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house_wilson, where the grass grows green and the House/Wilson shippers occasionally throw shit fits over whether or not David Shore is dicking around House/Wilson shippers.
amused![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
alisanne![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/syndicated.gif){kind=small}
slytherins100's prompt #97: FlukesevfanI have a few news items to start off your Saturday, beginning with a story that’s spread like wildfire through the political and religious blogospheres gaining mainstream coverage, and its all about prayer. Specifically its about “imprecatory prayer”, the Christian equivalent to malefic “black” magic (you’re basically asking God to kill, maim, or trouble some person). While there have been a few high-profile imprecatory prayer stories popping up lately, the most recent centers on a meme and line of merchandise urging people to “pray” for President Barack Obama, invoking the biblical Psalm 109:8 “let his days be few; and let another take his office”. It seems rather harmless as imprecatory prayers go until you read the rest of the psalm in question.
“It was, most likely, intended as a joke. But it isn’t really very funny. Especially since the next verse reads, “May his children be orphans, and his wife a widow.” The passage goes on the same way--asking God to pulverize this poor fellow--that he lose all his worldly goods, that his orphans be abandoned, that his father be remembered as a sinner, and finally, that “his memory be cut off from the earth.” Thus, the “Prayer for Obama,” does more than anticipate that he leaves office; it entreats God to destroy the president.”
Supporters and opponents of this prayer are battling it out at Cafe Press, with stores being removed and reinstated. Meanwhile, pundits are split on whether this is harmless fun, or yet another sign that far-right Christianity is coming unglued and “trawling for assassins”. How should Pagans and occultists, many of whom believe in the power of magic and intention, react to these sort of stories? Harmless? Or the beginning of a particularly nasty egregore?
Turning from prayer to more material conflicts over belief, Chas Clifton reports on a Russian Orthodox priest who was recently murdered in his church. 34-year-old Daniil Sysoyev was missionary who bragged of converting 80 Muslims personally, and wrote several books critical of Islam, gaining many death-threats in the process. But while this seems a rather open-and-shut case of a Russian Muslim taking revenge against a firebrand converter of Muslims, authorities are also looking at other groups, like Russian Pagans.
“Sysoyev also worked with former members of religious sects and wrote a book on Seventh Day Adventists and Jehovahs’ Witnesses. He also spoke out against nationalists and Stalinists, whom he criticized on his blog for ignoring the murder of innocent people.”
None of the articles specifically mentions Pagans when they mention “various religious sects”, but the ABC article links the phrase to another report they did on Russian Pagans, so they must know something we don’t. Clifton points out that Russian Pagans do come into direct conflict with the Russian Orthodoxy and “are more likely to have their own line of “blood and soil” rhetoric and to claim that they represent the true spirituality of their people”. All that said, I’m siding with Occam’s razor on this one, so the Russian Pagans and hard-liner Stalinists most likely have little to worry about during the investigation.
In a final note, it looks like “Agora”, which centers on the life (and death) of Neoplatonist pagan philosopher Hypatia, has finally found an American distributor and will hit theaters in early 2010.
“Alejandro Amenabar’s intellectual epic that had sat without a U.S. buyer for six months, has found a stateside home. Newmarket Films has picked up U.S. rights to the Rachel Weisz starrer and is prepping a release for the first half of 2010.”
Distribution deals finally materialized after the film starting doing far better than expected in European markets. So we’ll finally get a chance to see “Agora” on the big screen, anyone want to place bets on if/when it will gain American protesters?
overwhelmed
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geekyAbout a year ago, I reported on a University of Nebraska employee who was allegedly fired for being a Witch. “Jane Doe”, who is a member of Reclaiming, claimed that once her superior found out about her religious beliefs she was fired and replaced by a non-Pagan. Now, the Journal Star reports that the University has settled the case, though they still won’t admit that her claims of discrimination have any validity.
“A woman who sued the University of Nebraska saying the school fired her after learning she is a witch has agreed to settle the case for $40,000. The university made the offer “solely to compromise the claim … without admitting the validity of plaintiff’s contention or any allegations of wrongdoing by the defendants,” attorney David Buntain said in an October letter.”
