One Nice Bug Per Day
Show & Tell
TVSTRANGERTHINGS
d e v o n
Claire Keane
Alisa U Zemlji Chuda
taylor price
Kaledo Art
Andulka
PUT YOUR BEARD IN MY MOUTH
occasionally subtle
DEAR READER
#extradirty
pixel skylines
tannertan36
No title available
Product Placement
shark vs the universe
Jules of Nature
h
seen from Germany
seen from Netherlands
seen from Argentina
seen from Serbia
seen from Palestinian Territories
seen from Bahrain
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Germany
seen from Austria
seen from Belarus
@seedling-druidess
what movie did you have on loop as a kid
ponyo (this is for me)
the lion king
aladdin
cars
a movie that was definitely too mature for you
star wars
any superhero movie
matilda
an old disney princess movie (snow white, cinderella, etc
something else (say in tags)
Scottish spoken word album of folk tales and folk magic traditions which are fast being lost and abandoned
“Taibhhsear” (pronounced tive'sher) is the title given to one who can see spirits of the dead - literally ghost seer. Capturing the essence of this spoken word album project.
Scotland has many traditions such as this veiled within Gaelic charms, language and memories shared in metaphor and song.
With your support, we will be able to rediscover, reinvigorate, record and share a collection of these folk magic traditions in Gaelic and English, reclaiming them helping us share the knowledge with you and others.
My friend Scott of The Cailleach’s Herbarium blog is raising money to help share and preserve Scottish folk magic traditions. Please share and donate if you can :)
The path of Druidry
So, I debated this for a few weeks, but after a tarot/rune reading that basically told me to get on it already, I did it. I already feel better and it's only been a few days. Just knowing that I have some direction, and the path I am taking is because I chose it. It's probably one of the first things I've ever done for myself, that I feel will have the most impact anyways.
I ended up going with OBOD (The Order of Ovates, Bards, and Druids) because I really liked the idea of having a course that I can take on my own time, and something that would give me a base structure to build off of. (Although, it does cost a pretty penny unfortunately)
The first little bit has mostly been history and just an introduction. It has opened my eyes to how.... Controlling and hateful Christianity is, and has been throughout history. Reading the history from the Druids point of view is really interesting. To think that it's a spiritual based path, that serves the individuals needs, and there isn't a form of the ten commandments is simultaneously mind boggling and incredibly freeing.
Just this little bit (I've only read what is essentially 2 chapters), has calmed me and makes me excited to learn more.
Okay sorry, I thought I was done but apparently not. Going on the journey to find a spiritually that fits me has been interesting. It has made me realize all the things I have to unlearn from my childhood, in order to heal and to truly follow a different spirituality than what I grew up with. I'll make a post about that when I get my thoughts, but I'll type a little bit out just to get it out of my brain.
Growing up, we were Christian and went to church every Sunday. Then we moved a couple times, and didn't find a new church. Mom always talked about how she felt bad, and how we really should find a church, and that even though you're still a good Christian if you don't go to church, your should still go if you can. And I never cared, I only liked going because i got to wear nice clothes once a week. But Mom had a lot of guilt for not going, and I guess I soaked some of that up. So that's part of what I need to unlearn.
TL:DR I have begun the path of Druidry, and am very happy with it. And it's made me realize how much i have to unlearn from Christianity.
In Tolkien lore there is a saying
“Do not trust to hope, it has forsaken these lands”
It is not that hope has no place in our world
Instead we rest upon it too much, we must acknowledge that hope has led us into complacency.
Into a throne of inactions and distractions, forever enshrined in the ice of grief.
But what do we do then?
Is there even anything to be done?
I do not know the answers necessarily, but I do know that laying down and surrendering our hearts to the march of destruction and apathy is not what you or I want.
So Let the hearth be a bulwark against this creeping darkness, build upon your knowledge and practices so they may be passed down to future generations, they will be the ones that will suffer more then you and I.
We can only do so much but those little actions build upon each other, this is the long game and we may not see results in our lifetimes but this matters not, what matters is that we fulfill our oath to the lands that gave rise to us.
To the lands that shaped our childhoods and hearts, you and I are all of this planet, our fates woven into a greater tapestry.
Cultivate strong communities
Grow resistance wherever the soil is fertile
Sharpen your bodies and minds.
We need all kinds of warriors, wielding all kinds of tools, everyone from young to old can help.
