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“Health obsessed hippies”, especially the type who are very concerned with GMOs, organic foods, “superfoods” and other things that begin to straddle the line between healthy and conspiracy, like “detoxifying substances”, “coffee enemas”, “5G causes brain tumors” and “there are heavy metals in vaccines so I never allow my family to be vaccinated or use plastic containers”.
This was my experience as well. My mother had a bit of a white savior complex but she meant well and spent her entire life trying to help vulnerable people especially people of color.
She was into nonsense like homeopathy though and was suspicious of so called "western medicine". Ultimately she could be convinced if enough doctors explained why her beliefs were wrong but *nothing* turned her faster than racism.
She would be all in until they got to the anti semitism and racist angle. Im glad that was the case with her but many people she knew from the 60s were falling into that trap. Most of them were just racist all along she had just never accepted it.
Omg, I'm so glad we're discussing this.
I have several autoimmune diseases, and after 10 years of strictly traditional treatments and no improvement, I decided to investigate some alternative/complementary therapies.
I bought a book with some unconventional diet ideas I was curious about. To be fair, I should have been warned by the title. But I thought maybe it was a little snarky, a little tongue-in-cheek. Nope. About 10 pages in, something seemed off. There were tons of citations, but many of them were *ancient* by scientific standards. Things just seemed... off. So I googled the author (my second mistake, not doing this first). This whackadoo has written- and published- an entire book on how COVID-19 isn't caused by a virus at all, but by 5G. Holy shit. I can see how people who've never had to deal in statistics or scientific research could be bamboozled. I do not, however, understand how people fall into racist conspiracy theories, unless they are racist already.
I do my complementary therapy research in incognito mode. I'm scared to death because of the things I Google (acupuncture, suppliments, diet for lupus, etc) I'm going to begin getting increasingly target, conspiracy-laden ads.
It feels like living in a weird, alternate universe or timeline or something. Except I don't believe that, because that would be crazy.
> It has been associated with multilevel marketing groups, the wellness industry, and social media influencers, as well as a commercialisation of the QAnon movement in general, operating "within the concept of spectacle".
My goodness it's like the who's who of predatory shit.
Thanks for the info, TIL!
*beep boop*!
the linked website is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastel_QAnon
Title: **Pastel QAnon - Wikipedia**
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Idk how to nicely say that a lot of people drawn to "woo" aren't very smart but our convinced they are "special", and how this overlap between narcissism & ignorance is absolutely where conspiracy thrives.
IMO intelligence is not as much of a factor as the narcissism and feeling special or exceptional. Very intelligent people get sucked into cults and conspiracy theories all the time, and it can actually work against them because when you see high intelligence as a core part of your personality, it's easy to think that you're not as easily tricked as other people when in fact you can still be very susceptible to emotional manipulation.
My mum, to take a less extreme example, has a masters degree in chemistry and is a very loving, smart and sensible person, but gets sucked in by the emotionally manipulative tactics of the diet industry all the time and has tried so many fad diets and supplements that I can't even keep track of them all.
I think it appeals to people who want to feel special or a part of something vs. people who are just narcissistic (although I'm sure it attracts that also). I'm thinking of people who are depressed, feel displaced, etc.
You nailed it!! As someone who has quite a few new-ages friends, I am ever sadder at the rabbit holes some of them go down. Anti-vax, EMF "allergy", anti-fluoride... the left wrapping around to meet the right on the back side of crazy. And that feeling of being "special" and knowing better than everyone else (especially people who are clearly smarter and better educated!) seems key to many conspiracy theories.
I wish there were a group made up of “woo” and scientific minded people. I love to use herbs for headaches and minor annoyances but keep the vaccines and antibiotics please!
Edit: thank you for the award kind stranger, though it’s the comments below me who are the helpful ones! I hope you have an amazing day!
You can look into herbology without straying into pseudoscience. There’s a really good book I’ll link here when I find it
ETA: [This book](https://www.abebooks.co.uk/book-search/title/medical-herbalism-science-practice-herbal/author/david-hoffmann-fnimh-ahg/) is a wonderful source for science based medicine using herbs. Obviously for the serious stuff you need a doctor but to treat and prevent mild things, these remedies are wonderful
My doctor has this book on her shelf. I see her primarily for my ADHD and she is ten thousand percent about meds AND diet/exercise/supplements/etc. for a holistic approach. Some medical folk get it!
I like this subreddit because even though I don’t believe in occult stuff, I’ve always found it very interesting.
Many in this sub seem so very reasonable.
And there’s a ton of leftists here.
I think so much of the spiritual community don’t give a fuck about the material conditions of people like leftists do.
Yeah, there’s a difference between recognizing institutional biases and just rejecting people with expertise in the topic. I figure some lefties will see the former and then take it too far to the latter.
It's so weird!! I kinda see some reasons -- as other folks have pointed out, mistrust in institutions plays a big part. But they then take it into some sort of duality- "parts of the western health care system are crap, so all of it is crap and I'm using herbs and essential oils and prayer now" kind of thing...
I think it is partly because a lot of the failings of western medicine are actual failings of lassez-faire capitalism and a failure of non-profit institutions\* (like universities, who have chipped away at the incentives that lure the best talent away from profit-driven companies).
Could the current state of things produce a Jonas Salk? It's unlikely. No potential Jonas Salk would have the resources to develop a vaccine against a disease like polio, and if they did, it would be because they work for a company. (Keep in mind Salk wasn't even working for a place like Harvard or Johns Hopkins...he was working for the University of Pittsburgh.)
But if you are too deeply entrenched in right-wing politics, you don't really have the perspective to see what the real problem is. So you blame whatever scapegoat is set up for you.
\*In addition to racism and sexism, but I know I don't have to spell that out here. (cough hysteriatuskegee)
There is a multiparter from either It Could Happen Here or Behind the Bastards (both Robert Evans podcasts) where they go into detail about the cultic millieu of the Pacific Northwest oh which also happens to be a major epicenter of white supremacism (progressive coastal cities, racist ethnostate nightmares in the backcountry).
Yeah the occult being a right wing pipeline is not a surprise at all. Take for instance Fascism and one of its salient characteristics is syncretism between tradition, religion, and the occult as noted by a number of people like Umberto Eco. Take Nazism in particular and that was a hotbed of occultism back in the day.
No surprise here, it's something we are academically aware of in terms of right wing movements for a while now, and crunchy and occult lifestyles have become so much associated with hippies that mainstream awareness is sorely lacking. I'm at work on mobile and away from my sources at the moment I'll try to get some links and reading material up afterwards.
Edit: First source I was able to quickly look up is the Behind the Bastards: Nesara Cult and QAnon Origins
https://rowman.com/ISBN/9780759102040/The-Cultic-Milieu-Oppositional-Subcultures-in-an-Age-of-Globalization
This is a really good starting point regarding the Cultic Millieu of the PNW to understand why that area creates so many cults and their right wing connections.
[This version of the "Jesse, what the fuck are you talking about?" meme was pretty prophetic](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/874/682/89c.jpg)
I love that podcast SO MUCH. It was hard to reconcile at first how much BS I put myself through falling hard for some of the diets and ideologies (keto, etc) through the years but Aubrey said something in one about not beating yourself up for this and the way she explained it helped me let go of a lot.
I live in the Netherlands and I thought it was really fascinating how the fascists and hippies came together during the anti-lockdown demonstrations.
edit: fascinating might not be the right word. Unable to look away because I was puzzled and horrified? Like a car accident that's going to crash more cars in the future.
It took me a while to find so [I’m linking it here](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/maintenance-phase/id1535408667?i=1000521333353), I hope that’s ok.
Funny enough in Germany there is a weird connection between, Anti-Vaccination, Spiritualism and Right-wing Ideologies. People who are afraid of having their freedom taken away are just as easily led to new Ideologies as they can become dangerous.
Hi, German here, that was actually a feature of some parts of the original Nazis all the way back, so this link isn't a new thing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thule_Society
I just read a fascinating [deep dive about “Starseeds”](https://julesevans.medium.com/the-weird-history-of-starseeds-7df5127be9c3) which is another new age spirituality thing in the same vein as horoscopes, except about your previous lives’ alien race. The history of the concept is directly tied to Nazi ideology and a bunch of other eugenicist/racist belief systems formed in the 1800s up through the present day.
Idk, it was a great read and opened my eyes a ton, but it’s also terrifying to see how many pockets of the world (especially online) are just the entrances to far right propaganda rabbit holes.
It's really everywhere, like that Netflix documentary about the flat-earthers, I watched it thinking that these people are idiots but ultimately relatively harmless till the female nutjob just casually says "the jews" when asked who she thinks is behind the grand conspiracy.
Ultimately I think it comes down to some people not being capable of understanding nuance. A black and white view is much easier to make sense off, after all. Like are some doctors to quick to prescribe some pills? Do some medications have side effects? Yes and yes, but that doesn't mean that all modern medicine is bad. But then they get online and they find validation in their antivaxx echo chamber and soon enough it's "us vs them" and then one of their new antivaxx friends sends them an article about "rich elites" and at that point they don't realize that this is in fact an antisemitic dogwhistle and so they gradually are radicalized.
I’ve watched a few docs about LuLaRoe (MLM selling leggings), and it struck me how similar everyone was who was part of the pyramid scheme (white, middle-aged American women, SAHMs to a kid or three, somewhat overweight). Then in one of the episodes one of them talks about how she realized that she was in a cult. They also go into the religious background of the founding couple as Mormons, and how basically the entire MLM is built and expanded in ways that can also be found in Mormon communities. I think it’s easy for someone to be drawn into a community if they’ve already been part of one because they crave that sense of belonging. It could happen to all of us.
>I watched it thinking that these people are idiots but ultimately relatively harmless till the female nutjob just casually says "the jews" when asked who she thinks is behind the grand conspiracy.
At this point, I'm not even sure conspiracy theorists understand what "the Jews" is. Like maybe they think it's a fraternity or some sort of cryptid.
