How Postwar Germany’s Witchcraft Trials Can Help Us Understand QAnon And Other Conspiracy Theories
Doing research in a branch of the state library in Berlin a few years ago,…
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Satanic Temple Protests Pseudoscientific Therapies for Satanic Abuse and Witchcraft
If you happened to walk past San Francisco’s Parc 55 hotel this past weekend, you…
Read MorePagan Outrage Machine Fires Up in Response to Time Halloween Article
Pagans have demanded an apology for a Time magazine article that, according to a petition, compared witches to terrorists. The…
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Romania’s “Witch Tax”: Magic Meets Bureaucracy
On January 1, Romania implemented new tax codes that, among other changes, added the occupation of “witch” to the nation’s labor codes. Those charging clients for tarot readings, curses, and blessings must now pay a 16 percent income tax and make contributions to health and pension programs. The ire of the witches, some of whom responded by performing rituals to hex the government, has become fodder for scores of offbeat news stories throughout the West. But there is a deeper story to the witches of Romania.
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Halloween, Evangelicals, and the Macabre
While many evangelicals continue to treat Halloween as evil the holiday actually includes significant Christian contributions.
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Crying Witch: Learning From the O’Donnell “Dabbling” Debacle
While Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell didn’t say anything about Wicca, per se, when she talked about “dabbling into witchcraft,” her more recent “kill the witch” comments will surely distance her further from pagan communities used to dealing (especially around Halloween) with this confusion between the swirling cultural tropes of “the witch” and those who embrace “witch” as a religious self-description.
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Skepticism Over O’Donnell’s Dabbling in Witchcraft
Which witch is which?
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