New "American Council of Witches"

[too2sweet]

(i'm posting this in several guilds, so sorry for the deja vu xd )

Well... we know how many people feel about the original council and their "13 Principles", and apparently they are re-forming and getting ready to update. Thoughts on if this will go over any better than it did the first time, and does anyone think it would be worth it to try to participate (if nothing else as an effort to stop some of the misinformation from continuing to spread)?

Full article on the Wild Hunt blog - The Return of the American Council of Witches  

[X-Yami-no-Ko-X]

I'm kinda scared of what's going to happen if/when this actually gets back up on their feet.

One would be the fact that they're including all Pagans but we all know that not all Pagans are witches and not all witches are Pagans. But they sure seem to make it seem that way. Or atleast that's what I got out of the article.

Plus with them trying to contact everyone that was on the orignal council that, to me, makes it seem like its gonna do more harm than good. Especially with them making it seem like all Pagans are tree-loving hippies right in there in their mission statement.

I'm also wondering if Kenny Klein is really Wiccan based on his interview, since I have no clue who he is. I've never heard of him before.

Yes I'm typing this as I read it. Maybe there's a little hope for this group after all when they asked Kenny if it was open to non-witches.

But all I can really say right now is they're going to have a hell of a time trying to revise the Common Principles because of the fact that there is little holding the Pagan community together and even the witch community as I can see.

It'd be interesting to see what this group comes up with. Hopefully its nothing too severe and hopefully its something that'll actually help stop the spread of misinformation. But I'm thinking I'm hoping for too much if they're able to brong back a good number of the original group.  

[Sanguina Cruenta]

With any luck enough people will be telling them to bugger off that they'll give up in a huff.  

[too2sweet]

X-Yami-no-Ko-X

Yeah that's my problem too - unless they address the vast diversity that is "Paganism", it's sort of pointless. Not to mention that there are no common (or at least very few) that all paths would agree on.

Sanguina Cruenta

With any luck enough people will be telling them to bugger off that they'll give up in a huff.

Would it be better to tell them to "bugger off", or would joining, and potentially being able to help make a difference, be a better solution?  

[Morgandria]

X-Yami-no-Ko-X

I'm also wondering if Kenny Klein is really Wiccan based on his interview, since I have no clue who he is. I've never heard of him before.

Yes I'm typing this as I read it. Maybe there's a little hope for this group after all when they asked Kenny if it was open to non-witches.

Kenny Klein is one of the founders of the Blue Star tradition. It's not BTW, persay, but it is fairly damn close. As a form of witchcraft they're pretty damn cool - I have circled with some Blue Star folks before and enjoyed their company.

Mr. Klein is closer to being Wiccan than most ENP's out there who claim the title.

As for the rest of it;
I think this is pretty much like trying to piss up a rope.

One, witch doesn't equal pagan, and their choice to retain the title for their group encourages people to believe it does. Before they've said another thing they are still propagating misinformation, as the original Principles of Belief did.

Two, I do not think that Paganism has enough common ground to offer rules or guidelines. It would be better if they'd acknowledge or declare their are speaking on behalf of a particular variety of eclectic neo-pagan witchcraft, not all Pagan faiths or forms of witchcraft. Again, the misrepresentation that all Pagans are part of a single basic unified religion does not sit well with me.

Three: Opening this thing up to whomever applies to be a member is risky. If this is gonna be some sort of everyone's represented, 'democratic' thing, you can't discriminate. You can end up with people like Wade MacMorrigan sitting on the damn thing, trying to further their personal agendas - simply because they're pagan, and they will demand their pagan paths and perspectives are as valid as anyone else's, and the American way is to let all voices be heard.

Four: Oberon ******** Zell. UGH.

I don't foresee this coming to much of a consensus, except to pretty much piss off groups that aren't new-age-soft-poly-ENP witches. Being an American body, it's going to very strongly bear that American flavour and style to the paganism it represents. Sadly, this means it will still continue to misrepresent Wicca as something it is not, and it is unfortunately going to bear the marks of the North American entitlement complex in its' work.

