Pride Reflections

Like a lot of American celebrations with more radical roots, as GLBT Pride festivals & parades across the country have grown over time, they have become more mainstream and commercialized. (Great critique of Pride here) Some folks of a more radical bent wring their hands over this, longing for more overt expressions of sexuality, anti-capitalism, and pointing out trends with obscure academic sounding terms like “homonormativity” and pinkwashing. While I think there are many valid criticisms that can be made especially of larger Prides and the movement as a whole, these are internal community debates. Prides, while remaining GLBT-centered, are also a reflection of continued acceptance and integration into broader communities- much as ethnic celebrations like Cinco De Mayo, St. Patrick’s Day and so forth have become not just for Mexican and Irish-Americans. At the same time, there’s a balance to be struck. Straight & cis allies can enjoy Pride, while understanding that they are in a queer-centered space, so they can’t be complaining about being hit on by someone of the same sex, or guys parading around in leather chaps and such. There’s space for both the conventional lesbian soccer moms as well as the wacky drag queens.

This year of course we have even more to celebrate, as the Supreme Court just ruled in favor of marriage equality. Of course, I’m quite excited, though I realize there are many more issues we need to work on, both domestically and around the world. I do think we need to give folks a chance to celebrate before lecturing about gloomy statistics about queer youth suicides/murders and the continuing AIDs epidemic.  Anyone who thinks the entire GLBT rights movement was just about marriage and Don’t Ask Don’t Tell obviously has a pretty superficial understanding of it (and probably is only really thinking about the G and L parts) But I think this is part of why it’s a good thing that a more diverse range of people attend Prides- we can get the chance to educate non-activist GLBT folks & allies about these issues and convince them to do more than wear rainbow beads and dance to ABBA.

One of my fellow Unitarians- reflecting on the General Assembly- our national conference held that same weekend- points out two other important Supreme Court rulings that we should be celebrating– the one upholding the Affordable Care Act* (yes, I’d like a single payer system, but I’m still glad we have this one!) which I did hear about, and another the makes it easier to prove implicit discrimination in housing– proof of explicit intent to discriminate based on a protected status is no longer required. (I may have described that wrong- it’s hard to summarize legal stuff- so read the article) This is huge, because for decades the Supreme Court has been getting pickier about how obvious discrimination has to be before they will accept that it’s happening.

(By the way- if any “No pre-existing conditions/I’ll magically never lose my cushy job with benefits, so screw you”  people want to bitch to me about how it’s soo unfair they are being forced to pay for insurance they don’t need, don’t bother commenting, you can cry me a frickin’ river.)

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Updates/Notes on the Traffic Light/Racism Post

After reading some community feedback on my previous post, both here and on Wild Hunt, I’ve made some changes to the post and here are some further comments and explanations.

*Faoladh/C.L. Vermeers correctly understood my intent that the presence of  “yellow signs” aren’t necessarily OMG that means group/person X is racist! Other people didn’t read my post as carefully or perhaps I was not clear enough. The entire point of this exercise was to avoid jumping to conclusions and badly supported accusations of racism and Neo-Nazism based on certain words, symbols and themes found in European culture and religious oriented individuals and groups.

*I decided to removed some references specific to Heathenry- mainly the folkish and tribalist labels- partly because I find these terms are not always used consistently by different individuals and groups. There may also be different connotations in different countries- some have noted that “tribalist” has been used as code for folkish, but I think this is mostly a U.S. American thing. I was conversing with a British Anglo-Saxon tribalist Heathen over on Wild Hunt and realized this. Another reason is that I want to emphasize that racism among Pagans is not just a “Heathen problem” it’s a problem in almost all sectors of Pagan and polytheist religions, just as with broader society. I am concerned also that unnecessary paranoia about Heathenry and Asatru may lead to other Pagans wanting to further dissociate themselves from them. I would like to see more understanding between Heathens, other polytheists and Pagans, Wiccans et al while at the same time recognizing the uniqueness and independence of these different religions. Personally I have been impressed by the positive interconnection between local Heathens/Asatru with the broader Pagan community in the Twin Cities area, though it seems in the past few years they have retreated somewhat from this involvement.

*I have been trying to “sniff out” the signs of racism in various people and organizations unfortunately sometimes after rather unpleasant run-ins with them online. Frankly, I’m not sure how much I trust organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center to investigate organizations without having a bias against Heathenry, Asatru or other European polytheist religions. I also don’t necessarily trust the claims that specific Pagans and Heathens about being anti-racist- I judge them by their actions. My journey as a progressive activist with a strong interest in my European heritage can be a lonely and delicately trod path. Many of my fellow leftists have a secular or sometimes Christian bias and sometimes a degree of suspicion towards European cultural revivalists, so I have to be careful how I present myself and my views. For one thing, I pretty much entirely avoid the subject of Israel/Palestinian conflict.

*This is not about obsessively enforcing “political correctness” whatever the hell that means- it’s a rather vague term that gets thrown around, usually by people who are mad at me for insisting that they treat others with respect and try to learn about people who are different from them. How dare I disrupt their blissful ignorance!

