vehementlyvagabond

[vehementlyvagabond]

Do you guys have a nickname given by your deities? 👀

#r #yes and it stays between the two of us

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It's funny how, as a society, we'll embrace technological advances yet there's this tendency with witches who will refuse non-traditional tools in their own craft. For example: candles. LED candles can be programmed to flicker and mimick the appearance of a flame without the fire and smoke. With the internet, you can watch a video of a candle burning on your phone or PC monitor. Aside from techno witches or chaos magicians, I'm not sure why others haven't caught on and considered experimenting. I bring this up to ask: What are your thoughts about the (possible lack of) creative experimentation with modern technology on witchblr?

Bud I love your vibes of experimentation but idk why we have to try and drag all of witchblr like this.

"Aside from techno witches" so, aside from all the witches who are already using technology in their practice, why isn't everyone else also using it?

I think experimenting with digital stuff and technology is great, but I do take a tiny lil bit off offense to you saying "I'm not sure why others haven't caught on," which kind of implies that if people thought about using technology in their practice they'd obviously want to experiment with it, as opposed to people just realizing they could and then deciding not to.

Not all witchcraft is about doing the most convenient thing 100% of the time, and what you perceive to be the most rational or helpful course of action actually isn't necessarily accessible for everyone.

What about people who specifically get into witchcraft as a way to reconnect with tradition?

What about witches who find power and utility in working with certain tools that they can't grasp within modern technology?

What about witches who work with a spiritual or animistic path and literally believe they're connecting with the physical candle flame in a way that can't be reproduced/replicated by digital stuff?

What about witches who are experienced energy workers and perceive that the energies produced by the physical candle aren't the same as those produced by watching an internet video, and have decided that these two things aren't interchangeable?

What about witches who are sick of screens and are using witchcraft as a way to touch grass?

I think all of the witches I know who are seriously invested in magic have experimented with technology as part of their practice, very often for accessibility/disability issues.

I dislike the idea that all these hypothetical witches need to "catch on" to a certain specific kind of experimentation for some reason. But, as someone who has experimented with using digital/technology in magic, I can affirm that it doesn't fully replace my actual physical practice. Can it be helpful in many ways? Yes. Can the intersection of magic and technology be very powerful? Yes.

But I have to say if the witchblr buds really are completely lacking in technological experimentation, I really don't have commentary on that, except that I'm happy for everyone leading self-determined lives and I hope they keep doing it.

#yeah bottom line: they're different things #and while tech stuff works in some peoples' paradigms it's not for everyone #i don't have a lot of eloquent thoughts but the ones i have are veering into 'you can't use clear quartz & rosemary for everything' territo #territory*

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alternatively, how can i decide if they’re a trustworthy/reliable reader without at least seeing what they can do? yeah, some folks are going to be duds, but i also don’t go around fully and uncritically believing everything any reader tells me. there are always going to be inner aspects to the situation that the reader is not privy to, and it’s up to me to decide what i do with the information from the reading.

if nothing else, i look at it as supporting small businesses and giving newer diviners a chance to practice and hone their skills.

How the hell are you all able to trust strangers to do a reading on you?

Hello, random individual! Yes, I want a tarot reading on my spiritual path. I trust you, person I've never met.

I'm not just making fun of people, I'm genuinely asking, how can you possibly believe anything someone you have never met says about you in a reading?

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Eugenicist and bioessentialist beliefs about magic

Like New Age, modern witchcraft developed at a time period when eugenics and so-called race science were highly popular ideas - and consequentially, some of these ideas influenced people’s beliefs about magic. These beliefs also influenced modern conspiracy theories about the occult, which in turn influenced perceptions of magic in general. Here’s some of these beliefs:

People are either born with magical gifts, or they’ll never have them at all.

People born with magical gifts are meant to be spiritual leaders and guide the world into a new age.

There are special bloodlines whose members are more capable of performing magic than others.

People who can perform magic are able to do so only because they have special ancestry.

Some racial groups are more capable of performing magic than others.

