[ Silence ]
Hello everyone.
Thank you for being here today for this particular
episode.
We are talking about inclusivity in the pagan
and the witchcraft community.
Now, I want to preface this for anyone watching
on YouTube - again, since I have this presentation
up, I can't see the live chat right now.
I am going to pop over.
I had to get a new microphone, so I'm going
to pop over and make sure that you can hear
me real quick, so if you can hear me please
let me know.
Let me see.
Hello everyone.
Please, again, let me know if you can hear
me.
I hope everyone's doing okay.
I hope that if you are in the path of hurricane
Laura that you have been safely evacuated
or you have moved to a location that is safe
- you have done what you can to be safe in
this particular storm.
So, I think you can hear me.
[ Keyboard and Mouse Sounds ]
Let me just check something real quick because
I do want to make sure that you can hear me
because I have been having nothing but issues.
Okay, perfect.
Sorry.
My audio is definitely working.
I am an anxious person, so yeah...
Okay, so I'm going to go back to the presentation.
You can see - here, we can just go ahead and
get started.
So, we're going to be talking about inclusivity
in the pagan and witchcraft communities but
first, I do have a few announcements.
The first announcement is that the giveaway
is still going on.
The last day to enter the giveaway is August
31st, so for those watching on YouTube, that
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Podcast listeners, that is going to be the
day that this podcast goes live.
It will be closing at midnight on Monday - or
Tuesday morning, I guess.
So if you haven't entered already, make sure
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Podcast listeners, check out the link in the
description, and go ahead and enter that way.
Please keep it to one entry per person.
I will be validating that and then when the
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winner live on YouTube probably next Friday?
Whatever next Friday is - the fourth?
I think Friday is September 4th.
So, I will announce the winner live on YouTube
on September 4th - probably the same time
I do my live streams - 2 pm Eastern time.
So, look forward to that as well.
The next announcement is that my shop is going
to be updating September 1st at 12 pm EST.
I have a bunch of new products - I will have
a new guided meditation, I've got some cute
new little pouches and some altar cloths.
So, if you've been wanting to get your hands
on something like that, my shop will be updating
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And if you want to see some of the things
that I'm going to be adding to my shop, make
sure you're following me on Instagram @round_the_cauldron.
All the links is always in the description
and in the show notes.
The next little announcement is that this
topic was voted on by my patrons over on Patreon,
but it was recommended through my Discord
community.
So, if you ever have a topic that you want
me to cover or that you have questions about,
feel free to suggest them.
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Anyone on Patreon gets the chance to vote
for what we talk about next, no matter what
your tier, alright?
So, we can go ahead and get started.
I'm anticipating this is going to be kind
of a long episode.
I have several slides here, for those watching
on YouTube, and I also have some notecards
because there were some other things that
I couldn't fit on the slides and I didn't
want it to be a wall of text.
So, we can just continue on.
I do need to say Thank You to my patrons.
I have gotten several new patrons over the
last two weeks!
Thank you, Jess, Rose, Renee, Holly, Bleu,
Hillary, Lei, and Leili.
Again, the link for my Patreon is there - patreon.com/roundthecauldron.
Also, the link to my shop is shop.roundthecauldron.com.
So, jumping into the topic, the first thing
that I want you to ask yourself is, "Is your
practice and the way you interact with the
community inclusive?"
So, this matters when you speak to or interact
with other people and not just on your own
or the thoughts that you have just randomly
throughout the day or anything like that.
Inclusivity is a means to make sure that everyone,
no matter who they are - no matter their age,
sex, gender, race, etc. - to make sure they're
not excluded simply for being who they are.
And I have a typo here on my screen.
I forgot to include the word "not".
So, we're trying to make sure that no one
is excluded.
Everyone can participate in the practices
that they have access to and that they want
to learn about.
There are some caveats to this, obviously.
The first one is going to be taking into consideration
cultural appropriation.
The second one is going to need to take into
consideration different laws and regulations.
For example, when it comes to age, I know
minors - there are some things that you cannot
do as a minor.
We do need to keep those in mind as well.
So, we also need to define some terms, and
I have many different terms that I'm going
to talk about here.
We're going to go through each of them on
their own and define them and then we're going
to go through each of them and give some examples
of how these happen in different pagan and
witchcraft communities.
And then towards the end, we're going to talk
about some things that we can do as individuals
to make our community better, okay?
So, the first thing that we need to define
is racism.
Now, put simply, racism is a form of prejudice
in which one person believes that the other
is inferior based on the social construct
of race.
It's often way more complex than the definition
that I just gave, and it covers a wide range
of systemic and institutionalized issues.
There is also the fact that, when we speak
about racism, we're not necessarily speaking
about prejudice in itself.
We are speaking about the system of oppression
that uses race as a means to justify that
oppression.
