Publisher and author Taylor Ellwood has posted two open letters to Pagan convention organizers asking for, at least, partial expense compensation. In the first open letter, he writes, “In my pursuit of self-respect, one of the realizations I’ve been having is that how I allow my work and myself to be treated professionally is indicative of the respect I’m giving to myself. And if I don’t set standards and boundaries for that treatment then I’ll get walked all over.”
Ellwood goes on to say that he will no longer present at conferences with the exception of three already scheduled in 2016. He argues that his presence as a guest helps bring people to the conference, and that the promised exposure received in return doesn’t pay his bills. This lack of some compensation is, in his opinion, unacceptable. He writes, “It also tells me that the people putting on the conference don’t respect my contribution.”
In the second letter, Ellwood calls for transparency on the selection of the presenters. He writes, “Each year you select who the guests of honor are at your event, but you don’t tell us how it happens. It’s treated as a secret and it’s time for the secrets to come out. I have queried different conventions about how they select their guests of honor and I usually don’t get answers.” Ellwood emphasizes that, in the end, he wants more than anything a “consistency” in the treatment of presenters.
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In June, we reported on the startup of a new website called “The Pagan Marketplace,” which was born out of the continuing struggles to sell metaphysical items on Etsy. Founder Blake Greenman Carpenter spearheaded this new venture geared specifically at Pagan artisans. At the time, he said, “We all need a break from the outside world sometimes and this site can give us that small clearing in the forest away from the pressures of those who don’t think like we do.”
This week, Carpenter announced that the Pagan Marketplace would be closing down indefinitely. In a recent announcement, he wrote, “Sorry to those who showed interest but the few of you that did will not be enough to hold it afloat at the moment. I hope to bring it back at a later date but there would have to be some major improvements in my status to do it. Thanks for your show of support and interest, I wish there were more like you.”
The Amaranth Marketplace, created to serve the same artisan population, is still in operation.
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Llewellyn Worldwide has announced the publication of the 7th edition of The Golden Dawn. First published in 1937, The Golden Dawn was originally created by Israel Regardie, infamous for breaking his oath by publishing the society’s secret material. However, in recent times, Regardie has been somewhat forgiven, because his work helped preserve the society’s practices. Regardless of recent debates, he remains a controversial figure in the Golden Dawn’s history.
Despite the background, it has been claimed that Regardie’s book is “the most influential modern handbook of magical theory and practice.” And, that it “started the occult movement.”
The newest edition, which took three years to create, boasts 960 pages “with added illustrations, a twenty-page color insert, additional original material, and refreshed design and typography.” According to Llewellyn, “Scholar John Michael Greer has taken this essential resource back to its original, authentic form.” The bookseller is taking pre-orders now. The book will be officially on sale in January 2016.
In Other News
- Yule has arrived, and many people around the world have spent this past weekend celebrating. Everglades Moon Local Council (EMLC), the Florida-based division of Covenant of the Goddess, has uploaded its most recent seasonal podcast. For every sabbat, the organization produces a new downloadable podcast with the goal of celebrating and connecting is community. This year’s Yule podcast includes an interview with Wild Hunt contributing writer Cosette Paneque; discussions on holiday spellwork, medicinal herbs, “FooDoo” and Pagan craft projects.The “Reaching for the Moon” podcast is rounded off with music from Emerald Rose and Mama Gina.
- The 12th annual Conference of Current Pagan Studies is looking for vendors and program advertisers. As we reported last week, this conference, held in January, begins the Pagan indoor conference season. The 2016 event, held the weekend of Jan 23-24, is themed “Social Justice.” While proposals for presentations are no longer being accepted, the conference organizers are still looking for vendors and program advertisers.
- Another late January event is EarthSpirit’s A Feast of Lights, held annually in Amherst, Massachusetts. As described on the site, “A Feast of Lights is a weekend of warmth at the coldest time of the year – a festival of Earth spirituality and the arts, of community and hope, of tradition and creativity. The weekend is intended to nourish our hearts and minds, bringing together a collection of teachers, performers, artists and merchants who join with all of the gathering’s participants to kindle the fire within during the dark of winter.” Wild Hunt reporter Terence Ward was in attendance last year and wrote, “Winter is indeed a universal truth, an indivisible portion of the cycle of seasons which many Pagans acknowledge or revere. It is often unpleasant, sometimes even dangerous, but so long as there are events like A Feast of Lights held in the coldest days, there will be opportunities to dream again of spring.” A Feast of Lights will be held Jan 29-31, at the Hotel UMass, Amherst.