Some bloodlines or racial groups are more capable of performing certain kinds of magic than others (EG, so-called “light magic” or “dark magic”).

The traditions of your genetic ancestors will always come to you easily and intuitively, with little to no study required. (And if they don’t, you aren’t a “true witch.”)

Modern witchcraft was also hit by the gender essentialism stick, and claims that come from this line of thinking include:

Magic requires or at least massively benefits from some performance or symbolic representation of heterosexuality or heteronormativity; other forms of magic will be inherently weaker.

Literally all magic is a recreation of heterosexual reproduction.

The womb is a woman’s most potent source of magic.

There are only two important deities: the god and the goddess.

All goddesses represent the divine mother archetype, all gods represent the divine father archetype.

Feminine energies are soft and nurturing, masculine entities are aggressive and bold.

Masculine energies are too strong in the world, and are the reason for imperialism, violence, etc. The imbalance can be corrected by focusing on feminine energies.

So yeah, always watch out for claims like this because they don’t come from a good place.

#r

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Even if someone tells you that they're getting their insights from gods or some other higher beings, you still have to ask yourself "who else is saying stuff like this?" If their rhetoric lines up with the rhetoric of actual hate groups, then hatred is what they're channeling - no matter how much it's been prettied up with poetic language and grandiose imagery.

#r

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Many lgbt teenagers and young adults growing up on the internet today have socially conservative beliefs that they voice at all times that they got from their conservative parents which they’ve never challenged because they think the life experience of being gay or trans makes them politically progressive

#wrt cultural christianity

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On Blue being a "healing color"

"If, then, one can obtain a stoppered bottle or decanter of richly coloured blue glass, it can be used to get the benefit of this healing colour. Fill the bottle with water and stand it in a sunlit place for a couple of days. To drink this water will be beneficial to health and psychic sensitivity.

Alternatively, get a piece of deep blue glass and frame it so that the sharp edges are covered. Hold this glass so that the sunlight shines through it and the coloured ray is directed upon any part of the body affected by illness, preferably upon the bare skin. Do this for as long as you conveniently can, up to about half and hour at a time. Many beneficial results have been claimed from this practice. Electric lights is sometimes used to shine through the glass but warm natural sunlight is best, if available."

(p. 59 , Natural Magic, Doreen Valiente)

Just hear me out friends, just hear me out okay. Just listen. Okay, hear me. Maybe. .... maybe... it's the sunlight. And not the color of the light that's doing something. I KNOW I MIGHT be talking out my ass for a minute, but maybe.

Also I am very amused at the idea of drinking stagnant water for psychic abilities. Need a remind yall of the book that ... was like "Don't drink the stagnant water beside your bed because a ghost done did touched it."

I mean I know she's saying to stopper it. But still. Also ghosts are afraid of blue glass (according to a bit of Southern American lore hence the trees with the blue glass). But like. it's a bit of a folk custom nah? The blue glass thing? Interesting no?

#gif t #there is no public figure anyone should ever feel a need to defend like this #you don't know them and more importantly you don't know them #be critical of your heroes and of what you read

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Hello internet user whose entire concept of feminism comes from tiktok. In front of you are three ancient myths about women. You have five minutes to figure out which one of them was made up in the 1970s. If you choose wrong, you will be ripped to pieces by Maenads.

#r

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Ah, so I made a very awful discovery about a blog I used to follow. This person is quite literally transphobic. I am sharing this with the helpol community with the intention of spreading awareness.

@oflightandprophecy is their name. I have since blocked them. I was very civil; I didn't really know how to respond to their bigotry, being a trans person myself, so I just kind of thanked them for clarifying then ran away. 💀 Here are the screenshots of our interaction:

To clarify, this person was claiming that the gods do not support trans rights activists nor people who do not believe gender is based upon sex. Frankly, this was very disappointing to discover, and I am truly fucking disgusted with this viewpoint. I do not have the words to describe how vile this is to me. My advice to everyone out there is to block people like this. We really don't need this within our community.

How truly fucking despicable to spread a message like this.