So, when we're speaking about racism in this
way, I want you to keep in mind that since
we are speaking about racism as a system of
oppression, it is impossible for someone to
be racist, in this sense, like against a white
person because white people are the majority
and they are the ones that are in the positions
of power.
They hold the most power - we, I should say,
hold the most power.
I am a white woman.
We hold the most power over those - the minorities,
the Black community, the Latinx community,
you know.
It works as a system of oppression.
We as white people are not oppressed.
We as white people do not experience any sort
of ill effects, or violence, or hatred based
on the color of our skin to make our lives
more difficult.
So please, keep that in mind going through
this that racism in this respect is the system
of oppression that uses race as a foundation
for that hatred, okay?
Now, I cannot speak to any struggles, any
hardships, or the experiences of the Black,
Indigenous, and People of Color communities.
I'm a white woman and I do not speak for them,
okay?
So keep that in mind as well.
Also, I need to mention here before we continue
that all of the information I'm presenting
here in this episode is done through my own
research.
I don't have a degree in...whatever this would
be.
I don't have a degree in like, racial injustices
or women's studies or anything like that.
This is all based on my own research.
And with that in mind, there is the possibility
that I am forgetting something or that I don't
have a complete understanding of a particular
word or concept, so please keep that in mind,
too.
I've got some links in the description and
in the show notes for different articles and
sources and stuff that you can read, too,
if you're interested in where I got my information.
Okay, so we defined racism.
We can move on to the next term - is ableism.
This is one that I can resonate with because
I am not a neurotypical person.
I don't have any physical disabilities, but
I do have some mental illnesses that affect
the way that I live and the way that I view
the world.
So, ableism is the tendency to regard people
with a disability as incomplete, diminished,
or damaged.
Again, it's also a complex issue that covers
a wide range of systemic and institutionalized
issues, and oftentimes, people don't realize
that they are perpetuating ableist stigmas.
We'll talk more about how this plays in with
the witchcraft and pagan communities, but
this is why we have things like the ADA - the
American Disabilities Act - and we have laws
regarding accessibility for buildings and
access to treatments and things like that.
So, the next term is going to be sexism.
Sexism is discrimination and devaluation based
on a person's sex or gender, as in restricted
job opportunities, especially such discrimination
directed against women.
As with racism and ableism, sexism also tends
to be complex and involve systemic and institutionalized
issues.
Oh, I forgot to mention for podcast listeners
that all of these definitions are coming directly
from dictionary.com.
Sexism - we know what sexism is.
This is why we have the feminist movement.
And I also want to mention here, I don't have
a slide for it, but if your -- we need to
be intersectional when it comes to these things,
too.
And I'll try and remember to talk about that,
too, when we get to the things - when we start
talking about the things that we can do.
I'm going to make a note of it really quick
so that I don't forget.
But if you're like me, if you are female-presenting,
chances are you have experienced sexism at
some point in your life.
It does play a role sometimes in the pagan
community and the witchcraft communities that
I have seen, but it's not as prevalent.
Again, we'll talk about it.
Okay, I made a note of that thing that I needed
to make a note of.
The next term that we need to define is ageism,
and ageism - there's two parts to this and
I included both definitions here because I
think they're both relevant.
The first part is that ageism is a tendency
to regard older persons as debilitated, unworthy
of attention, or unsuitable for employment.
The second part is just discrimination against
persons of a certain age group.
The next term that we need to define is xenophobia.
Xenophobia is defined as an aversion or hostility
to, disdain for, or fear of foreigners, people
from different cultures, or strangers.
This one you might think is a little weird
to add in here, but it's - excuse me - it's
something that is becoming more common that
I'm finding in online pagan and witchcraft
spheres of community.
So, we need to make sure that we understand
this word, too.
I mostly see xenophobia happen with white
Americans claiming that those who look foreign
need to "go back to their own country."
That has nothing to do, really, with witchcraft
and paganism in this respect, but that is
sort of my basic understanding of the term
and the concept of xenophobia.
We also need to look at classism.
Now, classism is defined as a biased or discriminatory
attitude based on distinctions made between
social or economic classes.
For example, middle-class versus lower-class;
wealthy versus impoverished.
Classism is when someone from a higher class,
a wealthier person, looks down on someone
who is not on their level, basically.
Someone who doesn't have as much money as
they do, someone who is living in poverty.
Classism can also be a form of - not be a
form of - but classism can come from privilege.
Most of the time it does come from privilege.
But what I mean is that sometimes it happens
out of ignorance and some people just don't
know any better.
They don't know that someone living in poverty
might have to choose between paying their
rent or buying groceries for their family.
There's also this term here, SOGI.
It's S-O-G-I for podcast listeners, and it
actually stands for Sexual Orientation and
Gender Identity.
