Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!ora!daemon From: johnob@tekigm2.men.tek.com (John Obendorfer) Newsgroups: soc.feminism Subject: Re: Feminism in the Craft Message-ID: <6938@tekigm2.MEN.TEK.COM> Date: 27 Oct 89 21:11:37 GMT References: <891027.001438600@Prime> Sender: ambar@ora.ora.com Reply-To: John Obendorfer Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Vancouver, WA. Lines: 76 Approved: ambar@ora.com In article <891027.001438600@Prime> hb@prime.acc.virginia.edu (Hank Bovis) writes: > > Margo and Lee, in their _New Broom_ article, note that many in the > Craft have been disturbed by the appearance of feminist Witches > outside the "traditional" Craft, as well as the emergence of > all-women covens. > > A Feminist calls herself Witch and claims, "Witchcraft is > totally ours." The Craft rustles uncomfortably. She has never > been initiated into a Coven. She knows little of Coven Law and > myth, but proudly states, "I worship the Mother, I am a follower > of the Old Religion, I work for the restoration of matriarchy > under the Goddess." Wicca squirms. _Witch_ is our name, our > identity, our life. How, we demand, can these political women > drain our identity of its deepest emotional and religious > significance? Do they have any right to our name? I feel compelled to add a few comments here. The reason why the Craft "rustles uncomfortably" at the statement "Witchcraft is totally ours" is that this statement is a rather bold one for the feminists to be making. Witchcraft, in its "traditional" form, came to the United States in the mid 1950s; the feminists did not jump on the bandwagon until the mid-to-late 1970s. Having lived and worked with the Craft communities in 3 west coast cities over a 10-year period, my rough guess is that non-Dianic Crafters outnumber the Dianics by a factor of at least twenty to one. (This guess is derived from observations of festival attendances, circle attendances, and a lot of work in the San Diego, Portland, and Seattle Pagan communities.) For these two reasons, for feminist Crafters to make the statement that Witchcraft is "totally ours" or a "Women's Religion" is, IMHO, somewhat nervy. I certainly agree that feminist Crafters worship the Mother; that they follow the Old Religion is questionable. Gardnerian-derived Crafters worship the Goddess as well as a Consort; in Dianic Circles the role of the Horned God is downplayed severely if not eliminated. Gardnerian-derived Crafters believe in an egalitarian approach, where women and men are both honored; Dianic Crafters frequently do not permit men to join their Circles. Gardnerian-derived Crafters MOST certainly do not "work for the restoration of Matriarchy"; thank you, most of us would prefer a culture where what matters is your wisdom, knowledge, and intelligence, not the equipment you've got between your legs. For these reasons, I would say the feminist Crafters are not Witches in the traditional neo-Gardnerian sense of the word; I would say that they are feminist Pagans. > > _Yes_, say the writers. > > Feminist "witches" are seeking their own heritage as women. > They are reaching back, beyond five thousand years of > patriarchy. Independent of _any_ help from the Craft, they have Again, this is a little hard to swallow. As I indicated above, the point at which one began seeing strongly feminist "Craft" Circles was in the mid-to-late seventies; those women who initiated this movement borrowed heavily from the same archetypical sources as the neo-Gard- nerians who came before them, and put their own particular slant on it. I would go so far as to say, were it not for the preceding twenty year wave of work and publication by Gerald Gardner, Ray Buckland, Janet and Stewart Farrar, Alex Saunders, and even good 'ol Lady Sheba, among many others, feminist Witchcraft would not exist; the mainstream of the Craft would not exist! > found the Goddess. They have found Her in the past; they have > witnessed Her rape in the man-ravaged earth; they have found Her > within themselves. > What the feminist Witches hold is a new, yet ancient, > essence of pure worship. They hold the future. Okay. What they are doing is perfectly fine; let's just be honest about where it came from and how it is different from what came before and what is alongside them. That's all I ask. John > [*] _The New Broom_, Vol. 1, No. 3 (Lammas 1973), 21, 28.