Why Tricksters Are Important as Disruptors of Systems
A trickster is usually ambiguous, like someone slacklining, struggling to maintain a balance between being a hero and a villain.
This is a chapter from my ebook Sardonically Speaking: What Socrates, Standup Comedians, and Rappers Have in Common which is available for free download here.
“The Father called him the Clever One because he excelled all the blessed gods and mortal men in gainful crafts and stealthy skills.” – Etymologicum Mag num, 374.23
In many mythological narratives, the figure of the trickster is a curious one. A trickster is usually ambiguous, like someone slacklining, struggling to maintain a balance between being a hero and a villain.
“Almost all non-literate mythology has a trickster hero of some kind. American Indians had the great rabbit and coyote, the ravens, and blue jay. And there’s a very special property in the trickster: he always breaks in, just as the unconscious does, to trip up the rational situation. He’s both a fool and someone who’s beyond the system. And the trickster hero represents all those possibilities of life that your mind hasn't decided it wants to deal with. The mind structures a lifestyle, and the fool or trickster another whole range of possibilities. He doesn't respect the values you've set up for yourself, and smashes them.” – Joseph Campbell, An Open Life
Many studies have dealt with the role and cultural interpretation of the figure of the trickster. Some of these include Greek figures like Prometheus and Hermes, North Americans like the Coyote and Brer Rabbit, Eddic like Loki, and Sumerian like Enki.
My initial hunch is that we can look at tricksters as philosophers: they challenge the status quo and strive to improve it, they scrutinize traditions and belief systems, and they do all this with a comic “fuck-you attitude.”
The fire of Prometheus
There are several versions of the story of the Greek god Prometheus. In some, he is credited for creating the human race from mud, while in others he tricks Zeus to accept bones and fat as offerings from humans instead of meat. Subsequently, he steals and gives fire to humans to help them improve their condition.
As a result of his actions, the furious Zeus punished him by sending him to a faraway land where he was tied to a rock and had an eagle eat his liver out. The punishment was perpetual because the liver regenerated daily, giving the eagle a continuous feast. During one of his tasks, Hercules is said to have killed the eagle with his spear.
Prometheus was a craftsman, a magician, and a trickster of some sort. In Greek mythology, some scholars argue that “the relation between primitive craftsmanship and magic, although difficult to define, is admittedly close. Primitive magic is a technology of a sort; its aim is the manipulation of the external world. The primitive craftsman supplements his technique with magical practices, and success at his craft is taken to indicate possession of magical powers.” Such qualities apply equally to Prometheus and Hermes (discussed in the next section).
As a trickster, Prometheus challenged Zeus and brought civilization to human beings, despite the terrible toll his actions would eventually take on him. He defied the system that was already put in place and cunningly made humans’ lives better.
This is why in ancient mythology tricksters are perceived as heroes. Through their craftsmanship, magic, and courage, they disrupt uncontested traditional systems, question certain practices, and traditions, and create a new discourse on topics that are otherwise considered taboo. Tricksters in different cultures and mythologies are able to get away with their chicanery because they are ambiguous figures who do not seem to take themselves too seriously.
They also seem to have what Nassim Taleb calls “skin in the game.” That is, tricksters are not your typical pseudo-activists who claim to care for a cause but never take action to do something about it, in other words, virtue signalers. Instead, they are keen on walking the walk to improve the status quo, and in doing so, tricksters know they are putting themselves on the line in what they are doing.
With a playful attitude, tricksters stand at the helm of societies, inspiring their respective cultures to look into their dark side. They learn from such figures the importance of playing with fire from time to time, by bringing taboo issues to the table, questioning deeply rooted dogmas, and playing tricks on other gods. Tricksters are symbols of change and dynamism.
Think about it this way: tricksters are like kids. They are joyous and full of life; they constantly break the rules and challenge the sets of beliefs upheld by their parents. With their playful attitude, kids explore domains beyond the permissible spaces demarcated by their parents. At a restaurant, just because they can, they stand in the middle of the room and start dancing and greeting random strangers sitting at other tables.
Many a time, when their actions are not life-threatening, kids end up getting away with things, even applauded at times! That ice cream bite they take without their parents’ permission, or that jar they broke even though they were warned about the punishment.
As little tricksters who are also capable of laughing at themselves when they do stupid things, kids constantly put their parents to the test, who, along with school teachers, struggle to discipline them, but their method and approach keep on changing to adapt to the kids’ unpredictable actions.
However, and unfortunately, with time, parents succeed in sucking the life out of their kids. These kids grow up not only to be disciplined adults (which of course is very important as virtues ensure that individuals have a minimum sense of ethics to have a well-functioning, harmonious society), but also become completely brainwashed homogeneous individuals who take themselves too seriously. Imbibed by their parents’ narratives, they are raised thinking that being employed is a thing to aspire for, that saying what is on one’s mind is bad because it might “offend” others, that one is better off not engaging in critical thinking, or in examining oneself, or even one’s traditions and norms.
In short, we wind up with a swarm of think-alike bureaucrats who become the nuts and bolts of a system that only cares about maintaining appearances. Pink Floyd got it right, that’s why “we don’t need no education.”
This also applies if the parents are extreme hippies, only the kids would grow up to think they’re entitled to freebies of course. As you'll see later on, the trick is to try and not take things for granted or fall into the trap of extremes.
