Punk'd By Masons
Back in the 1930s, this amazing catalog from the DeMoulin Brothers offered fraternal orders such as the Masons, Elks, and Oddfellows a splendid array of truly demented and downright sick gags suitable for use in lodge initiation and hazing rituals.
Now I do love a good prank, and have always had a fondness for old standbys like fake poo and whoopee cushions, but this stuff is so far beyond the pale that I simply can't grok why anyone would subject another human being to this kind of humiliation unless they're closet sadists. Why anyone would ever join an organization that treated its members in such a fashion is beyond my capacity to understand as well.
Thanks, and a sekrit Masonic handshake to the Nonist
Comments
Hah! You're all blog-punk'd in 2002:
http://ookworld.com/irorbit/archives/000014.html
And I got it from BoingBoing, who got from etc, etc...
The ever-circling dance of the web dervishes.
Posted by: M.Ace | August 20, 2005 1:05 PM
damn you m.ace and your unstoppable mixture of good memory and tidy record keeping!
knowing it came from boing boing makes me feel dirty somehow. i myself got it from monkey filter thank you very much.
Posted by: Jmorrison | August 20, 2005 1:13 PM
M.Ace: yeah, I know this link has been around for a while, but I think 3 years is well over the Statute of Weblog Limitations, not to mention the memory span of almost everyone but old dinosaurs like you and I. These days, if it doesn't show up on Technorati (which is tits-up most of the time anyway), I simply give the referral to the site where I saw it last.
knowing it came from boing boing makes me feel dirty
"...it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big bOINGbOING."
Posted by: MrBaliHai | August 20, 2005 2:14 PM
Sorry, I just couldn't resist being a stinker, as Bugs Bunny might put it.
And yes, we might as well abandon any resistance to the inevitable circularity of linkage. I'm sure all links can eventually be traced back to listservs on DARPA (even if the links do actually post-date that era, 'cause time is circular as well).
The really sad thing is that I still haven't had the time to study that catalog as much as I'd like.
Posted by: M.Ace | August 20, 2005 2:54 PM
It's a scientific fact that everything on the wuh.wuh.wuh can be traced back to 2 posts that appeared in January of 1985 on the Usenet groups alt.sex.bondage.chocolate and net.bizarre.
Posted by: MrBaliHai | August 20, 2005 3:37 PM
I wonder how Jews managed to be mixed up in the "Jewish and Swedish Naval Battle." The (elaborate and expensive) game doesn't seem to be pejorative.
Posted by: jkcohen | August 21, 2005 8:28 PM
Maybe they're Swedish Masons battling the Jews over who gets to rebuild Solomon's Temple?
Posted by: MrBaliHai | August 21, 2005 9:29 PM