Don: 0:25

Hello, hello everybody, welcome back to The Uncannery. I'm Don,

Ron: 0:32

I'm Ron,

Doug: 0:34

I go second.

Ron: 0:35

No, no, I've told you 100 times I'm second billing. You're lucky to be here so we're not usually like this, but uh, it's been an especially heated day. It's been an especially yeah, I, I was seeing where I could assert myself, uh, in terms of the dominance hierarchy, and uh, clearly, ron's just gonna assert himself, not giving you an inch. Why are you so heated, Doug?

Doug: 1:01

I think it's uh, i't know, I'm just like in the competitive spirit here. I've been playing a lot of games lately.

Ron: 1:09

What kind of game, Doug?

Doug: 1:10

. Well, I recently dipped I don't know, depending on when you're listening to this, I feel like pickleball is at an all-time high and I recently, when I tried out a game played with my wife, my parents and I had a really good time. Did you go to the senior center? Let's just say we were the youngest ones. We were definitely the youngest ones, but I had a really good time. I think it's very fun. It's going to give you a lower barrier of entry than it is All right, here he goes.

Ron: 1:40

He's evangelizing again, but before you do, please. I needed to be told this morning what pickleball was. It's a.

Doug: 1:51

It's a thing I've heard. I thought it was like squash. Uh, yeah, probably just the vegetable connotation. Yeah, the next time that you're in a deli, if you ever are given three pickles in your sandwich box, you instantly are transported to a magical world in which you play a game. Uh, real answer is um, yeah, it's very similar to a tennis or a ping pong or a racquetball, kind of has all elements and it's on a smaller court, playing with a wiffle ball and like a graphite or a carbon fiber.

Doug: 2:17

Um, paddle that you make race cars out of that don't think carbon fiber absolutely serious business and you feel like a race car driver when you're playing going two miles an hour, but that's okay yeah, I bet you look like a race car driver too it made me. It's uh, it's one of those things like if you look in the mirror you see something else, but at the time you kind of feel like superman. Um no, but I, yeah, I was really enjoying myself, to say the least you have.

Don: 2:44

You have that glow about you.

Ron: 2:45

The pickle, glow the pickle glow, you got that salty sheen.

Don: 2:50

Yeah that's right. You can use a pickle as a light bulb.

Ron: 2:56

I thought that was a potato.

Don: 2:57

No, a potato will produce electricity, but if you run electricity through a pickle, it glows, so you have the pickle glow.

Ron: 3:04

Really.

Don: 3:05

Yeah, run electricity through a pickle.

Doug: 3:05

It glows. So you have the pickle glow really. Yeah, so I can take, uh, my fan that's in my room currently, and if I plugged in an extension cord with a pickle at the end, we'd be okay, I think we, uh, you and I, are still confused with the idea of the difference between conducting and producing light.

Ron: 3:21

I think don is telling us the pickle will produce a lot. You can, uh, you could put that in your closet and you could pull a potato and it will cause the pickle it probably would take more than one potato to make the the pickle short out, but yeah, but just they're cheap. I can get a bunch of them for insurance purposes.

Don: 3:38

We need to make sure. Please don't try this at home.

Ron: 3:40

Look it up on youtube yeah, find, find mr beast, who's probably already done this.

Doug: 3:46

He'll sell you the pickle have it on my new burgers. Uh, yeah, the um. No, I I'm I'm aware of that. I just like the image of like, uh, thinking of several extension cords, outlets and daisy chains that are like led with a bunch of pickles that are in the middle of them. I just like the image a lot, to say the least, but that's all right so, ron, you've never partaken, I've never partaken in a pickleball.

Ron: 4:09

Uh, doug wants me to pickleball. I'm open to the idea of pickleball, but, um, we've been here now for maybe two hours and you've brought pickleball up to five different people probably, and well to mixed reception. So this is why I'm wondering like is pickleball, like? Are you in this for real? Are you writing, which is sometimes a thing you do doug?

Doug: 4:30

sometimes you get caught up in the excitement of a beautiful day and you know an exciting idea I'm the type of guy that if you're going to give me some kind of new physical activity, I'm very interested in potentially trying it.

Ron: 4:44

So does that mean you're down with jujitsu, are you?

Doug: 4:46

no, no, pickleball better no, no, no, nothing tops the jujitsu. It's going to be too tough to get that out of the top spot, but um, there's not a ton, it's an easier sell. I guess I would say like hey, come on in mind, if I try to break your leg versus versus, would you like to break your own legs?

Ron: 5:05

Well, do you want to feel completely demasculated by me?

Don: 5:10

So jujitsu is part of how you identify yourself. Would you say, that Is that fair? It's definitely not on the driver's license, but um no as opposed to pickleball, is what I'm trying to is sure, pickleball might be something you do for, you know, a couple weeks and then uh, I don't know.

Doug: 5:27

I mean I again. I think that that's the reason that I'm I'm grasping at the straws here right now, going who wants to play with me, because I want to keep it going.

Don: 5:35

But you're gonna start wearing the headband to work and oh yeah if I look like mackinrow by the end of this summer.

Doug: 5:42

Yeah, I'll be very happy with pickleball. Well, he's playing mackinrow's.

Ron: 5:47

The mackinrow yeah, I was gonna say he's actually playing and still yelling at everyone. Yeah so it is cool then it's got real people.

Doug: 5:57

It definitely has real people. I don't think that we can say that it's cool. I don't.

Ron: 6:01

I don't think it's necessarily something you say that's cool, but I really enjoyed it, but does a thing need to be cool for you to have fun?

Doug: 6:08

no no definitely not, of course not. Come on. I was gonna say come on dungeons and dragons.

Ron: 6:12

I'm not gonna sit here and tell you that, yeah, I'm the coolest drow to ever walk. The, yeah, the, my broken lands, whatever that's right.

Doug: 6:21

I mean my black metal. Sometimes I look at the statistics on the black metal albums that I listened to it. It's like you're one of a thousand people in the world listening to this and I'm like that tells you everything.

Ron: 6:32

Yeah, you ever like, seen like a someone who writes for a metal magazine and then they pivot to video or something You're like. That's what this guy like everyone who writes for metal is like the bookish most accountant looking dude who happens to wear a black t-shirt Absolutely.

Doug: 6:48

Absolutely.

Don: 6:50

So you don't think. So, pickleball, does it have staying power? Is it just something that's going to?

Doug: 6:55

is it just having a moment in society right now and it's going to peak in popularity and then it will fade off and, I don't know, it'll be tetherball next, or and then we'll fade off and, I don't know, it'll be tetherball next, or I feel that there are enough people running around that it kind of feels like it's at its peak at the moment because so many. I mean, yeah, we went to a location that got rid of a set of tennis courts. I'm sure the tennis community hates pickleball, but yeah, I'm seeing that they're like converting areas of tennis centers into pickleball courts. So I'm imagining that it's growing right now. It's going to have its heyday and then, like, begin to fall um but yeah it's just a fad?

Doug: 7:35

yeah, it might be, although I mean I the the person who gave us our kind of introduction, said it's been around since, I think, 65. It's been around since 1965 okay so why?

Ron: 7:46

it's a long fad don.

Don: 7:47

Yeah, I was gonna say uh I don't know why something exists doesn't mean it's it's popular correct.

Don: 7:53

The fad comes from the, the momentary popularity yeah, like nintendo was a playing card company right until yeah nintendo entertainment system, and then mario because I wanted to, so to segue from our pickleball conversation, or that's right, yeah, what I wanted to ask you guys actually about fads and about uh growing up and your experiences of of what uh. Looking back at it now, like what fads were you involved in? Or did you notice when you were growing up and maybe you weren't involved in, but what uh?

Ron: 8:25

none, I'm always, you're always just cool.

Doug: 8:27

Yes, I've always marched to the beat of my own drum. You're the leader, that's right I set the. I'm a trendsetter, they call me actually it's kind of true, like if you think about, like the warhammer obsession, it's like there's nobody into this. I'm in, I'll take it. Yeah, that's it. Painting these miniatures, definitely. Yeah, you're right, yeah.

