Of Thespiae - Latest Comments

Re: Is “the goddess is alive and magic is afoot” racist?

Stephen Fleitas — Fri, 01 Apr 2016 23:28:29 -0000

You should read 'The Great Cosmic Mother: Rediscovering the Religion of the Earth' by Barbara Mor and Monica Sjoo. They discuss that the Goddess is both Light and Dark, creative and destructive. They discuss how there is a false dichotomy that patriarchal religion has created where there are sons of light/father god against the dark/children of the Mother which helps to foster racism against people of color. They mention African goddesses as well as European goddesses and indigenous ones too. Perhaps in some instances the white washing of the Goddess that you talk about does occur in white middle class America however to characterize the entirety of the Goddess movement in that way is unfair.

Re: On invitations and Etiquette

Ruadhán J McElroy — Sat, 01 Mar 2014 16:35:01 -0000

If it troubles you to learn that you're annoying, and I recall that it "troubled" you to learn that many polytheists feel they have nothing in common with the greater pagan community when you thought we were all just 'wun big happeh famblie", then I'd guess you're probably too fragile to be blogging, much less blogging under the guise of "activism".

Re: marc_bolan_and_june_child_pic1

pinballsdoll — Fri, 28 Feb 2014 17:42:11 -0000

this is a beautiful pic

Re: On invitations and Etiquette

Mx. David Dashifen Kees — Fri, 28 Feb 2014 09:32:45 -0000

You words inspire me and I'm troubled that you have felt such ..... exasperation (animosity?) toward me. I will struggle with the points you make above and, with respect to my involvement on PaganActivist, I will be speaking with the woman who runs the site and invited me to be a part of it to see what her perspective on my work is (and has been) and to assess my continued involvement therein.

If I gave the impression that the the burden of change isn't on the privileged than I worded things poorly. But, the less privileged have to be a party to the process of change, too. For example, if you and others weren't demanding that the analysis of Wiccanate privilege be undertaken, it wouldn't be. In such a way, there must be a reciprocal relationship formed around such a situation, but it's undeniable that while the less-privileged are a part of the change (largely because, in my experience, privilege is largely invisible to and/or denied by the privileged), it is the privileged who must actually change or be changed.

That said, you're correct that I am rather sheltered. I also avoid confrontation like it's the plague so I tend to frame things in diplomatic, non zero-sum terms. In situations like this, that's a poor choice.

Finally, I'd like to set the record straight with respect to one thing: I am not Wiccan nor do I operate from within the Wiccanate framework. That may change (it certainly has before), but for the moment that's why I've paid as much attention to this conversation as time and distance allow; it relates to me very personally.

Re: On invitations and Etiquette

Ruadhán J McElroy — Thu, 27 Feb 2014 18:12:51 -0000

You know what? I'm going to be frank: There's something about you I never liked. For the most part, I think your heart is in the right place, but I also think that you're incredibly sheltered in many ways, far too much so to really have earned the right to call yourself an "activist" in any meaningful way. I think you're painfully naïve on your best days and blissfully ignorant the rest of the time. I say this now, after holding my tongue on it for a couple years now, because I think the post you made in response to this one of mine is a prime example of why you just rub me in the way that you do.

You clearly don't understand how this sort of thing works. With regards to marginalised populations amongst the mainstream, the burden is always on the privileged population to be more accommodating to the less privileged. You wouldn't tell a fag like myself to be "equally accommodating" to hets and their lifestyles and still expect to remain in my good graces, would you? I really hope that you would not. Why? Because as a queer, it can be safely assumed that I've spend a significant portion of my life trying to accommodate the hets of the world, to varying degrees --I try to avoid eye make-up when going to D&D night because, while these het men certainly know I'm gay and kind of a goth and even do drag nights, it has been drilled into me from a young age that men in make-up make "normal" men uncomfortable.

Furthermore, as some-one who is also transgender (FTM), I am at a highly disprivileged position in the gay community (in addition to just about everywhere else) --to the point where I barely even flirt at the gay bars, because of the cultural assumption that trans people have to disclose even before the idea of casual sex with a potentially transgender person perhaps maybe happening crosses anyone's mind, and frankly, I'm just not comfortable at all with rejection, so I'd rather let people approach me --which isn't really me, at all, and essentially going out at all gets me in this ridiculous anxiety loop and I end up barely socialising. Basically, I've gone above and beyond any reasonable measures to ensure that every fag with a cock doesn't accidentally come across a vag in the night, so what reasonable person would "just make sure I know it works both ways" when I ask that gays be a little more open-minded, or at least polite about trans men in gay men's spaces.

