Problems with Contemporary Neo-Paganism
Jul. 5th, 2019 12:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
causticus1. First and foremost, Neopagan revival movements are not rooted in the ancient traditions their proponents claim to be reviving. Obviously, we all know that in Europe (among other places), the old pagan traditions were all-but wiped out by the aggressive and persistent spread of Christianity. At best, these Neopagan endeavors are reconstruction efforts; and ones based on fragments of surviving folklore, writings and ritual practices. The best we have today in terms of surviving retirements are the Greek and Roman traditions of the classical Mediterranean world. Whereas, Northern and Western European traditions are far more scant in terms of surviving literary works and artifacts we have to draw from.
2. Fortunately, the esoteric knowledge and practices of ancient traditions can be “recovered” to some degree by those who know how to do so. I won't really go into this here, but I'll just say that it is theoretically possible. Let's just say if the gods and goddesses are real, in one form or another, then they haven't actually gone anywhere just because human populations on Earth stopped actively venerating them for a period of time. If mystics and occultists today can make contact with deities then it should be theoretically possible to re-kindle the old flames.
3. The main problem today though is that a large number of self-professed Neopagans don't actually believe in the existence of their gods; or at least they don't believe their gods being anything more than mere psychological symbols or linguistic constructs. Nor are Neopagans today (by and large) adequately (or at all!) skilled in the arcane or mystical arts. And thus the τέχνη required for properly understanding and interacting with divine phenomena is largely absent.
4. Because of this (by and large) lack of connection with the higher planes, Neopaganism in the West is largely a mere escapist or alternative lifestyle; one among many others. And because of this, Neopagnaism tends to disproportionately attract society's misfits, the maladjusted, eccentrics and weird people in general. Any movement that fails to attract anything more than a fringe base of support isn't going to become anything beyond a fringe movement. From an Optics perspective, this prevents so-called “normies” from feeling comfortable joining or aligning with the movement in question. Normies tend to go where they see other normies already congregating.
5. Being little more than a mere lifestyle choice, in a crowded market with many other competing lifestyle choices, the choice of affiliation with Neopaganism is mostly driven by motivations and concerns that have little to do with anything inherently spiritual. And thus we can say that most Neopagan endeavors are driven by political beliefs and affiliations. The two most notable factions of Neopagnaism are largely political in nature. These are, (1) New Age Neopaganism, and (2) Folkish Neopaganism.
6. New Age Neopaganism is primarily a product of emancipatory politics (i.e. Leftism) and it's practitioners are what its critics might deride as “fluff bunnies,” among other pejorative labels. Because of its roots in emancipatory politics, this branch of Neopaganism is largely antagonistic toward anything reeking of rules, discipline, authority or firm principles. In other words, its collective mentality is stuck in a permanent state of adolescent rebellion, and as a result, is resistant of any effort to “impose” coherent metaphysical doctrines, principles or structured leadership upon its beliefs and practices. Wicca is the largest and most recognizable system that has emerged under the New Age Neopagan umbrella. Because its rebellion-based ethos, New Age Neopaganism attracts people who harbor quite a bit of animus toward rules, structure and authority. Good luck organizing that! In terms of its beliefs and doctrines, New Age Neopaganism, like New Age thought in general, is largely drawn from second, third and forth hand Theosophical and other late-19th and early-20th century Occult teachings, and the more hands you add, the more bastardized, misunderstood and misapplied those original teachings become. And much of the time these fuzzy teachings are poorly cited (from the original source materials), if at all. After all, asking for proper attribution is oppressive! Finally, we can observe that current-day New Age Neopaganism has almost become totally consumed by the Intersectional Cult (think: the Oppression Olympics) and the moral panic this cult has frantically stirred up among so many quarters of mainstream cultural discourse. As a result, New Age Neopaganism has purity-spiraled into a state of shrill emancipatory identity politics, which has drowned out anything remotely spiritual.
