Actually, let's throw in one more item that's been floating around.

Question: "Is it true that you claim that Jesus and Aphrodite are married?

Answer: Good Lord, No! Even if that was true, as hardly seems likely given Jesus' relative lack of interest in the pleasures of the flesh in the Gospels, how would we know? So, how, you ask, would such a rumor get started? Let's return to our previous question.

Question: "If it is all so easy as that, then why has there been such annoyance among some Hellenic Reconstructionists over this practice, of synchretizing Christianity and Hellenic Traditionalism?

Answer: You mean, among the few that have heard of this site? Normally, I wouldn't address this question, as it seems to rest on the faulty assumption that one should be basing one's opinions on a poll of those around one. However, this one leads to a point.

After some unpleasant silliness in the community, I raised the problem of how to deal with attempted hostile takeovers of groups in a discussion on the "Hellas" list. A Wiccan priestess (on this alleged Hellenic Reconstructionist list) threw a tantrum over this. The moderator responded by shutting the discussion down, but not before tossing out a proclamation that the existence of a constitution would render his organization's chapters immune to such efforts. I questioned the reasonability of this. After some further obtuseness on the part of the moderators and regulars on the list, I felt the need to express some doubts about the reasonability of the organization's management as well, given the circumstances.

Ever since then, points that didn't seem to be an issue for the "Hellas" management before, suddenly became the stuff of trumped up complaints and criticisms. It was shortly after putting an account of the whole silly incident on our site here, that one of their friends, who was working as an editor on the Dmoz.com open directory project at the time, suddenly decided that Christo-Hellenic Syncretists didn't count as Hellenic Pagans. Yet, inexplicably, "Hellenic Wiccans" (whose only connection to the old Hellenic Paganism was the use of a few deity names) continued to be counted as such, despite their inclusion of a deity of their own who certainly wasn't part of the Classical Hellenic pantheon (namely, the Wiccan Goddess). It was really just a cheesy excuse to deny a listing to a site where her friends were being criticized, however justly.

Oh, and there is somebody we will call "Sydney", who is reportedly the author of many of the rumors which we answered here. Sydney argued in favor of a position that I agreed with - that there was no evidence for any sort of universal prehistoric goddess cult, such as the one that so many Wiccans like to pretend that they have recreated. The argument offered, though, was a weak one - many alleged goddess figurines were found in what appeared to be garbage dumps, precluding any sort of religious significance, according to Syd.

I pointed out that, while I agreed with the conclusion, I had some issue with the argument being offered in support of it. The presence of the figurine in the dump, I pointed out, would speak to the way it was viewed at the time of its deposition, not at the time of its making. How did we know that there wasn't a religious war, or other event resulting in a change of religions in the village where the figurine had been?

Syd's response was that since we had no evidence of such a war, Occam's razor would compel us to reject my theory that there had been such a war. I pointed out that I hadn't offered any such theory, that what I had offered was a possible scenario that would result in the same evidence, without validating the theory in question. In other words, the implication the argument rests on is broken. I pointed out that if one did want to use Occam's razor, a better point would be that there was no evidence in support of the proposition that these figurines were deity images. For example, to take the case of a culture we do know a bit more about, than we do those of Neolithic Europe, there is a large number of votive figurines found in the ruins of old Greek temples, none of which are deity images. Given this, the assumption that a figurine must be a deity image, seems most illogical. Clearly, the assumption has broken down in that case.

Syd's reply, was to being out the refrain of "Occam's razor" again, challenging me to offer evidence for my theory that the alleged Neolithic goddess figurines were votive images. "Sydney, I didn't offer an affirmative claim that they were" ... and so it went, with Sydney glossing over the distinction between a hypothesis, and a hypothetical situation offered by way of counterexample, throughout, and just generally lying about what I had said, resorting to the straw man technique of argument. In other words, s/he acted like the mailing list was a Usenet group.

Finally, I offered a note of protest, asking where the moderator was, while this kind of trolling was going on. This angered the moderator, who took to posting Syd's reported distortions of what we have written here, on the home page of his list. And the name of the (now non-existent) list was ... ready for this? Honest Pagans. That's something to think about, isn't it? It would almost be over the top to add that one of the "leaders" of "Hellas" was present, but she was. What a small Pagan world it is - and much more of this sort of nonsense, and it will probably get a lot smaller.