This is actually an acronym that I learned
from a training when I worked for a hospital
in Oregon a couple of years ago.
SOGI is included here in its own sort of category
because I didn't feel like it fit quite in
with sexism, but this would include discrimination
and prejudice based on someone's sexual identity,
orientation, or gender.
This includes all manner of the LGBTQAI+ issues
and community.
Okay, so, we have definitions out of the way.
I hope you stuck with me through that.
I didn't want this to really turn into like,
a lecture, I guess, but it's important to
understand these terms, what they mean, and
move forward from there because if you don't
understand what the terms mean, it's going
to be impossible for you to accurately see
it in the community and then do something
about it.
But I want you to be able to use your critical
thinking skills to form opinions and question
the things that you see.
It's an important thing for you to do.
This is why I give you these definitions and
why I tell you to do your own research because
everything here is based on my research, so
naturally, I'm going to see it a little bit
different than you will.
But I'd like for you to be able to go forward
from this and understand these terms while
also questioning the things that you see around
you and, you know, maybe you will have different
ideas than I will.
Maybe you'll have different ideas than someone
else.
But please use your critical thinking skills
and - go into the community with your thinking
cap on and go forward from there.
So, the first thing - I want to talk about
what racism looks like in the pagan and witchcraft
communities.
I'm not going to talk about what it looks
like outside of this because there's a lot
of other sources for education out there right
now, especially with everything that's going
on in the world with Black Lives Matter and
the movement for racial justice, okay?
But within the witchcraft and pagan communities,
we can see the most notable examples of racism
in the - some sects of Norse paganism.
And this is a form of blatant racism, basically.
Odinism is a sect of Norse paganism that worship
Odin and claim that only white people can
worship or honor the Norse gods.
That is the furthest thing from the truth,
however, we see these pagans perpetuating
their white supremacist ideals and using their
religion to do so.
There's also the fact that white supremacists,
even outside of the pagan community, have
taken these Norse symbols and used them as
symbols for their white supremacy, okay?
Now, a form of systemic racism, and one that
is not always so obvious, is the fact that
books on cultural and ethnic practices are
oftentimes not written by people of those
cultures or ethnicities.
So, books like - books on Hoodoo, Vodou, Santeria
- they're often written by white people who
have no business teaching cultural and ethnic
faiths.
And when this happens, it essentially drowns
out the voices of those cultures and the ethnicities
that deserve to be writing about their stories
about their own faiths.
We don't want to drown out their voices and
this isn't something that happens - not necessarily
on an individual level.
I know Fire Lyte actually wrote an amazing
blog post that has so much information in
it.
That link is in the description and in the
show notes, that talks about how racism is
perpetuated systemically within pagan publishers
like Llewellyn and Weiser.
And that goes into the fact that a lot of
the people that are writing these books or
teaching about the cultures and the ethnicities
and those practices that they have no business
doing, they are essentially profiting off
of someone else's cultural practice.
And there's a problem with that because, for
the longest time - let's take Indigenous peoples,
for example.
They didn't get the freedom to practice their
religion, to practice their belief system,
until recently - I think within like the last
50 years.
And so it's really upsetting for them culturally
for a white person to come along and be a
shaman and practice indigenous practices and
then make a profit off of it because then
it perpetuates the idea that it's totally
fine when a white person does it, but when
an Indigenous person that has every right
to practice those practices from their culture
does it, then you know, it was illegal.
So, that is one of the bigger problems that
I see within the pagan community.
And I do want to mention here that closed
cultures are different.
When we talk about inclusivity in paganism,
I know there's going to be people out there
who say, "Wait!
But the closed cultures, the Indigenous peoples,
they need to be inclusive of everyone else!"
No, they don't, and we'll talk about that
a little bit towards the end, but calling
out cultural appropriation is not a denial
of inclusivity, okay?
I want you to keep that in mind.
There is also racism perpetuated when people
choose to ignore the words of Black, Indigenous,
and People of Color when they say that what
you're doing from their culture is disrespectful.
This goes for smudging, practicing Hoodoo,
Vodou, and any other cultural practice that
you really have no business practicing.
And I want to mention, too, that if you were
invited in, that's different.
If you were invited into that cultural practice
by someone from that culture and you're practicing
it, and you've been initiated or whatever
that culture requires, then that's different.
You're not taking part in cultural appropriation.
You were invited in by that culture.
And this also goes along the lines of taking
concepts, practices, and ideas from closed
cultures and using them as your own with no
cultural context or respect.
That's a problem.
Okay, next we're going to talk about ableism.
Ableism is something that we've talked about
before, but not so blatantly.
We had a conversation in the live stream of
one of my previous episodes about, I think
it was Mental Health and Trusting your Gut,
but someone had asked me if I had ever encountered
gatekeeping in the witchcraft community when
it comes to mental health because someone
told them that because they had bipolar disorder,
they could not practice witchcraft.
