing an episode on Ireland's Vanishing Triangle and Matt, you
Speaker 1: did something really interesting, which is to you went through
Speaker 1: Google Earth, I believe, and you started constructing an overlay,
Speaker 1: a skin to put on the area such that we
Speaker 1: could see different events and see when they occurred. That
Speaker 1: has a lot of similarities with the idea of philosophical
Speaker 1: magic here, right.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I could see that. I could definitely see that.
Speaker 3: It's also very reminiscent of modern insular groups that we've
Speaker 3: discussed on this show recently. I'm thinking about Nexium thinking
Speaker 3: about our discussions with Mike Grinder, thinking about it just
Speaker 3: has very very very similar things where on the surface,
Speaker 3: there appears to be exactly what you're saying here ben
Speaker 3: a self help kind of thing, a self improvement or
Speaker 3: map that you get to follow, but at the end
Speaker 3: of that map there's something that is really hidden, or
Speaker 3: or there's something you know just very different or a
Speaker 3: different route to get there.
Speaker 1: I guess yeah, yeah. The Google Earth example, right, maybe
Speaker 1: you apply an overlayer of skin on an area of
Speaker 1: Google Earth that you're looking at, and maybe you have
Speaker 1: one map that shows future planned constructions. So you go
Speaker 1: down the street, you walk around, You've got this cool
Speaker 1: map that says this is coming in twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: or this is coming in twenty fifty four, or alternatively,
Speaker 1: you could have a map that shows how a place
Speaker 1: looked a thousand years ago. This is what London looked
Speaker 1: like back in ten twenty one, or something like that.
Speaker 1: You haven't then necessarily changed anything about the outer world,
Speaker 1: but you have changed your perception of it, and therefore
Speaker 1: your actions will reflect and potentially benefit from this new perspective.
Speaker 1: From a secular viewpoint, If we want to look just
Speaker 1: at the group dynamics of this. There could be another
Speaker 1: kind of magic at play, and we might some people
Speaker 1: might not want us to call it magic, but I
Speaker 1: I think it's not too different social engineering, right, It's
Speaker 1: a club.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: The society itself would let the members of the different
Speaker 3: classes and background ex listed in society, people who would
Speaker 3: be considered by others to be lowly others to be
Speaker 3: you know, notable and in power, essentially allow them to
Speaker 3: interact and encounter each other in ways that they just
Speaker 3: wouldn't have that opportunity outside of being in this group.
Speaker 2: So it was merit based in some way. It wasn't
Speaker 2: just you know, cutting off certain parts of the social
Speaker 2: you know, ladder like like. It wasn't closed off to
Speaker 2: the lower the lower classes. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Apparently it was unusually progressive.
Speaker 2: That's fast in that way.
Speaker 3: Cool.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And it's not necessarily sinisters. So I don't
Speaker 1: want to poison the well. But for anybody who's read
Speaker 1: the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson,
Speaker 1: there is an organization of bad guys in the story.
Speaker 1: They're called Dark Friends, and they they function kind of
Speaker 1: the same way. They have this hidden knowledge, they have
Speaker 1: signals they use to indicate their presence to one another.
Speaker 1: Also similar Matt to the Latitude Society. Right, dark friends
Speaker 1: are fictional and dark friends are definitely antagonists, but this
Speaker 1: organization itself is not necessarily antagonistic, nor is it necessarily sinister.
Speaker 1: But it definitely feels cool to be included. Right, You're like, oh, hey,
Speaker 1: what did you do today? I went to I went
Speaker 1: to the pub, and then I talked with a fellow
Speaker 1: member of my order who happens to be you know,
Speaker 1: the Duke of Middlebury on Sandwich or whatever.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, it reminds me of some of these country
Speaker 3: clubs that exist, or these private health clubs or something where.
Speaker 3: But in this case that the entry fee, the bar
Speaker 3: to entry is different. It's very different. It's more about
Speaker 3: are you interested in this more esoteric version of the
Speaker 3: world or of reality, and that's really all you need.
