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How witches took over Tumblr in 2017

How witches took over Tumblr in 2017

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The rise of witchblr was a response to a year in which nothing made sense

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Image: Polydor

In February, Lana Del Rey decided to put a hex on the president.

This was a month before she debuted the trailer for her album Lust for Life — a two-and-a-half-minute short film about how she recedes into her home (in the middle of the H in the Hollywood sign) to practice witchcraft and figure out what her “contribution to the world should be in these dark times.” Fans on Tumblr had long considered Lana a witch, mostly just based on her general aesthetic and some garden-variety pop-culture conspiracy theories. But she spent the early part of the year embracing the idea, and being welcomed with open arms.

In July, Pitchfork dubbed her “the pagan pop star,” and when NME asked her if she really followed through with her plan to hex Trump, she said, “Yeah, I did it. Why not? Look, I do a lot of shit.” She explained her interest in witchcraft in vague, poetic terms: “Your thoughts are very powerful things, and they become words, and words become actions, and actions lead to physical changes. I really do believe that words are one of the last forms of magic, and I’m a bit of a mystic at heart.” The event blew up on Tumblr, where witchcraft enthusiasts GIF’d her alongside other famous witches, proclaimed her “the new Supreme,” and churned out a stream of original artwork. One fan posted instructions for combining quartz, rose water, and agate stones to rejuvenate the skin and appear as magical as Lana herself.

2017 was a huge year for internet witches, even outside this brush with the entertainment news cycle. The witchcraft community, or “witchblr,” was ranked the 11th largest community on Tumblr for 2017, in the platform’s annual compendium of its most popular memes, fandoms, topics, and groups. The top 10 communities had all been on the list before, but this was the first year witches charted. Beyond the cult of Lana, why was this year in #witchblr so big?

Tumblr content insights manager Amanda Brennan offered some speculation, telling The Verge in a phone call, “As people are dealing with the political climate and watching the world feel like it’s falling apart, a lot of them are drawn to finding this deeper connection with the physical world, and this idea of magic being something that exists outside of them, but that they can have a little bit of control or influence over.”

She says a lot of the growth in the #witchblr tags can be read as reactionary, particularly when it comes to Tumblr users who are embracing witchcraft as a hobby, rather than a strictly religious practice. “It’s like ‘Uh, I feel like I can’t do anything. I’m calling my senators, and it doesn’t do anything. Let me take some time, focus on what part of the world I can control, and take a little piece of my narrative back through this idea of magic.’”

The top #witchblr posts of the year, according to data compiled by Brennan, included explainers and instructional guides to candles, crystals, teas, curses, and palm reading. Much of the community’s growth is, unsurprisingly, coming from people who want to learn about witchcraft and are looking for a good place to break into the community. Master posts that aggregate tarot tips, spells, DIY projects, literary resources, and religious history into one enormous text are also wildly popular.

Rae, a 19-year-old witchblr blogger from Michigan, told The Verge via Tumblr direct message, “I think the community is best at helping each other, as cheesy as it may be. [E]veryone, in my experience, has been very kind and helpful. As a baby witch, I would reach out for advice, and others wouldn't hesitate to help me learn.”

Also among the top posts: plenty of “emoji spells,” a genre of self-help that Tumblr promoted during its “Post It Forward” mental health awareness project in May. Emoji spells are just artful combinations of emoji that are “charged” when you “like” them and “cast” when you reblog them. (My personal favorite genre of witchblr post is emoji spells intended to protect net neutrality.) They’re fun, though their connection to real witchcraft is obviously nonexistent. Like Del Rey’s flowery prose about thoughts and vibrations, they’re an embrace of an aesthetic, rather than a rigorous practice with cultural and religious significance.

they’re an embrace of an aesthetic, rather than a rigorous practice with cultural and religious significance

Brennan says she doesn’t see much of a clash between disparate intentions and backgrounds in the witchblr community on-platform, though she’s aware it’s often discussed on outside blogs and podcasts. She certainly remembers a late 2015 controversy referred to as “boneghazi,” during which a debate about the harvesting of human remains nearly destroyed witchblr entirely. But in 2017, she sees the community’s renewed popularity happening alongside the rise of “wholesome memes,” a genre of internet language and artwork that contrasts the severe, alienating irony of the broader internet with outpourings of sticky-sweet sincerity. “It’s all about good energy and helping each other out,” she explains. “As wholesome memes rose, so did this idea of using the magic around or within you to lift other people up, as well as yourself.”

