Is this an invasion of privacy?

[LeFou]

Personally, I've never found a reason to believe that third-party readings are effective.

I hear you. I tried them, and it didn't work for me (aside from a small number of trivial details). I think people should just try, and see if it works for them, because...

I think that whether or not these readings are effective is actually a moot point.

And also, if it's not effective, discussing the ethics is (perhaps) pointless and misleading. Props to anyone who can do it reliably, and usefully -- I can't.

 

[LeFou]

...it would seem that the degree of follow-up we're able to have with the subject(s) of a reading would provide the best yardstick for measuring effectiveness.

Sure and thank you for that -- it seems to support the idea that the reader won't really -know- if the reading is good, unless there is (eventual) feedback.

Just personally, I think Tarot is useful, but still, can be used in an entertainingly useless way. Nothing really wrong with that, although I wouldn't want to mislead people into thinking it was "psychic portal" if it's more like talk therapy with a Rorschach twist and a witchy vibe.

 

[chaosbloom]

Nothing really wrong with that, although I wouldn't want to mislead people into thinking it was "psychic portal" if it's more like talk therapy with a Rorschach twist and a witchy vibe.

Just wanted to say that I love how this sentence is worded. No sarcasm. That is all.

 

[Sulis]

I tend to think that if I'm doubting whether I should do it or not, then I probably shouldn't for the reasons that I wouldn't like it if someone was reading about my relationship without my knowledge and I tend to work on the general life principle that if I wouldn't like something done to me then I shouldn't do it to anyone else.

 

[Barleywine]

Just personally, I think Tarot is useful, but still, can be used in an entertainingly useless way. Nothing really wrong with that, although I wouldn't want to mislead people into thinking it was "psychic portal" if it's more like talk therapy with a Rorschach twist and a witchy vibe.

Nice pithy observation. It's why I think so much "one-way" (remote) reading can degenerate into self-referential navel-gazing that mines the reader's subconscious and not that of the distant querent (unless we agree that psychic forces may be at work between the two that have little to do with the intermediary of the cards). I've already gotten howls of protest over my past assertions that remote reading can be a dead-end, just so much earnest, overheated self-stimulation that has little grounding in the querent's reality beyond the narrow window afforded by the question itself. I realize I'm crapping on the very bedrock of the way many modern readers operate, but I just don't buy it; tarot reading should be an interactive, interrogative art, not a declarative one. Can it be effective? Perhaps, in the hands of a master who has paid the dues. But the average journeyman is swimming against the tide, and the neophyte is simply lost at sea. In that sense, unauthorized remote reading about a third party would be more than an invasion of privacy, it would be symbolic assault with a blunt instrument.

 

[chaosbloom]

Barleywine you just rendered any and all readings about future events moot if they're about any sort of your querent's social interaction with other humans. You can have a back and forth exchange with your querent regarding just the things they themselves might do but not with every single person they will interact with that will eventually shape the future. Therefore everything besides the information the querent will give you regarding their own potential actions is as much a matter of guessing as reading for third parties with no one being right there to correct you.

 

[Barleywine]

Barleywine you just rendered any and all readings about future events moot if they're about any sort of your querent's social interaction with other humans. You can have a back and forth exchange with your querent regarding just the things they themselves might do but not with every single person they will interact with that will eventually shape the future. Therefore everything besides the information the querent will give you regarding their own potential actions is as much a matter of guessing as reading for third parties with no one being right there to correct you.

Not entirely true. You can legitimately explore your querents' future interactions with their social circle since the querents may be directly affected by such shared activities, and you are (or should be) in dierct contact with those querents. It's their conjectures about what is going on in the minds of those third parties that I find suspect. I have no problem with addressing what so-and-so might do to my querents, but am hightly skeptical of trying to probe how that individual might think or feel about them. The invasion of privacy question remains however, but its onus is largely transferred to the querents who must decide how to apply any insights in their interpersonal dealings. But I would certainly feel terrible if one of my querents did something nasty to an acquaintance based on my observations. I find it best to stay away from that possibility.

 

[chaosbloom]

I have no problem with addressing what so-and-so might do to my querents, but am hightly skeptical of trying to probe how that individual might think or feel about them.

So you are saying that predicting actions is easier than predict what someone might think or feel towards someone else? Or are you saying that both can be done but in the second case, there's an ethical problem of invading their privacy. I'd like to know why you're distinguishing those two things, it sounds interesting.

 

[Barleywine]

So you are saying that predicting actions is easier than predict what someone might think or feel towards someone else? Or are you saying that both can be done but in the second case, there's an ethical problem of invading their privacy. I'd like to know why you're distinguishing those two things, it sounds interesting.

I'll try. To my way of thinking, likely actions/events have (or will have) an objective presence on the formative plane of existence (foreshadowing) that purely subjective mental/emotional constructs lack unless and until formalized and actualized. More elastic conceptual reality is less coherent and often turns out to be illusory when we attempt to pin it down. Human actions imply intentions, which presuppose value judgments based on thoughts and feelings, and the farther removed from where "the rubber meets the road," the more provisional the picture becomes. Hypothetically at least (and the way tarot works is entirely hypothetical in my book), the emerging manifestation of something can prefigure its arrival via the cards in a way that a thought or feeling rattling around in someone's head about what they might like to see happen cannot. If that stray thought ultimately hardens into an intention and then a resolve, it would begin to make its presence felt in a way that the cards can make sense of. At that point, I'm comfortable examining what that individual might actually do regarding my querent. (That's why I encourage querents to ask how a third-party individual might act toward them, not how he or she might feel.) Until then, the outlook is clouded, entirely too amorphous and kaleidoscopic to leave a convincing impression that I can present to the querent with confidence. And I refuse to try reading something in the cards that I don't think is there.

I hope this isn't too rambling. I haven't put these thoughts into words since my days of intensive qabala studies back in the 1980s.

 

[gregory]

I'll try. To my way of thinking, likely actions/events have (or will have) an objective presence on the formative plane of existence (foreshadowing) that purely subjective mental/emotional constructs lack unless and until formalized and actualized. More elastic conceptual reality is less coherent and often turns out to be illusory when we attempt to pin it down. Human actions imply intentions, which presuppose value judgments based on thoughts and feelings, and the farther removed from where "the rubber meets the road," the more provisional the picture becomes. Hypothetically at least (and the way tarot works is entirely hypothetical in my book), the emerging manifestation of something can prefigure its arrival via the cards in a way that a thought or feeling rattling around in someone's head about what they might like to see happen cannot. If that stray thought ultimately hardens into an intention and then a resolve, it would begin to make its presence felt in a way that the cards can make sense of. At that point, I'm comfortable examining what that individual might actually do regarding my querent. (That's why I encourage querents to ask how a third-party individual might act toward them, not how he or she might feel.) Until then, the outlook is clouded, entirely too amorphous and kaleidoscopic to leave a convincing impression that I can present to the querent with confidence.

I hope this isn't too rambling. I haven't put these thoughts into words since my days of intensive qabla studies back in the 1980s.

Makes excellent sense to me, including an "explanation" of where it can be iffy reading about people's feelings etc without their consent/knowledge.