ElsaElsa.com » Blog Archive » Prejudice! Avoiding Being Oppressed By Astrology Or Using It To Oppress Others

Feb
5

Prejudice! Avoiding Being Oppressed By Astrology Or Using It To Oppress Others

Dear Elsa,

In recent years I found myself more and more believing in astrology.

Someone said to me once that my horoscope had its peculiarities, not necessarily good ones, and showed me why on a chart. From that moment on, I started to look at how other people’s charts too.

On and off, this is something I value as a fine tool to know more about me and the world I’m in. That said, I never really got into the theory in itself, and never learned how to properly read a chart or anything. All I look for are the coincidences, you know.

Now what worries me is the following: Bluntly put, I think I have developed a nasty “need” to know who has what zodiacal sign before I make my mind about her/him. I never forget a birthday (not for the reasons the others think). I develop sympathies and aversions chiefly based on the prejudice of knowing people’s zodiacal signs and charts. I am an avid reader and a wannabe writer and a art lover, and now I can’t fall in love with a writer or artist unless I know his/her zodiacal sign.

Such prejudices are largely based on my own experience, on how certain signs or planet positions are good or bad to me - so they shouldn’t strictly be called prejudices. Nonetheless, probably because I don’t really see Astrology as a science (because I don’t know what the real rules behind it are), I feel like I am becoming a “victim” of astrology, so to speak, because I can’t make my mind about things without it anymore.

So I am asking you, Elsa: how can someone aware of astrology avoid the risk of judging people wrongly and with prejudice?

Astrology Student
Italy

zodiac horosope Dear Student,

I think experience solves this problem. For example, when I hear someone say “I don’t like Aquarians,” I take it as a sure sign of ignorance. How can a person say that? Have they met all the Aquarians?

There are Aquarians with their Sun in the 8th house, or the 3rd house, or the 5th. There are Aquarians with Saturn conjunct their Sun, Uranus conjunct their Sun, Pluto opposing, etc. There are also Aquarians who have their Sun as part of a stellium in the sign, while others have just their Sun in Aquarius and perhaps five other planets in… Pisces!

So invariably a person with a prejudice is going to eventually meet the anomaly to whatever their hard line is. Oh my! This Virgo / Taurus / Gemini, etc, is fascinating! And here I thought they all sucked!

And they may stay right there for a week, or for ten years. I hear this all the time. “I hate all Scorpios, except this one…” But if they continue to advance, the hard line will continue to blur. And this is true, period. It’s not exclusive to astrology. This is true of all prejudice and I’ll give you an example:

My first husband was a homophobe and boy was I shocked when I found out. This was about 20 years ago and I was talking to my gay friend Ben all the time. In fact, I went to visit him right after I got married and my husband just couldn’t figure it out. “Why are you friends with a fag?” he asked.

Well I thought that was just stupid. I thought it was ridiculous. I wouldn’t even answer this and over the course of some months, Ben won my husband’s respect. And about a year later, my husband met this lesbian. Uh huh. She kicked his butt on the pool table (he’s a master) and those two are best friends to this day - 20 years later!

So this can happen. It happens all the time to the intelligent and open minded and you can expedite this process by not attaching yourself to hard line statements, like “I hate anyone with Moon square Pluto” and here is why:

zodiac planets When a person makes a statement like that… it is human nature to defend it! They have judged something (good or bad) and announced their conclusion and no one likes to be wrong, do they? So once they make their statement they enforce it even as the ground is melting beneath them.

And you could counteract this by saying. “I have never met a Virgo I like, but I am only 35 and I am sure I will…” Because here’s the other thing…

We all have all the energies to one degree or the other. And if you boil this down… to me, it is a matter of humility. If you are sufficiently humble then you know you have not met all the Aquarians/Virgos/Scorpios, etc. and you would never in your wildest dreams imagine yourself equipped to judge them all even if you did!

Thanks for posting. This was a great question and I hope others will weigh in…

~~
Have a question? Need advice? Ask here!

