I dont want to make the thread into a wicca bashing one but wicca really is immature (it is less than a century old and yet proclaims to teach people "the old ways")
And it is weak, many of its members have no idea what witchcraft, paganism or even wicca are. They know nothing of the religion itself and are usually misguided individuals who seek a group in which they feel they fit.
Not all wiccans are that way of course, there are many who are intelligent, strong willed and wise but as a religion wicca lets itself down because of it's members.
I've read this thread, Shadowx, and have to say I agree with what you've had to say. I don't "hate" Wiccans, they more exasperate me than anything else. I began my path as a Wiccan, but it only took me about a month to realize that I was NOT going to be bound by any rede or threefold law. The reason I was drawn to paganism was its individuality and the responsibility of the individual to formulate his/her code of ethics. I find "rules" like the rede to be very limiting. In effect, it closes off entire avenues of thought and learning and growing. What I am mainly referring to is the darker side of paganism. When you focus only on "light," "goodness," bunny rabbits, sunflowers, and unicorns, you are severely unbalanced - in every way. You don't have to be evil or consort with demons to acknowledge the darkness. It's about examining yourself and your darker motivations and actions, and determining what you're going to do about it. Pretending that the world is all peaches and kittens is a delusion. I am talking about serious self-examination to ferret out the ugliness within. We all have it. The only way to be balanced emotionally, mentally, and spiritually is to bring those things out, ask yourself why you do them, if you are willing to try to change, or if you actually enjoy doing them, and find out why. Wicca denies this for the most part, basically telling you that you just have to be positive all the time, look for beauty, blah blah. Sure, you can be positive and look for beauty, but when you've got unresolved issues all the feigned happiness isn't going to last long. And it's not a one-time okay-I've-found-my-inner-darkness-now-I'm-done kind of thing. It's a lifetime thing. We have to examine ourselves
all the time to become what we want to be and to be able to look ourselves in the mirror. This means we should have a regular trip into our own personal dark side. Maybe there are things in there we can live with, or even embrace. Other things we want to get rid of. This is about each of us as individuals and has nothing to do with projecting energy of any sort onto anyone else. However, unless we acknowledge all aspects of ourselves, our interactions with other people will suffer. Lying to ourselves only results in bad relationships in so many ways. If you can lie to yourself, it's easy to lie to others, or not to be who you really are. Many people go through life this way, being miserable, pretending to be all perky and at peace, leaving a trail of broken friendships, resentments, and worse behind them, and never understanding why, because they think they are "walking in the light."