The University very likely settled because the Nebraska Equal Opportunity Commission had already ruled that Ms Doe’s rights were violated in the run-up to the lawsuit. So rather than potentially lose a lawsuit, and gain lots of unwanted attention in the press, they settle. Better a lump sum than humble pie. A trend we may well see repeated in the Bath & Body Works and Google firings.
Thanks to Religion Clause for the tip-off on this story.
contemplativelilbreck and the outrageously awesome purplefeen. 
workingalisanne![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small}
snupin100's prompt #235: The Pensievesevfan
cheerfulMy semi-regular round-up of articles, essays, and opinions of note for discerning Pagans and Heathens.
It seems like a given nowadays that if some dead animals turn up, practitioners of Santeria or Vodou will get blamed by a police officer, animal shelter spokesman, or speculative/lazy/bored journalist, even though most of these cases bear little resemblance to the actual religious practices of African diasporic faiths (and it usually ends up being teenagers). Journalistic coverage of these animal killings, and the assumed religious angle, has gotten so bad that press watch-dog blog Get Religion has started asking for some needed clarification.
“Say what? Let’s read that quote again, the one in which it is claimed that the number of ritual animal sacrifices spike at this time of year because of “a lot of high holidays that different groups celebrate.” … what in the world are these words supposed to mean? Are we to believe that there is a wave of beheaded animal corpses because of (a) the arrival of Advent/Nativity Lent, (b) approaching observances of Hanukkah, (c) Kwanzaa festivities, (d) some alleged connection to Solstice? Is the goal to link this to voodoo or something? But before you go there, please note that the story says absolutely nothing that would point toward Santeria and, even if it did, there is no discussion of whether these sacrifices in any way fit patterns of worship in that tradition. You see, it’s wrong for journalists to say, “Behold, beheaded animals. Those Santeria people are at it again.” That’s too simplistic. So let me ask the obvious question and ask readers to weigh in: Precisely what “high holidays” are we supposed to assume are being discussed here? I honestly do not have a clue. What does this strange sentence mean? Just asking.”
The quote referenced above, from an AP story, and left unexamined, is from another representative of an animal cruelty center, making me wonder what kind of workshops on ritual killings (or horror movies) these people are attending. I’m very glad to see the issue of the horrible reporting concerning mysterious animal deaths and their alleged connection to Santeria or Vodou is being picked up on by more religion-news watchers. Maybe now we can finally inch away from pure sensationalism whenever a dead animal turns up.
Over at the Times, Cambridge classics professor Mary Beard visits a famous Clootie well near he village of Munlochy and wonders if the practice of tying rags to branches for healing really is an ancient pagan custom.
“The notice nearby, put up by the Scottish Forestry Commission (for like most shrines it’s a tourist attraction too), claims that this tradition goes back to pre-Christian times, and is a reflection of the power of water in pagan Celtic religion. It is, in other words, an amazing survival across the millennia. I found myself thnking that this was really rather hard to believe. If most other customs are invented in the nineteenth century, then why nt this pagan one too. How far back does it really go, in this form. Does anyone have any real hard evidence?”
I’ll leave it to my Celtic reconstructionist readers to look into the matter and let me (and Mary) know. While we’re on the subject of Ms. Beard’s skeptical nature, she also takes aim at the theory that ancient Greek temples were deliberately built to face the rising Sun. I’ll leave it to my Hellenic Pagan readers to weigh in on that one (I’m quite the delegator today).
Author and techgnostic Erik Davis has posted an essay adapted from the introduction to the new photography collection “Tribal Revival” that deals with the West coast neotribal festival culture.
“Every summer, tens of thousands of participants descend upon dozens of festivals and gatherings, great and small, that occur on the West Coast of North America: Shambhala, Oracle, Moontribe, Lightning in a Bottle. The names of these clans and crews are legion: hippies, ravers, pagans, crusties, free spirits, burners, seekers, travelers, eco-warriors. They gather together to dance, to escape, to hold ritual, and to craft a visionary culture based on community, creative self-expression, and a celebratory earth wisdom. Labels are always dangerous, but an honest name for the scene is neotribal. These are the new tribes, recreating and reinventing patterns of organic culture that are inspired by the premodern past but designed for a high-tech planet hurtling through a period of unprecedented global change.”
