Author Topic: "Morgain" whitesplains it all  (Read 17520 times)

Offline morgain

  • Posts: 5
"Morgain" whitesplains it all
« on: September 15, 2011, 10:53:12 pm »
Thank you for the valuable service here. I thank you also for allowing someone not of Native American lineage to speak here.
I state my position here to identify myself, accepting it may not be of much interest apart from to me.

I am a Craft priestess of about 35 years experience.
I live in Wales with my husband, our adult son, and 8 cats.

My husband and I in writing, talks and teaching, long ago since 1990 challenged the theft and misuse of others' traditions. We see a strong parallel between the plunder of Celtic spirituality and the same done to Native Americans. The English first worked out colonial methods in Wales, then exported them. Now others return here to take and take again.

Another aspect of this is how so many Westerners disrespect our own Ancestors, our own native spirituality. In obsessing on "strange gods" and foreign philosophies they deny and diminish their own. The result is a spiritual immaturity. Because the tradition is foreign it cannot be as profoundly 'serious' - there is always an underlying opt-out because this is not-me. Not very conscious but there.
It shows up in the fear of our own ancestral traditions The exotic foreign package is so much safer because it cannot reach deep to our centre.

We lost our religious leadership class in Europe when the Druids were massacred, persecuted, then forced to take on a foreign faith to survive. This I believe has left a long lasting historical scar in us. Our inner lack, its pain, created a radical insecurity that bred aggression and conquest (alongside economic factors). So, spiritually starving, my people stole or trashed, like badly brought up children. But far more dangerous because these armies of sick kids had/ have guns.

I honour other faiths and traditions, especially Native ones. In asking my people to honour our own heritage I do not mean that we must not learn from others, enjoy each others' Stories, exchange gifts and share knowledge. Interfaith is valuable and necessary.
But to deny our own roots is to sicken them, sicken us, and poison our dealings with others from our self doubt and guilt.

I do not claim an impressive lineage of teachers.
I do not teach complicated things, though the simplicities I know are profound.
I ask people to pay attention, to notice - waters, grass, tree, stone, flame, cat, baby, foot, shadow. In land and water and flame and air, in our bodies, lie the same wisdoms our Ancestors found.
Who taught the first Witch? as Valiente asked us in her wisdom.

That our 'whitey' traditions have been broken and damaged is no excuse to thieve from others. Instead we need to go carefully to our sources, in nature and ourselves, to rediscover our own Ways and in doing so our self respect. With that as a basis, we can much better respect others.

I practice a simple but powerful dedication to my Land, my Ancestors, to community and family. The core of it is children, and the Land.
I have taught a practical Circlework for rituals which many people have found clean, intuitive, safe and effective. It is kitchen and nature based.

The Craft I serve does not permit money for ritual or teaching, although it does allow expenses.
I do not use a leadership title as there is no need. To say I am a priestess is a job description like plumber. I do not approve of certificates, diplomas, college type trainings that divide priesthood from people.

I do provide some basic introductory information online or on paper (book, booklet). I think it is fair to help people decide if I am worth talking to, or if they might possibly like working with me, or not.
Though I love books.and find some of them useful, Craft learning requires no books. It moves mouth to ear. Any items needed can be found in kitchen, garden or woodland.
Safety is the first priority. With safety and confidence in place as the container, magic/ spirituality flows out of it in a natural way.

I did learn a little shamanic method, perhaps from suspect sources you would not approve. But I judge what I find by if it works. Very simple drumming, chanting, light trance, does work. So I honour it and use it. But I am not a shaman nor ever could be because I do not live in a shaman community.

I did once do a sweat and found it immensely inspiring in its gifts to me. I have very occasionally led something similar but mostly using sauna with my own form of rites. I could never call this sweatlodge because that tradition is not mine to take and use. But heat in an enclosed space is!

