Month: October, 2015

Cancer Sun, Virgo Moon: Astrology of the “Black Lives Matter” Movement

(Photo Credit: Rena Schild/Shutterstock.com)

Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared on page ten of our original issue. -Matt

The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement got its start on July 13th, 2013 at approximately 8:00 pm as the result of a conversation between Alicia Garza of Oakland and Patrisse Cullors of Los Angeles. Using their conversation as the movement’s moment of birth, BLM has its Sun (conscious identity), Mercury (communication), Jupiter (good fortune), and Mars (fighting) all in Cancer — considered the sign of women — with its Moon (emotional needs) in Virgo, the sign of service. According to an article published by Al Jazeera-America, the movement was sparked by the deaths of black men but is being led primarily by black women (Cancer) who are motivated by a desire to serve (Virgo) their kinfolk.

Jefferson Anderson says the mission of the Cancer/Virgo pairing is “to use your inner strength, compassion, and understanding to be of help, whether as a counselor, teacher, or concerned humanitarian.” (Source) That’s exactly what BLM’s leadership is doing: using the strength, compassion, and understanding they have built up from years of living within a systemically unjust society to counsel, help, and teach others about humanitarian issues that should be of concern to us all.

BLM’s stellium of planets in Cancer (sign of food, family, clan, and country) is opposed by Pluto (planet of power and purging) in Capricorn (sign of big business, big government). Cancer is renowned for its elephant like memory while most astrologers agree that Pluto in Capricorn is the astrological signature for both the police state and the corporate oligarchy. The BLM movement is thus fueled (Sun/Mars/Jupiter) by ancestral memories (Cancer) of abuse at the hands of an oligarchic police state (Pluto in Capricorn) whose roots go back hundreds of years.

Cancer is also the sign most likely to shed tears for friends and family in the here and now. Due to the highly disparate nature of our criminal justice system, a disproportionate number of BLM’s leadership have likely shed tears for loved ones abused and/or snatched away at the hands of the prison industrial complex — a deeply corrupted institution (Pluto in Capricorn) that is to their families what slavery, segregation, and Jim Crow were to their ancestors (Sun/Mars/Jupiter in Cancer).

BLM’s Venus (planet of love) is in Leo (sign of theater, drama, celebrity) and receives a trine (support) from Uranus (planet of radical breakthroughs). BLM’s protests often include radically dramatic forms of street theater while the movement has received lots of love (Venus) from celebrities (Leo) including Dave Chappelle, Lebron James, and Samuel Jackson.

The BLM chart has a conjunction (merger) between Saturn (planet of karma) and the North Node (point of destiny) in Scorpio (sign of death) in the 11th House of tribal consciousness. In his book Myth Astrology, Raven Kaldera associates Saturn in Scorpio with the myth of Cerridwen, a Celtic goddess who assists others by regenerating slain corpses in her cauldron. (Source) BLM obviously is not of the Celtic persuasion and obviously can not literally regenerate the bodies of those who have been unjustly slain. The movement has, however, certainly combined free speech, community organizing, and grass roots activism into a potent socio-political cauldron that has regenerated the spirit of the civil rights movement(s) of the 1950s and 60s — something recent events have made clear is needed now more than ever before.

Ladies of the Zodiac: It’s Showtime! (Astrology of the Feminine Asteroids)

(Photo Credit: Juergen Faelchle/Shutterstock)

The following is an 850 word excerpt from “Ladies of the Zodiac: It’s Showtime!”, a 4,500 word article on the astrology of the feminine asteroids that is one of the four features in our premier issue. It was written by Willow of Willow’s Web Astrology, republished with permission. -Matt

Introduction: The Feminine Asteroids

As a reflection of the patriarchal constructs of current human society, we deal in an astrological zodiac that is masculine-heavy, illustrating certain reinforced dynamics on the planet. Seven of the 10 major planets used in astrological analysis are considered masculine (the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto) with one (Mercury) considered neutral. Only the Moon and Venus are considered feminine. Important as those bodies are, this is still a whole lot of imbalance.

