Is It Fun to Be Fooled?

In 1937, Horace Goldin put out a book whose title dubiously claimed…

The question is… Is it?

A magician stating how “fun” it is to be fooled reminds of those pedophiles who try to convince us that kids like being molested by 46-year-olds. I mean, it’s an awfully self-serving position to take.

But, I think you can make an argument they’re right. (The magicians, I mean. The pedos should burn.)

I was having a conversation with someone last week who gave up magic decades ago. “People don’t enjoy being fooled,” he said. “Give me one situation where people like to be fooled?”

“A magic trick,” I said.

“No, I mean another situation,” he said. “You can’t use that as an example. That’s the thing we’re arguing about. My point is people don’t like being fooled which is why they don’t generally like magic. They watch it to puzzle it out. Or hoping you’ll tell them how it’s done. If people liked being fooled there would be a bunch of other things they did in their life to feel fooled.”

“Well, no,” I said. “People don’t like to be fooled in most cases. But magic is the ‘safe’ way for them to explore feeling fooled, mystified, confused, or whatever. The way to be entertained by those emotions rather than threatened by them. People don’t like being scared, but they go to haunted houses and horror movies. People don’t like being sad, but they’ll watch a tearjerker or read a sad book. People don’t like to be in danger, but they’ll go on a roller coaster to get the feeling of danger. I don’t think people like being fooled generally but I do think they like it in the right context.”

Of course, this must be something that’s covered in some magic theory book somewhere, but it was my first time putting it together for myself. As humans, we like playgrounds where we can safely experience negative emotions. And magic is such a playground.

People don’t like to be fooled. People don’t like to be deceived. People don’t like to be outsmarted.

They don’t like these things IN REAL LIFE.

This is why I say that my first goal is to get them to understand that it’s fake, and that we’re both on the same page about that. Only then do I put a ton of effort into making it feel like maybe it’s real.

Of course, there are some people who just don’t like magic. But I think those people are pretty rare.

Most people don’t mind being fooled by a trick. But people don’t want you to try and fool them about the nature of the experience. If you’re trying to pretend you can really read their mind or bend a spoon with your thoughts, that’s what turns people off.

People also don’t want to feel like the goal of this exercise is to make them feel stupid. And if you do a meaningless card trick or coin trick, it can be hard for them to see any other point to this than you showing off how you can fool them.

But if you can give your tricks an engaging premise and context, people realize there’s more to the experience than getting fooled. It’s an interactive bit of personal theater. There’s a story there. And for the story to play out, something mystical or impossible has to happen. That’s why you’ve created this moment. Not just to show how clever you are.

If you can couch being “fooled” in that sort of encounter, then I think Horace Goldin was undoubtedly right. It’s fun to be fooled in the service of a compelling story or experience.

The problem many magicians have is that they aren’t fooling.

Or if they are, then they’re just fooling. Which actually probably isn’t that much fun.

Another question remains… Did Horace Goldin actually know shit about fooling people? Here’s him performing the “classic” Bunny From A Dog’s Stomach That Disappears Into A Single Sheet of Newspaper, Suspiciously Delivered On A Tray.