Ron: 8:44

I tend to just like lead people off of cliffs. No, there's got to be a score of fads. The first one, I mean this is the fad of our generation, I think, doug which is the Pokemon.

Doug: 9:02

Yeah, pocket monsters.

Ron: 9:09

Absolutely Pocket mon yeah mon. Yeah, yeah, pokemon was big what we were. Pokemon still big baby. All right, you, pokemon is huge. Yeah, the so. Is it a fad if it never really went away? It had its fad, it had its ways. Yeah, right, like the fact that I was very into a self-identified pocahomani maniac yep, when I was in third grade or whenever that came out. Yeah, and the fact that I'm not now tells me I participated in a fad, right yeah, I got in trouble in fourth grade.

Doug: 9:33

I had my collection of cards and like laminated sleeves inside of a three-ring binder. They had just been banned from school so like a group of guys we would always meet like we'd fly to just outside of school grounds, like so we could start trading international waters.

Ron: 9:48

Yeah, exactly that's right that's right.

Don: 9:52

Why were they banned at?

Doug: 9:52

school um so many distractions from learning.

Ron: 9:56

Yeah were, and they were pornographic kids were drawing things on those sand shrews uh, didn't experience any of that I.

Doug: 10:06

I'm curious what your school did, but, um, no, I remember going out to recess. Um, we had kids whose cards were stolen. We had parents who were calling the school saying my kids cards a, b and C. I don't want this kid trading cards with this kid because he did this, this and took advantage of him I remember that being a thing, and so we got this kid's a card shark. Yeah, exactly, exactly but oh, the credit you had when you had a, uh, a charizard.

Ron: 10:34

I stole my friend's charizard. See he was, he was moving. This is perfect heist by the way does he know?

Don: 10:40

or this is like revealing to the world. This is confession.

Ron: 10:43

This kid does not know? I don't think. Yeah, his family was moving states and, like I, went in in the chaos of a move, yeah, and I found his Pokemon and I took his Charizard. That's how, that's the power of a fad baby.

Doug: 10:59

Yeah, you're willing to commit crimes and sins. Yeah, wow, yeah yeah, that's vicious. I also got duped during the Pokemon era. Do you even know what a GameShark is? Oh yeah, don. Are you familiar with this?

Don: 11:12

No, it sounds like a gaming system.

Doug: 11:16

It's close. So I'm sure we're familiar with the original Game Boy. There was something that came out called a Game Shark in which you could plug in a cartridge holder into the already cartridge holder that's on a Game Boy, right, but it's like this modification chip and then you place your game into the chip inside of the card. It's like a. You know, it hacks your cartridge essentially and you could do different things to your games. You can modify what is happening within them. It pulls up a menu and it lets you do different things. So one of the ways you could access one of the Pokemon on on um and I don't remember if I was using it to like get extra items, I don't know, it's been long enough, but I think it was the only way that you could get a certain Pokemon. I think you could get Mew If you only went to the side of the island. You had a game shark.

Doug: 12:10

The point of the story is, after I had hacked it had a buddy at school, um, who said, can I borrow that? I said, sure, um, absolutely Everybody wants this. I'd be happy to do that. So a few weeks go by, hey, can I get that game shark back? I want to make sure yeah, absolutely, I'll bring it to school. Two months go by and I'm like what's going to happen? And so I eventually tell him cause this is third grade, so is he a third grade or fourth grade? And I remember telling him I'm going to need that back tomorrow.

Doug: 12:33

My mom said she's going to come to school if I don't get it back. And he goes, okay, I'll bring it. And so we get to school. I see him, he's got it in his hands, hands, he gives it to me and then quickly goes sorry, and runs away. And sure enough, it had been dropped on the ground and broken. And the shame of the kid. That moment and the funniest and most disgusting part of this is, I remember, as if it were, like you know, the mafia had assassinated somebody within my family. I dropped to my knees and held my arms toward the sky in dramatic fat shenanigans, like let out this huge scream, like just so upset that my game shark got destroyed because I'd saved up so much allowance for that and that's why they banned it.

Doug: 13:17

Don't yeah, because children look at this fad, yeah, yeah, this fad, yeah. I mean like, why am I holding my arms up like I'm willem dafoe and platoon?

Ron: 13:26

that's not good I think you can find a lot of fads based on things that were banned in school, that I remember getting banned. So I remember tech decks, the little miniature finger skateboards those were all banned. Um uh, crazy bones. Remember crazy bones little tiny pieces of plastic shaped like weed cartoons from the side of a vape shop.

Doug: 13:49

And then you would flick them.

Ron: 13:50

It was just jacks right. And you just flick them. What were your fads, Don?

Don: 13:56

Well, speaking of things that should have been banned, I wish fidget spinners had been banned a couple years ago.

Don: 14:02

Everybody had those, but thinking back to my childhood, fidget spinners had been banned a couple of years ago. Everybody had those. But, um, yeah, but thinking back to uh, to my childhood, like I've had a hard time answering this question for myself, uh, because I feel like I can notice fads in other people, but I kind of like it's hard because you do feel like I know you're joking, rob, but I, like you did at the beginning, where everything that I do is is for a reason, um, I'm not just doing it because everybody is doing it, but uh, um, I think, uh, there was a fashion fad when I was in high school where we would uh take our jeans and we would roll them up on the bottom, but you had to peg it, so it was tight to your, to your ankle, um, and, uh, I did that cause that's what everybody was doing, but that was the fashion. So, I don't know, it seems like a fad, cause it's not done anymore, but I bet you it's going to start happening again, cause they their uh.

Doug: 14:52

students are starting to uh to roll their pants out, but uh um, it's weird with fashion because it's so cyclical, like you know, when my kids are watching stranger things and then showing up like I look like this and it's like which was made in the 80s and you're basically copying 80s fashion in some way. Um, like, I've seen a lot of um, a lot of the makeup that's being done right now looks very like suzy suze from suzy and the banshees, which I think is really cool because it's like such a like distinct and like artistic interpretation. But I have literally told kid like oh, the suzy sues and they're like what?

Ron: 15:27

I love that dessert.

Doug: 15:28

Yeah, old man, hey old guy get out of here, um, but yeah. So it's hard with fashion because and then maybe. I mean, I guess that doesn't disqualify it from being a fad, even if it comes back well, yeah, I mean, people laugh looking at your pictures, your old haircuts and you know who had a mullet and who had a crew cut and all that.

Don: 15:47

Mullets are back. Okay, that's a fad.

Ron: 15:49

The spiked hair gel chipmunk look was like a thing I definitely had where, like the spikes are way too you know, they're not like cool enough to, they're not long enough to be punk but longer than like you could wear in an office job. Did you ever do bleach tips? No, I never bleached my tips.

Doug: 16:08

Oh, I did that, I did you. Oh yeah, my sixth grade actually my whole sixth grade photo, or it's either fifth or sixth grade photo is a fad. I'm doing the rocks eyebrow. I'm doing the rocks like in a signature eyebrow that he would do on uh wwf at the time. I've got the bleach tips and then I'm wearing oh, does anchor blue even exist anymore? Oh yeah, remember that store, yeah, yeah I had like the shiny shirts from the early 2000s.

Ron: 16:35

That was a thing um the coolest place you could get a shirt when I was in middle school was tilly's it's that vibe.

Doug: 16:43

yeah, anchor blue is kind of like Tilly's yeah.

Don: 16:46

Listening to you describe Pokemon um, there was it reminded me I actually had. I had forgotten there was a fad when I was in fourth grade. Um, and it's going to make me sound like I'm older than I am, because when we did this it was retro already. Um, but we played marbles at uh, at recess and it was a. It was a big, like you had to get the. You know, the cat's eye was the, it was the premium marble and you had a shooter and you had a right. Oh yeah, um and uh. But when I, my mom, got worried when we started collecting marbles and and playing at recess and stuff, because we were playing like high stakes, like you would lose marbles and and and things, um, because my brother, who's who's significantly older than I am I mean, he's not ancient, but he's when I was in sixth grade he would have been about twice my age um had been suspended from school for playing marbles. Um, they, they suspended him for gambling oh.

