The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum

So your solution to a bad political system is to try and force another sentient being -- a human of a different element -- to come at your beck and call and do your bidding?  If you actually care about injustice, you might want to reconsider the entire ethics of "summoning."  The belief that entire groups of beings exist for your benefit, and you're entitled to order them around, is exactly the kind of thinking that creates the political systems you're so upset about.

Now I am imagining a sort of Jinn Suffrage Movement.  I mean, invocation is always sticky business for safety reasons and ethical reasons, and there are ways to do it non-coercively (by extending an invitation, say, with protections for you but not bindings on them), but yeah, from a social-justice perspective, there's a potential debate to be had.  It's one thing to use invocation like a long-distance phone call or a court summons, and another to use it like a lasso and holding cell and shock collar.  (That and people always seem to want to haul dangerous things into their homes and poke at them.  And sure, if your only goal is power, I can see why you'd go for that, but honestly, death wish much?)  (I know I'm overfond of parentheticals, but I did a consultation once on a particularly nasty case of a woman who had a ghulah sicced on her.  That sort of thing never ends well for anyone.)

Now I am imagining a sort of Jinn Suffrage Movement.  I mean, invocation is always sticky business for safety reasons and ethical reasons, and there are ways to do it non-coercively (by extending an invitation, say, with protections for you but not bindings on them), but yeah, from a social-justice perspective, there's a potential debate to be had.  It's one thing to use invocation like a long-distance phone call or a court summons, and another to use it like a lasso and holding cell and shock collar.  (That and people always seem to want to haul dangerous things into their homes and poke at them.  And sure, if your only goal is power, I can see why you'd go for that, but honestly, death wish much?)  (I know I'm overfond of parentheticals, but I did a consultation once on a particularly nasty case of a woman who had a ghulah sicced on her.  That sort of thing never ends well for anyone.)

Well could you or at least other members do magic, it doesn't have to be black, but magic that would atleast prevent the signing of the internet censorship bill into law and that will help the country. I am deathly afraid if they are not stopped they will imprison most of the US, or worse kill them. Why do you think I'm willing to summon a Djinn, I can't physically fight the government, so what else is there for me to do. As the law is now if I protest, I could be arrested as a terrorist and people go about their daily lives ignorant to the fact that they are slaves to an unjust system. I need help, all the US needs help right now and "thinking about things from another point of view" won't help. Do you think sympathizing with Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin would have helped anyone that was killed during their reigns? NO, it would not. THese men are tyrants that run the world and they should be seen as such.

Why do you think I'm willing to summon a Djinn, I can't physically fight the government, so what else is there for me to do.

 So you call a Djinn, then someone else calls a Djinn to counter the efforts of the one you called.  How many will it take?

Educating, and getting people involved in what is supposed to be a government of the people is one solution.

Well could you or at least other members do magic, it doesn't have to be black, but magic that would atleast prevent the signing of the internet censorship bill into law and that will help the country. I am deathly afraid if they are not stopped they will imprison most of the US, or worse kill them. Why do you think I'm willing to summon a Djinn, I can't physically fight the government, so what else is there for me to do. As the law is now if I protest, I could be arrested as a terrorist and people go about their daily lives ignorant to the fact that they are slaves to an unjust system. I need help, all the US needs help right now and "thinking about things from another point of view" won't help. Do you think sympathizing with Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin would have helped anyone that was killed during their reigns? NO, it would not. THese men are tyrants that run the world and they should be seen as such.

 
I have never had rights, human child, and I have already been to jail and back as an activist.  Where were you then, in an unjust system?  Where were you panicking when it was just Arabs and Muslims getting locked up without recourse?  When it was just Mexicans getting shot at by drone aircraft, or having their families torn apart by fiat and their children taken away?  When it was just queers getting arrested and assaulted by police for no good reason?  When it was just Black people having their votes thrown out or beaten out of them?  When it was the rest of us being surveilled and spied on as terrorists?  When it was just Africa, or India, or Iowa, or Cincinnati, or Detroit, being starved out by corporate lobbies?  When it was New Orleans being handed over to martial law?  

What do you think magic is?  What do you think it's for?  Do you think it's any safer or easier than doing work in the world, the hard slow way, that it's anything the rest of us haven't already tried?  These are complex grown-up problems and they require complex grown-up solutions, and that means far older magic.  It means the magic of getting off your ass and getting your hands dirty and actually doing the work.  It means the magic you can't do by yourself but only by connecting with other people.  So you've noticed that the world is frightening and unfair and you feel alone in it.  I get that.  Instead of insisting that everyone reinvent the wheel and start where you are, consider joining the people who have been fighting this fight for the entirety of memory.  Magic is not a shortcut and it is not a panacea.  It's us and how we move in the world, and grown-up witches don't expect the planet to shift on its axis with the wave of a wand.  They get elbow-deep in the reality of things and sweat a little.  

If you're too scared to be an activist, you're not going to get any better results with any sorcery you can find--because magic requires courage and will and sacrifice and compassion and common sense, it bears risks and costs, and it requires a willingness to exist in the world and communicate and see how things fit together.  Magic is like any action.  It has consequences.  Caring has consequences.  Justice has consequences.  If you're trying magic to avoid risk and hard work, you're never going to get anywhere.  And if you think there's a real difference between doing magic and helping your neighbor, you have a lot of homework to do.  

That's what people are telling you.  Magic is not a cheat code to the universe.  You want to wave your hands and light a candle and make everything better in a twinkling, read a fantasy novel.  You want results, do the much more effective magic of getting involved in your community.  "What else is there for you to do"?  You've been given suggestions.  Suggestions that work.  If you don't want to hear those answers, that's on you.

Now I am imagining a sort of Jinn Suffrage Movement.  I mean, invocation is always sticky business for safety reasons and ethical reasons, and there are ways to do it non-coercively (by extending an invitation, say, with protections for you but not bindings on them), but yeah, from a social-justice perspective, there's a potential debate to be had.  It's one thing to use invocation like a long-distance phone call or a court summons, and another to use it like a lasso and holding cell and shock collar.  (That and people always seem to want to haul dangerous things into their homes and poke at them.  And sure, if your only goal is power, I can see why you'd go for that, but honestly, death wish much?)  (I know I'm overfond of parentheticals, but I did a consultation once on a particularly nasty case of a woman who had a ghulah sicced on her.  That sort of thing never ends well for anyone.)

One of the things that's always fascinated me about various magical systems is how profoundly embedded within existing cultural attitudes and contexts they are.  The Western ceremonial grimoire-based traditions are so, so much the products of the privileged classes -- middle/upper-class men with the funds, education, and leisure time necessary to even access the materials in the first place.  It's completely unsurprising that these magical systems are predicated on the idea that it's okay to summon and bind sentient beings -- when you've been raised to believe that you are intrinsically entitled to order around to the vast majority of the human race, pushing spirits/djinns/demons around is no big conceptual leap.  (There is some comfort in the fact that, as you said, a lot of these beings are more than capable of delivering some instant karma.)

You are seriously fucking awesome.

Seconded. :lub:

You are seriously fucking awesome.

 
Indeed! Well written Valentine, and good food for thought for everyone.

Thank you!