No one holds authority over me other than where I consent to it for my own or others' benefit.
In becoming a priestess I ritually acknowledged this ultimate freedom and authority, even as I dedicated it to the gods.
I love proud free people like me. Where I am permitted to speak, discuss or teach I try to help others feel this sense of freedom and honour.

I hope this is acceptable to you and I have not misused my guest right.
I have already learned a great deal on this forum both new things, and reminders of things I had forgotten. I do tend to write lengthy posts and serious ones too, but I would hope anyone who finds me tedious could have the basic guts to stop reading, reject, and move on. Such is freedom.
Thank you again.




« Last Edit: September 16, 2011, 12:38:42 am by morgain »

Offline morgain

  • Posts: 5
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #1 on: January 11, 2017, 09:14:20 pm »
Yells thank you for your criticism. I think sharing the different parts of what we know to make a more complete picture is important.

APOLOGY?
You say there was no apology.
I took the info on an apology from the post by one of your admins, page 1 of this thread. (omgsrsly?)
Peter Wesley, a media spokesman for the Bearspaw Nation,is quoted as saying "the G8 protesters apologized".
I suggested Starhawk make a private penance, as a public one would feed into media fuss. She (and the elders) would then be accused of staging an event purely to get media attention. I felt a quiet private penance would be better. But your criticism is a good one. Perhaps a dignified statement afterwards that a penance had taken place, so it could not be exploited.

CELTIC NATIONS
I agree a lot of ignorant statements were made about history and I said so. People like Starhawk and I have openly admitted that. So I don't understand what I said which is "not true."
It's not so that modern Witches, Pagans, and Druids are shunned by all the modern Celtic Nations. They have been welcomed in the Green Field at Y Eisteddfod Genedlaethol for several years now. That's the largest and biggest event held n Wales which celebrates Wales and Welsh culture. It's also the largest and most successful arts festival in Europe - but is sidelined in the news because it's not an English event.
I myself have cordial acquaintance and work with some of the top Druids of Wales.

The Welsh have been oppressed and exploited by the English longer than any other nation: since 1400. The English developed their colonial methods of conquest and domination here, then exported it all elsewhere later. It is not only brown or black or yellow people who have been colonised and enslaved.
By the way many Welsh and others do not like to be lumped together as "Celtic Nations" by outsiders. We prefer it to be clear which culture is meant as they are so different. Like Plains and Mountain people I suppose.

GIVING WHITE PEOPLE CONFIDENCE
You say: "I'd say all you've done is give white people a boost in self-confidence as they run roughshod over Indians. And now you've come here to justify it and do it some more."
It's important to separate ordinary white people from the white masters. We too have been damaged, our heritage stolen from us, our wealth from our labour stolen, our children taken away, our women raped, our young people rotted by booze and drugs.
I have completely agreed that many New Age people are frequently ignorant and arrogant, adding to the history of exploitation against native peoples. There is a post by me on the Leo Rutherford thread for example when I called him on it and challenged him to tithe to the First People of America whose treasures he was using. My husband wrote a classic Celtic diatribe published in 1993 against the exploitation of our Welsh people, especially by Americans. I am about to write again on that shortly in a well known Welsh magazine.
But I would never see giving people more self confidence as a bad thing. Eventually more confidence means more ability to change things for the better. For all of us. I see so many happy projects and strong campaigns coming from that old Pagan work. That doesn't "justify" its wrong side, but it does balance it and the good side is still worthwhile. I don't condemn First Nation people just because some of them do bad things either.