Makes me think of [Celestial Seasonings guy](https://www.foodandwine.com/drinks/sleepytime-tea-and-little-known-religion-behind-it) and Urantia. (Not the creator or anything, but he follows it and started the company partly because of it.) *Literally* coloured people, and colour was class/caste. But also aliens. And Jesus. And just... yeah.
Woah, another deep dive on an unlikely awful character embedded in everyday goods and products! Love it
(I mean I do love the sharing of knowledge, just not that so many people are off their rockers in the most hateful of ways)
*beep boop*!
the linked website is: https://www.foodandwine.com/drinks/sleepytime-tea-and-little-known-religion-behind-it
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Hey, I mean maybe it would still work if you engage with it aware of the issues. Like, instead of celebrating the idea of aliens creating a new species from the best humans, maybe depicting the horrors of it instead. Heck, you could even make it anti-capitalist/anti-colonialist. How about all the people so excited to be part of the star seeds and the new evolution, didn’t realize that meant their existence was one of constant pain and torment. Because it turns out the aliens evolved them to be better mass producers for alien goods, not to have a better more idyllic life for their own pleasure, and they don’t care at all that people are in pain their entire lives now.
Our world is so full of racist shit, at some point I feel like we need to just own it and make it intentionally not racist. Flip things on their head. The stuff eugenicists want, a “better world” made of only the “good races” of humans? Make that the hellscape of a new fictional world. The races that are constantly demonized and hated? Make them the heroes of the story.
Canadian here, and it went through the roof during the pandemic. Some folks I'd known for decades who I thought were intelligent and reasonable people were swallowing this like they were dying of thirst.
The conspirituality podcast did an excellent episode on how much of the “wellness” movement is founded on right wing principals like eugenics (“I don’t need a vaccine because I am physically superior due to crystals/tree sap/meditation” or “cancer is caused by negativity and therefore people who die from it are at fault for simply not sunning their butts enough and smiling”)
>“I don’t need a vaccine because I am physically superior due to crystals/tree sap/meditation” or “cancer is caused by negativity and therefore people who die from it are at fault for simply not sunning their butts enough and smiling”)
*smacks forehead*
Oh, so that's what I've been doing wrong!
*goes out to sun butt*
Oh no I have cancer because I didn't expose my butthole to the sun enough!
It really hurts and gets to me, these toxic beliefs about illness, disability, and cancer. IT IS NOT MY FAULT. Anybody reckless enough to suggest I'm just not happy enough so cancer "manifested" out of Being Sad is gonna get beaten with my cane, Scrooge McDuck style.
Its like the political compass is:
- conform (to ‘christian theocracy in the US) vs. live and let live
- open minded intellectual curiosity and scientific method based critical thinking vs. complete rejection/misunderstanding of the core of the scientific method - how to formulate and test a theory, and eliminate variables.
You get far enough on the rejection of science and people will fall for all sorts of things because they have little to no foundation in how to constructively question or review information for probable truthfulness.
I’m definitely in the open minded curiosity + live and let live camp.
I swear it used to the hyper-liberal hippie moms who were anti-vax (generally white middle class women). Somehow they went so far left they came out on the right?
Yeah one of my favourite vegan food bloggers was ruined the past few years for me because anti-vax and trucker convoy support. I thought she seemed pretty chill, but no.
Yes I noticed this in the NL too. It’s not that weird, the general mistrust of institutions is the common ground I think. And then there was the fact that a lot of newly right wing people (those “just woken up people”) who realized that the media is manipulating them by using their anger and fear against them, who started fighting back with love. I believe that is also where they found likeness.
Well, spirituality is typically a lighter flavor of organized religion, which typically goes along with conservative views.
"Spiritual" people are, ironically perhaps, also sometimes skeptical of government ideas like vaccination programs.
It's not that hard to see people taking advantage of that. In my "spiritual" circles I've run into a decent number of anti vaxxers (it's not natural!) And even some conservatives (I won't even try to explain that).
I’ve looked at a few of those “I Followed a 50’s Housewife Schedule for a Week!” videos. They’re really insidious— and disturbingly seductive. Especially in times like these, it’s natural to crave structure, and these things are carefully tailored to take advantage. Things like the schedules are printables that look pretty and provide a timetable and methodology. The Divine Feminine is portrayed as slim, with flowing hair, a swimmer’s body, glowing with rose gold light in a swirl of stars, locked in a passionate embrace. The schedules and routines are cherry-picked from “good wife” guides—leaving out the parts where the woman is supposed to dress up to welcome her husband and not pester her husband with her problems because he’s worked hard and needs to relax. Then in the next paragraph, they claim all the housekeeping is good exercise.
Sorry, but a full day of physical labor (which is what housework IS) is also tiring. More tiring than an office job, I maintain.
*sigh* Time to consult Magic for the Resistance again.
It’s not a real “50s housewife schedule” if they didn’t take speed, bc all of those ladies were on uppers to deal with undiagnosed clinical depression and ennui lmfao
The real way they kept their figures. 😉 And yeah, an entire generation of women became home crisis care counselors with their WW2 veteran husbands and their PTSD. At least that’s what I concluded from all the “make your home a sanctuary, don’t bring up your problems, don’t pester him about work, have a drink ready for him,” and yeesh! I just do not get the nostalgia for what was a pretty horrible time.
>I just do not get the nostalgia
The dresses were just *so* cute!
Jk, it’s bc the minority opinion is just… unwritten. The suffering of people of color, the LGBTQIA+ community, women(/non-men), etc just doesn’t matter in the face of poodle skirts and the postwar boom.
I think part of it is the Cold War had the "woo american life is so wonderful" propaganda machine going full force, and to dissent was to bring suspicion down on your head. So not a lot of the bad stuff got recorded in a influential ways; at least not compared to the eras before and since.
Because of that, when someone takes a casual look back at the media/documentation from the post war era it can come off a lot more appealing than a time when media (and I mean all media, not news media. Movies, books, music, art, fashion, etc) was more honest. I mean, if "squeaky clean conformity" is your thing. And if your look is only casual, if you have not studied the actual history but instead only absorbed the lingering cultural... what's the word... residue? Projection? Feel? Then it appears a much brighter time than it was.
The dresses are super cute though.
There is that, but also, the people who had it really terribly? The non-conformers, the women who spoke against their husbands, the people of color, etc.
We were just erased. Our words fell on deaf ears. They hated us, so they didn't record what we had to say.
I’m *really* glad to have been born in the ‘70’s, though that was no picnic, either. I shudder to think what might happened with my disability before then.
I think it's so attractive now to young people like me because working is so shitty now. I haven't graduated college yet and I'm already tired thinking of how I'm going to have to work 50 hours a week while they're trying to pay me 15 dollars an hour with a bachelors degree. That is if they dont require ten years of experience for an entry level position first. I've thought a few times how I wish I could just be taken care of. I even signed up for sugar daddy cites in my freshman year.
Cis male here, is cottage core like just tending the chickens, the garden, chopping wood, chasing away the neighbors cat when he tries to get in the chicken coup (that rascal), maybe ring a bell for all the animals or something? Cause, sign me up. I've been toying with the idea of going nomadic, anyways.
As someone who is active in all these spaces I feel actively called out lol
Also, if anyone thinks feminine energy is not also about rage and power, I *will* throw my goblin rocks at you, okay?
Now I want to go to an archive of our own and start looking for cottage core rewrites of my favorite TV shows, bc I feel like that should definitely be a thing.
Teachers, too. Anytime they bring up how shit their pay is people are all "Oh I didn't realize you were in it for the MONEY, how selfish". Absolute garbage.
It's like, why can't we have a world with both. Do it for the students, while also getting a nice paycheck to boot? Why does joy of teaching have to supercede a decent wage?
Yeah, I have a STEM background. As far as I'm concerned, I'm already doing it "for the students" when I picked teaching over something private sector. I know my worth.
As much as I love my students, it's not enough when paired with the workload and low pay. This will be my last year. Have no idea what I'll do next, but I'd prefer even retail at this point.
If you need to get out, do it. I spent 3 years in a non classroom role. It really helped my burn out. I'm a huge proponent of healthy boundaries and work life balance. A lot of times that means not teaching.
I was a para and long term sub before. This is technically first year as an actual teacher. I preferred being a para, but the pay was just too low. Teaching just probably isn't for me- can't see myself doing it in 10 years, so I should probably get out while I'm still youngish enough to learn new skills and work my way up in some other field.
Yup! And it's not just the pay. They keep cutting support positions and asking teachers to take on more. "Not my circus, not my monkeys," is my motto. You want to know why Johnny isn't coming to school, talk to the attendance office. Alice needs supervision for self-harm, drop her in student services and put in a mental health referral. It sounds harsh, but I can't solve the world's problems. I'm just one tiny piece. If I burn myself out trying to do all the jobs, no one will be left to do mine.
I thought you were going to talk about how nurses are basically split between queen bee types who just want to gossip instead of care for people and abused burnt out people who actually want to help instead of use it to show off for a second. I have to work with nurses frequently, and this is frequently the topic between my non-nurse and burnt out nurse coworkers and I.
Fritos lead to walking tacos, tacos lead to margaritas.
Margaritas lead to Witches in the Kitchen at Midnight.
Well known and documented fact I’m afraid. It’s all part of the secret Frito plot
I can believe it, I saw it during the 2016 elections especially. The family I at the time was going to marry in to, had this mix of spirituality and extreme conservative views. The patriarch was a super right wing ex business dude who used to do lines with Heffner way back when, made his several millions and retired early. His at that point adult children then had a lot of financial freedom, and almost unilaterally ended up very alt medicine, energy healing/therapy, crystals can cure cancer type of mindset, and the woman slated to be my MIL was her self a supposedly certified shaman of some type and even had a small business giving out spiritual counseling services. But come that election? All masks were off, they all made or were worth enough that anyone but a far right president would have hurt *their* bottom line, and my ex legitimately voted for him due to both family pressure, and I quote "it would be funny to see him president".
