Community

 We had a music show last weekend at the studio where I dance.  It was a lovely evening except for an incident involving an unhoused individual.  I didn't find out about it until sometime afterwards.  Here's what I posted on social media:


It was brought to my attention that at one point during the show Saturday evening, an invited guest was told to "get the hell away, we don't need you here." This person was invited, and yes, they are unhoused, but that does not mean they shouldn't be treated as anything less than.

We do have a larger community of unhoused people in the area around the studio.  We work to get along with everyone that passes through the area because they are humans. They are simply dealing with different circumstances from our own, and that doesn't give us the right to treat them poorly. The fact that this person was actually invited to our event disappoints me even more.

I can't fix what's already happened. I will be addressing this at future shows, though. And please, in the future, think about what we're even doing here in the first place.


Since I posted this yesterday, I've had quite a few comments and musings, and of course, the person who invited the individual in question was good enough to make a few statements concerning what went on as well.

I've also been thinking about what this could mean for our community here in southwest Missouri, and maybe overall.  Who are we associating with?  How well do we know our fellow Pagans?  Is it possible that opening the door to the world is having bad effects?

People judge.  It's human nature, and it's going to happen.  I'm guilty of it.  I don't know anyone out there that hasn't made some sort of snap judgement that wasn't well thought out and even possibly damaging.  However....this was a situation that I think could have been handled a lot differently.  And considering this was a Pagan event, it absolutely should have been handled differently.

This isn't the first time an unhoused person has been to one of our Pagan events.  My personal philosophy is, if someone is hungry and happens to wander in, let's feed them.  I'd rather accidentally feed someone who may not need it and not risk starving someone just because they look a little rough.

But the bigger issue for me is this: Who are the people in our community?  I would hope our local Pagan community has compassion.  I hope our community would be understanding.  But that doesn't seem to be the case.

People are drawn to a Pagan path for a number of reasons - to feel closer to Nature.  To celebrate the Earth.  To honor ancestors.  We follow Paganism because we can feel the energies of the Earth and the different planes of existence, and we want to try and live in harmony with All That Is.  For the most part, those are the people I know and the people I associate with.  But there are others - others who get into it for power because they find people who are easy to manipulate.  Others who will claim knowledge they don't have just to impress.  And others still will fawn and beg to be taught only to take it all to use against you.

We used to refer to people like that as "plastic Pagans."  No real substance, just looking for attention.  And because we host open events, those kinds of people will show up.  And in some cases, they will cause damage.

So my question - what can we do about this?



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