5mo ago

You don't have to fear these things

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I mean tarot is still superstitious nonsense, but so are religions.
- I like tarot because it’s like „death; the tower of doom; the swamp of famine” and that means that you’re gonna have a chill week or something
  
  FWIW, tarot decks were used for card playing before they were used for divining money from the gullible
  
  divining money from the gullible
  Thank you for phrasing it this way. Superstitious nonsense is all fun and games until someone loses a buck.
  Tarot / psychics / etc. being used for personal and financial gain by preying on the vulnerable is far too common and needs to be called out for what it is. People who peddle this hokum for personal and financial gain are no better than TV preachers.
  
  so, I'm not entirely sure you quite got it. Before our modern deck of cards, which we play games like shanghai rummy or spades or texas holdem, etc, it was the tarot deck. the scammers that ran around as fortune tellers used the generic standard playing card deck of the time to do it.
  It'd be like me doing some slight of hand with the deck and telling fortunes or something. "an here we have the Ace of Spades, a clear indication of strength and nobilty. You have a challenge ahead of you; but you will face it with dignity. And with with ... oh dear... the suicide king, that is a powerful omen of self-sabotage. but I have a charm against ill omens for thirty internet points!"
  
  yes, I already know that there is a history to it that has been tainted by modern skullduggery.
  
  The card that portends doom is the Tower, usually. There are as many interpretations of Tarot as there are folks that read it, but Death usually means “change.”
  Tarot is largely harmless; it’s odd how upset folks on Lemmy get over it. It’s mostly middle aged women and queer men who do it for fun. I use it as a way of organizing my thoughts sometimes - I own a few decks which I enjoy as art pieces and brainstorming tools. I’ll read for friends sometimes and I’m pretty open about the fact that I’m mostly leaning on what the cards do in the Binding of Isaac.
  
  I dislike all means of normalizing magical thinking, that includes things as petty as tarot and horoscopes and making wishes. Decks as art are cool, cosplay mysticism makes superstition more mainstream.
  
  It doesn't mean you're gonna have a chill week.
  It means literally nothing.
  "You drew a royal flush, congratulations. That means the local mayor will give you an enema. Since it's in the suit of clubs, that means it'll happen on Tuesday afternoon. That'll be $30, thanks. Go get flushed, removed."
- There's a bunch of card games you can play with tarot decks. People should mention this more so that they become more popular again. The people using them for non game reasons is the same as if they were using a Yu-Gi-Oh deck for it.
  PS: the standard 52 deck is also a kind of tarot deck.
- No, we use it as a reframing device. You basically point a random story generator at currently relevant facets of your life. This helps you to see them from a new perspective, which can get you unstuck when you have reasoned yourself into a corner.
  There's absolutely no belief in magic necessary to use it.
  
  People who use tarot absolutely believe in magic.
  I loathe apologists.
  I personally hate people who try to marry atheism and mysticism as a unified community. It is completely at odds with my values.

160 comments