Hate Speech or How to Break Someone's Bones

In this episode of Pagan Coffee Talk, Oswan is joined by Lord Night, Elder and Third Degree High Priest, for an unfiltered discussion on one of today’s most controversial topics: hate speech and censorship.

From a traditional Wiccan perspective, this conversation challenges modern narratives by asking a fundamental question: do words truly have power—or do we give that power away? Lord Night explores the importance of personal responsibility, emotional control, and self-mastery, emphasizing that within the Craft, your reactions—and your power—belong to you alone.

The discussion dives into:

•  The relationship between words, intent, and personal reaction
•  Why self-discipline and emotional resilience are essential in traditional Wicca 
•  The risks and implications of censorship and restricted speech
•  Historical parallels between modern censorship and past religious suppression 
•  The role of open dialogue, disagreement, and critical thinking in personal growth 

Oswan and Lord Night also explore real-world examples, from restricted access to occult materials to modern debates around media, parenting, and cultural influence, offering a grounded yet thought-provoking perspective rooted in tradition.

This episode invites listeners to rethink freedom of speech, individual sovereignty, and the nature of true empowerment—both in spiritual practice and everyday life.

Perfect for Pagans, Wiccans, witches, and anyone interested in philosophy, free speech, and personal development, this is a bold conversation that doesn’t shy away from difficult questions.

Join us on
Discord:  https://discord.gg/MdcMwqUjPZ
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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:37

Welcome back to Fugin Coffee Talk. I'm Oswan, and I have with me Lord Knight. Today's topic that has been pulled out of our hat is hate speech and censorship.

SPEAKER_03 0:51

Why would anybody think I'd care about such a subject?

SPEAKER_01 0:54

Or any of us would. I don't I don't know. I mean, I don't know why we should really care about it at all.

SPEAKER_03 1:01

Well, you know, after trying to go get the the witch books from the library and finding out that they were kept behind the counter, even though they're still in the card file so kids can't find them. I wonder why I have a problem with censorship. No idea. Okay. Here's my problem with hate speech. I don't like it. I don't believe in it. I think it's bullshit. And here's why. Our religion is about self-control, about us having our own identity and being our own people. And God forbid any of us, especially the traditionalists, y'all know exactly what I'm talking about. To allow someone to make you mad over a word for any traditional to give up that control to somebody else, to give that power over to somebody else over you, is unthinkable. And I know people are confused about this. If someone calls comes up to me and calls me a name and I get mad, that means that they have control over me and my emotions. You know why we call them my emotions and your emotions? Because they're yours. You're responsible for them. Not me, nobody else. Because they're yours. And the only people that get to use them are you. So if I sit here and call you a bad name and you get all upset or trigger, again, not my problem. That's your problem. Why are you allowing me to have that much control over you? And once I have that control, what in the hell makes you think I'm going to give it up?

SPEAKER_01 2:49

Well, there's there's there's a saying that says you can't control what other people say, but you can control how you react to what they say. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 3:01

You know, well, I mean, we grew up in the whole entire age of, you know, sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. I mean, again, this is true. They're just words. All right. And I'm sorry, my will's strong enough. I know exactly who I am, and it doesn't matter what anybody else thinks. You can call me whatever you want underneath the sun. I am not going to give up that, relinquish that power, that control over my me to somebody else. Right. All right. And again, and then I start to look at this hate speech with the way they're wanting to do it in laws, and I do not see how this is any different than the obscenity laws we were still battling in the 70s and 80s. There's still controlling speech. Oh, you're not allowed to say these words. You're not allowed to say these seven words, and the FCC will not let you say this stuff. And how's this any different than hate speech laws?

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Well, it's not, but I mean, is is hate speech even real?

SPEAKER_03 4:08

I I don't think it is.

SPEAKER_01 4:09

Is there such a thing as hate speech? Really?

SPEAKER_03 4:11

No. No, I mean there's speech that will make you upset. That's life. I mean, I don't know about you, but I remember growing up, and the biggest thing we had there was Donahue. All right. I mean, I I'm sorry. I think every grandparent in the South, especially every grandmother in the South who stayed at home. It was a home, I'll watch Donahue. They followed him around like the grateful dead. All right. Now, I remember he actually had some Klu Klux Klan members on and some of the skint head movement. Right. Again, that's to date me. I want y'all to realize how long ago these were. I was still in elementary school.

SPEAKER_01 4:56

I remember those episodes as well.

SPEAKER_03 4:58

So I remember my grandma making me watch that. So I could see how stupid these people were. Right. By allowing them to speak. She looked at me and said, This is why in the world we got freedom of speech. That way you can see the stupid people when they're coming.

SPEAKER_01 5:17

And your grandma was absolutely right.

