I was on my Facebook page for Pagans living in South Africa and one of my fellow Pagan friends posted a link to a page that is so horrific towards a lot of us.
The page promotes the burning of witches, something thought to have been over with and forgotten about, but it seems there are even people suggesting modern videos on youtube of actual witches being burned today.
It's hard to believe that there are still people out there who will keep on being so ignorant and refuse to be open minded and tolerant of others.
I was a little upset by the page but not as infuriated as all the others had posted on the page. What upset me more is that no matter how many people have said they have reported the page to Facebook, the page still remains up.
If Facebook is to act on all religous groups and not allow hate pages such as this be allowed, then why has this page been up for over a year with numerous requests to have it shut down?
There are over 200 people who clicked that they like the page, and I wish that those 200+ people who did so will soon find the education they need to be more accepting of all types of people and all types of beliefs. There is nothing more behind it that hate and ignorance.
I would love to know why Facebook will shut down a page targeting Christianity in no time, but for a page targeted at witches is still up over a year later?
I have reported this page a number of times and so many people I know have also done so, but it still remains up.

My question is, how can we be comfortable with the fact that not even those who claim to be willing to help protect all religous groups from online attacks, simply not recognise that this case is one of those situations, and simply let the witches be treated this way without the same rights as those of other religous groups? If Facebook will not do what they claim they will do when a page is in violation, is this to be taken as a sign that we as witches or wiccans or pagans are not given the same recognition as everyone else? Are we now to accept that we will just be treated as a lower class than everyone else?

I refuse to sit there and allow this hatred to continue, if I had to start a page about hatred toward Christianity it would be shut down in no time. I would not do such a thing because it is beneath me and I am not about hatred, I am about spreading the love and the light. I want to be a healer and educator. So where can one start their educating others without getting into a religous debate?

If you want to report this facebook page and get in on the action to get Facebook to take action then let me know.

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MoonShine @ MoonGrove

please post the link to such page!

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..to sleep..to die....

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Burning- ... 5656405121

I have tried to tell my friends not to click the like button so they can post comments unless they click unlike when they are done posting because such a page does not need to give facebook the impression that it is gaining true followers.

It has gone from around 180 likes this morning to over 220.

This page was started on Feb 1 2010.

And dispite all the reports against it, facebook has not yet removed it.

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MoonShine @ MoonGrove

I know how frustrating it can be, but the best and easiest solution is to just not visit the page If you don't expose yourself to it there is less chance of being offended.

I do believe in the right to free speech, but I agree that the hypocrisy of allowing one hate group and not others is annoying (which of course, you should point out to the facebook peeps!). However, go to many "pagan" groups on facebook and you will see some truly dispicable things said against Christians too, so "pagans" are not exempt from spreading hate and bias towards another faith. I used to think "pagans" would be more tolerant to those of other faiths, but alas, people's is people's no matter what their faith and we are all capable of saying hurtful things about other people.

"We" as a community are no better than anyone else. I've also seen some pretty horrible things said about Wiccans/recons/BTW's etc by "pagan" facebook pages (i.e. recons hating on Wiccans, trad Wiccans hating on eclectic Wiccans etc). You also see groups for people that say horrible things about Muslims, Immigrants, ALL Israelis, the list goes on...we are not alone in being persecuted, the best way to change society is to lead by example. Express tolerance, and you will recieve it Getting in to an argument and spurning on the haters never leads to good things.

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Listen and in thine heart engrave my words; Keep closed thine eye and ear 'gainst prejudice;
Of others the example fear; think always for thyself: Consult, deliberate, and freely choose.
Let fools act aimlessly and without cause. Thou shouldst, in the present, contemplate the future.

(The Golden Verses of Pythagoras - D'Olivet)

Yeah, that isn't a serious group...pretty sure it's a joke. At least some of the witches on there are speaking sense about not advertising the group just to be negative

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Listen and in thine heart engrave my words; Keep closed thine eye and ear 'gainst prejudice;
Of others the example fear; think always for thyself: Consult, deliberate, and freely choose.
Let fools act aimlessly and without cause. Thou shouldst, in the present, contemplate the future.

(The Golden Verses of Pythagoras - D'Olivet)

Thanks for the comments, I agree that Pagans are not exempt.

I also agree with you that there are many people out there of all other religious groups and different belief systems that have said many things in hatred to one another.

I did not waste my time posting comments on the page as I didn't want to give it any more energy than that of making a report against it.

My whole gripe with the situation is not that the page itself was created, these types of pages are made daily and towards many different groups, religious, sexual orientation, race, you name it they all get made.

What I don't like is that out of all the pages that are made which are clearly in violation - this one seems to be one of the few that Facebook is not doing anything about.

I also agree that it must have been started as a joke, but jokes can even lead to a pretty unpleasant situation. There is a very large group of people who are taking this very seriously. I am only serious about getting this sort of thing to end before it gets really ugly. Name calling has already started in a not so nice way on that page, and I have to say I'm not impressed by what some of the witches out there had to say in their deffense. I'm not one to judge, but negativity breeds negativity.

It's not enough for me to simply ignore it, and it's not something I can ask everyone else out there to do. Even if it started out as a simple joke.

