Today’s SEO tip: if you need to create buzz, just add “uncucked.” You’ll get people talking, even if you don’t get them understanding.
From Facebook we see many comments: here is a small sampling. (Names changed to protect the ignoinnocent:)
TWITCHBOTTOM SPARKLEFART: Doesn’t sound like “Odinists” though…they are straight-up neonazi. This is
more like…what? 8chan heathenism
*****
GENERICA TUMBLR: That crumples my soul. My soul is crumpled now. Thanks.
CUCK YEAGER: Mine is growing spurs. You think bone spurs hurt? Try soul spurs.The fact that some Asatru practitioners were Volkish was annoying, But i knew plenty of counter examples.
This shit, trying to unite Pagans under an Alt-Right banner enrages me.
*****SUBBETA CUCKMANN, ESQ.: This…article …is so fucked on so many levels it is easy to lose sight of one or two fucked up sentences in the overwhelming headlights of vacous crap, to plagarize tim minchin. Misogynistic pseudocreationist patriarcal rascist rightwing extremist classist…the atempt to catagorize is depressing me.
As a Traditionalist, I’m always happy to turn to the past for insight about the present. I didn’t need to look very far at all to find a useful quote from one of 20th century England’s greatest prophets:
What was slightly horrible, was that from the stream of sound that poured out of his mouth it was almost impossible to distinguish a single word. Just once Winston caught a phrase —‘complete and final elimination of Goldsteinism’— jerked out very rapidly and, as it seemed, all in one piece, like a line of type cast solid. For the rest it was just a noise, a quack-quack-quacking. And yet, though you could not actually hear what the man was saying, you could not be in any doubt about its general nature. He might be denouncing Goldstein and demanding sterner measures against thought-criminals and saboteurs, he might be fulminating against the atrocities of the Eurasian army, he might be praising Big Brother or the heroes on the Malabar front — it made no difference. Whatever it was, you could be certain that every word of it was pure orthodoxy, pure Ingsoc. As he watched the eyeless face with the jaw moving rapidly up and down, Winston had a curious feeling that this was not a real human being but some kind of dummy. It was not the man’s brain that was speaking, it was his larynx. The stuff that was coming out of him consisted of words, but it was not speech in the true sense: it was a noise uttered in unconsciousness, like the quacking of a duck.
On a more positive note, Tahni J. Nikitins has offered a very interesting critical analysis of the AFA’s policy in the comments section of our maiden post. Her entire response is well worth a read: I’ve pulled out a few points for discussion here.
I asked how many People of Color had spoken up about the Asatru Folk Assembly’s policies and noted that, in my experience, Asatru and Heathen events — not to mention Pagan events in general — tend to be overwhelmingly White. She replied:
Not hearing them doesn’t mean they’re not there, or even that someone may have had their interest piqued but backed off before they got really dedicated because they got wind that they weren’t welcome because the concentration of melanin in their skin is too high. Not to mention that people generally tend to not make many real attempt to get involved with an organization who makes it so plainly obvious that they’re not to welcome your efforts of involvement (specifically as you cited, the AFA). Why waste the energy only to be met at best by passive aggressive dismissals or at worst verbal violence?
I have no doubt many People of Color feel intimidated about attending Heathen events thanks to all the bad publicity about Odinist Nazis and suchlike. But I don’t see Universalist Heathens doing outreach to recruit People of Color. (And dear Gods I hope I don’t: the last thing Polytheism needs to steal from Monotheism is proselytizing). Nor have I seen People of Color complaining about Tribalist and Folkish Heathens. What I do see is a lot of de facto lily-white organizations virtue signalling by pointing the fingers at de jure lily-white organizations and calling out their racist admittance policies. And I think that’s something worth exploring. Does this campaign end with multicultural hofs throughout America — or does it end with a lot of self-satisfied white people congratulating themselves on how non-racist they are?
Small numbers of people of color being affected by the discriminatory practices in some pagan groups or by the highly racialized propaganda those groups peddle isn’t an excuse to not call out such bullshit where it occurs, just like the historical fact that old pagan religions (Norse or otherwise) didn’t conquer the world with their religion and mostly kept to tribal religious practices isn’t an excuse to not call out bullshit in modern day paganism, which is not the same as the paganism of the days of yore by virtue of existing in the modern world.
What do you mean by “calling out?” I have no problem with heated discussions between Polytheists: it’s not like the Classical World didn’t have numerous competing philosophical schools and there’s certainly plenty of disagreement, discussion and debate beneath the umbrella the West calls Hinduism. But if we’re talking about the total war tactics Galina Krasskova discussed in a recent post on her blog then you can count me out.
