Auction Outrage

This story goes back several years…
There is an auction site that I have sold at, off and on for many years. (The site will remain nameless, since I don’t want to get sued for defamation.) I did well there, selling handcrafted items and used goods. Being that I am part of an online Pagan community, and I had made custom items for several people there, I decided to try to make and sell some Pagan oriented items on the auction site. I thought it would be all well and good until I made a post asking about the items. I got told everything from “put them under a different ID” to “That devil filth shouldn’t be sold”. Well, I sold some of the items, even though I was dismayed at some of the responses that I received. That’s when things started to get ugly.

Posts were made to the site’s message boards by people that were boycotting my auctions because I carried Pagan items. I also received many nasty e-mails from people saying that they would never buy from me again because I sold “satanic” and “devil” merchandise. I lost a lot of business on my non-religious items because of that. But that wasn’t the worst part…

I started getting e-mails from customers, asking me not to leave them feedback on items they had bought from me. I couldn’t understand why. Then I got e-mails from people saying that they were losing business! Many of the people on the site who bought, were also sellers, and the people that were against me selling my Pagan items, also stopped doing business with sellers who had purchased from me!

I wish I still had the e-mails, and the first article I wrote about this event. I had quotes from some of the people. It was enough to make anyone sick. At any rate, I pulled all my items and left the site for quite some time, hoping things would settle down in my absence. I started selling there again just recently, and I was appalled. There are almost no Pagan/Wiccan items being sold on the site anymore. There are very few items for “alternate” religions at all. And what’s worse, the message boards were filled with Christian this, and Christian that, and a slew of posts full of hate and discrimination. I wanted so badly to post, and say something about all the hate and evil that they were promoting, but fear caused me to stay quiet. I need to make sales to pay my bills. I knew full well that if I opened my mouth, I’d be out of business before I even began.

Most of the boards got pulled on the site, but some of the radicals took it upon themselves to bring their “opinions” over to the Seller’s boards, and start all over again. It’s not quite as bad now, but it’s still there. Obviously some people complained to Customer Service and got the boards pulled, and now and again I see people complaining that threads from the Seller’s area have been removed, but it’s not stopping them. Not only are they preaching religious intolerance, racism, and hate toward people of alternative sexual orientations, they are tearing down every member who dares to speak against them. I know that a lot of people are leaving the site. Honestly, if I thought my items would sell anywhere else, I’d probably leave too. I used to love the site, and I had made a lot of good acquaintances there, but it’s become a horrible, scary place in the last few years.

Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate Christians. Like every group out there though, there are some really rotten apples that spoil the name of the whole bunch. This auction site has some of the worst I have ever seen. Some people go so far in their “beliefs”, that they don’t realize they are doing just what they tell others not to do. What ever happened to “Love thy neighbor”? What happened to “God loves everyone”? Some of these people are such zealous radicals, they are tearing the world apart. Anyone who does not agree with them either has to leave, or shut up and try to slink by unnoticed. Either way, it’s bad for business. And they have spread their hate and intolerance to other boards, particularly ones that allow them to swear, and completely tear down and degrade people. And here I used to think Christians didn’t believe in swearing. Guess I was wrong.

This is one of the many issues that I think needs to be addressed. In a public place, and a business place at that, these kinds of things should not be allowed. I keep praying that the site I have mentioned will ban the problematic people, but instead they hurt everyone by removing boards, and only add fuel to the fire by removing posts. They should have a strong banning policy. If the people that do this were shown that it will not be tolerated, they would move on, and maybe some of them would actually learn that talking like that is wrong. Saying that entire races or religions need to be killed off, or thrown out of the country is disgusting at best. If they want people that agree with their insane, zealot mentalities, they should go to a religion board, not spew their hate in a business venue on public boards.

**UPDATE**

The site mentioned in this article has now closed. I’m not surprised, nor am I all that upset. I heard tell that the boards were out of control, business was bad, and the company was having too many issues and too few profits. Hopefully other sites learned something from this site’s fiasco, and will make sure to keep religious hate out of the businessplace.

Tags: auction, auction outrage, auction site, boards, business, dark, hate, items, message boards, pagan, pagan items, people, people saying, pulled, radicals, religious, site, site mentioned, sold, wiccan

Since this subculture section is going to include the content from another site I used to run, I thought you might want to read the mission statement we had for HAVEN. I think it will give you a good idea why we started that site, and why we have decided to integrate it here.

What is HAVEN/Why was HAVEN created?

HAVEN (Haven Alliance: Virtual Enlightenment Network) was created because I have seen too much hate and discrimination in my short time on this earth. People are ridiculed, belittled, and made to feel useless and “dirty”, because they do not follow a “majority” way of thinking. Being one of the “minority” myself, I decided to start this site, and try to make at least some small difference in this world. Even if all this site and its board succeed in doing is giving a few people of “alternate” faiths and orientations a place to come and hang out and feel safe, then I’ve accomplished something. I may not be able to change the world, but if enough people join and make their voices heard, WE can change the world, one piece at a time.

HAVEN is a site/board system created to allow people of varying faiths, races, sexual and gender orientations to come together, learn from one another, and find support. I hope that this will enable people to learn, find acceptance and understanding, and find our common bonds. People today separate themselves under so many labels, “Pagan”, “gay”, “black”, “sanguinarian”… We are breaking ourselves into ever-smaller groups, and making it that much easier for the right-wing majority to cut us down. I want to gather people from all walks of life together, and hopefully help people realize that the only way we are ever going to get anything changed, is if we all stand together, as one united force against the opposition. Small groups are easy to target and destroy, but if we all stand together, we form a wall that’s a hell of a lot harder to knock down.

We may all be different, but we all face a lot of the same issues. Hate, prejudice, violence… They don’t care what you look like or what you do in your bedroom. They will find you. It’s universal. Every one of us who does not follow the cookie-cutter mentality of the majority is a target. We are all walking targets for hate crimes, prejudice, lost jobs, lost friends, suffering and poverty. We all get sick, we all bleed, we all die. I for one will not just lay down and wait for the axe to fall. I’m well aware of the fact that making this site, posting on the boards, and speaking my mind is going to make me a prime target. I know that one day I may well die for what I believe is right. But to me, it’s better to die trying than to just sit back in my safe little corner and let it happen. The internet can provide anonymity for those who want it, so people who come here will not need to fear. If you have the guts to post your real name, feel free. If you’d rather not, that’s fine too. But I hope that you will at least speak up, even if it is without a name, and show others that they are not alone. Tell of your experiences, voice your feelings on various issues, and provide support for those that need it. Do not let the world come crashing down around your ears without a fight.

Tags: change world, die, faiths, hate, haven, learn find, majority, mission statement, orientations, people, prejudice, site, site board, stand together, target