That is a form of ableism that is perpetuating
stereotypes and that's not okay.
So, obviously that does happen in the communities
- telling someone that because they have a
mental illness, like Bipolar Disorder, DID
- Dissociative Identity Disorder - Schizophrenia,
Depression, Anxiety, you name it.
Telling someone that because they have this,
they can't practice witchcraft or be a pagan?
That is very ableist.
We also need to make sure in the community
that we aren't seeing neurotypical and abled
people as the default.
That can lead to a lot of - I even talked
about this, too, where people always say,
you know, "Oh, you have to trust your gut!
Oh, you have to trust your intuition!"
But I can't...it's something I'm working on,
but it's not my default.
It's not something that I can do like your
neurotypical people would just be able to
do because they don't have the mental illnesses
behind their intuition or behind their gut
feelings like I do.
We also need to realize that certain conditions
make certain things difficult or impossible
for people.
We - we...I keep saying we!
I have seen this, too, besides the mental
health thing.
There are so many resources out there for
people learning paganism or learning witchcraft
in general and they always tell you that you
have to visualize.
You have to be able to visualize what you're
doing, visualize your manifestations, visualize
the energy, do this, do this, do this...all
in terms of visualization.
What they don't realize is there are people
out there who literally cannot visualize.
It's a medical condition called Aphantasia.
They do not have the ability to visualize.
That is another way, I think, that we just
need to be mindful of the way that we're speaking
and of things that we're telling people to
do.
I also want to talk about accessibility here
for a second because there are - there are
like videos, and websites, and podcasts, and
different things like that that aren't accessible
for everyone.
So, what I mean by accessibility is for like,
YouTube videos - are there subtitles?
Do you have a transcript of a podcast?
Do you use Alt Text when post images on social
media?
Those are all things that your average person
doesn't think about.
So, again, in the community, your average
person isn't going to think about these things
either.
And my biggest issue with ableism in the community
is when people tell you that you have to heal
the mind to heal the body.
That is the biggest load of crap I have ever
heard in my life.
There is nothing wrong with my mind.
Like, there is nothing wrong with it.
Yes, I have some mental health issues, but
they don't correlate with my body specifically.
There are studies that show that different
mental states and different emotions and things
like that can have an effect on your body,
but just a general like, "Heal your mind to
heal your body," or, "You have to heal your
mind to be spiritual," or, "You have to heal
your body to be spiritual."
That's all ableist crap that needs to stop.
The next one that I want to talk about is
sexism.
Sexism, again, I see it in people who perpetuate
the idea that only women can be witches.
I don't see that one very often anymore.
I do see a call for people to recognize that
men can be witches too which, umm, duh.
Of course, they can.
But there are people out there who say no,
they can't.
They're men.
They can't be a witch.
They have to pick a different word, which
is stupid.
Then there is also the idea of women-only
spaces that exclude other sexes and genders
for no other reason than because of their
sex or gender.
Raising the voices of male witches or pagans
over the voices of females and then "mansplaining".
I'm sorry, hold on just one second...
Okay...so sorry about that.
It's just me and my daughter home right now
and somebody was knocking on the door and
I guess I just got like, ding-dong-ditched
because I opened the door, and nobody was
there.
Okay, so, where was I?
Sexism - okay, I want to talk about this thing
that I have up here really quick - women-only
spaces that exclude other sexes and genders
for no other reason than because of their
sex or gender.
This one can get complicated because I understand
the need for women-only spaces for safety
issues during healing from trauma or some
sort of issue like that.
I understand that completely.
That is a reason, though.
For me, that's a valid reason to exclude people
because of their sex or gender, because the
reason is not because of their sex or gender.
It is because of a safety issue for healing
and trauma, okay?
But when someone just says, "Nope.
No, we don't want any men here.
Just because you're a man?
Nope.
We'd rather not."
That's a problem.
The same thing goes for women spaces, too,
okay?
And then raising the voices of male witches
or pagans over the voices of females - this
happens sometimes.
It's not something that I see a lot, but it
does happen.
And then mansplaining...I think in the pagan
community, or on Twitter at least where I've
seen it, we have coined it witchsplaining,
but that doesn't apply here.
When a man comes to you and explains what
you're doing like you don't know what you're
doing.
That's mansplaining and that's really annoying.
Anyway...
This can also become an issue for trans people,
though, and I'm going to talk about that when
we get to the SOGI section, but the next one
I want to talk about is ageism.
Hopefully, you're not finding this episode
too boring.
This is a really heavy topic, really important
to go through all of these completely and
understand them completely, but ageism happens
in the pagan and witchcraft communities when
it comes to discounting the words and/or advice
of elder witches and pagans because they're
"out of date".
