Edain McCoy

[TheDisreputableDog]

I wish people would stop setting up President Obama as a Messiah-figure (as cool as it is to say "President Obama"). The man hasn't delivered us from racism or absolved the United States of its slave-owning past and the systemic and systematic oppressions of its present. I hope he's going to be an awesome president. But electing and swearing him in as President doesn't make it all better.

And this author is doing it not in well-meant ignorance but with malicious and self-aggrandizing intent.  

[Deoridhe]

mute_coyote

I literally flinched when she asserted that part of our religious eclecticism came from "our frontier churches which sprang up in the 19th century." A lot of those churches were involved in the forced conversion of the Native American peoples. Not exactly something you want to cite when talking about religious freedom in the U.S.

Also consider the forced conversion of African slaves and the marginalization and rudeness toward the synthetic religions which followed (notably Voudoun and Santeria) even within pagan movements, since most white pagans decry animal sacrifice.

Gods, I wish I had the time or presence of mind to help with the research.

The reason I think this line of research would be highly useful is it shows a pattern of ignorance and cultural appropriation and destruction which she is simply another piece of, including a highly Christian pattern - but it's deeper than that. I suspect some of her defensiveness about Christianity is an attempt to project her own appropriation and rigidity onto it so she doesn't have to own it.  

[Ainwyn]

*shudders* When I read "Edain McCoy" in the heading, I had a slight involuntary spasm, and I think I made some sort of pained noise because my roommate asked me if I was ok... That woman is evil and I wish I could get the money I spent on her books during my uninformed youth back. No one should be allowed to make money off lies, even if it's only 35 cents a book.

I loved the fact that she thought that since the book was out of print, it didn't matter. No hun, it doesn't work that way. It made me sick that she brought Obama's childhood into this. If his mother knew that the way she raised her son was being used to defend cultural rape, she probably wouldn't be very pleased, as anthropologists are generally against that sort of thing.  

[TeaDidikai]

Is the site up yet?

I wonder if some folks form the United Nations would be willing to write her a nice little letter and point out that her book is in violation of some core doctuments on the rights of independent ethnicities.  

[CuAnnan]

I need to get my hands on an OED before I put it up. I need definitions for "liar" "bigot" and "racist" so that, form a legal point of view, I have an airtight argument.

Llewellyn will have no reservations in suing me to bankruptcy, however they have to do it here where, if I have proven the definitions apply, I am in the clear.  

[CuAnnan]

There is a holding page up.
It contains my email to her and her response and a comment from Ronald Hutton  

[niamhybeag]

I'll get those definitions for you later on, OK Wing?  

[CuAnnan]

Spread the word Edain McCoy is a liar, bigot and racist. And we have proof.  

[TeaDidikai]

I was looking over her page-
It seems that she considers some of the most unsavory characters in the pagan publishing scene to be friends or close acquaintances.

Frosts amongst them. gonk

Hey Hun? Where's the commentary from Hutton?  

[CuAnnan]

TeaDidikai

I was looking over her page-
It seems that she considers some of the most unsavory characters in the pagan publishing scene to be friends or close acquaintances.

Frosts amongst them. gonk

Hey Hun? Where's the commentary from Hutton?

I'm gonna wait until I have other comments from scholars. Having one on it's own it would be lonely.  

[TeaDidikai]

CuAnnan

I'm gonna wait until I have other comments from scholars. Having one on it's own it would be lonely.

But I'm curious! gonk

Post it here?  

[CuAnnan]

TeaDidikai

CuAnnan

I'm gonna wait until I have other comments from scholars. Having one on it's own it would be lonely.

But I'm curious! gonk

Post it here?

Ronald Hutton

Thank you for your question. I fear that I cannot really help you, because I am an expert in British paganism, old and new, and Witta, whatever it is, seems to be entirely an American phenomenon.

 

[TeaDidikai]

CuAnnan

TeaDidikai

CuAnnan

I'm gonna wait until I have other comments from scholars. Having one on it's own it would be lonely.

But I'm curious! gonk

Post it here?

Ronald Hutton

Thank you for your question. I fear that I cannot really help you, because I am an expert in British paganism, old and new, and Witta, whatever it is, seems to be entirely an American phenomenon.

Nice.  

[Molly Mollusca]

Just a thought... It might make the reading better if you draw a line between her mail and your response. It reads like she made the whole page.

Other then that, looks great and I wonder what her response will be when she finds out. xd

Edit: I've been looking at her site too. xd

Edain site

How does Edain react to negative book reviews? "Books are subjective and cannot please everyone. I try to take negative book reviews and examine them from all points I feel are valid criticisms, then I try to find better information, a better way of phrasing, or confirmation from another source before repeating the same mistake. Sometimes when I'm reading a reviewer I cringe from fear that I actually wrote a sentence that stupid. Then I pray, 'Dear, Goddess, please tell me I didn't really write that?' Sometimes the error is in interpretation. I could have made my statement with more clarity. Other times I just bash my head with the book a few times--a sort of scourging ritual for authors who did not triple check sources. In those cases I'm quite grateful to have the mistake pointed out, hopefully in time to correct it before a second printing."

Grateful? eek

Edit two: This just keeps getting better.

Quote:

Has she ever refused to answer an e-mail or letter? "I've never 'refused.' When I can't answer someone it's an issue of time. My inbox can receive 300 or more e-mails a day. Answering each one would be a full time job. I do read all incoming e-mail. I've also been lucky that even the readers who have negatives to point out are mature enough to do so in the spirit of mutual learning, and they approach their letter with polite but firm directness and a harm none attitude. Those I usually answer and, in most cases, I find the person on the other end to be a deep thinker and we get a really profound e-mailing of ideas going for a while. Even if we don't change one another's minds, we've learned to think about an issue in a new light and I just love that.

You must be one of the deep thinkers? And she did refuse further E-mails from you right?

Edains site

"Have no fear of speaking up if you don't agree with something I write or think, or if you know of a source that contradicts ones I used. I want to continue to learn too."

xd Really? So when someone who did his homework and actually used real sources points out that Edain is wrong, Edain will happily want to learn from that? That would be great, right? biggrin  

[RubyLight]

I checked out your site. Nice. 3nodding
I hope you will include a section where Americans who are insulted can state their case as well?