“Some of the forces exerting the most pressure to erase Pagan history and tradition are ironically doing so in the name of inclusion. We definitely need to do better in including and acknowledging minorities we left invisible even as we spearheaded other progress. Those include the non-binary, transgender, asexual etc.

But rather than creating additional rituals and spaces, many activists on the hard left are demanding that purge our traditions and practices of anything which acknowledges difference. We are, according to these folks, supposed to eliminate any sort of gender based rites of passage, any theology such as maiden, mother and crone which is rooted in biology, ritual nudity, sex magick and pretty much any reference to anything to do with the creative powers of reproduction in natural cycles.

In other words cleanse Paganism of Paganism to adhere to the One True Religion of Inclusion and More-Woke-Than-You Social Justice. There is a rising fundamentalism around this and it's wearing real thin with me. And I'm a leftist myself, or at least an unrepentant liberal.

The other major force for erasure are the Pagans playing for mainstream respectability who want to make sure we don't look any freakier than the local Lutherans.

Far more erasure is happening at the hands of our own people than the old Christian fundamentalist crowd could ever hope to do.”

— kenofken, comments from Column: the Mainstreaming of Pride

Tags: kenofken & ugh-politics & pagan & history & inclusion & acknowledging & minorities & progress & rituals and spaces & activists & gender based & rites of passage & natural cycles & fundamentalism & mainstream

“Sometimes today's Pagans seem to think that wearing a Thor's hammer should grant them the presumption of honor of a Viking king.”

— kenofken, comments on Anatomy of a failure: the Piedmont Pagan Pride collapse

Tags: kenofken & Pagans & Thor's hammer & honor