ASSUMPTIONS & MISUNDERSTANDINGS
There are a lot of assumptions in what you say. I can't possibly answer them all. I'll do some.
Yes I read all the threads you mention. Not that I needed it much as I was part of radical politics back to 1966 fighting for native and Black rights. I won't list all the things Ive done over almost 50 years to support your struggles.
I'm not sure what you assume I am - a white American perhaps? I'm not, certainly not American.
I speak as a native of my own land. I am an elder and I have studied my own native traditions for 45 years since my youth. My family is rooted in the land we love and we feel as fiercely about it as you do about yours. We know its history if being enslaved, exploited by the English, the genocide and land clearances, the cheating, the Christian propaganda,  and so on. We are part of the native revival which began in the 18thC.
I am now doing a PhD in one of the oldest surviving pieces of literature in my own Nation (from 1100). My university is one of the best in Britain, and my supervisor is one of the top Druids of Wales (not the pagan Druids, the Welsh ones). I am trying to get our culture a deserved place among the Nations.

I do not insist you respect me for any of this. I could be giving you empty untrue boasts (though my name is searchable). I do ask that you do not throw a stereotyped contempt at me as if I am just one of the superficial New Age crystal fashion follower. I don't stereotype you or your people, or at least I try not to. Don't do it to me. It's condescending and doesn't help us understand each other.

EDUCATING YOU?
I did not write to educate you. That's not my job. It's your job to educate yourself by selecting what you find useful or rejecting what you don't. I offered information, and y own thoughts. It's up to you what you want to do with that: make use of it, make assumptions about it, or ignore it.

Thank you for saying you did not write to hurt. That was kind, or I assume so.
On your opinion of Starhawk's books I also like her vision. But making even a beautiful way of life compulsory, without the option to dissent,is poisoned.

ON RACISM
You have several times accused me of being racist. I completely agree. I grew up in a time when Black or Brown people were only to be seen as servants, never driving cars,never wearing good clothes except to go to Church. Decades of that experience grind deep into the brain so I observe my reactions still today, contaminated.
But what I also see is that we are all racist. Anyone who pretends otherwise lies, trying to compete, trying to be worthy of some version of holy heaven above.
We cannot be otherwise than racist because we all live and breathe and swim in racism. One day we will cleanse it and it needs people like you and people like me to do it. No liberation movement has ever succeeded withut bridging the gap.
Some of us try not to be racist and partially succeed. Those who belong to "ethnic groups" practice and react in a graded racism which ranks paleness, tallness, voice accent, thin lips etc. It's ingrained and inescapable, tragically. Some who are the target of racism invert it and cast their anger at all whites in a huge assumption we are all the same.Unhelpful - the mirror image of making all tribes the same.

My white English ancestors were some of the most bloody, aggressive people who have ever lived. The British (really the English) still are the most warmongering snobbish people in the Western world who adore inequality (with some exceptions who try to go against the grain). I live over the Welsh border from Bristol, a large city built entirely from slave trading profits. My husband's homeland in Wales was razed and subject to genocide by the English and still shows the scars of it even though a long time ago.
But this is done by a small group of a wealthy people who control our Government and attack and damage and deprive our own native people. We have children here suffering malnutrition, TB, rickets which was all stamped out until 25 years ago. People are dying for lack of medical treatment, heat in winter. Young males are at especial risk from police and our land now has more surveillance of its citizens than any other in the world. Some of that will be familiar sounding.
It would be better if we could help each other in our common sufferings. If you cannot reach out and connect with an outsider, I understand and I respect you for it. I felt like that for a long time. Separatism is an honorable place to be. But please, at least, try not to attack people like me and pull us down.  Destroying an ally is facing the wrong way. Attacking the slaves who have white skin is no help to you or us. I would like to see you keep your fire for those who are powerful, those who are in charge of oppressing your people.

I am not telling you what to do.
I am not 'educating' you (only you can do that).
I am offering thoughts, and asking you to consider. You may not want to in your free choice.




 



Offline Defend the Sacred

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Posts: 3290
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #2 on: January 11, 2017, 09:29:59 pm »
Wow. You really can't see how you come off here.

You do not get to declare yourself an ally. People decide who their/our own allies are. You are a guest here. Your long, condescending rants are violating hospitality.

I'm not even going to get into the self-proclaimed "Druids". People here know about those groups.

I tried to be nice.

