Ken sits down with Shira Chess, cultural scholar and author of The Unseen Internet, for a wide-ranging exploration of magic, myth, and belief in digital culture, examining how the internet has become an esoteric system in its own right — a space where technology, occult practice, conspiracy, and spiritual anxiety collapse into one another. Framed from the perspective of chapel perilous, the conversation traces how memes, algorithms, simulation theory, AI discourse, and techno-paganism function not metaphorically, but as active forces shaping belief, agency, and reality itself.

This episode moves through the haunted edges of online life, from meme magic and technognosticism to AI demons, digital egregores, and the slow erosion of consensus reality — asking what responsibility, belief, and magic mean when nothing is true, and everything is permitted.

This week:

The internet as an esoteric and magical system, Chapel perilous as a method for studying belief online, Meme magic, chaos magic, and the Cult of Kek, The destruction of consensus reality and its consequences, Techno-paganism and the occult roots of internet culture, Simulation theory as modern Gnosticism, Algorithms, platforms, and digital spaces as egregores, AI, demons, and the mystification of technology, Belief, practice, and agency in online magical systems, and “Nothing is true, everything is permitted” as an internet condition

🔗 People, books, and concepts mentioned:

Shira Chess – Cultural scholar and author

https://shirachess.com

The Unseen Internet – Technology, magic, and belief online

https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=3…

High Weirdness – Erik Davis on esotericism and modern culture

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_We…

Technosis – Myth, magic, and mysticism in the age of information

https://erikdavis.com/technosis

Chaos Magic – Postmodern magical practice

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_m…

Meme Magic / Cult of Kek – Internet irony and belief systems

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kek_(my…)

Grant Morrison – Hypersigils and pop-culture magic

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_M…

Simulation Theory – Digital Gnosticism and modern myth

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulat…

Gnosticism – Secret knowledge and false reality

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnosticism

AI and Demons – Non-corporeal entities in technological discourse

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artific…

Egregores – Collective thought-forms and group entities

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egregore

Dayal discusses his years documenting the scene, the complex relationship between Black Metal and spirituality, and why physical media, authenticity, and seriousness of intent remain vital in an increasingly digital and disposable age.

📖 Get Black Metal: Evolution of the Cult and other titles from Cult Never Dies:

🔗 People, bands, and concepts mentioned:

💻 Follow & Support

Follow Cult Never Dies:

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This week, Ken and Ulysses Black talk to sorcerer and author Lili (Idlu Lili Regulus) about her remarkable book She of the Night(Theion Publishing). We explore the enigmatic figure of Lilith across Mesopotamian myth, Jewish mysticism, folklore, and modern magical practice. Lili shares how Lilith first revealed Herself to her, the challenges of writing about such a fluid and multifaceted being, and how one might carefully approach Lilith in ritual and devotion.

This week:

Get She of the Night from Theion Publishing:

🔗 People, places, concepts mentioned

Lili (Idlu Lili Regulus) – Author of She of the Night

Lilith – Wikipedia (overview of the mythological figure)

Lamashtu – Wikipedia (Mesopotamian demoness, precursor figure)

Ardat-Lili – Wikipedia (Spirit connected with Lilith traditions)

Ninlil – Wikipedia (Sumerian goddess linked with air, winds, and Lilith traditions)

Tiamat – Wikipedia (Mesopotamian chaos goddess, sometimes connected to Lilith)

Ereshkigal – Wikipedia (Goddess of the underworld)

Queen of the Night plaque – British Museum page

Kabbalah – Wikipedia (context for Lilith as Queen of the Qliphothic husks)

Theion Publishing – Publisher of She of the Night

💻 Follow & Support

Follow Lili’s work at Theion Publishing:

Follow Ulysses Black’s Substack:

Support Right Where You Are Sitting Now on Patreon:

Visit SittingNow for more episodes, articles, and extras:

This week, Ken talks to author and cultural provocateur Stewart Home about his explosive new book Fascist Yoga: Grifters, Occultists, White Supremacists and the New Order in Wellness (Pluto Press). They dive into the strange, hidden history of yoga in the West, its unexpected ties to fascism, and how those shadows still linger in the modern wellness industry.

This week:

The carnival-barker roots of yoga in the West and the con artistry of Pierre Bernard

How racial myth-making turned yoga into an “Aryan science” for early fascists

Guido Keller, the Rijeka YOGA group, and the bizarre avant-garde politics of proto-fascism

Major J. F. C. Fuller: from Crowleyan yogi to architect of modern warfare

Francis Yeats-Brown, Hitler fandom, and yoga propaganda

How fascist mysticism evolved into post-war yoga evangelism and daytime TV gurus

Why the modern wellness industry still carries the DNA of its darker past

Get Stewart’s book at Pluto Press:

Pierre Bernard – Wikipedia (The “Great Oom,” early yoga grifter)

Support Right Where You Are Sitting Now on Patreon:

This week Ken talks to author and esoteric scholar Peter Mark Adams about his new book Ritual and Epiphany in the Mysteries of Mithras (Theion Publishing). They explore the deep mysteries of Mithraic initiation, why caves matter, Mithras as cosmic hero, connections to Saturn, and the relevance of true initiatory experiences today.

