Thread by @TylerAlterman

Thread about the extraordinary events that ensued when I brought my Fool to vibecamp:

"Brought your *what* to vibeca––"

My FOOL. I trained a bit in Pochinko clowning, which combines euro-clowning w Native American sacred clown traditions to induce intense authenticity. Basically I put on this stupid nose and then lose control over what emotions I express

So @andrew0blevins volunteers to be my chaperone & escort me around. I put on the nose, become my Fool. Very quickly things get weird. My Fool interacts with invisible objects over the heads of @sh__len & @FractalAuth, seemingly giving them some intense experiences (?)

Next My Fool comes across two ppl doing metta (@harry_taussig & @buildingEden) & starts acting aggressively bro-y (chest bumps, etc). It was a funny contrast

The two meditators join in the silliness. Then we start to roam around Vibecamp

We accumulate more ppl who themselves start to clown. Eventually it's a posse of ~15 roaming around, humming, playing spontaneous games and dropping them when we got bored. Quickly a hive mind develops. We begin to speak as one. It should be creepy but instead it's hilarious

We develop a strange ritualistic language. (“Second cousin twice removed cheese cat-bear!” becomes one of many chants). We beg people to be our teacher because we wanted the truth. The teachers then join our posse

Eventually it is apparent we have developed a spontaneous yet coherent idiot religion. Over breakfast the next day we reflected on its tenets:
a. Everyone is “Me” (one way we’d greet people was with handshakes and “nice to meet Me”

b. But Me is confused and so we need to take on more of Me as teachers. Anyone could be a teacher. (“Are you a teacher?” “Teach us!” “Speech speech!”)
c. One if the best ways to learn from the teachers, especially when they don’t have a speech, is...

nonverbal transmission (“Knowing through touch!” Or when someone reacted to us with a funny movement or by shifting awkwardly back and forth: “Teaching through the body!”)
d. Something about the basic condition of our minds/souls being that of a knot, and we need to learn how...

to tie and untie the knot. Maybe? (We would hand people a tie, and if they knew what to do with it then “They know knot!”)
e. Things should not be boring (“I’m bored.” “Yes, me too.” “We’re bored.” “Let’s do something else.”)

But also the big joke over pretty much the whole thing was “ha ha we’re the demographic without a religion and thus get hypnotized by all these trite vaguely Eastern new age-y things”

Pretty much anything that anyone said got transformed into a stupefyingly awe-inducing trite profundity

“What are you guys up to?”
“What *are* we up to????”

“Is this an improv game?”
“*Is* this an improv game? Is life an improv game? Are you a teacher?”

The especially funny part is that the whole thing ended up being legit profound. Several people had genuine "spiritual" experiences being part of the clown posse or interacting with it

A few reactions:

https://twitter.com/TylerAlterman/status/1670579643471081472?s=20

For anyone curious about this style of clowning, check out the book Clown Through Mask. But the real way to learn it is in person. I'm currently persuading my teacher to come to NYC sometime in November. It's gonna b lit

https://twitter.com/TylerAlterman/status/1640825820485943296

Shoutout to spontaneous clown posse participants @maybegray @Fooljeff @andrew0blevins @buildingEden @animalologist @_brentbaum @LukeSallmen @MasterTimBlais
@sh__len @FractalAuth @harry_taussig @JoshuaLelon @cauliflwr_human @animegirlpoastr @LeonSomSim @behaviary @ElectricKeyLime

@strangers_gate @_brentbaum