#heathenry problems

[gefdreamsofthesea]

Everybody get out your finest mead I have just discovered that the AsatruLore forum appears to be offline.

Good riddance.

[gefdreamsofthesea]

I think this post might piss some people off so I apologize in advance.

Dear Lokean friends,

You know I love you and you deserve all the space you need in the Heathen community.

But listen

Not everything is about Loki.

What I mean is, sometimes when Heathens are discussing other deities sometimes it’s not a good time to chime in about Loki. Sometimes people want to talk about other deities (like say, the goddesses, especially the ones who don’t get a lot of attention).

This doesn’t mean that you’re never allowed to talk about Loki or that I think my more henotheistic/monolatrous Lokeans are wrong, but I would appreciate a bit more, how do I put this? A bit more awareness.

This is related but I would also appreciate it if I could talk about other deities without you turning it into a funny line about Loki. For instance, one time I said “this statue of Freyja is pretty” and someone said “Loki is pretty”. Listen friends, there is a time and a place for random Loki related humor, and sometimes these quips....aren’t appreciated?

I think basically what I’m trying to say is some of you need a bit more tact, and I personally would really appreciate it if this sort of stuff was called out more often, not just regarding Loki, people do it with Odin too.

[gefdreamsofthesea]

Folkish PSA

This is just a note about the term “folkish”.

Please do not confuse “folkish” with “folketro” which means “folk belief” (A.K.A. folklore, folk customs, folk/popular religion). Please don’t be assholes to non-native English speakers who are just talking about their local traditions. Please also understand that the word “folk” is older than racist nonsense and folk music doesn’t deserve to be lumped in with scum.

[gefdreamsofthesea]

I disagree that we need to stop wearing certain runes but I think we need to get a bit more creative with our tattoos and jewelry like can we stop doing runes in angry black? I mean like when you have big runes in solid black ink, that’s angry black.

I mean, is anyone going to mistake a Sowilo rune with a cute sun face and maybe a phrase beneath it like “The sun shines on everyone.” for a white nationalist symbol?

Don’t get the wolf’s hook though, that’s not an actual rune and is associated with racist scum.

[gefdreamsofthesea]

Heathen Shops PSA

Hey just a heads up for Heathens and Norse polytheist types but Pagan Studio Yarinka is being pretty open about being white supremacist scum.

Save your money.

[gefdreamsofthesea]

Hey do you think people will stop making excuses for using the virtues if we start calling them “The Nine Nazi Virtues” instead?

It’s not wrong.

[gefdreamsofthesea]

Some Heathens: Loki is an outlaw therefore Lokeans are also outlaws and aren’t welcome in Heathenry.

Some Heathens: No homo, no blacks, women can join but only if they’re ~sexy shieldmaidens~

Also some Heathens: Wow why is everyone obsessed with outlaws don’t they know outlawry is bad? Also why won’t women speak to me and why does everyone think Heathenry is racist?

[gefdreamsofthesea]

When I started interacting with Facebook Heathens, I was friends with this guy, I think he IDed as an Anarchist? He seemed cool, wrote about how Heathenry is compatible with leftist politics.

I eventually unfriended him because he wouldn’t condemn folkishness.

“I know people who are folkish,” he’d say. “They’re good people!”

This is just one example of how “soft” racism is acceptable in Heathenry. Some Heathens focus on how “folkish Heathens and universalist Heathens are both wrong!” and conveniently ignore how one is just racism in the guise of “celebrating our heritage”.

Some Heathens who are vocally against neonazis still make racist “jokes” about black men, or talk about how they don’t want “weird” people (read: queer folks, feminists, people who are too “radical” politically) in their “respectable” religion.

Somebody says this every time I post something like this so I’m going to post this in caps for emphasis: THESE PEOPLE ARE NOT PART OF FRINGE GROUPS! THEY ARE THE FACE OF MAINSTREAM HEATHENRY! They’re writing the books and running the community spaces and telling people about what “real Heathenry” is (no seriously they run a website called Real Heathenry) and is not.

People have complained that I talk about this too much but you don’t understand that these issues are so deeply entrenched in our traditions, and it’s not just the people who scream 1488.

I need everyone to understand that.