Talk:New Age/Archive 10

This is an archive of past discussions about New Age. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 5

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Archive 8

Archive 9

Archive 10

Spiral Dynamics

The question has been raised as to whether this is a new age movement or not. The involvement of Wilber and the integration of Spiral Dynamics (Beck) into the Integral Movement would seem to indicate it is. However the category "new age" has seen a few attempts to remove it, the latest of which is today. The views of other editors with specialist knowledge here would be appreciated.--Snowded ^TALK 18:21, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

The argument is transparently ridiculous. The book Spiral Dynamics is a business book written by Beck and Cowen. Ten years later, Wilber adopted the ideas. Wilber's adoption of the ideas does not magically transform the ideas or the book into New Age ideas. I would appreciate it if User:Snowded would stop wasting my time with absurdities. — goethean ॐ 22:27, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

You have an opinion Goethean which is fine, but you need to calm down a bit. The split in the Spiral Dynamics movement means that there are two entities at least, one (now the better known) is clearly New Age (and more or less labeled as such by Cowen), the other probably not. We had a similar issue on the Integral Movement where you gave a similar intemperate response but the other editors on the page agreed that the move you attempted to drive through was not appropriate. The category New Age has been on the Spiral Dynamics page for a long time, you attempted to remove it last June and have now ignored WP:BRD in another attempt. My response has been to post the notice here to try and get some other editors involved and to set some research strands in motion to gather some material before responding. You have now failed on WP:AGF with the above comment as well as WP:BRD and I suspect an ownership issue with this topic. Lets try and get some other editors involved. --Snowded ^TALK 07:11, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Postmodern

I am unhappy with the way Postmodern is used as a heading in this article. There is nothing in the article text to say why it is used and the Post-modernism article makes no mention of the New age. This is confusing to a reader trying to discover something about the subject. The paragraph itself is just a history of key events and figures since the 1970s. Either lets have a paragraph explaining what the link is, or lets rename this section to one more in line with what's written there, I suggest 'Contemporary' , ie the New Age in contemporary history. Lumos3 (talk) 13:06, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I have no problem with your suggestion. Post-modernism is not the same as New Age though I am sure there is some overlap. Terry Macro (talk) 23:21, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
- Agree; change to "Contemporary" and remove internal link to main article. All is One (talk) 20:05, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
- I concur as well. Please make it so. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 07:17, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Done. I have made the new heading Contemporary use. There is a piece to be written by someone on the New age and Postmodernism but its not me at the moment. Lumos3 (talk) 10:25, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Very nice collaboration everyone! All is One (talk) 21:06, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Wikitables

The Spirituality section may be more concise with two wikitables. The subheadings are currently internal links in a dictionary definition format. Any thoughts? All is One (talk) 20:04, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

An example:

New Age practices and philosophies
Concept	Description
Theism	General and abstract idea of God, understood in many ways and seen as superseding the need to anthropomorphize deity.
etc.	etc.

Done

This is an archive of past discussions about New Age. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

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Improved sourcing

It's been a while since I looked at this article, and it is nice to see, at long last, some authoritative scholarly sources like Hannegraaff, Heelas and Drury represented. Well done, and good luck with the GA. --JN 466 17:35, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

Bias

Article only highlights viewpoints supporting it's overall slant. In particular a few writers are quoted and referenced extensively. Scientology appears to be added and deleted often. Should it be added or removed and why? Please discuss. Please add criticism section to balance viewpoint. Anything from difference of opinion of prominent New Age adherents to outright dismissal of concept. Refs always. Discuss if unsure. Daffydavid (talk) 14:02, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Disagree. Criticism sections are poor form and should not be added. Instead, the "Reception" section adequately addresses other perspectives. /ƒETCH COMMS / 16:20, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

ƒETCH, article is still lacking in balanced perspective as per wikipedia standards, but I note you have a vested interest in this article so I understand your personal view on the topic. Removing the tag based on just your opinion is bad form, but I'm not interested in a edit war, so have it your way. Just know that the article is likely to fail a Good Article test if challenged. It won't be me. Just thought I'd point it out. Daffydavid (talk) 17:10, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Troll behaviour concerning Scientology and tagging; most likely another form of: Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of DavidYork71. Recommend checkuser on Daffydavid. All is One (talk) 23:38, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