This January, Wiccan author Ivo Dominguez Jr. will be releasing his new book, Practical Astrology for Witches and Pagans. Published by Red Wheel/Weiser, Dominguez’ book explores the “sacred science” and symbols behind Astrology with the aim of applying the knowledge to ritual, herbalism, crystals and other similar work. “This is a practical handbook for any practitioner of magic to use in building individual rituals and creating the most effective magic.” Practical Astrology for Witches and Pagans will be available in paper and ebook formats.- In other publishing news, Joanna van der Hoeven has published a new book titled The Stillness Within: Finding Inner Peace in a Conflicted World. It is a “collection of writings on finding inner peace, based on Zen principles, meditation” She told The Wild Hunt, “This little e-book is a collection of writings designed to find peace even in a world that seems to going to pieces. All proceeds from the sale of this book are going to charity: The Woodland Trust UK and the UK Orangutan Appeal.” In addition, van der Hoeven has recently released an “online Zen Druidry course, based upon her Pagan Portals introductory book of the same title.”
- For those readers who like dark folk music, Nemeur, a duo from the Czech Republic, has released its second album titled Labyrinth of Druids. The music is being used as the official soundtrack for a video game of the same title. “The [Labyrinth of Druids] is set in a maze of nightmares and its main aim is to provide extremely strong atmospheric experience combining fantasy and horror.” The group’s sound is described as “minimalistic and dark,” and “if there is a project that can disrupt the walls of mainstream, it is Nemuer.”
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Kudos to Mr. Ellwood for taking a stand on this issue! I’m not a Pagan author or presenter, but I’ve been convinced for years that one of the biggest barriers to advancement and teaching is what I would call a freeloading mentality in the movement. From the bottom up, everyone has come to expect something for nothing, whether it be at cons, local events, the upkeep of community centers or paying for created works like books and music. Everybody is always pleading poverty, and in doing so, have created the metaphysical conditions and economic systems guaranteed to deepen and perpetuate that poverty.
Some of this started from a healthy place. We didn’t want to make our events the $2,500 a weekend New Age exploitation events that only serve the idle suburban affluent. I know that presenters like Shauna Aura and no doubt Taylor Ellwood, do what they do because they want to serve their community and share the knowledge they have. Drawing on a tradition which probably arose out of our 1960s counterculture roots, we didn’t want to make Pagan religion all about money, so our teachers and organizers have tended to organize everything around nominal and often voluntary donations. That gets interpreted by many people, even those who can well afford it, as a license to ride free on everything.
So event organizers keep entrance fees artificially low while managing to offer a wonderful bill of programming. They do this in no small part by stiffing presenters and others who create much of the value of the event itself. Presenters, often acting from the best of intentions and a misguided belief in the power of “exposure”, have enabled and underwritten this exploitation. More than a few of them wind up burned out and disengaging from their work sooner or later. The rest of us lose something of real value because we didn’t value it properly. Presenters – at least those who are sought by the event organizers to serve as an integral part of the event’s programs – need to be paid.
At the least, they should have their expenses paid. Authors and teachers who are well known and have an established draw should also be paid a decent honorarium. “Exposure” doesn’t feed the bulldog at the levels any Pagan events can provide. Back in the day when Oprah used to deliver her entire audience to an author or self-help guru on the show, that kind of exposure was more than payment enough. If you’re a brand new unknown author at a Pagan con and you host a little program at your booth of your own volition and aren’t part of the event bill, then yes, you probably should settle for exposure until you create a draw and demand.
This kind of exploitation is insane and unsustainable and I would argue goes against everything we know to be true in our understanding of ecologies, of how magick works and what many of our gods teach us about honor.
The first step to ending this is for more presenters to do exactly what Mr. Ellwood and I think a few others have done. Insist on fair compensation for your work and walk away from any and all gigs that won’t offer it.
Thank you for your support. I went through a recent period of burnout, and took a retreat and in that perspective found that yes I needed to make some changes and if it means less appearances, I can live with that.
Thank you for this!
On the one hand, I agree with the basic principle that someone who is creating value (presenter at a conference) should be compensated. However, I wonder if many conferences could afford to do so with all their presenters, without raising the attendance fees so much that most people wouldn’t be able to come at all. Even for a small conference, it would add up quickly. Let’s say there are 25 presenters, expenses average around $500/each (conservative, given airfare, hotel, food, etc.), spread that out amongst, say, 250 attendees, and you raise the cost per attendee by $50, not insignificant. Now, if the conference is extremely profitable, then sure it makes sense that they should share that profit with the people contributing to it. But some are done as labors of love for the most part. I admit, however, that I was surprised back when I spoke at PCon that I wasn’t even offered a comped registration.