Ron: 17:47

And so your mom's like, oh, no, it's coming back.

Doug: 17:49

It's awakening in him it's a, it's a plague yeah right, which that immediately brings up pogs.

Ron: 17:57

That was like the thing is like when I was in. Yes, yeah, I didn't. I never saw a pog in my life until I started watching simpsons and like that was a joke.

Doug: 18:06

I think that that's the most brilliant of all the marketing, because it's just the cheapest printed materials you can possibly imagine. And same thing as well as a play for key, are we playing for keeps and then you got a reputation if you didn't play for keeps, because it's like, oh you can't believe it.

Ron: 18:20

He values his property. That's lame beanie babies a lot of these kind of cheaper kids things. But we got way into the beanie babies collecting those when we were on road trips and stuff.

Don: 18:34

My dad had hundreds of beanie babies. He would be up late at night on the computer shopping.

Ron: 18:41

That was his pastime did it kind of coincide with the beginning of e eBay or something?

Don: 18:46

Was it one of those like first?

Ron: 18:48

item commodities.

Doug: 18:50

Early eBay was fun, Isn't yeah? How do you not get into fads?

Don: 18:53

I feel. Well, I think that's a that. Let let's take a look, cause, uh, cause I have story that I, uh, I want to share with you all and see if we can figure out what's going on here. So we, uh, we need to go back in time. Okay, we're gonna go back to uh, to 1518 always way back with you, don't I?

Ron: 19:13

know the rest of us. We're over here talking about stuff from the 80s that's our ancient years 1989.

Don: 19:18

Yeah, yeah so 1518 is the year we're in the city of strasbourg.

Ron: 19:23

Strasbourg, that's in austria, today it's in france oh yeah, a lot of borders shifted in that part of the world. It is, it's uh wars come.

Don: 19:34

It's in an area called alice and it uh, but back then it wouldn't have been france, it was the holy roman emperor empire, um, so it's a. It's a weird space, though it's a um, it's almost germany, like it's. You can take a 15 minute tram ride today to uh to get to germany, um, it is kind of kind of in that uh, that eastern area and um and so in 1518, german is the language. So, um, there's uh, mid-july in 1518, a lady named Frau Trofea goes outside one day and starts dancing.

Ron: 20:13

Fun, nice yeah.

Doug: 20:14

You trying to tell me the dancing's a fad?

Ron: 20:16

Well, I mean, did she invent dancing? Yeah, this is the beginning of dance.

Don: 20:20

Yeah, dancing has existed, but she's out there Prove it. She steps into into the cobbled street right outside her house and she just starts moving. There's no music, she's not singing, she just is moving, and the description of her dance was that it was neither graceful nor joyful.

Ron: 20:39

Oh, sounds like me when I dance.

Don: 20:44

So her body seems to be seized by a, an invisible force I like that, compelling her to dance with this unending fervor and she, she doesn't stop the sun sets.

Don: 20:58

The sun sets she dances all night. The next day sun comes up, she's still outside her house dancing and so people start to gather, they start to look around and they're like, oh my gosh, what's going on? She's having trouble breathing, her shoes are clunking on the cobblestones. Everybody is first kind of curious, right Like this is a strange thing. But then they realize she can't stop. She's dancing and she can't stop, so they just watch her for about a week.

Doug: 21:34

A week.

Don: 21:35

A week.

Doug: 21:36

Okay, pause, this is a fable, all right, we don't do fables on this podcast, don we do hard science. We do. Bigfoot and missing children in yosemite yeah and let's just say that this region of france, the worst neighbors ever like oh, she's still over there dancing. Let's not try to help her, because I mean, at this point, get two people to restrain her and she stops right no, she, she can fight people off to move, even when people try to grab her.

Doug: 22:03

Oh okay, so we've at least made an attempt. I just thought these people were awful.

Ron: 22:06

So are we using the word dance sort of liberally. Yeah, so sort of like do we just mean she is convulsing while she's?

Don: 22:15

on two feet. She seems to be upright, so we'll come back to what could be happening. And convulsions is a possibility, right, but she doesn't lose her ability to maintain her balance, which which raises an eyebrow about whether or not it's just convulsion. But here's here's where it takes a turn. After about a week of dancing all by herself outside, all of a sudden somebody else joins her and they start dancing. Yeah, no, about a dozen people, yeah, and they start dancing and they can't stop. Um and uh, they don't seem to be having a good time, so there's no music like a white person's wedding one person starts and slowly others aggregate, but it's never that.

Don: 23:04

Yeah they start complaining, they start crying, their feet are bleeding um. They start begging onlookers for help. Tell the dj to go home there's no dj now.

Doug: 23:18

Here's the problem, don't you asked us about fads? Yeah but this okay, when I was playing pogs when I had, we didn't talk about tamagotchis when I oh yeah, another band I guess that's what defines a fat is whatever gets banned at a school. Um, when I was taking out my tamagotchi to feed it, when I was looking through my pokemon cards. I'm not crying, not screaming, I'm not. I'm not standing in the middle with my pokemon going I can't stop trading these things somebody help me.

Don: 23:45

You could have stopped at any time. You would have put your tamagotchi down and just let it die no, eventually I did.

Ron: 23:51

My mom took me out of school so I could watch my tamagotchi die, that's true, that's beauty.

Doug: 23:57

Yeah, mother, you're trying to tell me that tamagotchi wasn't real.

Ron: 24:01

I will not buy that. You're right. I guess your point taken, don, there's a compulsion. Telling me as an eight-year-old or, however, whenever this was to stop playing Pokemon. I don't know if I could have. You're right, Maybe. But again to Doug's point, I'm being very neutral this episode.

Doug: 24:22

Thank you.

Ron: 24:24

Finally, one point to doug, because he wasn't in pain when he was playing pokemon well, if we try to take those pokemon away?

Don: 24:32

I bet you he would have been.

Doug: 24:34

Yeah, but they're engaging this compulsive act of thanks, my pickleball point I'll serve now um. Yeah, this is I'm. Obviously I'm gonna let you finish um, but I think I I'm not convinced exactly yet because, like we're not convinced that they're dancing.

Don: 24:53

What are you not convinced?

Ron: 24:54

he thinks you're hoaxing us somehow.

Doug: 24:55

Yeah, it's like you tried to bring up fads in the beginning of this. We do this cute thing that you probably have caught on to where we start with, like here's a little question for you, oh, a beautiful segue.

Ron: 25:03

And here we are saying people were in pain back in 1510 last time.

Don: 25:09

Last time I gave you a conspiracy theory.

Doug: 25:11

Yeah, yeah, all right and, to be fair, I mean things generally when you think of things being medieval. I think we use that adjective now to say like it was painful, dreary, awful in some ways.

Don: 25:21

So maybe dancing did start, awful, so I I I will continue the story, but I will tell you that that what I have told you so far is well documented, like multiple sources corroborating what I've told you so far.

Doug: 25:33

I I didn't doubt the historicity of this, I just you just doubt your intentions, for sure.

Don: 25:39

Doubts my integrity. That's why I come every week, so within a month, there's 400 Dancing uncontrollably in the streets all in this one town, all in this one town the bodies are twisting and and Turning in, like I say they're. They're undergoing physical injury because they are dancing so much.

Ron: 26:02

I'm stressed out so tell her hundred, you said 400. Yeah over the course of a month.

Don: 26:06

Mm-hmm and Town Council tries to figure out what to do. Alright, do so. They look for signs of supernatural intervention. Is this a possession? And what they decide to do? Their solution is they probably just need to dance it out. We just need to let them get whatever is in their system out. Let them get whatever's in their system out. So they actually they build stages and they hire musicians to come in and and play music, so that the dancers can, you know, finally reach the end of the dance, I guess, or?