After we are gone what memories will we leave?
What stories will be told?
What songs will be sung?
Stories can inspire great things, from inventions to political action. stories are how we grow and sometimes sadly it is how we also rot.
So what story will you tell? What story will you make? I hope this doesn’t sound like a lecture, I have plenty to work on in my own life.
Maybe there won’t be many of us left but I’d like to imagine a time when a group of our descendants huddle round the hearth and tell tales together.
Tales of love, struggle, responsibility and diversity and of course courage.
Courage is what we must keep.
Hail The Dawn!
Pagan Holiday Ritual Template (Simple)
What is a ritual?
According to my definition and understanding, a ritual is simply a religious/spiritual celebration or the fancy word for a spiritual work. What makes it special is its structure and mixture of verbal and physical acts.
1.) Preparing the space
Both physical and spiritual cleaning should be done before a ritual. We are supposed to feel safe and relaxed in the place where we are going to perform a ritual. I believe it is pretty obvious how physical cleaning is performed (vacuuming the floor, wiping dust etc.). However, spiritual cleaning, that is cleansing is usually done by sprinkling some salt, or (salty) water or it is done by going around with an incense a.k.a smoke cleansing - my favourite. There are some other ways too, but these are the most common ones. The goal of cleansing is to remove any unwanted energies from the space. When it comes to my experience, since I perform my rituals at my home, I actually do not have a problem with negative energies but I still do the spiritual cleansing because it sets me in the mood for a ritual. If I am outdoors, however, then I usually leave some small offering for the natural world instead of cleansing, because I believe that the nature is actually pure in that sense.
2.) Self-cleansing
As we prepare our space, we also have to prepare ourselves for the ritual. This can be done by taking a shower or a bath, smoke cleansing, short meditation, short walk in nature etc. After this, we are supposed to be mentally and physically ready for what is to come.
3.) Drawing a sacred circle
Although this practice comes from Ceremonial Magic and Wicca, I like to use it as a part of my ritual structure. A sacred circle is supposed to be an energetic barrier, a ward that blocks unwanted energies and a place where wanted energies easily stay. From my point of view, a sacred circle is simply a border of my sacred space - as churches, mosques etc. have walls which determine a holy and special place in them, I have the sacred circle. The circle also reminds me on Stonehenge or a forest grove, so that is one reason more why I like to use it in my spiritual practice.
4.) Invocation
The word invocation comes from the Latin verb invocare, which means "to call on", "to beg for", "to cite". In this part deities, ancestors and the other beings could be invited to join the ritual. When I say "invite", I must say that so far I have never experienced anything supernatural (nor I have such expectations - at least not anymore) but this step is important for me because I believe that deities and ancestors are going to pay much more attention to me and to what I am going to say. I also like the gest of acknowledging that they are welcome in my sacred and special place.
5.) Celebration
This part of a ritual is what could be called a classic religious celebration. At this stage I usually firstly pray to the deities and my ancestors, then I put on some appropriate music, I contemplate about things that are related to the holiday I am celebrating, I do some divination etc. It is my favourite part of a ritual because it is the most informal - I can freely enjoy in all the beauty of my pagan path and practice.
6.) Feast
The Feast is a part of the ritual where food and drink is being consumed in deities' or someone else's honor. This is the time for the offerings.
7.) Closing
This is the end of a ritual. A farewell is bid to the deities, ancestors and the other beings, if they were called, and the sacred circle is being closed.
Note: This template is how I do my rituals. Not everyone's rituals must or should look like this - that is mostly why I wrote a lot of my thoughts and experiences, to maintain the subjectivity of this template. I hope some of you will find it useful for your spiritual/religious practice.
Imperialism kills.
They stole the land and killed the children.
I want to put this in perspective for anyone else in Canada: this has happened within less than a century. These are 1665 human beings who would have otherwise been elders today. Thousands of people who should have been able to grow up, live their lives, build families, maintain and pass on traditions, and more, gone because of British colonialism.
The Canadian government and Catholic church intentionally destroyed an entire generation of Indigenous people. Please, support your Indigenous friends, and please stop pretending that Canada is better than America when it comes to institutional racism.
Five clay dogs found buried under a doorway in the North Palace at Nineveh, and now in the British Museum . Inscribed as follows.