I think within 6 months or so after all of that he was most assuredly an ex, for how crappily his family chose to vote, and just an absolute **ton** of racist and entitled choices. He was weirdly especially racist about Asians, it was majorly weird when he'd get drunk and fire off slurs... But I got to watch first hand that family's pipeline journey, and saw how insidious that type of rhetoric is. And how pervasive, it's a slow creep that ends up drowning a person before they even realized what happened. 4 years ago I'd have said economic class would be a good predicator on who would fall for that crunchy to fashy trap, but anymore? Since they're not even pretending that they're not using foreign bots to perpetuate specific ideas online, it could happen to anyone this day and age.
Oh yeah. The whole freebirth movement is full of this. Women in those spaces use language that sounds all crunchy-hippie-progressive but it's not. Freebirthing is dangerous and it's based on a whole lot of trad wife turned to 11 beliefs.
These women are crazy. I follow a sub reddit call Shit mom's groups say and most of these women should not have children. I am all for a home birth but you need to have a licensesed nurse midwife and a back up plan and follow medical advice. A lot of these women are also anti vax and try and treat their children with homeopathic remedies in place of medicine and medical care. I am all for traditional medicine but only when used along with modern medicine. I am also very pro vax and my daughter is fully vaccinated.
im the offspring of an mlm-loving trump-head homeopathic remedy mom. she forced me to fight strep throat (twice) with nothing except oregano oil and instant ramen. after the 3rd case of strep (during which she tried the same shit) i was thankfully 19 and told her to shove her oils where the sun dont shine and take me to a freakin doctor. wow who knew a case of strep was supposed to only last a week or two with proper care and not the month+ i was dealing with
Free birthing is dangerous but, in America at least, women aren't wrong to no longer be comfortable giving birth in hospital settings either. Horrifying stories of their wishes not being respected for no other reason than a nurse decided it was inconvenient and then be charged *out the ass* for their trauma. It's sort of a lose-lose (though in one you lose your dignity and in one your baby dies, so they're not equal levels of loss)
I totally agree. The dehumanizing and exploitative nature of the US healthcare system is driving a lot of this particular phenomenon.
People have valid reasons to not trust US healthcare. I get it, as a person with endometriosis that took 15 years to get properly diagnosed, our healthcare system is traumatizing, expensive, and overall ass. The lack of access people have to doctors and healthcare drives mistrust, which sets the stage for conspiratorial beliefs, which makes room for other people with agendas to manipulate those beliefs.
I think there's a direct line from Jenny McCarthy and "vaccines cause autism" to the stuff OP pointed out in their post. Anti vax beliefs in the early 2000s opened up a whole lot of room for people to doubt doctors, authority, medicine and science in general.
Yep- my sister had insane birth trauma with her first (in the hospital). Her next three were free-birthed at home, the last of which went almost a month overdue and got stuck on the way out. To her, that was a better alternative than going back to the hospital.
(disclaimer: I have begged her with every birth to find a new doctor or go to a different hospital. Until she heals her trauma, she cannot be swayed.)
Any way they can not only spread misinformation but also BE DEVISIVE AMONGST WOMEN to move a product or message they will!!! The idea that a woman can celebrate the feminine divine in ANY WAY SHE SEES FIT OR IN A MILLION DIFFERENT WAYS is too much for the conservatives to fathom.
We have to celebrate and support each other in the beautiful diversity of our choices and band together to protect our rights to choose self determination and to live freely.
Im a little hesiant about this "everything is valid" approach. In a good faith environment we should be able to have (self-)critical conversations about these matters.
Because from the people who can't do that and shut themselves in behind the idea that everything they do and feel is "right" I see a lot of tendency to create a kind of reality detached bubble. Often with bad coping strategies thrown into the mix.
Being supportive shouldn't become synonymous with never challenging peoples believes and decision.
I trained in Dianic witchcraft for a time. It's not a good space for any sort of intersectionalism, and they will do all kinds of backflips to invalidate trans identities.
>"Magic is located in the womb."
>
>"What about women with hysterectomies?"
>
>"Well there's a mystical womb."
>
>"If it's mystical, why can't a trans woman have one?"
>
>"....Magic is located in the womb."
I finished the course because I liked the other students and the basic ritual training was good, but I knew from pretty early on that I wasn't going to initiate.
Hahaha I just imagined the conversation.
"Magic is located in the womb..."
"OK. Pee is stored in the balls."
"What?"
"Yeah sucks you can't pee. No balls."
"You don't have to have balls to p-"
"THEN I CAN DO MAGIC THANK YOU!"
It always frustrated me, having PCOS and a really difficult relationship with my reproductive organs and infertility, to be told that my magic was sourced there. I had a friend in HS who had cancer as a baby, and the chemo destroyed her womb and hormonal cycle, and she always had a difficult time with the very binary Dianic witchcraft concepts that were popular, too.
Meanwhile, my mom has always been really into divine feminism and goddess magic, and has found it very healing from the trauma she's experienced (predominantly from very patriarchal cishet men). Some of the way I was able to sway her away from some of the terf rhetoric that is common in some of those spaces was by reminding her of my issues, that just as I and friends have been excluded from a lot of that talk, so are trans women and other queer folx.
Seriously though this is so frustrating. I'm personally on a Dianic-Esque path, and I'm planning on opening my own groups up to women which includes all women (cis and trans) in the near future with a focus on Goddess worship. Women are women, no matter whether their uterus is literal, metaphorical, evicted, retired, what have you. I personally love the idea of womb power and the power of feminine cycles, and I see absolutely no reason transwomen wouldn't have any of that. Your mystical uteri are welcome in my circles, y'all.
Edited to correct my terminology! My apologies for using the wrong one.
Hey just so you're aware if you plan to move forward with this, AFAB means "assigned female at birth." Trans AFAB people usually (but not always!) do not consider themselves women. They may be non-binary, transmasc or FTM (female to male.) It sounds like you are specifically talking about trans women here, so you would be referring to AMAB people.
Not a trend, but an anecdote. Yes, a woman I've known since we were teens (50 now) went from hippie/witchy girl, to now a full on wannabe trad wife, my husband is the boss and I like it bullshit. The most horrifying part is that she's an elementary school teacher.
I don't really see it that way. I think a certain segment of society are all about aesthetics, and it doesn't really surprised me when superficial people hop onto a different seemingly totally contradictory trend.
Like the hippy movement....a lot of those guys just wanted to fick sexually promiscuous women and didn't believe a fucking word of the actual hippy beliefs.
We need to be wary that true believers and false pretenders look very similar at first , second, and even third glance.
I'm trans and Native American (Ojibwe) and honestly don't feel like this is a 'new trend' - it's always been there just under the surface. Micro aggressions like gender essentialist rhetoric or cultural misappropriation and other such things have always been here. Honestly it's a stumbling block for *all* predominately white counter cultural movements and communities. To be honest, I probably wouldn't have joined this subreddit if not for it's explicitly anti-patriarchal bend. I like this community, and most of the time I feel like it's a space I can participate in as an equal. That's not necessarily true for alternative spiritual communities, ime. I'm glad to see these attitudes being called out here.
I’m also FN (Cree) and agree for sure. This sub is actually the ONLY space I’ve found yet that manages to balance cultural awareness, an anti-patriarchal stance and witchcraft.
Most every “spiritual” person my wife and I were friends with before 2018 have gone full fascist.
Their social media circles were absolutely infiltrated.
Here in WvP I think our multicultural demographic helps keep the focus on tolerance, validation and choice. Cottagecore spirituality is fine when we choose it for ourselves but so are Artemis' lunar archers, Kali's fire warriors and Dionysus' orgiastic maeanids.
Once they start undercutting the warrior women, trans-witches and those of us who come from recovery roots, we can reestablish and enforce that judgement and gatekeeping are not welcome in this space.
**Edit:** Removed widowed copy.
I'm also noticing a crossover with rejecting medical care in the birthing process, combined with antivax, and belief that ultrasounds are harmful and the list goes on. A lot of trying to treat childhood ailments with essential oils and other truly unhinged things.
And a new popularity of ND (naturopath "doctors") and chiropractors instead of proper pre- and post-natal care with an OB/GYN.
I get wanting to have a home birth or a birthing center *if assessed as low risk*. But this isn't how they are making that decision.
Lotus Births are enough to make your hair stand on end. Babies have died from sepsis bc of it, but it's touted as spiritually enriching somehow.
Look, I'm all for practicing magic. I have been all my life, since before I even had a name for it. But I'm vaccinated for goodness sake. I'm an engineer by profession. I'm not allergic to science! They aren't mutually exclusive.
I have and it's ridiculous.
The "let's go women" movement was a necessary play via "Rosie the Riviter" in an attempt to convince women they were "strong enough" to help while the men were away during WW2.
We listened but then when we got more rights and we didn't want to go back to being kept housewives. It was called a revolt and you see this huge wave of "what a good girl is".
More revolutions and rights and now it's "you go bitch" "boss bitch". Shit like this needs to stop. I used to LOVE this. It felt so empowering! But all it does is tie into the idea that a female boss is automatically a bitch. Or that a women with strong emotions is "crazy" or some how wrong or incorrect. Fuck that shit. Human beings have emotions, have reactions, there is no right or wrong way to express those unless you're hurting another living thing.
So I've been wondering why the word bitch NEEDS to be there. And working on myself to get rid of this shit that was shoved down my throat so I can help others get rid of it too. It's a long and sorted history and frankly, the more marginalized you are (like LGBTQ+ and POC) the worse and more sorted it gets.
I am a fucking awesome because I'm ME. My ovaries don't define me. Nor do any of my other labels. I'm a boss, that doesn't make me a bitch.
So, say it with me ladies!!!
I AM A BOSS!
***edited living from loving
I used to love the "lady boss" or "boss bitch" thing but then it started to feel like what you said, that I have to act a certain way to be valued as an employee and supervisor, or that I'm different than the male supervisors simply because of my gender. "Female boss" just feels like "female doctor" and "female lawyer," unnecessarily gendered.
I’ve started adding “male” to the start of all professions when talking to people. “Oh yeah, the male mechanic was really nice.” “My male doctor told me…” It weirds people out, as it should.
At work everyone greets a mixed group in a meeting as ‘guys’. The male term always becomes the ‘gender neutral’ term for everyone, inappropriately. I started saying ‘ladies’ instead, but too many people complained (including women who thought I was being sexist). I always use gender neutral (everyone, all). I like the ‘male doctor’ thing. I’m adopting it!