I really do believe that the principle works out the same way with the Wiccanate majority in the pagan community with regards to how the polytheist minority gets treated and the proper response. NO SHIT, SPANKY: Polytheists KNOW that respect toward the Wiccanate majority is the proper way to respond to respect shown to us --in fact, most polytheist religions have hospitality as a part of their ethical codes --but as a Wiccanate pagan, you don't realise that, because you only make an effort to "learn" about polytheistic religions when you feel it can "enhance" your own practise, like an artisan cheese atop your baked pasta. I don't need some ignorant Wiccanate neopagan telling me that my ethics need to be taken into account when I'm in pagan spaces with a Wiccanate majority, cos guess what? I've been practising that ever since i've been a Hellenist. Hell, I've arguably been practising that since I've been a Satanist, as one of LaVey's "Eleven Satanic Laws" or whatever he actually called it was "When in another’s lair, show him respect or else do not go there." I have been living the ethic of hospitality for over fifteen years, in some way, shape, or form, and I don't need some naïve Wiccanate boy on the Internet who thinks a saccharine personality is all one needs to be an activist to tell me that I should extend the same respect I desire in mixed pagan spaces. I have never met another polytheist who needs you or anyone else to remind them of that, and I find your desire to rephrase my proposed standards "for both sides" to be not only presumptuous and rude, but to truly betray your self-appointed title of "activist", as you clearly don't understand what that actually means.

By treating polytheists as being in equal need of a reminder of hospitality, you're coming from an assumption that there has been an equal miscarriage of justice, as it were, and that there is not a significantly larger, dominating community that has repeatedly, and in no uncertain terms, demanded that "compromise means majority rules" for literally decades, which simply flies in the face of many polytheists who have said, repeatedly, that that's what been going on.

Re: On invitations and Etiquette

Mx. David Dashifen Kees — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 19:58:48 -0000

So I thought about these standards for some time, sat with them a bit, and then expanding my thinking over at PaganActivist.com. This is both a shameless plug but also to let you know that I was talking about you elsewhere: http://paganactivist.com/20.... Cheers!

Re: On invitations and Etiquette

Mariah Sheehy — Mon, 17 Feb 2014 19:40:29 -0000

I think these are all perfectly reasonable. I am thinking of getting involved with Paganicon in the Twin Cities. I will bring this to the table if it seems to need addressing. Twin Cities Pagan Pride (who organizes it) has historically been pretty friendly to polytheists and non-Wiccan religions, but staying involved helps keep it that way.

I will add the caveat that the word "discrimination" is used far too loosely by many people including pagans- often to mean social exclusion on a more informal level. I think that adds to people not taking it seriously. But in general, I agree we should take seriously any kind of complaint of discrimination or exclusion at pan-pagan events.

Re: Derek Jarman’s Sebastiane and polytheism as a metaphor for homosexuality

Ruadhán J McElroy — Fri, 14 Feb 2014 12:50:03 -0000

Unfortunately, I have not done a similar post for Satyricon, though I did love that one, as well. I should, though.

Re: Derek Jarman’s Sebastiane and polytheism as a metaphor for homosexuality

Nicole Danielle — Fri, 14 Feb 2014 10:00:31 -0000

So I am so late to this party, I mean this post is like what? 4 years old now? But I was so excited when I finally ran across it (I've actually spent the past few days obsessively reading your older posts) because I too loved this movie especially since I caught it "on a whim" on Netflix and had just finished watching Fellini's Satyricon and was jonesing for another fix. I don't know if these films can be considered "art house" but they were a welcome respite from the normal fodder pumped out iinto the movie theaters these days. But now I feel I have to watch it again because there is so much symbolism I obviously missed. Some of it I immediately caught on to probably because, as your said, I'm a Hellenist so the motifs popped out but the many of the subtle allusions completely went over my head. So now I have to see if you did do a similar post on Satyricon.