The page may not seem as terrible to many, but for those who are looking at the page for what it has done and not just what it was for and what was said in the beginning, but the reaction it has gotten from the witch community. It has certainly been able to press enough buttons of enough people out there, some who are my friends, and has made them spread the negativity.

I do not want this negativity to spread, it has already gotten a little out of control by the looks of the comments so far, and it gets worse. Fair enough we cannot control what others do. But what we can do is speak together and get social networking sites like Facebook to uphold their word for all groups and not favor one over the other. If they can shut down other hate pages in a short period of time, why can they not do the same for this one?

My whole point is that as witches, pagans, celts, wiccans etc... you name it, we are still not seen as groups with the same right and importance as others. How can we get together to make sure that our old and new religions or religous views and choices are respected in the same way as all the others?

This little page is but one example of us as a community not standing together to get the right action taken right away.

I agree we are no better than anyone else, but we are not less than they are either. Equality is something we have been fighting for, for such a long time. Recognition of being an actual religous group, the right to believe in what we want to believe in, the right to practice our rituals without being persecuted. What makes this any different? The right to be seen as important as any other religous group out there by official organisations, why is achieving this simple thing such a huge task?

Forgive me if I repeat myself from time to time, it's the curse of someone who writes and thinks a lot at the same time.

I am the kind of person who is not likely to sit back in the shadows when I see inequality towards our kind being the norm. There is a lot of deep issues here, a lot has been said to me by fellow friends who had loads to say about this page and many other pages like it all over the web. And this seems to be something that we are just letting happen. We wont be taken seriously if we never take serious action, perhaps we should do as other groups have done before us and get loud about it. No doubt that could cause a lot more upset, but I was raised to know that you need to take the bitter with the sweet. And then again at the same time I was also raised to speak my mind and stand up for what I believe in. I just cannot seem to stand up for it all alone, 1 person can do a lot, but a lot is only so much, many people can do so much more.

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MoonShine @ MoonGrove

I cancelled my Facebook page. I have also cast a spell to turn all the people who "liked it", into frogs. Soon I will send all the frogs to the closest French resturant. Let the chips fall where they may.

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Love and laughter,
Ouroboros

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~ PM ME ANYTIME ALWAYS GLAD TO HELP ~



~ It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live ~

It seems that after so many comments from so many people upset about the page, the admin of the page has suddenly changed the info on the page to make it out to be a Monty Python joke, this was however not mentioned until a few days ago.

Now there are still alot of comments about wiccans and pagans being stupid due to how they reacted, but we can simply ignore those comments as only a stupid person would say such things about another religious group.

I am not pleased that the name of the page has not been changed yet though, or that is has not been shut down to begin with, seems FB still counldn't give a hoot. But at least the Page admin has come out of hiding and tried to ave face a little. Even though he won't admit his faults honestly, he has tried to explain himself.

So that one seems to be over for now. I still have many friends monitoring the page and will update me in the future of it's content to make sure it does not break rules again.

Thanks to all who sent a request to FB to report the page and request it be shut down, even though it has not happened, your effort is still appreciated.

Bright blessings to all.

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MoonShine @ MoonGrove

It WAS a Monty Python joke, so it hasn't changed...it's just people have realised it now! I think it is pretty funny how a lot of pagans/witches jumped all over it without understanding the context. It is quite silly and hasn't done pagans/witches any favours from what's been posted there. We need to still have a sense of humour!

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Listen and in thine heart engrave my words; Keep closed thine eye and ear 'gainst prejudice;
Of others the example fear; think always for thyself: Consult, deliberate, and freely choose.
Let fools act aimlessly and without cause. Thou shouldst, in the present, contemplate the future.

(The Golden Verses of Pythagoras - D'Olivet)

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I have a facebook page too but I always check Magicka before going on facebook and sometimes I don't check it at all. But pages like that I just ignore. I don't let stupid hate pages on facebook keep me away from the site. I'm sure there are a dozen independent hate pages on the internet against witches and it doesn't keep me off the internet so why should I stop using facebook over that page. In one ear and out the other, that's what I think.

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*Giggles* I concur! I may get flack for this one but I think that a lot of the pagan community are so quick to play the victim and poor me game that they don't care whats going on they just are waiting for something to be said so they can start a riot and scream YOU HATE ME because I'm Different! Because I'm not Christian! Blah blah blah get over it. Yeah your different I guess.. Just shut up about it already LOL. Seriously. People need to cool down. And the best thing to do in such situations is to just let these people be, move on with your life and don't allow their energy to effect you because it shouldn't. Whats the point.

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It's not a very intelligent joke, I agree, but it is still a joke. Not many people even like it! Most of us have more friends on facebook than that!

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Monty Python is awesome I guess the humour is not for everyone though lol

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Listen and in thine heart engrave my words; Keep closed thine eye and ear 'gainst prejudice;
Of others the example fear; think always for thyself: Consult, deliberate, and freely choose.
Let fools act aimlessly and without cause. Thou shouldst, in the present, contemplate the future.

(The Golden Verses of Pythagoras - D'Olivet)