Total Pageviews

Sunday, December 26

Weekly blogs? And more ahead...

Hey all.

I know I keep saying I want all you to let me know you are out there. Well, If I expect something from you, I should expect something from myself as well. In light of this, I expect to start making a blog post every week. Expect to hear from me at least every Sunday. Feel free to go off on me if I don't make it in by midnight Sunday.

So for today's post, I want to address the issue of witch schools online. After listening to a podcast from the Dark Side of Fey, I found myself wanting to address it here. While I enjoy the podcast, the episode on witch schools raised a lot of issues for me. Fey said a lot of things about why witch schools were unethical and have no value whatsoever. While she is entitled to her own beliefs, I cannot help but address why I think she is wrong. There are a lot of witch schools out there online. While I do not have personal experience with them, I have no reason to write them off because of that lack of experience. First, I will address the issue of the subject matter in the courses. If the course covers nothing more than something that can be found in a book, not only is this failing to provide valuable information to the community, it also borders on plagiarism. The same goes with websites, if nothing of use is added to the community, then there is no motivation for its existence. If the courses teach their students to interpret information or examine it in a manner not done before, then it has a reason to exist. Next, there is the issue of money. Many say that if a course charges, it is unethical because traditional witchcraft was taught free of charge. I would like to point out that not all communities have the type of elders that is needed for decent education. Within my local community, unless you join a coven, the only classes that can be found are horribly expensive for a class that only lasts a few hours. The idea of quality classes, even online, for a reasonable price, is wonderful especially when someone is not out of the broom closet and might not be able to freely search for a teacher within the community. While traditionally, it is right to offer teaching services free of charge, we live in a world where covering personal charges for a class may cost quite a lot. A basic charge could be useful, especially in making sure that the people involved are looking for something out of their class, rather than just having information fed to them. In short, if a class is made with the best intentions and does not charge for the course in order to make a profit (costs are designed to cover charges), then there should be no problem. Online classes provide an important service for those who cannot get a quality education in their community.

As always, let me know what you think of today's topic. Any future topics you have are welcome and I will try to address as many as possible.

Blessed be!

4 comments:

  1. Excellent post! Finding a good teacher (much like finding a good book) can be a challenge, especially as it needs to be a good fit as far as personalities go too. In my opinion, whether a course is offered online or in person, a good teacher will take the time to evaluate the students’ work, and guide them so that they are able to interpret things for themselves. Not only does this method call for an intuitive teacher, but it is also very time-consuming. Sadly, in our society, few people have the luxury of donating time without charging at least a nominal fee for it. As you said, trying to make a huge profit from religion is one thing, but I agree covering one’s cost and time perfectly acceptable.

    People ought to know better than to generalize – I’m sure there ARE a lot of bad and overpriced courses out there, but when the student is ready, the right teacher will appear!

    ~S.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for your kind words. I am thinking its probably a good idea for me to check into some schools to see what is really out there. I know I have no experiance there, but I don't feel generalizing, especially when I have no experiance. If I did know at a personal level what was out there, I would be comfortable talking about what I know, but generalizations are still not acceptable when there is no way of knowing everything.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hello,
    My two cents...I think it is good that there are witch schools available, as there are many people who live out of reach of other pagans and witches, and this is a way to connect. Ethical or not ethical to charge a fee, people argue this day in and out. If you don't feel right charging or paying a fee, then don't. I don't believe that there are very many people making a fortune on something like this. And, to make the school available, you have to have a website, which has costs associated with it...etc.

    I have not gone to a witch school either, but I have seen the curriculum for some and they seemed to be helpful.

    Peace.

    BB
    Christine Amaryllis

    ReplyDelete
  4. I completely agree with you Christine. If there was a fortune to be made, we would be hearing much more about the controversy than we already do. On a Pagan path, I think the important thing is to remember that every part of our path is of our own choosing, and no one can make us do something we have no desire to do. Therefore, if we feel something is wrong, we don't have to associate with it.

    ReplyDelete

Please refrain from flaming. Constructive criticism is welcome but rudeness is not. I am getting a lot of spam, so I might have to turn off comments all together. To spammers: all comments are moderated, no one but me is even seeing what you send. Please stop it.