Nikitins offers some interesting documentation on ethnicity and intermarriage in Heathen society, and makes a very good case that Norse society was not so exclusionary as many Folkish Heathens might claim: again, all her comments are well worth a read. But I must admit to some trepidation at this section.
If [AFA members] truly are descended from Vikings, there’s a reasonably good chance they have dark-skinned ancestors (again: all that intermarrying and interbreeding) not to mention the whole fuckton of archeological and genetic evidence that supports the Out of Africa Theory. In short: ancestor veneration seems like a very silly thing to do if a person just patently refuses to acknowledge the diversity of their ancestors. If they called it “selective veneration” I might be less prone to highlight the ridiculousness of their stance based on the historical and genetic facts because at least then they’re being honest about it. I’d still call it bullshit, though.
I see the point, but I’ve also seen the “Out of Africa” theory used for some pretty unsavory purposes. Afrocentric organizations who want to reserve membership to People of Color are regularly classified as “racist” and reminded “we all come from Africa.” (Which is true, but some of us have a harder time catching a cab and an easier time catching a police bullet). The SPLC has begun listing Black Separatists as “Hate Groups” using much the same reasoning used against the Asatru Folk Assembly. Their mere espousal of unpalatable ideas is enough to land them on the SPLC’s bad guy list, with no evidence given that any of these ideas have ever resulted in actual antiwhite violence. I think there is a real need for Afrocentric organizations and for PoC-only space. And I think it would behoove Pagans and Polytheists of all political persuasions to support that right — even if it means tolerating sloppy scholarship and occasional embarrassing Facebook posts from people who want Northern Europeans-only space.
Keep an eye on this space for posts from other Polytheists, and for more commentary on past, current and future affairs. We’re still in our infancy but things are growing faster than we could ever have hoped. Until next time stay uncucked and remember: the Gods are Real, the Gods are Many, the Gods are Here.
Europa’s Children 
You realize that no one is intimidated by this but your writing is so bad and your logic so circular that many people thought this was a joke or parody of right wing types? If you want to intellectualize your bigotry you need to, you know, be intellectual.
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“What do you mean by ‘calling out?'”
Why, thanks for having the courage to address me directly, it’s really appreciated. (Just in case you missed it: that’s sarcasm. What you actually did was attempt to misconstrue my points to somehow validate your exclusionary and discriminatory nonsense, in a most passive aggressive way)
But to get to the point: I’m not familiar with Krasskova’s all out war tactics as you call them, but the concept of “calling out” is really quite simple: it’s seeing a thing that’s bullshit, and calling it bullshit. Didn’t think anyone would need that explained, as it’s pretty common knowledge at this point.
Furthermore, I don’t think anyone needs to congratulate themselves on being not racist, as you say. All the self congratulating seems to lie squarely with the folks who think their minimal melanin concentration somehow makes them a special snowflake. I mean, these circles are basically circle jerks of racialized self righteousness. It’s actually… Really fucking weird, come to think of it. How exactly does pinkness make you special again? The logic has always been lost on me.
Next:
“I see the point, but I’ve also seen the ‘Out of Africa’ theory used for some pretty unsavory purposes.”
It is so cute that you somehow think that other groups using the Out of Africa theory 1) justifies your own exclusionary tactics (“well he’s doing it too!!” Go to any playground and you’ll hear some kid shouting this, I guarantee you) and 2) that it seems to make you a little squeamish (see that word “unsavory”). You don’t have access to a space so it automatically becomes unsavory but the exclusionary policies you advocate for are…what? Righteous? Preserving of some mythical notion of whiteness, which itself erases hundreds of specific cultures originating on the European continent? (aside: also adorable, the way you throw quotes around Out of Africa in a yet even more passive aggressive attempt to communicate a sense of it being invalid [apparently despite the copious amounts of archeological and genetic evidence to support it])
This is the reason academic accountability is so vital in the pagan community. I started out with such high expectations of this community rising above the bullshit that drove most of us away from Christianity but I am continually disappointed to see corners such as these sinking to the same level or even lower than the Christianity I left behind. If misappropriation is your jam fucking go for it I guess, but also be prepared for people to call you out on the ignorance (in case you forgot what calling out means, you can scroll up to double check the definition).