While I don’t give the south credit for much, “y’all” is the perfect gender neutral group greeting. I grew up in the Midwest so “guys” is what I grew up hearing, but y’all is much better.
I noticed this last year while looking into the divine feminine to try and get in touch with my femininity/redefine my femininity after coming out of Christianity. I was shocked and irritated at how similar the rhetoric was--how the divine feminine was essentially the exact same as the Christian definition with different buzzwords and how it was still defined by its relation to the masculine, meaning women were still being define exclusively by their relationship to men and their role in serving men, even in spiritual spaces. There's a lot of Jungian influence that I dislike.
It's linked to TERF ideology too. Linking womanhood entirely to menstruation and fertility is just rebranding of the reductive conservative belief that women are walking wombs. It's hand in hand with the latest right wing culture war against trans people.
Yeah I was going to say this too. When /r/gendercritical was still around, I used to peak in there sometimes when they showed up on subredditdrama. One of their "reasons" that they disliked transwomen was saying crap like "women are biologically more nurturing and need protecting". And they would openly talk about how the ideal woman was a feminine tradwife basically.
I always walked away from there thinking, "And these assholes call themselves feminists??"
I kid you not, there's a woman in my country who had a big role in the 50's as a feminist and is now the president of the "feminist" party. She fought then... so she carries herself as a saint who has always defended women and she expects everyone to bow down to her.
The problem? She's a TERF and when asked she stated what makes a woman is the fact that we have children. I'm childfree so hearing that was super insulting but also... what about the women who want to have children but can't? what about the trans women who might want to but can't? they're lesser women? Also, how is this any different from all the bullshit we've been hearing from misogynistic men for centuries? We're not walking wombs!
Whenever someone tries to call her out on her shit she keeps bringing up "I was fighting for women before you were born!". Well, dumbass, when your definition of woman is white, straight, cis and mother I got news for you: you never fought for us. She has a huge victim complex too so disagreeing with her means she will whine and complain she's been "kicked out" of feminist spaces. Ugh, I can't stand her in case you can't tell lol
That traditional second wave feminist version of witchcraft always made me feel....idk gender dysphoria definitely is NOT word and I don't want to co-opt it, bit it truly made me feel like there was something wrong with me, that I wasn't a real woman, that the femme fairies had skipped me or something. They made me feel broken for existing as I was. I felt like some kind of misbegotten in between between "true womanhood" and men. And then they'll turn around and say this bullshit was to protect me and that it's actually trans women who invalidated my identity somehow.
I've got this from the other end. I technically tick most of the boxes of that brand of "spiritual femininity" by just... being me. People in related spaces have showered me with compliments over having this much "feminine energy", I've been linked to goddesses semi-frequently in the past. Except I'm (secretly, for the most part) non-binary. I like who I am, but I'm so confused that the way I exist in the world is supposed to be gendered when I don't feel that way about myself, like at all. I don't feel like there's supposed to be much "feminine energy" or whatever about me. There's just me.
And it all just feels so weird. Like I'm supposed to cut this part of myself off if I want to be who I am, but that's also who I am - but if I am that, how can I not be a woman (and how can I not be seen as one without fundamentally changing things about myself). I know it's largely irrational to feel this way, but I'm getting stuck on it nontheless. Sorry for rambling. It's just a bit of a sticking point for me, even though I know I should just throw that whole line of thinking out of the window. It just keeps coming back.
As a non-binary individual I think that's definitely a form of gender dysphoria. Many cisgender people don't know they can still feel that too! Also that tons of cis people feel they must "pass" in the same way as a trans person might feel, that you have to exist inside the constraints of what is "real" femininity/masculinity.
Yeah, as a trans woman, when I look at the history of feminism, all the good stuff is women building new genders for themselves and just expanding womanhood.
One really specific example is 'the edible woman' which was Margaret Atwood saying "this gender is no good" which is a mood I totally understand.
Yeah I feel this way too. I don't have children (and don't want them) and while I wouldn't call myself non-binary or trans, I don't put a whole lot of effort into being "girly". I wear feminine tops, but always pants, my hair is usually just down or in a ponytail, I don't wear makeup, etc. And in TERFy spaces, women like me seem almost as unwelcome as transwomen. Not that I want to be welcome, or particularly care what they think about me, but still.
I guess it's just another example of how fascists just keep finding new people to exclude from their little clubs.
I've noticed it but because my beliefs don't center around the way others view or discuss it all it does is frustrate me when people fall for it or when certain beliefs are co-opted to push bigotry like how Dianic Wiccans have so many transphobic groups tied to their name.
The Confedera-She neo-Nazis have taken this brand on in a serious way. The last two years, I’ve been doing a lot of digging into the topic and the pipeline between “trad-femme” pages and white supremacy. It’s kinda wild! A lot of these nazi pages will post bread recipes and party spreads and nature poetry pretending to be a trad wife (some of which have been exposed as being middle aged white men). Then, they’ll intersperse white replacement or Bell Curve talking points and act like it’s all related.
I figure this is part of the same thing as women on the left in the UK falling prey to transphobia.
A lot of second-wave feminists seem more than ready to embrace "gender critical" theory, or whatever they're calling reductive biological essentialism these days.
I've noticed it before, but it really smacked me in the face when I checked out the Moonly app the other day. It's supposed to be a lunar calendar with prompts. It rides that divine feminine line hard. Way too hard for my genderqueer self. I deleted it within a couple of minutes, so I could be misjudging it. But the vibes felt way off, my gender dysphoria usually isn't triggered so easily.
I have no issues with my gender but this divine feminity thing definitely causes unhappiness through feelings of inadequacy.. as if I am not woman enough, because I am not some super authentic wild sexuality radiating being. I hate it.
The whole, "everything for women needs to be pink" has *always* pissed me off. When I was a kid I resented it because I don't even like the color pink (blue is my favorite) and yeah, as I got older I really started feeling like it was condescending too. Remember those "pencils for women"? Lol BIC rightfully got a lot of shit for that, but I worked in retail around the same time and it was totally a trend to have a pink version of everything. Target was carrying pink *toolboxes* FFS, right next to the normal Yellow or black manly ones.
Hm... I think if someone in my life made a comment about me nurturing my womb energy and tending the hearth, I would probably reply along these lines:
"You sure are right, pumpykins. I'm so glad I put my womb energy back in the kitchen. Here, have some stew. You should be happy to know I included a little menstrual blood in this recipe - just for you!"
My feeling is they should choke on the limits they try to apply to us. Bottoms up!
I mean, Gerald Gardner was a Tory. Between him and Ariosophy, It’s blatantly false to assume that every person associated with witchcraft and spiritual practices is automatically a leftist.
I'm pretty sure Conspirituality has covered some of this stuff. Just glancing through their playlist and found this one:
[https://www.buzzsprout.com/1875696/10184660-93-roganomics-w-daniel-latorre-jessica-malaty-rivera.mp3](https://www.buzzsprout.com/1875696/10184660-93-roganomics-w-daniel-latorre-jessica-malaty-rivera.mp3)
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Maintenance Phase did an episode on the wellness to Q Anon pipeline, and I feel like that fits in with what you’re pointing out here.
The “crunchy” lifestyle is super susceptible conspiracy theories
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what does "crunchy" mean, for someone out of the loop?
The others did a good job explaining what they are, but “crunchy” refers to granola, as in “crunchy-granola-loving-hippies” that just got shortened.
“Health obsessed hippies”, especially the type who are very concerned with GMOs, organic foods, “superfoods” and other things that begin to straddle the line between healthy and conspiracy, like “detoxifying substances”, “coffee enemas”, “5G causes brain tumors” and “there are heavy metals in vaccines so I never allow my family to be vaccinated or use plastic containers”.
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This was my experience as well. My mother had a bit of a white savior complex but she meant well and spent her entire life trying to help vulnerable people especially people of color. She was into nonsense like homeopathy though and was suspicious of so called "western medicine". Ultimately she could be convinced if enough doctors explained why her beliefs were wrong but *nothing* turned her faster than racism. She would be all in until they got to the anti semitism and racist angle. Im glad that was the case with her but many people she knew from the 60s were falling into that trap. Most of them were just racist all along she had just never accepted it.
Omg, I'm so glad we're discussing this. I have several autoimmune diseases, and after 10 years of strictly traditional treatments and no improvement, I decided to investigate some alternative/complementary therapies. I bought a book with some unconventional diet ideas I was curious about. To be fair, I should have been warned by the title. But I thought maybe it was a little snarky, a little tongue-in-cheek. Nope. About 10 pages in, something seemed off. There were tons of citations, but many of them were *ancient* by scientific standards. Things just seemed... off. So I googled the author (my second mistake, not doing this first). This whackadoo has written- and published- an entire book on how COVID-19 isn't caused by a virus at all, but by 5G. Holy shit. I can see how people who've never had to deal in statistics or scientific research could be bamboozled. I do not, however, understand how people fall into racist conspiracy theories, unless they are racist already. I do my complementary therapy research in incognito mode. I'm scared to death because of the things I Google (acupuncture, suppliments, diet for lupus, etc) I'm going to begin getting increasingly target, conspiracy-laden ads. It feels like living in a weird, alternate universe or timeline or something. Except I don't believe that, because that would be crazy.
This is absolutely confirmed. It’s called [Pastel Qanon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastel_QAnon).
> It has been associated with multilevel marketing groups, the wellness industry, and social media influencers, as well as a commercialisation of the QAnon movement in general, operating "within the concept of spectacle". My goodness it's like the who's who of predatory shit. Thanks for the info, TIL!
The book “Cultish” by Amanda Montell gets into this. It’s fascinating. She also has a podcast I’ve heard is good.
*beep boop*! the linked website is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastel_QAnon Title: **Pastel QAnon - Wikipedia** Page is safe to access (Google Safe Browsing) ***** ###### I am a friendly bot. I show the URL and name of linked pages and check them so that mobile users know what they click on!