Placing elder witches and pagans on a pedestal
like they can make no mistake, and also discounting
the ideas, concepts, and practices of younger
pagans and witches solely based on their age.
Ageism in our community goes both ways.
There are some people who completely disregard
the elder pagans and witches in the community
that have been practicing for decades simply
because they've been practicing for decades
and people think that they're out of date
or they're out of touch or something like
that.
But it also goes to the opposite end of that
spectrum.
There are people who completely discount the
beliefs and practices of younger pagans and
witches, and neither one of those is the right
thing to do, in my opinion.
Just because someone is old, or someone has
been practicing witchcraft or paganism for
decades doesn't mean that you just get to
write them off.
They still have important things to say.
Same thing - just because someone is young
and maybe hasn't been practicing for as long
doesn't mean you get to write them off.
They have important things to say, too.
Also, we can't discount a person and their
practices and faith just based on their age,
you know?
I've been practicing for...15ish years, okay?
There might be a 20-year-old out there who
knows way more than I do because they grew
up in it, so we can't discount and disregard
the practices of someone and the opinions
of someone solely based on their age, okay?
And then the other part to this is it's a
really dangerous thing to place anyone on
a pedestal and to hold someone in such high
regard that you believe that they can't make
a mistake.
And this is especially true in the pagan and
witchcraft communities where most of us are
learning every day.
Most of us are unlearning things every day,
and there are things that, you know, we're
going to make mistakes, and if you have someone
on a pedestal because they're an elder witch
or because they are a younger witch - if you
have them on a pedestal and you view them
like that, that leaves no room for you to
question things that - maybe they say something
that is problematic.
You're not going to question it because you
view them in such a high regard that they
can make no mistake.
I also want to talk quickly about xenophobia,
but I need to mention here that I don't encounter
xenophobia very often in the witchcraft and
pagan communities.
I also have a very basic understanding of
this concept so, it's possible that my examples
here aren't entirely correct or don't make
sense completely, so if so, please let me
know.
But the examples that I have for xenophobia
are telling someone they can't be a pagan
or a witch because of their culture or where
they come from, telling a pagan or witch that
they can't do x/y/z because it's against the
Wiccan Rede, and keeping Wiccans out of Pagan
and witchcraft spaces because they are different.
This can also be applied for all other belief
systems.
I have here in my notes that the second one
might be a stretch for xenophobia, but it
makes sense to me because xenophobia is like
the fear or disdain for people who are different
than you, or for strangers, and when we start
telling people what to do based on their beliefs
or because they are different than - I don't
know, maybe it's like telling someone that
they're not welcome because they are a Wiccan.
I see that a lot.
People seem to really look down on Wiccans
and I don't know why.
But that's - I have a very basic understanding
of the concept of xenophobia, so that is something
that I need to do way more research into to
make sure that I have an accurate understanding
so I can have better examples.
So, if you have examples of xenophobia or
if you have a better understanding of it,
I'd love to hear your side.
I'd love to hear your thoughts and opinions
on that one too.
I also want to discuss classism.
Again, classism comes from privilege.
This includes things like looking down on
or excluding pagan - or excluding a pagan,
witch, or community because they don't have
certain tools; not believing that some people
don't have adequate access to certain plants
and ingredients, and the belief that if everyone
just tried hard enough, they could have the
tools, herbs, or whatever it is that they
need.
Again, as I said, classism comes from privilege.
Sometimes, you know, if they're not exposed
to people who live in poverty or who don't
have that adequate access, they're not going
to know any better.
They are going to be very naive and think
that everybody has access to all of this,
you know, all of the tools and the things
that money buys, right?
But again, we'll talk about privilege in a
minute.
The last one - I think it's the last one here
- is SOGI, the sexual orientation and gender
identity discrimination.
This looks like excluding trans and nonbinary
people from participating in or joining a
coven, excluding trans women from women-only
spaces, and telling someone they can't worship
or work with a specific deity solely due to
their sexual orientation or gender identity.
And immediately what pops into my head is
Z. Budapest and her, you know, very specific
tradition of Dianic Wicca that looks to exclude
anyone that does not have a vagina or who
was not born a woman.
Their traditions are very heavily based on
the sexual identity of their members.
And - now, this isn't all Dianic traditions.
I want to make that very clear.
These are just the traditions that follow
Z. Budapest and her guidelines.
So that is a form of SOGI discrimination.
Telling someone that they can't join a women-only
coven just because they're a trans woman and
they weren't born a woman.
trans women are women, okay?
The same thing goes for the other direction.
I'm not familiar with any covens that are
men-exclusive, but if a men-only coven were
to exclude a trans man, it would be the same
thing.
And I have seen people tell other people that
they can't work with or worship specific deities
because of their sexual orientation or gender
identity, or any of that.
Their sex in general, which I think is just
silly.
