> A definition by which every human alive ever qualifies as a magician

Exactly correct.

Chapter 2: "No, every act of your life is a magical act; whenever from ignorance, carelessness, clumsiness or what not, you come short of perfect artistic success, you inevitably register failure, discomfort, frustration. [...] Why should you study and practice Magick? Because you can't help doing it, and you had better do it well than badly."

If you called him on it he would say that was on purpose, then talk your ears off about how. He was a ferociously effective charlatan, which is why people still remember the name he made up for himself. (And even invented a rhyming couplet to prate as a pronunciation guide!)

These don't sound like convincing indicators of being an "effective charlatan". Am I to see the Notorious B.I.G. in the same frame?

Yes.

Mhm.

Will you still think I'm fucking with you if I call your comparison a lot more insightful than I think you realize?

White nerdy kids have just been relatively less desperate up to now, socioeconomically speaking. You used to have to be a real hardcore loser, as a not otherwise messed up white boy, to embrace Crowley or hermeticism or any of that other shit that's only interesting to the poor kids and the crime kids and the kids from fucked-up families, who hang around smoking cigarettes together just off school property. (Hello.)

But now, as we exit the second "gilded age" for the second "great depression," the prospect of success in "straight" life, the white folks standard college/job/marry/kids/Epstein-client script, proves a mirage, and the same immiseration of opportunity comes for American whites that American blacks have always known. Thus proliferate get-rich-quick schemes among those certain they are deserving - i.e., con games among suckers, Crowley's native element. Given how much his speed habit led him to write, it's no surprise he comes roaring back. (He did have a sense of character and of history, hence making sure he left behind an appealing - as appalling! - set of lies.)

I have a lot more respect for B.I.G., who at least in my recollection never pretended he was other than one in a million. But when somebody like any of these guys starts saying he sees himself in you or vice versa, you had better keep your knees tightly together and a hand over your drink.

No this was much more substantial and I quite enjoyed it, I was thinking along these lines when offering the comparison, but you have a flowery way to put it.

That is to say, this is the first I'm hearing of this Crowley guy directly, but I have heard murmurs of "magick" down stream in video game culture. So while I agree with the broad social analysis, and have even brushed the aesthetic diffuse through culture, I don't really see any practitioners or other indicators to suggest this is being taken seriously.

Thank you for expanding on this!