National Witch Trials Rembrance Day

Three hundred and twenty-four years ago, on March 1st, the Salem Witch Trials began....

....and today, someone thinks that we need a national holiday to remember this (and to teach people the truth about witches).

Seriously, someone has started a White House Petition petitioning Obama to create such a holiday.

And there is such a raging response to this petition.

Unfortunately, it is marred by bad spelling and grammar.

And Cthulhu hates bad spelling and grammar. 

And it overlooks the little fact that we already have a national holiday celebrating witches...

Full sized Baby Ruth and Butterfinger candy bars---you are awesome Mrs. Cleaver.

...and it is called bloody Halloween!

But anyways, I suppose that we should stop and give this petition some consideration.

B. W. of Litchfield, ME says that we can't express our religion without the influence of Hollywood's incorrect interpretation. Ok, fair enough. But does Hollywood show any religion, or any society, or culture correctly? And if so, maybe you want the White House to outlaw Hollywood instead.

They go on to add that our holy days can't be found on any calendar. Huh? Does this person not know of that remarkable book publisher called Llewellyn? I am quite sure that there are several calendars that not only list the Sabbats, but every moon phase.

B. W. whines that we have no national monuments paying respect to those who lost their lives in the name of religious persecution and bigotry (outside of the tourist attractions in Salem, Massachusetts). Uhhh....you do know that most of the witch trials was actually Christians claiming that other Christians were heretics and/or powerless people with land that some accuser wanted, right? And that most of these deaths happened in Europe? And that the numbers are sorely overstated by those who scream, "No more burning times!"? And that burning witches was not the normal punishment?

In fact, the Salem Witch Trials is more of a footnote than anything remarkable when compared to the European trials. Before the Salem Witch Trials, only a dozen witches were convicted and killed in North America. And only twenty-four executions occur at Salem. That is whooping thirty-six witches....and they were Christians and/or had beliefs that would not be classified as witchcraft by the modern witchcraft movement. Just because the term "witch" was used, it does not mean that they were members of our religion (in fact, modern witchcraft, more or less, starts in 1951---in England!).

And where other than Salem would you put a monument? Denver? Ohama? Seattle? Last time I checked, the only logical place for such a monument was....drumroll please...Salem!

So what is really going on here? What does B. W. really want? Well, I think that the most important sentence in the petition is "Our children do not learn about our history in school." So you want kids to be taught about witchcraft in schools, and that Christians are evil (I presume); but seriously, if schools did teach this part of history, they would be told that the Witch Trials actually have nothing to do with the modern witchcraft movement. Opps.

And the Boom Boom award goes to B. W. 

Yes, we are a "real people with rights!" And we have the right to harass the government for stupid things, including the right to insist that people believe our made-up history justifying the fact that we are a real threat to Christiantity, predating it and having been prosecuted for our beliefs, forcing the government to give us monuments and outlawing Hollywood portrayal of us.

And the government has the right, if it chooses to notice all our screaming, to tell teachers to teach our real history. Hmmm, maybe we don't actually want that.

Then again, what do I know---I am merely someone's mad uncle.