Non Fluffy Wicca

Gee, what a lovely way to take care of yet another murdering spree.

India: Someone in the government is confused. More than 2500 women have been murdered after being accused of witchcraft in the last 16 years, and obviously something must be done. How about increasing the stigma these women face by making that which they are falsely accused of illegal? The decision to ban witchcraft, and do nothing about the murderers, comes on the back of a UN report into the problem:

The central government has moved to declare witchcraft illegal after the UN expressed concern at the number of murders ascribed to witch-hunting.

The UN also released figures of what is said were the victims of witchcraft and black magic around the world. The world body has named India along with countries in Africa, Asia and South America as a high-incidence zone for witchcraft related killings.

According to official figures, 2,556 women were branded as witches and killed in India between 1987 and 2003.

And one very bizarre statistic:

The figure was around 4,000 collectively for Britain, Scotland, Ireland, Wales and Australia between 1999 and 2003.

The BBC has very little to say about this apparent epidemic. The closest story they have relates to a male occultist murdered in Yorkshire, but that was not the killers' motive. The result for Australia was even less helpful:

There are no pages about witchcraft murder australia from BBC News .

Perhaps there is a secret conspiracy of fundies going round bumping off occultists to please their God, and no-one knows about it.

Government may make witchcraft illegal - newkerala.com, 25th July 2004.

Posted by mikki at 08:51 PM | Permalink

And it's about time. You KNOW that if a Wiccan tax-exempt group dared speak out about political issues, we'd lose our status so quickly our heads would spin off and spit pea soup. But it seems ok for people like Rev. Falwell. Perhaps something will be done.

United States: The IRS has been asked to investigate televangelist Jerry Falwell after he sent out a newsletter urging his supporters to vote for George W. Bush in the forthcoming Presidential election. The newsletter also asked for donations to an organisation which supports Republican candidates. The complaint was made by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Executive Director, Rev. Barry W. Lynn, said Falwell is thumbing his nose at the IRS. He must not be permitted to use a tax-exempt ministry to engage in partisan politics.

Falwell, in his Falwell Confidential bulletin, wrote, For conservative people of faith, voting for principle this year means voting for the re-election of George W. Bush. The alternative, in my mind, is simply unthinkable. To the pro-life, pro-family, pro-traditional marriage, pro-America voters in this nation, we must determine that President Bush is the man with our interests at heart. It is that simple.

Falwell continued, However, simply voting may not be enough. I believe it is the responsibility of every political conservative, every evangelical Christian, every pro-life Catholic, every traditional Jew, every Reagan Democrat, and everyone in between to get serious about re-electing President Bush. That is why I am utilizing this column to urge you to support the Campaign for Working Families, which is headed by Gary Bauer. It is the organization that I believe can have the greatest impact in re-electing Mr. Bush to the Oval Office.

Falwell told the New York Times that the message did not come from his religious organisation, but from a lobbying organisation, and that it represented his personal view. But Falwell published it on his ministry's web site, and it was sent out under the auspices of Jerry Falwell Ministries.
[The Pagan Prattle Online]

Posted by mikki at 12:54 PM | Permalink

Oh NOOOO! More PROOF!!

England: A rather unusual crop formation has appeared in a Wiltshire field. The Hello Kitty crop circle was created by Circlemakers and New York artists surface2air to celebrate her 30th birthday and is approximately 60m in diameter. The photo is by Steve Alexander, whose web site includes a lot of impressive aerial photos of crop formations. (via Simon).

Update: Just noticed this was the 1500th entry in the Prattle. Must be a conspiracy or something...

Posted by mikki at 12:51 PM | Permalink

HAHAHAHAHAHA! (editor)
Guatemalen evangelists Juan Pablo and Kathia Leonardo have investigated a Hello Kitty craze in Hebron, and made some disturbing discoveries.

Well now we will see the relationship of the acient cult of cats and this Hello kitty character, as a matter of fact bast is still honored by some pagan cults, and that is not surprising because the greeks called her Artemis and the Romans Diana, which is also semiramis and every other pagan goddess around, Bast is represented as we said by a human body of a woman with a cat's head… that's Hello kitty description also!!, the difference is that it has cartoon non idol appearance, but as Demetrius the silversmith of Artemis, the Silversmiths of Hello kitty, a company named SANRIO (wich in chinese means Lord of the Mount), brings in no little business for her craftsmen, claiming net earnings of 114 billion yen for the fiscal year 2001.