I feel as if participating in this would only make it look more legitimate than it has any right to pretend to be. The first council was a massive act of hubris that I feel has no need to be revisited - trying to correct their efforts 30 years down the road is perhaps noble, but also sort of like tilting at windmills.

No random council of people anywhere has the right to define and make statements of belief or practice on behalf of all the rest of the people currently identifying under a very large umbrella term - especially if you're going to conflate two things that are really, properly, totally separate concepts. They either need to be more honest with how they identify their council and who exactly they are actually speaking for - or they need to just leave it be.  

[X-Yami-no-Ko-X]

too2sweet

I think the only thing that holds Pagans together is that the Pagan path is non-Abrahamic(was guessing on spelling and Merriam-Webster Dictionary made me cry inside while I was trying to find the spelling.)

Morgandria

Kenny Klein is one of the founders of the Blue Star tradition. It's not BTW, persay, but it is fairly damn close. As a form of witchcraft they're pretty damn cool - I have circled with some Blue Star folks before and enjoyed their company.

Mr. Klein is closer to being Wiccan than most ENP's out there who claim the title.

I was actually going to ask about the Blue Star tradition once I got back on. I was reading the Facebook page during Social Psychology.  

[kyndryana3]

Funny, I get together with some local Pagan's here once a month, and last night we were just talking about the possibility of some kind of organizing group for witchcraft (in terms of the vast number of people who are just full of bunk yet wandering about claiming to be experts about this or that).

I agree though, that by keeping the name Witch but then not requiring members to be witches, it is going to have some serious problems off the start. There were parts of the original principles the first group wrote that I didn't like. The bit for the army chaplains guide wasn't bad as I remember it (though it has been years since I've read it so I might be mistaken here).

A part of me thinks the concept (a group to stand up for and express Pagan rites and some sort of organization that promotes community) is a sound one. But I think that there is so much diversity in the community that building such a unifying organization might be more problematic than useful.  

[Morgandria]

That is the largest part of the problem. Paganism isn't a community in and of itself. It's a meta-community. It has many smaller communities beneath its' cover, that don't nescessarily function with other communities, or have any need to connect with other communities.  

[Loona Wynd]

I am actually intending to write something long about the previous 13 principles of belief and how they fail to work as a "Wiccan" concept as well as general pagan concepts and why witchcraft can not be unified as a religion as it is not a religion.  

[X-Yami-no-Ko-X]

Loona Wynd

I am actually intending to write something long about the previous 13 principles of belief and how they fail to work as a "Wiccan" concept as well as general pagan concepts and why witchcraft can not be unified as a religion as it is not a religion.

I've actually been brainstorming ideas like that since I told my friend about the new US American Council of Witches later that day too2sweet posted this. I got the idea to start a website to try disprove the 13 principle beliefs and touch on other stuff like the black and white magic arguement and other stuff like that.  

[too2sweet]

It's interesting to note that there is the possibility that this is all just a scam of some sort, if you look at the comments from Jill Medicine Heart Combs on the Wild Hunt Blog, as well as the fact that they are apparently "re-grouping" and forming other FB pages - see comments on their Wall, it all seems a bit fishy.  

[X-Yami-no-Ko-X]

I'm not sure whether I'd prefer it be a scam or not.  

[Katefox Tarnagona]

Well, apparently their Facebook page no longer exists. Take that as you will.  

[X-Yami-no-Ko-X]

Katefox Tarnagona

Well, apparently their Facebook page no longer exists. Take that as you will.

Its still up. I'm on it right now.
Is it possible you're not logged in? I had to log in to see it.  

[Katefox Tarnagona]

X-Yami-no-Ko-X

Katefox Tarnagona

Well, apparently their Facebook page no longer exists. Take that as you will.

Its still up. I'm on it right now.
Is it possible you're not logged in? I had to log in to see it.

Weird, because every link I follow (the one in this thread, and the one at The Wild Hunt) just drops me at the Facebook main page, and I'm logged in, so that's not it.