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I'm a fifth level cleric with 32 hit points!!
Marc
A lot of it has to do with some shoddy research that many Neo-Pagans have claimed that turned out to be utterly false.
The biggest and most well known is the “Lost Coven” of New Forest that Gardner was supposedly inducted into in 1939 and used as his founding for modern Wicca.
Also Leland’s research for Aradia, a Gospel of the Witches and Margaret Murray’s work on the witches and Paganism during the Inquisition as also been show to be full of holes.
But more, modern, respectable & objective research has come out recently. Look up Triumph of the Moon… by… damn, I can’t remember the author. Once again, I’m at work and don’t have access to my library at home 
More later!
In my admittedly limited experience with this, I believe that the ones most radically against Wiccans/Pagans are the fundamentalist Christians, just as you said. Many people of that stripe are not just insecure about other faiths, their belief structure includes an openly hostile “We are at war,” footing against those faiths. This brand of fundamentalist believes that the pagans and Wiccans truly are in contact with the spirits just as much as the practitioners of those faiths do. The difference is, they labor under the impression that it’s Satan and his minions that these people consort with. Sometimes it’s because the big S has duped them by putting on a friendly face, and other times it’s because they are actively casting their lot in with the Devil against God. I think it’s less about insecurity than it is about having an active Enemy to fight against.
Satan, with reference to the “magic” he and Drain Bead share:
Absolutely. Do you remember my response to Doctor J regarding being asked to pray along with his patient’s family? Sometimes the simple, mundane thing is also the spiritually appropriate thing: – prayer for healing, whatever metaphysics you may have, benefits the believer by improving his/her mental state and will to recuperate.
What you two have, and Skulldigger and I share, is “magic” by the Tin Pan Alley use of the word – and I’m not sure they’re wrong! Maybe the Lovin’ Spoonful had a point to make, way back when.
Remember my post about being telepathic? I use the term, and mean it, although I’m perfectly well aware that what Chris and I did was simply to attune our mental processes so that we could follow each other’s trains of thought, emotional sequences, etc., nearly perfectly. But it sure as hell worked as functional telepathy, at the time.
God’s answer to prayer is often “I sent you two boats and a helicopter.” (I assume most people know the anecdote.) And maybe his answer to prayers for a gift of knowledge is, “I led you to the Straight Dope board, didn’t I?” – and for a gift of wisdom is, “I sent you Triskadecamus.” (Hmmm…would that mean the answer to “tongues” is bjOrn? ;))
As I noted to Sqrl on another thread, no Christian should have a big problem with animism per se – God’s spirit is, after all, everywhere. We’d just have a problem with (hypothetically)limiting Him to Nature – He’s involved in a lot more as well.
(Computer literate witch: "I don’t know why this incantation’s not working – I ran it through my spellchecker!! :D)
So where’s the problem? You want us to believe in the Craft on your say-so? Doesn’t work, any more than standard-issue Christian witnessing does. I know what Christians are called to do, and I work my hardest at doing it, day in and day out, online and elsewhere. What are witches supposed to do about others? Do it – maybe you’ll gain acceptance doing so. Wisdom is, after all, where you find it.
Pthallis, I couldn’t agree more. I think the peaceful enemy that many Fundamentalists have to face when looking at Paganism still is a form of insecurity. Why attack something that is basically non-threatening if one is secure about oneself. Pagans in general don’t prosthelitize. I assume the people who are radically against different ideas assume that the worst characteristics of their ideas and beliefs apply to all characteristics of those that are different. Prosthelitizing is one of those ideas. I have heard many a fundamentalist within my own family upon learning that I was a Pagan exclaim that I was going to corrupt their children with my radical beliefs. I have heard that from the gay side too. Woohoo. Luckily I really only hear it from one side of my family. They are pretty easy to ignore now. This is more evident with the gay side of my nature rather than my religious self, but both are pretty evident. I am sure that you have heard of the “gay recruitment theory” that fundamentalists take as gospel. I know of no gay people who were “recruited” to become gay by other people nor do I attempt to recruit anyone. It is just a horrible stereotype that exists out of ignorance. It really is the same with Paganism.
HUGS!
