Witches, Time Is Running Out To Realize Our Political & Magical Power

It’s not a secret that a lot of people tend to secretly root for the underdog, the rebel with a cause. It’s one of the many reasons why Star Wars appeals to so many, the tale tapping into the myth of the creation of the hero, with the young boy from a simple farming background going up against a large, authoritarian government. Challenging societal structures isn’t about random chaos or blowing crap up just to watch the world burn; it’s been about opposing that which seeks to destroy for its own benefit. Witches are inherently subversive. Our background, our history, all of that follows this narrative.

Witches in traditional lore have been a threat to larger governing structures and those who uphold them because they challenged the status quo and who held power. It’s a good chunk of why the benandanti, Italian folk craft/shamanic practitioners who supposedly fought against “bad witches in league with the devil” went from being allies to the church to being seen as a threat to the church, and ultimately hunted down. It’s also why witches have been seen as being enemies of the church to begin with, as the church was essentially the ruling body of that time. They held power, and the church was ultimately threatened by that power. Much of this has to do with religious doctrine, wars against the lingering pagan populace, and stamping their rule over those who would oppose them. It was better to have the witches’ fear of the church be greater than that of the church’s fear of the witches. After all, they didn’t want an uprising.

“People should not be afraid of their government, government should be afraid of their people.” – V, V For Vendetta

In modern times we’re facing a very similar situation in which an increasingly fascist and authoritarian government desperately wants their people too afraid to oppose them, too skeptical to vote, and ultimately too distracted to actually make a difference. It’s heavily ironic that the term “witch hunt” has been used by the Trump administration to describe the ongoing Mueller investigation and other questioning and criticism. The reality is that like much of their accusations of the politically left leaning, it is total projection. They are not the witches being hunted down, the people being discriminated against. They are not the immigrant children being put into cages, the LGBTQIA+ community living under the threat of their basic human rights being taken away, women’s rights over their own bodies as autonomous beings being removed, or the people being shot and killed for the crime of being black or Jewish. For those of us living under the threat of the Trump government, we are the witches and they want us to burn. As a queer women of Jewish descent, this impacts me. And even if it didn’t impact me directly, it’s my responsibility as a decent human being living in society to do the right thing by fighting for others facing oppression.

And this is why we actual witches, especially those of us who are non-white and even more so those who are black, LGBTQIA+, female, and/or of Jewish heritage need to fight back and embrace our innate understanding of what it means to upend the status quo. That very status quo would have us deprived of our basic rights or even dead because it belongs to those who desire to oppress others for their own sakes.

There are two things every single witch should be doing on or before Nov 6th:

1. Tapping into our own power as witches to help end the madness. I’ve blogged before on how to do magic to influence world events and oppose tyrants, feel free to brush up on that. There are a lot of other occultists who have been writing about performing such magical acts of resistance and organizing them as well. I recommend starting or joining an existing one. Some are public while others are not. If you’re interested in the ones that aren’t public, feel free to contact me.
2. Vote Democrat for absolutely every office in the midterms, especially those who represent us in Congress. The GOP have been complicit and every last one of them should be removed if at all possible. Bring your friends to the voting booths. Hold them accountable. And hold the Democrats accountable too post elections.

Are the Democrats perfect? No, they aren’t–and we can hold them to the fire if need be and they are far more likely to care about civil rights than the Republicans do. And we really ought to be listening to black people, especially women, on how we should be voting and handling this on the whole. The vast majority of them have voted in past elections for the Dems for excellent reasons. And 92% disapprove of Trump. Also, they don’t have literal Nazis running for office while their president refers to them as “fine people”, so there’s that.

We are watching our country collapse in real time, and those of us who already have been historically discriminated against and disenfranchised have felt the burn first. It will continue to trickle down. It will get worse. Voting blue and taking back at least one of the houses is the start, and it is the proverbial duct tape that will hold back the fire so we have a chance at getting better. It gives us a chance versus having none whatsoever. 2020 will not save us otherwise; the same people who helped Trump will still be in power.

Getting a Democratic majority in either or both houses is literally our last and only hope as a nation. If we do not succeed, we have none left.

Witches, assemble.