My Heathenry is Anti-racist
The following piece was written in response to the attempted coup on the Unite States capitol January 6, 2021. There is no room for white supremacy in my life, but saying so and doing something about it are two very different things. My faith as an American Heathen, or American practicing Norse Pagan, comes with a messy history of folkish supremacists, destruction, and violence. We, as a community must be so bold in our rejection of racism that onlookers could easily assume it’s a core tenet to our practice.
My dear friend Alejandra of @gemineyetarot
created this post I am reposting with her blessing. She says what needs to be said in a way I have been searching for within myself for months.
Her words are as below. Mine will follow because her words need to come first.
@gemineyetarot
“I’ve seen pieces of information circulating about this conspicuous protester. I haven’t been able to verify it—that he’s a “manifestation coach” and “shaman”. // A former history professor emailed me that the French media had identified Jake Angeli as a Nazi and his costume resonates with him as nod to Norse mythology.// I’ve never addressed some of these things for fear of being misunderstood or my intentions being questioned. Fuck it. There is, and has been, for a very long time been an issue with Druidic and Pagan paths being connected with Nazism. It’s not uncommon for Odinist to also be associated with White Power groups.// There are strong contingents of Odinists in prisons within white power groups. This is because pre-colonial religious paths often resonate with Nationalists who view colonization and the mixing of bloodlines and religion that followed as a “tainting” event that undetermined an era of racial purity.// The concept of “manifesting” or focusing ones attention through a ritual act to produce an (often) material outcome is present in almost every spiritual tradition. It provides to the poor and vulnerable. However, there is a strong ideological connection between “manifesting” and “manifest destiny” an ethos of genocidal entitlement in the Western world. The idea that gaining more and more is a divine birthright requires serious examination in both a historical and a contemporary context. In regards to the Druidic/ Odinist connection to Nazism this is not to say that those religions equal Nazism. It is to say that it’s important to understand the connection and be aware of the insidious ways racism permeates even “safe” spaces.”
My words: I am a Heathen. I am a friend to Odin. Seeing this man stamped with our sacred symbols comes as no surprise to me. Have we not seen through history the appropriation and misappropriation of our symbols usurped and used as beacons of poisonous hate and violence? This is not new. Now is not the time to circle the wagons and say reclaim. What are we reclaiming? We haven’t done the fucking work. The sacredness of these symbols are lost as long as the cultural relevance demonstrates we have not done the work. This man is demonstrable proof we have not done the work. Is this ongoing history not an affront to basic human rights? Human rights are not up for debate. You nor I nor anyone possesses a latent higher value to get to debate that; it is indubitable.
I urge Heathen and non-Heathens alike, anyone practicing a faith that reaches back to pre-colonial expressions of their ancestry to look into not only the interweaving of their histories to those of others in shared interconnectedness, but also the insidious ways the leaders of reclaiming movements have often aligned themselves (either covertly or overtly) with political leaders and movements that feature nationalism as a core tenet. The Orange Order of Ireland, Scotland, and England and in North American Heathenism McNallen and Odinic Folkish practices holding hands with European White Nationalism.
If you’re worried about this guy making us look bad, your priorities are in the wrong place.
If your idea is to just show off you sick tats as if to say “see, not me” you’re centering yourself, passing the buck, and really you’ve done nothing to truly differentiate yourself from this dingleberry.
We have to be loudly and unapologetically against white supremacy. This doesn’t just mean fighting the most loud and visible forms. If we want to reclaim the ways of our ancestors, then we have to act in ways that separate us from the violence that removed our self-governance centuries ago. And, in doing so, align ourselves in solidarity with those fighting for their self-governance today.
I pulled these runes on January 6, 2021:
Berkana, Dagaz, Ehwaz
○Healing, secrecy and strength of spirit, deep-knowing, where all lines merge, creation birth
○Duality and unity, what was now is, day and night, inspired mysticism, existing in paradox, change as quick evolution
○Trust, stepping forward, teams, necessary adjustments, cooperation and consideration that leads to movement
I've been trying to reconcile how two people (hypothetical) who have made oaths to the same deity, study the same lore, and think of themselves as decent people can have such a fundamental difference of belief when it comes to anti-racism and heathenry. I am reminded of various sagas and battles for victory in which both sides claimed to have Odin on their side.
Heathens, generally, are not a Pollyanna pearl-clutching bunch. On the contrary, I think our general obsession with the Warrior archetype is deeply unhealthy because we also have a supreme lack of self-awareness. Our history isn't just speckled with racists and white supremacists, it's smeared. And the chest-thumping individualists whether they do or do not condemn white supremacy are a thorn I'm trying to work past in my own practice. They either do wrong or they do nothing. To do nothing is to maintain the status quo and that is white supremacy in action.
We need to be so loudly anti-racist people think it's a tenet of our practice. It is for me.
I am going to break down the core principles of the most rudimentary Heathenry, trying to avoid being reductive, but explaining through these core values just why there is no place for white supremacy.
My Heathenry is animistic. Reverence of nature and nature-spirit is given to all natural life. To suggest a person is unnatural, or less than in anyway, because of their being is an afront to my practice.