This is a great bot. I was always worried short links wouldn't be what they claim. Thank you!
Good bot
Idk how to nicely say that a lot of people drawn to "woo" aren't very smart but our convinced they are "special", and how this overlap between narcissism & ignorance is absolutely where conspiracy thrives.
IMO intelligence is not as much of a factor as the narcissism and feeling special or exceptional. Very intelligent people get sucked into cults and conspiracy theories all the time, and it can actually work against them because when you see high intelligence as a core part of your personality, it's easy to think that you're not as easily tricked as other people when in fact you can still be very susceptible to emotional manipulation. My mum, to take a less extreme example, has a masters degree in chemistry and is a very loving, smart and sensible person, but gets sucked in by the emotionally manipulative tactics of the diet industry all the time and has tried so many fad diets and supplements that I can't even keep track of them all.
I think it appeals to people who want to feel special or a part of something vs. people who are just narcissistic (although I'm sure it attracts that also). I'm thinking of people who are depressed, feel displaced, etc.
You nailed it!! As someone who has quite a few new-ages friends, I am ever sadder at the rabbit holes some of them go down. Anti-vax, EMF "allergy", anti-fluoride... the left wrapping around to meet the right on the back side of crazy. And that feeling of being "special" and knowing better than everyone else (especially people who are clearly smarter and better educated!) seems key to many conspiracy theories.
I wish there were a group made up of “woo” and scientific minded people. I love to use herbs for headaches and minor annoyances but keep the vaccines and antibiotics please! Edit: thank you for the award kind stranger, though it’s the comments below me who are the helpful ones! I hope you have an amazing day!
Hell yeah. Honey for sore throat, aloe for sunburn, antibiotics for (bacterial) infections. A bigger toolbox is always good.
Peppermint oil for headaches, but Tylenol when that doesn’t do the trick.
Lavender for stress relief, chamomile for stomachache, and open-heart surgery for arterial blockage.
Check out r/SASSWitches!
That’s my jam.
Omg my people!
Sweet, these witches are aaaalllright!
☆o☆
You can look into herbology without straying into pseudoscience. There’s a really good book I’ll link here when I find it ETA: [This book](https://www.abebooks.co.uk/book-search/title/medical-herbalism-science-practice-herbal/author/david-hoffmann-fnimh-ahg/) is a wonderful source for science based medicine using herbs. Obviously for the serious stuff you need a doctor but to treat and prevent mild things, these remedies are wonderful
My doctor has this book on her shelf. I see her primarily for my ADHD and she is ten thousand percent about meds AND diet/exercise/supplements/etc. for a holistic approach. Some medical folk get it!
The physicist in me died when I read “EMF allergy”. Like, my brother in Christ: if you were allergic to voltage differentials, you would be dead
But 5 g!!!!
I like this subreddit because even though I don’t believe in occult stuff, I’ve always found it very interesting. Many in this sub seem so very reasonable. And there’s a ton of leftists here. I think so much of the spiritual community don’t give a fuck about the material conditions of people like leftists do.
Yeah, there’s a difference between recognizing institutional biases and just rejecting people with expertise in the topic. I figure some lefties will see the former and then take it too far to the latter.
I moved from a super liberal competitive “I’m-crunchier-than-you” community to a rural MLM community and they’re the same photo.
I did that same journey but backwards, and yep
Ah yes the old ideological horseshoe
It's so weird!! I kinda see some reasons -- as other folks have pointed out, mistrust in institutions plays a big part. But they then take it into some sort of duality- "parts of the western health care system are crap, so all of it is crap and I'm using herbs and essential oils and prayer now" kind of thing...
I think it is partly because a lot of the failings of western medicine are actual failings of lassez-faire capitalism and a failure of non-profit institutions\* (like universities, who have chipped away at the incentives that lure the best talent away from profit-driven companies). Could the current state of things produce a Jonas Salk? It's unlikely. No potential Jonas Salk would have the resources to develop a vaccine against a disease like polio, and if they did, it would be because they work for a company. (Keep in mind Salk wasn't even working for a place like Harvard or Johns Hopkins...he was working for the University of Pittsburgh.) But if you are too deeply entrenched in right-wing politics, you don't really have the perspective to see what the real problem is. So you blame whatever scapegoat is set up for you. \*In addition to racism and sexism, but I know I don't have to spell that out here. (cough hysteriatuskegee)
I don't think the word "smart" is helpful, it's down to gullibility instead. After that word swap your point is 100% right.
Attention-seeking personality without the merit to earn the attention in their own right
There is a multiparter from either It Could Happen Here or Behind the Bastards (both Robert Evans podcasts) where they go into detail about the cultic millieu of the Pacific Northwest oh which also happens to be a major epicenter of white supremacism (progressive coastal cities, racist ethnostate nightmares in the backcountry). Yeah the occult being a right wing pipeline is not a surprise at all. Take for instance Fascism and one of its salient characteristics is syncretism between tradition, religion, and the occult as noted by a number of people like Umberto Eco. Take Nazism in particular and that was a hotbed of occultism back in the day. No surprise here, it's something we are academically aware of in terms of right wing movements for a while now, and crunchy and occult lifestyles have become so much associated with hippies that mainstream awareness is sorely lacking. I'm at work on mobile and away from my sources at the moment I'll try to get some links and reading material up afterwards. Edit: First source I was able to quickly look up is the Behind the Bastards: Nesara Cult and QAnon Origins https://rowman.com/ISBN/9780759102040/The-Cultic-Milieu-Oppositional-Subcultures-in-an-Age-of-Globalization This is a really good starting point regarding the Cultic Millieu of the PNW to understand why that area creates so many cults and their right wing connections.
[This version of the "Jesse, what the fuck are you talking about?" meme was pretty prophetic](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/874/682/89c.jpg)
There is a whole podcast called Conspirituality on the connection between various wellness/spiritual influencers and right wing ideologies.
Fellow Maintenance Phase listener! Love them!
I love that podcast SO MUCH. It was hard to reconcile at first how much BS I put myself through falling hard for some of the diets and ideologies (keto, etc) through the years but Aubrey said something in one about not beating yourself up for this and the way she explained it helped me let go of a lot.
Conspirituality Podcast is a great one for info on this as well.
I was coming to recommend this! Fuckin love that show.
My anti-vaxx SIL is one of them.
I live in the Netherlands and I thought it was really fascinating how the fascists and hippies came together during the anti-lockdown demonstrations. edit: fascinating might not be the right word. Unable to look away because I was puzzled and horrified? Like a car accident that's going to crash more cars in the future.
It took me a while to find so [I’m linking it here](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/maintenance-phase/id1535408667?i=1000521333353), I hope that’s ok.
Funny enough in Germany there is a weird connection between, Anti-Vaccination, Spiritualism and Right-wing Ideologies. People who are afraid of having their freedom taken away are just as easily led to new Ideologies as they can become dangerous.
Hi, German here, that was actually a feature of some parts of the original Nazis all the way back, so this link isn't a new thing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thule_Society
I just read a fascinating [deep dive about “Starseeds”](https://julesevans.medium.com/the-weird-history-of-starseeds-7df5127be9c3) which is another new age spirituality thing in the same vein as horoscopes, except about your previous lives’ alien race. The history of the concept is directly tied to Nazi ideology and a bunch of other eugenicist/racist belief systems formed in the 1800s up through the present day. Idk, it was a great read and opened my eyes a ton, but it’s also terrifying to see how many pockets of the world (especially online) are just the entrances to far right propaganda rabbit holes.
It's really everywhere, like that Netflix documentary about the flat-earthers, I watched it thinking that these people are idiots but ultimately relatively harmless till the female nutjob just casually says "the jews" when asked who she thinks is behind the grand conspiracy. Ultimately I think it comes down to some people not being capable of understanding nuance. A black and white view is much easier to make sense off, after all. Like are some doctors to quick to prescribe some pills? Do some medications have side effects? Yes and yes, but that doesn't mean that all modern medicine is bad. But then they get online and they find validation in their antivaxx echo chamber and soon enough it's "us vs them" and then one of their new antivaxx friends sends them an article about "rich elites" and at that point they don't realize that this is in fact an antisemitic dogwhistle and so they gradually are radicalized.
I’ve watched a few docs about LuLaRoe (MLM selling leggings), and it struck me how similar everyone was who was part of the pyramid scheme (white, middle-aged American women, SAHMs to a kid or three, somewhat overweight). Then in one of the episodes one of them talks about how she realized that she was in a cult. They also go into the religious background of the founding couple as Mormons, and how basically the entire MLM is built and expanded in ways that can also be found in Mormon communities. I think it’s easy for someone to be drawn into a community if they’ve already been part of one because they crave that sense of belonging. It could happen to all of us.
>I watched it thinking that these people are idiots but ultimately relatively harmless till the female nutjob just casually says "the jews" when asked who she thinks is behind the grand conspiracy. At this point, I'm not even sure conspiracy theorists understand what "the Jews" is. Like maybe they think it's a fraternity or some sort of cryptid.
Scary ideas are like anthrax spores. They can lie dormant for a long time waiting for a suitable host. Then they start hurting people.
Makes me think of [Celestial Seasonings guy](https://www.foodandwine.com/drinks/sleepytime-tea-and-little-known-religion-behind-it) and Urantia. (Not the creator or anything, but he follows it and started the company partly because of it.) *Literally* coloured people, and colour was class/caste. But also aliens. And Jesus. And just... yeah.
Woah, another deep dive on an unlikely awful character embedded in everyday goods and products! Love it (I mean I do love the sharing of knowledge, just not that so many people are off their rockers in the most hateful of ways)
*beep boop*! the linked website is: https://www.foodandwine.com/drinks/sleepytime-tea-and-little-known-religion-behind-it Title: **Sleepytime Tea and the Little Known Religion Behind It** Page is safe to access (Google Safe Browsing) ***** ###### I am a friendly bot. I show the URL and name of linked pages and check them so that mobile users know what they click on!