💡 This week: Origins and roots of Mithras in Indo-European traditions, The bull-slaying scene (Tauroctony) and its deeper meaning, Mystery cult initiations and purification by water and fire, Why Mithraism appealed to Roman soldiers and elites, Connections to Saturn, Orphism, and the non-dual AI in reconstructing ritual processes, Freemasonry, Thelema, and modern echoes of Mithras

📚 Get Peter’s book at Theion Publishing: https://theionpublishing.com/shop/pma-ritualepiphany/

Peter Mark Adams – Official website

Peter Mark Adams – Scarlet Imprint profile

Theion Publishing

David Beth – Wikipedia

Helena Blavatsky – Wikipedia (briefly referenced re: esoteric currents)

Epic of Gilgamesh – Wikipedia

Tiridates I of Armenia – Wikipedia

Nero – Wikipedia

Pleiades (star cluster) – Wikipedia

Plato’s Phaedrus – Wikipedia

Porphyry – Wikipedia

Orphism (religion) – Wikipedia

Saturn (mythology) – Wikipedia

Cronus – Wikipedia

Demiurge – Wikipedia

Vajrayana Buddhism – Wikipedia

Freemasonry – Wikipedia

Thelema – Wikipedia

Mystery cult – Wikipedia (general concept)

Tauroctony – Wikipedia

Pater (Mithraism priest grade) – Wikipedia

***Begin transmission

Joseph Matheny, David Metcalfe, Willow Truman and Ken Eakins send you transmissions from the Mauve Zone.

How idiots became 'intellectuals', The Queen of Canada's Conspiracy scene, how to 'prove' UAPs, and ploughing them fields baby.

Music by Simon Smerdon

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This week: Why boredom is a powerful magickal tool, how the modern world is removing us from the spiritual Kosmos. and how to find Aleister Crowley books in an Indian bookshop in Africa (no, really!).

Joining me in co-host duties this week is Ulysses Black

Main theme by Simon Smerdon

Music bed by chriszabriskie.com

David Beth was born in Luanda, Angola, South-West Africa in May, 1974, into a family of the (West) German Diplomatic Corps. He was educated in Europe and in Los Angeles, California, USA. David began his career as a teacher of occultism by leading small classes and conducting seminars in Denmark and Germany, where he was able to initiate a new style of ‘dialogue’ with the various levels of psychic experience. In 2002, after more than a decade of occult and spiritual studies, David began the intensive study of German philosophy and psychology, as internal experience and as evolution of the person, paying attention to those areas where the age of systems (Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, Lotze) had failed to communicate with their respective age and with contemporary consciousness, especially ‘youth-culture’.

At that time, David experienced an epiphany when he was led to discover the evolutionary theogony of eros, as found in the writings of Ludwig Klages, the Graf Hermann von Keyserling, and Max Scheler (philosophers highly read during the Weimar years, 1919-1933), as well as in the work of recent ‘character analysis’. By a careful exploration of his own inner-consciousness, David was able to enter upon a voyage into his own gnostic being. David realised that he had been initiated into this primal awareness by a high-priestess of an ancient Afro-Totemic tradition-history, when he was a very young man, still living in Africa. In a profound sense, she was the archetypal influence discovered by Klages in 1922, when he wrote his book Vom kosmogonischen Eros. In this work, the role of the eternal feminine in evolution was delineated as the faces of Isis, Yenus, Freya, Shakti, Tanith, Sophia-Maria. David realised that this was the answer to the needs of contemporary consciousness, particularly the disenchant­ment of the youth-awareness movement, which was found world-wide.

In his first book, Voudon Gnosis, David began to teach for publication his interpretation of the modern mind which becomes gradually suffused with the polar-mysticism of his deeply personal encounter with god-archetypes and forms. These force-fields, which awakened as powers in David’s lectures and class-talks, now came to appear in his desire to hear the new sound-energy and see the light from the north, yet coming from the voice of a youth, a youth fed-up with static traditions, fed-up with traditions that had lost their vital-roots.

***Begin transmission

David Metcalfe, Darragh Mason, Willow Truman, and Ken Eakins send you transmissions from the Mauve Zone.

Check Darragh's amazing podcast @SpiritBox

Check Willow's podcast archive @thenonsensebazaar7273

Music by Simon Smerdon

Transmission ends***

This week: RAW’s Aleister Crowley influences explored, why did the Chicago Police have a file on the Wilsons, RAWs relationship with Timothy Leary, and much more.

Main theme by Simon Smerdon

Music bed by chriszabriskie.com

Pick up Gabriel’s book:

Amazon UK

Amazon US

Lulu

Gabriel Kennedy, aka Prop Anon, is an actor, musician, and writer whose work has been featured in BoingBoing.net, Realitysandwich.com, Mondo2000.com, and his own website, http://chapelperilous.us. Chapel Perilous: The Life and Thought Crimes of Robert Anton Wilson is his first book. Source: Google Books

***Begin transmission

Joseph Matheny, David Metcalfe, and Ken Eakins send you transmissions from the Mauve Zone.

It's a Drone-O-Rama in the US and UK, The Orange Man is back in power, and Ken's Mantoid encounter.

Music by Simon Smerdon

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