Interested in a personal consultation? Click here for more info…

Advice, Astrology, Astrology in Real Life, Astrology, bigotry, lgbt, philosophy,

| Posted at 4:00 am

8 Responses to “Prejudice! Avoiding Being Oppressed By Astrology Or Using It To Oppress Others”

Don says on 2/5/07 at 6:11 am:

astrology as a control type defense mechanism to avoid intimacy with others and self - Yes ! done that extensively ….
and it is not just astrology that can be used this way - all experience reduced to knowledge becomes like this ….
Crazy Moon says on 2/5/07 at 7:43 am:

Dear Student: Some month’s ago I performed a small investigation: all the people born like my 5 october 1966. Please watch what I found:
Some preachers and extreme religious, a senator woman in USA, a councilman in Spain, a cyclist who travels England photographing birds. An North European Porn star (wow!). Some musicians - simphonic and instrumental. A fireman who died the 9/11 saving lives. A maratonisth policeman, died while working. A murderer in prison waiting for sentence. … and I, a psychologist in Argentina…
Viviana says on 2/5/07 at 8:09 am:

True, Don.
As an aquarius rising, i like seing the world through astrology, or any other system i’m interested in at the time, and it does work as an intimacy blocker and it’s a reducing way to relate to people, even if that’s not the intention.
This has also happened to me when i learned about personality theories, I saw the world and the people through that lenses. I think it’s part of the learning process, once it’s innate you let go, and also of course, by that time, have already had enough experience to not have prejudice.
I think it’s part of the process and doesn’t last. The more intensily you go into astrology, the faster you’ll be through with the worst consequences of learning it. I go intensily into this sort of thing and then spend a year or two seeing the world through it.
I do sometimes day i don’t like scorpio moons, that doesn’t mean i don’t like people with scorpio moons, I actually do because they tend to like me, so it comes easy, but once you realize it is an energy /archetype and not people, you get a litle more free.
I still feel insecure to date people with sun signs that I know aren’t compatible with me, but this is also because experience has taught me this. But since I’ve met people that astrologically would be ideal for me, and that hasn’t happened anyway, I let go of it, “nothing’s going to work anyway” so why not enjoy whatever temporary moments life throws my way.
Strawberry Fields says on 2/5/07 at 10:43 am:

Dear Astrology Student,

You ask “how can someone aware of astrology avoid the risk of judging people wrongly and with prejudice?”

Perhaps the answer lies right there in your question.

Why are you ~judging~ people anyway?

Perhaps using astrology to attempt to ~understand~ people might be a better use?

Just a thought.
Strawberry Fields says on 2/5/07 at 11:07 am:

I want to add a personal story.

It is generally believed that if one person’s Planet X is aspected a certain way with another person’s Planet Y, it means these two people should just steer clear of each other because they will always fight.

I’ve done a check and by golly, found this to be true in my life. Half a dozen people from my past had this planetary combo with me. And we did clash. And these people are no longer in my life.

HOWEVER!! Guess what? My very-best-friend-EVER has that same aspect with me — and we are so smooth and easy and everything good, together. I have known her some twenty-odd years and we DON’T fight or clash.

The lesson? If I had known astrology back then and used astrology to weed out people, yes, I would have weeded out all those other people who ‘didn’t work out’. But I would also have weeded out the MOST PRECIOUS PERSON IN MY LIFE.

So. I still keep in mind the danger for me of ‘people with Planet X in aspect to my Planet Y’. I’m definitely gonna keep that on my radar, because, yes, experience *has* demonstrated it *is* a red flag. But I will NOT use this criteria ~alone~ as the basis for excluding anybody.
Uncle Hanita says on 2/5/07 at 12:42 pm:

A very good lesson. I agree with the projection thing. If you say you dislike an energy, sign or potential type of energy it’s probably safe to say that you dislike something so intensely within yourself that you reject it, projecting it onto others as a way to deal with it. I know I’ve done that. Oye vey! It’s hard to avoid these patterns.

Good luck y’all…
june says on 2/5/07 at 1:08 pm:

Thanks for covering this, elsa.
Strawberry Fields says on 2/5/07 at 4:28 pm:

This comment is somewhat off-topic but I thought some people who read here might be interested in Pat Paquette’s article of Feb. 4, 2007 - “Tricks of the trade”.

http://pisces-chronicles.blogspot.com/

She also had a couple of great articles on Michael Lutin’s book, SunShines. See Jan 13, “Adventures on the path to fulfillment”, and “Sunshine Astrology”, Dec. 22.

Overall, an astrologer worth reading, and lots of very knowledgeable commenters, for those who want to learn.