Crystals - who are we fooling?

[icymist]

Am I the only pagan who feels a need to heal other people's crystals? I ask this because I have become increasingly concerned over the past few years at the (as I see it) unwarranted prominence given to crystals in so many new age and "pagan" publications. They seem to have become a sort of sacred cow of neo paganism. You know - the "a real pagan has shelves full of crystals" or "crystals were the secret power source of Atlantis" approaches. Well, sorry, but this is a load of crap. Let us stop for a moment and compare the romantic fantasy about crystals with the oh-so-unromantic reality.

The fantasy appears to work upon the sad belief that all crystals which are sold in new age shops, whether in their rough or polished state, have been collected from the banks of some long lost river in an untouched-by-Western-"civilisation" Amazonian rain forest paradise by a native shaman (what's one of those when he's at home?) in a between-the-worlds trance - which is about as realistic as the plot of a Barbara Cartland "novel".

The reality is that of a multinational mining company descending on the hitherto unspoilt Amazonian paradise, coercing the natives into cheap bonded labour and blasting "crystals" out of the earth with dynamite or high-pressure water hoses. These sad rock fragments are then transported down to the seaports, loaded in bulk onto a freighter, shipped to wholesalers in the western world, bought in bulk by the proprietors of new age shops and end up being plonked in to a box on the counter under the glare of spot lights. And then what happens? Some Sad Case of a new ager or neo-pagan comes into the shop, rummages through the box to find the prettiest bit of rock, takes it home, plonks it onto the table and demands "Heal me!!" Poor little bugger!

http://whitedragon.org.uk/articles/crystals.htm