Doug: 26:40

Ron, when was the last time that you danced it out?

Ron: 26:44

My wedding yeah, fully out though it was done. Oh yeah, yeah, I can dance once every seven years and I'm good.

Don: 26:53

Okay, it was done. Oh yeah. Yeah, I can dance once every seven years and I'm good, okay, cool. Do you think that worked? Do you think they danced it out? Would that be the right solution? Somebody can't stop dancing, so you're going to play music for them. It's more fun if they didn't.

Doug: 27:03

It's more fun if they did so I'm hoping no, you're sadistic.

Don: 27:15

Well, it doesn't, doesn't, doesn't work. They keep dancing, despite the fact that the the music is playing. They call doctors in, um, and they can't figure out what's going on. Um, there's. They start to be concerned then about demonic possession and, of course, um, and an overheated blood is an option. No, hot blood, and uh, and finally, what they, what they kind of decide is uh, is there's a, a saint called saint vitus?

Doug: 27:40

uh, saint vitus dance. That's it. Is this what? Okay, what are you?

Ron: 27:45

this is a metal, you're all like liking this thing and I don't know what you're talking about.

Doug: 27:49

Please, let me like something wrong. I just want to be, a part of it.

Don: 27:52

Negative points, Doug.

Doug: 27:54

My server man.

Don: 27:55

What do you know about St Vitus Dance?

Doug: 27:57

There is a metal band named St Vitus, and so I at least like looked up the connotation of St Vitus Dance as being like what that came from, and I'm really hoping that we make some connections here, because I just like Wino heinrich's band, uh, saint vinus. But if, if you're about to tell me this is where it comes from, I'm very excited. It is where it comes from, oh yeah um saint vitus was.

Don: 28:22

uh was a saint from the early fourth century, I think um and uh was part of a group of of christian saints that in the Middle Ages were called the Fourteen Holy Helpers, cool band.

Ron: 28:37

That's also a great band, yeah.

Don: 28:41

The Fourteen Holy Helpers all had specific things that they were the patron of right. So Vitus was who you would pray to for protection against epilepsy, um, protection against lightning, um and protection from rabid animals.

Ron: 29:01

What connects those three?

Don: 29:02

I don't know.

Doug: 29:04

Convulsions maybe yeah, that's what I'm thinking.

Don: 29:07

But, uh, but if you made St Vitus angry, the curse of St Vitus is that you would have to dance.

Ron: 29:16

Ah Do all the saints have a curse associated with them too? A lot of them do.

Don: 29:23

That's cool. But I don't know them. I know what their painterhood's of right, right. So they ask and consider whether or not Frau Treffea did something to anger the saint, probably, and receive this curse. So she is taken in the back of a cart, still dancing.

Doug: 29:46

I was going to say got to be still moving around a bit.

Don: 29:48

I think that the accounts say, I think that she was, um, it took two people to restrain her, enough to hold her within the cart, um, but uh, they take her to St Vitus's shrine and, uh, they pray over her and she stops dancing Love it, love it, love it. Yeah.

Doug: 30:08

So, yeah, the credibility that I feel is being challenged is we're at four month count, correct?

Don: 30:17

well, that's just when she stops. I'm not sure when she went to the shrine. The plague went on until september, so july to september three about three months, took three months and during that time, like, say, hundreds of people um up to 400 all at once at one point and people started to die.

Doug: 30:34

I was gonna say who's bringing them water?

Don: 30:36

that was gonna be yeah the reports say that up to 15 people a day are dropping dead from exhaustion and dehydration, and st Vitus is a rough guy.

Doug: 30:49

Yeah, yeah, no joke.

Ron: 30:50

So, but the patient zero survives Patient zero survives they identify her and they take her and pray over her, and does that end the bout for everyone? Do they all stop dancing, or can they take everyone to the shrine now?

Don: 31:06

Well, it seems to taper off after her resolution. Okay, because that's right, it takes about that much time for them to figure out what to do. And you know off after, after her resolution. Okay, because that's right, it takes about that much time for them to figure out what to do. Um and uh, yeah all right.

Ron: 31:18

And then do they interrogate her, do they?

Don: 31:22

torture her what's what's happening? What did you do? Yeah?

Ron: 31:28

does she speak at all about?

Doug: 31:30

oh, thank you, you saved me from the groups of I'll never help that rabid rabbit again or something like that.

Ron: 31:40

She's kind of timidly have a good day walks away.

Don: 31:43

I think we're lucky to know her name. Yeah, true.

Ron: 31:47

How do we know this, Don? Where's all this coming from?

Don: 31:49

so most of the records come from a physician named uh uh uh, para um. I can't remember. He doesn't know the name. We caught him, so the doctor's name is paracelsus um. Paracelsus, he's a the parrot celsius not celsius first name para para paracelsus is his, is his last name.

Ron: 32:12

Who am I thinking? Of this whole era, celsus isn't that Para Paracelsus is his, is his last name. Who am I thinking of? Paracelsus? Isn't that a Greek dude, I don't know? Isn't he like?

Doug: 32:17

that's a name.

Ron: 32:18

I know that's like one of the famous doctor people from olden days.

Don: 32:22

He may be he may be borrowed the name from somebody but he's Swiss, um, and he's about 25 years old when this plague happens. Claims to fame for him. He is the first doctor to describe syphilis.

Ron: 32:37

That's why I know him Okay.

Don: 32:43

And to prescribe mercury as the cure for syphilis. So mercury, that continues to be, the treatment for syphilis through the 19th century.

Doug: 32:50

Two known things to make one crazy. I love that. Let's just add fuel to the fire. So he's a great doctor. I mean, for his time he was.

Don: 33:00

So yeah, so mostly his record is where a lot of it comes from, and he was opposed to a lot of the conventional thinking about what was happening. So that's why we have a lot of writing from him, because, like, he didn't think it was a good idea to play music for these people, he didn't think it was um, he didn't think it was a supernatural cause. Um, he, uh, he actually uh, you know, for as long ago as it was, he posited a lot of psychological explanations for what was happening, like suggesting that there was an emotional disturbance or something else going on that was contributing to this, even though psychology wasn't a thing and he certainly didn't have that word in his vocabulary.

Doug: 33:43

But, um, seems to be a, a good empath in terms of his bedside manner he just always seems like during the medieval and Renaissance era, all that it took to be a doctor was confidence. You know, it seems like you're ill in this way. Take these leeches.

Ron: 34:00

Like what's going on? Found some bugs. You want me to put them in your bed, that's right. But he's not one of those. He's a good. He's a good doctor, I'm sure he used leeches.

Don: 34:15

That was. That was what they did. You're allowed to use leeches, I'm not knocking anyone for using leeches when it was cool, yeah, the leech fad um.

Ron: 34:22

He's the town doctor. Is he called in? Like he's called in, okay so he's like we got to go to the big city. This is a movie. I can see this movie already right right, we're. We're in his office. He's in the palace of Vienna. Get a call. What they're sending me to Strasburg, what's in Strasburg? Hard cut people dancing and dying in the street. It's the cinematic, the electric.

Don: 34:44

Strasburg festival.

Doug: 34:45

Yeah, the medieval version of house music. Just go, he's out there.

Ron: 34:51

It's like the scene in Jaws when they got to get all the people off the beach.

Doug: 34:54

And he's like we got to get these musicians off of these streets. Crash to your face.

Don: 35:01

Get out of the water, billy. So what's going on is my question. So this is a thing that happened for sure. Like it's not a conspiracy, like I led you guys with last time, like this is definitely an actual historical event. It's documented. People died. What's going on?

Doug: 35:18

so I'm drawn to think of, yeah, diseases that make people mad.

Ron: 35:27

Yeah, my head, I'm going some sort of microbial right because like uh, uh, what were we the? The uh lately, or in the zeitgeist again, is the last of us tv show in the video game series. Yeah, the idea that there are fungal nodes that can control your brain and zombify you and that's partially based on a reality of like certain insect species, can be infected by a fungus right.

