BS: Witches! Good and Bad?

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 04:11 PM

I think that should read, "There aren't ANY witches... Anyone who claims otherwise is selling something, deluded, or both"

heh

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 04:08 PM

Your first posting on the other thread: There aren't any good witches. Anyone who claims otherwise is just plain wrong...hg

Seems as though you had an idea of what it meant to you at that point.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: mack/misophist
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 03:58 PM

When you can't get a responsive answer to a question as stated, change the statement. Forget witches. Witches are airy-fairy and people are going to give you a hard time about that. Instead, look for the closest parallel you can find. See Maya Derin's book Divine Horsemen for a good parallel. In Voudou, the houngan is a herb doctor, counselor, and leads the services. He may be political or manipulative. He might become relatively rich. But if he does anything overtly evil his congregation will desert. A bokor has the same training but chooses to act alone, without a 'church' for personal power and influence. Does that help?

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: artbrooks
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 03:44 PM

And rudeness is soooooo helpful.....

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 03:41 PM

"I don't have a dictionary handy so I am totally unable to give you a definition beyond my childhood experience of understanding"

Yes, I'm sure that's true. After all, it is sooooo difficult for a college educated, computer literate person to find their way to the Merriam Website online dictionary...

"...which parallels Clinton's definitions..."

Thanks for sharing your definition. It seems the definition you are using is one of cartoon caricatures, then.

"I was hoping someone elsae could actually define this word the way it is being used by everyone here"

By everyone here? I don't think so. How about for argument sake, we limit the definition to your and Clinton's simplistic, bigoted cartoon caricature definition of a witch? Or shall we attempt a reasonable discussion, and use the perfectly good dictionary definition graciously provided above by artbrooks? Or a definition from a member of the Wiccan community itself? Silly me, that isn't the harpgirl style. You'd never be that reasonable. You much prefer attacking, mocking, and belittling people you don't like.

"I want some answers to my questions."

No you don't. You want to pick a fight.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 03:28 PM

ahem.

Guest 03:18 PM. Most of the Protestant religions practiced today have their roots in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Does that make them suspect, or merely illegitimate in your view, because they aren't old enough to be a Real Religion (tm)?

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 03:18 PM

ahem.

Wiccans practice a religion created during the 1800's based on practices that predate Christianity. The actual Wiccan religion as exists today did not.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: Dead Horse
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 03:14 PM

There are good Catholics & bad Catholics. Define Catholics.
Witches are people, some good, some bad.
Not all the good are good all the time.
Not all the bad are bad all the time.
Wiccans (what most folk regard as white witches) practise a religeon that is MUCH older than Christianity, and has done a darn site less harm.
If you wish to believe in any philosophy, look within yourself to see what YOU wish to worship - be it a god, nature, or mammon.
Then learn about others with similar views - and Hey Presto, there is your religeon!
Personally I worship ale, folk singing & dancing.
(but I have been known to drink lager, sing pop, and do the twist)

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: artbrooks
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 03:14 PM

Clinton said: The good witches dress in white, look pretty, and have a munchkin fetish... the bad witches dress in black, have green skin, and melt in water.... These are physical characteristics, and have nothing whatsoever to do with behavior patterns definable as "good" or "bad." Are you defaulting to Walt Disney's definitions? Do you mean the behaviors attributed to the men and women hanged in Salem Village as witches (and whose executions were condemned by Cotton Mather)?

My Webster provides the following definitions:
1. a woman supposedly having supernatural power by a compact with the devil or evil spirits; sorcerous.
2. (Obs.) a man with such power.
3. an ugly and ill-tempered old woman; hag
4. (Colloq.) a bewitching or fascinating woman or girl.

Personally, I can easily believe in Webster's numbers 3 and 4, and they can be either good or bad.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:54 PM

HG - you are contridicting yourself! You say your understanding of "witch" parallels Clinton's - then you make a statement such as "all witches are bad". conflict is major between those two statements.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: harpgirl
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:51 PM

Isn't it obvious that I know way less about what this word means than you all do? I don't have a dictionary handy so I am totally unable to give you a definition beyond my childhood experience of understanding
, which parallels Clinton's definitions. Sorry...I was hoping someone elsae could actually define this word the way it is being used by everyone here. I'm rather unenlightened, contrary to what our really mean GUEST is saying about me.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: artbrooks
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:46 PM

Please define the word "witch".

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: harpgirl
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:43 PM

I want some answers to my questions. Plus I am sure that if I get to chose I would rather be bad sometimes than to present myself as always good. How about you?

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: harpgirl
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:39 PM

What is a good witch? What is a bad witch? How can you tell the difference? I thought I asked this in the first post....

What is the "religion?" How do you practice it? How is the religion different from white magic and black magic? Do witches do magic?

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:36 PM

Not to mention, knowing what harpgirl's intention is for asking the question. What I sussed out from reading the thread requesting songs about wicca(ns)/witches, was that the enlightened mental health counselor wanted to pick a fight with the people discussing the songs.

Do help us understand what the hades your motives are for starting this thread, won't you Self-Proclaimed Bad Witch of the South?

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: artbrooks
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:25 PM

Sounds a lot like the perennial bashing of "liberals", without a common agreement on what a "liberal" is.

Harpgirl, what, precisely, do you mean by the word "witch?" Reading the comments made in the other thread, it seems reasonably clear that you are not referring to practitioners of the religion, or perhaps "followers of the path" is a better expression, called Wicca. Witch clearly means different things to different people. It would be much easier for me to answer the question if I knew better what I was being asked.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:13 PM

when you get down to brass tacks -

yup.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: harpgirl
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:08 PM

I just thought that with all the talk about witches around here, some of these witches and witch sympathsizers would have something reasonably enlightening to say about the differences.

"Does deliberate harm" by that definition both Ted Kazcinsky and George Bush qualify as deliberately harmful humans. So are they no different than "bad witches"? After all, Ted chose to kill people for his beliefs and guess what? So did George!

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 02:00 PM

Nope... I've never seen an angle... So I don't believe they exist!

LOL

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: Bill D
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 01:47 PM

why, I saw a 45° angle just yesterday!

The mind is a funny thing...like the Red Queen said, she can believe in several impossible things before breakfast.

Witchcraft seems to me like a complex fantasy game some people play, but, like other such concepts, (ghosts, elves, fairies, angels and BigFoots) they achieve a certain 'reality' in some folks lives. I dunno what to say when something I don't 'feel' or see is taken seriously by others. Best to just duck..*grin*

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 01:36 PM

The good witches dress in white, look pretty, and have a munchkin fetish... the bad witches dress in black, have green skin, and melt in water...

Sheesh...

What's next?

Angles??

Little green men from mars?

Loch Ness Monster? Unicorns??

Some other element of fantasy?

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 01:35 PM

Now - based on what I have read - Cotton Mather was a devil's tool - (If there is a devil) - but evil. evil. very evil.

Subject: RE: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 01:26 PM

if I understand it correctly - the prime tenet of Wicca is "Do no Harm" - if one adheres to that (and are talking Wiccan witches)- then "good" witch.

Does deliberate harm? "bad" witch. or at least human.

Subject: BS: Witches! Good and Bad?
From: harpgirl
Date: 25 Jul 03 - 01:23 PM

I posed a question on the music thread about witches which is better dealt with here so I am posing it. If you believe in witches, do you also believe that some are good and some are bad? How do you distinguish?

I stated my opinion about witches on the other thread and naturally several of our members insulted me instead of saying anything kind, reasonable or enlightening to me, but I'm giving them another chance. What is a good witch? what is a bad witch? How would you know if someone sad they were a good or bad witch? hg