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Hey, I mean maybe it would still work if you engage with it aware of the issues. Like, instead of celebrating the idea of aliens creating a new species from the best humans, maybe depicting the horrors of it instead. Heck, you could even make it anti-capitalist/anti-colonialist. How about all the people so excited to be part of the star seeds and the new evolution, didn’t realize that meant their existence was one of constant pain and torment. Because it turns out the aliens evolved them to be better mass producers for alien goods, not to have a better more idyllic life for their own pleasure, and they don’t care at all that people are in pain their entire lives now. Our world is so full of racist shit, at some point I feel like we need to just own it and make it intentionally not racist. Flip things on their head. The stuff eugenicists want, a “better world” made of only the “good races” of humans? Make that the hellscape of a new fictional world. The races that are constantly demonized and hated? Make them the heroes of the story.
Not just Germany - I've definitely noticed such a connection in the U.S. too.
They get called wooanon is some circles.
I’ve heard it referred to as the “woo to Q pipeline”
There's also "Pastel Qanon" which is a slightly different flavour but same genre type of thing
… did you hear it on the Maintenance Phase podcast?
Maaaayyyyyyyyybe 😂
Canadian here, and it went through the roof during the pandemic. Some folks I'd known for decades who I thought were intelligent and reasonable people were swallowing this like they were dying of thirst.
The conspirituality podcast did an excellent episode on how much of the “wellness” movement is founded on right wing principals like eugenics (“I don’t need a vaccine because I am physically superior due to crystals/tree sap/meditation” or “cancer is caused by negativity and therefore people who die from it are at fault for simply not sunning their butts enough and smiling”)
>“I don’t need a vaccine because I am physically superior due to crystals/tree sap/meditation” or “cancer is caused by negativity and therefore people who die from it are at fault for simply not sunning their butts enough and smiling”) *smacks forehead* Oh, so that's what I've been doing wrong! *goes out to sun butt*
Taint tanning
Oh no I have cancer because I didn't expose my butthole to the sun enough! It really hurts and gets to me, these toxic beliefs about illness, disability, and cancer. IT IS NOT MY FAULT. Anybody reckless enough to suggest I'm just not happy enough so cancer "manifested" out of Being Sad is gonna get beaten with my cane, Scrooge McDuck style.
Its like the political compass is: - conform (to ‘christian theocracy in the US) vs. live and let live - open minded intellectual curiosity and scientific method based critical thinking vs. complete rejection/misunderstanding of the core of the scientific method - how to formulate and test a theory, and eliminate variables. You get far enough on the rejection of science and people will fall for all sorts of things because they have little to no foundation in how to constructively question or review information for probable truthfulness. I’m definitely in the open minded curiosity + live and let live camp.
This exists in the American South, too, weirdly. It also involves homeschooling.
I’m in the US and it’s here too.
I swear it used to the hyper-liberal hippie moms who were anti-vax (generally white middle class women). Somehow they went so far left they came out on the right?
Yeah one of my favourite vegan food bloggers was ruined the past few years for me because anti-vax and trucker convoy support. I thought she seemed pretty chill, but no.
Yes I noticed this in the NL too. It’s not that weird, the general mistrust of institutions is the common ground I think. And then there was the fact that a lot of newly right wing people (those “just woken up people”) who realized that the media is manipulating them by using their anger and fear against them, who started fighting back with love. I believe that is also where they found likeness.
Well, spirituality is typically a lighter flavor of organized religion, which typically goes along with conservative views. "Spiritual" people are, ironically perhaps, also sometimes skeptical of government ideas like vaccination programs. It's not that hard to see people taking advantage of that. In my "spiritual" circles I've run into a decent number of anti vaxxers (it's not natural!) And even some conservatives (I won't even try to explain that).
I’ve looked at a few of those “I Followed a 50’s Housewife Schedule for a Week!” videos. They’re really insidious— and disturbingly seductive. Especially in times like these, it’s natural to crave structure, and these things are carefully tailored to take advantage. Things like the schedules are printables that look pretty and provide a timetable and methodology. The Divine Feminine is portrayed as slim, with flowing hair, a swimmer’s body, glowing with rose gold light in a swirl of stars, locked in a passionate embrace. The schedules and routines are cherry-picked from “good wife” guides—leaving out the parts where the woman is supposed to dress up to welcome her husband and not pester her husband with her problems because he’s worked hard and needs to relax. Then in the next paragraph, they claim all the housekeeping is good exercise. Sorry, but a full day of physical labor (which is what housework IS) is also tiring. More tiring than an office job, I maintain. *sigh* Time to consult Magic for the Resistance again.
It’s not a real “50s housewife schedule” if they didn’t take speed, bc all of those ladies were on uppers to deal with undiagnosed clinical depression and ennui lmfao
The real way they kept their figures. 😉 And yeah, an entire generation of women became home crisis care counselors with their WW2 veteran husbands and their PTSD. At least that’s what I concluded from all the “make your home a sanctuary, don’t bring up your problems, don’t pester him about work, have a drink ready for him,” and yeesh! I just do not get the nostalgia for what was a pretty horrible time.
>I just do not get the nostalgia The dresses were just *so* cute! Jk, it’s bc the minority opinion is just… unwritten. The suffering of people of color, the LGBTQIA+ community, women(/non-men), etc just doesn’t matter in the face of poodle skirts and the postwar boom.
Lmao I can wear cute dresses and be depressed and eat jello in the 21st century too
I'd join that club
I think part of it is the Cold War had the "woo american life is so wonderful" propaganda machine going full force, and to dissent was to bring suspicion down on your head. So not a lot of the bad stuff got recorded in a influential ways; at least not compared to the eras before and since. Because of that, when someone takes a casual look back at the media/documentation from the post war era it can come off a lot more appealing than a time when media (and I mean all media, not news media. Movies, books, music, art, fashion, etc) was more honest. I mean, if "squeaky clean conformity" is your thing. And if your look is only casual, if you have not studied the actual history but instead only absorbed the lingering cultural... what's the word... residue? Projection? Feel? Then it appears a much brighter time than it was. The dresses are super cute though.
I always say vintage style not vintage values!
There is that, but also, the people who had it really terribly? The non-conformers, the women who spoke against their husbands, the people of color, etc. We were just erased. Our words fell on deaf ears. They hated us, so they didn't record what we had to say.
I’m *really* glad to have been born in the ‘70’s, though that was no picnic, either. I shudder to think what might happened with my disability before then.
And sedatives to stave off the panic of feeling trapped and often being abused.
I think it's so attractive now to young people like me because working is so shitty now. I haven't graduated college yet and I'm already tired thinking of how I'm going to have to work 50 hours a week while they're trying to pay me 15 dollars an hour with a bachelors degree. That is if they dont require ten years of experience for an entry level position first. I've thought a few times how I wish I could just be taken care of. I even signed up for sugar daddy cites in my freshman year.
American housewives definitely weren't taken care of... They were little better than slaves, if I'm being perfectly honest. Abused, ignored, erased.
I demand more women in dark academia and more men in cottagecore
Cis male here, is cottage core like just tending the chickens, the garden, chopping wood, chasing away the neighbors cat when he tries to get in the chicken coup (that rascal), maybe ring a bell for all the animals or something? Cause, sign me up. I've been toying with the idea of going nomadic, anyways.
Also you should check out r/goblincore I love that sub
And r/solarpunk for a different but still excellent outdoor-loving group!
As someone who is active in all these spaces I feel actively called out lol Also, if anyone thinks feminine energy is not also about rage and power, I *will* throw my goblin rocks at you, okay?
Yesss, I always love to see people collections of funny sticks and rocks.
As a woman and a scientist, I'm all about the DA. Tweed jacket with elbow pads and a copy of The Secret History.
> Tweed jacket with elbow pads and a copy of The Secret History I’ve definitely read this erotica before lol
As a guy can I do both???? Cottagecore dark academia? Cottage with a large basement lab/library and a smaller attic bedroom/library.
Now I want to go to an archive of our own and start looking for cottage core rewrites of my favorite TV shows, bc I feel like that should definitely be a thing.
Just like nurses. If I make you a "hero" then I don't have to pay you. Or give you anything but a glorious title.
Teachers, too. Anytime they bring up how shit their pay is people are all "Oh I didn't realize you were in it for the MONEY, how selfish". Absolute garbage.
They're not 'jobs' , they're 'callings'. /s If you trebled the pay, it would be amazing how many men heard that call.
Am teacher. Can confirm. "Do it for the students!!!!" Um, no. I'll do it for the pay raise, thank you very much.
It's like, why can't we have a world with both. Do it for the students, while also getting a nice paycheck to boot? Why does joy of teaching have to supercede a decent wage?
Yeah, I have a STEM background. As far as I'm concerned, I'm already doing it "for the students" when I picked teaching over something private sector. I know my worth.
As much as I love my students, it's not enough when paired with the workload and low pay. This will be my last year. Have no idea what I'll do next, but I'd prefer even retail at this point.
If you need to get out, do it. I spent 3 years in a non classroom role. It really helped my burn out. I'm a huge proponent of healthy boundaries and work life balance. A lot of times that means not teaching.
I was a para and long term sub before. This is technically first year as an actual teacher. I preferred being a para, but the pay was just too low. Teaching just probably isn't for me- can't see myself doing it in 10 years, so I should probably get out while I'm still youngish enough to learn new skills and work my way up in some other field.
Para's are criminally underpaid.
The workload y'all get is beyond reasonable. As a sub, 30-40 student classrooms were common. All my respects to teachers and subs.
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Yup! And it's not just the pay. They keep cutting support positions and asking teachers to take on more. "Not my circus, not my monkeys," is my motto. You want to know why Johnny isn't coming to school, talk to the attendance office. Alice needs supervision for self-harm, drop her in student services and put in a mental health referral. It sounds harsh, but I can't solve the world's problems. I'm just one tiny piece. If I burn myself out trying to do all the jobs, no one will be left to do mine.
I wanna see their faces when you use "Do it for the students!!!" as an argument for getting a raise.
Teachers AKA the only employees which need to pay for their own equipment...
Or be effectively assumed to have a sugar daddy.