Doug: 35:52

Yes, that video, is it a?

Ron: 35:53

fungus. Doug Don, who do you want? Tell us who you want. One point each of you, If we can move on.

Don: 36:02

It's a possibility it was examined as a possibility and remains a possibility that a fungus called ergot, which grows on grain, could have polluted the local food supply and that would, of course, cause a mass hallucination that could manifest itself this way. I got me the ergot again.

Ron: 36:24

Right, okay, so like hallucinations is like another element.

Don: 36:28

But for two months Was there like a ergot. Well, if it was in the food that they would keep, like it would keep resupplying, right.

Doug: 36:34

If it was in all, if we were all eating erga bread right and and, like they were dancing so long, like how do they eat and drink like they have to have been eating and drinking while they're dancing like you're still?

Don: 36:44

not going to be able to like have enough nutrition and right but they're going to keep, you know, re-eeding the high every time they have a piece of bread.

Doug: 36:52

Then it would last for a new image unlocked of, I'm sorry, just people continuing to dance, tears just streaming down their face, but just shoveling bread in their mouth like I can't stop this bread's decent, it's back again. Oh, this is insanity.

Don: 37:14

Ergot poisoning is also on the list of possible suspects for the Salem witch trials.

Ron: 37:20

Oh, there we go. I think we got it. It's in the ergot. It's in the ergot again Done and dusted, but I bet you got five other hot theories to send our way. I got two other hot theories, but our way.

Don: 37:32

I got two other hot theories, but um, but I will tell you for ergot, um that, uh, that this event in Strasburg in 1518, it's not the only time this has happened.

Doug: 37:44

This is what I was waiting for. Yes, no, it's struck again.

Ron: 37:47

Yeah 1962, the Beatles arrived in New York.

Don: 37:51

That's right. Yeah, 1962, the Beatles arrive in New York. That's right. Forgot poisoning in New York in the Ed Sullivan Theater. It was in the popcorn. They were sprinkling it on top. No, actually dancing plagues have been recorded as far back as the 11th century. The first one is 1017. This one has a legendary background, so the story for this one seems much, more, much stranger. So the story is in a town called Cold Big in Saxony. On Christmas Eve about 18 people gathered in a circle outside the church and started dancing and they apparently were making so much noise and clapping and chanting that the priest couldn't do Christmas mass inside the church. So he came out kind of upset and he told them, shook his finger and said you better stop dancing. And they didn't. Oh no, I know.

Ron: 38:51

Never spite a priest and when the priest shook his fingers.

Doug: 38:55

He just kept the fingers going staying alive staying alive.

Don: 38:58

No, they got him too so the priest, in all his christian charity, cursed them oh I didn't know they could do that yeah, I think, yeah, I don't. I think it's one of the lesser known powers.

Doug: 39:11

Yeah you get eternal forgiveness, but you also can curse people.

Don: 39:16

It's an orthodox thing he cursed them to dance for a whole year. Oh, and the story is they did that. They danced outside the church, uh, for a whole year, until uh 10, 18, and on Christmas day they collapsed.

Doug: 39:35

But scientific explanation is the Eucharist was probably filled with ergot Ergot yes, I don't know.

Don: 39:42

Well, they didn't have it because they didn't even let them finish mass. So they would have had to, would have been.

Ron: 39:47

Christmas, ergot. I'm not sharing my Eucharist with those dirty dancers.

Don: 39:53

So that's the first record of a dancing plague. Christmas, or I'm not sharing my Eucharist with those dirty dancers, so that's the first record of a dancing plague. But again that one has this legendary component to it, because the story is they dance for a whole year without eating and drinking.

Ron: 40:01

But still there's that religious connection, though it ties them right.

Don: 40:04

There is. But then again in 1188, uh, this one's in Wales. Um, then in 1247 in Erfurt this one's in Wales Then in 1247 in Erfurt, germany, and then 1278 in Belgium and 1374 in the Rhineland, In 1418 in Switzerland I love this 1463 in Trier Germany.

Ron: 40:23

And all of these are people dancing till they die. Yeah, or are we just calling any sustained?

Don: 40:34

It's a group of people dancing uncontrollably. They, they want to stop, but they cannot stop. They don't all have deaths involved with them, although in uh 1278 in belgium, um 200 people are involved, and they, they cross a bridge and the bridge collapses, and so there were some, some injuries there for sure, but it so. My point is that it happens from about the 11th century all the way through the 16th century. A good portion of them are along the Rhine River in Germany.

Doug: 41:03

Okay, yeah, because my, I'm sorry, go ahead.

Ron: 41:06

Ryan, I was just going to say it all seems very German and Northern European Right.

Doug: 41:11

So the techno craze of today, right and that's continued.

Ron: 41:14

It's always been right.

Doug: 41:16

Autobahn has always been in that people's blood whether you're at berghain or you're on the rhine um, we gotta stop all the people on the river cruises. We gotta get off those cruises, get them out of there so I mean because my next question was going to be like when does this wheat crop die out? Because, like ergot poisoning you said this earlier, correct Like this is still a possible thing.

Don: 41:41

Yeah, it's on the list of possibilities for what's going on.

Ron: 41:46

So but what's the? I think we cut you off when you were making the rind connection. Is the is the rind? I'm assuming that's adjacent farmland where they grow the wheat that can contain the ergot that would be, yeah, part of the.

Don: 42:01

The question would be if, if it's reoccurring and if it is ergot, then is it being spread through? Right? Yeah, baby, so that's possibility, but, um, it, it doesn't seem to be the most likely, um, because it ends so if it were ergot, it would continue and it um it doesn't, so is the the?

Ron: 42:27

when's our most recent outbreak of this plague, the?

Don: 42:30

most documented documented one is 1518. There's two after it in the 16th century. So, like, 1574 is the most recently documented version, and then it stops. Okay, we haven't had we haven't had one since. Cross our fingers, knock on wood, yeah, yeah.

Doug: 42:43

It's interesting. I think we just do this to ourselves. Now it raves right, Well, like yeah, yeah, we just call it. You start dancing every time we play our theme songs.

Doug: 42:59

This is a hundred percent when we get those video right, the behind the scenes, absolutely it was when I saw doug do the trill on the drums that I knew we had something special. Um, yeah, I mean, but yeah, I'm thinking of like yeah raves today. And then, like the connection of like, how many people are on psychedelics, because, like I, uh I think I attended electric, electric daisy carnival in 2011 and, um, unfortunately, like that was the most, I've seen people like wheeled out on stretchers that are like convulsing and having seizures my guess is because of dirty drugs, just because, like, I've been at other gigantic festivals where people have passed out from heat exhaustion, but like it seemed like everybody who was leaving was like seizing, and so it it is interesting Were they eating the bread this is the thing or the bread of life.

Ron: 43:35

They always say bring your own bread to those festivals. B-y-o-b.

Don: 43:39

In so many different ways, yeah, so Urgot's possibility, but, like I say, because it dies out of it, like the biologically, that's not how that would happen. It would, it would take hold, so it could be St Vitus.

Ron: 43:52

Yeah, yeah, what's up? Okay, that's right yeah.

Don: 43:54

I forgot about him.

Ron: 43:55

He's not a metal band or he is a metal band, he's the metal man coming all the way Thousands of years later started a band.

Doug: 44:03

So I was going to ask you if any of these have other connections to St Vitus, like did anyone else get the idea we need to take them to the shrine?

Ron: 44:11

um yes, oh, this vitus is a interesting fellow. Why am I only now hearing about saint vitus? I feel like if he was the guy in charge of a series of dancing plagues over the course of hundreds of years and when you pray to him he actually causes you to stop dancing I would know him more than saint francis a sissy. It's because you don't dance.

Doug: 44:35

Yep, you're right, I knew him right away?