Speaker 3: You're still gonna have to pay something to get in,
Speaker 3: but you know, you don't have to spend several thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: And of course there were cases of con artists being
Speaker 1: involved in impersonating members of the Order or claiming to
Speaker 1: be a temple when they were you know, just doing
Speaker 1: a money grab.
Speaker 2: But this.
Speaker 1: Kind of street, this kind of social circuit moves both ways.
Speaker 1: So not only did it allow people to have access
Speaker 1: to maybe influential individuals they might not have otherwise interacted with,
Speaker 1: it is also possible that these influential individuals themselves could
Speaker 1: have used their presence in the organization to advance their
Speaker 1: own worldly goals. Hey, you know, great meeting today. Before
Speaker 1: we leave, I need you to help me with this
Speaker 1: import deal. I'm working on things like that.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 1: It's quite possible, and it's also quite possible that all
Speaker 1: of this was occurring at the same time, and that
Speaker 1: different people were prioritizing different things in their relationship to
Speaker 1: the organization. We're going to pause for word from our sponsor,
Speaker 1: and then we'll return with a well with a great
Speaker 1: example of when these motivations contradict one another.
Speaker 2: Oh God, and we're back to talk about the dark
Speaker 2: One himself, the Great Beast, the Grand Magician, Wizard, high Wizard.
Speaker 2: I made up all those except for the Great Beast.
Speaker 2: I believe. Alistair Crowley, Alista Crowley.
Speaker 3: Here he is, Ladies and gentlemen. Alistair.
Speaker 2: He was around in the late eighteen hundreds and joined
Speaker 2: the Order in eighteen ninety eight.
Speaker 1: And he is an episode all his own. He's one
Speaker 1: of those kind of phantom topics we mentioned earlier because
Speaker 1: comes up in various related topics. The Golden Dawn heavily
Speaker 1: influenced a lot of what he would go on to
Speaker 1: write and a lot of what he would go on
Speaker 1: to claim to believe. He did not really care for
Speaker 1: a lot of the members that were already in the
Speaker 1: organization when he joined up, because he thought he thought
Speaker 1: they were like holding call Field style phonies.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 1: He said, look, you're not in this for the real reasons.
Speaker 1: You're in it because it works out for you socially,
Speaker 1: or it gives you material rewards.
Speaker 3: You're in the country club.
Speaker 1: You're in the country club. Yeah, exactly. He was saying,
Speaker 1: this should not be a country club. It's kind of
Speaker 1: like the way someone might take up golf, not because
Speaker 1: they care about golf, but because it gives them access
Speaker 1: to money, advancement, and power. So that's what he that's
Speaker 1: his issue that he had with a lot of those members,
Speaker 1: but they also had some issues with him.
Speaker 3: Mm hmmm.
Speaker 2: He was a bit of a libertine, a bit of
Speaker 2: a hedonist, you know, very open about it. Those a
Speaker 2: little bit, but yeah, and wasn't ashamed of his uh,
Speaker 2: his sexual proclivities. Uh, and was very gregarious and then
Speaker 2: just you know, really kind of brought a whole another
Speaker 2: b D energy kind of to the to the group.
Speaker 3: You know, bellicose in derogatory, didactic correct.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, and he uh, he progressed through that first
Speaker 1: order where you're learning most of these spiritual metaphysical concepts,
Speaker 1: and he wanted to be in the second order, but
Speaker 1: a lot of people were against it. They were like,
Speaker 1: this guy, no way, do you know what he gets
Speaker 1: up to on the weekends.
Speaker 3: He goes to pyramids with his wife and they you
Speaker 3: should see the incantations. Oh that was later.
Speaker 2: That was later.
Speaker 1: Yeah, They're like, how disgusting. Tell me more in detail.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, So there was there was controversy, right, but
Speaker 1: the guy that he was following, Mather, liked him, and
Speaker 1: so Mather unilaterally inducted him into this second order, which
Speaker 1: caused a great deal of problems. He became like Mather's
Speaker 1: sort of he did things for Mather, and he also
Speaker 1: experimented heavily with the ritualistic use of drugs. Everything comes
Speaker 1: to a culmination when he and his mistress try to
Speaker 1: take over a space that was rented by the Order
Speaker 1: in West Kensington. This goes to court and when the
Speaker 1: case goes to court, he loses, and that's one of
Speaker 1: the final nails in the coffin of his official membership.
