Hipster Paganism

I’m working hard to make Hipster Paganism a thing. Now that Pagan means Wiccan, and polytheist means Pagan, it’s only a matter of time before the People We’re Embarrassed By start calling themselves polytheists and recons. (It’s already starting.) I for one am embracing this endless cycle by bringing “Pagan” back… but in, like, an ironic way.

Since I owe my editors over at Aontacht Magazine my next Wild Earth feature column by the end of this week, naturally I’ve been procrastinating a lot today by hanging out on Google+ instead of writing. The above quote came about during a complain-a-thread (I just made that term up) complaining about Pagans complaining about Christians (and Pagans) complaining about Christmas being pagan and/or secular and/or consumerist. Because when I procrastinate, I like to go meta.

For your reading pleasure, I have devised a list to help you determine whether or not you are a Hipster Pagan.

Things Hipster Pagans Say

• “I celebrate an obscure harvest festival. You’ve probably never heard of it.”
• “I worshipped Jormungandr before it was cool.”
• “All of my ritual offerings are organic.”
• “I’m wearing this huge shiney pentacle ironically.”
• “I post all my instagram altar pics on Tumblr.”
• “I used to like Damh the Bard’s early stuff, before he sold out.”
• “I got this hooded robe at Goodwill for only $5.”
• “Have you read Anaxagoras?”
• “I love the bodhrán. We should start a drum circle.”
• “Do these jeans make me look Christian?”
• “Starhawk is just too mainstream.”
• “I always bike to rituals on my fixie.”
• “Isn’t Chaucer’s Mead the best?”
• “I made my wolf-fur headdress from refurbished vintage coats.”
• “I don’t go to Pantheacon anymore, it’s just gotten too big.”
• “Let’s have a ‘Halloween’ Party for Samhain this year and watch ‘The Craft’ — that’d be so retro!”
• “All of my candles are rechargeable LEDs; incense is so bad for the environment and beeswax is basically like animal cruelty.”
• “My black Pagan friend told me it’s pronounced ‘Vodoun’.”
• “I don’t like labeling people.”
• “I’m not a Hipster Pagan.”