All is One, I'm disappointed in you. I'm suddenly a troll because I asked if Scientology should be included? I have no idea if it should or not. I just noticed that it was added and removed several times. I tagged the article because Wikipedia standards say the amount of material in each article should be proportionate to the world view. Given that there has been a significant decline in the number of Naturopaths, Homeopaths and other similar professions it would be reasonable to infer that the New Age movement is in decline. Maybe it's increasing. I don't really care enough about this topic to research more than I already have. I note with interest that instead of addressing the topics I brought up you instead attempt to brand me as A troll and a "sockpuppet". Perhaps you should read the Wikipedia article on the "Straw man argument". Check away on my username, Daffydavid all you want. This is my one only account on Wikipedia. If you wish to debate the points I raised, either to enlighten me or otherwise convince me of the error of my ways, it would make more sense to post on my page (talk) than to conduct personal attacks on the New Age talk page. All I can say is "convince me", attempts at slander and denigration do nothing to prove you are right. Daffydavid (talk) 03:22, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Bad form? Actually, it's called BRD. I am not a sockpuppet, Daffydavid, and I would recommend avoiding such accusations in the future (as well as you, All is One). If either of you would like to request a CheckUser, please go ahead. I look forward to seeing the results. /ƒETCH COMMS / 17:07, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Fetchcomms, My apologies for the comment and I agree with your BRD point. I was hoping for a reply on some of my queries, but it seems that is not to be. To clarify, I expected a discussion on the Talk Page rather than tag removal. Perhaps I am wrong but it seems that the tagging supersedes BRD. Happy Editing.

Seems unbiased overall. Shocking for a government/banking propaganda psy op like Wikipedia.

How New Age differs from counter-culture

I think it would be good if this article were to explain how the New Age of the 1990s differs quite radically from the counter-culture of the 1960s. The former tends to be a more middle class exercice, and can be quite entrepeneurial, as is evident from the title of Peter LeMesurier's book "This New Age Business". Paul Heelas described the New Age as being like angels in pinsuits! This contrasts with the counter-culture, with its emphasis on dropping out from society. The counter-culture was, in many ways, a much more radical and unorthodox movement. ACEOREVIVED (talk) 14:53, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

New Age as a reaction to traditional religion

One thing that is lacking to me is a discussion of how New Age philosphies are a reaction to "that old time religion" of the 1950s and earlier times. I'd like to see some history that discusses people's unhappiness with attending Church on Sunday with the "right" social crowd in order to be seen to be pious and then ignoring religion and spirituality the rest of the time. Along with this, there were much doctrinal hair splitting which seemed to many to be a manifestation of the Biblical image of gnats and camels. I also would give more emphasis to intentional communities including Christian ones because they are trying to do something new as well. I did find many articles about the decline in traditional religion but was unable to easily find references that linked the growth of New Age with reasons for the decline of traditional religion. Jerryfern (talk) 18:09, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

"non-religious"?

In relation to the contemporary debate and academic diversity regarding the problem of defining religion, to generalize such a broad concept as New Age as "non-religious" is (and I can't believe no one has questioned this yet) misguiding, questionable, or simply incorrect. Consider how one supposedly reacts to some christian or other religious movements that claims to be "not a religion", religions and/or religious persons do avoid the word "religion", for reasons that are ideological, theological, that is: for RETHORICAL purposes. And usually the story follows with "..it is rather a relationship", refering to God or Christ etc. Furthermore the word "religion" is clearly politized and ideologically "infected". Rethorics such as above have implicit theological/metaphysical statements. My point is that Wikipedia would'nt simply let religious organisation represent themselves in defining and describing what it is. The same should go for New Age. My concern is, first of all, quote: "The New Age movement is a non-religious Western spiritual movement" sounds like a "insider" stance, that is, to make such a (sharp) distinction between "religious" and "spiritual" is a typical normative-"theological" viewpoint from the perspective of most self-identified new-age/spiritual/personal belief-person, but certainly not a self-evident or factual distinction which should be taken for granted. I would gladly discuss this further. But not to be misunderstood, I'm not saying new-age is a religion, it is obviously not A religion. But isn't it just as obvious, according to most (or all) definitions of what "religious" means, that it is in no way correct to claim or imply that New Age is a "non-religious" movement!? (and if I do have any kind of agenda it is simply from the perspective of contemporary academic sources, and the theoretical view of science of religion/religious studies, sociology of religion etc.) —Preceding comment added by Justathought (talk • contribs) 19:18, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