I should have just said:

[Long-ass whitesplaining rant] translation = "White people decide what is and isn't racist. If it makes white people feel good, it's good for all people. So STFU, Indians, we rule."

Offline Defend the Sacred

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Posts: 3290
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #3 on: January 11, 2017, 11:14:55 pm »
But but finally I do criticise Starhawk's vision as authoritarian. ... However, there is no room for dissent, for the outsider,who is pushed into exile.

OK, this is just bizarre. This makes me think you haven't even read her fiction that is marketed as fiction. Her futuristic books have people living in independent collectives in the same city, all of whom have their own cultures. It's actually rather derivative of Marge Piercy's, Woman on the Edge of Time. There are no prisons, and the antisocial people who would be imprisoned in contemporary society are banished from the city, but allowed to form their own group, called The Wild Boar People who live up in the hills where they herd the wild pigs. I hesitate to even bring this up as I have zero interest in discussing Starhawk's writing, your defense of her, or hearing more of your whitesplaining. I only mention this because you not only misrepresent the good you think she's done, you also misrepresent her work in your sole criticism. You are arguing about someone whose work you don't even seem to have read. If you think her fantasy fiction version of a multicultural future of autonomous, anarchist collectives is "authoritarian," I don't think you have even a basic understanding of culture or politics. Or you're simply lying about having read her work and are here for some unfathomable, self-promoting reason. Like perhaps you're planning on marketing your own pay-to-pray sometime soon that involves teaming up with her.

Offline Smart Mule

  • Administrator
  • *****
  • Posts: 1074
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #4 on: January 11, 2017, 11:25:00 pm »
Yells thank you for your criticism. I think sharing the different parts of what we know to make a more complete picture is important.

APOLOGY?
You say there was no apology.
I took the info on an apology from the post by one of your admins, page 1 of this thread. (omgsrsly?)
Peter Wesley, a media spokesman for the Bearspaw Nation,is quoted as saying "the G8 protesters apologized".
I suggested Starhawk make a private penance, as a public one would feed into media fuss. She (and the elders) would then be accused of staging an event purely to get media attention. I felt a quiet private penance would be better. But your criticism is a good one. Perhaps a dignified statement afterwards that a penance had taken place, so it could not be exploited.

You really like to talk don't you? Talk and talk and talk...

It's not for you to decide how an apology should come about. If she was a good person she would have said she was sorry the first time rather than repeatedly perform for the media on indian land. She is shameless.

Quote
CELTIC NATIONS
I agree a lot of ignorant statements were made about history and I said so. People like Starhawk and I have openly admitted that. So I don't understand what I said which is "not true."
It's not so that modern Witches, Pagans, and Druids are shunned by all the modern Celtic Nations. They have been welcomed in the Green Field at Y Eisteddfod Genedlaethol for several years now. That's the largest and biggest event held n Wales which celebrates Wales and Welsh culture. It's also the largest and most successful arts festival in Europe - but is sidelined in the news because it's not an English event.
I myself have cordial acquaintance and work with some of the top Druids of Wales.

Modern witches are an embarrassment. At least in the US they are. They're considered foolish by more traditional pagans. Droods over here aren't much higher on the list. What is the documented history of Druids in Wales?

Quote
The Welsh have been oppressed and exploited by the English longer than any other nation: since 1400. The English developed their colonial methods of conquest and domination here, then exported it all elsewhere later. It is not only brown or black or yellow people who have been colonised and enslaved.
By the way many Welsh and others do not like to be lumped together as "Celtic Nations" by outsiders. We prefer it to be clear which culture is meant as they are so different. Like Plains and Mountain people I suppose.

O.o And here, when talking in general about indigenous people we refer to indigenous people. We don't name every Nation. When I was making my way through the Celtic Nations I was chastised vehemently for turning down a breakfast invitation at a farm we camped at but never for using the term Celtic Nations. Maybe it's because I spent my time in more rural areas and not with educated folk working on their doctorate.