Soon, we started hearing the "argument" that since we disagreed with Syd's argument against the Universal Goddess cult origin of the Neolithic figures in question, we must "really" have been in favor of that theory (ie. we were closet Wiccans). Continuing the usual Pagan process of argument by free association, they then argued that since we were honoring one god and one goddess (Jesus and Aphrodite), and we were "really" Wiccan, these two must be our god and goddess and thus, we were claiming that they were married - even though we never wrote anything of the sort on this site, or anywhere else! One might add, even though we've already mentioned THREE divinities on this site, and have made moves toward adding a fourth to be honored (Dionysus). But, as some will point out, correcting somebody's incorrect statements as to what one has said, is a form of trolling, while putting words into somebody else's mouth, is a legitmate form of free expression! At least, according to 'Netiquette'.

Did you follow that? We surely didn't. Add this to a lengthy list of reasons why we cut the mail links, and have stopped going to general Pagan functions (*).

Need I tell you, that ever since then, Sydney et al. have been distorting everything written here, on a semi-regular basis. This is the classical "Tempest in a Teapot" scenario, in which a very small person seeks a very small point to blow out of proportion, just to make trouble. It is a beautiful example of why we have taken to rejecting the label of "Pagan" altogether. We're rejecting the subculture.

Think about what we're trying to do with this group. We're trying to set up something akin to an academic discussion group, which holds an occasional small festival, or party, or other happening. We can not do that, very effectively, if the slightest effort at a counterargument produces attempts at backstabbing or reprisals, or with people present bogging the discussion down by lying outright about what their opponent's position is, or by going into a rambling marathon of free-associating hostility. Postmodernist characteracter assassination and Rationalism just don't mix.

A major part of what is currently considered to be "Pagan" culture, lies in the embrace of Sydney's style of communication, with positions settled more by politics and haggling than by open discussion. This, and the authoritarianism it will tend to give rise to, are things that we reject and part of why we choose to reject the label of "Pagan", choosing to call ourselves "Traditionalists" instead. It is more than a choice of word. It is a choice of culture.

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(*) Food for thought, before we go off on our next Wiccan bashing - these were Historical Reconstructionists, not New Agers. The behavior looked remarkably similar, though, didn't it? This is what is wrong, with inviting those who have not been on the graduate school track, into scholarly discussions. They have never been part of the institution of Academia, with all of its history. They have not become accustomed to a sense of reverence for its traditions, that will help them find the self-control needed to know how to conduct themselves, as a matter of habit. (Call this, 'scholarly maturity').

In other words, let's not take the easy path, and just blame Wicca for this. Wicca needs work, and some sordid behavior has been seen out of its promoters, but the real problem is far broader and deeper than that. It is anti-intellectualism, Wiccan and otherwise, and the "anything goes" mentality that it paves the way for. Wherever people claim scholarly status that they haven't worked to earn, the need to stay in denial, if nothing else, will insure that a great deal of anti-intellectualism will be seen. Down deep, the 'elders' and 'clergy' will know that they are in danger of being exposed, and of having their fantasy world evaporate.

Also, the freshmen just tend to act up these days (early 21st century).

Part of the problem is the growing on-campus popularity of the insane pseudo-philosophy of Postmodernism, which holds that arguments are to be assessed in terms of their motivations and hidden agendas, not their substance (standing Basic Logic on its head). Indeed, there are such things as hidden agendas, and when one sees both persistance on an issue, and an absence of substantially valid argumentation on behalf of the speaker's position on the issue, such agendas are a legitimate issue. Otherwise, sophists may win through sheer persistence, by spinning one fallacy after another, until chancing onto one that their audience either can't refute quickly, or until their audience has been worn down to the point of not bothering to look for the flaws in the arguments advanced. A little well-justified scorn serves to bring that process to a close.

However, Postmodernists will skip that inconvenient middle step, of listening to one's opponent's argument, and assessing its validity, and go right to a discussion of their opposition's 'true motives', in lieu of actual counterargument. This is the ad hominem fallacy, formalized into a 'school of philosophy'. They need not fear any criticism of the dishonesty of their methods, on their own terms, because honesty can only be defined in terms of an objective, external reality, and they won't admit to the existence of such.

With some noteworthy exceptions, this tends to be a grad school vs. undergrad conflict. Postmodernism sells far better among the freshmen, who'd like to be able to bluster their way into an "A", than among their more objective, rationalistic teaching assistants and graders, who grow tired of those who would substitute confrontation for substance in their work, and of having to sit through shouting matches every time they flunk somebody. Postmodernism isn't a philosophy. It's an excuse for not being mature enough to develop one.