I'm not going to say that heathen communities are not without faults. All communities are going to have people in them that fall on the outskirts of whatever values the community upholds. Currently in heathen and asatru groups there is a tremendous amount of racism, sexism, queerphobia, etc. It's not a new thing just like it's not a new thing in our overall society. People kid themselves if they think they can isolate themselves into a small group of people and get away from all prejudices or insulate themselves from the biases that govern our systems.
But that doesn't mean we should abandon these communities. It is not hopeless to stay and fight. It is hopeless if you leave and give up.
And this is where I find myself. I have had a few conversations with people online and in real life about leaving the community because of the obvious prejudices. My philosophy is to stay and call out abuses and biases as they come up in conversation and activities. I don't mean to be confrontational but educational. I try to keep a calm tone. There are times when I get upset, but that is often in reaction to outright name calling and ridicule.
There was a period of time recently when I was rageful. I still get that way but my ability to reset my emotions has gotten a lot better. I don't carry stuff with me like I used to. I try not to. It's bad for my anxiety and rage was the fire that fed that anxiety. Anger is a useful emotion since it gets us up and moving, but there is also a danger that when that anger is paired with hopelessness it can turn into paralysis. I'd rather be focused on what can I do to help or make things better, than to spend my time screaming at people whose opinions I won't ever be able to change. Especially if those people don't even see my humanity because of my demographic.b
But here's where shit gets personal. In recent discussions over the passed months I have seriously wondered who actually knows me. I have felt like, in many situations in my life, that people aren't talking to me but to a thing that symbolizes something. I'm not a person but a role, or a demographic, or an idea that they are reacting to. What I say and what I do gets interpreted through this haze or lense. Ruby Payne "It's not what you do but who you are while you're doing it."
And there's no real way to eliminate this tendency to categorize people. But it effects our relationships. There are a group of people that I became connected to through my hubby ten years ago. One died about three years after I met her and the other four members of this community are still around however disbursed. I have had experiences that make me think They think I have somehow filled the role or position of the woman who passed. She was our priestess and the center of our community at the time. I do not and did not have the charisma or background to step into her position and hold things together so nothing would change. No one has that ability in any situation like this. You can't replace people.
But these individuals seemed to think that I was this maternal, soft place, this earth mother type, that they could use in the same way they had used her. I am not earth. I cannot be a counselor for them, or listen quietly, or yoke someone up by the neck and shake some sense into them. I don't have the time and experience invested in Them that she did.
The group obviously scattered after she died since her gravity was no longer holding them together. Her husband remarried and moved away. Her live-in lover/friend/soulmate moved to the opposite side of the country. I kept in touch through facebook and once in a while would receive a "you would like" post. I didn't always agree with their assessment of what I would like.
The outburst that occurred recently seemed to involve this perception of me as this other type person. The distant acquaintance responded to a post I had put up about heathenry and religious elements. I had what seemed to be a civil conversation with this acquaintance aboutthat seemed to be trolling to recruit potential racists to their political cause. When a member of our kindred responded from a Reconstructionist point of view, this acquaintance attacked her. She seemed to take it for granted that the poster was straight, cis, right-wing, etc. And she just launched herself at her in response to a post that was very civil and intellectual. And the back and forth just got worse. In a more abrupt way of saying, She flipped her shit.
I responded she had crossed a line attacking someone she didn't even know. And she accused me of sticking up for racists and then unfriended me.
It reminded me of the last time we got into it over a political issue. That time it had to do with cisgender issues at the women's march on Washington. But she said something along the lines of -my post has surprised her and hurt because she thought I wasn't a certain type of person. Which made me wonder then and again now, who did she think I was? (Unless she was doing that as a way to set herself up as the victim in order to gain sympathy from others.)
I feel like I was being used as a blank slate for people to download whatever they needed onto. Like I was a blank mannequin and they changed the features to suit their needs whenever. My personality, my needs, my identity wasn't even a thing they considered. I acted as a mirror to their needs, and I was empty as far as they cared.
It both pisses me off and makes me really sad. How many of my relationships were like this? How many times did a relationship end because I stopped doing what they had programmed themselves to expect from me? It wasn't me that changed. They had simply had a moment where I didn't live up to whatever image they had built up of me in their head. I didn't actually fall from grace. Their illusion was actually shattered. There came a point where they couldn't ignore me anymore in favor of their fantasy of me and what I represented to them.
It's screwed up but there is Feminist Theory that explores how this kind of dynamic works between men and women. Women serve as mirrors for men's greatness. As long as she smiles and beams her affection and worship of him through her eyes, he is satisfied. The moment she gives him less than the worship he thinks he deserves, then he loses interest in her and looks for another mirror to admire himself in. It's literal Narcissus and Echo Narcissism, but the mirror is actually another person instead of the pond surface. It's dehumanizing for the person who serves as the mirror, as is evident in our society and the way women are treated.
I'm not enraged over this. But it upsets me in the sense that I don't know how I can count on the continuity of relationships when they devolve into roles and mirrors, rather than authentic whole people sharing their lives together. I need truth for this and truth cannot exist with illusions and mirages.
I've been doing a lot of reading on love these past couple of days. It's part of my Definition of Love entry and my work with Freya. In this book I'm reading now Love requires some things in order to be free or capable of existing. Honesty is one of those things.
And to be honest, as much as I want to put all of the blame for their misunderstanding me on them, and in some cases it really is all on them, I played into it somewhat. I can be a very generous person. There are times when I gave too much and too often which seemed to encourage a person to use me for resources without giving back. Or I was too silent and didn't assert myself in a conversation which gave the impression I was agreeing, didn't have an opinion, or was a counselor type for them. Part of this is my social anxiety, which sucks, and part of this is the introvert. I'm actually pretty good at supporting people.
But too many people expect to receive love and not have to do anything to earn or keep it. As if it is my job or the woman's job to give with no back and forth. Which brings me to my current rune, Gebo or equal exchange. A community cannot exist without Gebo, nor can love continue without it.
So I have to get back some of that fearlessness, some of that in-your-face-ness I once had in my 20s. I'm probably going to need to call on some anger for that. Which is good in a way. I think I'm at that point where I can be mad at something without feeling like my insides are on fire and I can't sleep for raging.
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