There are some deities who work more with
women than men, but I'm not too familiar with
any of them, so I don't want to speak on that
too much.
The next thing that we need to talk about
is cultural appropriation and inclusivity,
okay?
Being called out or educated on cultural appropriation
is not a denial of inclusivity.
Some gates are meant to be closed for a reason
and it's perfectly acceptable for one culture
to tell another that they cannot take their
practices, okay?
So practices of closed cultures are closed
because of belief, context, cultural ties,
and history, okay?
It's - when you think about it on the surface,
it doesn't make sense, right?
It doesn't make sense that you can be inclusive
and still uphold the idea of cultural appropriation.
But you can because there are certain things
that you just don't have access to, period,
okay?
Like - excuse me - when - a white person has
no right to demand access to a cultural practice.
You can be invited in, but you cannot demand
to have access to those practices.
You cannot demand for someone to teach you,
and the biggest reason for this oftentimes
is history.
Because these cultural practices were historically
banned and the people from these cultures
were not able to openly practice their belief
systems, it's very disrespectful and offensive
when a white person comes along and they can
completely get away with doing whatever they
want because they're white, right?
And, you know, when a white person does it,
it's okay, but when an Indigenous person or
someone from another culture does it, then
people look down on that and ban, even, those
beliefs.
So I want to make it very clear that cultural
appropriation and inclusivity can happen together
- or the idea of cultural appropriation is...there's
a thing that I'm trying to say.
I'll think of a better way to say that, but
you can call out cultural appropriation and
still also call for inclusivity because inclusivity
does not cover closed practices, period.
I will go back to using the doctor analogy
that I used in the article that I wrote about
gatekeeping, okay?
You can be invited in, but you can't demand
that they teach you.
If you want to read about that analogy, I'll
leave a link in the description and in the
show notes.
Or you can just go to my website.
The article is called On the Topic of Gatekeeping,
I think, but I will find a link and I will
leave it in the description.
Now we can move on to the fun stuff - what
we can do to be better individuals and what
we can do to be better as a community, okay?
I'm sorry that this episode is really long.
I'm sorry that this episode is really information
intensive.
Actually.
You know what I'm - I take that back.
I'm not sorry because it's important.
Apologizing is something that I'm working
on in my shadow work, by the way.
But there are so many things that you can
do to help combat the racism and the transphobia
and all of these issues in the pagan and witchcraft
communities.
There are so many things that you can do to
be inclusive in your own individual lives
and in your practices, and in the way that
you interact with the community, okay?
The first thing you can do is listen to marginalized
communities when they are speaking out about
something that is problematic.
I just recently had this issue when I made
a video talking about bullying and cancel
culture and conversations.
We were talking about the Fated Star tarot
deck and how some of the images that they
were using were very offensive and perpetuated
a lot of negative stigmas for the mental health
community.
If you want to watch it, by all means, go
watch that video.
But we need to listen to marginalized communities
when we are trying to make our community better.
If one community is standing up and saying,
"Hey, this thing that you're doing is hurtful
to us," or "This thing that you're doing is
offensive to us," then the rest of the community
needs to listen.
We need to stand up and listen.
We also need to be aware of the content that
we consume.
Again, this goes back to, for me, books.
If I ever wanted to read something about Santeria
or any of the African Diasporic traditions,
then I would do my best to go to the source
and find someone within that culture who can
write about it for me to learn, because that
is the purpose of them writing the book.
I don't want cultural information from a white
person.
And I will never teach cultural information
because I'm a white person.
I don't have the right to do that, so be mindful
of the content that you consume.
This goes for books, podcasts, YouTube videos,
you know, basically everything.
We also need to think about if you create
content - ugh, I'm having a hard time talking
today.
We also need to discuss that if you create
content, are you inclusive?
Are you making your content accessible?
This is why my podcast episodes have transcripts.
If someone wants to, you know, take part in
my podcast and they're hard of hearing or
they are deaf, they have that option because
it's transcribed.
And the same thing goes for YouTube.
A lot of my older videos and my older podcasts
aren't transcribed or have subtitles yet,
but I'm working on it.
Those are things that I do myself because
I can't afford to pay anybody right now.
But it also goes for if you have a website,
is it accessible?
Do you use alt text for your images for people
that use screen readers so - because maybe
they're blind and they can't actually see
the image?
Alt-text is an alternative text that describes
the image to people who can't see the image.
That's - those are all things that we need
to take into account if we create content.
Are we accessible to everyone that we can
be accessible to?
We should also - we also need to be able to
understand our privilege.
You should not rely on marginalized groups
to educate you.
Now, if someone like me who speaks about mental
illness and how that plays a role in my faith,
and in my practice - that's kind of...that's
what I do, you know?
So, if someone has questions or topics or
whatever, they can bring it to me, and I can
do my best to answer those questions.