Speaker 1: But weirdly enough, and you know, he went on to
Speaker 1: do all the other stuff that you know about, But
Speaker 1: weirdly enough, his interaction with this group is one of
Speaker 1: the few reasons mainstream society talks about the Golden Dawn today.
Speaker 1: Even if he didn't like them, he helped keep their
Speaker 1: legacy around.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, and that's what we talked about. I mean,
Speaker 3: he he is probably the search term that gets many
Speaker 3: people to a Hermetic Order site or to something written
Speaker 3: about Hermetic Order. It's because they went Alistair Corawly. But
Speaker 3: you know that there's something really interesting that we can
Speaker 3: talk about here. Because as open as they were, as
Speaker 3: large of a membership as the Golden Dawn had, they
Speaker 3: were able to keep a lot of their stuff very
Speaker 3: very quiet, at least the materials they used to learn,
Speaker 3: rituals to learn a lot of the more secretive knowledge.
Speaker 3: They were able to keep that stuff hidden at least
Speaker 3: pretty well.
Speaker 1: And this occurs, of course, because they know everybody who
Speaker 1: would have access to that information, kind of like the
Speaker 1: way in a film production, scripts will be watermarked, so
Speaker 1: you know what leaked or what didn't leak. Even so
Speaker 1: specifics of the story might be excised or changed just
Speaker 1: a bit so you can say, oh, we put that
Speaker 1: TYPEO there on purpose. That way we would know if
Speaker 1: Reginald or whoever spilled the beans.
Speaker 3: Revenge pa always stealing scripts and sending them over to
Speaker 3: where do you send scripts? I don't I don't even
Speaker 3: know scripts.
Speaker 2: You mean prescriptions or scripts?
Speaker 1: Script like screenplays?
Speaker 2: Oh? Screenplays? Okay, what like? You're leaking it to TMZE
Speaker 2: that works.
Speaker 1: And then somewhere right now, JJ Abrams is listening to
Speaker 1: this podcast and he roses fist up in the sky
Speaker 1: and he goes Reginald.
Speaker 3: He knew it. Don't mess with Disney if you're gonna
Speaker 3: steal a script, don't mess with Disney.
Speaker 1: No, don't mess with the mouse.
Speaker 2: No, that's true, It'll come for you. And he's terrifying
Speaker 2: in person. Let me tell you my script.
Speaker 1: Well, there's a dark listen side.
Speaker 3: No, he's one of the founding members.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, so so now socide they all took a
Speaker 1: specific valve of silence, but that valve of silence didn't last.
Speaker 1: And that is why today you can see detailed descriptions
Speaker 1: of various specific rights on any number of websites like
Speaker 1: chrometic dot com is a pretty great resource. And don't worry, folks,
Speaker 1: it's not a bunch of witches like cackling around a
Speaker 1: cauldron or practicing human sacrifice. What's interesting here is that
Speaker 1: the Golden Down itself, nothing ever happens in a vacuum, right,
Speaker 1: The Golden Down itself occurs in the same kind of
Speaker 1: cultural context of spirituality spiritualism, rather than science of emerging psychology,
Speaker 1: like the Western fascination with what they called Eastern mysteries
Speaker 1: like meditation or yoga. They definitely came bundled up with
Speaker 1: a lot of xenophobia, a lot of racist notions of
Speaker 1: the time, But there turns out to be genuine science
Speaker 1: to the benefits of things like mindfulness and exercise. You're
Speaker 1: practicing rhythmic breathing, you know what I mean. You're you're
Speaker 1: moving your body in a healthy way and you're exploring
Speaker 1: your own mindset. So that's like, that's beneficial to people.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, it is and you know, I mean whether or
Speaker 2: not these practices will grant you, you know, the ability
Speaker 2: to commune with the astral plane or across the astral plane.
