Text:
Jitske Kramer
Published
27 May 2024
Reading time:
20 minutes
In the book Tricky Times - don't let yourself go crazy, I write about how we are in a state of transition in all kinds of fields. Anthropologists call this liminality, a confusing in-between period when things are not as they were, but also not yet how they should or will be. In a liminal time, an extraordinary situation arises where hierarchies and established norms disappear, where sacred symbols are mocked, authority in any form is questioned, authority is undermined and old rights are shaken up.
Nothing really seems to matter anymore, while at the same time everything takes on enormous meaning. The disappearance of certainties gives a particularly shaky feeling. During liminality, we are therefore especially sensitive to people who claim to know how things are and promise wonderfully simple solutions. The meantime is the domain par excellence of the archetypal trickster.
Cultures always have their own internal logic. In major changes, it is not one small area that changes, but the coherence and whole logic of the cultural story is challenged. That makes the phase of liminality during transformations so intensely. All sorts of things that used to be normal are no longer so. The familiar cultural narrative is under pressure, causing heated debates. I wrote The book Tricky Times about.
The trickster is the master of the frontier, the archetype of doubt. Sometimes a villain, sometimes a hero.
The trickster is in every one of us. In you, in me, in all of us. Trickster tactics are part of life. No one is born a trickster or ís a trickster. I must confess that during my trickster explorations, I was also regularly reminded of specific people.
‘Trickster!’ I then shouted during the Journal to television. But strictly speaking, this is not true, and that is an important point to make. Humans are not divine a-moral mythological beings. People have a heart, a soul, a conscience. They are responsible for their behaviour and accountable for their actions at all times. The all-around-tricksterarche type you only come across in myths and stories. In daily life, however, you can come across people who are incredibly good at using tricky tactics. With different motives. Out of a positive commitment to challenge prevailing fixed ideas and to overturn sacred cows in order to make room for a new order. Or from cunning, cunning, stupidity or malice to enrich yourself and/or deliberately harm others and the world. Discussion of this is essential.
The trickster archetype has everything to do with the rebellion against established norms and social conventions. Scientific reports that offer a different light on reality challenge different conclusions and new policies. Artists and performers make us look in the mirror, so we keep thinking about taken-for-granted truths. You can also see the effect of the trickster archetype today in how people challenge the mainstream media. Books can be self-published, podcasts and youtube provide space for marginalised voices, unconventional ideas and diverse perspectives. Alternative platforms allow you to break free from the constraints and rules of mainstream media.
Archetypal tricksters challenge people to look differently, question established narratives and uncover hidden truths. This is why mythological tricksters are also called culture makers. By disrupting conventional narratives and power relations, you can gain a more nuanced understanding of complex issues. At least, and this is essential, if we continue to think critically ourselves and don't take trickster stories at face value. Trickster's tactics let people play with boundaries. This provides food for thought, challenges you to check assumptions and expand your understanding. To redefine with fresh eyes and through critical thinking what is true and what is not. And exactly this, unfortunately, often goes wrong these days. The internet and the greater growing influence of AI have been game changers in human history in this regard. Disinformation, misinformation and bullshit is of all times, but now present to such an extent that it is hard to tell anymore what is real and what is fake. A playing field in which trickster tactics are used to their heart's content, adding to the chaos.
Not being able to see what is what anymore is a real threat to our mental health, our democracy and hence our society. Trickster energy is essential to avoid getting stuck in thinking frames and structures, but you shouldn't have too much of it and still be able to think for yourself.
Is a director who manages to polish the annual figures by skilfully sidestepping crucial information the dream leader, somewhat negligent or someone who cheats?
The jolly charlatan is a fun archetype, but it should be obvious that it is not fun when it defines public space. The trickster challenges people to make moral judgements about his trickster antics. That is one of the functions of mythological trickster stories, that the audience talk about them and discuss what they think about them.
Was Robin Hood a hero or a villain? Is it a politically clever move to lose emails or receipts and not have an active memory of something, or is it scurrilous and criminal behaviour? Is a director who manages to polish the annual figures by skilfully bypassing crucial information the dream leader, somewhat negligent or someone who fools around? Is positing a dichotomy, such as between ‘urban and rural’ or ‘genuine refugees and fortune seekers’, permissible to bolster your narrative or does it steer the discussion away from the facts? And what do we do with the implicit dichotomy created when there is a big political focus on ‘The Ordinary Dutchman’? Tricky, but when is this a harmless and convenient communicative frame and when does it cross the line into manipulation and polarising tactics? Important issues to consider. Trickster tactics raise moral questions. It is up to each of us to answer them, in order to create (new) realities together based on truthful information.
Trickster logic produces a strange kind of feeling of enchantment. It has a dampening and narcotic effect, and somewhere it has something peerlessly irresistible.
We feel that something is wrong and yet we go along with it. There is no oppression, exploitation or coercion, but a voluntary abandonment of our own truth. We are regularly tricked in all kinds of ways, under the banner of marketing or public relations. The trickster is then like a clever entrepreneur trying to sell you something and has a sneaky appeal that can prove fatal to us. Reality has too often become something to play with and bend to your will.
When playing with facts has become the norm, it is incredibly difficult to test information for accuracy and veracity. Perception management has become more important than factual and substantive information in many places. Information from leaders, politics, management and organisations is, to put it mildly, not always complete and sometimes just plain lied about. Reports are played with, stories spun by all kinds of parties. On a large and small scale, from left to right and top to bottom. We have come to think trickster tricks are far too normal, with the result that people have lost faith in politics and management.
