Comments on: Pagans in the media!

By: Lorraine

Lorraine — Thu, 23 Jun 2005 16:21:43 +0000

I was reminded of this topic by the Solstice coverage on Tuesday. Did anyone else see the BBC news at 10 coverage featuring the OBOD gathering the week before? I thought that was quite positive. I was waiting for the dire warnings when they cut to a bishop, but he was quite upbeat – clearly someone for whom interfaith work is not entirely meaningless. I also enjoyed the C5 programme on Stonehenge the same evening, though I managed to head out to the park in between to see the Solstice sun seting and the huge pink-tinged moon rising, so I didn’t spend the entire time glued to the box!

By: Daniel

Daniel — Wed, 25 May 2005 20:22:26 +0000

Anna, that idea of ‘recomplicating’ things really rings true for me. It is so much what we need to do.

By: anna

anna — Wed, 25 May 2005 08:44:52 +0000

Really!! I can’t say I’m that surprised. Did you ever see the hilarious film where the US soldiers try to take off a bike lock the Greenham women had put on the main gate. They come back with bigger and bigger metal cutters and it still can’t be done. A good metaphor for US military power I think. I do understand your point – I think people would also have been surprised at the fact that an NUM banner and full miner’s band led the gay pride march the year of the miner’s strike – they (like many working class men) were always shown as unremittingly macho. The thing is that the media do this to so many different groups of people that more and more of us can see through it (or ought to be able to – sometimes with a little reminder). Those programmes may make good reminders to us to question everything that typecasts any group of people – whether that is Muslims, pregnant teenagers, young black men with hoodies on, or even binge drinkers in small towns. The truth is always more complex. An American poet called Jorie Graham has said that the role of the artist these days is to ‘recomplicate things’ to counter that reductionism and that is my poetic mission as well and as a result, for me, part of the purpose of Druidry.
Nice to finally meet you at Beltainne.
Anna

By: francesca

francesca — Tue, 24 May 2005 21:34:52 +0000

Hi Anna – it’s not that I think what other people think does matter really, and I wasn’t denigrating dreadlocks and beards, not at all, it’s just that the way so many programmes are slanted it does seem that they are trying to project the feeling that Pagans Are Peculiar, in a way they wouldn’t quite dare so blatantly with any other religion these days. There are some pagans who you would never identify through the way they look in a million years, and I suppose it irritates me that our diversity is so under- emphasised, when one of the joys and glories of our path is its diversity and its welcome to all kinds of people. Mind you I do know also what Hilde means about the reductionism of the media – they do just seem to want to appeal to peoples’ prejudices to make ‘good’ television! A good slightly older friend of mine lived at Greenham for several years, and she tells me the media routinely would shoot the women through a camera with a fish-eye lens to make them as ugly as possible.

By: anna

anna — Mon, 23 May 2005 18:44:21 +0000

But Hilde – that means you are missing Dr Who. There have been more imaginative programmes made in the past and several of our druids are media people. Personally, however, I always opt not to be filmed when filming takes place at bigger rituals. My pathway is a private matter that I share with a few trusted likeminded souls (that’s you lot) also, as we are not evangelical it doesn’t matter that much what people think of us (as long as they don’t set fire to us). As for the long haired ones – they often have a great and brave energy which I admire tremendously and I think pink is the best colour for dreadlocks.
Love
Anna

By: hilde

hilde — Sun, 15 May 2005 00:05:27 +0000

You know, it happens to everyone. The media use a shorthand that is convenient to them. Pagan might equal weirdo with dreadlocks. Catholic invariably equals conservative pro-lifer. That still irritates me, even though I no longer identify myself as a Catholic. They just pick the people who are going to make ‘good television’ or are going to express extreme views in a debate. It’s just more entertaining. And television is an entertainment medium, even when it pretends to be something else. I still don’t regret we decided to do without it a couple of years ago.