I will also point out, for what it’s worth, that I have organized and participated in several major conferences in a corporate setting where the only compensation for speakers was a free registration (worth hundreds of dollars, but they still had to pay their own expenses). So it’s not as if, in this case, the pagan community is being any more stingy than anyone else.
I’d love to see a major pagan conference make their finances open to examination, so we could see if it’s even possible to have that level of compensation for all presenters.
I think you make some valid points here. I’ve also been involved in business conventions as a speaker and have actually gotten paid and expenses covered, so I think there’s spectrum dependent on community, industry or what have you.
Much as I (heart) Ken’s POV on this, I think Dver has the numbers on his side.
I wouldn’t dispute that numbers matter. My answer to that refers back to sustainability. No conference can afford to pay everyone who wants to present, nor should they. What should happen is that the event organizers should solicit and curate a bill of paid presenters who will add real value and perhaps draw to the event, and then compensate them fairly. Depending on the nature of the particular conference, that might mean two or three substantive programs each day plus one bigger keynote, can’t-miss workshop near the close of the event.
That might mean the conference fee goes up $50, or more, and then decisions need to be made about what level of programming the conference needs and what people are willing to pay. There will be plenty of excellent potential presenters who will not be selected in a given year, and they need to be offered the option of whether to do something on their own dime and initiative. It might be a good way for unknowns to build their presentation skills and saleability as paid speakers. Moreover, by selecting and compensating the key presenters, the event has greater control over quality and content. Under the present pay-to-play serf system, the presenters schedule is basically dictated by whoever planned to show up on their own dime. If you spend some money, you might be able to pull in the best talent from, say, the opposite coast or Vancouver or the UK.
The problem should not be solved as it has been, by fostering an expectation of receiving high value services for nothing. We’re a pretty progressive lot, we Pagans. We tend to be among the more energized supporters of fair trade products and policies for people in the developing world. That’s great, but we need to bring those values home as well.
What was mentioned about unpaid corporate speakers may or may not translate to what we’re talking about. If you’re going to a corporate event, chances are you can expense that, and the exposure factor we have been talking about is more likely to offset the lack of a speaker’s fee. If you have a real shot at making a contact worth six or seven figures of business, the math of a speculative trip to a conference and a free presentation makes sense in a way it does not at a Pagan con.
You make a really fantastic point that, under the current models, the schedule is full of people who can afford to pay to present. And–I know a lot of amazing presenters who aren’t out there teaching because they can’t afford the costs to travel. It’s a significant *loss* to our community that these people aren’t out there teaching.
I think there are a lot of potential solutions to this conundrum, and those solutions will vary by the specifics of the conferences and festivals. There are different solutions for a hotel event than for a camping festival, or for an event where it’s viable to host presenters in people’s homes near the event venue, for instance. I stay at people’s houses all the time instead of at a hotel to save costs. There are inherent challenges there, too, but it’s been the only way I’ve been able to make most of my traveling and teaching cost effective.
When I do stay at a hotel at a conference, I’m always sharing rooms to split costs. Heck, even at events where I was paid my travel costs and given a hotel room, I’ve offered to share a room with others to keep costs down.
Raising conference fees is a potential solution, but that also creates a corresponding problem of pricing more people out of the event. One solution I’ve tried at a few events was offering a sliding scale of pricing and the option to pay into a scholarship fund. The sliding scale was $25-$100, and some people paid in $50-$100 on top of that. That allowed people to attend who could only afford $25, but also allowed people with more financial abundance to offer that to the community. Something like that, or a crowdfunding model, might be useful to sponsor specific guests. Again, it depends on the goals, intentions, and setup of the individual events.
I would love to see some different funding models investigated. We have to first get real about the costs, but we have a decent start on that with conversations like this. Sliding scales are a good idea, if they can be effectively implemented. The trick lies in how to fairly do means testing and verification vs intrusiveness on the one hand and abuses of the honor system on the other. If someone is living on disability or is otherwise truly poor but sincere about wanting to come, I’m all about that. I think there will always have to be limitations, but we should do what we can. When plead poverty and want to be comped for everything because all of their disposable income goes to weed or the latest ultimate iThingy, that doesn’t go down well at all with me, and I’ve seen a lot of that in the Pagan community over the years (and elsewhere). I like the idea that those of us with a little more juice can help underwrite others. There might be some creative ways to do that as well even beyond means tested discounts. For example, I think this last year’s PSG ran $225. That’s a deal breaker for some of us, and a relative pittance for others. It ain’t a pittance for me, but I would have happily paid a solid premium, perhaps $400, for the right to a reserved spot. I can imagine some paying nice upcharges to rent an air-conditioned yurt. Maybe a system where you pay the entry for someone and they take a couple of your work shifts. These ideas of course invite charges of elitism, and not without merit. However, relative degrees of privilege have always existed and always will, even if we (hopefully) bring the bottom tier up to a decent standard of equity. Why not harness some of the power of privilege for the common good? I think a number of potential models will emerge and will enable us to do more and spread the costs more fairly.