SPEAKER_03 5:20

You know, I'm sorry, but you put that on there. You're not gonna know anytime soon. And I'm sorry, because it hurts your feelings is not an excuse to me. You need to sit down and meditate and figure out why in the world that word hurts your feelings. It's just the sound, it's just a word. Right. Seriously.

SPEAKER_01 5:42

Well, what about the folks that say, well, but words have power?

SPEAKER_03 5:46

Well, words have power with intent.

SPEAKER_01 5:50

But if somebody's if somebody's calling you names or spitting out all this quote unquote hate speech, all that has intent behind it.

SPEAKER_03 5:59

Right, true. But the again, the idea here is that we all have a quote unquote aura field around us. Well, energy that flows through us, a life force, right? When it's damaged, okay, when it works properly, things cannot get through it. Correct? Right. So the intent people have will just kind of like bounce off of it. Like a shield. All right. What weakens this shield is your psychological issues, the ones you haven't dealt with. They're the ones that put cracks in that barrier. Again, your fault, your issues. You need to deal with them. Okay. All right. Either th go to therapy, do medication, and and do you meditations. And you'll start going through them issues really fast. That will smooth them back out. Then people being able to hurt you and not is irrelevant. Right. Because again, you also have to admit, yeah, you gotta also start to understand. When people start attacking you personally and not what you're saying, this is I'm going to kill the messenger instead of the message because I can't destroy the message.

SPEAKER_01 7:10

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_03 7:11

These are people that are going out going, okay, look, I need to make him look like an asshole so everybody thinks that everything that comes out of them is shit. But they're not attacking the idea. So again, to me, this weakens people's position that try to debate you on this stuff or tell you you're wrong. Well, you you're not telling me I'm wrong, you're just telling me I'm a bad person. Right. What does that have to do with this concept?

SPEAKER_01 7:42

Well, because it's easier to attack the person than it is to attack the concept.

SPEAKER_03 7:46

Again, you're still here's their argument is I need to make you look like an asshole because your idea is too good. And the more I personally and I'm sorry, there are people in craft, in this uh traditional that see these debates going, well, you're attacking him and not his ideas. This just tells me you don't know what in the world you're talking about to begin with and makes you look even weaker. But yeah, people still think this is a good idea and want to call it hate speech to end it. I d no, how about this? Actually pay attention to what in the words you're doing, look at all the examples, talk to other people, and then decide if the idea is good or not. Right. If you see a hole in there, actually have a hole and a logic behind it. You know, if you really can't argue the idea or anything, just and you can't see any holes in it, and you still don't like it, well just say I don't like it just because and end it there. You don't have to listen to it anymore.

SPEAKER_02 8:46

Right.

SPEAKER_03 8:47

But to sit there and try to call certain things hate speech under this concept makes no sense to me. How in the world can anybody of craft give up that much control to somebody else to where it triggers you to where you gotta go and take medications or sit down in a room or something. How in the world are you allowing somebody else to control your emotions?

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Well, it doesn't make sense to me either. And I and I guess that's because I'm part of that traditional train of thought here. Well, yeah, you are I mean, there was there's been many occasions at work when I've worked at other facilities where I've heard people talking and they'll say certain things and then they'll turn around and they'll be like, Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say that, and it's not what you think. And then I just look at them and what? It's no big deal. I don't I don't care. It didn't bother me what you said.

SPEAKER_03 9:47

Everybody that listens to it knows I'm gay, and I listen to gay jokes all the time. I think some of them are freaking hilarious.

SPEAKER_02 9:54

Right.

SPEAKER_03 9:54

Some of them are dad jokes, but but uh they can still be kind of cute and funny, especially for being so cringy. It don't hurt my feelings. Why should it? Somebody just saying stuff.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Right. Again, we're back to they're just words.

SPEAKER_03 10:15

Again, stranger out on the street. Why do I care?

SPEAKER_01 10:18

I really don't care what you think.

SPEAKER_03 10:20

You're not paying my bills, you're not I'm not waking up beside you every single day. Now, again, if you're paying my bills and you're waking up beside you, we're gonna have an issue.

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Right. Well, and you know, it's funny because it's I'm seeing a lot of uh seeing a lot of things on Facebook where people are posting things along those lines that, well, I just decided that I need to I need to stop caring what people other think about me. It shouldn't matter what people think about you.

SPEAKER_03 10:49

Well, see, this is what I like about traditional craft. It shows you a way if you take the opportunities, it gives you the tools to where you no longer really do care what other people think. It's irrelevant, you know. It it actually gets you to the point where some of these arguments and stuff come up, and you're kind of like, I'm bored. I've I've I've heard it, I know all that, I know how this is gonna end. It's absolutely futile or could be or couldn't be. And then walk off. For as much as I don't like this, I don't like censorship the other way. Don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem with the the labels that they put on stuff for like the games and music and and and TV shows and parental advisories. All right. But I sure in the world do not want no government body, right? Because I I mean I don't consider myself wise and smart enough to make those decisions either. And if I can't do it, I'm sure in the hell don't believe anybody else can either. What should be read or what shouldn't be read.