Edit:

Here is another person for you to block. 💀

#r #transphobia t

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Whoa there, pardner! What have you done to make sure that belief or practice actually originates in ancient times and didn't come from the imagination of a repressed Victorian romantic?

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Lilith Appropriation Bingo

I have a Kabbalah Appropriation Bingo too, but Lilith deserves her own personal card. Enjoy! Lmk if you get bingo, I want to see.  🖤  Have a wonderful day!

#r

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Another reason we gotta stop conflating witchcraft with paganism:

There is a huge difference between "working with" gods as a part of a magical practice,

and worshiping/honoring gods as part of a personal spiritual or religious practice.

Stop making hopeful pagan seekers think they need to learn "advanced witchcraft" before they are allowed to honor the gods.

(No, I don't believe that working with gods in magical practice is advanced. But that doesn't mean it's okay to act like magical business relationships with gods is the same thing as having pagan spirituality.)

#r #in my opinionnnnnnnn you should be developing relationships with gods before you start asking them for things #so it's interesting to me to see some ppl think of it the other way around

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game awards fiasco has left me with a conclusion . the "cool woke" people in spaces online are still embarrassingly ignorant (or worse, tolerant) of antisemitism to the point where people can straight up explicitly say the most obvious bullshit and it'll be memed within five minutes. this has seriously hurt the credibility of some people i really care about, so im writing this in hopes the next time an antisemite makes the news i dont see thirty posts regurgitating their trash on my feed again.

if you want to do your part in preventing this, please do some reading into what antisemitic dogwhistles look like and how to avoid giving them a platform. the american jewish committee has a pdf with a list of many antisemitic dogwhistles here, and though it isn't comprehensive to everything antisemites come up with, it's a good start for helping you identify these phrases if you've never spoken to any jews about this before.

i will say this though. much of identifying dogwhistles is using your brain because they're hidden and cryptic on purpose, but learning about what they mean and how they're used can help you stop spreading this trash.

#antisemitism t #you guys need to hear this too

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"Witchblr drama" as tarot cards.

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saw yet another one of those “stop calling us culturally christian atheists, my abuse does not make me privileged. this is just religious people feeling threatened by atheism” posts again

your abuse does not make you privileged ofc but your membership in a dominant cultural group does. the fact that you’re unable to understand that there is a dominant cultural group and you are in it does make that less true. in fact it makes it more true.

and the “religious people feeling threatened by atheism” is literally just projection of christianity onto everything. like yes, it’s normal to assume that everything is like the thing you are familiar with, but really it is not always. jews talking about the way christian culture marginalizes us and how frustrating it is when people try to deny that they’re part of a dominant cultural group is not being threatened by your atheism bc we’re religious. how could it be when like half the jews talking about this are atheist or agnostic ourselves. your inability to distinguish a minority cultural group calling you out from christianity is part of what indicates that yeah actually. you see christianity as a default which is the problem in the first place.

#cultural christianity

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If you interpret “religion” as meaning “belief” or “faith”…

If you think all religions have a dualistic afterlife, such as the duality of “heaven” and “hell”…

If you believe that someone’s intentions or internal feelings are more important than their actions…

If you think that religious texts are to be taken literally, are unchanging, and are authoritative…

If you believe that you have an obligation to make all others believe like you or think like you, or that you must protect others from believing in the wrong thing…

If you believe culture and religion are severable…

If you believe Christmas or Easter is a secular holiday…

…you might have some internalized Christian hegemony to examine.

#r

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if you celebrate christmas, even if you do not consider yourself a christian, you are still culturally christian. christmas is a christian holiday and as such cannot be entirely secular.

you can celebrate whatever winter holiday you like, you can create your own, but ask yourself why you’re calling it christmas if you’re not participating in the christan holiday cycle?

requisite disclaimer that it’s perfectly okay to be christian or celebrate christmas, but there are some biases at work here that deserve examining.

is christmas secular? i go back and forth on it a lot. i wanted to hear ur take if ur willing <:)

No it is not.