Something of a neotribal himself, Davis waxes Utopian about the the “festival [as] foundation of world renewal”, and the “earthy communion” these interweaving groups partake in. Whether this subcultural phenomenon will truly equip us for an uncertain future remains to be seen, but I’m certainly open to there being more festival, “feral joy”, and liminality in our lives.
Turning briefly to pop-culture, the io9 blog has a clip from the upcoming Percy Jackson movie “The Lightning Thief” featuring Uma Thurman as Medusa. I’ve written about the pagan-ness of Percy Jackson previously, which follows the adventures of young Greek demigods. “The Lightning Thief” is due out in February. Meanwhile, the highly literate/geeky indie rock band The Decemberists is putting out a full-length animated film of their recent myth-drenched pagan-y concept album “The Hazards of Love”.
“…next month, Colin Meloy and co. will push The Hazards of Love to full-on The Wall status, releasing the album as a full-length video. Here Come the Waves: The Hazards of Love Visualized premiered at a show in Los Angeles on October 19, and on December 1, it’ll be available exclusively via iTunes. Filmmakers Guilherme Marcondes, Julia Pott, Peter Sluszka and Santa Maria created animations to accompany individual sections of music from the album.”
That trailer looks pretty cool/trippy. If you want to acquaint yourself with the music before considering the movie, you can download it at Amazon.com (they also have it in vinyl for those that want to kick-it old-school).
In a final note, no matter how much I deplore the idea of sparkly vampires, if Vatican spokesmen and evangelical anti-occult book-peddlers don’t knock it off soon, I’ll have to see the darn things just to spite them.
“Monsignor Franco Perazzolo, of the Pontifical Council of Culture, said: ‘Men and women are transformed with horrible masks and it is once again that age-old trick or ideal formula of using extremes to make an impact at the box office. This film is nothing more than a moral vacuum with a deviant message and as such should be of concern.’ ”
Man, if sparkly celibate-till-marriage Mormon vampires are a “moral vacuum” I’d hate to hear what he thinks of “True Blood”.
That’s all I have for now, have a great day!
workingalisannesweetmelodykiss, who successfully guessed which fall_fantasia fic was mine. Her prompt: Starry nightsevfan
accomplishedagilebrit's clairvoyantwank writeup. Clairvoyant indeed! To sum up, romance publisher Harlequin Enterprises teamed up with a publisher called ASI solutions to form Harlequin Horizons, a vanity press. Romance Writers of America promptly revoked Harlequin's "recognized publisher" status.
lazy workingalisannedracoharry100's prompt #140: Pulsatingsevfan“I like your pledge drive season much better than NPR’s!” – Snoozepossum
Things are really moving along in my first-ever pledge drive! To everyone who has given, I want to thank you for your generosity and for sharing my vision of a Pagan new-media model that can eventually grow to support not just The Wild Hunt, but a variety of media and journalism projects originating from within the modern Pagan movement. To all my wonderful readers who haven’t had the opportunity or time to donate to this effort yet, please consider taking a few minutes before this week is done to become a part of the growing community of support that has emerged these past four days. Ask yourself, if The Wild Hunt was a magazine or newspaper, what would I pay to have access to it year-round?
“Thanks for letting us donate, and making it easy. I know that sounds weird, but it’s great to be able to be an itty bitty part of what you do here. So many pagan resources crash and burn and never ask for anything until it’s too late.” – Jane H.
I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank some more Pagan bloggers for spreading the word, and encouraging their own readers to support my mission here. Starting with author Erynn Rowan Laurie, who not only posted about my Winter Pledge Drive, but also encouraged me to offer a monthly subscription service.
“If you’re so inclined, this would be a great way to support a significant news source in the Pagan community. Jason keeps up with all kinds of things of interest to our communities, from news about Pagans to interfaith to politics that might impact our communities locally or globally. I think he’s very worth supporting in this work.”
So if donating a small amount every month sounds more your speed, click here for a $10.00 per month subscription commitment, and here, for a $5 per month subscription. If you would like to donate a custom amount, simply contact me and I’ll set it up. Thanks to Erynn for her generosity and commitment to Pagan journalism.
