The Adventurous GIT

In my last post , I raised the alarm about Stephen McNallen's latest endeavor, which appears to not only involve partnering with out-lout-n-proud AltRight Red Ice Media, but utilizing Apocalyptic Rhetoric in order to push a racist agenda under a Heathen veneer. Now I'm sure everyone's curious about my closing statement from part 1, so let's get to the action. "[...]where I try to figure out just why McNallen's somehow willing to throw Wotan under the bus to achieve his goals." Transcript to follow - Video queued to begin in line with transcript (02:29 - 03:16) "Now, I happen to have been a follower of Wotan, under his name of Odin, for some 45 years, and my personal experience is that He is utterly real, if inherently mysterious. But I don't expect my Christian, or Atheist, or Agnostic, or Other friends to agree on that. Instead, I invite them to think of Wotan as Carl Jung, the famous psychologist, did: Namely, as an inherited ...

An ant has no quarrel with a boot.  - Loki, The Avengers A very pointed question arises often in Pagan circles, and it is even more often used as a kind of Heathen litmus test in some circles: "Do you have a Patron Deity?"   What they're really asking is: Do you have the Pagan equivalent of "Buddy Christ"? Do you have personal chats with Divine Beings who, in some people's estimations, have "better things to do"? There are those in Heathenry (though by no means are these naysayers confined to those interacting with the Norse Gods and Goddesses) who would argue, stringently , that the Gods are so far removed from us, working on such a vast scale, that unless They are approached with the care owed a fire-walking, nitroglycerin juggling act, They can and will make your life and wyrd their plaything and it will suck . Thor, the office Nice Guy. Except that's likely the way our ancestors treated them. The Gods dealt with communities a...

As a certain world-travelling pagan writer  recently pointed out , using the phrase "toxic masculinity" can be troublesome. By using the phrase, is a speaker implying that all  masculinity is toxic, or only certain types? Since I've dropped the label into both the title and will be using it throughout this post, let me define it as coherently as I can so there can be no future quibbling about what, exactly, I am speaking about. Toxic masculinity, for the purposes of this post, is defined twofold: (1) The behaviors, attitudes, and speech by which people of any gender or none attack (either verbally or physically) others who do not conform to a set or sets of behavior, appearance, and attitude that have been defined by certain cultures as inherently "masculine" or "male." (2) The behaviors, attitudes, and speech by which people of any gender or none argue or imply "male" as the superior gender, and/or interact with "female" in obj...

Less than 20 blog posts into this mad experiment, and I've had my words shared across dozens of pages, a couple hitting views in the thousands. I've been shared to far corners of Facebook whose intersectionality with the Pagan (and specifically Heathen) audience I originally envisioned for this blog makes a game of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon  seem straightforward. Seriously. But am I someone who should be saying some of these things? They're being shared and read, so there's obviously an audience who appreciates that they're said at all, and a large majority of the feedback I've gotten has been positive. From a certain point of view, I am practically the  worst  person to be sharing these thoughts, though. My upbringing was so cliché American White Bread™, it's practically an SNL skit without a punchline: White, firmly Middle Class, two parents, Christian, Private School, International Exchange Student... The list can go on, but you get the idea. ...

23: An unwise man lies awake all night, brooding on everything; he's quite worn out, when morning comes, and it's all just as bad as before Translation -  Andrew Orchard - Penguin Classics We all worry, it's a natural part of being human. Isn't it? I'm not sure. I mean, shouldn't I worry? Seriously, the meta-worrying is stressful AF. Every choice can bring anxiety. Is there a "right" or "wrong" choice? Often, our experience and knowledge can tell us that the answer for the majority of our choices. Running a red light, even though we're late, is a "wrong" choice, it's safe to say. But what about taking that job offer on the other side of the country? What about the comfortable, but cramped, house you can easily make payments on, but you're positive some space would grant some peace of mind? For those questions, things get significantly fuzzier. For the monotheists, it's a common response to "Let Go...

It's no secret these days that  Nazis   are   everywhere.  The themes of nationalism and racism are rising to the surface once more. Now, more than ever, we must be wary of what and who we endorse, even tangentially. We can no longer afford to "explain away" questionable viewpoints from celebrities, no matter how large or small their reach. The majority of Pagans will agree with the phrase, "Words have power." We're not just talking about spell-casting, ritual, prayer, or anything specific to religion. Every spoken word has the power to bind, to heal, to divide, to wound, to do any number of things in the right hands in the opportune moment. via GIPHY Like how a single word can make an entire generation cry. Which brings me to today's Havamal verse: 57: One brand takes fire from another,  until it is consumed, a flame's kindled by flame; one man becomes clever by talking with another, but foolish through being reserved. The Po...

Odin is a Thief and a Deceiver. Tyr is an Oathbreaker. I'm okay with that. Not exactly qualities to aspire to, though. Something that many Polytheists struggle with is the fallibility, the errors, or even the outright terrible behavior attributed to the Gods and Goddesses in the Lore. Lacking the certitude of an "all-good" monotheist worldview, the myths and stories we have from pre-Christian times don't always seem like the noblest of deeds. There's a host of  examples that can counter that narrative of "all-good",  but on the whole, most monotheists still count their Deity as lacking character flaws. A debate on that is a different post for a different blog. This here blog is Polytheist Territory, and I'd much rather talk about Them, thank you very much. I can't promise this power isn't going to my head. Yes, the title of this post is the classic Star Wars reference, where a deception was created ( retroactively , because we k...