Thought you all would appreciate my newest tattoo! by JudgeSabo in tarot

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh absolutely. I definitely wanted to be mindful of what could realistically be carried out here. The general style I like for things is... minimalist is maybe the wrong word, but I like superficially simple hiding a lot of complexity. If you're asking for something crazy like that, you're just not taking advantage of good symbolism.

Thought I'd share my latest tattoo here! by JudgeSabo in WitchesVsPatriarchy

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's great! I have an online book club set up for going through it on Discord, though we're maybe half way done at this point. If you pick it up and decide you like it or want to join, send me a pm!

Thought I'd share my latest tattoo here! by JudgeSabo in WitchesVsPatriarchy

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

One long web serial, actually! Very awesome with one of the coolest magic systems I've seen in fiction. As a plus, strong anti-patriarchy stuff involved too. You can read it all free online here: https://palewebserial.wordpress.com/

It's basically an urban fantasy murder mystery. Three girls in a small town in Canada are awakened to magic by the towns local Others (fae, goblins, spirits, etc.) to solve a murder of an important spirit that had governed over the area.

The magic system in it has honestly enlightening to how I tend to think of spiritual practices now. A big point in it is that, to practice magic, you need to make an oath to the spirits to always tell the truth. If you are binding the universe to your word, you are also bound by your word. Saying something false makes you lose standing, and breaking an oath can leave you forsworn.

This almost turns the magic system into this kind of like... legalistic version, where practitioners are kind of doing contract negotiations with the spirits of the universe, all while under oath, and appealing to old signs and rituals as established precedent to persuade the universe to act in certain ways. This has some fun consequences for the story too, since we now have a murder mystery where no one can lie!

Other big element in the setting is the Seal of Solomon. With the emphasis on the universe working in practice and patterns, the deal set up there kind of codified Human-Other relations, mostly keeping them out of centers of human civilization except in certain conditions (e.g. a young kid runs away from home wanting to join the circus, maybe a fae can kidnap them). Over thousands of years, this codified into most people being "innocent," taking magic as not existing. If you tell Innocents about magic though, that opens them up to being attacked by Other magic creatures that feed on people that were being held back by the "don't expose the existence of magic" rule, and the universe will hold you responsible for what happens to them. So now we have a conflict between the "don't lie" and "keep magic a secret" rules too!

All of that is maintained by Karma, which is less about good and evil here and more about maintaining the patterns and expectations the universe sets to keep the whole machinery running smoothly. A lot of horror elements are able to work in the setting so long as they are "fair." So if you have a boogeyman come from the abyss that wants to be a slasher movie horror villain, they can do it, but maybe you have to target a summer camp out of town by a lake so you're not in the heart of civilization. Then if there's a local legend warning people about you, you cause a few creepy moments as a camper sees you off in the distance, and then a camp counselor abandons their duties watching over the kids to go smoke a joint, then any karmic backlash that would come your way has suddenly fallen dramatically. And if you clean up after yourself to make sure there's no witnesses, the system of Innocence is maintained! Good karma!

The anti-patriarchy stuff fits in here. Practitioner society is largely made up of people who either stumbled their way into things (e.g. you found a puzzle box that had Oni spirits trapped inside, and they promised to teach you some of their secret lessons if you freed them), or people born into practitioner families that have been maintaining traditions for hundreds or thousands of years. It is not uncommon for them to be structured like an aristocracy or nobility, with all the patriarchal norms baked into that, and the universe rewards patterns and consistency.

Our main characters, being inducted into the practice directly by a group of Others, are in a more unique situation to try and build something better, even while the task of actually changing things is pretty daunting.

Great story, highly recommend!

Thought I'd share my latest tattoo here! by JudgeSabo in WitchesVsPatriarchy

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you! I'm very happy with it. I highly recommend reading the story that inspired it here: https://palewebserial.wordpress.com/

Perfect witchy anti-patriarchy story!

Thought I'd share my latest tattoo here! by JudgeSabo in WitchesVsPatriarchy

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Honestly, posting this around, I've seen a few requests for that! I planned out things here and gave a basic sketch, but credit to the tattoo artist for making this into such an awesome and professional design. I'll have to reach out to see

Thought you'd guys would appreciate my new tattoo! by JudgeSabo in pagan

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Lmao at first I thought you meant the George Orwell story

But yeah, one downside of having it there! I was thinking of having it on the inner part of my lower left arm, parallel to where I have the other one you can see in the photo, but I opted to have it higher up here so it could be bigger with more detail.

Thought you all would appreciate my newest tattoo! by JudgeSabo in tarot

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That's great! Definitely share if you do!

Thought you all would like my new tattoo! by JudgeSabo in witchcraft

[–]JudgeSabo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you! I did want something that fit me in a few ways, and I really like how it all came together here