Re: [review] Goth Craft: The magickal side of dark culture by Raven Digitalis

Ruadhán J McElroy — Mon, 10 Feb 2014 13:05:41 -0000

It wouldn't surprise me at all if everything you said about him was true --he does seem to be genuinely nice, in just about all I've seen from him. Like I said, I'm being more forgiving of this book than I would've been if I had not sensed some massive heard behind it —which is what makes Ed Wood's early films (you know, before he got desperate for cash and did a string of no-budget girlie flicks) watchable, in spite of their flaws; Wood believed in what he was doing, and most of the people who worked with him had nothing but nice things to say about him, as a person, even if they realised he was one of the worst writer-directors. I make the comparison as a compliment.

Re: [review] Goth Craft: The magickal side of dark culture by Raven Digitalis

P. Sufenas Virius Lupus — Fri, 07 Feb 2014 15:50:06 -0000

I agree with most of your critiques of the book; and, I've shared some of them with Raven personally, as I do actually know him.
(Incidentally, he's at very least bisexual in actuality, so he is actually a GLB.)
Raven is one of the most genuine, earnest, and good-hearted people I've ever met within modern paganism.
He's also one of the most poorly-informed individuals I've met in the movement who is writing (several) books and giving courses, and who even appeared on some MTV documentary or news-bits in the last seven years. Part of this has to do with his location, as he's operating out of Missoula, MT, so take that into consideration; part of it is likewise that his main teacher/advisor/HPs is extremely misinformed, but he has taken her at her word (because he's trusting and good-hearted--and he is!) when he probably shouldn't have done so. (I had a talk with her at PantheaCon the last time I saw him there, too, which was in '09 or so, I think, and she didn't seem to understand that there was a difference between the Scythians and the Scottish--who are, of course, "Celts," and thus are the same as the Scythians...but, because she has a B.A. from some university or other, why should anyone question her information or authority?)
But, he's also very open to discussion, critique, and (perhaps most importantly) correcting, and he does freely admit that he doesn't know everything, and has been misinformed in many cases. So, there's hope there.

Re: I have about eighteen months….

Ruadhán J McElroy — Tue, 28 Jan 2014 01:51:57 -0000

Not only was it 2°F the windchill according to my weather gizmo on FireFox said it felt around -27°F. Tylenol is completely ineffective at this point, and I spent most of the day on the couch.

That said, I have no interest in Texas, anyway. No offense, but I have what I think is a well-deserved aversion to living South of the Mason-Dixon and East of the Mississippi and while Texas is just West of the Mississippi, most of the people from there I've met are kind of culturally indistinguishable from Alabamans —and really, my friend Esther (another one of the few friends I had from the Goth scene who stuck with me through transitioning, and one of my longest friendships of about 13 years), who's originally from Corpus Cristi, says that King of the Hill is practically an animated documentary —which is kind of true, actually: Mike Judge apparently sent the writers on annual trips to sub-rural Texas to study people and get a real grasp of small-town Texas realism. I mean it's a great show and not as "scary-conservative" as it could be, but I have no desires to live it.

And yes, we should both move back to Los Angeles, and start a house of awesome happenings. It'll be like Oblivion! (Except hopefully no-one will burn the house down.)

Re: I have about eighteen months….

Indigo Glitterlust — Tue, 28 Jan 2014 00:11:17 -0000

Gods, I can't even imagine that kind of cold (well, I can since I just got back from Chicago, but not all the time!). Just stay away from Texas--the people are crazy and the summers are 115 fahrenheit LOL

Good luck with the move and getting everything sorted. Now I'll actually have an excuse to go back to LA.

Re: I have about eighteen months….

Ruadhán J McElroy — Mon, 27 Jan 2014 18:02:44 -0000

I know, right?

But it's 2°F right now, and the reason my humanoid meat-based housemate knew I just got out of bed is cos I was screaming from the back pain.

Re: I have about eighteen months….

thehouseofvines — Mon, 27 Jan 2014 14:22:23 -0000

Personally I'm sad that you'll be leaving now that I'm on the east coast, but you've got to find a place to nourish your soul so I applaud your pursuing that no matter how insurmountable the odds seem. I'll do everything I can to help!

Re: Hellenic Blogos Collective

Ruadhán J McElroy — Sun, 12 Jan 2014 19:55:21 -0000

Hello there,

I haven't made those posts yet. My original intention was to post them after the first of the Boeotian lunar year, but between the snow and ice storms I've had, and seasonal depression, I've been either too sore or just too down to get started.