Speaker 2: Is it a thing you have to cross or a
Speaker 2: place that you occupy I'm not quite sure, or be
Speaker 2: able to speak with those machine ls. We talked about
Speaker 2: that in the in the Kesha episode, that you gotta
Speaker 2: have DMT for that business. Here's a surprising thing, maybe
Speaker 2: not to everybody, but there is this seems like pretty progressive,
Speaker 2: I would argue, even in the earliest forms where they're
Speaker 2: letting you know, regular old folks join in and they
Speaker 2: thought Aleister Crowley was a creep. But there apparently is
Speaker 2: a far right version of this organization.
Speaker 1: Yeah, fortunately they have they have a very similar name,
Speaker 1: but they are not They're hopefully not related past the name.
Speaker 1: And of course you know, we have people who have
Speaker 1: read up on the Golden Dawn in the audience here,
Speaker 1: so we wanted to be clear there's a different organization
Speaker 1: that has very little to do with magic.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 1: The Golden Dawn is a far right political party in Greece.
Speaker 1: They've got a number of policy platforms. The main thing
Speaker 1: is they want to return Greece to a military dictatorship,
Speaker 1: and they say the benefits of this would be superior
Speaker 1: to the current Greek government. Here's the thing. They're often
Speaker 1: described by many people as neo Nazis. Many members of
Speaker 1: the party disagree with that characterization, but I did. I
Speaker 1: did put a little link to their official banner. Matt Nole,
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear you guys describe this on air.
Speaker 2: I'd love to. I will describe it. But it's like
Speaker 2: it has way more than a whiff of a swastika.
Speaker 2: I mean, you look at it and it practically feels
Speaker 2: like a swastika. So you look a little closer and
Speaker 2: realize that it's twisted a little differently. It kind of
Speaker 2: looks like a hedge maze or something, but it's just
Speaker 2: very swastika. Ask Matt, what does it? How does it
Speaker 2: strike you?
Speaker 3: Well? I guess it depends on which one we're looking at,
Speaker 3: because I know, I think one of them is a
Speaker 3: slightly different color than the other. I know that their
Speaker 3: standard colors are red, black and white. And when when
Speaker 3: you've got the black symbol on top of the red background.
Speaker 2: That's where your mind goes.
Speaker 3: That's right, there's a distinct flavor, let's say to it
Speaker 3: doesn't mean like just because they chose colors that look
Speaker 3: like that, and just because their symbol is, you know,
Speaker 3: blocky shapes that are look like they could be a swastika,
Speaker 3: doesn't mean they are like that. Fact doesn't mean that
Speaker 3: they are in any way related to Nazis or anything
Speaker 3: like that.
Speaker 2: Colors aside, it definitely has a whiff of a swastika though.
Speaker 3: But the butt is you should see the ideologies that
Speaker 3: they're associated with. For you know, many many, many people
Speaker 3: who write about this group, several people who have you know,
Speaker 3: come from this group to talk about it. Good lord,
Speaker 3: don't even look at the Wikipedia page, because it will
Speaker 3: tell you all of the varying ideologies that they're associated.
Speaker 2: It will probably gets you on some kind of lists
Speaker 2: just for pulling it up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in the interest of, you know, giving their own
Speaker 1: reasoning for this banner, they say that it is has
Speaker 1: nothing necessarily to do with Nazism. It is a depiction
Speaker 1: was called meandros. Meandros is a kind of decorative border
Speaker 1: in a continuous line like you've seen it at every
Speaker 1: Greek restaurant you've ever been to, probably in some form,
Speaker 1: so that that's what that's at least their argument. But
Speaker 1: as Matt said, if you just take a quick dip
Speaker 1: into their Wikipedia page, you'll see the various members of
Speaker 1: the group and leaders have been found guilty of murder,
Speaker 1: attempted murder, attacks on immigrants, the creation of an organized
Speaker 1: crime ring, and they've been you know, convicted. So maybe
Speaker 1: maybe they should take a take a cue from the
Speaker 1: other Golden Dawn and just try some meditation.