Don: 44:37

do you think that out? Very disappointing but you asked earlier, doug, if there was any connection between the metal band and yeah, and the saint, and I know about the saint I don't know about the metal band, so is there a connection?

Doug: 44:50

um, so. So what's interesting? I, I would say not really other than I could see them being into the idea of the dancing plague like, uh, they're, they were signed to sst records, which is famously the um label that signed black flag and the minute men and it's like they're kind of like a punk rock label. But when Heinrich's band was um, they were specifically um signed to this as well and they had like a very slow metal, sludgy sound like a little bit more in the style of like black Sabbath, like, if you can imagine that Um, and so they had like a very cool kind of difference. Um, I think the album that I had from them was born Too Late. I think that that was the release. Let me fact check that as you go on. But yeah, nothing direct. Yeah, they didn't state anything.

Don: 45:43

So, as far as I know, savitas was never signed to a label. Oh, well you should get him on there, but I don't know how the connection was made between his story and dancing.

Ron: 45:56

I know that he is connected to the dancing plagues, um, but uh, um it might just be that, like you said, the convulsion thing right, like he seems to it could be. But like are there?

Don: 46:06

his story doesn't include any, so he just it's like actual story yeah, his actual story. He's um um. He's a sicilian, um senator around uh 300 ad um. He's persecuted by diocletian. So he's part of that, the famous diocletian christian persecution which we talked about in my last episode yeah, definitely um and was put to death. He survived a bunch of tortures that's part of what made him a saint and they eventually just cut his head off. Wow.

Ron: 46:38

Yeah.

Don: 46:40

They boiled him alive.

Ron: 46:40

Was a lot of the Again but he survived that.

Don: 46:44

So then they had to cut his head off.

Ron: 46:45

Oh.

Don: 46:45

Yeah, but again I don't know how we get from that to how did we miss him?

Doug: 46:49

in the boiling episode, don, are you drawn to this or something?

Ron: 46:52

Is that your greatest? We're not trying to find links between dancing plays. We're trying to find links between Don's psyche and boiling.

Doug: 46:59

At the end of this podcast, we'll really find ourselves.

Ron: 47:02

Is the sanctification process. I'm assuming a lot of these were canonized around the same time or something right, and so were they just sort of handing out roles, uh, and sometimes they fit thematically and other times they're like well, we need a, we need a rabid animals guy. So sorry, vitus, that's you.

Don: 47:21

The formal canonization is actually a relatively recent um phenomenon. Uh, so saints prior to that were more um became saints by um. But but everyone just agreeing to folkloric yeah, okay, so um.

Doug: 47:42

Oh, I need to retcon really quick. I'm sorry to interrupt you it wasn't. Sst. It wasn't, it was SST. I've been saying why? No, heinrich, it was Weinrich, Hence he's very affectionately known as just wino, like people will just call him wino, and I knew there was an heinrich in there, and heinrich, of course, being the most comic of all common cannot come.

Ron: 48:02

Yeah, not making fun of the heinrichs. How could you change your name already, buddy? Wow, why no? It's gonna come after you, absolutely so well, his name is not heinrich, so he's got nothing to worry about.

Doug: 48:09

Yeah, forgive me for derailing like I always do.

Ron: 48:10

Wow, why not, it's gonna come after you absolutely so well, his name's not Heinrich, so he's got nothing to worry about.

Don: 48:14

Yeah forgive me for derailing, like I always do sure so do we think that it's supernatural the same virus cursing our dancers, and that's the real explanation it sounds cool.

Doug: 48:24

I was gonna say I'd love it to be. I'd love it to be, wouldn't it be fun if that's in our universe?

Ron: 48:29

I can't believe them as we. It's too hard. Yeah, you want to believe and I can't believe.

Doug: 48:33

I'll always be the role we need to fox molder.

Ron: 48:36

Yeah, the group and I'll be the scully drugger.

Doug: 48:41

What's right are you thinking that gives like skull drugger?

Ron: 48:48

Oh my gosh Anyways, but this would be like a really big deal for, you know, believer types, people who want to prove the material capabilities of the supernatural and the saints, right. So is this brought up a lot of times in those sorts of discourses?

Don: 49:10

I don't think it is, because it's not. I mean, if it is evidence of a saint's interaction, it's not a good one, right? It's a saint, causing people to die because they dance too much. Oh, but then he fixed it right. Well, at least for one. For one, yeah.

Ron: 49:26

Okay, so maybe, yeah, maybe Vitus is there. I'm trying to think of a third and I'm wondering like, okay, we've kind of got the biological covered in the ergot right we've got the supernatural with vitus. Is there a sociological kind of uh angle here, right? That does people's frow, trafea, trafea, has she. Is there some reason she believes she has to dance right like does she? Does she not have full? Does she not believe she has full possession of herself? Would that?

Doug: 49:59

mean that the people who saw her dancing go. I guess I'll just start to like I I think, yeah, that could happen, I feel until you die.

Ron: 50:09

I think people like I think we don't give enough, uh, credit to people dying dancing, I don't think we give enough credit to the power of belief like if people believe a thing, it's very hard for them sometimes I think to, to, to cut out that belief if they're like this.

Ron: 50:25

like you said, you drew a different kind of connection, I think, to the salem witch trials, but I feel like that's a similar kind of thing, like, even if you are being accused of being a witch, uh, that doesn't mean you don't believe witches don't exist, right? You don't think you're a witch, but maybe aren't there instances of people being like oh wow, maybe I am a witch, like and then adopting the persona Right.

Don: 50:44

Yes, there are recorded stories of that. That was a self-defense right yeah, right, it's a it's a way to explain why you live in the forest by yourself with the herbs. It's uh, it was a a way to explain your existence, but um, but I think you're on to something, ron, because, um, we do have um documentation of other instances where groups of people have believed something so firmly that that they just start doing things, or or or, believing that like a cult is a good.

Ron: 51:17

Yeah, yeah All of the cults. Take your pick.

Don: 51:24

Right, um, do you guys have is there a word for it that you, that you are familiar with, maybe the uh of like a um, a belief in something that might not have a physical reason but it manifests itself physically because you believe it so firmly? Um?

Ron: 51:41

I want to you want.

Doug: 51:43

You want to have a word. Can I manifest this word in my mind?

Ron: 51:46

I feel like you're gonna say it. I'm gonna be like, oh yeah, of course, but maybe that's also just me trying to act like I'm smarter than I am.

Doug: 51:52

I think of what was often used against women for their behavior to be hysterical. Do you know what hysteria is? I don't. I know that it. I just know that it was used at one point against one. Like you're being hysterical, Therefore we need to treat you in this way. And that's the. That's the word I was looking for. You're being hysterical, therefore we need to treat you in this way, and that's the.

Don: 52:14

That's the word I was looking for and I know hysterical yeah, I want to.

Don: 52:17

I want to talk about hysteria, but one of the um and we'll come back to hysteria, but one of the, the necessary components of a mass hysteria, so so to convince a group of people is that there's a uh, increase of stress and pressure on the local society or the local culture. Um, in 15, 18, um, we are coming out of a recent bubonic plague. Yep, we are experiencing several different famines, so, going back 20 years, but the year 15, 18, especially, was a bad famine poor harvest, high grain prices, obviously money is scarce, always, um, so we have all of these things compounding on top of each other and then we have this plague breakout of dancing, right, so, um, so that's a possibility. Is that, um, because of the increase of of cultural pressure, societal pressure, economic pressure, that people are like primed to believe that there's something?

Ron: 53:20

wrong.

Don: 53:20

Right. Why are we having these famines? And in 1518, what would be the, what would be the explanation? Why is why are we being? Why can't the crops grow?

Ron: 53:28

Why can't Okay, so you're saying is there sort of like, a sort of like a, a doomer mentality, an apocalyptic uh mentality is? Is there a connection here to the medieval dance macabre, like the artistry, the, the, the images of dancing skeletons and the idea that like death is a joyful congratulatory sort of exuberant presence.