Don’t get me wrong. For example, you might think I’m criticizing those who prefer to work a 9 to 5 job and don’t want to give themselves any headaches. That is not the problem here. The issue is that many of us are trained to become pawns in the grand scheme of things. We are hammered throughout our educational years to become “yes people,” so much so that when we need to say no, we can’t muster the courage to say it because we have mortgages, college debts, car loans, expenses, kids to feed, and so on.
How did I end up discussing this? I’m not quite sure but bear with me a little bit more.
Can you remember the last time you pranked your superior? I bet the last time you poked fun at someone it was during college; it was probably your professor who took him or herself too seriously, no? Why do you think this is the case? Any ideas? Tweet @decafquest and let me know!
I think the answer is simple, after college we have to take ourselves more seriously, we’re somehow obliged! We have to suit up, get our shit together, and get grinding. In the words of a friend of mine, Mahmoud Natout (www.corridorri.com), we forget how to play, we start separating between play and work, between fun times and serious times. Be my guest and check out his work on this subject.
Hermes the troublemaker
“Hermes is not only the Thief, but also the Shepherd, the Craftsman, the Herald, the Musician, the Athlete, and the Merchant. Scholars have usually explained Hermes the Thief as a derivative of Hermes the Shepherd. According to this view, the Homeric Hymn to Hermes, the story of the infant Hermes’ theft of the cattle of his elder brother Apollo, represents the original core of the mythology of Hermes, and reflects the primitive mores of Greek pastoral tribes.”
Let’s move now to Hermes, the Greek messenger if I remember correctly from God of War. The only non-FIFA-PS4 game I ever played and fully enjoyed. As a non-gamer, the only game I usually play is FIFA. However, in August of 2015, right after I defended my Ph.D. dissertation, I decided to take a much-needed one-month vacation. I did not even leave the house during that month except to buy a video game, which turned out to be God of War Remastered, to buy food (I mean, a guy's got to eat), and maybe to go to the beach once or twice.
I loved the game and finished it with my wife the same day. But that’s not the point. The reason why I’m mentioning this story is that it made me realize that I had been writing a dissertation on how cinema was a contemporary form of mythology for three years, but I had never viewed ancient Greek myths in a concrete way. Ironic actually, because my entire argument was that for the Greeks, mythology was very much vivid in their consciousness, much like the way we talk about movie characters nowadays. I can mention Darth Vader, Tyrion Lannister, or Captain America, and you would directly relate to the name if you've seen the movies, or if you've heard about the characters from your friends, or just seen them in passing on your phone.
Hermes was also a frivolous trickster. As a youngster, he stole his elder brother Apollo’s cattle and hid them in a cave. During the trial, Hermes of course denied the accusation, but when he confessed to his misdeed, Zeus was amused by the entire story and decided not to punish him.
If you ever had a younger sibling, it’s very likely you've experienced something similar. Younger siblings are always successful at getting away with things! Well, maybe it’s just because they’re youngsters, or maybe they picked up on a few tricks, or heck, maybe the parents don’t have the energy anymore, who knows?!
Either way, the idea is that there seems to be a reason why cunning tricksters sometimes get a pass. In the case of Hermes, he was stealing from his brother, not a total stranger. This is central to the overall story. The point of this myth should not be that it is ok to be a thief or to actually deceive and manipulate someone. Instead, there’s a more fundamental lesson to be learned from the critical yet playful attitude tricksters adopt. They are ready to push boundaries, create more tension, induce laughter, and open up the realm of possibilities.
If you think about it, the ambiguity that seems to govern the trickster’s personality also plays an important role in situating them in a greyish zone. Is he good or bad? Well, he’s neither, he transcends these dichotomies, he is “beyond good and evil.” His stories give societies fodder to question and reflect on their values. As a jester-like figure, his stories are a constant reminder that we need to have more humor and laugh at ourselves.
“Trickster is at one and the same time creator and destroyer, giver and negator, he who dupes others and who is always duped himself. He knows neither good nor evil yet he is responsible for both. He possesses no values, moral or social … yet through his actions all values come into being.” – Hyde, Lewis. Trickster Makes This World
When we get all too caught up in the minute details of our lives and our jobs, we tend to forget the bigger picture. We basically become nitpickers, a good example here would be your thesis advisor who, in attempting to prove that he’s intellectually superior, spends much of his time pointing out shitty errors in your dissertation rather than focusing on and discussing the content.
If you’re a consultant you definitely know what I’m talking about. How many times has your boss asked you to add or take out a comma? How many times have they changed their minds about the font, spacing, or order of the slides of your presentation, which you put together and have been recycling for three years now depending on the client?
If you are not quite convinced about what I just said, consider this: sometimes, trickster stories can also be used to reinforce social values. Their fuck-ups can be a source of valuable moral lessons to learn how not to act given a similar situation. The reason they get away with their actions though could perhaps be viewed as a moral in itself: sometimes it is just not worth it to fixate on being wronged by someone.
Ross from Friends would disagree though. He went berserk over the fact that his boss ate his sandwich. Was that worth it? I'll just leave that here and let you decide!
I would like to end this section with a quote that sums up my discussion about tricksters.
“In some curious ways representative of conservative social teachings, tricksters appear primarily at the point of growth and change that represent ‘the exponent of all possibilities.’ Their stories provide a fertile source of cultural reflection and critical reflexivity that leaves one thoughtful yet laughing: and what a culture does with laughter reflects its vitality, flexibility and creativity. Certainly, humans often take themselves too seriously, a foible Oscar Wilde hit squarely when he suggested that such an attitude ‘is the world’ original sin.” – Mythical Trickster Figures