Speaker 3: I agree, Let's just let's do that all around. Let's
Speaker 3: do that. Do we mention that their salute is kind
Speaker 3: of the same one.
Speaker 1: It's the exact same one, same one.
Speaker 3: They you know, according to officials from the group or
Speaker 3: people spokespeople from the group, is you know again has
Speaker 3: a different inspiration.
Speaker 1: But it's like Vanilla Ice years and years ago when
Speaker 1: he described the slight difference in a drum beat to
Speaker 1: say a song with unique You remember that as I'm
Speaker 1: behind the music.
Speaker 2: Is one little extra don because ours goes theirs goes
Speaker 2: case closed, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Right? So this is uh, it's just important for us
Speaker 1: to say this because what it means is, if you
Speaker 1: want to learn more about joining an organization affiliated with
Speaker 1: the hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Just make sure
Speaker 1: you're joining the right outfit. Double check the website, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean.
Speaker 2: Be careful.
Speaker 1: Also as a message to anybody who actively investigates these
Speaker 1: sorts of schools of thought or philosophical explorations. We are
Speaker 1: obviously outsiders to this, but we find it fascinating because
Speaker 1: it touches on so many levels of society at the time,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And there's there's a boldness
Speaker 1: to the exploration in theory. And that's where we leave
Speaker 1: it to you, folks. What do you think is the
Speaker 1: Golden Dawn is or was it really teaching people magical rights?
Speaker 1: Was it really giving people extraordinary abilities or allowing them
Speaker 1: to commune with the board the management of reality? I
Speaker 1: gotta tell you again, and I promise this last time
Speaker 1: won't bring it up. Control is such a cool game.
Speaker 1: It might I don't know if it's the best, but
Speaker 1: it might be my favorite game I've played during the pandemic.
Speaker 2: Really, I'm in such an unfortunate position where I'm like
Speaker 2: past the point of no return in several games, like
Speaker 2: like I'm like, you know, good midway through Last of
Speaker 2: Us two and then they gave me such a bummer
Speaker 2: that I can only play it for a little at
Speaker 2: of times. Also pretty hard. And I'm almost done with
Speaker 2: the Breath of the Wild and I've still got Red
Speaker 2: Dead to installed on my machine, which is like three
Speaker 2: hundred gigs, so I've got, like, you know, guilt about
Speaker 2: not finishing that. So I'm like convincing myself that I'm
Speaker 2: going to. But I keep hearing about these cool new games.
Speaker 2: It's just like Ghost of Tushima or something like. It's like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: s heard, that's fat And then you guys keep talking
Speaker 2: about this control. Is that a Switch game or is
Speaker 2: it only PS four? Where can they get this game?
Speaker 2: They can dig myself deeper.
Speaker 3: I think it's everything. I don't know if it's on Switch, though.
Speaker 1: I've got I've got PS four X files meets big government,
Speaker 1: conspiracy meets Lovecraft?
Speaker 2: Is it like long form game? Is it like?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: And uh they're their rules for communication with extra dimensional
Speaker 1: entities or things like you have to go through this
Speaker 1: weird time bubble where it's always mid afternoon at a
Speaker 1: strange hotel. Anyhow do you do you think that there
Speaker 1: it is possible that these extra dimensional entities whatever you
Speaker 1: want to call them. Do you think it's possible that
Speaker 1: they exist and that members of the Golden Dawn somehow
Speaker 1: figured out a way to contact them, or was this
Speaker 1: organization functioning more as an an experiment of sorts it's
Speaker 1: social interaction or is it something in between? You know,
Speaker 1: we'd we'd love to hear from you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, please, And did we do we tell people how
Speaker 3: to join? We did not, because you can right now.
Speaker 3: You want to get in on this hermetic Order of
Speaker 3: the Golden Dawn in twenty twenty one, or whenever you're
Speaker 3: listening to this past, present or future, you can do it.