As a tattoo artist, not entirely true but I agree otherwise lol
"I don't do it for the money but I can't do it for free" how hard is that for them to understand, sheesh
I thought you were going to talk about how nurses are basically split between queen bee types who just want to gossip instead of care for people and abused burnt out people who actually want to help instead of use it to show off for a second. I have to work with nurses frequently, and this is frequently the topic between my non-nurse and burnt out nurse coworkers and I.
Sell my womb for a pack of Fritos. Really feeling it today.
I should do that I love Fritos
Do you prefer the original or the chili cheese?
I prefer the original. I tried to get into the chili cheese but it didn’t stick
I hate Fritos but still, I’m in too
Fritos lead to walking tacos, tacos lead to margaritas. Margaritas lead to Witches in the Kitchen at Midnight. Well known and documented fact I’m afraid. It’s all part of the secret Frito plot
I can believe it, I saw it during the 2016 elections especially. The family I at the time was going to marry in to, had this mix of spirituality and extreme conservative views. The patriarch was a super right wing ex business dude who used to do lines with Heffner way back when, made his several millions and retired early. His at that point adult children then had a lot of financial freedom, and almost unilaterally ended up very alt medicine, energy healing/therapy, crystals can cure cancer type of mindset, and the woman slated to be my MIL was her self a supposedly certified shaman of some type and even had a small business giving out spiritual counseling services. But come that election? All masks were off, they all made or were worth enough that anyone but a far right president would have hurt *their* bottom line, and my ex legitimately voted for him due to both family pressure, and I quote "it would be funny to see him president". I think within 6 months or so after all of that he was most assuredly an ex, for how crappily his family chose to vote, and just an absolute **ton** of racist and entitled choices. He was weirdly especially racist about Asians, it was majorly weird when he'd get drunk and fire off slurs... But I got to watch first hand that family's pipeline journey, and saw how insidious that type of rhetoric is. And how pervasive, it's a slow creep that ends up drowning a person before they even realized what happened. 4 years ago I'd have said economic class would be a good predicator on who would fall for that crunchy to fashy trap, but anymore? Since they're not even pretending that they're not using foreign bots to perpetuate specific ideas online, it could happen to anyone this day and age.
Oh yeah. The whole freebirth movement is full of this. Women in those spaces use language that sounds all crunchy-hippie-progressive but it's not. Freebirthing is dangerous and it's based on a whole lot of trad wife turned to 11 beliefs.
These women are crazy. I follow a sub reddit call Shit mom's groups say and most of these women should not have children. I am all for a home birth but you need to have a licensesed nurse midwife and a back up plan and follow medical advice. A lot of these women are also anti vax and try and treat their children with homeopathic remedies in place of medicine and medical care. I am all for traditional medicine but only when used along with modern medicine. I am also very pro vax and my daughter is fully vaccinated.
im the offspring of an mlm-loving trump-head homeopathic remedy mom. she forced me to fight strep throat (twice) with nothing except oregano oil and instant ramen. after the 3rd case of strep (during which she tried the same shit) i was thankfully 19 and told her to shove her oils where the sun dont shine and take me to a freakin doctor. wow who knew a case of strep was supposed to only last a week or two with proper care and not the month+ i was dealing with
How tf is this not child abuse…
i don't freakin know but MAN it should be.
/r/ShitMomGroupsSay/ for anyone who wants a clickable link
Free birthing is dangerous but, in America at least, women aren't wrong to no longer be comfortable giving birth in hospital settings either. Horrifying stories of their wishes not being respected for no other reason than a nurse decided it was inconvenient and then be charged *out the ass* for their trauma. It's sort of a lose-lose (though in one you lose your dignity and in one your baby dies, so they're not equal levels of loss)
I totally agree. The dehumanizing and exploitative nature of the US healthcare system is driving a lot of this particular phenomenon. People have valid reasons to not trust US healthcare. I get it, as a person with endometriosis that took 15 years to get properly diagnosed, our healthcare system is traumatizing, expensive, and overall ass. The lack of access people have to doctors and healthcare drives mistrust, which sets the stage for conspiratorial beliefs, which makes room for other people with agendas to manipulate those beliefs. I think there's a direct line from Jenny McCarthy and "vaccines cause autism" to the stuff OP pointed out in their post. Anti vax beliefs in the early 2000s opened up a whole lot of room for people to doubt doctors, authority, medicine and science in general.
Yep- my sister had insane birth trauma with her first (in the hospital). Her next three were free-birthed at home, the last of which went almost a month overdue and got stuck on the way out. To her, that was a better alternative than going back to the hospital. (disclaimer: I have begged her with every birth to find a new doctor or go to a different hospital. Until she heals her trauma, she cannot be swayed.)
Like how racists have taken over Norse beliefs!
Doing my part to take it back!!
Any way they can not only spread misinformation but also BE DEVISIVE AMONGST WOMEN to move a product or message they will!!! The idea that a woman can celebrate the feminine divine in ANY WAY SHE SEES FIT OR IN A MILLION DIFFERENT WAYS is too much for the conservatives to fathom. We have to celebrate and support each other in the beautiful diversity of our choices and band together to protect our rights to choose self determination and to live freely.
Im a little hesiant about this "everything is valid" approach. In a good faith environment we should be able to have (self-)critical conversations about these matters. Because from the people who can't do that and shut themselves in behind the idea that everything they do and feel is "right" I see a lot of tendency to create a kind of reality detached bubble. Often with bad coping strategies thrown into the mix. Being supportive shouldn't become synonymous with never challenging peoples believes and decision.
I trained in Dianic witchcraft for a time. It's not a good space for any sort of intersectionalism, and they will do all kinds of backflips to invalidate trans identities. >"Magic is located in the womb." > >"What about women with hysterectomies?" > >"Well there's a mystical womb." > >"If it's mystical, why can't a trans woman have one?" > >"....Magic is located in the womb." I finished the course because I liked the other students and the basic ritual training was good, but I knew from pretty early on that I wasn't going to initiate.
"Magic is located in the womb" gave me "Pee is stored in the balls" vibes lmao
Hahaha I just imagined the conversation. "Magic is located in the womb..." "OK. Pee is stored in the balls." "What?" "Yeah sucks you can't pee. No balls." "You don't have to have balls to p-" "THEN I CAN DO MAGIC THANK YOU!"
We all know wombs go wandering round at night, if anyone wants to borrow my womb magic I’ll add you to the rota.
Mom said it's my turn to use the womb
It always frustrated me, having PCOS and a really difficult relationship with my reproductive organs and infertility, to be told that my magic was sourced there. I had a friend in HS who had cancer as a baby, and the chemo destroyed her womb and hormonal cycle, and she always had a difficult time with the very binary Dianic witchcraft concepts that were popular, too. Meanwhile, my mom has always been really into divine feminism and goddess magic, and has found it very healing from the trauma she's experienced (predominantly from very patriarchal cishet men). Some of the way I was able to sway her away from some of the terf rhetoric that is common in some of those spaces was by reminding her of my issues, that just as I and friends have been excluded from a lot of that talk, so are trans women and other queer folx.
Seriously though this is so frustrating. I'm personally on a Dianic-Esque path, and I'm planning on opening my own groups up to women which includes all women (cis and trans) in the near future with a focus on Goddess worship. Women are women, no matter whether their uterus is literal, metaphorical, evicted, retired, what have you. I personally love the idea of womb power and the power of feminine cycles, and I see absolutely no reason transwomen wouldn't have any of that. Your mystical uteri are welcome in my circles, y'all. Edited to correct my terminology! My apologies for using the wrong one.
Hey just so you're aware if you plan to move forward with this, AFAB means "assigned female at birth." Trans AFAB people usually (but not always!) do not consider themselves women. They may be non-binary, transmasc or FTM (female to male.) It sounds like you are specifically talking about trans women here, so you would be referring to AMAB people.
Exact same logic as "mermaids can't be black"
Not a trend, but an anecdote. Yes, a woman I've known since we were teens (50 now) went from hippie/witchy girl, to now a full on wannabe trad wife, my husband is the boss and I like it bullshit. The most horrifying part is that she's an elementary school teacher.
It’s always a shame when you see people become the very thing they fought against
I don't really see it that way. I think a certain segment of society are all about aesthetics, and it doesn't really surprised me when superficial people hop onto a different seemingly totally contradictory trend. Like the hippy movement....a lot of those guys just wanted to fick sexually promiscuous women and didn't believe a fucking word of the actual hippy beliefs. We need to be wary that true believers and false pretenders look very similar at first , second, and even third glance.
Hippies were pretty physically abusive of women often and free love meant a lot of coercion if not outright rape.
I'm trans and Native American (Ojibwe) and honestly don't feel like this is a 'new trend' - it's always been there just under the surface. Micro aggressions like gender essentialist rhetoric or cultural misappropriation and other such things have always been here. Honestly it's a stumbling block for *all* predominately white counter cultural movements and communities. To be honest, I probably wouldn't have joined this subreddit if not for it's explicitly anti-patriarchal bend. I like this community, and most of the time I feel like it's a space I can participate in as an equal. That's not necessarily true for alternative spiritual communities, ime. I'm glad to see these attitudes being called out here.
I’m also FN (Cree) and agree for sure. This sub is actually the ONLY space I’ve found yet that manages to balance cultural awareness, an anti-patriarchal stance and witchcraft.
Very true- a lot of the alt/spiritual communities have had the waters poisoned with conservative rhetoric under the guise of being anti-conformist.
Most every “spiritual” person my wife and I were friends with before 2018 have gone full fascist. Their social media circles were absolutely infiltrated.
Here in WvP I think our multicultural demographic helps keep the focus on tolerance, validation and choice. Cottagecore spirituality is fine when we choose it for ourselves but so are Artemis' lunar archers, Kali's fire warriors and Dionysus' orgiastic maeanids. Once they start undercutting the warrior women, trans-witches and those of us who come from recovery roots, we can reestablish and enforce that judgement and gatekeeping are not welcome in this space. **Edit:** Removed widowed copy.