Not only is she bringing Pagan cat worship into Christian homes, but she is doing so in a typically feline sneaky manner:

My so called theory is that there is a dumb spirit behind her, mentioned in Mark 9:16, and our children the children of Hebron are being drawn to destruction for no other reason that for the love of this world, satan Shrewdness brings this so called Toy because he knows Christians would reject Mickey Mouse, Pokemon, but Hello kitty? Oh she's so Cute, Most disturbing is the fact that Pi Beset in hebrew means mouth of loathing.

The depth of our fundagelical friends' research is stunning - it turns out that Kitty-chan's husband, Dear Daniel, is not a boy cat!

Also it is said that bastet is the goddess of the Lesbians, recently Mcdonald's launched a toy collection of Hello kittys dressed as a She and as a He, they came in such couples, of She and She but dressed as He and She, isn't that a repulsive statement of Lesbianism?????

But worst of all, she's leading little children into the occult!

Social Communication, without a mouth? How then does it communicate? according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience..... because anything that doesn't brings us an our children to the obedience of Christ, is not other thing but DISOBEDIENCE, And so maybe some contemptuous parents would snap… Are you saying I am exposing my children to witchcraft and sorcery!!!!!! Well maybe this parent should not wait until he sees his children in some sort of pagan practice, since the scripture says that rebellion [is as] the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness [is as] iniquity and idolatry. And adds … Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from [being] king.! Sam 15:23 And indeed Ephesus the capital of diana, was a city with one particular trait we find in Acts 19:19, …. And a number of those who practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all, witchcraft and ocultism is deeply linked to the goddess diana, artemis or bastet, all the names refer to same evil force... , even we find october 31st to be her day.

HELLO KITTY OR HELL OF KITTY - Kjos Ministries, 2003.
[The Pagan Prattle Online]

Posted by mikki at 12:49 PM | Permalink

Intel v. Jesus, via The Register. [The Trademark Blog]

Posted by mikki at 12:41 PM | Permalink

An interesting event occurred when I was in Grand Cayman last week that got me to do some serious thinking. One of the fellow students in the photo course I took seemed to take a liking to me, and asked me all kinds of questions about my life and things I did, etc. Then she asked me about my pentacle, and what it signified. When I told her I was a Witch, she kind of nodded and went on.

During our last day on the Island, she told me how much she admired all of the things I'd done in life, thought I was an interesting person, "but I wish you'd give up that witchcraft." I was taken aback, but asked her why she felt that way. Her only response was "because I'm a christian."

It was clear that she felt that her response answered the question I'd asked, and she was completely confused when I told her that the answer was meaningless and confusing at the same time. I began to wonder whether or not she would have said something similar to a Jew, a Buddhist, a Hindu, or follower of some other religion. "I like you, but you should give up Islam" is likely something that would rarely be heard, yet this person felt it perfectly ok to attack my choice of religion because she is a christian.

How many statements such as these are made out of total ignorance of another person's choices? I attempted to explain to her that Wicca is a polytheistic religion where we worship multiple Gods. I told her that we have no problem with anyone else's choice of religion, we do not attempt to convert people, and we respect others beliefs. She seemed completely confused and obviously did not understand the first thing I was saying.

This short encounter got me to thinking about both the lack of information in the mainstream about our religion, and the subsequent lack of legitimacy we receive in the eyes of the ignorant. There definitely is a lot to think about. For example, would an educational "foundation" of sorts be helpful or harmful to our cause? Educational groups to indeed exist, and groups like Pagan Pride try to "get the word out" but they depend on interested members of the community coming to THEM. But those who have interest and are willing to do research are not the target audience I'm talking about. The target audience are those who would never think to travel somewhere to attend a talk on Wicca. They are the ones who could be most helpful to us, merely by knowing that we aren't anti-christian crazies who want to burn down their churches.

So where do we find the people who we most need to get the word to? We need to go to their churches, to their schools, and to wherever else they exist. We need to impress them with who we are, with the type of people we are, the deeds we do, and the inner morality and strength we represent. Then we need to let them know what we believe, and that we are not a threat, and that we can work together to make the world a better place.

Am I dreaming? Perhaps so. But I would still like to keep giving it a try. If I can't educate by the thousands, maybe just one at a time will do for now. And I hope that I have perhaps taught at least one thusfar.

