by starroute » Fri Mar 17, 2006 1:28 am
antiaristo -<br><br>I don't know as much about what happened in that period as I would like -- just a handful of data points that appear to be related:<br><br>- There was a major occult revival starting about 1865 and continuing into the 1920's.<br><br>- To a large extent, the people promoting this revival were upper class, even including noblemen like Lord Bulwer-Lytton<br><br>- This occult revival was entwined in complex ways with a great flowering of elitism, especially in the US, where the newly-wealthy industrialists turned their back on the American frontier spirit and allied themselves with the British ruling class<br><br>- Along with the elitism went a great upsurge in racism. <br><br>- All these things -- the occultism, the elitism, the racism, and the US/British alliance -- climaxed around the time of World War I.<br><br>- By the 1920's, occultism (which had previously appealed across the political spectrum) was increasingly associated with conservatism, elitism, and ultimately fascism. Occultists tended to decry materialism, despair of the modern world, despise jazz and fast cars, and seek a return to the old hierarchic class distinctions. In contrast, Communists and other left-wingers tended to be materialists as a natural part of their egalitarianism.<br><br>- By the late 30's, traditional occultism had become widely discredited for its fascist associations. Even abstract art -- which had largely grown out of occultism c. 1905-15 -- was eager to distance itself from the old occult systems. The abstract expressionists and other bohemiams of the 1940's and 1950's were far more interested in Zen, Jung, and Native American religion. It was not until the 1960's that traditional occultism made a comeback (and this time on a far more populist basis.)<br><br><br>Now what I don't know for sure -- and certainly can't prove -- is to what extent the occult revival of the late 1800's was a sincere (if misguided) effort on the part of the old ruling classes to justify their "spiritual" superiority and their accustomed position of power, and to what extent it was a deliberate attempt to maintain that power through increasingly toxic magical means. <br><br>I can readily conceive of a bangup novel based on the second idea -- one in which black magic is used throughout the 20th century to ensure the perversion and decay of the Russian Revolution, the rise of thugs like Stalin and Hitler, and the sabotage of worldwide hopes for a saner and more peaceful global society at the end of World War II. It would both make more sense and be a lot more interesting than the usual dreary record of missed opportunities and shattered dreams that makes up the standard 20th century histories. And it's also possible that it could be mythically true, whether or not it's factually true.<br><br>But I can't prove a damn thing.<br> <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=starroute>starroute</A> at: 3/16/06 10:32 pm<br></i>