“Expeller of evil” (mušēṣu lemnūti) with white pigment and red spots (BM 30001)
“Catcher of the enemy” (kāšid ayyāb) with red pigment (BM 30002)
“Don’t think, bite!” (ē tamtallik epuš pāka) with white pigment (BM 30003)
“Biter of his foe!” (munaššiku gārîšu) with turquoise pigment (BM 30004)
“Loud is his bark!” (dan rigiššu) with black pigment (BM 30005)
The model dog that became a cat
Transcript:
“Most of what you think you know about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is wrong.
This is the model that we all learned in psych 101 is wrong [image of Maslow’s pyramid is shown] where our basic physiological needs are at the bottom of the pyramid and achieving one’s full individual potential is at the apex.
What you may not have known is that Maslow spent 6 weeks with the Blackfoot First Nation in the summer of 1938. He learned about their worldview and the Blackfoot Tipi, appropriated and misrepresented their perspective to establish his own Maslow’s hierarchy, and then didn’t give them credit.
[Image of Maslow’s pyramid and Blackfoot tipi shown, described below]
According to the Blackfoot Tipi, self-actualization is at the bottom of the pyramid. In the middle we have belonging and community actualization, where people take care of each other and help each other with their basic needs. And at the top, we have cultural perpetuity, which is teaching each other how to live in harmony with the land and achieve community actualization through generations.
It makes so much sense, right? Taking care of oneself is not enough. We need to take care of each other and our community.
This is why we need to decolonize psychology.”
Where's the spirit essay jojo
oh you mean the essay about how spirit untamed is legitimately the most evil thing i have ever seen and knowledge of its existence caused me to question whether humanity can truly be redeemed? you mean that essay? i need you to understand that i think dishing on children's media is stupid. children, and young girls especially, are constantly derided for what they like. i'm not here to do that. likewise, i'm not here to dish on sequels and reboots. i love sequels and reboots. i even liked the hobbit movies. i have no taste and won't attempt to force my taste on others. no. i'm here to say that spirit untamed is an unmitigated crime against both god and man in every way a piece of media can be because it attempts to build on the unparalleled masterpiece that came before it.
and i know i'm right. i've never been more right. what the fuck is spirit untamed, you ask? here's a trailer. you'll note they turned off comments. every official iteration of this has comments turned off. what i'm about to say in this essay is very much fellow-feeling for people of a certain age and they've made their thoughts explicitly clear basically everywhere this sequel film has been talked about. if you don't want to watch the above trailer or can't, it's a cgi animated horse girl movie with all the horse girl accoutrements. she moves to a small town, she's a little weird, she loves animals, she makes friends. presumably something bad is happening and she will fix it with horses and friendship. once again, i'm not here to dish on that. i love cgi and i'm a horse girl. i learned how to ride on a mustang. this is a movie about me. that's fine. if this were the only spirit that had ever existed, it would be fine.
unfortunately, this is a sequel to a much better movie, 2002's traditionally animated spirit: stallion of the cimmaron. when i say it's a "better movie" i mean that i'm not totally sure two movies so different can exist in the same universe. because the 2002 movie was told from the perspective of the HORSE as voiced by MATT DAMON and it was literally about him SABOTAGING WESTWARD EXPANSION and FUCKING THE EVIL UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT and DESTROYING INDUSTRY.
there are exactly two relevant humans in the film: the colonel (he's a colonel) and little creek (he's a lakota boy who gets captured by the united states government along with spirit, the titular horse). i'll let you guess who the bad guy is! no i won't. it's the united states government which is accurately depicted as an accessory of capitalist expansion west as represented by the railroad specifically, to the detriment of all things good. the first time we see anyone in uniform, they're killing natives in an unproved massacre on a native village. shortly after, the colonel captures spirit, and then little creek after that. when the colonel sees little creek, he comments on his race in a way that is malicious and real, and then has him put not in the stockade but tied up where they tie unbroken horses, where they have tied spirit. the movie never attempts to sidestep what it's depicting or saying. it says it plainly, in a way any child or adult can understand. it's uncompromising.
honestly, i'm kind of shocked this movie hasn't entered into the modern sphere of discourse a little more. maybe it's because it's unimpeachable. no one can disagree that it's visually one of the most beautiful animated movies out there. no one can disagree with the message, because it's so simple and true: yes, the government destroyed native populations. yes, it existed largely as an arm of capitalism to aid westward expansion at the expense of native populations and the land itself. the dichotomy of good and evil is so clear in this one and the evil is american.