But also, we don't need to be treating content
creators or authors or anyone else on the
internet or outside of the internet like Google.
If you can Google the question and find an
answer in the first page of Google search
results, then you should probably do that
first.
Now, if you have a question like personal
experiences or advice or things like that,
then yes, maybe go to someone, but only if
they have said it's okay.
It is not the responsibility of any marginalized
group or community to educate you.
That is...that is on you.
It doesn't matter if you say, "But wait, how
am I supposed to know?"
There are resources.
There are people like me, for example, who
talk about mental health and spirituality.
I am a resource.
There are people on YouTube and people that
write books that talk about their faith and
their cultural practices.
There are able-bodied and disabled people
who talk about their experiences.
There are resources out there, but you just
have to look for them.
Don't leave it up to content creators and
authors and stuff to teach you because it's
not their responsibility.
And let's go back to this one really quick
because I also - I want to discuss privilege
for a second.
Privilege changes how you view the world,
and as a white person, I recognize that I
have privilege because of the color of my
skin.
As a woman, I recognize that I do not have
privileges that a man would have.
As a neurodivergent person, I recognize that
I do not have the privileges of a neurotypical
person.
As a person who is, I don't know, below the
poverty line I guess you would say, I recognize
that I don't have certain privileges.
But if you do, you know, you need to understand
where that privilege comes from.
And privilege doesn't mean that your life
has been easy.
Privilege doesn't mean that you haven't struggled.
It doesn't mean that you're rich.
It doesn't mean any of that.
Privilege just means in the case of, you know,
sex for example.
I'm a female.
I'm not a man.
For a male, privilege for a male means that
they have not been discriminated against based
on their sex.
They haven't been discriminated against because
they're a woman.
That is male privilege.
The same thing applies for every other privilege
out there, okay?
And we can also touch on the idea or the concept
of intersectionality.
If your inclusivity isn't intersectional,
then it's not inclusive.
Intersectionality means that it includes everyone.
So, the easiest example to talk about is feminism,
right?
You have feminism and we want equality for
all women.
But if you don't include the fact that white
women have a privilege, even among other women
of other ethnicities, then it's not intersectional.
We need to understand that yes, while women
as a whole have struggles like the Wage Gap
and just how we're treated in the workplace.
The different ethnicities of women have different
struggles, you know?
Black and Latina women are paid less than
white women.
White women are paid less than men.
All women are paid less than men, but Black
and Latina women are paid less than white
women.
So, making sure everything is intersectional
means that everything comes together, and
we take into account everything, and that
needs to happen within paganism and witchcraft
too.
So, lastly, I want you to not be afraid to
make mistakes.
Mistakes are part of the learning process.
That's how we grow, and it's how we learn
as people and as spiritual beings.
We also need to listen when people correct
us, but we don't, you know, don't expect them
to educate us.
I'm so sorry.
And back to learning from your mistakes - making
mistakes as part of our learning process.
When we are afraid to make mistakes, we cannot
grow, and we cannot learn.
I will be the first one to admit to you when
I make a mistake, or when a mistake has been
pointed out to me.
I will own up to that mistake.
Take responsibility for the mistake, but also
for my own education so that I do not make
that mistake again.
That's part of this whole process, and it's
part of learning to be inclusive.
I also want you to not get overwhelmed, because
if you've never thought of any of these things
before, all of this information can be 100%
overwhelming and you can feel like your brain
is just going to explode.
It's okay to take it one step at a time.
Find something that is important and learn
about it.
Learn how you can be inclusive.
Learn how you can shift your language to be
more inclusive and continue.
I don't expect people who have never encountered
any of these things before to just take them
all and run with it and do everything right.
I don't even do everything right all the time,
okay?
Don't get overwhelmed and don't be afraid
to make mistakes, and I included a quote here
in the PowerPoint for those on YouTube.
Podcast listeners, I will read it to you.
It is a quote by Maya Angelou, and it says,
"Do the best you can until you know better.
Then when you know better, do better."
And we will leave it at that.
That's basically everything that I have.
I had all of those slides and all of my notes
here and we can move into the bonus section.
So if you're not going to stick around for
the bonus section here on YouTube, I will
see you next time.
Podcast listeners, you can turn it off here
if you don't want to listen to the bonus section,
and I will talk to you soon.
Okay.
I don't even know how many people are here
if anybody is even here right now, so I'm
going to minimize this and go to the live
chat and see what's going on.
Hi, okay, so there's a couple of you here.
I know this is like a humongous topic.
Hello Cloud.
Hello Bex.
Hello Jezebel.
Hello Raven Morning Glory, and hello Curses
and Prayers.
Let's see...
Right, okay, so Bex mentioned in talking about
the Norse symbolism or the Norse symbols being
used for Nazis - this is an important piece
of history and she says that it all stems
from --- Sorry I lost my place.