Women and the feminine influence are far more multi-dimensional and diverse than the loving, pleasing, and supportive mate (Venus), the mothering nurturer (Moon), or the vindictive, vixen/seductress version of the dark feminine.

We pick up some of the slack as far as the feminine influence in the zodiac with the feminine asteroids and dwarf planets.

The four major “secondary” bodies most often used in astrological charts – asteroids Juno, Pallas Athene, and Vesta, along with dwarf planet Ceres – are considered feminine, though these bodies most often play second fiddle to the planets, doing their thing with little recognition or fanfare in mainstream astrology.

An invisible feminine force doing its work from a disempowered position for much less than its due share of recognition, respect, and reward. Sound familiar?

As with the planets, these four bodies have ties to Greek and Roman mythology, which color their themes in astrological analysis.

Unfortunately, the men who created and furthered the mythology that is used in current-day astrology have missed about 50% of the story. They missed the herstory of the history, as they say.

Pictured above: the Hexagon prototype
“Ladies of the Zodiac: It’s Showtime” article in the Hexagon prototype

This missing feminine/female influence is apparent in Greek and Roman mythology as well as in much of the standard religious and spiritual imagery of the current day. We’re working with partial archetypal truth at best and straight up patriarchy-approved fabrication at worst, and we have to understand how detrimental these power-imbalanced units of cultural transmission can be.

The feminine bodies used in astrology have been saddled with an Old Boys Club mythology. There is widespread sexual violence, control, and misconduct toward women, among many other offenses, in the stories of those old Greek and Roman dudes. Women are most often in secondary roles with their stories told for them by males, through the male lens.

The threads of misogyny in the symbols and myths reflect current-day societies and structures where underlying hatred of and violence against women are woven right into the fabric. They simmer and poison, a little flicker visible here and there, until they are full-on confronted – repeatedly – and made wholly unacceptable by both men and women.

(The feminine force in men is also suppressed, oppressed, and damaged by the dynamics outlined in this article.)

Instead of carrying the half-truth, misogyny, and sexual violence of this mythology forward in astrological symbolism, it’s time to consciously address it, working the feminine energy free from the karmic weight of these myths.

By exposing this androcentric mythological misogyny, by adding a stronger and more fully-developed female perspective, and by calling the old “Gods” on their crap, we move beyond the old stories and dynamics, advancing an astrology that is more balanced, humane, just, relevant, and true-to-life.

As Saturn (structure) transits Sagittarius (religion, stories, truth) into December 2017, the time is ripe to open into new truth told through cultural symbols, where the experiences of women and the feminine aren’t filtered through a male-dominant lens.

Pictured above: the Hexagon prototype
“Ladies of the Zodiac: It’s Showtime” article in the Hexagon prototype

It’s time to carve a new path, shedding light on the domination/subjugation dynamics that are wrapped up so neatly in these mythological images.

Spiritual and religious paradigms past and present have whitewashed out much of the female influence, making it invisible and subservient. But as Saturn transits Sagittarius, it’s time to stand up, speak up, and add the full wisdom and knowledge of the feminine to the scene.

That wisdom and knowledge doesn’t necessarily come in the form of easily-swallowed, non-threatening Glittery Goddesses and Angels and Mermaids and Faerie Nymphs, either. (Much of that was designed to titillate males, anyway.)

The feminine wisdom and knowledge to be integrated is white hot and will shake things up considerably. It requires something of people. It makes people uncomfortable at times. It’s not about being pretty or demure or seductive.

It demands its rightful place – nothing more, nothing less.

Women are used to having to compete with each other for a limited number of spots, for a limited amount of influence.

