...Where, however, is the line between respectful cultural borrowing and disrespectful cultural appropriation? Pagans fall on both sides of this equation as borrowers and the borrowed-from. In particular, British Traditional Wiccans have frequently expressed anger at the appropriation and commodification of “Wicca.” The word “Wicca” is now frequently used interchangeably with “eclectic contemporary Paganism” and has been applied in popular Pagan books to practices that bear little or no resemblance to the duotheistic, highly liturgical, lineaged mystery religion that Gerald Gardner’s coven practiced. Dismayed and bitter at the association of their sacred traditions with faddish Teen Witch spell books, most of which lack any clear theology or mention of central rituals such as the Great Rite, some British Traditional covens have become doubly secretive, irritated by seekers whose interest springs not from an authentic spiritual calling, but from an adolescent rebellion against their parents’ Christianity.

I first encountered the term “Neo-Wicca” (used to describe any Wiccan-derived tradition that deviates heavily from the work of Gerald Gardner and lacks initiatory lineage) on British Traditional Wiccan listservs in the early 2000s, along with the far more derogatory term “McWicca.” Detractors of these Wiccan innovations often point fingers at Silver Ravenwolf, Scott Cunningham, or even Raymond Buckland for the watering-down of their practices. Some of those who use the term “Neo-Wicca” see it as a valid religious path, but insist that the initiations and experiential training received in a lineaged Wiccan coven are unique and cannot be learned from a book. Others imply that the training involved in eclectic covens is simply so lax that the result is a fast food version of the religion. On one humor site, an aspiring young witch named Raven Ravensong places her order to be a witch at the drive-thru and then adds, “[C]an I get a first degree Initiation on that?”

As borrowers, contemporary Pagans and those identifying as “New Age” practitioners have most often offended Native American groups by using their spiritual practices out of context and without any kind of relationship to living Native American communities. Religious studies scholar Sarah Pike writes of the 1993 “Declaration of War against Exploiters of Lakota Spirituality,” a statement that accuses New Age practitioners and Neo-Pagans of “cultural genocide” through commodification, dilution, and misinterpretation of Lakota practices (124-5; also York, 368 and Magliocco, 216). Native American leaders such as poet and anthropologist Wendy Rose accuse whites of stereotyping Native peoples and then profiting off these misrepresentations in books and workshops, as in the example of bestselling author Lynn Andrews, whose eighteen books include titles such as Medicine Woman and Jaguar Woman. Others fear that acts of cultural appropriation will endanger Native Americans’ legal rights to their religious practices. As increasing numbers of whites imitatively use the feathers and claws of endangered species for ritual purposes, a commercial demand for these objects arises and potentially threatens Native Americans’ exemption from endangered species laws. New Agers and Pagans have also interfered with the growth of sacred plants and overused sites sacred to Native Americans (Pike, 136).

White fascination with Native Americans often lacks an awareness of power inequalities. Ritual studies scholar Ronald Grimes writes of The Improved Order of Red Men, a fraternal society of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century America. Members dressed as Native Americans and engaged in “Indian” initiation rites intended to solidify social relationships and prove the candidate’s masculinity. Ironically, Native American peoples were, during this time, still being removed at gunpoint from their land by state and national armed forces. Quasi-Indian ritual societies remain active in the United States today, over Native American objections that they represent a spiritual version of the same imperialism that destroyed their communities economically and culturally and confined them to reservations (117-9). These “plastic shamans” (a term coined in the Native American activist community) include organizations such as Chuluaqui-Quodoushka, a sexually oriented New Age organization that founder Harley Reagan claimed was of Cherokee origin when he appeared on HBO’s Real Sex in 1992. After being threatened with a lawsuit by Cherokee leaders, Reagan relabeled his practice as a blend of ancient traditions. Workshops in “the Q” are still available today.

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