The following is a post I wrote in response to a question that someone posed about "bunny hunters and bunny stuff" in an e-group I currently belong to. Please note I am publishing this here at this blog in order to potentially save a few readers some trouble of locating it. Also, I make no apologies for having socks. Socks do not a troll or predator make. Some of you also have socks and maybe even more than one or two e-mail boxes. And finally, those things that appear in a slightly different color are things that I added for the sake of clarity:
WHAT IS A BUNNY HUNTER AND ALL THIS BUNNY STUFF GOING ON?
There is a history of pagans/heathens/witches/wiccans/satanists/satanic witches-- just like all regular people sometimes-- going after each other. On the internet, it can become what is called a "flame war," just like all regular people.
Ready access to "how to be a witch" or those "handy-dandy spells" books has caused some of us folks to raise an alarm because being a witch is not an easy path. It requires much self-discipline and some willingness to search and research. The popularized books leave those parts out.
The reconstructionists ["recons"] and the eclectics in particular seem to butt heads fairly often because of their different styles. Newbies to the pagan/witch/heathen community are sometimes referred to as "fluffy bunnies," and the "fluffiness--"
i.e. rose-colored glasses, claiming long names and titles, or thinking everything is grand here in witchland--can be wearing upon the rest of us.
It is generally hoped that we all grow out of the "fluffy bunny" stage. Or at least the parts that mix and match pantheons and don't stick with historical research and perhaps aren't willing [or don't know how] to do the internal work. [Or, the pink cloud stage.] There is a cost to doing this work. It is not free.
It is generally hoped that we all grow out of the "fluffy bunny" stage. Or at least the parts that mix and match pantheons and don't stick with historical research and perhaps aren't willing [or don't know how] to do the internal work. [Or, the pink cloud stage.] There is a cost to doing this work. It is not free.
On the internet, a small but vocal group of folks got together in 1992 or thereabouts on one yahoo "self-help" for fluffiness as a way to laugh and a few of that group began to post essays on a board.
Not that they were bad people-- more because of the frustration of dealing with those who tread lightly on our paths that we take very seriously. Later on.......skipping quite a few years here.......that evolved into a sort of club on one blogsite and that club named itself "bunny hunters."
....The particular club has as its' aim to educate or reform or shut down the particularly troublesome [to them] fluffies. Some of the folks in the group are well-known in the pagan community, including at least 2 published writers and a handful of elders with much experience.
on-line] to join e-groups where some "fluffies" may be found, purchasing a domain where information about a main target was published and another target being identified as "toxic" or a "toxic bunny" and assumptions made and accusations stated without any sort of proof, maintaining blogs elsewhere which are devoted to one or more targets, name-calling on-line...etc.....enthusiastic yet typical flame war stuff.
Sometimes the targets, "fluffy bunnies," or "toxic bunnies," trolls, alleged predators... etc...have done things which sparked the controversy and/or they continue to do things to add to it. And sometimes, the act of extending the f2f or internet hand of friendship to targets has contributed to being identified as a new target i.e. more "fluffy bunnies," "toxic bunnies" or "trolls" for the electronic fodder.
At least one of us who has been targeted has years of experience on what is commonly called L.H.P., or a left-hand path; a second [or is she a sock?] is a nobody in the pagan world who has added to the controversy by writing really bad poetry. A third has a serious medical condition which is now being successfully treated-- however true healing takes much time. A fourth isn't even a pagan but a soon-to-be-guest writer on a collaborative blog. [Two of us who have acted in less than honorable ways have made public apologies for our past behavior. One of those two is me.]
It is difficult for those of us who have been targeted by reason of associations to carry on with our online lives but we do so because we have goals and those goals involve an active online presence. Very difficult when a small group of folks blog about our blogging or about our links to our friends who are not targets at all or about our links to writers who we happen to like and admire or about the many erroneous things they suppose about us or about the idea that we eat scrambled eggs and drink orange juice for breakfast [or about the idea that we don't eat scrambled eggs and drink orange juice for breakfast. The double-bind that some of us experienced in our dysfunctional families of our youth is alive and still being perpetuated by ourselves these many years later!]
However, it can be done. I am continuing with my life, comfortable with my L.H.P. and secure in knowing who I am. Because it is not about what other people think about me today, it is about what I KNOW (about me)-- to paraphrase Nathaniel Branden.
The best thing that any human being can do to protect themselves against any sort of bullying is to do the internal work required to develop or to maintain a good healthy self-esteem. The best thing that any witch or wiccan or heathen or pagan or other can do is to do the search and research. In other words, remember that things are not always the way they appear to be. People are not always the way people appear to be. And wherever you go, NEVER leave your brains in front of any doorway before entering therein.
