Hello community of /r/pagan! Your mostly friendly neighborhood moderator here, with a long overdue State of the Subreddit post.

First, hi! I'm Ryder, she/they, caffeine vampire, and feral ADHD gremlin. I've been some kind of witch for about 30 years and have identified as an eclectic pagan polytheist for the last decade. My user flair is my general flavor, but Hermes has never really cared about my label. I'm one of those "Do no Harm, Take no Shit" people. I have a degree in History with separate additions of Asian and Religious Studies. My day job includes yelling at actual bears.

I've been a moderator for this subreddit for almost 8 years. Yes, that is a long time, and for the last year or so it's almost exclusively been me active as my fellow mods got hit in the face with Life.

So my first announcement: /u/Epiphany432 has graciously sacrificed/volunteered herself for one of our open moderator positions. She's been active here and on our Discord for a while, and I'm excited to have her.

Second announcement: We're looking for more moderators, obviously. So, if you've been here a hot minute, have some community moderation experience, and are willing to wield a ban hammer against facists and bigots, please send the mod team a DM with your info. We'll likely internet stalk you, so please be honest. We're looking for a variety of pagan flavors, so please at least disclose that.

Third announcement: I'm going to be "overhauling" the subreddit rules and guidelines this week. "Be Decent" is apparently not specific enough for many of you. Among the edits I currently have is specific verbiage regarding suicide baiting and cultural appropriation, some examples of what is considered off-topic, and what we generally consider spam in regards to artists and craftsmen posting their work.

The rule about Discord servers will likely not change much, but with the addition of more mods to the subreddit we may be able to actually have servers vetted again. At this time if you want to promote a pagan-related Discord server, please talk to the mods on our Discord.

Fourth announcement: We're taking suggestions for anything about the subreddit. This can be for the sidebar, the Wiki, the weekly AUA that will hopefully be fixed, and anything else you want to comment on.

Some things on that though:

• This is a religious subreddit geared toward THEISTIC pagans. Specifically polytheistic pagans because for the longest time we were the minority voice in the pagan community. This subreddit, our sister Discord, and the moderators of both are not proponents of atheopaganism, and we never will be. Obviously you do you, but this space was specifically set up for us to get away from people that said we talked to imaginary friends in the sky. Sorry if this disappoints you.

• The definition we use of what we consider contemporary paganism will likely not change. This is both to define the community as well as acknowledge that the historical use of pagan to mean "not Christian" is not valid here.

• We're a religious subreddit, not an occult subreddit. I know lots of us follow a folk/witchcraft practice as well, but asking for help with spells and stuff is off-topic. Discussion of your practices is fine, but please stop asking how to hex your roommate and summon demons. There are better subreddits for that.

I've likely forgotten something, and if you'd like me to expand on a topic in the comments please ask.