(*) If you were wondering where this name came from, it is explained in this post from the predecessor to The Chicago Demipagan Exchange, from the point of view of the Shrine.
This explanation is well on its way to becoming outdated. It is a relic of an era when the Shrine welcomed Wiccans as guests, and even as members. In those days, it was only natural to make an effort to accomodate their schedules (which required their presence elsewhere on the full and new moons), and to make an occasional allusion to their writings and customs.
Times have changed, and so have they, at least locally, and certainly online. Wiccans and their influences are in the process of being expunged from this site, and this group, given what it is that we have witnessed from their local community.
Let's move on, now.
(1) North Africa, here, is defined, in the customary fashion, as lying north of the Sahara : ie. Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Libya and Egypt.
(2) Please not that as explained in the introduction, the use of the label "Pagan" has been reconsidered, and rejected as an option here, for a variety of reasons.
(3) The Agora was a Pagan group listing site which we no longer maintain, now.
(4) A great example of just how silly things have gotten in the world of political correctness can be found in the case of one debate, that I came across on a webboard, elsewhere. If you can believe it, somebody went onto the home board of an Egyptian Traditionalist group (not to be mistaken for a Pagan group) to badger them about his belief that Cleopatra was black, and otherwise rewrite history.
This, however, paled by comparison to another person who wrote in to the same site, and in a list of the accomplishments of the ancient Egyptians, included the "possibility" that they had harnessed electricity! When I went into some small amount of detail over why it was, that this was wildly implausible, the author seriously argued that a critique of his claim was inappropriate, because he merely said it was a "possibility".
Some people have way too much time on their hands. Unfortunately, they have a way of sucking the rest of us in, and wasting our time as well.
(5) A very old argument: to create a set of rules, that would rightly govern all decisions, one would have to have a perfect understanding of the human psyche, the nature of which determines that which is desirable for those who would live under that code, and that which is not. But one can not even perfectly know oneself, so how is this understanding to be achieved?
The very act of getting to know oneself better, is an experience, that will arouse thoughts and feelings that one can not help but react to, thus changing the very thing that one seeks to study - one's own character.
End result - perfect self-knowledge is a mirage that forever recedes from those who would seek to pursue it. Any formulation of Philosophy that claims finality, has little to offer, but a false sense of confidence.
(6) Given more information, we might not have been as surprised. It has been alleged, with some support from those who claim to be witnesses, that the man most actively pushing this point of view ("Frank" from the "Prima Nocturne Incident") was actively embezzling charitable contributions. A number of his friends, upon examination, were up to things just as sordid.
The Reader Circuit is not unusual, in that the crooks in its midst would seek to shut down an effort to get a free and independent press going. The one thing a crook fears more than anything else is the threat of exposure. What is unusual about the Reader circuit, is that such an effort is viewed with respect, while the effort to get the truth out is viewed with scorn.
This is why all relations were broken off with that community. When corrupt behavior becomes normative, there no longer is anything to discuss with those embracing the local norms. It is time for that subculture to fade away.
(7) "Pagan", in the Classical sense, that is. Certainly not in the Neo-Pagan sense.
These notes are part of the the old newsletter page in the Curmudgeon's Corner section of The Almond Jar.