Quote
GIVING WHITE PEOPLE CONFIDENCE
You say: "I'd say all you've done is give white people a boost in self-confidence as they run roughshod over Indians. And now you've come here to justify it and do it some more."
It's important to separate ordinary white people from the white masters. We too have been damaged, our heritage stolen from us, our wealth from our labour stolen, our children taken away, our women raped, our young people rotted by booze and drugs.
I have completely agreed that many New Age people are frequently ignorant and arrogant, adding to the history of exploitation against native peoples. There is a post by me on the Leo Rutherford thread for example when I called him on it and challenged him to tithe to the First People of America whose treasures he was using. My husband wrote a classic Celtic diatribe published in 1993 against the exploitation of our Welsh people, especially by Americans. I am about to write again on that shortly in a well known Welsh magazine.
But I would never see giving people more self confidence as a bad thing. Eventually more confidence means more ability to change things for the better. For all of us. I see so many happy projects and strong campaigns coming from that old Pagan work. That doesn't "justify" its wrong side, but it does balance it and the good side is still worthwhile. I don't condemn First Nation people just because some of them do bad things either.

Wouldn't that be a classic Welsh diatribe?

Are you reading what you are writing? Do you see how you are presenting yourself as the gleaming star of white privilege? You go on and on (and on and on and on) about things we do.not.care.about. I don't care what your husband wrote or what you are going to write, it has nothing to do with the subject at hand it just shows how much you do not get it and how poorly you ally. You cannot compare pagan work and indigenous people. Pagan is a choice, being indian is not. Being pagan does not come with 500 years of historical trauma (DO NOT EVEN GO THERE).

Quote
ASSUMPTIONS & MISUNDERSTANDINGS
There are a lot of assumptions in what you say. I can't possibly answer them all. I'll do some.
Yes I read all the threads you mention. Not that I needed it much as I was part of radical politics back to 1966 fighting for native and Black rights. I won't list all the things Ive done over almost 50 years to support your struggles.
I'm not sure what you assume I am - a white American perhaps? I'm not, certainly not American.
I speak as a native of my own land. I am an elder and I have studied my own native traditions for 45 years since my youth. My family is rooted in the land we love and we feel as fiercely about it as you do about yours. We know its history if being enslaved, exploited by the English, the genocide and land clearances, the cheating, the Christian propaganda,  and so on. We are part of the native revival which began in the 18thC.
I am now doing a PhD in one of the oldest surviving pieces of literature in my own Nation (from 1100). My university is one of the best in Britain, and my supervisor is one of the top Druids of Wales (not the pagan Druids, the Welsh ones). I am trying to get our culture a deserved place among the Nations.

Oh boy. I hear Native revival in the Celtic Nations and a very bad picture comes to mind. Very very bad. Scary bad. The silly victorian revival is pretty and flowery but very distorted wouldn't you say? That's my experience anyway if its compared to other translations. I'm glad you're working with older pieces of literature even though I thought you had said nothing like that existed.

Quote
I do not insist you respect me for any of this. I could be giving you empty untrue boasts (though my name is searchable). I do ask that you do not throw a stereotyped contempt at me as if I am just one of the superficial New Age crystal fashion follower. I don't stereotype you or your people, or at least I try not to. Don't do it to me. It's condescending and doesn't help us understand each other.

Might I suggest you go back and reread what you have written? It's a lot so you may want to set aside some time. People don't generally go on and on and on sprinkling in how fabulous they are because they are getting their phd and their hubby wrote some stuff. You're kind of full of yourself :)

Quote
EDUCATING YOU?
I did not write to educate you. That's not my job. It's your job to educate yourself by selecting what you find useful or rejecting what you don't. I offered information, and y own thoughts. It's up to you what you want to do with that: make use of it, make assumptions about it, or ignore it.