7. If New Age Neopaganism is the “Left wing” if Neopaganism, then Folkish Neopaganism is the “Right wing” of it. As the name alludes to, folkish Neopaganism is mostly concerned with the ethnic identity of the practitioner, and thus is an accessory to ethnic identity politics movements. In Europe and North America, Folkish Neopaganism is taken up by those who could be generalized as White Nationalists and White Identitarians. In other words, white people who reject the multicultural and increasingly globalized and homogenized direction modern Western culture has veered off in. Many of these people might claim to reject modernity as a whole and be for restoring what they imagine to be the Traditionalism of their ancestors. Overtly racist, ethnocentric and antisemitic beliefs are common among Folkish Neopagans (some are even out-and-out Neo Nazis) and of course this elicits an unyielding amount of hyper-furious indignation from the pro-multiculturalist New Age Neopagans. The ideology of Folkish Neopaganism is just about as “postmodern” as that of their Leftist opponents. Folkish Neopagans loosely draw their ideas from the likes the pessimistic “will to power” musings of thinkers like Arthur Schopenhaur and Frederich Nietzsche, and of course the 20th century “Traditionalist” spiritual polemicist Julius Evola (Evola was essentially the spiritual founder of the current-day Alt Right). The Folkish interpretation of Evola's writings tends to lend itself to a sort of naive and reactionary anti-intellectualism; many followers of this line of thought are seriously convinced that philosophy and metaphysical discourse constitutes the “degenerate” stage of a culture. And thus, the only real “solution” is to just...like...go back to being one with nature or something. And this “nature” means re-embracing a long, lost warrior spirit that long ago got snuffed out by the corrupting influences of civilization. Taken to its logical conclusion, this ideology ends up degenerating (to appropriate a term they love to use) into an incoherent mishmash of vaguely-anarcho-primitivst sentimentalism. Really, not so different from the “noble savage” back-to-nature festishism we might find among their New Age Neopagan counterparts.
Conclusion: These two main “wings” of Neopaganism are both largely driven by competing forms of romanticist sentimentalism, as opposed to any coherent set of metaphyscial principles or properly-sourced teachings from time-tested lineages. At some point in the future, I shall propose that Paganism can and should be metaphysical again. Which means that it will be an endeavor that will sit high above the political sphere and all its petty, time-sensitive trappings and distractions.
2. Fortunately, the esoteric knowledge and practices of ancient traditions can be “recovered” to some degree by those who know how to do so. I won't really go into this here, but I'll just say that it is theoretically possible. Let's just say if the gods and goddesses are real, in one form or another, then they haven't actually gone anywhere just because human populations on Earth stopped actively venerating them for a period of time. If mystics and occultists today can make contact with deities then it should be theoretically possible to re-kindle the old flames.
3. The main problem today though is that a large number of self-professed Neopagans don't actually believe in the existence of their gods; or at least they don't believe their gods being anything more than mere psychological symbols or linguistic constructs. Nor are Neopagans today (by and large) adequately (or at all!) skilled in the arcane or mystical arts. And thus the τέχνη required for properly understanding and interacting with divine phenomena is largely absent.
4. Because of this (by and large) lack of connection with the higher planes, Neopaganism in the West is largely a mere escapist or alternative lifestyle; one among many others. And because of this, Neopagnaism tends to disproportionately attract society's misfits, the maladjusted, eccentrics and weird people in general. Any movement that fails to attract anything more than a fringe base of support isn't going to become anything beyond a fringe movement. From an Optics perspective, this prevents so-called “normies” from feeling comfortable joining or aligning with the movement in question. Normies tend to go where they see other normies already congregating.
5. Being little more than a mere lifestyle choice, in a crowded market with many other competing lifestyle choices, the choice of affiliation with Neopaganism is mostly driven by motivations and concerns that have little to do with anything inherently spiritual. And thus we can say that most Neopagan endeavors are driven by political beliefs and affiliations. The two most notable factions of Neopagnaism are largely political in nature. These are, (1) New Age Neopaganism, and (2) Folkish Neopaganism.