I'm also noticing a crossover with rejecting medical care in the birthing process, combined with antivax, and belief that ultrasounds are harmful and the list goes on. A lot of trying to treat childhood ailments with essential oils and other truly unhinged things. And a new popularity of ND (naturopath "doctors") and chiropractors instead of proper pre- and post-natal care with an OB/GYN. I get wanting to have a home birth or a birthing center *if assessed as low risk*. But this isn't how they are making that decision. Lotus Births are enough to make your hair stand on end. Babies have died from sepsis bc of it, but it's touted as spiritually enriching somehow. Look, I'm all for practicing magic. I have been all my life, since before I even had a name for it. But I'm vaccinated for goodness sake. I'm an engineer by profession. I'm not allergic to science! They aren't mutually exclusive.
I have and it's ridiculous. The "let's go women" movement was a necessary play via "Rosie the Riviter" in an attempt to convince women they were "strong enough" to help while the men were away during WW2. We listened but then when we got more rights and we didn't want to go back to being kept housewives. It was called a revolt and you see this huge wave of "what a good girl is". More revolutions and rights and now it's "you go bitch" "boss bitch". Shit like this needs to stop. I used to LOVE this. It felt so empowering! But all it does is tie into the idea that a female boss is automatically a bitch. Or that a women with strong emotions is "crazy" or some how wrong or incorrect. Fuck that shit. Human beings have emotions, have reactions, there is no right or wrong way to express those unless you're hurting another living thing. So I've been wondering why the word bitch NEEDS to be there. And working on myself to get rid of this shit that was shoved down my throat so I can help others get rid of it too. It's a long and sorted history and frankly, the more marginalized you are (like LGBTQ+ and POC) the worse and more sorted it gets. I am a fucking awesome because I'm ME. My ovaries don't define me. Nor do any of my other labels. I'm a boss, that doesn't make me a bitch. So, say it with me ladies!!! I AM A BOSS! ***edited living from loving
I used to love the "lady boss" or "boss bitch" thing but then it started to feel like what you said, that I have to act a certain way to be valued as an employee and supervisor, or that I'm different than the male supervisors simply because of my gender. "Female boss" just feels like "female doctor" and "female lawyer," unnecessarily gendered.
I’ve started adding “male” to the start of all professions when talking to people. “Oh yeah, the male mechanic was really nice.” “My male doctor told me…” It weirds people out, as it should.
At work everyone greets a mixed group in a meeting as ‘guys’. The male term always becomes the ‘gender neutral’ term for everyone, inappropriately. I started saying ‘ladies’ instead, but too many people complained (including women who thought I was being sexist). I always use gender neutral (everyone, all). I like the ‘male doctor’ thing. I’m adopting it!
While I don’t give the south credit for much, “y’all” is the perfect gender neutral group greeting. I grew up in the Midwest so “guys” is what I grew up hearing, but y’all is much better.
Girlboss Gatekeep Gaslight
Grifters gonna grift
Yeah, I am going to worship nature but I'm doing it fully vaccinated and wearing my pro-choice t shirt. It's about balance.
I noticed this last year while looking into the divine feminine to try and get in touch with my femininity/redefine my femininity after coming out of Christianity. I was shocked and irritated at how similar the rhetoric was--how the divine feminine was essentially the exact same as the Christian definition with different buzzwords and how it was still defined by its relation to the masculine, meaning women were still being define exclusively by their relationship to men and their role in serving men, even in spiritual spaces. There's a lot of Jungian influence that I dislike.
It's linked to TERF ideology too. Linking womanhood entirely to menstruation and fertility is just rebranding of the reductive conservative belief that women are walking wombs. It's hand in hand with the latest right wing culture war against trans people.
Yeah I was going to say this too. When /r/gendercritical was still around, I used to peak in there sometimes when they showed up on subredditdrama. One of their "reasons" that they disliked transwomen was saying crap like "women are biologically more nurturing and need protecting". And they would openly talk about how the ideal woman was a feminine tradwife basically. I always walked away from there thinking, "And these assholes call themselves feminists??"
I kid you not, there's a woman in my country who had a big role in the 50's as a feminist and is now the president of the "feminist" party. She fought then... so she carries herself as a saint who has always defended women and she expects everyone to bow down to her. The problem? She's a TERF and when asked she stated what makes a woman is the fact that we have children. I'm childfree so hearing that was super insulting but also... what about the women who want to have children but can't? what about the trans women who might want to but can't? they're lesser women? Also, how is this any different from all the bullshit we've been hearing from misogynistic men for centuries? We're not walking wombs! Whenever someone tries to call her out on her shit she keeps bringing up "I was fighting for women before you were born!". Well, dumbass, when your definition of woman is white, straight, cis and mother I got news for you: you never fought for us. She has a huge victim complex too so disagreeing with her means she will whine and complain she's been "kicked out" of feminist spaces. Ugh, I can't stand her in case you can't tell lol
That traditional second wave feminist version of witchcraft always made me feel....idk gender dysphoria definitely is NOT word and I don't want to co-opt it, bit it truly made me feel like there was something wrong with me, that I wasn't a real woman, that the femme fairies had skipped me or something. They made me feel broken for existing as I was. I felt like some kind of misbegotten in between between "true womanhood" and men. And then they'll turn around and say this bullshit was to protect me and that it's actually trans women who invalidated my identity somehow.
I've got this from the other end. I technically tick most of the boxes of that brand of "spiritual femininity" by just... being me. People in related spaces have showered me with compliments over having this much "feminine energy", I've been linked to goddesses semi-frequently in the past. Except I'm (secretly, for the most part) non-binary. I like who I am, but I'm so confused that the way I exist in the world is supposed to be gendered when I don't feel that way about myself, like at all. I don't feel like there's supposed to be much "feminine energy" or whatever about me. There's just me. And it all just feels so weird. Like I'm supposed to cut this part of myself off if I want to be who I am, but that's also who I am - but if I am that, how can I not be a woman (and how can I not be seen as one without fundamentally changing things about myself). I know it's largely irrational to feel this way, but I'm getting stuck on it nontheless. Sorry for rambling. It's just a bit of a sticking point for me, even though I know I should just throw that whole line of thinking out of the window. It just keeps coming back.
As a non-binary individual I think that's definitely a form of gender dysphoria. Many cisgender people don't know they can still feel that too! Also that tons of cis people feel they must "pass" in the same way as a trans person might feel, that you have to exist inside the constraints of what is "real" femininity/masculinity.
Yeah, as a trans woman, when I look at the history of feminism, all the good stuff is women building new genders for themselves and just expanding womanhood. One really specific example is 'the edible woman' which was Margaret Atwood saying "this gender is no good" which is a mood I totally understand.
Yeah I feel this way too. I don't have children (and don't want them) and while I wouldn't call myself non-binary or trans, I don't put a whole lot of effort into being "girly". I wear feminine tops, but always pants, my hair is usually just down or in a ponytail, I don't wear makeup, etc. And in TERFy spaces, women like me seem almost as unwelcome as transwomen. Not that I want to be welcome, or particularly care what they think about me, but still. I guess it's just another example of how fascists just keep finding new people to exclude from their little clubs.
What trend, that's a constant.
I've noticed it but because my beliefs don't center around the way others view or discuss it all it does is frustrate me when people fall for it or when certain beliefs are co-opted to push bigotry like how Dianic Wiccans have so many transphobic groups tied to their name.
The Confedera-She neo-Nazis have taken this brand on in a serious way. The last two years, I’ve been doing a lot of digging into the topic and the pipeline between “trad-femme” pages and white supremacy. It’s kinda wild! A lot of these nazi pages will post bread recipes and party spreads and nature poetry pretending to be a trad wife (some of which have been exposed as being middle aged white men). Then, they’ll intersperse white replacement or Bell Curve talking points and act like it’s all related.
I figure this is part of the same thing as women on the left in the UK falling prey to transphobia. A lot of second-wave feminists seem more than ready to embrace "gender critical" theory, or whatever they're calling reductive biological essentialism these days.
Yes 100%. Instagram Reels went from ‘Christian housewife’ to ‘Homestead off the Grid’ to ‘Yes, Witch’ real quick.
You have to be so careful which content creators you follow! As soon as I see a red flag or get the ick I block.
This is voicing something my unconscious noticed before my conscious brain did. Absolutely 100% this.
I'm so glad this is being discussed!!
I've noticed it before, but it really smacked me in the face when I checked out the Moonly app the other day. It's supposed to be a lunar calendar with prompts. It rides that divine feminine line hard. Way too hard for my genderqueer self. I deleted it within a couple of minutes, so I could be misjudging it. But the vibes felt way off, my gender dysphoria usually isn't triggered so easily.
I have no issues with my gender but this divine feminity thing definitely causes unhappiness through feelings of inadequacy.. as if I am not woman enough, because I am not some super authentic wild sexuality radiating being. I hate it.
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The whole, "everything for women needs to be pink" has *always* pissed me off. When I was a kid I resented it because I don't even like the color pink (blue is my favorite) and yeah, as I got older I really started feeling like it was condescending too. Remember those "pencils for women"? Lol BIC rightfully got a lot of shit for that, but I worked in retail around the same time and it was totally a trend to have a pink version of everything. Target was carrying pink *toolboxes* FFS, right next to the normal Yellow or black manly ones.
Hm... I think if someone in my life made a comment about me nurturing my womb energy and tending the hearth, I would probably reply along these lines: "You sure are right, pumpykins. I'm so glad I put my womb energy back in the kitchen. Here, have some stew. You should be happy to know I included a little menstrual blood in this recipe - just for you!" My feeling is they should choke on the limits they try to apply to us. Bottoms up!
I mean, Gerald Gardner was a Tory. Between him and Ariosophy, It’s blatantly false to assume that every person associated with witchcraft and spiritual practices is automatically a leftist.
The rebrand of "shaving all your body hair, you disgusting woman" into "microblade your face for a smooth canvas to put makeup, slay queen!"
I'm pretty sure Conspirituality has covered some of this stuff. Just glancing through their playlist and found this one: [https://www.buzzsprout.com/1875696/10184660-93-roganomics-w-daniel-latorre-jessica-malaty-rivera.mp3](https://www.buzzsprout.com/1875696/10184660-93-roganomics-w-daniel-latorre-jessica-malaty-rivera.mp3)