Don: 53:53

I don't know that there's a direct connection to it, but there always was this, um, the desire to remember that death was around the corner. Yeah, right, but, um, but if the crops won't grow, what's the reason in 1518? Oh, cause the uh right? Cause God hates us in 1518? If it's, and why would god be mad at us? Uh, because we've been, we've strayed exactly, and so the uh if, and we don't know very much about this, but it's possible that frau trefea went out and did lose control of her body because she firmly believed that she or the town were being punished by St Vitus or you know God, through St Vitus, to uh to do this, uh, this terrible thing, as a penance for whatever sin the town had had, you know, sunk into.

Ron: 54:46

Right, uh, that there's a lot of those kinds of cases right Of individuals who oh, there's a term for them too. Is it zealot? Is it zealot?

Ron: 54:54

the same thing right, or they just sort of like oh, I am not a member of the clergy, but I have a very strong opinion about the way things are going and I need to take action and lead a movement of people to change the world, or God is speaking through me Right In specific, and in 1518, you wouldn't need to be a zealot because everybody would have that firmly held belief.

Don: 55:16

Like now, we have a much larger diversity of beliefs in 1518. There's there's less of that in Western Europe. So it's, um so people are primed to believe whatever they're told. And if they're told that if you sin, st Vitus will punish you, yeah, guess what happens when they realize that sin must be happening Because you've got all these other right we?

Don: 55:35

have no food, we have no money we have, we're all malnourished. So we're like primed for this belief that we're ready to have a plague, I guess, and we have to dance till we die. The conditions in which people say it's the fall of the empire. Yeah, but like you said, doug, like it's hard for me to imagine believing something so firmly that I would dance until I literally dropped dead Right, or do anything until I dropped dead.

Ron: 56:07

Life is so poor, you know, and conditionally, yeah, I think there's something to what you just said about um, the, I guess the paucity of belief systems at the time right which?

Ron: 56:18

is like when there is a very hegemonic dominant belief system, uh, the way that Catholicism ority at large was in europe at the time. I think that's just. I think that's usually what I have the hardest time, and why I'm continually fascinated with the medieval period is because I think that's the thing that in a lot of ways, I don't think we're that different from those people, but that is the one thing. I think that it's like I have a hard time understanding or setting myself in the shoes of people at that time. Is having such a dominant, uh universal belief system that uh affects every moment of your daily existence Right and universal culture.

Doug: 56:55

Yeah, yeah, yeah, which is just not something that has been the case.

Ron: 56:59

It's not even like a 2020s thing, it's just like it hasn't been the case, probably since I don't know 1700s or something right.

Don: 57:06

So, coming back to the word hysteria, though, because, doug, you mentioned that it has a negative connotation- and it does because it has historically been used to describe ailments specifically of females. Do you know where the word comes from? Do you have any etymological knowledge of the word hysteria?

Ron: 57:26

Yeah, there's a pre hysteria, which is the that's when the dinosaurs Hysteria.

Doug: 57:38

I'll go out on a limb here and say it sounds like the name of a God. No.

Don: 57:43

Okay, good guess. Thanks for playing.

Ron: 57:45

have a great day, everybody this has been the uncannery end minus five points to duck.

Doug: 57:49

Yeah, wow you can only rise so high before you fall so low. You're about to drop that pickle yeah, get back in the court. It's all right, it's lit up so I can see it at night hysteria is the greek word for uterus right because the hyster I'm feeling, so here's yeah hysterectomy is the removal of uterus, so I'm feeling a little bit better that at least I was close with greek. I mean, I was thinking like a greek god.

Ron: 58:15

Yeah I know, we know, yeah, minus 2.5 it's fine.

Don: 58:20

So, uh, first, uh, described by hippocrates, the uh, the hippocratic oath guy, so another famous physician, and well, the famous physician, the father of medicine, um, around the fifth century bc, and he believed that his hysteria was a specifically female disorder that was caused by disturbances of the uterus. And he believed that the uterus was an independent creature that lived inside a woman's body and that hysteria would be caused when it started to roam around the body. Uh, seeking moisture, apparently that happened to my brother his uterus.

Ron: 59:02

I had a twin, and it was just he never came out.

Don: 59:08

So for Hippocrates, like the symptoms were like almost anything, like almost anything that was wrong with a female, he could define or or diagnosis as hysteria. So suffocation, anxiety, fatigue, a sense of choking, all of these were believed to be caused in women because their uterus was was wandering around, wow. And so how would you treat that? You got to coax the uterus back to its home, yeah, so so the leave a carrot kind of thing, Kind of like.

Don: 59:39

so the Hippocratic solution is to put sweet smelling herbs near the female private parts and foul smelling herbs up by the mouth. Oh, so that way, push it out.

Ron: 59:51

Yeah, smoke it out, exactly.

Don: 59:53

Get it back in its home. How nice for the female. It's for that reason that the word has this negative connotation, because it was used since ancient Greek times all the way through the 19th century, specifically to refer to any mental concern that was afflicting a female, and it was believed to be a physical ailment all the way through the 19th century. It wasn't until Freud got around, and Freud is the one who recognized that it wasn't a physical ailment, it was a psychological one.

Doug: 1:00:29

Wow.

Don: 1:00:30

And uh, so he, um, he moved the medicine forward a little bit. And now today, hysteria is not a medical diagnosis, it's a. It's what we use it in common parlance to refer to any type of of Praise.

Doug: 1:00:42

Yeah.

Don: 1:00:42

Like your emotion. You're unable to regulate your emotions. As we say, you're hysterical. But again, it carries that negative connotation of being attached to female elements. So you're so. For the most part, it's not well used. However, when you talk about groups of people, we do still sometimes use it as a way to describe why a group of people decides together to do mass hysteria. You've caused mass hysteria, Right. So there's there's modern examples of this, that that exists. So some people think, for example, like alien abductions.

Don: 1:01:22

If one person reports that they've been abducted by an alien, especially in a certain area, or even alien sightings. All of a sudden, there will be a cluster of those that occur around the same, and they're always similar right, You're reporting on the same thing.

Ron: 1:01:37

You heard someone else report on right Right.

Don: 1:01:46

Um, and and probably in a broader sense, um, I don't know if you guys know about, like in the 1980s, 1990s there was a a social panic in uh in the United States about the rise of Satanism.

Ron: 1:01:55

Yeah, yeah, it's deeply tied to D and D. Lore Right. The history of it Satanic panic.

Don: 1:02:02

That's right, and it rooted in very few, like in a couple survivor stories of you know, people who claim to have been abducted by a satanic cult and then escaped from them. But based on just a few stories. All of a sudden, more and more experiences were, you know, imagined by the public and and everyone had to be on guard against you know, the, this elusive Satanism that was was rising. There's even suggestion of uh, in a smaller sense that uh. Have you ever heard of the phenomenon of a recovered memory?

Ron: 1:02:33

Yeah, yeah, it's like uh, something you quote, unquote experienced, but never knew you experienced until someone puts you. Is it usually hypnosis or something like?

Don: 1:02:42

that. So it's, yeah, there's. There's several different techniques that guided imagery or hypnosis, or or just um talk therapy, where a therapist can help someone who has experienced a past trauma, sort of resurface memory. So the idea is that those memories have been repressed. Um, uh, the idea has been posited by Elaine Showalter, who's a famous literary critic and academic who's studied hysteria, specifically that some of those recovered memories people have recovered memories of abuse. They've accused their parents of abuse.

Don: 1:03:17

A parent actually went to jail and then it was discovered that the memory that his daughter was having was completely fabricated and implanted. And I don't know if it was implanted on purpose or even you know. It seems like it would be very easy to accidentally implant a memory like that as well. So if some were suggestible to that, that would be on a much smaller basis, not a mass hysteria, but it's an idea that you're implanting the belief in somebody and then it manifests itself in the real world. Right, yeah, can you guys think of any other occasions when that has happened, like when a firmly held belief by an individual or a group of people has led to the manifestation of physical outcomes?