*There are various discussions about a type of philosophy called Radical Traditionalism, and authors that are said to support that philosophy, which is connected with the “New Right” that I made reference to- this tends to be more of a European thing, though this school of thought seems to be an influence in the U.S. and Canada as well. I don’t feel knowledgeable enough about this to comment on it too much. Some folks feel that certain Pagan bloggers/activists are unfairly targeting particular scholars and philosophers as fascists, and including the journal “TYR” in this. If Rhyd Wildermuth cares to discuss the “Rad Trads” on his blog or elsewhere, I would recommend checking out what he has to say. Though I don’t agree with everything he says politically, as a political scientist I respect the research and thought he puts into his analysis.

A Druid’s Thoughts on Privilege

This is the post I spent so much time fussing over, but didn’t end up using for Pagan Blog Project. I decided to post it after all before I spend any more time on it that I could on other things! Another very insightful post about a broader perspective on privilege can be found at the World of Dust & Bones Blog: Paganism & Privilege Part 1: How We Talk about it (which in turn was a response to this post by John Halstead)

Note: I’m going to discuss religion and privilege in the United States specifically because I can better understand & explain it, I would be greatly interested in hearing viewpoints and experiences specific to other countries.
Some “privileges” are really rights that everyone should have, while others are simply unfair advantages that no one should have. Everyone should have the right to practice their religion freely, (or not practice any religion) in a way that does not interfere with others’ rights. Christians in the United States and many other countries have this right, but it is more protected and unquestioned than it is for those of minority faiths. Christians in the U.S. also  sometimes misuse their privileged status to get favorable treatment for their religion that other religions do not get. These are facts that most Pagans would agree, and most Christians that have any self-awareness at all. (I.e. not the ones who think this was founded as a “Christian nation”.)

On to Wiccan(ate) Privilege
Wicca, and pagan religions,  that closely resemble it, are like it or lump it still the largest group of self-identified Pagans. Anytime a group has been around longer and is bigger, it is typically going to get social privilege along with that.
The status of Wicca and Wicca-like forms of paganism within broader interfaith pagan settings (8 sabbats, use of magic, Goddess or God/Goddess theology etc) is similar to the status of Protestant Christianity within monotheist religions. Talk about God and religion in the public square-  “civil religion” historically reflected this, and excluded Catholics, Jews and Muslims. The Catholics and Jews are *kind of* more included, and the Muslims are slowly starting to be,  though they face an uphill battle of xenophobia and anti-terrorist paranoia.  Then there’s all kinds of wrestling over who’s “really” a Christian, as we saw in the 2012 election with a Mormon and a *suspected* Muslim running for President.

After Wiccans, Druids and Heathens/Asatru are the most commonly known pagan religions. If you’re a pagan of some sort, you probably know of all three, and likely specific traditions and organizations that fall within them. If you’re a monotheist or atheist in the broader U.S. culture, it’s likely you know of Wicca, think of Paganism in general as “Wicca-like” or the same, and may have vaguely, in passing heard of Druids and Heathens.
Druids are usually considered “close enough” to Wicca to benefit from some types of Wiccan privilege. As in, we typically celebrate the same 8 holidays, consider ourselves nature/earth-based.  British-style revival Druidry such as OBOD is even closer to Wicca. (Ross Nichols, its founder was good friends with Gerald Gardner after all) And as with Wiccans and their close cousins, many Druids have interest in movements like feminism, environmentalism, peace, some kinds of New Age spirituality and magic.

Ruadan: “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.” Spot on. As someone who is part of both, I think that is very true. We celebrate the 8 “standard” holidays and have a ritual structure that be adapted for various pantheons.

Heathens worship some of the same Gods as Wiccans, and celebrate some of the same holidays (like Yule) But in general the Heathen community has less in common with secular aspects of Wiccan subculture.  (link to the Hammer & the Pentagram article) The Heathen community has developed a very distinct identity from Wicca-centric Greater Pagandom, and the positive interactions they have had are much due to the efforts of people like Diana Paxson, who was Wiccan before becoming Heathen, intermarriage and friendship between the two and so forth. To the Heathen’s advantage, the United States has major English & German cultural influences- secular holiday customs, and various other customs and social mores that we are familiar with not to mention the English language itself.

Further afield, we have Roman, Greek, Egyptian reconstructionists/revivalists/polytheists. Other pagans may be familiar with Roman, Greek and some Egyptian God names and mythology, but the ritual practices, calendars, and cultural worldviews are likely to be very foreign to them. And the knowledge many pagans do have of these cultures is often superficial and distorted by outdated Victorian or feminist scholarship, and Western occultism. (Actually the knowledge people have of Celtic cultures is usually pretty superficial too, but that doesn’t stop them from thinking they know all about it.)

More posts on the subject:

Baring the Aegis: On Interfaith & Privilege– this is one of the most moderate polytheist responses that I feel closest too.

Unity & Diversity by Helio Pires, Golden Trail blog

A Gaelic Polytheist’s experience’s with WP in a CUUPs ritual