Thank you for saying you did not write to hurt. That was kind, or I assume so.
On your opinion of Starhawk's books I also like her vision. But making even a beautiful way of life compulsory, without the option to dissent,is poisoned.

Phew, well that's good.

Quote
ON RACISM
You have several times accused me of being racist. I completely agree. I grew up in a time when Black or Brown people were only to be seen as servants, never driving cars,never wearing good clothes except to go to Church. Decades of that experience grind deep into the brain so I observe my reactions still today, contaminated.
But what I also see is that we are all racist. Anyone who pretends otherwise lies, trying to compete, trying to be worthy of some version of holy heaven above.
We cannot be otherwise than racist because we all live and breathe and swim in racism. One day we will cleanse it and it needs people like you and people like me to do it. No liberation movement has ever succeeded withut bridging the gap.
Some of us try not to be racist and partially succeed. Those who belong to "ethnic groups" practice and react in a graded racism which ranks paleness, tallness, voice accent, thin lips etc. It's ingrained and inescapable, tragically. Some who are the target of racism invert it and cast their anger at all whites in a huge assumption we are all the same.Unhelpful - the mirror image of making all tribes the same.

I'm glad you can admit it! That's awesome! People who belong to ethnic groups are not racist because racism = power + privilege

Quote
My white English ancestors were some of the most bloody, aggressive people who have ever lived. The British (really the English) still are the most warmongering snobbish people in the Western world who adore inequality (with some exceptions who try to go against the grain). I live over the Welsh border from Bristol, a large city built entirely from slave trading profits. My husband's homeland in Wales was razed and subject to genocide by the English and still shows the scars of it even though a long time ago.


How long ago?

Quote
But this is done by a small group of a wealthy people who control our Government and attack and damage and deprive our own native people. We have children here suffering malnutrition, TB, rickets which was all stamped out until 25 years ago. People are dying for lack of medical treatment, heat in winter. Young males are at especial risk from police and our land now has more surveillance of its citizens than any other in the world. Some of that will be familiar sounding.

Let's be honest about these diseases shall we? http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/local-news/return-victorian-scourges-1861320 As to people dying for lack of medical treatment and heat in winter that is horrible. I only wish we had the average mean winter temperature you did though. 39f is balmy.


Quote
It would be better if we could help each other in our common sufferings. If you cannot reach out and connect with an outsider, I understand and I respect you for it. I felt like that for a long time. Separatism is an honorable place to be. But please, at least, try not to attack people like me and pull us down.  Destroying an ally is facing the wrong way. Attacking the slaves who have white skin is no help to you or us. I would like to see you keep your fire for those who are powerful, those who are in charge of oppressing your people.

Attacking the slaves who have white skin? What does that even mean?

Quote
I am not telling you what to do.
I am not 'educating' you (only you can do that).
I am offering thoughts, and asking you to consider. You may not want to in your free choice.

Just please keep your thoughts to a minimum. you are taking up so much dang oxygen it's astounding and you don't even see it.

Offline Defend the Sacred

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Posts: 3290
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #5 on: January 11, 2017, 11:42:07 pm »
We've merged the tangents from the Starhawk / Miriam Simos thread here.

Everything but the first post above (from this rant down) has been moved here from that thread. Sorry for the confusion/derailing.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2017, 05:33:26 pm by Defend the Sacred »

Offline morgain

  • Posts: 5
Re: "Morgain"
« Reply #6 on: January 11, 2017, 11:59:46 pm »
I am Guest here and some have recognised that formally and ceremonially by saying so.

The Guest Tradition here is very different to the ancient  Guest Right among my own people. I know colonialism is damaging but it is tragic when t destroys the honour of Guest Right.

It is the responsibility of a host to ensure their Guest is comfortable and treated with respect and dignity.
The host should make the Guest comfortable - even at the expense of their own comfort.
Accepting a Guest is a sacred act.

According to Guest Right no worthy host would insult the elders and culture of a Guest's people.