IP 141.217.232.209 changed the wording from "quasi-religious" to "nonreligious" on December 1, 2010; no explanation was given in the edit summary. All is One (talk) 21:54, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Comment Perhaps changing the wording from:"The New Age movement is a spiritual and nonreligious Western movement that developed in the latter half of the 20th century." ......... Too: The New Age movement is a spiritual, religious alternative movement that developed in the latter half of the 20th century. Perhaps this wording reflects the idea more correctly, perhaps not.--User:Warrior777 (talk) 10:22, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Nagualism

I would respectfully suggest that woven somewhere into the article be mentioned: Carlos Castaneda,Don Juan Matus, Neo-Nagualism or a reference be made to "modern day" Toltecs perhaps making the article more complete. I only suggest and leave that decision up to you. --User:Warrior777 (talk) 09:56, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Agree. It's one of major influences in the New Age. -- Nazar (talk) 19:02, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Also Deepak Chopra. Henry123ifa (talk) 13:08, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Atheism included in "spiritual and religious traditions"?

"The New Age movement includes elements of older spiritual and religious traditions ranging from atheism and monotheism through classical pantheism,(...)"
This implies that atheism is a religion, when atheism is the antithesis of theism. This is misleading and should be corrected. Skaruts (talk) 21:41, 1 October 2012 (UTC)

You are quite right! And, as it is not sourced and doesn't appear anywhere else in the article, please feel free to be bold and remove it. Lova Falk talk 09:07, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

I removed the word atheism from it. But from what I heard some atheists may take part of this movement. Someone with better understanding of the movement should probably include atheism in there once more, as long as it's not in the same context of religious tradition as I perceived it was. Skaruts (talk) 09:58, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Sure some atheists take part of this movement! But that is not the same as stating that "The New Age movement includes elements of older spiritual and religious traditions" such as atheism. There is no mention in the article of elements of atheism that are incorporated into the New Age movement. An if someone wants to put this in, well, as long as there is a good source for it, that is absolutely fine! Lova Falk talk 10:02, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Then it's all good. Thanks for the feedback. Skaruts (talk) 21:23, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

NPOV

New age movement is viewed as a big load of bs by the majority of humans who know of its existence (specially anyone with critical thinking abilities).

Yet this is in no way reflected in the tone or weight of the content of this article. Earlier attempts at adding some balance have been consistently blocked. There is an ocean of reliable sources criticising new age movement yet the article does not adequately reflect this context. Until this criticism is allowed to be included, DO NOT REMOVE THE NPOV TAG.

Alertboatbanking (talk) 05:27, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Here is an example to get you thinking: Astrology#Scientific appraisal. It would be better to talk about specifics. "New Age" covers many different concepts and actvities. It would be better to categorize by subjects of criticism, as opposed to categorizing by critic. This would primarily involve the restructuring of the "Reception" section.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
^{86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk} 07:47, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

@Alertboatbanking: I do not agree that this article lacks neutrality. Most of it is straightforward and informative, and parts of it are very well sourced. In addition, two segments are at least partially dedicated to criticisms of the New Age movement: the section titled "Reception" (reporting on some criticisms of the personal-spiritual side of the movement) and the sub-section titled "Political criticisms at century's end" (reporting on multiple criticisms of the socio-political side). Yeah, I wrote most of the "Political criticisms" sub-section myself.