It all stems from the Third Reich and the
Nazis repurposing the old Germanic Symbols
for their patriotism and horrible doings.
That is 100% correct, and it's actually not
something that I know a lot about, but I did
see that within my whole research.
So thank you for bringing that up Bex because
I forgot to mention it there.
Jezebel says that there's classism the other
way around.
Some pagans will dismiss someone for having
too much and call it plastic witchcraft and
consumer witchcraft.
That's true too.
That's very true.
I mean, I'm not here to say like just because
you have all this stuff you're, you know,
you're not a witch or you're not a Pagan or
whatever, and I don't look down on anybody
that has all of those things.
Do I think that maybe they could do something
different maybe?
I don't know, but it's not my place, you know,
I'm not there to tell anybody what they can
and can't do or what they should and shouldn't
have.
It's just...it's a...It's a whole topic, I
guess.
Bex said that they might actually be guilty
of that too sometimes.
And you know, it's - we all are.
We all - we don't live in a bubble.
We don't live in a perfect world.
We don't live in a perfect society or anything
like that, so it's, you know, it's not uncommon
for us to have done any of these things at
any point in time.
The difference between someone, you know,
who still perpetuates this and who doesn't
is the fact that we can recognize the things
that we have done in the past, or the things
that we're currently doing, and work towards
being better.
Curses and prayers says "I'm sad YouTube stopped
sending email notifications.
I always seem to miss most of these as it
is."
They stopped sending email notifications?
Well, what you can do if you have the YouTube
app on your phone or something, this will
work, but if you're subscribed and then you
hit the bell and go into it and hit like all
notifications or all something, you'll get
a notification on your app about 30 minutes
before I go live because I have these scheduled
so you should get a notification that way.
I didn't know they quit sending emails, like...that's
a bummer for us content creators because a
lot of the time people, you know, I schedule
these a week in advance and people will forget
or they'll just miss out.
That sucks.
I'm sorry.
Does anyone have any questions, or you know
anything that they want to say about this
particular topic?
I didn't want it to come off too lecture-y,
but I feel like it did.
I feel like it came off is like me teaching
a class, which I'm okay with that, but you
know, with YouTube and how YouTube is, if
it's not pretty and aesthetically pleasing,
sometimes people just won't listen.
But you know, it is what it is, I hope anybody
that watches it gets, you know, gets something
out of it.
I do want to apologize earlier for those watching
in the live stream when I had to stop my stream
and go check the front door someone knocked.
And then and then I opened the door, and nobody
was there.
So that was weird.
Thank you, Bex.
I really appreciate that.
Well, if nobody has anything that they would
like to ask, oh, hi Dindrane.
Very good and extremely important, yes.
I like to cover these kinds of topics, even
if they're not aesthetically pleasing.
I still like to cover them.
They are important and I'll have the transcript
up too, and I'm going to leave a link to...somewhere...where
you can download the PowerPoint presentation
if you want to keep it.
I know some people like to do that, but I
don't have a link up yet, but I will.
Podcast listeners, that link will be in the
description.
The Skeptical - hi Skeptical Witch!
Yeah, see, and that's why I like to talk about
these things because people don't talk about
them.
Podcast listeners, The Skeptical Witch said
that this was a really good video of things
that aren't talked about enough in witchcraft
and pagan communities.
Sorry, I have to repeat myself so podcast
listeners know what the heck I'm talking about.
But yes, things need to be talked about and
it's - I always want to stress that I don't
want people to get overwhelmed because it's
a lot.
An even for me, you know, going back and learning
these things and unlearning problematic behaviors
that I didn't even know I had is a process.
That's why I don't want people to be afraid
to make mistakes.
And I want people to be able to learn and
go forward and do better for themselves and
their communities.
And I know some people are going to watch
this or listen to this and say "Oh, but that's
just...you're just being politically correct
and you're just being too nice," and all of
that other crap, but it's not politically
correct to make sure that everyone is included.
It's not.
So, I hope it was informative.
I hope it was helpful for you and...yeah,
I will...I will catch you all later.
I hope that if you're watching the live stream,
you are safe.
If you are in the path of Hurricane Laura.
I hope everyone is staying safe and healthy.
If you had to evacuate, you know, I hope you
were able to get to a safe place, okay?
My thoughts are with all of you.
I'm doing what I can on my end to keep that
whole area in my prayers and I am doing my
prayers and giving offerings for all of you
to be safe.
So, I will catch you all next week.
Oh, I totally forgot to do my like if you're
watching now...so if you're watching this,
make sure, this is your reminder to give the
video a thumbs up if you liked it, if it was
helpful to you or, you know, you can give
it a thumbs down too if you didn't like it,
whatever.
Everybody can have their own opinions, but
I will...I will catch you all next week.
Bye for now.