From the animal inspired titles we bear (Bjorn) to the pillar of our cosmos, Yggdrasil, and all the nature based mysticism between, the ways of nature are bigger than humanity's attempts at categorization.
Land spirits
Wights
Our creation story -Ymir, Ask, Embla
Fire and Ice
Fylgja
The animals of our lore- cats, wolves, ravens, bears, owls, eagles, cows
Frith, as a concept is hard to explain literally but it easily witnessed through the actions of those who share bonds. This is not blanket loyalty; frith can be broken. I find that through the arc of breaking and mending we come to know deeper frith and value those we share it with more and more.
A lot of racist, folkish heathens singularly associate frith with blood kin and ancestry, claiming they fight for some wacky idea of purity. Their understanding of frith betrays them as their ancestral histories betray them. Racial purity is a myth; Scandinavians were not isolated from the geographic movements of people throughout history. So, logically to use frith as a justification for white supremacy is a deluded form of confirmation bias.
Let me speak personally: members of my extended family long ago taught me what hate and violence of spirit look like. One of my uncles (edit and update 4/16/21: all but one of my living uncles) went to DC for the events of January 6th. The shame and disgust I feel has stewed inside me. His actions, my extended family's general beliefs show me they hold no space for who I am and the people I love.
The people I love are queer, gay, trans, black, brown, existential hippies, leftists, radicals, intersectional feminists, tree huggers, world travelers, punks, wayward souls, artists, poets, free thinkers.
Frith is ongoing. There is nothing static about it. None of us are incapable of redemption. One can come to earn a seat at the table again.
The picture I used for this is from my birthday party in 2019. This is my table and I hold no space for those who would do harm to the beautiful souls seated at my table (the irony is that someone who helped set up that table caused harm and had to get gone. I will stand for frith. I will not back down).
When you see misdeeds, speak out against them, and give your enemies no frið”
Hávamál 127
I believe in orlög, the primal layer. Ancestors, family, parentage, the web of like begetting like, hedging our bets, Luck...it's flavor is similar to the concept of epigenetics. My mother and father broke away from gross and toxic environments that enabled my other, distant relatives to feel justified in participating in an insurrection. In orlog, my parents changed course like breaking a branch off a family tree, rooting it, and planting it somewhere else. This impacts how I understand ancestral healing and veneration, and furthermore how I have come to understand intersectionality, human rights, altruism and eleemosinary, how I blot, my use of magick, and philosophies on divination. I will not perpetuate the same ills of my ancestors. I will work to stop the perpuation of the cycle of abuse societally and individually. I will honor the triumphant deeds and ways of my ancestors that have also influenced my orlog: my knowledge of plants, my fascination with medicine and healing, stewardship of the land, challenging authority, etc. Energy begets itself. An object in motion stays in motion until... 'Until' is the moment when Orlog and Wyrd and choice and luck converge and our Free Will engages.
Feeling in my bones what is right and righteous, my moral and ethical compass, this is the language in which Wyrd and Orlog speak.
You want to predict the future? You must create it first. A clue from Carl Sagan's apple pie recipe.
I believe in Wyrd and the Norns. Feeling in my bones what is right and righteous, my moral and ethical compass, this is the language in which Wyrd and Orlog speak. We see Wyrd played out in our actions and how cause and effect and consequence shape the topography of our lives. Urðr ,that which has come to pass. Verðandi, that which is in the process of happening. Skuld, that which is yet to happen. Skuld evokes a sense of owing, a tallying that can change based on the dynamics of urđr and verđandi. I am a part of the history that has brought me here, the systems that have been created, and the impact that it has on others can henceforth be swayed on how I and others individually respond to those systems and histories. Fate is a gift given by the Norns, but each of us gets choice in what to do with it. You want to predict the future, you must first create it. This foundational concept imbues action and honor to the core of heathenry, but my sense of action and honor is to not abide the passive, apathetic, and worse- the actively hateful and self-righteous.
Even the gods are subject to the forces of fate which to me, reinforces a grand notion of interconnectedness. That the dynamics of all things tabulate against one another resulting in a constant give and take, surplus and deficit, a cosmic if-then of butterfly effects. And the dynamic is not binary, nor linear. It is this great mush of stuff pushing and pulling, which is why those who feel called to raise their voices must heed that call, why we must scream so loud- to make up for the tally of those who stand for hatred AND those who stand (or sit, in inaction) for status quo.
On a finer note, I feel the concept of Orlog and Wyrd do what new age c-opting of karma does not: I think it avoids inherent spiritual bypassing. So many folx in the broader new age, neo-pagan, animistic movements have a simple answer for the problem of evil: karma. Not only is this a gross bastardization of concept Karma and Klesha, it’s a huge denial of systems of oppression that cannot be pinned down to individual ownership of those who are oppressed, that places the blame for given circumstances on those who did not create the given circumstances. Also, that’s lazy as fuck. Instead, Orlog and Wyrd says all that which proceeds us is a blueprint and, as a concept, enables us, empowers us, and emboldens us to build. It holds autonomy, sovereignty, as well as fellowship, community, and society in a cosmic dialectical materialism. (Marx would hate me for that last sentence)
Be well, comrades. And as always:
Get Wyrd
Stay Wyrd
Believe in Magick