Since starting Shit My Soul Says, I’ve gotten a lot of questions about what the fuck I mean when I say I’m a practicing witch. Which is totally understandable - after all, there isn’t a single image that comes to everyone’s mind when they hear the word. Here are just a few of the stereotypes that tend to pop into peoples’ heads.
An old hag with warts on her nose who stirs cauldrons and has a pointy hat. Her skin may or may not be green. She may or may not eat children. She definitely has supernatural powers and uses them for her own evil purposes.
A woman in the middle ages who was accused of worshipping and/or fucking satan and got tortured and killed for it. But odds are she was just someone who pissed men off by existing with a vagina.
A goth girl with black hair, many piercings, chipped nail polish, and questionable taste in both music and sexual partners.
A charming 50s housewife who wiggles her nose to make the world conform to her will.
Maybe I included your idea of a witch. But if I didn’t… well, that just proves my point.
Unfortunately, the reality isn’t much clearer. People who identify as witches often have deeply personal associations with the word. The one thing that most can agree on is that we are reclaiming a word that was historically used as a weapon against women and other “undesirables.”
For me, it’s a big fuck you to the patriarchy. But it also means that I practice magic (If you aren’t sure what I mean by magic, check out our episode, Magic Shit: Abracadabra-Dildo!). It’s a lifestyle that means that my guiding principles are based on the natural world, old gods, and modern paganism.
When someone else tells me that they’re a witch, all I assume about them is that they’re into woo shit and are at least a little bit anti-establishment. Long story short - if someone tells you they’re a witch, ask what it means to them. Because, as a recent internet debate taught me, there are almost as many meanings of the word as there are people claiming it.
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