SPEAKER_01 12:00

No, I think you can only make those decisions for yourself.

SPEAKER_03 12:04

Exactly. I know some people, and again, libraries in public, in the public library should be completely free, no censorships, whatever. It's out there.

SPEAKER_01 12:14

Right. If it if the book exists, you should be able to get it.

SPEAKER_03 12:17

You should be able to get it at the library with no hassles or whatever, and make sure you return them and all that. But a school library, I can understand we're pay parents, we're parents, not some administrator twice removed from some golem somewhere that has the personality of a stop sign. Right. All right, only a step up from his cousin who has the personality of a cement block. Mainly because of the bright red color. I do not want them making that decisions. Again, if parents want to sit there and go through the list of the books in the library and decide, okay, well, I really don't want my kids, you know, in elementary school, reading this book or reading that book. And say, well, maybe wait until they're in junior high or high school. I don't have a problem with this. Because there's parents and their kids, and they should decide what in the world the parent what the kids read or don't read. Right. I mean, it's just the same thing to me, it's the same thing as music. You get the parental warnings on there and the whole nine yards, you need to make a decision as a parent. Right.

SPEAKER_01 13:30

Because your child is your child, and they are unique to themselves. Right. And that's you know, those decisions are affecting the way you you want your child molded.

SPEAKER_03 13:43

Right.

SPEAKER_01 13:44

I mean, as a parent, it's your responsibility to mold your child. So I mean, like you do it the best way you know how.

SPEAKER_03 13:52

I mean, I don't know about you, but like me growing up, yeah. I hope the whole gay rights stuff and stuff happened and we eventually were able to get married and all that. My hope was is that it just became a normal part of life and nobody really said anything, and little Jimmy and Junior High can finally go out with little Johnny if he really wanted to. Right. But I'm sorry, the drag queen hours and all this other stuff. Yeah, if you want your kid to go to it, great. But I don't see forcing that on anybody else. You know, requiring kids to do certain activities that the parents do not agree with to me is not a good policy. No, it's not. And it again is a form of censorship. Yes, I think you should be an adult before you get to go see porn. I know most boys, most kids don't, but you know that's between them and their parents. Does that make sense? I cannot stand the thought of censorship. And I really see this as more of a cultural thing and stuff like that. Because I'm sorry, I remember my Celtic history. Celts at one point were not allowed to speak their own language and had to live a certain way according to what the Romans said. I don't like that. Right. We fought against stuff like that. We remember these battles and these struggles, so we don't repeat them. You know, that's kind of like the whole entire idea of in Celtic society way back in the day, and again, could be wrong, women could own land, but they had to be able to defend it themselves. So they had to be able to pick up arms. When some of the when the Roman Catholic Church came in and started sending all the first thing they did was they got all the lords and ladies and kings and queens to outlaw people carrying weapons, and it was a whole lot easier to start burning witches.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

Right.

SPEAKER_03 15:52

Because nobody could defend themselves anymore. Because nobody could defend themselves anymore. You know, we're supposed to learn from our history. This is why we teach it so readily and over and over again. But yet, if you're willing to start giving up these thoughts and these ideas because it's a cool thing to do, whatever happened to being an individual? I mean, is that not one of our core tenets of craft is that we should be able to stand up by ourselves? Right. And you have to be able to stand up before you can help anybody else. Kind of like the whole airplane, you know, you got to put on your mask before putting on, you know, the mask of your favorite kid. Right. At first.

SPEAKER_01 16:42

It all comes back to it's real if you let it be real.

SPEAKER_03 16:47

Right.

SPEAKER_01 16:47

As far as hate speech goes. Censorship, there should be no such thing as censorship. Everything should be made available. That goes back to freedom of speech. If we give up our freedom of speech, where's it gonna end? What else are we gonna give up?

SPEAKER_03 17:05

You know, I that's my point. How much? I I'm sorry, but you know, your your safety is not worth my freedom.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

No.

SPEAKER_03 17:14

No. I can't see it. No, won't have it. Well, I think I'm out of coffee here.

SPEAKER_01 17:21

I'm out of coffee too.

SPEAKER_03 17:22

Y'all follow us on one of the social medias and visit our website. Let us know how we're doing. Please, either on YouTube or Facebook, shoot us an email. See y'all next week. Thank you for listening to Peggy and Coffee Talk. I hope you join us next week.

SPEAKER_00 17:44

We travel down the straw, the stone in my stole my hand as we find out.