Gnosis Diary: Life as a Heathen

My personal experiences, including religious and spiritual experiences, community interaction, general heathenry, and modern life on my heathen path, which is Asatru.

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Heathen Visibility Project 2024 Year in Review

Posted by on in Paths Blogs

Heathen Visibility Project artists had to decide whether to continue to make and share art, including Project art, in the face of the cesspool of genAI slop invading art spaces with images "generated" via near-universal data theft by so-called "AI" companies. (Generative AI is neither generative nor AI. It merely digests the creative output of human beings and regurgitates average output.)

Many artists have stopped sharing art online, and have taken down their already existing galleries. I too stopped making certain kinds of art. However, since the purpose of the Heathen Visibility Project is to provide free images for editorial use, I have made some Project photos this year. I hesitated to load any more art to my Deviantart because it's not only awash in AI slop but has added features for making the crap. Nonetheless, I do have an established gallery with followers there, and I decided to go ahead and load one Project image there: a photo from the Swords and Swimming ritual. You can see it on this link:

 https://www.deviantart.com/erinlale/art/Swords-Asatru-summer-ritual-1073234630 

Whenever we appear in public with our symbols and rituals in a positive way, including both on the net and in person, we're contributing to a positive view of Asatru and Heathen people, groups, and religion.

However, when any of our symbols appear in public in a bad way, it subtracts from the total goodwill towards every one of us. This year a traditional Icelandic Magic symbol used by many Heathens, the Vegvisir, appeared on police body cam video of the murder of Massey. The Wild Hunt covered the issue and quoted The Troth's official statement. You can read the Wild Hunt's article here: https://wildhunt.org/2024/07/heathen-imagery-appears-during-video-of-fatal-shooting-of-a-black-woman.html 

The genAI problem only got worse throughout the course of the year. It could have been a passing fad like NFTs if the megacorporations had not burned money, water, and ultimately uranium to shove genAI into everything. The internet has been poisoned with lies and search is no longer a reliable source of information. Entire industries are collapsing, including mine, small press and indie publishing. I tried to wait for the genAI fad to blow over but instead it was fed until it is eating the world. At this point it is clear those jobs are not coming back and I have to move on to something else. 

I feel that there is no longer any point in making Heathen Visibility Project images, since the public has rightly decided to disbelieve everything they see on the net. I don't plan to make any more. If anyone else would like to continue, of course, they are welcome to do so. The Project was never about me, but about the entire community. 

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Erin Lale is the author of Asatru For Beginners, and the updated, longer version of her book, Asatru: A Beginner's Guide to the Heathen Path. Erin has been a gythia since 1989. She was the editor and publisher of Berserkrgangr Magazine, and is admin/ owner of the Asatru Facebook Forum. She also writes science fiction and poetry, ran for public office, is a dyer and fiber artist, was acquisitions editor at a small press, and founded the Heathen Visibility Project.

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