It seems the witty and sardonic Father John Misty, musician and apparent Buddhist, has a bit of a weak moral compass. A rose quartz crystal went missing at an organic LA café, prompting the owner to issue this plea:
PLEASE RETURN THE CRYSTAL! Our rose quartz was stolen from the Silverlake shop. This loving rock has given so much to an entire community and has much more to share. To whomever took her out the door, you do not want the energy of a stolen crystal, please trust me! Anyone who can help her find her way home will be hugged and fed, no questions, just thanks.”
To which Josh Tillman, aka Father John owned up, posting the following response online:
“There’s been, understandably, a not insignificant outcry regarding the alleged “theft” of the rose Quartz crystal from the Echo Park Moon Juice™, pictured above. I am here to claim responsibility, though I do not condone the rhetoric employed in Moon Juice’s post. To claim that “something has been ‘stolen’” is in tself a tacit endorsement of the capitalist values that blended superfoods and locally sourced produce stands, ironically, in direct opposition to.
The universe, however you may define her, brought this crystal into my life at what can only be described as a “pivot moment”. As my (again without trying to be didactic in my terminology) Saturn returned within the last year I found myself unsatisfied with a culture at large that insists on attributing rigid, currency based value to objects (I do not mean in a pejorative sense) that are naturally occurring and can be procured freely at any number of energy-central dispensaries located nearly anywhere within the well-defined boundaries of globalization.
While I empathize with your loss I do believe that there is a larger lesson to be gleaned from this experience: namely that material goods, no matter how sacred, WILL come and go from your life. As a practicing Buddhist I can only advise you to try and remember the crystal is only random phenomena, and if it HAPPENS to find its way into my pocket, and that pocket HAPPENS to leave your store, creating some ownership/theft/possession narrative will only cause you more pain – as you will be attempting to find significance where there is none. Also your smoothies are inconsistent to say the least but largely impossible to steal so that is an injustice that I must face, and I accept with an open heart knowing that each watery gulp is an invaluable teaching moment.”
Undeniably funny but he is a bad bad man. All property is not theft. (Stealing things is, though!)
To see the crystal in question, click on the link.
http://www.vocativ.com/339081/father-john-misty-steals-healing-crystal-from-new-age-juice-shop/
So remember, walk up to his merchandise stand and just help yourself to anything co its all free, yeah, m’kay? Cos its all come and go, fat Buddah
Funny but it’s a crime against hippies which is no crime at all. Boomshanka
Good idea about the merchandise! And then you can claim you are having a “pivot moment”.
The guy is a `Rock` star!
If blended superfoods and locally sourced produce stands in direct opposition to capitalist values, why are they so very expensive?
Cos goji berries don’t just grow on trees, you know.
Each “berry” lovingly handcrafted out of cedar by Buddhist carpenters and painted with the natural, if slightly bitter, red pigment made from exotic lice.
Never mind his Saturn returning, I think he was talking out of his Uranus. I bet the smoothie had goji berries and kale in it which probably put him in a very bad mood too.
In Sweden we take great care to only eat kale on Christmas, when it’s offset by enough delicious treats to not manage to spoil anyone’s mood!
A wise man once said “Never trust a hippie”
The fact he’s named himself “Father John Misty” is a big clue.
“Father” “John” appears to be struggling with the ‘right action’ part of the Noble Eightfold Path.
Thanks Nigel. I just knew Buddhism must have something in it that would go against nicking stuff but not what it was!
I’ve always suspected FJM was, well, bit of a dick, and I read this link eager to have my prejudices confirmed. While he did indeed pull a dick move, the people he has played it against appear to be equally dickish so now I am confused. Is a dick move still a dick move when the victims are dicks themselves, and if this does ameliorate the dickishness of the dick move, what happens when you consider that the perpetrator of said dick move is a dick himself? Is the dickishness doubled? Halved? Does the dickishness of the victim cancel out the dickishness of the perp, leaving only the pure unsullied dickishness of the dick move?
I can also explain Like A Virgin, if you like.
Thanks, I’ve managed to work that one out but your explanation may shed new light on the matter!
I’m still trying to work out “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?” I think we need a Professor of Philosophy or of Comparative Moral Ethics or sumthing….
Of course it does. Sound waves are emitted whether or not a hearing mechanism picks them up.
Thank you for posting that @carolina
What I really want to know from the Vocativ story is how does one become a ‘tastemaker’? I need that on my CV.
Until he takes that quartz back, I’ll be boycotting his music.
@GCU-Grey-Area I suspect it involves getting a squillion followers on Instagram/Twitter/FB, creating a ” healthy food craze” with blog and probably having long glossy hair and posting daily bikini or yoga posing photos (I realise that most of this won’t be helping you). Personally I am prepared to spearhead an anti-juicing and smoothie movement called Whole Fruit Eating with the slogan “Why-don’t-you-have-fruit-salad-like-a-normal person.” Obviously the Whole Fruit Movement wouldn’t include the skin always, especially if it was a banana.
Good on you for your principled stand, GCU. I have always been fond of crystals even before the New Age stuff began, when they sold them in huge chunks in a shop in Devon on holiday when I was small.
Let’s see. Squillions of followers on Instabook? Nope. Long glossy hair? Nope. Bikini photos? Nope.
Oh dear. Bang goes the book deal, etc, etc.
I like rocks and crystals. Despite what the Crystal shop in Glastonbury says, they haven’t got any more properties than being nice to look at.
I’m also entirely with you about smoothies.
Oh.
I had assumed he was trolling the shop and was taking the piss out of them, not that he had genuinely taken the crystal.
Well, true he might have seen it as a golden publicity stunt, but I’ve a feeling larceny was involved!
Because this is the Afterword, here’s a YouTube clip
The Crystals – Da Doo Ron Ron
There’s nothing like a good Youtube clip – here’s another Crystal from Josh Rouse:
ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MsJiqyNHi8
Trying again
The man is spouting bullshit for ‘look at me aren’t I cool and ironic’. A karma cretin.