Secrets, Mysteries, and Spoilers
Feb. 13th, 2006 08:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bnewmanI can't tell you what made me think of this.
In one of my reference books on Wicca, there is a paragraph on "the oath of secrecy" which is so vague as to convey, simply, that the meaning of this phrase is not compositional — in the author's tradition, there is an oath of secrecy, and it is not about keeping a secret.
A mystery cult is one where initiates have had some experience that non-initiates haven't, which is kept from non-initiates. Why is this experience kept from non-initiates?
Answer one would be that it's something outsiders shouldn't know for their own safety, or that the mystery cult keeps from outsiders in order to maintain some kind of power or advantage, but that's almost never true — really, how many organizations do you know of that have this kind of information? A few government agencies, and they're not surrounded by the pomp and hype of a mystery cult, because they don't want you wanting to know their secrets, they just want you to go about your business.
No, the real reason is that the experience must be kept from outsiders who might join, because otherwise they can't have it when they join — the experience must therefore involve surprise on some level.
In other words, mysteries aren't secrets at all — they're spoilers.
This is a great comfort to me — the idea of a religion with genuine secrets is scary! But no, the real mysteries are not secrets, but rather are the experience of finally grokking what you already know. But anyway...
If you've ever thought that the fandom of a book, movie, or TV series with a spoilable twist or ending felt creepily like a cult, this is probably why: Because it is one. And the first rule of any mystery cult is: You do not talk about... sorry, make that "No spoilers!"
In one of my reference books on Wicca, there is a paragraph on "the oath of secrecy" which is so vague as to convey, simply, that the meaning of this phrase is not compositional — in the author's tradition, there is an oath of secrecy, and it is not about keeping a secret.
A mystery cult is one where initiates have had some experience that non-initiates haven't, which is kept from non-initiates. Why is this experience kept from non-initiates?
Answer one would be that it's something outsiders shouldn't know for their own safety, or that the mystery cult keeps from outsiders in order to maintain some kind of power or advantage, but that's almost never true — really, how many organizations do you know of that have this kind of information? A few government agencies, and they're not surrounded by the pomp and hype of a mystery cult, because they don't want you wanting to know their secrets, they just want you to go about your business.
No, the real reason is that the experience must be kept from outsiders who might join, because otherwise they can't have it when they join — the experience must therefore involve surprise on some level.
In other words, mysteries aren't secrets at all — they're spoilers.
This is a great comfort to me — the idea of a religion with genuine secrets is scary! But no, the real mysteries are not secrets, but rather are the experience of finally grokking what you already know. But anyway...
If you've ever thought that the fandom of a book, movie, or TV series with a spoilable twist or ending felt creepily like a cult, this is probably why: Because it is one. And the first rule of any mystery cult is: You do not talk about... sorry, make that "No spoilers!"
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-14 01:59 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-14 11:23 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-14 06:37 pm (UTC)Or that could be just that I've been reading Mary Renault.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-17 06:19 am (UTC)