For my part, if you want to debate me, do it directly. Don’t respond in a separate blog post knowing I may not see it in order to respond–I mean, you *can.* No one is going to stop you, but know that the cowardice is obvious and that you’re not impressing anyone. Okay, except for maybe the coddled few who’ve bought into/helped you and people like the AFA build the echo chamber that allows them to believe that no one will call them out. Those people will buy into it, but don’t savor it too much (their critical thinking skills are…well… I’ll point you back to my comment about the necessity of academic accountability. The lack of such accountability leads to stunted and self indulgent thinking, which is why sloppy scholarship should not, in fact, be tolerated, so I’ll leave it at that. Though thank you for admitting that the scholarship is sloppy, though that’s putting it very lightly and quite gently, too. I guess you have a vested interest in going easy on the sloppy scholars, though)
So in the meantime: remember to not be passive aggressive as it’s always unbecoming, and try to keep that scholarship tidy.
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Gratingly immature superiority of tone is also unbecoming. So is looking for and deliberately misunderstanding the other party’s points so that you can engage in some self-gratifying bashing of someone with whom you disagree.
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Hmm, at which points do I *deliberately* misunderstand? I would enjoy to be enlightened on this front, as I am open to the idea that perhaps I misunderstood, though if I have forgotten deliberately doing so I might be a little worried about the state of my memory.
As a person who puts a very high value on scholarship, when the other party is primarily approaching what I had initially put forth in good faith by flippantly dismissing the copious amount of scholarship which also disagrees with him as not really worth taking into consideration (presumably only for the reason that it disagrees with him) any retort which insists on the importance of academic accountability is likely to be found to have “gratingly immature superiority of tone” by that party and his supporters. (Whooee, that was a mouthful, wasn’t it? I apologize if I’ve become grating again)
As to self-gratifying bashing…I suppose my language was unnecessarily aggressive, this is true. While I concede that point, it was hardly self gratifying. What I would find truly gratifying would be if it were acknowledged that exclusionary and discriminatory policies have nothing to do with worship and everything to do with the biases and prejudices of the worshippers, because at least that would be honest and not potentially mark those of us who welcome diversity with the bad name such actions give the religion. If you doubt that it gives the religion a bad name, there is an article here that shows how people outside of the religion might think of us as the result of the unfortunate actions of a few people: https://thinkprogress.org/the-new-religion-of-choice-for-white-supremacists-8af2a69a3440#.wnzp1ah8q Though violence isn’t the main topic here, one of the many things worth worrying about in this conversation broadly is that exclusionary rhetoric is far more often a starting point than an ending point, and it tends to go down hill quickly. We’ve been seeing a lot of that lately, both here in America and in Britain (that spike in hate crimes after Brexit tho).
In all honestly and as plainly as I know how to say, I would have been happy with engaging in thoughtful discussion until this strange, somehow secretive while still being public response. As I’ve already noted, that hardly sets the tone for a particularly mature discussion and certainly set me off and while I did reign it in (it’s okay, you don’t have to believe me) I also didn’t bother to soften it. I’ll take this criticism into consideration.
Here’s to hoping in *this* comment I’ve kept my snark duly in check to meet with your standards. May the mutual exchange of ideas, thoughts, research and ideology continue on with the blessings of the powers that be and until next time! May we all remember to not be a dick, not be passive aggressive, and keep our scholarship tidy. 🙂
P.S. your owl icon is beautiful.
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You attacked a scholarship problem that doesn’t exist. I’m not entirely sure why. Everything that was quoted was cited- not using any standard of citations that we were taught in college, I’ll grant you, but it IS cited. The conclusions drawn about certain theories (which are theories, not laws, as a scholar like yourself should realize) are clearly different from your own, but that was admitted plainly and is thus not a flaw in scholarship. You have no case, yet you insist on arguing for one. I can only assume that it is because you disagree with the conclusions in the above post. There’s nothing wrong with disagreeing. There’s a lot wrong with saying the author has a problem with scholarship simply because the two of you came to different conclusions when faced with the same information.
And my comment wasn’t passive aggressive- that was me being annoyed by your tone but still trying to be polite. I’m still annoyed by your tone, actually. Your comment reads like you deliberately dredged through a thesaurus in an attempt to intimidate me with as many polysyllabic words as you could squeeze into your sentences. I can also hear the saccharine sarcasm which, in combination, is a surefire way to get on my nerves. It is entirely possible that I am hearing what isn’t there, but there are some reasons for my brain to jump to that conclusion and you may in fact be innocent on this count. I tell you this not to attack you, but to let you know why it annoyed me. This part of my annoyance is not personal, and I hope you won’t take it as such.
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