Speaker 3: There is a website you can go to prepare yourselves
Speaker 3: and your wallets. It is www dot Golden dash Dawn
Speaker 3: Dawn dot com and once you get there you can
Speaker 3: look up memberships and you will find that at least
Speaker 3: on this date we record this in March of twenty
Speaker 3: twenty one, you can join for the low low price
Speaker 3: of one hundred and ninety nine dollars us US. It
Speaker 3: used to be one thousand, one hundred and eighty eight
Speaker 3: dollars and it's got to slash through it, but now
Speaker 3: it's only one hundred and ninety nine dollars.
Speaker 2: Is that is that just like a limited time offer
Speaker 2: or is this just the new the new rate.
Speaker 3: I do not know, but you get lots and lots
Speaker 3: of books and PDFs. It looks like a dagger. Perhaps
Speaker 3: at least maybe some very interesting folks on the front
Speaker 3: of that live webinar training picture. I'm fascinated.
Speaker 1: Maybe we draw straws and one of us joins up
Speaker 1: and then breaks the valve silence for the other two.
Speaker 3: Dude, I'm not breaking a valve science if I if
Speaker 3: I join up, I'm taking this seriously, you guys.
Speaker 1: Of course, Okay, you're one hundred percent in, so then
Speaker 1: it would be a conversation where to talk with you
Speaker 1: about it. We have to also join up.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you better believe it. I'm not going in two
Speaker 3: hundred dollars just to give you guys all the information.
Speaker 2: Is there is there any criteria other than just just
Speaker 2: paying the fee? I mean, I would love to think
Speaker 2: that there was some kind of you know, test of
Speaker 2: might that you would have to pass or mental fortitude,
Speaker 2: you know. I mean, I'm cool with it being like
Speaker 2: not about like your wealth, because that that's a reasonable
Speaker 2: enough fee. But I don't want to be in there.
Speaker 2: If it's if it's like just anyone can join, I
Speaker 2: the wrong craft. I think it should be merit, merit
Speaker 2: based merit. But no, now that's not what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: I'm saying it should be you should be able to
Speaker 2: have to bring something to the table. You know what
Speaker 2: I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Well, you do have to pass a written examination at
Speaker 1: least in the original Golden Dawn to move to the
Speaker 1: second or inner order.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so there's there's a rupric like.
Speaker 3: Not everybody can do this. It says, not everybody's gonna
Speaker 3: make it.
Speaker 2: Okay, great, this is this is important information.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're taking it seriously as well. So we want
Speaker 1: to we want to hear your opinion of it. Tell
Speaker 1: us if you have joined, if you are joining, tell us,
Speaker 1: if there are concerns about the organization, tell us if
Speaker 1: most importantly, whether you think the rights and rituals described
Speaker 1: actually actually have efficacy, whether they work out of respect
Speaker 1: for you know, the idea of initiation and the idea
Speaker 1: of secrecy. We have not described any specific rituals other
Speaker 1: than to say it's not you know, it's not like
Speaker 1: eating eyeballs or flaming people alive or any any of
Speaker 1: that movie stuff, and if you want to learn more,
Speaker 1: there are people who are glad to share that information
Speaker 1: with you. You could tell us about your experiences, tell us
Speaker 1: about other secret organizations, and tell us whether you think
Speaker 1: there are forms of magic that are real. By finding
Speaker 1: us on our own kind of magical order of these
Speaker 1: times the internet.
Speaker 2: You can find us a conspiracy Stuff on Twitter and Facebook,
Speaker 2: Conspiracy Stuff show on Instagram. We recommend joining our Facebook
Speaker 2: group Here's where it gets crazy, where you can exchange memes,
Speaker 2: have spirited conversations about episode topics, and maybe make a
Speaker 2: new best friend.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: You can also give us a phone call. Check it out,
Speaker 3: you guys. Our number is one eight three three std WYTK.
Speaker 3: If you choose to pick up your phone in call,
Speaker 3: please do the following. Give us the name you'd like
Speaker 3: for us to refer to you as. If it's not
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