I have distilled seven trickster tactics from the vast array of possibilities; there are bound to be more. They work great in sowing confusion and getting others to buy into your own story.
They also create monsters of doubt that make us even more susceptible to these tactics. They are used by everyone, from left to right, top to bottom, in profit and non-profit, by activists and lobbyists. These tactics are an essential part of life, but become tricky when we have too many of them and when people with malicious intentions use them. In The book Tricky Times more on this and how to deal with it.
Seven trickster tactics to sow confusion, manipulate and create boundless insecurity:
Trickster logic produces a strange kind of feeling of enchantment. It has a dampening and narcotic effect, and somewhere it has something peerlessly irresistible.
During my search for the patterns of transformations, I have come to love the trickster, but have also been startled by the impact this archetype is having on our modern society and leadership in organisations. I see a connection between the widespread distrust of leaders and organisations and the trickster archetype that has managed to manoeuvre itself to the centre of our lives in recent years.
In mythology, they are figures who cause a stir and bring creativity, fight with leaders, but will never be the leader themselves. That is where things have gone wrong. We have increasingly come to confuse trickster logic and tactics with leadership skills. In many places, it is not so much about communicating the truth, but about how to use the facts to make yourself or a product look better, and your opponent worse. Isn't that of all times? Yes and no. With the choice of an infinite core value as economic growth (which gives room for playing with boundaries), the flight of the internet (where everything can change every day), the decoupling of money value from gold value (making financial space a playground for speculators) and artificial intelligence (where nothing seems to be what it is anymore), we have a unique mix of factors to tackle that lead to a great liminality in which we have made the trickster the hero and leader.
The limitlessness of long-term social liminaliteit encourages trickster behaviour. A trickster culture means a society where we constantly trick each other.
Ratings of restaurants turn out to be fake because just bought. Diplomas for training courses turn out to be less in practice than promised on paper. Seemingly neutral researchers are paid by a special-interest party. Politicians supposedly lose important notes. Advertisements promise great things. Photos on Instagram are photoshopped making beauty ideals unrealistic (and there are people who ask plastic surgeons to model their faces after an Instagram filter). It is a culture that suits today's post-truth era, by some even as post-reality indicated, in which feelings and opinions seem to be more important than facts, distrust prevails and emotions are played on to gain political power. In a trickster culture, it is tricksters who produce the truth. We are constantly fooled, duped, lied to, conned and swindled. The difference between truth and lie no longer matters much in a trickster culture. It is perfectly acceptable to bluff, contradict yourself without any embarrassment and dismiss all criticism in advance as fake. Those who disagree with you make fun of you. And those who can do this best become the leaders. Moreover, it fuels a huge struggle among people about who is actually fooling whom. Which story can be believed, who is telling the truth. And who doesn't.
It is often said: If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. I believe the kitchen is broken. So: let's fix the kitchen.
It sounds so logical: never make people who excel at trickster tactics into leaders. Use them to challenge you, to shake things up, but don't believe their twisted stories or give them access to the power arena. Don't confuse self-confidence with expertise. A borderline trickster cannot set boundaries, cannot cut knots, cannot manage people, cannot speak his or her own truth, because he or she does not have it ... The trickster is an important fringe figure, who has somehow managed to manoeuvre himself into the centre of power in our culture. We have all done that and it is working out disastrously.
Tricksters can trick others as long as there are people who fall for it. So the big danger is not the trickster, but that we fall for it.
We are easily seduced by our deep desire for a good story and a quick fix. We have more to fear from our own naivety than from evil men. In the uncertainty of a liminal period, we have a huge need for charismatic leadership and massively make the vital mistake of confusing trickster tactics with charisma.
Trickster logic and tactics are not wrong in themselves; they possess a mythical creative power. But when there is insufficient backlash, they take everyone into a negative spiral of smooth talk, lying, cheating, swearing, scolding each other, exploiting others and pitting people against each other (not just on X). Then the once playful and witty trickster becomes increasingly selfish and unapproachable on behaviour because he is a master at ducking for responsibility and gaming boundaries.
As exciting and exhilarating as the trickster's capabilities are, it is slowly driving us crazy. We get away from our feelings, losing touch with ourselves, each other and nature. And exactly that contact is so badly needed right now.
Tricksters belong on the periphery and do not belong at the centre of power. Often, change means freeing ourselves from constricting straitjackets, pushing boundaries and breaking things open. Funnily enough, I think a different kind of change, or revolution, is needed now. Not so much more growth and new ideas, but rather back to basics. To limit the out-of-control trickster culture, we need a backlash of human truthfulness, contact with reality, silence, intuition, meaning, interrelationships and nature. To navigate the liminality of the great changes of our time, we need interconnectedness, authenticity and sincerity. So that in letting go of what we know, we can hold on to each other.
This whole trickster culture is, of course, an integral part of the big problems crying out for attention. It is often said: If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. I believe the kitchen is broken. So: let's fix the kitchen.
Anthropological research shows that in these dynamics worldwide and in all cultures, we always and everywhere encounter the same special character: the trickster. There is no mythology, no origin story, no film without a trickster. The trickster is the master of the frontier, the archetype of doubt.Sometimes a villain, sometimes a hero. Think Pinokkio, Anansi, Robin Hood, Loki and Jack Sparrow.
The jolly charlatan is a nice archetype. But not if it starts to define the discussion and we end up in a culture of half-truths, anthropologist Jitske Kramer believes.
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