this is the climactic scene:
spirit--who has just destroyed the railroad with little creek's help--tries to escape the actual literal united states government who are trying to actually kill this horse and this lakota boy with actual guns. i think little creek actually gets shot, but not fatally. they escape together by jumping across a canyon, solidifying the eagle symbolism that the movie used repeatedly as a metaphor for freedom and the spirit of the west, but the west-west. like the actual land in the west. not whatever texas thinks it is. it ends with little creek letting spirit go (this scene apparently still makes me cry 20 years later so JOT that down) along with his own horse so they can go live in horseful peace in the (titular) cimarron, which in this movie is an effective stand-in for the unmolested west--though the area depicted is largely a fantasy mishmash of various areas.
full stop i'm a emotionally compromised about any discussion of the american west and history. it's been most of my life and the depth and nuance is endless. we could examine the rights and the wrongs of the national park system, of preservation over conservation, over the drastic and continued and literal physical marginalization of native people and cultures. we can also get deep into wild horses in this area specifically today, how they're rounded up, why, and where they ultimately end up. all the efficacy of that. i've been to more bureau of land management auctions than i can count, and even trained a few wild horses. i'm not going to get into any of that here. i just want you to know that this animated horse movie, with music by bryan adams and hans zimmer, is the closest thing we have had to a mainstream kid's movie addressing any of it. any of the reality and any of the history.
it depicts the government sanctioned destruction of native populations, it shows how the "untouched" west was actually very much touched by native populations prior to industrial expansion west but not in a way that destroyed those areas, it critiques the very concept of taming the west, and it shows that manifest destiny and westward expansion as represented in the movie by the railroad had a very real toll on nature in and of itself and required vast fucking resources to accomplish. it even shows that they were really shitty to horses in the old west. and again, not to harp on it, but it absolutely 100% is the only mainstream animated film that shows an unprovoked massacre of a native village by the government. and it did all this no exposition, almost no dialogue at all. it just puts it on screen in stunning animation. i dare any studio to even attempt a movie like this today. no one would even try.
NATURALLY, THIS GIVEN, I WOULD FEEL SOME RESERVATIONS ABOUT A CUTESY SEQUEL WHERE SPIRIT IS LITERALLY TAMED BY THE DAUGHTER OF THE RAILROAD OWNER.
Good news: if you’re currently laying around and not producing anything, you are a credit to your species.
I’m an ant biologist and I’d like to point out that ants also spend a significant percentage of the time doing nothing.
Turns out sometimes the most evolutionary useful thing you can do is chill and not wear yourself to shreds, whether mammal or insect. It helps you deal with emergencies and adapt to change. Plus, you can act as living food storage!
That last part is probably more an ant thing than a human thing, but hey, live your dreams.
it’s also a bear thing, which absolutely explains me
Doing absolutely fuck-all is how antarctic sea sponges live to be over 10,000 years old, so live your best, longest, laziest life.
Remember lions? Fellow apex predators?
Yeah, they spend 16-20 hours of the day laying around, socializing, raising Cubs and napping.
The last 4-8 hours are spent hunting.
Wait wait, they’re not a primate so they don’t count.
How about Orangutans?
Well, they spend 90% of their time awake just hanging out in food-rich areas, eating fruit and leaves, socializing, raising children, and chilling.
Well, they’re not people so it doesn’t-
How about Stone Age people in Europe?
They probably worked 3-5 hours per day, every day. (Though seasonal changes in food scarcity could change that)
Laborers in ancient Egypt worked 8 hours, with an hour break at lunch. They did this for 8 days, then rested 2 days. That sounds familiar. Except… they also had regular time off for festivals and holidays, and only worked for about 18 out of every 50 days.
Artisans in imperial Rome generally worked from 6am to Noon, and then had the rest of the day off… and only worked for half the year, due to all the holidays and festivals they got off.
But that’s too easy, what about a Peasant in medieval England?
6-8 hours per day, with Sundays off, Farm workers put in longer hours at harvest time but worked shorter days in winter when there are fewer hours of daylight. Economist Juliet Schor estimates that in the period following the Plague they worked no more than 150 days a year, due to the long holidays and many festivals.
Ugh, let’s go poorer. 17th century France. Starvation was afoot for the working poor!
