Articles tagged with "communities"

Decompressing from DeCult

29 October 2024

It has been a busy week for me, and today has been the first day I've been able to unwind and reflect on everything that has happened. It has been good, but it has been a week bookended by two conferences, a board meeting, and a UFO lecture where I've had to do a lot of code-switching from professional skeptic, to professional disabled/Autistic person, to skeptical UFO enthusiast, to midwifery PhD researcher and lecturer, and finally back to skeptic. I am unreserved in enjoying the DeCult conference, and am pretty happy that I got to see 95% of the talks I wanted to see.

Smudge, Like, and Subscribe: The Occult's second life on social media

18 July 2022

Has anyone noticed that NZ stoner supplies mainstay, Cosmic Corner, has been taking a more witchy route as of late? Increasing its stores of tarot cards, smudge sticks, and crystals? The answer for why may lie in how magic and witchcraft have rapidly dominated TikTok, currently one of the world's most popular social media platforms.

"Treatment" for suffering just creates the disease

1 February 2006

For those of us who learnt of the tragedy through the media, the anguish and grief of the family who lost their two youngest children in the icy depths of Lake Wakatipu is painful even to imagine. We know their lives will never be the same again. So it was comforting to read that the people of Glenorchy are doing what close-knit communities always do in times of adversity.