Blessed be indeed!
spike q
a.k.a. sapphoq n friends !
Who am I?
*I have been involved with the occult and rootwork and pagan pursuits for more than half of my life.
*I am a witch. I believe that we are Divinity. I don't much care about any "afterlife."
*I don't belong to any covens, I have no titles or degrees or initiations.
*I teach no one. I claim no extraordinary knowledge. I stifle my inner mystic.
*My practice is solitary although I do get together with other folks on a variety of paths
when I feel like it and I have had and continue to have spiritual teachers or mentors.
*I am not a wiccan. I have not followed "the Wiccan Rede" or the "Law of Three" ever. [I
came in long before those popularized books and quite frankly, I had never heard of those
things early on and middle on. It appears that my first teacher hadn't either.]
*I have my own set of ethics.
*I have recently named myself a satanist in philosophy although not in theology.
What else?
*I have some long-term blogs. I have abandoned two blogs-- I hate msn spaces.
*I have two domains. Resistant-witches is one of them. No surprises there.
*I "own" one e-group, moderate another, and am a member of many.
*I am healing. I have a traumatic brain injury caused by a car accident. The driver behind
me was high on marijuana. I do have some permanent neurological effects from the t.b.i.
*I am a published writer [off-line: print-- the forgotten medium!]
*I have been clean since the fall of 1980. I am bisexual but faithful to my marriage partner.
We currently share our home with a dog and three uppity cats. I am a keeper of frogs.
Again, no surprises there either.
*I am actively involved in disability culture and in the fight for civil rights for all civils.
*I am opposed to illegal immigration and some other stuff.
*I have been doing computer art since last summer, my art was in one art show last summer,
and I am learning how to do simple animations with The GIMP.
*I read primarily computer books and travel books. Nikolai calls me a "nerd" and a "hacker."
*I became obsessed with e-mail addys a year or two ago and I have far more than 12 e-email
boxes. I had one serious sock but I abandoned her when she turned out to be nicer than me.
*The word "snark" is one I just learned recently. Those of you with snarky comments to
make can take yourselves over to http://witch-wars-report.blogspot.com/ and/or to your own internet lairs. This is my little piece of the internet, my lair [thanks to blogspot.]
a.k.a. sapphoq n friends !
Who am I?
*I have been involved with the occult and rootwork and pagan pursuits for more than half of my life.
*I am a witch. I believe that we are Divinity. I don't much care about any "afterlife."
*I don't belong to any covens, I have no titles or degrees or initiations.
*I teach no one. I claim no extraordinary knowledge. I stifle my inner mystic.
*My practice is solitary although I do get together with other folks on a variety of paths
when I feel like it and I have had and continue to have spiritual teachers or mentors.
*I am not a wiccan. I have not followed "the Wiccan Rede" or the "Law of Three" ever. [I
came in long before those popularized books and quite frankly, I had never heard of those
things early on and middle on. It appears that my first teacher hadn't either.]
*I have my own set of ethics.
*I have recently named myself a satanist in philosophy although not in theology.
What else?
*I have some long-term blogs. I have abandoned two blogs-- I hate msn spaces.
*I have two domains. Resistant-witches is one of them. No surprises there.
*I "own" one e-group, moderate another, and am a member of many.
*I am healing. I have a traumatic brain injury caused by a car accident. The driver behind
me was high on marijuana. I do have some permanent neurological effects from the t.b.i.
*I am a published writer [off-line: print-- the forgotten medium!]
*I have been clean since the fall of 1980. I am bisexual but faithful to my marriage partner.
We currently share our home with a dog and three uppity cats. I am a keeper of frogs.
Again, no surprises there either.
*I am actively involved in disability culture and in the fight for civil rights for all civils.
*I am opposed to illegal immigration and some other stuff.
*I have been doing computer art since last summer, my art was in one art show last summer,
and I am learning how to do simple animations with The GIMP.
*I read primarily computer books and travel books. Nikolai calls me a "nerd" and a "hacker."
*I became obsessed with e-mail addys a year or two ago and I have far more than 12 e-email
boxes. I had one serious sock but I abandoned her when she turned out to be nicer than me.
*The word "snark" is one I just learned recently. Those of you with snarky comments to
make can take yourselves over to http://witch-wars-report.blogspot.com/ and/or to your own internet lairs. This is my little piece of the internet, my lair [thanks to blogspot.]
sapphoq
bunny+hunters
flame wars
socks
trolls
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