I would also like to thank Patti Wigington, the About.com Paganism/Wicca guide, for supporting the Winter Pledge Drive, and for pointing out the differences between an ad-supported model and a donation-supported model.
“It’s no secret that About.com is owned by the New York Times Company, which is why we have advertisers all over the place. Their money helps keep the site free for readers (yes, Virginia, that’s why you keep seeing those ads for the Mormon Church). However, the Wild Hunt, which is one of the best resources on the Internet for Pagan news, runs strictly on donations. Jason Pitzl-Waters has put out a call for pledges, and I strongly encourage everyone to go help him out. Even if all you can spare is $5, every little bit helps keep the Wild Hunt ad-free and running daily: The Wild Hunt Winter Pledge Drive“
I think Patti does excellent work at About.com, but as she points out, the price for her platform can include ads by groups who may be directly hostile to modern Pagan and minority faiths. For that reason, and for others, I want The Wild Hunt to stay non-commercial, whether those commercials come from the Mormons, or from within the Pagan community. That isn’t to criticize those who may want to pursue an ad-based model, I think it can lead to some significant successes, but that I think it is important that we have commercial and non-commercial news sources within our community.
Again, thanks to all who have spread the word and given during this week, we still have days to go, so let’s keep the momentum up! Please support a non-commercial, open, accessible, and daily Wild Hunt.
Even though the American Family Association stumbled from the gate in the kick-off to this year’s skirmishes over religious language and iconography during the Winter holidays (aka “The War on Christmas”), that doesn’t mean other groups haven’t been cowed. Instead it looks like were going to be seeing a rather holy protest at the steps of the United States Supreme Court as Faith and Action and the Christian Defense Coalition stage a live Nativity scene.
“Rev. Rob Schenck, President of Faith and Action, states, “The traditional creche, portraying Mary, Joseph and the Christ Child, along with the angels, shepherds and Wise Men, remind us all of what Christmas is all about. “We like to refer to this effort as keeping Christ Mass in the nation’s Capitol.” Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense Coalition, adds, “Sadly, we are seeing an erosion and hostility toward public expressions of faith in the public square. This is especially true during the Christmas Season. “The Nativity Project and Operation Nativity are reminders that our Constitution provides freedom ‘of’ religion not freedom ‘from’ religion…”
Ah, the old “freedom of” not “freedom from” argument, too bad that commitment to freedom is a mile wide and only an inch deep. As the Green Bay Wisconsin Nativity battle proved, once people actually start demanding real “freedom of”, which means the inclusion of all religions and philosophical points of view on public lands, things start to go a bit haywire for those crusaders for “religious freedom”.
So while the “you aren’t saying Christmas” boycotts have lost their sizzle, the battle over Christmas religious displays in the public square is still heating up. There are already a couple cases that look like they’re headed for the courts, and it seems like only a matter of time before a Wiccan or atheist decides they want a Winter display next to a Nativity on public land somewhere. Then we’ll get to really test the “religious freedom” resolve of the groups currently dressing up like Joseph and Mary on the Supreme Court’s steps.