Sqrl
I ALWAYS think of it that way…LOL…for myself, it’s about ‘perceptions’…things I perceive as ‘magical’, the next person may think of as coincidence, or luck, etc…I perceive the joy, love, and laughter that you and Drain bead share to be ‘magical’…hence what I mean when I say I ‘see’ the ‘magic’ between you…
I also see it with a few other couples here…I love ‘seeing’ that…and the fact that I perceive it, to me is natural magic…I choose to see what I define as ‘magic’ in others…some people go about their whole lives never ‘seeing’ or noticing, oblivious to all the grace and ‘magic’ arounf them…that is their choice…and I would never impose my views upon their choices…
again, coming from MY personal belief system, yes, I agree that good vibes, mental health affect our physical bodies…regardless of medical facts, it makes logical sense to me, and again, I CHOOSE to believe it…maybe that choice makes it work for me…
[major hijack]
of course, to see magic in action, it would have required me + Lynard Skynard + their tour bus…
:: sigh ::
that would have truly been magical…:
:
…but I’m getttiing oooover it…::sniff::
and you are most welcome…like I said, I couldn’t HELP but notice 
you guys are great and I cried tears of joy at your engagment (see? told you I was a flake)…
[major suck-up]
and you must tell Drain Bead that Dylan says: Satan is a VERY attractive person and Satan is a very lucky guy.
[/major suck-up]
[/major hijack]
Satan wrote:
I guess it depends on your definitions of “magic” here. The definition I am using is the Hollywood/D&D version, and maybe that’s a shortcoming in myself.
This is going to sound weird, but if you want to do magic, you have to have believe you can do it. You simply can’t chant words and wave your arms and call it a spell. You have to really put your will power behind the working.
The only analogy that comes to mind is this; the local OTO temple (the order founder by Crowley) puts on a series of plays each Oct/Nov in our area, one for each day of the week for the planet/God associated with that day. These are all based on Crowley’s own work, The Rites of Eleyusis (my spelling is probably off on that. Sorry).
Anyway, each play is produced and interpreted from Crowley’s work, same words, but the setting is interpreted as per the director. The god associated with Wednesday is Mercury, the Trickster/Magician god. The director for the production of Wednesday/Mercury choose to do 1920s setting with Harry Houndini, his wife Beth and a few other sceptics. Harry gets a chance to debunk a faker, a charlatan. During this, the charlatan gets to “invoke/chant” a spell. From his chanting, he might as well had been reading names out of the phonebook rather than trying his hand at magic.
Later on, Harry, at the insistence of Lady Gemini, reads off the SAME spell. The effect is like night and day. The difference one felt was electric. Harry chanted the same words, but you could feel the magic he was invoking. The difference was one of intent.
I know, this was a stage production, not a real magical rite, but it explains the how magic works, how the necessity of intent and belief in one’s abilities is 50% of any magical working.
Yes, the whole thing is totally subjective, but it is real nonetheless. Let me draw a comparision. How “real” are you emotional states? You’ve been caught in the joy or anger of a moment, it felt real to you. But could such a thing be objectively measured?
In my salad days I spent some time as a Wiccan, or at least as a person very interested in Wicca, but ended up being utterly turned off by the sort of “shoddy research” you mention above. I just could not stomach hearing some pagans make ridiculous claims about their rituals being handed down unchanged from the Middle Ages (or even the Stone Age!). I had previously thought that only Fundamentalist Christians made such obviously false religion-inspired claims about history. Learning that this was not the case was one of many experiences that helped to turn me off of all religion altogether.
I hope I don’t seem as though I am singling out pagans for abuse here. Certainly many pagans do not make false claims about history, while there are many members of other religons who do. It bothers me just as much when non-pagans do it.
Hi Dark Rose, welcome! What a sprited debate resulting from one’s first post! Outstanding!
Why are witches/wiccans/pagans viewed as evil? Do you mean by the “general public?” Probably because of media hype, and because most people view the misunderstood or not-understood-at-all with fear and mistrust. Fear will sometimes blossom into hatred or cruelty.
Lots of non-mainstream religions get slammed in the popular media, because it is their job to enflame, excite & get ratings. Remember the flap over the practice of Santoria in NY? Wade Davis has done some great work in the field of anthropology, but his name is known by most people because of his book “The Serpent & The Rainbow”, later made into a film with Bill Pullman. The serious aspects of his work in Haiti are lost in the “zombie” hype.
I am a member of a group normally viewed by the uninitiated and/or uninformed with mistrust or derision. Fuck 'em. I know who I am, and maybe I’m not vocal about it in certain circles, but I am damn proud anyway.
You go girl, the world needs a LOT more open-minded souls.
::applause::
Spoke: speaking as a Christian, i have absolutely no problem with wiccans, and have reccomended neopaganism to those who could not “find” any other faith. And those Biblical injunctions agaist 'witches" stems from a translation problem, as the word 'witch" did not even excist until some 1500, way after the Bible was written. A Biblical “witch” is one who has “a familiar spirit”, ie a demon, etc at their beck & call. This would not apply to wiccans, even those who call themselve “witches”, and would not even apply to those who are “satanist-witches”, as they really have no “familiar spirits” at all. In fact, afaik, the last real biblical “witch= with familiar spirit” was the “witch of Endor”. There is somewhere a verse which condemns “false soothsayers”, which I would put some 90% of modern witches in.
