Coincidance - Principia Discordia

COINCIDANCE 201
Theatre, where Dillinger was gunned down, every year on the anniversary
of his death, June 22. Their major spiritual teaching comes from Mr.
Dillinger, whom they call St. John the Martyr, and consists of the words,
"Lie down on the floor and keep calm," (St. John said this often to nervous
and agitated bank officials, before looting their tills.) Every member
ordained by Dr. Naismith gets a membership card making him or her an
Assistant Treasurer, entitled to collect tithes from any new disciple naive
enough to remain a disciple and not become an Assistant Treasurer, too, by
writing to Naismith for a card.
Power! Sex! Success! Money!
I have saved the best—or worst—for last. The Church of the Sub-Genius
in Dallas has borrowed a bit from all of the above, and from every other
religion on the planet, uses high-powered advertising techniques in the style
of the most aggressive Christian Evangelists, and promises in capitals to
teach you the secret of POWER! and SEX! and SUCCESS! and MONEY! It
will also put you in touch with SUPERHUMAN FORCES, save you from
THE CONSPIRACY, and even show you how to achieve SLACK and
literally get something for nothing. That is admittedly a tall order, but the
founder, J.R. "Bob" Dobbs, is no ordinary mortal. In fact, it is far from clear
whether anybody has actually ever seen "Bob" at all, at all, and Sub-Genius
advertising darkly hints that before an ordinary human can survive a
meeting with "Bob" it is necessary to go to Dobbstown, located somewhere
in South America, and have special surgery to "open the third nostril." Even
then, it is warned, you might come back from such a Close Encounter with
inflamed eyes, headache, total or partial amnesia and other stigmata of UFO
contactees, and you will probably be harassed by agents of THE CONSPIR­
ACY who will appear at your door pretending to be Jehovah's Witnesses
and try to get inside to brainwash you.
J.R. "Bob" Dobbs was allegedly an ordinary aluminum window-siding
salesman until in 1957 he met L. Ron Hubbard—founder of the more famous
Church of Scientology—and learned the Secret of Power. "Bob" is now
fabulously rich, maybe even richer than Hubbard, and offers to teach you
the Secret too, in various books and pamphlets ranging in price from $1 to
$25. It is admitted frankly that these Metaphysical Works look "incomprehensible"
or "nonsensical" to the unenlightened, but it is firmly promised that if
you buy enough of them, keep them in the loo, and consult them often, you
will eventually get SLACK and understand the Secret and how to use it.
I think 1 have found the Secret of Power. It is in one of the cheaper
Sub-Genius publications "More Quotes and Gloats From 'Bob'" and it reads,
"You know how dumb the average guy is? Well, by definition,
half of them are