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Article Specs
Article ID: 11331
VoxAcct: 266712
Section: protection
Age Group: Adult
Days Up: 2,307
Times Read: 7,302
RSS Views: 73,877
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Dealing With Real Hate
Author: Shadow
Posted: February 25th. 2007
Times Viewed: 7,302
We see it in the news everyday, read it in the papers, hear it on the radio, and witness it occurring in our day to day lives – hate. In one form or another, in the name of one religion or another, caused by one ideology or another, hate surrounds us. We cannot escape its presence because of how pervasive it is.
That does not mean we cannot do something about it.
As Wiccans, Pagans, and Witches, we have to deal with our own various forms of hate from time to time. Most of the time it’s just due to misinformation, and once we sit down with the persons in question and explain everything, then things tend to smooth over. At worst in these circumstances, the most you’ll get is someone constantly pestering you to become Christian or whatnot.
But that’s simply misunderstanding. It’s not the same as hate. Real hate has one of two faces. Either the proponents of hatred blatantly ignore the facts about your religion (or really anything about yourself), or they are informed but twist the facts for their own purposes. In both cases, this can lead to open conflict, hostility, and in the worst-case scenario, violence.
Thankfully, I’ve come to find that society has begun to understand our religious beliefs and allow us a place in the world, especially among teenagers and young adults. That being said, there are still those out there who would wish us everything from fire to brimstone.
The first ones to come to mind generally are fundamentalist Christians – mainly due to the media fascination with them. Notorious names such as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell come to mind most often with their virulently anti-Pagan rants. These forms of Christians (though by no means the majority) still associate any religion outside Christianity as being of the devil, and even more so where witchcraft is involved.
But fundamentalist Christians are by no means the only anti-Pagans out there. Recently, I’ve discovered that Pagans are also a target for Neo-Nazis. Excluding the splinter sects of Pagan-Nazis (Neo-Nazis who disguise their ideologies with German paganism, such as Wotanism), many NN’s adhere to their own twisted interpretations of the Bible, and they generally aren’t shy about preaching hatred to non-Christians. Granted, Pagans aren’t one of their top priorities, but they certainly aren’t buddies with us.
I’ve had such hate from both of the above categories flung at me. When the fundies come to protest at my campus, I sigh in silent humor with their anti-Pagan Jack Chick comic books. I’ve had an encounter with a self-described Catholic fascist Nazi, and once he saw my pentacle, he remarked how he wished it was still medieval Europe and I could be burned at the stake. Yeah, fun times.
But getting to the point here – how does one deal with the hate? First of all, don’t go assuming everybody who doesn’t know about your path, doesn’t understand it, or is Christian to be anti-Pagan. We’re still in the minority, so it’s common to encounter the uninformed. Also, don’t go thinking that somebody who doesn’t agree with your religion is hateful. This is just personal conviction at work. They may not agree with your path, but that doesn’t mean they hate you for it.
Hate is when someone wishes true ill against you. If somebody learns of your religion and begins calling you every curse in the book, or screams that your evil and whatnot – that is real hate. If you encounter this, remember to keep your cool. Don’t get riled up and start shouting back. It’s better to keep these sorts of conflicts to a minimum rather than fanning the flames. Once they are done ranting, try to explain your beliefs in a calm, rational manner. If they stop yelling and begin to listen, go on. But if they continue to yell and refuse to listen, then there’s little hope at this point. Let them go, and hopefully when you meet them again they’ll be more level headed and you can explain things better.
But say they won’t listen even after that. If the person in question continues to treat you with hostility, the best thing to do is to distance yourself. If you feel that your safety is now in jeopardy, work on creating a psychic shield for whenever you find yourself close to the person in question (Christopher Penczak’s The Witch’s Shield is a good start for protection magic). Carrying around protective herbs and/or stones is also a good idea. And employing the aid of certain protective spirits, be them guides or gods, can help deter the situation.
Now, if you find yourself actually threatened, or are met with violence, before you do any of the above, call the police. Don’t even bother with magic if you start receiving death threats. Just file a report with you local police, get a restraining order, and make sure they keep your harasser as far away as possible. Remember, if you are attacked because of your religion, it’s not just any crime – it’s a hate crime, and that’s an offense, which the law takes more seriously, even for us.
As a rule of thumb, it’s a wise idea to learn how to defend yourself. Even if you’re a pacifist, knowing how to effectively fend off an attacker can be an invaluable asset. I recommend learning some form of martial arts for starters. Even a minimal knowledge of how to fight can be enough to take out an assailant, and many dojos and gyms offer basic self-defense courses to get you started.
Carry around things like mace or a small staff in your backpack/purse if you feel at risk. If you feel you must, I’d also suggest learning how to wield a weapon as a backup. Remember, we aren’t learning how to fight to cause harm. The first rule of martial arts is that you never use your fighting skills to cause harm – only to defend yourself and those weaker than you. Don’t feel that because you’re learning how to fight means you have to. It is always a plan of last resort.
My last suggestion is that you do a regular spell to quell the hate and violence in your community and/or the world. Craft a spell of your own design to help calm whatever hate lurks in your area. Ask the God and Goddess to guide your community away from harm and hate and into peace. You can even write a prayer if you want and recite it everyday to help promote peace.
Hopefully, you won’t find yourself in any of the above situations, and it’s my sincerest hope that you never do. But we mustn’t forget that this is still a hostile world, and nobody is immune from the devastation that hate causes. But we can do something about it.
By refusing to become victims, by refusing to get involved with hate, and by doing what we can to promote peace, magically or otherwise, we can put hate to an end, one person, one community, one world at a time.
May the gods watch over you, and blessed be.
Copyright: © 2006-2007 Shadow
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