There are lots of different funding options out there, and you bring up some good points about ways to increase funding at an event. One thing that’s worth pointing out is what I alluded to in one of my other comments, that different events have different goals and intentions.
Pagan Spirit Gathering, for instance, is a week-long festival. It’s $225 for the week (plus your travel costs, plus your camping gear) but overall, that’s cheaper than a conference that might be $70 to get in, $400 to fly to, and $200-$400 or more for hotel. So we end up with apples and oranges, so to speak.
It’s also a different event in that one of PSG’s primary intentions is as a fundraiser for Circle Sanctuary. PSG is how they raise the funds for their operational costs for the following year. Circle does a lot of great work in the Pagan community, but they’ve had significant difficulty getting people to donate funds to them since Pagans tend to reject the tithing model in specific, and donating to a not-for-profit in general.
Thus, I’ve been more willing to pay admission for PSG, even as a presenter, because I recognize it as a tithe toward an organization that is doing a lot of important work on behalf of Pagans. That being said, I also simply couldn’t afford to pay that this past year, so I didn’t attend. And in 2016, another group offered to host me at their festival and pay me, so that’s where I’m going.
I hate for money to be the determining factor for where I teach, but as a starving artist, that’s now determining where my compass points.
Sounds like Taylor Ellwood is encountering the same types of problems we Belly Dancers often face. Good on him!
Carry on with yo’ bad self, Taylor. We support you!
It becomes more and more difficult for me, as a presenter, to travel to events where I’m not at least getting some travel expenses compensated. Over the past years, I’ve had to reduce what events I do. Or more specifically, reduce events where I’m not getting paid, and I’ve gravitated to events where I make more selling my artwork.
The thing is, I want to teach. I want to offer skills and tools on leadership and facilitation and the rest. It’s a spiritual calling for me to serve the community, and I want to make these skills and tools available to every Pagan who wants them, not just the ones who are wealthy. I don’t want to see events go the way of the New Age community where only those who are already well off can do spiritual seeking and get advanced training.
However, quite simply I’m drowning. My choices to focus on making my work available mean that I am living off of very little income. I’ve made personal sacrifices to live simply, but it hasn’t been sustainable for a while now, and I’m soon going to lose my free-rent place to live. I love being able to offer my articles and blog posts, videos, and classes for free to those who need them. And I often do leadership consults for leaders facing difficulties in their own communities.
But I’m not breaking even. I make far more on my artwork than I do getting paid from teaching or selling books, but even that has me living below the poverty line. Now–all of this is beyond the whole conversation on whether or not Pagan conferences should pay presenters, but it’s all part of the equation.
This coming year, I’m going to start having to make some really difficult decisions about how much time I spend writing and teaching for the Pagan community. If I can’t bring in a viable living, I’m going to have to switch gears, and that’s going to give me significantly less time and energy to do the work I do with helping Pagan community builders.
As an event organizer, I’ve been the one to ask Pagan teachers to present–and not had money to pay them. I’ve run a couple of smaller conferences where I was able to pay for some presenters travel expenses, find them places to stay in town, and all the presenters got in for free, but I’ve run other events where there simply wasn’t the budget to do anything other than let presenters in free. Heck, I’ve run my share of events that didn’t even get enough donations/registrations to pay for the space. I know it’s a ridiculously tough balance to try and keep costs low enough that the event is accessible, and pay the bills.
But we (all of us, all Pagans who want conferences and festivals and other events) have to figure out ways to do this that are sustainable. Financial burnout is one of the biggest reasons Pagan leaders throw in the towel–as teachers, as leaders, as ritualists, as event organizers, across the board.
What you and Taylor are doing as far as standing firm on what you can afford to do will go a long way by creating transparency in a market that has had none. People have a very distorted idea of what things cost in the Pagan world because we’ve drifted into a system which expects and demands costs to be subsidized largely by a handful of people of struggling or average means. As more teachers and presenters refuse to give up their livelihood, sanity and self-respect to make things run, we will get a more realistic sense of what you get for a free event vs a $50/day event vs $100 a day event.