Steph (crisis version)Mar 21

I would consider myself a sensible skeptic, in that I do not believe in the supernatural, but if I saw something that looked like a demonic possession or a hostile ghost or whatever I would immediately LEAVE.

Like, I can tell myself it was a hallucination AFTERWARDS. I'm not risking my shit on that 0.1% chance I'm wrong about demons.

Show threadSteph (crisis version)Mar 21
I've consumed far too much horror media where the skeptic refuses to believe the evidence in front of them and ends up microwaved by a demonic head laser or whatever. Couldn't be me.
Show threadSteph (crisis version)Mar 21
I think this is a characteristically Irish POV. Faeries aren't real. But also, you don't fuck with the faeries.
Show threadthomas yager-maddenMar 22
@astronomerritt My friends and I had a tour guide in Iceland who, when the subject of the huldufólk came up, said that “I wouldn’t say that Icelandic people are superstitious, but we are stitious”
Show threadSteph (crisis version)Mar 22

@tym Ha! Oh, I like that. I might take that on myself.

I think there's an aspect to it of simply respecting your culture's old and entrenched folklore. By not cutting down a fairy tree, you're taking part in something people have been doing (or not-doing) on this island for hundreds of years. I bet it's similar for the Icelandic.

Show threadthomas yager-maddenMar 22
@astronomerritt Yeah I think you put that very well. There’s all kinds of stories of like road construction projects in Iceland being re-routed after someone reports that a particular boulder houses a church for the elves or something like that. One thing I love about the Icelandic elves is the whole mythology is like a textbook example of unfalsifiable claims: the elves live inside the rocks, and it’s up to them whether they let themselves be seen by humans, and they rarely do. You can choose to believe it or just to play along, without it intersecting with your participation in the world of facts much at all
Show threadSteph (crisis version)
@tym Yes! Exactly. And honestly, sometimes it's just fun and fulfilling to play along, because the world of facts can be bleak and disappointing, and it's nice to think that the fae/elves/etc are still out there in their trees and their rocks, where this hard cold world can't reach them, and we're doing our bit to preserve that.
Mar 22 at 12:35pmWeb