It is the height of bad manners to do nothing but attack a Guest, even in debate. Young people who offend by doing this are sent from the room.
Every criticism must be balanced by a compliment, to show good faith. To only throw negative remarks in long lists is completely against Guest Right.

The meaning of Guest Right is that your Guest today may host you or one of your people tomorrow.
So you win the best treatment for that future day by how you provide hospitality now.

As our Gwynfarddau have taught us over 300 years now, working together is how we are winning our revival. The masters are powerful and we do not win against them by attacking each other.

Offline Defend the Sacred

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Posts: 3290
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #7 on: January 12, 2017, 12:04:57 am »
LOL. We do not acknowledge you as an elder or Elder. You violated our hospitality with your many offensive, racist comments. Any guest right you might try to impose on us by your arrogance, entitlement and colonialist white privilege is irrelevant to us and thoroughly forfeit. Your behaviour is not welcome here. It is grotesque of you to imply we owe you anything.

Offline Defend the Sacred

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Posts: 3290
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #8 on: January 12, 2017, 12:07:51 am »
If you continue to post your self-aggrandizing spam in other threads your posting privileges will be removed. It's gross enough that you rant it once, to copy and paste it elsewhere so we have to go around deleting multiple copies is vile. Contain yourself.

Offline Smart Mule

  • Administrator
  • *****
  • Posts: 1074
Re: "Morgain"
« Reply #9 on: January 12, 2017, 12:26:52 am »
I am Guest here and some have recognised that formally and ceremonially by saying so.

Ceremonial? This is the internet. I don't know how you do things but I for one don't internet ceremony. Sheesh.

Quote
The Guest Tradition here is very different to the ancient  Guest Right among my own people. I know colonialism is damaging but it is tragic when t destroys the honour of Guest Right.

I am posting from Pokumtuck Territory which is a part of the greater Wabanaki Territory. I have not been colonized by the Welsh so I will not be following your Welsh Guest Traditions. Please keep your settler mentality to yourself thank you very much. Colonialism is damaging you know.

Quote
It is the responsibility of a host to ensure their Guest is comfortable and treated with respect and dignity.
The host should make the Guest comfortable - even at the expense of their own comfort.
Accepting a Guest is a sacred act.

As a guest it is appropriate to gift the host. Message me and I will provide my address and appropriate visiting gifts. They are small and are likely in your cupboard, it's not like I'll be needing a stereotypical pony or anything.

Quote

According to Guest Right no worthy host would insult the elders and culture of a Guest's people.

I'm a grandmother, I think we're fairly close in age.

Quote
It is the height of bad manners to do nothing but attack a Guest, even in debate. Young people who offend by doing this are sent from the room.

It is the height of bad manners to come into somebody's parlor and shit on the carpet then chastise the host.

Quote
Every criticism must be balanced by a compliment, to show good faith. To only throw negative remarks in long lists is completely against Guest Right.

Not in Indian country.

Quote
The meaning of Guest Right is that your Guest today may host you or one of your people tomorrow.
So you win the best treatment for that future day by how you provide hospitality now.

I am not in Wales. You have that on the carpet and order us to clean it up. That is not polite and I cannot imagine how much worse it would be if you were the host.

Quote
As our Gwynfarddau have taught us over 300 years now, working together is how we are winning our revival. The masters are powerful and we do not win against them by attacking each other.

#wearenotinwales #postcolonial #yourenglishrootsareshowing
« Last Edit: January 12, 2017, 01:03:57 am by omgsrsly? »

Offline Defend the Sacred

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Posts: 3290
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #10 on: January 12, 2017, 12:52:14 am »
While a minority in the so-called "UK" and Europe, the Welsh are still white. The Welsh are not slaves. The struggle for language preservation is of course relevant, which is why many of us support The Celtic League as a whole as well as various individual branches (and are right now laughing at this colonist's wildly inconsistent statements about "Celtic" as a political umbrella. #YourEnglishRootsAreShowing, indeed).