Doug: 1:04:09

I think of, uh, cult-like behavior, like I think of anybody's like leading a cult, and then there's like a mass, um kind of physical response to spiritual awakening. I would I would look at that potentially as hysteric behavior.

Ron: 1:04:25

Yeah, who are the space faring? Is it Heaven's Gate Space faring ones?

Ron: 1:04:31

Heaven's Gate's the one with Hale-Bopp yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, those are like you can. I think this is to me also. There's similar to the dancing plague.

Ron: 1:04:43

It seems like there's an era of this kind of cult in america that also dies out right, like I mean, I guess we just had the um, there was the man nexion is that what it was called? There was like a recent cult, right or like, where there were some famous celebrities who were caught up in it and and this is like four years ago or something, but it was like to me, like the, the resurgence of this kind of very sort of uniquely American cult, which is usually some sort of religious figure, gathers people into a compound and they hang out and they have beliefs that usually turn violent and it you know, investigations reveal that there is all sorts of layers and layers of ritual abuse and exploitation by the cult leaders of the people who are pulled into this system, and those seem to kind of start with, like the Marilyn Manson thing in the 60s 70s right, and then they kind of die Marilyn Manson is not the 60s 70s right, and then they kind of die Marilyn.

Don: 1:05:45

Manson is not the 60s, 70s Charles Manson. Charles Manson, you know what I?

Ron: 1:05:49

mean.

Doug: 1:05:51

I'm vibing here.

Ron: 1:05:51

I'm vibing, I ain't into facts Going all the way up until like the 90s and then, like the last big one I can remember is like Waco and then and I think Nexeon again, and I can remember it was like Waco and then and I think NXIVM again.

Don: 1:06:05

If I'm even getting this NXIVM I don't know if I'm getting this. It could be a mobile game after.

Ron: 1:06:09

Waco. But oh yeah yeah, but again like it's localized, but you're bringing up some important points.

Don: 1:06:19

So Showalter points out a few things about hysteria, and one of the required components is an authority figure that is sort of directing the, the belief, and so in the case of our dancing plague, 15, 18, that would be the church and the belief that St Vitus is going to curse you if you, if you sin, um, in the case of the culture, bringing up right, it's obviously the, the cult leader, um, but uh, but there's also, you know, political beliefs If you think about what we're talking about like um, uh, and regardless of which side of of the political spectrum you're on, like the, the way that our leaders tell the stories and that's another component show Walter brings up is that there has to be a narrative that is attached to this.

Don: 1:06:59

this belief, it's not just a belief that comes out of nowhere. It's attached to a story about, usually, the political spectrum. It's the other side, right. The other side is doing this terrible thing.

Don: 1:07:10

Therefore, our response has to be you know, firmly held and firmly believed, and you know there's no compromise. But in the case of the dancing plague of 1518, the same thing, like the, the story is that if you don't do what saint vitus wants, or if you don't do what god wants, that saint vitus will curse you. Like that, that story exists, which then, because we know that sin exists, that it must manifest itself here and so then the dancing starts right. So okay.

Ron: 1:07:40

So we've got authority figure, we've got people who are believing a narrative can have you know actual real world behavior and it seems, importantly, there's no requirement for like the actual factual basis or like evidence, right, it's just like a person in authority is believed because obviously they are. They got there for some reason, right.

Don: 1:08:03

Right? And the physical evidence is actually self-produced, right? So if if we say in St Vitus will punish us, well, look, I'm dancing, right, I'm?

Ron: 1:08:10

being punished Right, so the look look, I'm punished Right, exactly, Um.

Don: 1:08:14

And another component Showalter brings up is that societal pressure and cultural pressure. So, um again, if you think of our, of politics, the way that you encourage people to to, you know, send $5 today is to explain how terrible the story is if the other side wins. Yeah, yeah, right, so it's creating that panic of uh, you know the sense of urgency because, uh, there's a um, uh, uh. It's not usually a famine in our case, but like a plague of. You know, whatever the other belief is Right.

Ron: 1:08:48

And then cause no one. No one's motivated by uh, it would be nice to to to join this club right there has to be a sense of urgency. There has to be a sense of, uh uh, existential threat. Yeah, for sure.

Doug: 1:09:02

Yeah, I wouldn't recommend anybody like listen to it, but just because I find it so disturbing. But I have listened to the uh what is it? Jonestown tapes, like when they are drinking the Kool-Aid, and you can literally hear what he is saying. You can hear, you know, kind of people like crying out and screaming and it, yeah, it's very much follows that because he was immediately who I was thinking of. Jim Jones, yes, jim Jones.

Doug: 1:09:35

Initially when we said that, because he kind of has a lot of those things, I didn't know what the physical response to be. But literally, physically, knowing that you're going to drink something that's going to take your own life, I mean, like as a response, I think is enough to be considered hysterical Right. And I, yeah, that as a response, I think is enough to be considered hysterical Right. And I, um, yeah, that checks off all of those boxes. And so that's why I've always found that audio so disturbed. Like that to me is one of the most disturbing, if not the most disturbing piece of audio like I've heard. Um, just because you can hear collectively that everybody is on board. And like, when I think of hysterical behavior, I mean how can you not, cause you'd want to save anybody who's that entrenched in it. But again, people are on the Island and you know it's like, uh, sorry folks. Like you know they got us. So you know what you got to do.

Don: 1:10:19

If you want the, you know the, the eternal paradise, paradise, you're gonna make this call, yeah I guess a piece of good news is that these sort of uh um mass hysterias can happen without uh dire consequences.

Doug: 1:10:34

Um so uh, pokemon, I don't know, turn, turn, turn Ron into a thief. Sure did.

Ron: 1:10:45

My soul's never been clean since.

Don: 1:10:48

Ron, why are you dancing? So the Beatlemania, for example, in the 1950s, would be an example, but an interesting one that I found when I was looking into. This occurred in 1962 in Tanganyika, which is in africa, was a german colony that was taken over by the british after world war one and they got independence. They received their independence from the uk in 1961, in december and in january 1962, at a girl's school um, there was a plague, uh, of laughing, yeah. So it started with three girls who just couldn't wait, but did it open.

Don: 1:11:30

No one died well, three girls couldn't stop laughing. Um, it started to spread to their classmates. It got so bad they had to close the school. Um, and apparently so they would. They would laugh uncontrollably. Um, it seems like they were able to. They not able, but they did stop at some point. Um, it seems like they were able to. They not able, but they did stop at some point, but then, like, it would start up again. It's spread throughout the town. Um, several other villages and schools were affected in the nearby area. So it's again. It's a local, like it. It's almost like a contagion, but it's sort of housed. I wonder how that would happen today, cause, you know, our ability to communicate is so much faster today and everybody's online like if they're, you know the killing joke you know someone yeah, post it's too.

Ron: 1:12:09

It's too. It's the uh entertainment from infinite jest right.

Don: 1:12:13

It's too funny but it got so bad that they did have, um, like some of them, they would faint or they would have respiratory problems because they were laughing so hard that they were getting hypoxic. Um, but the good news is nobody died and it only lasted about six months. But can you imagine six months? In living in a town where, like school, people were just laughing, laughing yeah.

Ron: 1:12:35

So I do feel like I've been at the cusp of a near laughing pandemic, Like when I was in school. Cause the, the the ability of laughter to sort of infect, yes, Infect people We've all been there, right Like.

Don: 1:12:48

I understand that that's pretty extreme, though, right, I feel that way every time we get together. Yeah.

Ron: 1:12:55

I just can't stop. That's pretty good Can't stop, won't stop podcast and stop asking us to.

Don: 1:13:02

And I sure hope that we are inspiring our listeners to be hysterical for us.

Ron: 1:13:08

Yes.

Don: 1:13:09

And be our followers so well. Thank you both for chatting about the dancing plague of 1518.

Ron: 1:13:15

Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I had no idea. I've never wanted to dance more.

Don: 1:13:18

All right, well, here you go. I've never wanted to dance less Ready to go, thank you.