That’s all well and good, and much better than trends you could name on other platforms this year. But Araceli, a 20-year-old witchblr blogger from Spain, told The Verge via Tumblr that she worries about how white and American-centric the community can be. “The witchblr community appropriates non-white cultures (Native American, Yoruba, Hindu, Caribbean, Romani, and so on) and comes up with a lot of shitty excuses for that.” She still participates in witchblr because she can see it’s trying to get better, and says there are plenty of blogs focused on making people of color more visible.

She’s also concerned about the fact that some younger witches don’t bother to understand the history of witchcraft, even if she doesn’t necessarily disapprove of their general intentions. “We feminists have created this figure of a nature-oriented, possibly queer, sorority-centered witch that was burned not [because] of their magic, but [because] they defied the norms. That may have been the case, but at least in Spain, the Inquisition’s archives show another profile — poor, outcast, old women who defied religious authority and tried to make money out of scamming their neighbors. Some believed their magic was real, some didn't, but most of them used it to get financial stability.”

“it’s this kind of exploration of what is inside of you, and what things you can do to take control of one little piece of your life.”

Though she could rattle off plenty of misconceptions about the history of witchcraft and paganism, she interrupts herself and concludes, “Honestly, who cares? These were women who burned for resisting conventionalities and displaying non-conventional, non-patriarchal religious beliefs. And we’re their heirs.” She loves the jokes, memes, and “Millennial humor” of witchblr, and thinks the spells that circulate there are “cute” — like a book of recipes handed down by your grandmother, except they’re all for “sacred lavender bread” or anti-anxiety solutions.

It’s easy to see what Araceli is worried about when it comes to the centrality of white, American cultural interests. Witchblr accounts that look an awful lot like glossy lifestyle blogs are common. They’re often centered around collectible (expensive) crystals, or the idea of the “kitchen witch,” which Brennan describes as “very self care.” The most popular kitchen witch posts are photo sets of herbs, tea, or food, characterized by soft lighting and appealing, Instagram-ready still-lifes. These posts get tons of notes because they intersect with other popular communities on Tumblr, like photography, cooking, and interior design.

On top of the cultural connotations, many of these posts are full of things that cost money. But Brennan argues that, as with studyblr — an enormous community that has sprung up around study tips and academic ambition — pristine arrangements and expensive accessories are secondary to conversation and shared knowledge. Again, self-help is huge. “There are tons of master posts that are like, little everyday things you can do to feel this power,” she explains. “A lot of it is like ‘Come up with a mantra and say it every day.’ That doesn’t cost any money, and it’s very low lift, a low barrier to entry. Maybe it’s not as traditional as other things, but it’s this kind of exploration of what is inside of you, and what things you can do to take control of one little piece of your life.”

For an outsider, the appeal of witchblr looks a lot like the appeal of any other community on the women-dominated social platform. The Tumblr posts look cool. The contributors are talented and funny. This kind of camaraderie is rare on the internet. There are thousands of notes on simple text posts like “everybody thinks you’re kinda creepy and cool when you say you’re a witch until they see you collecting water under the rain and screaming at a jar,” or “pros of drinking tea: it tastes good, warms the soul, magical. cons: i’ve peed 15 times today.” The way reblogs work in the witchblr community is reminiscent of the way email chains functioned inside middle school friend groups once upon a time, and they have the goofy allure of a slumber party ritual. For example, in the last week, 17,000 people have liked or reblogged a photo of a tarot card with a pink candle, captioned, “Reblog this within 30 seconds in order to receive luck in your efforts for romance, assistance in your relationships, and/or to help [ease] conflict in your current relationship.”

Bella, an 18-year-old blogger from New York, told The Verge via Tumblr, “I think this year in particular, some of our posts reached people that had no idea this community even existed, and who wanted to learn more … I think the community is best at providing a place for people to learn about and experience witchy things without it being so serious.”

In a disorienting political year, Tumblr users practiced their studied witchcraft — or sweet, sloppy approximations of magic — both to protect their hearts and minds, and to confront the things that frighten them. Amid all the self-help efforts, witchblr frequently congregates to decide what to do about President Trump, with posters offering screwball suggestions, real curses, and commiseration over the fact that they’ve failed so far. There was a lot to be afraid of in 2017 and plenty of reasons to look for a space that was simultaneously as beautiful and charmed as a daydream and as dark as our frames of mind.

“We're broke and we're tired,” Araceli says. “But we're trying.”