Blessedwolf: No, the word “witch” was coined in about 1500 to mean specifically a person who called on demons & the devil. Wicca has existed about 200 years, so you are 300 years off.
Opalcat: you are absolutely right, and I apologize- there are many wiccans/neopagans who do NOT refer to themselves as 'witches", I was referring only to those who did. But those who DO, reflect on those who do not, unfortuately.
Satan: indeed, you did BBQ me to a “crackly-crunch” in the PIT, which is where, Folks, we should take the thread of “Christian bashing”.
Could you please enlighten me as to your source for the ‘fact’ that Wicca has been in existence for 200 years?
I really am seriously interested in where you found that.
Gerald gardner (1883>1964)was, for all intents & purposes, the father of modern “wicca’. Prior to him, there were a few “neo-druids” in England, around the 1800’s. I quote from “The Ancient & Shining Ones”, DJ Convay, llewellyn1993 “it is fairly obvious from Kelly’s research, however much modern Witches would like to beleive in a direct link to Stone age ritual, ther is no evidence of a tie to any 'ancient & authentic” way of worship.”
It is really a well known fact that wicca/neopaganism is a quite new religion, with some roots to the 19th century, and of course a great respect to as much of the "old ways’ as they can reconstruct.
Thank-you Daniel.
I’m about to show a Christian that he has the history of Wicca wrong, we didn’t exist before 1939.
Daniel: you’ve got your facts a bit skewed. There’s no evidence of Wicca existing before 1939. I’ve done the research and if you can show the existence of a coven or organized (neo)Pagan group before then, I’d like to know about it. Please go back and see my reference about Jeffrey Russell’s book.
He includes an interesting history of pre-Gardner research into Paganism. In the first 1/3 of the 19th century, folks were getting the idea that withcraft and those who were persecuted for it were practicing this old pagan religion.
Now, there are rumors of family traditions, old families carrying on fragments of old pagan ritual and tradition, but finding one of those and getting them to answer questions is as hard as getting into a traditional witches esbat. 
This is the classic example of chicken and egg. In order to believe in magic, I have to see that it is so. In order to see that it is so, I have to believe in magic. If by “magic” you mean something mundane like “energizing a crowd” then sure, I believe in that, although I don’t believe there is any supernatural agent responsible. If you mean something along the lines of divination, curses, good luck charms, not to mention manifestly affecting the physical realm by the power of spells, then I have to take a pass I’m afraid.
Gardnerian Wicca is, I’ll admit, the primary source of Wiccan Renaissance, but it draws (albeit liberally) from numerous traditions, some, though not all, dating back as far as the Iron Age, and possibly before (check out some of Cunningham’s works).
Ptahlis, it depends on what you mean by magick. For a practicing Druid, magick is the embodiement of the spirit in animate and inanimate objects. I see all things in life as living and containing deity therefor magick. To see proof all you have to do is look around you. There are plants, animals, and minerals in existence that you can interract with therefor they are magick.
Then there is cinematic magick (from the movies). That is magick that shows direct effects like fireballs and telekineses originating from an individual. I believe that this type of magick exists but humans have no control over it really. A lightning bolt can be explained scientifically and I believe in its existence. I think that is magick as it falls under the animistic belief set forward previously. Do I believe that people can create this by the will of mind alone, no. Insofar as it doesn’t involve making some type of mechanical device to produce one. I believe the scientific principles behind lightning and other natural wonders. We are part of the divine afterall. We should be able to figure out things like that in a way that is meaningful to us. It may just take time. That is also magick.
Last of all there is stage magic (notice the absence of the k). It is the magic that a performer does on stage. He and performs mind-bending puzzles and other types of illusions. This is only magick (with a k) insofar that everything he does manipulates the divine but I would not really consider it magick in the way the illusionist is trying to get you to think. It is more of a trick rather than a practice of divinity.
Of the first two types of magick and their effect on the spiritual realm, you really have a misled approach to the way spells work. A spell is basically a ritualized prayer and the effect of the prayer is to formally put a task into motion. In a spell, you say your will (you need to put emotions behind it because it helps solidify your future actions) and then you muster up enough energy to go out and do it yourself. It works just like prayer but usually has more ritual attached to it. Some people see procrastination as an act against a spell, I see the spell as a cure for procrastination. It is not magickal in the sense that it miraculously affects the real world like in the movies. It is magickal though because it is simply an aid to help one help one’s self. As an animist, any act conceived is divine. Even non-action is divine.
Does that help clarify the concept?
HUGS!
Sqrl
Just to add in, for the benefit of those who have never encountered it, (Arthur C.) Clarke’s Third Law:
And Harry Turtledove’s Corollary:
Yes, it does. Your beliefs are far more reasonable than those who claim more ‘cinematic’ powers. Thanks Sqrl.