Re: Hellenic Blogos Collective

Hannah Berg — Sun, 12 Jan 2014 15:21:00 -0000

Hi, I found you through Rhyd Wildermuth who posted about your Thirty Days of Devotion challenge. However, I can't find your blog posts… In any case, I enjoyed writing in response to your challenge. Thank you for the questions.

Re: [PBP 2013] Wiccanate Privilege

Ruadhán J McElroy — Tue, 31 Dec 2013 21:24:53 -0000

So, you link me to a post that actually says that discussing "racism" is useless when compared to discussing "white supremacy", after you decide I'm some irredeemable racist? Cute!

Additionally, the writer of that article, while certainly articulate in their thoughts and ideas, also has the audacity to dismiss binary sex and gender and (ostensibly hetero-)sexuality as "made-up privileges", when people lacking that experience will tell you it's not (while I agree that "Western", "monoracial", "cis-ethnic" and "vanilla" are all false privileges that simply didn't exist until dumb-dumbs on the Internet decided that "feeling left out" was the same thing as oppression, I really can't stand behind their claim that binary gender and sexuality are somehow "made-up" in terms of privilege, and it's unfortunate, but that really is enough to taint my own ideas of what this person is saying).

Also, this person says toward the end:

More often than not, discussions about privilege are draining and exhausting and, ultimately, change nothing for most of the oppressors participating. It can be useful in intra-community discussions for understanding certain aspects of our experiences (since, sometimes we can only define something by what it isn’t or by remarking on its absence).

By stating that "Wiccanate privilege" is an idiosyncratic reality of the pagan community, i am clearly engaging in that intra-community discussion that the writer thinks is a possible useful discussion of privilege. Do you even understand that piece you referenced, or do you only understand that it's something that you want to agree with?

Furthermore, you clearly missed the several points in my piece where I pointed out that making the comparison to racism was tacky, but simply something I chose to do to explain how, within the pagan community (that intra-community discussion biyuti thinks is a useful realm for discussing privilege) the supremacy of Wiccanate paganism works --do I think that it's at all comparable to how the reality of racism and how it affects people? Of course not, but hey, clearly you feel it's better to not even read what's been written, assume things, and then berate people than to engage in a dialogue.

Clearly, your only interest is in shutting down any and all dialogue that doesn't fall 100% in line with what you yourself say. So goodbye. Feel free to send me an e-mail when you can get a grasp on the arguments you're making.

Re: [PBP 2013] Wiccanate Privilege

Alexi — Tue, 31 Dec 2013 20:59:02 -0000

A) No

B) Stop

C) Jesus balls comparing "Wiccanate privilege" to white supremacy is *BEYOND FUCKING RACIST* stop it.

D) Read this and realize you're one of the reasons why what's being said is so: http://biyuti.com/blog/on-p...

Re: [PBP 2013] Wiccanate Privilege

Allec — Tue, 31 Dec 2013 01:56:57 -0000

"And ADF really seems to have more in common with Wiccanate paganism than it has with Celtic Reconstruction than some people want to really believe, even though it does seem to generally be a recon-friendly group."

I can attest that ADF is a middle ground between CR and Wiccanate paganism as described here. ADF values scholarship like CR, but a bit more lenient. More about practice over authenticity, though they stress a value in knowing the authenticity.

"Many simply learn that their local community will NEVER cater to their needs, and wants no suggestions on how to accommodate them, so they drop out of the broader pagan community and keep to their own practises and whatever semblance of their own religion’s community they can get, even if it’s only on the Internet."

I was of this opinion for a while, to be honest. I attended a "pagan" event only to learn it was NeoWiccan-based and heavily duotheist. I'm a Gaelic Recon Polytheistic who celebrated my festival to my god Lugh with no trace of tradition elements (celebrating Lughnasa without even bread...) The group, prior to my attendance, never heard of hard polytheism.

However! I'm slowly thinking of ways to make the group more open to me. My friend I met through the group is trying to be less NeoWiccan (or, at least, not inherently so) and we're doing an Imbolc ritual that will be closer to the Gaelic Festival than the NeoWiccan holiday of the same name. We'll be honoring Brigid, having a community fire, etc. I'm excited.

