Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism • Hacker News Board

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#171

Post by wutbrodo » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 8:21 PM UTC

paulgerhardt wrote: post #2

One thing that becomes immediately apparent when visiting the medieval witchcraft museum in Iceland[1] was how strategic the use of Witchcraft accusations were by the middling elite. One cunning foreign family with ties to occupying Denmark was able to secure land hold rights for nearly an entire peninsula from local Icelanders on the northwest through the strategic use of witchcraft accusations. During this period o…

The _elites_ weren't superstitious, but that doesn't mean noone was. Evil always needs useful idiots to grab power, a dynamic that's only accelerated with the move to democracies (though to be clear, this isn't a knock on a democracy: I'm with Churchill when he says democracy is the least bad of all the forms we've tried).

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#172

Post by danans » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 8:26 PM UTC

hatenberg wrote: post #19

danans wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most likely that you had enough wealth and owned enough productive land or other capital to secure the lifestyle of your progeny for generations to come.

So like Fred Trump

Probably, but he's far from alone. It's practically the definition of what the nobility and the gentry/bourgeoisie have in common.

In contrast, workers and professionals must sell their personal skills in the labor market to survive. Unless they are extremely lucky, opportunistic, and hardworking and doing so become part of the gentry, their children will have to do the same.

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#173

Post by ficklepickle » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 8:31 PM UTC

aaron695 wrote: post #25

This still happens, a recent case of satanic witchcraft trials (2020 Australia) - At the time it was called as what it was by logical people, the exact same pattern of hysteria has been seen before, but they still had their lives ruined. https://www.dailymercury.com.au/news/circus-abuse-case-was-t...

That has really piqued my interest. How did this happen? The article says charges were dropped, but does not explain the wider context or how these very serious charges got so far with no evidence.

I found some more information from an article[0] from 2018. The only evidence appears to have been the testimony of a young child. The disturbing allegations, like a needle in the eye and multiple rapes, would have presumably left physical evidence of injury.

That article I linked makes no update about the charges being dropped. That falsely accused family has been split up for two years because of this, yet their exoneration didn't seem to get much coverage at all.

I would really like to understand the sequence of events that initiated this. I find it unlikely that the kid came home one day and came up with this completely unprompted.

Do you know of any resources for gaining a better contextual understanding of this bizarre incident?

Surely somebody has written about this case, but I haven't found it yet. I'm torn between thanking you for pointing this out and cursing you because I'm not going to be able to think about anything else until I figure out how this went on for so long.

[0] https://www.news.com.au/national/nsw-act/courts-law/bail-gra...

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#174

Post by TeaDrunk » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 9:04 PM UTC

runawaybottle wrote: post #169

TeaDrunk wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no guillotine. Aziz Ansari's career is totally fine. The statute of limitations on rape and other sexual assault ranges from 3 to 30 years. It seems completely reasonable to me that Al Franken should continue to have consequences on whose lives he harmed via sexual assault years after doing it. The effects of trauma last a lifetime. I don't understand why we should be sympathetic to one man having his life ru…

30 seconds of googling can get you the Tamara Harrrians link. Look, patterns are important. The same way we failed in jailing people for modest drug possession, is the same way we are going to fail in measuring reciprocity, or more clearly, exact legal justice on sexual harassment, racial discrimination. I’m interested in fixing patterns. I’m not going to die on the Al Franken hill. Frat boy behavior in professional…

I don't think there's eternal shame to dole out. I think it's perfectly equivalent to say if you give someone lifelong trauma that the result should be lifelong consequences, including that people don't want to affiliate with you.

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#175

Post by dang » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 9:31 PM UTC

Mirioron wrote: post #32

Or in 2020: "China created the virus and must be held responsible!" Except that viruses jump from other animals to humans all the time. It can happen in any country.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23730288.

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#176

Post by jholman » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 9:42 PM UTC

TeaDrunk wrote: post #174

runawaybottle wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

30 seconds of googling can get you the Tamara Harrrians link. Look, patterns are important. The same way we failed in jailing people for modest drug possession, is the same way we are going to fail in measuring reciprocity, or more clearly, exact legal justice on sexual harassment, racial discrimination. I’m interested in fixing patterns. I’m not going to die on the Al Franken hill. Frat boy behavior in professional…

I don't think there's eternal shame to dole out. I think it's perfectly equivalent to say if you give someone lifelong trauma that the result should be lifelong consequences, including that people don't want to affiliate with you.