Posted by mikki at 11:58 AM | Permalink

Not sure what's worse. The fact that this loser Riordan attacked a small child because of her name, or the fact that the scheduled protest was cancelled because they found out the girl was white. I'm just mind boggled.

LOS ANGELES - The head of the California NAACP is demanding state Education Secretary Richard Riordan resign for jokingly telling a preschooler that her name, Isis, meant "stupid dirty girl."

Riordan, the wealthy former Los Angeles mayor known for his support of public schools, startled even friends last week with the comments at a Santa Barbara library.

Alice Huffman, president of the California chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (news - web sites), said Riordan "is not suitable to lead education in our state" and should be removed.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (news - web sites), his longtime friend, called Riordan's statement to the girl "unacceptable in any context" but gave no hint that his job was in danger.

But the issue has persisted. In an editorial Thursday, The Sacramento Bee said California "shouldn't have an education secretary who makes offensive, damaging remarks to young children for no apparent reason."

"He's the governor's top person on education, which means we would expect him to have some love and respect for children," Huffman said. "I think he is the wrong man for the job. There is no way for him to explain this away."

The conversation, videotaped by KEYT-TV, took place Thursday at a promotional event for summer reading at Santa Barbara's central library. The unidentified girl, who appeared to be a preschooler, asked Riordan if he knew that her name meant "Egyptian goddess."

Riordan replied, "It means stupid dirty girl."

After nervous laughter in the room, the girl again told Riordan the meaning of her name.

"Hey, that's nifty," he said.

A day later, Riordan issued a statement that said he "teased" the girl. "I immediately apologized to her, and I want to do so again for the misunderstanding," Riordan said.

Riordan, a venture capitalist who started a foundation supporting literacy, has a reputation for awkward — some might say insensitive — remarks and behavior.

As mayor, he once greeted hunger strikers outside his office eating a hamburger. In a speech to school administrators earlier this year, he told a story about a nun physically disciplining a student that startled some in the audience.

"There wasn't an uproar, but some people felt the comment was inappropriate," said Joseph Jones, assistant executive director of the Association of California School Administrators.

State Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg, a Democrat who served on the Los Angeles City Council when Riordan was mayor, called the remarks to the girl "completely reprehensible" but said they were uncharacteristic for a man with a soft touch for children.

"I've been in dozens of situations with him with children — he's usually the grandfatherly guy," Goldberg said. "I've seen him say things he wished he could take back many times — but never around kids."

A group of civil rights organizations, including the NAACP, planned to protest Riordan's remarks at the Capitol Thursday.

But the organizer, Democratic state Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally, canceled the protest after an apparent mix-up over the girl's racial background.

Gee, it's only important to protest if it was a black child, but not a Pagan child, or perhaps an Egyptian child?!?

Dymally was quoted in the San Jose Mercury News Thursday saying the child was "a little African-American girl. Would he (Riordan) have done that to a white girl?"

The girl is white, with blonde hair.

Dymally did not return telephone calls. His office issued a statement Wednesday calling Riordan's remarks to the girl "outrageous and irresponsible," then issued another statement Thursday saying, "To err is human; to forgive is divine."

"Race is not a factor in this issue," Dymally said, adding that Riordan had apologized a second time. "It is time for us to move on."

Posted by mikki at 08:50 PM | Permalink

After an utterly wonderful meeting and dinner with Don Lewis, High Priest and Chancellor of the Correllian Nativist Tradition, it is now time to head out for our trip to Grand Cayman where I will spend 10 days underwater communing with nature, fishies, other photographers, and Cathy Church the instructor who actually yells at you underwater.

Hopefully we will return with more fun pictures. Soon to come home.

Posted by mikki at 06:51 PM | Permalink

It's just been so strange, watching George Dubya's choices of appointees, and how he constantly tries to sneak just one more fundamentalist into the fabric of decision making in the US. He's surrounded himself with "advisors" of backgrounds that even I think are strange. So we shouldn't be surprised at this one either.

One of the craziest Bush judicial apointees yet.

The nominee in question, Leon Holmes, for the federal court in the eastern district of Arkansas, is simply nuts. I really don't know how else to describe the guy. First off, Orrin Hatch and Rick Santorum are both wild about him. This alone should be... [Morons Dot Org]

Posted by mikki at 10:42 AM | Permalink