I also conversed with some other friends who share in my grievances of wanting to have a communal celebration without being erased and we came up with a ritual outline. Perhaps it is time for me to post it on my blog...

Anyway, thank you for writing this. I hope this continues the conversation about "Wiccanate Paganism."

Re: Sometimes I think about Danny Thomas

Ruadhán J McElroy — Sat, 28 Dec 2013 19:06:53 -0000

But to those who have publicly criticized Ms. Krasskova recently online I
challenge you: if you don't like what she says, then write your own
posts, teach your own classes, write your own books on the same subjects
and tell us how you think worship should be done in a way that would
actually make us want to follow your suggestions. For example, if you
don't like that Ms. Krasskova is teaching a class on money and charging
for it, teach your own class and offer it for free. (And make sure it is
at least as good as the one she is teaching.)

My guess is that actually doing what you advise takes far more work than it does to jump to the wildest possible conclusions based on what appears to be doing little more reading than a quick skim for a few words and phrases that might send up certain flags out of context. Granted, I too am only forming ideas from my own catalogue of knowledge based on what I've observed, that's all we ever do

And what really pains me about all this, is that I generally agree with a lot of the kids on Tumblr about social justice, *but* I also have the experience, knowledge, and wisdom to see where they really don't understand a lot of the things they're talking about, much less the odd little paradoxes that are created by social justice. Paradoxes like how, say, it is generally true that many women have sexist ideas because of the society being inherently sexist, *but* it's also sexist for a man [which, for these purposes, "a man" is defined as "anyone who is generally assumed to be one until they state otherwise"] to tell a woman how to feel about sexism, especially about how sexism directly affects her, because that would be placing a man's ideas over a woman's experiences --this therefore creates a situation where men have to be very careful in how they try to teach others about sexism, but because of the very individual nature of experiences, the longer he tries to teach others, the more likely he is to reach a point where he's best off not teaching others about sexism at all, simply because he is a man; furthermore, the more women attempt to teach other people about sexism, the more likely there is to arise highly incompatible information about it distributed, because the logic goes that without the institutionalised power a man is afforded, it becomes very hard to define a woman treating others poorly based on their sex as "sexist", even though the exact same behaviour given the context of a male enactor is very easily defined as such, so this becomes simply "two women having an argument" and all we ultimately learn about sexism is that it's a topic for women to teach and discuss amongst themselves, I guess?

Now I'm sure you see why I just can't get along with many self-identified "activists" on Tumblr is pretty much the same reason I can't get along with many self-identified "pagans": They refuse to define things in a manner that makes them easier to understand, and what definitions are often given end up undefining these ideas. I whole-heartedly agree with the basics of social justice activism that have been around for years --people should not be discriminated against, or treated as second- or third-class citizens because of X [sex, gender, race/ethnicity, sexuality, etc...]-- and I believe that people can do and say things that fall into that definition of poor treatment of others due to X without even realising it, because that's just how they've always done it and seen others do it. But when we get to nit-picking things to the point of being simply unable to define them anymore, then something has gone terribly wrong. When you can't call out a woman because she's made a crass, sexualised comment against another woman because of something the latter wrote, but when a man wrote the same thing and she only disagreed, and we can't call that out as being "sexist" because it's somehow impossible for women to be sexist, or because the person who noticed it was a man, then there's something wrong with the MO of the activism.

Re: [PBP 2013] Wiccanate Privilege

Ruadhán J McElroy — Wed, 11 Dec 2013 04:17:17 -0000

Wow! Thanks for your comment. I can't believe I forgot to respond, even forgot you made it until I saw your recent post link back.

...but yes, it just floors me that, for how much the Pagan community likes to talk about all the diverse paths represented "under the umbrella", this amounts to little more than lipservice, and there's an overwhelming expectation to do and say things geared toward the (ostensibly) Wiccanate majority at large events like Pantheacon.

Re: Free Will

Zandra Bevis — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 11:25:28 -0000

fine by me dude

Re: Free Will

Ruadhán J McElroy — Mon, 09 Dec 2013 22:18:16 -0000

Depends on who's writing about them, actually.

Re: Free Will

Zandra Bevis — Mon, 09 Dec 2013 11:00:42 -0000

vampires r cool