> if you give someone lifelong trauma that the result should be lifelong consequences

That is a terrible plan. There's no restoration there, only retribution. We can do better than an eye for an eye.

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#177

Post by ithkuil » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 9:54 PM UTC

kimi wrote: post #16

I have been reading a bit of local history, and I came across an interesting mail exchange in 1500-1600 between the church of Como (far north, large mountain territory, witch trials) and the central authorities of Rome. Basically Como was going "Please help! witches are taking over." and Rome was trying to do damage control by replying "You bunch of clowns cannot possibly believe that.". Of course in very polite and…

Reference please, I'd love to read!

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#178

Post by Thorrez » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 10:25 PM UTC

vmception wrote: post #52

Thorrez wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds more like a technique to attain comfort rather than a comfort level itself.

I’m glad you understood

I'm not sure I did. ipsum2 seemed to be asking for a comfort level.

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#179

Post by ithkuil » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 10:33 PM UTC

CryptoPunk wrote: post #141

praveen9920 wrote: post #89

Don't want to be political on HN but I see lot of parallels between now and then. A plague effected region, ruled by conservative parties, opposing science and logic in the name of religion or freedom. persecution of people who either look or do something different from their own. Printing press helped in spreading both lies and truth. Now a days, mainstream media and social media is being used to spread all kinds of…

>>persecution of people who either look or do something different from their own. Who is being persecuted now? The Cancel Culture is much more a modern corollary to witch hunts than anything conservatives are doing. Conservatives exhibit witch-hunting tendencies to some extent, in relation to liberals, where they promote unhinged conspiracy theories about them trying to subjucate the masses. But these conservatism in…

Is "cancel culture" new? What happened in the past to people who would say inconvenient things (swear words or blasfemies in TV, being homosexual, ...)?

Bigotry was always there. It's just that nowadays we have a different cultural majority.

What's irritating about the present situation is that nominally the current cultural majority was against the bigots of the past and yet is applying pressure against who thinks differently and thus becoming bigot themselves (bigotry: "intolerance towards those who hold different opinions from oneself."). I'm sure people have opinions about whether the reasons to apply the corrective pressures are well founded or at least in good faith ( also have personal opinions about that) but that's not so important IMHO; people can be wrong: dogmas are dangerous; we should be able to have candid conversations about things.

That's said, I have the feeling that the critiques of "cancel culture" coming from the right are not based on the desire for an open dialogue but more a combination of whataboutism and playing victims to strengthen in-group bonds.

This is driving us apart even more. I want to know how do people who think differently than I do think.

Re: Invention of satanic witchcraft by medieval authorities was met with skepticism

#180

Post by aaron695 » Sat, Jul 04, 2020, 10:35 PM UTC

ficklepickle wrote: post #173

aaron695 wrote: post #25

This still happens, a recent case of satanic witchcraft trials (2020 Australia) - At the time it was called as what it was by logical people, the exact same pattern of hysteria has been seen before, but they still had their lives ruined. https://www.dailymercury.com.au/news/circus-abuse-case-was-t...

That has really piqued my interest. How did this happen? The article says charges were dropped, but does not explain the wider context or how these very serious charges got so far with no evidence. I found some more information from an article[0] from 2018. The only evidence appears to have been the testimony of a young child. The disturbing allegations, like a needle in the eye and multiple rapes, would have presuma…

For specifics just keep Googling. But no media wants to pick the real story up. You will just have to piece it all together.

In general try watching "Capturing the Friedmans" for how this happens.

Satanic rituals hysteria was big in the 80s but no docos stand out. Try youtube.

Else it's familiar patterns meshed together.

It happened in a "small town" which seems to still matter.

This was a circus which has a story book gypsies feel even though that's stupid, since it wasn't even a traditional circus. But it kinda shows the medias roll since it's a good headline not good reality.