This forum includes members living and raised in the Celtic Nations. What we all know is that white people are not "slaves" in the "UK". Bias against white ethnic and linguistic minorities is not the same as what we are facing here in Indian Country on Turtle Island. Our members who understand sovereignty get this, and don't act entitled, or like the struggles are equivalent or interchangeable. We support one another and work in solidarity. It's not a competition. We don't order one another around or insult one another. Strangers do not get to come and declare that they are part of this alliance, however. Solidarity and trust are earned over time.

So when someone comes here and acts like they can spew any b.s. and pull one over on us... yeah, it's appalling.
 

Offline Defend the Sacred

  • Global Moderator
  • *****
  • Posts: 3290
Re: "Morgain" whitesplains it all
« Reply #11 on: January 12, 2017, 03:41:04 am »
Given recent information that's come to our attention I'd like to clarify this statement from the Starhawk thread:

Non-natives on Turtle Island, or Americans who move to a Celtic Nation, are not "other native people"

More accurately: Non-natives on Turtle Island; or Americans, English people or other non-Celtic folks who move to a Celtic Nation, are not "other native people".

English people aren't Welsh, either. 

Offline Laurel

  • Posts: 150
Re: "Morgain"
« Reply #12 on: January 12, 2017, 11:39:33 am »
It is the responsibility of a host to ensure their Guest is comfortable and treated with respect and dignity.
The host should make the Guest comfortable - even at the expense of their own comfort.
Accepting a Guest is a sacred act.

According to Guest Right no worthy host would insult the elders and culture of a Guest's people.

It is the height of bad manners to do nothing but attack a Guest, even in debate. Young people who offend by doing this are sent from the room.[/b]

Holy moly, she's Dracula. If you invite her in, she gets to do anything she wants! 

Offline JeelyPiece

  • Posts: 22
Re: "Morgain"
« Reply #13 on: January 16, 2017, 05:27:49 pm »
I am Guest here and some have recognised that formally and ceremonially by saying so.

The Guest Tradition here is very different to the ancient  Guest Right among my own people. I know colonialism is damaging but...

So... You come one here and think it's OK to impose your own ideas of "Guest Rights" (lol) onto a forum and then complain that your made-up rules aren't being observed?

Any sentence that begins "I know colonialism is damaging but..." Seriously?


CELTIC NATIONS
I agree a lot of ignorant statements were made about history and I said so. People like Starhawk and I have openly admitted that. So I don't understand what I said which is "not true."
It's not so that modern Witches, Pagans, and Druids are shunned by all the modern Celtic Nations. They have been welcomed in the Green Field at Y Eisteddfod Genedlaethol for several years now. That's the largest and biggest event held n Wales which celebrates Wales and Welsh culture. It's also the largest and most successful arts festival in Europe - but is sidelined in the news because it's not an English event.
I myself have cordial acquaintance and work with some of the top Druids of Wales.

I'm really not sure why you're bringing an arts festival into all this? Or what it has to do with neopagans? Or your acquaintance with "some of the top Druids of Wales"? Good for you? What does that have to do with Starhawk?

Quote
I am not telling you what to do.
I am not 'educating' you (only you can do that).
I am offering thoughts, and asking you to consider. You may not want to in your free choice.

But you absolutely are, and you're bringing totally irrelevant things into your posts as well. You want to make a distinction between "white masters" and "white slaves" but ignore the fact that you're not a slave and never have been. That you absolutely have white privilege that many members on this forum don't.

I'm Scottish. I live in Scotland, and you can put money on the fact that a lot of my ancestors got the crappy end of the stick at the hands of the English. And politically, as a nation, we still kinda do, as does Wales and Northern Ireland. None of that compares with what's going on elsewhere, like in North Dakota right now, and the part that people like Starhawk have to play in the exploitation that's going on there. It comes across as patronising and arrogant to try and lecture a bunch people you've never met before into thinking otherwise.