With Saturn transiting Sagittarius over the next couple years, women will be working their way into full cultural and structural representation – or at the very least, into a full understanding of the detrimental feminine shortfall. As Saturn in Sagittarius builds to a trine to Uranus in Aries in December 2016, we have a chance to unravel these fabricated units of cultural transmission, breaking their spells once and for all.

The Goddesses are breaking out of their fairy tale nightmares. They’re tearing at the Technicolor blue skies, ripping up carefully-manicured, lime green lawns, tossing matches into the castles. They’re standing back as all of creation – the feminine and the masculine – comes spewing forth.

Pallas Athene: The Female Warrior Asteroid

The following is an 450 word excerpt from “Ladies of the Zodiac, It’s Showtime!”, a 4,500 word article on the astrology of the feminine asteroids that is one of the four features in our premier issue. It was written by Willow of Willow’s Web Astrology, republished with permission. -Matt

Pallas Athene: The Female Warrior Asteroid

The asteroid Pallas Athene is the female warrior, and this symbol indicates something for which we are willing to fight throughout our lives. It indi-cates how we fight — but in a less overt and obvious way than the male warrior symbol, Mars. This symbol is about the way the feminine fights, with its very own strategies, skills, and cunning. Pallas athene indicates battles that go on in the subtler realms and battles that involve strategy. This is also a symbol related to the battle for equality and justice between the sexes.

Pallas Athene was a woman who, according to the mythology, was born from the forehead of her father zeus wearing a full set of armor. There could be no doubt that she was a born warrior, and her skills in strategy, crafts, and combat were so impressive that she was accepted into the fold by the male warriors.

There was just one hitch: in order to be accepted as an equal, Pallas athene had to give up her sexuality and remain celibate, something that was not required of the male warriors.

The mythology of Pallas athene involves an element of female sexuality suppressed in order to be accepted amongst the men. There is a theme of women having their sexuality controlled by the established order and of women having to remain celibate in order not to threaten that established order.

The suppression of female sexuality in professions like military or police work is a Pallas athene theme. Rape against women in the military, a widespread problem, is another. According to an April 2014 lawsuit filed by service Women’s action network and Vietnam Veterans of America against the Veterans’ Administration, nearly 1 in 3 female U.S. soldiers is raped during her service. (Source) There are currently 200,000 active duty women in the U.S. military so that would mean nearly 66,000 of them have been raped during their service. A 1976 U.S. army Manual advised female soldiers that they should guard against being raped by “wearing comfortable clothing and shoes adaptable to running.” (Source) According to a recent Alternet article, “Inside the Military rape Cult”, “in 2010, the DoD found that 19,000 service members were sexually assaulted. (Source) Of those a paltry 3,100, or 13.5 percent, were reported, and of those only 17 percent were prosecuted.” (Source) The overwhelming majority of the 19,000 service members sexually assaulted were junior enlisted women under the age of 25. In 2012 the Pentagon estimated the number had risen from 19,000 to 26,000. (Source) Shockingly, female soldiers are far more likely to be raped by fellow service members than they are to be killed in combat by enemy fire. According to a 2012 Huffington Post analysis of data provided by the Pentagon, “a servicewoman was nearly 180 times more likely to have become a victim of military sexual assault in the past year than to have died while deployed during the last 11 years of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.” (Source)

Female soldiers who do come forward with accusations of rape are often harassed by male soldiers and intimidated by their higher-ups, discouraging the reporting of these crimes.

Themes of sexual violence against women as well as the suppression and control of female sexuality run through much of the Greek and roman mythology, reflecting the violent, patriarchal societies from which the stories came.

From Persephone being forcefully dragged off to the underworld by Pluto to Pallas athene having to take a vow of celibacy in order to do her work, many of the feminine bodies are connected to mythological themes of control, suppression, violence, and abuse, often along sexual lines.

Final week to pre-order your copy of Hexagon #2:

Hexagon #1 and Hexagon #2
Hexagon #1 and Hexagon #2

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