During the reign of King Louis XIV, the workers of France had it tough, and hunger for the poorest was a fact of life. The typical working day was as much as 12 hours long, but two hours were set aside midday for lunch and perhaps an afternoon nap. Nevertheless, the Ancient Régime is said to have also guaranteed peasants, labourers and other workers a total of 52 Sundays, 90 rest days and 38 religious holidays off per year, meaning they worked just 185 out of 365 days.
So what changed?
The industrial revolution, baybe~~
New factory owners could work their employees to the bone due to a lack of regulation and abundance of cheap labour.
The typical factory worker in mid 19th-century England toiled away for a soul-destroying 16 hours a day, six days a week, 311 days per year!
THAT nightmare became the standard by which western society began to judge “work-life balance” and anything gentler than the industrial factory’s unfettered brutality is considered “softness”
(So many people died being mangled in those machines. Hair handkerchiefs went into style during American industrialization because working women would otherwise get their hair caught in the machines, and be either scalped or be bodily pulled inside to die…. But that’s a horror for another time)
Americans in 2020 worked an average of 8.5 hours per day on weekdays, plus another 5 hours on weekends.
Taking out federal holidays and weekends, we work 262 days per year. Most of us get 5-9 sick days to take per year. (Yes, a fixed number, no matter how sick you really are), and usually either no paid vacation, or 7-15 days paid vacation, depending on seniority and the company. Unpaid vacation doesn’t have a max, but taking it often risks you getting fired.
Even comparing against the poorest laborers in ancient history the current working structure for humans is, frankly, inhumane.
We are mammals. Let us rest. Let us celebrate holidays and attend festivals. Let us attend to our homes and families.
Even the ultra wealthy folks who got their heads chopped off gave us more time off than this!!!
Someone in the comments said something like “humans are instinctively industrious and productive, as social creatures!”
Buddy, that’s a lie fed to you by capitalism.
In our default state, we attend to our families yes, but we also party like hell, lounge around, and make fantastic works of art just to be proud of ourselves. We made beautiful things for the joy of creating them.
Stone Age humans may have spent a couple hours hunting and gathering, but DEFINITELY spent loads of time painting every available surface. Time and weather washed most of it away, but some places like Arizona and Colorado still preserve a few of the endless murals made by ancient hands.
Evidence shows that the ancient world was COVERED in paintings and etchings - just saturated with images of birds and beasts and humans, sunsets and cool weather. We invented mythologies and painted about them. We did something impressive, and painted about it. We taught our children how to paint and lifted them into our shoulders so they could mark the ceiling.
In our most base state, humans will work enough to survive, but our instincts demand we use all other time to create art. We want to communicate. To make connections.
“Working” or “being productive” is not on that list.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
so can we start hunting down white liberals now or what
The full picture is even more heart breaking after you open the uncropped version. Just a heads-up, it's rough
“The Roman Catholic Parish in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan was just grafitted.”
Nah let’s post it. Let’s feel it. Don’t look away.
I notice alot of my followers on here skipping these posts just to mess with my lgbt ones, suspiciously the white popular ones.
Heres a not so friendly reminder, as an lgbt metis person, i dont give a single fuck what your blog is themed or if this is too painful for you to look at. Reblog this post. Reblog this post with the sources of the 751 children who were found.
Your compliance and silence as well as the compliance and silence of your ancestors is what allowed these schools to open and kill first nations children. The children of MY people.
Dont follow me if you cant reblog this post or the one with sources to your political blog or your most popular blog. Add trigger warnings if you must but if your political blog is only focused on the harms you personally face like being lgbt then you need to see some bigger pictures and stop being afraid of angering your racist mutural or actually saying some shit about racism. If you can reblog some antifa graphics or add blm to your bio to be a surface level ally, you can reblog some sources on the genocide first nations people faced and still face today.
They were CHILDREN.
They were murdered in cold blood.
today i’ve seen a lot about disney ‘copyrighting’ loki. the whole thing seemed rather ridiculous to me, so i decided to do some research; it’s still a sketchy situation all around but as someone who is close with people who are practicing norse pagans, i felt like it was important to share.
firstly: the mouse did not, actually, do anything here in regards to the redbubble artist. it was actually redbubble that sent the email and took the work down, because the artist was copying a shirt from the comics. as in, it’s literally on the cover of a comic book, same text, color, and all.
the email alert to the artist was likely auto-generated. the email states: “…in most cases, this means that the rights holder did not specifically identify your work for removal.” so redbubble is being overly cautious here.
is it silly? yes. we won’t argue that point. it’s two words on a t-shirt.
secondly: that article is poorly researched and written. their “source” for their claim that disney might trademark mythological depictions of loki is the artist who was copying the shirt. according to the article: “Even art specifically of the Norse deity, which predates the MCU character by a handful of centuries, could be claimed, according to an artist who posted a takedown notice of their Loki art from Redbubble.”
