I Love Fluffy Bunnies

[feotakahari]

 Pictured: a fluffy bunny.

Pictured: also a fluffy bunny.

(Source.)

The term is often used to refer to Wiccans who’re doing Wicca “wrong” for whatever reason, especially ones whose interpretation of Wicca is too idealistic. The implication is that true Wicca acknowledges all of existence, and Wiccans who don’t do that aren’t really Wiccans. There are loads of ways to argue this from an inside perspective, and since I’m not a Wiccan, I’m not going to wade into that. But from the outside, there’s one thing I can say: I like fluffy bunnies.

The serious Wiccan, as quite a few Wiccan thinkers will tell you in excruciating detail, believes that “light” and “dark” are both natural parts of the universe, to the extent they can be considered separate at all. Problems arise when imbalance is created, but too little suffering is just as much of an imbalance as too much. Scott Cunningham, for instance: “From a ravaging flood comes rich soil in which new plants thrive.  Death brings a deeper appreciation of life to the living and rest for the transcended one.  ‘Good’ and ‘evil’ are often identical in nature, depending on one’s viewpoint.”

The fluffy Wiccan believes that suffering is bad, because suffering is bad.

This is not unique to Wicca. The more concerned you are with following every precept of the Bible, the more disconnected you are from the values Jesus espoused, and some of the most obnoxious people I’ve ever interacted with have been Buddhists who got way too into living their lives by Buddhist standards. For that matter, the dedicated Utilitarian will argue for hours over whether a particular action results in more or less utility, while the casual Utilitarian can often see immediately that it’s the wrong thing to do.

So if you ever run into a knotty problem that you can’t fit into your beliefs, cut the knot. The rules you’ve been following can guide you, but you shouldn’t let them blind you to what’s actually in front of you and what your instincts are telling you to do.

(I say this, knowing full well that a normal human being would not agree to some of the moral principles I espouse. What can I say? When you’re as far into Blue as I am, everyone else is Orange.)

Comments

[lb_lee]

"‘Good’ and ‘evil’ are often identical in nature, depending on one’s viewpoint.”

That's generally the part where I start backing away and then sprinting the moment the speaker's back is turned. Because it's taken me YEARS to be able to discern even shades of gray, and anyone trying to take me back down to the eternal moral beige I lived in as a kid is NOT good for me to be around.

Some things really are evil. It took me a long time to come to that belief, but I do believe it now, and it's been a huge boon.

[feotakahari]

Heh. Remember that story I was trying to write with a multi main character, the one I never wrote more than a page of? Since it’s basically dead, I’ll give away a spoiler.

There was a main character who was part of a sect that believed all things were the Void’s creations, and all things were loved by the Void. As she saw it, something that’s evil is something good in the wrong context, like passion in a context where it becomes fanaticism, or kindness in a context where it becomes enabling. Even the Shadow that nearly destroyed civilization had a part to play.

At a certain time and place, the sect’s prophecies said the Shadow would escape again. A Savior would arise to defeat it and lead the worlds into an era of prosperity. So at that time and place, they unleashed the Shadow themselves, then began searching for their Savior.

Billions upon billions of people died. The sect itself was reduced to a single survivor, still searching for her Savior, not realizing that the prophecy was false all along and the Shadow never needed to be released.

[lb_lee]

Seeing as we used to call our headspace the Void, this is all the more entertaining to me.

And yes, that. Mac sometimes says he thinks evil is a sort of... moral laziness, for lack of a better word. Just trying very hard not to think about what you're doing, or care.

--Rogan