6. New Age Neopaganism is primarily a product of emancipatory politics (i.e. Leftism) and it's practitioners are what its critics might deride as “fluff bunnies,” among other pejorative labels. Because of its roots in emancipatory politics, this branch of Neopaganism is largely antagonistic toward anything reeking of rules, discipline, authority or firm principles. In other words, its collective mentality is stuck in a permanent state of adolescent rebellion, and as a result, is resistant of any effort to “impose” coherent metaphysical doctrines, principles or structured leadership upon its beliefs and practices. Wicca is the largest and most recognizable system that has emerged under the New Age Neopagan umbrella. Because its rebellion-based ethos, New Age Neopaganism attracts people who harbor quite a bit of animus toward rules, structure and authority. Good luck organizing that! In terms of its beliefs and doctrines, New Age Neopaganism, like New Age thought in general, is largely drawn from second, third and forth hand Theosophical and other late-19th and early-20th century Occult teachings, and the more hands you add, the more bastardized, misunderstood and misapplied those original teachings become. And much of the time these fuzzy teachings are poorly cited (from the original source materials), if at all. After all, asking for proper attribution is oppressive! Finally, we can observe that current-day New Age Neopaganism has almost become totally consumed by the Intersectional Cult (think: the Oppression Olympics) and the moral panic this cult has frantically stirred up among so many quarters of mainstream cultural discourse. As a result, New Age Neopaganism has purity-spiraled into a state of shrill emancipatory identity politics, which has drowned out anything remotely spiritual.
7. If New Age Neopaganism is the “Left wing” if Neopaganism, then Folkish Neopaganism is the “Right wing” of it. As the name alludes to, folkish Neopaganism is mostly concerned with the ethnic identity of the practitioner, and thus is an accessory to ethnic identity politics movements. In Europe and North America, Folkish Neopaganism is taken up by those who could be generalized as White Nationalists and White Identitarians. In other words, white people who reject the multicultural and increasingly globalized and homogenized direction modern Western culture has veered off in. Many of these people might claim to reject modernity as a whole and be for restoring what they imagine to be the Traditionalism of their ancestors. Overtly racist, ethnocentric and antisemitic beliefs are common among Folkish Neopagans (some are even out-and-out Neo Nazis) and of course this elicits an unyielding amount of hyper-furious indignation from the pro-multiculturalist New Age Neopagans. The ideology of Folkish Neopaganism is just about as “postmodern” as that of their Leftist opponents. Folkish Neopagans loosely draw their ideas from the likes the pessimistic “will to power” musings of thinkers like Arthur Schopenhaur and Frederich Nietzsche, and of course the 20th century “Traditionalist” spiritual polemicist Julius Evola (Evola was essentially the spiritual founder of the current-day Alt Right). The Folkish interpretation of Evola's writings tends to lend itself to a sort of naive and reactionary anti-intellectualism; many followers of this line of thought are seriously convinced that philosophy and metaphysical discourse constitutes the “degenerate” stage of a culture. And thus, the only real “solution” is to just...like...go back to being one with nature or something. And this “nature” means re-embracing a long, lost warrior spirit that long ago got snuffed out by the corrupting influences of civilization. Taken to its logical conclusion, this ideology ends up degenerating (to appropriate a term they love to use) into an incoherent mishmash of vaguely-anarcho-primitivst sentimentalism. Really, not so different from the “noble savage” back-to-nature festishism we might find among their New Age Neopagan counterparts.
Conclusion: These two main “wings” of Neopaganism are both largely driven by competing forms of romanticist sentimentalism, as opposed to any coherent set of metaphyscial principles or properly-sourced teachings from time-tested lineages. At some point in the future, I shall propose that Paganism can and should be metaphysical again. Which means that it will be an endeavor that will sit high above the political sphere and all its petty, time-sensitive trappings and distractions.