‘could be claimed,’ says the artist. so what i’ve just read is that disney isn’t actually claiming anything. the artist is upset that their copied work was removed from redbubble by redbubble and is making baseless claims.
then i got to thinking about “the rights holder,” being the mouse. where does that leave us? do they hold the rights to loki? can they even do that?
the answer is no — sort of.
from what i can tell (and again, i’m an internet random, so i may be wrong!) it appears that the mouse is not copyrighting the norse gods, they’re trademarking their particular versions of loki — so comic depictions, movie depictions, etc. “marvel’s loki,” vs norse loki, basically, or “loki as depicted by tom hiddleston.” meaning any unauthorized art that could be linked to disney’s trademarked version of loki is within the company’s rights to have removed. but again, in this situation that started the whole kerfluffle, it was redbubble that removed it.
then i got to thinking a little more: what’s the difference between trademark and copyright?
as it turns out, copyright and trademark are two very different things. here’s an article that details it fairly clearly, but this snippet below is a pretty good summary.
“Overall, copyright protects literary and artistic materials and works, such as books and videos, and is automatically generated upon creation of the work. A trademark, on the other hand, protects items that help define a company brand, such as a business logo or slogan, and require more extensive registration through the government for the greatest legal protections.”
so disney has trademarked their particular version of loki. trademark is also limited to a particular context. the mouse trademarking loki in the context of a superhero/comic book world means that he cannot be made into a comic book hero or villain by anyone but marvel.
tl;dr — don’t panic if you are someone who counts loki or anyone else in the norse pantheon among your deities. a very overzealous redbubble, not disney, was the one who took down the shirt and sent the email, and they state in that email that “in most cases, the rights holder did not identify your work for removal.” the article that claims that disney is trademarking loki is poorly researched, written, and designed to freak you out.
You said that even you would have trouble going through four transpositions, which means xe would probably find it very difficult. What exactly is a transposition, and how do they work?
A transposition is basically when information changes form.
Think about it like this: if I have a pipe, and I draw a picture of it, that's a transposition.
If I them show you the picture I drew of the pipe, and you write a few sentences describing the pipe, that's another transposition.
Now, a lot of magic works via what we call Thaumaturgy. Think poppet magic. Well, every time something is transposed, it becomes more difficult to form a thaumaturgical bond.
So, if I asked you, just based on your description of the pipe, to perform a spell on the original pipe, that bond would have to go through two transpositions.
Does that make sense?
That makes a lot of sense, which is why a lot of magic would use a person’s name or taglock to the most refined source right? Where do you get so much information on magic? I mostly look at paths of philosophy rather than ritual but it’s something I’d like to look deeper at to incorporate into my practice. What would you recommend as being a good place to start research? (I would send this as an ask but my tumblr won’t verify it so I hope this is okay)
Celebrate St. Patrick’s Day by quietly remembering that Native Americans sent more aid to Ireland during the famine than Britain or the US.
specifically, it was the Choctaw nation that sent aid to the Irish during the famine
1. “more aid to ireland during the famine than britain” okay let’s clear this up, again– there was no famine, it was a genocide, commited specifically by the british. ireland was literally packed with food. the only crop that failed was the potato crop. the british had no problem with ships FULL OF FOOD leaving british ports on british ships from ireland to other places to make money. IT. WAS. NOT. A. FAMINE. IT. WAS. A. GENOCIDE. and that probably explains why britain didn’t “send aid”. britain was literally using the “famine” they manufactured to clear the land of indigenous irish people.
2. which lends poignancy and power to the attempt by the choctaw nation to send food to starving irish people.
3. there was much fanfair about this in the british press at the time, because of course the british government was lying to its own people about what they were doing. it’s convenient to blame natural disasters like “famine” when in fact it is mass murder– kinda like what’s going on in yemen right now. but to conclude, what didn’t receive a lot of fanfair in the british press is the fact that much of the corn and other food the choctaw nation attempted to send did not go to starving irish people, it was essentially hijacked and went to feed british pigs and livestock.
