Alternate Title: Boiling Frogs
We Pagans (or Polytheists or whatever name we wish to call ourselves) fancy ourselves a group of fairly open-minded individuals. I mean, why wouldn't we be open minded? We worship gods that have animal heads and walk around sporting boners for the lols. We talk about spirits and otherkin and magic and gods know what else- things that would get us some strange looks if we were to talk with non-Pagan type folks (like our coworkers).
"Discernment is important to be sure – because there are some situations where it could very well be mental illness, attention mongering, or fake entities at play (among other things). However, discernment isn’t the same as being narrow minded and shooting down someone before they’ve even had a chance to get out of the gate. We as a community need to make sure that we are doing our best to keep an open mind, and also politely calling out those who might be doing a less than stellar job at keeping their minds open.
I guess you could say that it boils down to that respect thing, again. Respect the fact that someone might very well have been thrown down a crack-laden rabbit hole by the gods, and that it can technically happen to you. And at the end of the day, we all need to work on figuring out how to help each other break new ground and new territory, because we need these things in order to continue to grow as a community and a religion. Without new ideas and thoughts (crazy as they may seem at first), we are sure to stagnate and die."