workingalisannesnape100's prompt #308: The other familysevfan awake trobadora: All-Human AUs? - Someone explain this trope to me. You have characters who aren't human: aliens, vampires, demons, angels, gods. What they are is an important part of their character, and writing them as ordinary humans takes away something essential to that character, and I just don't get it. Why is this so popular? -![[info - personal]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alixtii: AoOO Thoughs - I'm very uncomfortable with the implication, given by the existence of the primary warning tag "noncon/rape" that dubcon isn't rape. -smallbeer: my random morning thought processes - So, tell me how you would define "manpain" in a fannish context? -just_katarin: But Katarin, you just posted! - I distinctly remember, when Heroes fandom started talking about the problematic aspects of the show, the racism, the sexism, how uneven storylines and deaths were, all of it, we all maintained it was unintentional....We thought they meant well but now I see that that was a lie. That was... they never intended good things for the People of Color on Heroes or the Women on Heroes. -hradzka: Donny Osmond RPF. By pros. - Mike Sterling has an interesting post that touches on on for-pay RPF from the 1970s. He points out that teen magazines included fictional stories about celebrities, mysteries and adventures and romances and -- yes, *exactly,* it was totally RPF. -melannen: Statistics! - But when I was going through all the Dear Writer posts being linked in the yuletide community over at lj, I kept noticing that there were actually quite a *lot* of people who were linking their letters from their DW accounts instead of their LJs, and I was wondering if there really were a lot, or if it was an illusion based around what I wanted, and was expecting, to see. And then it occurred to me that this might actually be a pretty good metric of how fandom actually *is* moving: yuletide participation is probably as close as we can get to a real cross-section of people who are active in the sort of fandom that is on journal sites, and it seems like the site people link in their letters would be the site they consider their primary home, regardless of whether they crosspost and how. -
tiredalisannesnarry_ldws week #9 submission.sevfan, to eeyore9990 for her hand-holding and support, and to the slashchat girls for cheering me on for the nine weeks of this challenge.hobbitdragon's The Bondage of the Mind (which is the best Snarry I've read all year, by the way,) instead. I gave up. Did you catch that? I gave up on TF for the day, and went to read porn. And suddenly felt immeasurably better, and less like just hitting delete until the entire manuscript and all its generative notes were gone. (Lo, the healing power of pr0n...)cluewrites as I go along. (Although not today, because of that whole 'the first half of this scene is an outline' thing. I have to fix that first.) Only now I'm going to go ahead and let myself TAKE days off when I need them, and to read other things when my brain aches from all the sameness, or when my subconscious knows there's something off in the outline, but can't get its fingers round exactly what it is. (That happens to me a lot, I'm afraid. I have a plot sense that will sometimes just stop me DEAD until I figure out what aspect of the upcoming scene needs to change. It can be vexing when it hits me in the middle of a deadline crunch, but it's never steered me wrong yet.)RWA Alert: RWA Responds to Harlequin Horizons
Dear Members:
Romance Writers of America was informed of the new venture between Harlequin Enterprises and ASI Solutions to form Harlequin Horizons, a vanity/subsidy press. Many of you have asked the organization to state its position regarding this new development. As a matter of policy, we do not endorse any publisher’s business model. Our mission is the advancement of the professional interests of career-focused romance writers.
One of your member benefits is the annual National Conference. RWA allocates select conference resources to non-subsidy/non-vanity presses that meet the eligibility requirements to obtain those resources. Eligible publishers are provided free meeting space for book signings, are given the opportunity to hold editor appointments, and are allowed to offer spotlights on their programs.
With the launch of Harlequin Horizons, Harlequin Enterprises no longer meets the requirements to be eligible for RWA-provided conference resources. This does not mean that Harlequin Enterprises cannot attend the conference. Like all non-eligible publishers, they are welcome to attend. However, as a non-eligible publisher, they would fund their own conference fees and they would not be provided with conference resources by RWA to publicize or promote the company or its imprints.
Sometimes the wind of change comes swiftly and unexpectedly, leaving an unsettled feeling. RWA takes its role as advocate for its members seriously. The Board is working diligently to address the impact of recent developments on all of RWA's members.
We invite you to attend the annual conference on July 28 - 31, 2010 in Nashville, TN, as we celebrate 30 years of success with keynote speaker Nora Roberts, special luncheon speaker Jayne Ann Krentz, librarian speaker Sherrilyn Kenyon, and awards ceremony emcee Sabrina Jeffries. Please refer to the RWA Web site for conference registration information in late January 2010.
Looking forward to seeing you at the Gaylord Opryland!
Michelle Monkou
RWA President
thoughtful
sra_danvers, for creating it for me. ♥asnowyowl and isisanubis, who ran a tight ship and who were always gracious and lovely. Thanks also to sra_danvers who every week came up with brilliant banners for winners and those who were eliminated. joanwilder, you always kept me on my toes. It's always fun writing with you. One of these days we have to end up on the same team for something. ;)centaury_squill, shiv5468, angela_snape, magialuna and prayer_at_night are entitled to claim drabbles. I won't insist on writing Snarry for you, you can choose any HP pairing you prefer, but I will need a one word prompt to do them, and of course, Snarry is always encouraged. ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
darkhavens - Five Things Spike Gave Up After Getting Involved With Xander Harris. Written as a sister set to Five Things Xander Harris Gave Up After Getting Involved With Spike.Buffy, Spike/Xander. Rated R.** 
ditzy