4. which is why every saint patrick’s day we remember the genocide (one of many the british attempted in ireland) of black ‘47. and we always remember the native americans who responded in such good will and with such generosity to starving people an ocean away from them.
And - all through primary school (until age 12) it was taught as a famine; only in secondary school did we learn that the British caused it deliberately. There’s a fair amount of Irish YA novels about the Famine (can’t remember titles off the top of my head), and they’re all pretty brutal with the facts of what happened. Not to mention most people’s great-grandparents probably lived through it - it’s not that far back.
Also there’s a monument to the Choctaw nation somewhere up the country for the help.
It’s by Alex Pentek, it’s in Bailick Park, Midleton, Co. Cork, and it’s called “Kindred Spirits”.
“The English never remember and the Irish never forget.” (Chesterton)
Not forgetting is why there are so many Irish names here.
(The link above is to donate to the Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund - definitely contribute if you can! I could not find a website to donate to a Choctaw relief fund.)
Sit in the mud and do a little scream. There’s nothing wrong with that
@thebloodlineofaphrodite me just casually chillin
Feast Days Comparison: The Recon System
Because people expressed interest in this, I’ve decided I’m going to go ahead with my NeoWiccan Wheel of the Year experiment. I’m not going to officially start until this upcoming November Eve, since it’s the “New Year” and is all about death and renewal, which are themes I’d like to really focus on in my experiment. Before I go, I want to nail down exactly what each feast day of the year means to me curently, as well as how I will be worshiping in the new experimental system over the upcoming year.
So, first off, let’s look at the Gaulish Recon/Recon-ish year of feast days that I personally celebrate.
Hallmarks of this system: hard, distinctly individualized polytheism; emphasis on folk practice and archaeology; based in a raiding and pastoral-agricultural tribal culture with a warrior oligarchy
Trinoxtes Samonii (October 30-November 1) - Festival of the end of harvest, the butchery of animals, and the ancestral dead. Deities I honor at this time are Sucellos, god of vegetative fertility and the underworld, and Cernunnos, another cthonic god tied to wealth and animal husbandry.
Eponalia (December 18) - Festival of Epona, goddess of horses and sovereignty. At this time I honor her as pyschopomp and good mother, and consider this the point where she sets out to journey to the underworld (a reconstructed myth).
Medi-Giamos (December 21) - Festival of the winter solstice. At this time I honor Ogmios, god of eloquence, as gatekeeper of the underworld, and pray to Maponos, the poetic/youthful god, as the returning sun once it has passed.
Ambiuolcia/Imbru (February 1) - Festival of the hearth and home, calving, and the first melt of winter. This festival is all about Brigandu and the household spirits.
Semiuessona* (March 21) - Festival of spring, the release of water into the world, and the return of the land to planting. I celebrate Sirona on this day, less out of evidence and more because that’s been my UPG for ages. Plus it lets me incorporate eggs and eggshells into the festivities, which makes it easy to do Easter things with my family.
Belotenia/Beltenos (May 1) - Festival of the end of winter and the beginning of summer, light, healing, and the otherworld. While I am less certain about this than others, I tend to celebrate Belenos, the fully-crowned god of the sun, and Nemetona, goddess of the sacred grove, during this time
Mediosamos (June 21) - Festival of fire, summer solstice, and the victory of Taranis over the serpent of drought. Unsurpisingly, I honor Taranis, the god of thunder and the sky, during this festival, and sometimes also the Ram-Horned Snake, who is possibly the aforementioned drought god.
Lugunassatis (August 1) - Festival of the tribe, crafts and skill, law and oathtaking, as well as Lugus’s mastery of agriculture. Honors Lugus, god of crafts, travelers, and oaths.
Harvest** (September 21) - Possibly doesn’t exist, but I like to celebrate it anyway. I usually honor Matrona, a river goddess, as the mother of the gods, and also Maponos again.
If you are noticing a lot of Maponos, it is because I am biased and swore devotion oaths to him last November or so. I tend to include him in a lot of my festival observances. One day I will probably write a nice post series about how I see him. Someday.
* Semiuessona is my own name for the season, picked up from the month name Semiuissonos, meaning “half-of-spring.”
** I’ve yet to find a good Gaulish word to use to name this season, so Harvest works just fine. With Semiuessona at least it includes the word for Spring–Uessona–whereas Gaulish has no unique word of Autumn.
