Authenticity in the Witchplace
Recently a student of mine and I were discussing the overwhelming inundation of occult related information available. “Witchtok” has taken off running, Instagram is laden with carefully witch-crafted aesthetic accounts, even Etsy is overrun with occult-related options, right down to purchasing spells for nominal fees.
How do you decipher the authentic from the grifters? When reviews are bought, or bots, it becomes harder and harder to know who to trust. The simplest answer is to start with your gut—though I know many struggle with that, and it’s often the reason someone is seeking the counsel, work, or how-to of an online-witch in the first place. The second layer is to look objectively at the offering, and the proclaimed result. Regardless of how desperate and at the end of your personal rope you may be—is the offering integral, and are the results reliable? Is the language used organic, or AI drivel? (Many of you know my take on AI usage in general—I take it as a personal affront when Etsy sellers are pawning off spells and potions that are nothing more than chatGPT spell-salad, with zero receipts to demonstrate any work was done on the client’s behalf in the first place. I hope you can recognize how problematic this is.)
Understanding that there’s a fine line between creating new traditions and honoring existing ones is also important—new traditions have to begin somewhere, yes, and they still need to have a sort of foundation or root-network. For example, the new “trend” of blowing cinnamon powder across your threshold, through your open front door on the first of the month. There is no ancient tradition, no indigenous folk magic that performs this ritual..and… cinnamon is associated with prosperity and abundance. (Probably because in general, spices are expensive and have always been viewed as a luxury item.)…and… “sending” something across your threshold, ushering it into your home is also commonly found in various traditions. On the surface it makes this mini-monthly ritual seem legit. It certainly won’t harm anything. It may or may not work, either. Though, with enough momentum (and social media is certainly a way to build momentum) it may very well become legitimate through the power of the collective conscious. What I take umbrage with is the lack of transparency: if only Witchtokers would state off the cuff: ”I made this up because it seemed like a good idea from what I know of this and that”, or “I liked the way it looked, it fits my aesthetic”, instead of implying that these rituals and spells are rooted in tradition and are reliable.
Countless times I find myself attempting to explain to students that—for example—the freezer spell they saw on social media simply won’t work. “But freezer spells work! You’ve said so yourself!” Yes, and, the materia used, or the process described won’t proffer the desired outcome. Then we break it down, Socratically. We question our way through the outlined spell and more often than not the student realizes that the spell is bunk. Ie: you don’t use a freezer spell to attract something, ever. The nature of ice is not magnetizing, it’s binding.
This is why learning spellcrafting and spellweaving takes time. There must be a foundational understanding of how nature herself moves and operates, how the cosmos move and operate, how your own rhythms and tides ebb and flow. This can be explained and outlined in a class, but most importantly it needs experiencing. A good teacher creates opportunities for you to explore (as safely as possible) all of these concepts and how they interplay with one another, before throwing you in the deep end. Experientially, a greater understanding, a wisdom is then cultivated and built upon. Witchtok cannot offer that wisdom in a 30 second video.
What Witchtok can offer is inspiration and curiosity (and occasionally a good laugh). I utilize reels and carousels found on social media regularly in my coursework. I’ll share a handful of “cord-cutting” videos of two candles burning, bound together by twine, and invite my students to observe and come to their own conclusions. To contrast and compare within their cohort before ever going to the comments. This is how they cultivate eyes to see and ears to hear: by observing and listening, without having to “be right” or taking everything at face value.
Witchtok isn’t all snake oil and charlatans—there are some brilliant folk magic practitioners and ceremonial magic practitioners to be found. Usually they care less about curation and more about content. Their captions read like mini-novellas, their tools are worn and often hand-crafted, their altars well used, less shiny. This doesn’t mean they don’t necessarily have a well-crafted aesthetic or branding, but that what they offer is deeper than that. They’re using social media as the tool it’s meant to be; not just to create content. If you take the time to really observe, instead of immediately jumping to try the latest trend, you’ll begin to winnow the wheat from the chaff.