I do think the "Reception" section fails to adequately discuss the negative response to the personal-spiritual side of the New Age movement among many publics. Long sub-sections of the Reception section could be devoted to "The media critique," "The academic critique," "The Christian critique," and - even - "The self-critique" (e.g., the book by New Agers David Spangler and Bill Thompson that is mentioned on the David Spangler page).

However, all of that can be done by future contributors to the Reception section who are willing to report, dispassionately, on the "reliable sources" you allude to. It is not true that the article, as it stands, is fundamentally or structurally biased against such criticism. - Babel41 (talk) 22:56, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

I was surprised by the neutrality and factuality of this article. It does not read like one of those articles written by modern spirituality-adepts, who throw together anything they like. The NPOV-policy says: "The editor who adds the tag must address the issues on the talk page, pointing to specific issues that are actionable within the content policies". 'Lack of inclusion of criticism' is not very specific, and not factual, since the "Reception"-section does contain criticisms. So I dispute the NPOV-tag, and think it should be removed. Joshua Jonathan (talk) 20:55, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Insufficient citations

There are still citation needed tags that have been unaddressed for months. I will start a Good Article Reassessment if this issue if not fixed soon.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 16:16, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

GA Reassessment

This discussion is transcluded from Talk:New Age/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the reassessment.

This article contains multiple unaddressed citation needed tags, thus failing criterion 2b. The "when?" and "which?" tags should also be addressed.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 13:25, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

Checked to see if there had been massive editing and citation removal by Qworty/Robert Clark Young, which was his modus operandi as of recent. He had edited page and removed two external links. He did not remove any citations from within the article that could be returned. Taram (talk) 14:22, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

Plan of action

To make this process easier, I have taken the initiative of copying all the passages in question (i.e., all the passages with unaddressed tags) below. I striongly suggest that we improve the article by (a) either finding a citation for the passage in question, or deciding to eliminate the passage, (b) entering the change rught in the article, and then (c) telling what we did (and, optionally, why we did it) after the Action taken phrase below. Others might then (d) comment on the changes.

Let's help this article hold onto its hard-won "Good Article" status! - Babel41 (talk) 00:42, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Update: So far, no one has taken me up on this suggestion. In order to preserve our "Good Article" status, I have therefore taken it upon myself to rework each passage below based on citations to reliable sources, and transfer the results to the article. I hope no one feels I have diminished the article, and if anyone can improve on my efforts (while properly citing their sources), I encourage them to do so. - Babel41 (talk) 20:04, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Ah yes, nice job. The article looks much better now. The lack of citations to certain statements was the main reason for why I started this GAR. Now that this issue has been fixed, I'm willing to close this reassessment if you don't anything else to add.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 23:29, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, FutureTrillionaire. To "celebrate," I fixed the ISBN numbers at the end of footnotes 36 and 38, and am now happy to turn the New Age Good Article over to the new generation. - Babel41 (talk) 02:09, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

"History" section

Passages in question: None.

"Spirituality" section

Passage in question: Afterlife cell, first sentence: "The New Age sets no restrictions on one's beliefs about an afterlife".^{[citation needed]}

Action taken: The premise of this sentence is incorrect, which is why no citation could possibly attach to it. There is no official New Age entity or movement that has the capacity to set "restrictions" on beliefs about an afterlife, or anything else. There is a variety of beliefs about an afterlife among New Age thinkers, well described on pp. 171-76 of spiritual writer Nevill Drury's carefully researched book Exploring the Labyrinth (1999). I modified the sentence accordingy, and footnoted Drury. - Babel41 (talk) 22:19, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Passage in question: Age of Aquarius cell, first sentence: "Some astrologers^[which?] regard the current time-period^[when?] as the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, correlated to various changes in the world; and some claim that the early 1960s was the actual beginning of the Age of Aquarius, though this claim is highly contentious.” [also lacks cite – ed.]

Action taken: Besides being unsourced, this sentence goes off track. The focus here should be on what New Age thinkers say about the age of Aquarius, not on what certain astrologers say. I have therrefore replaced it with a passage citing three New Age thinkers' views on the age of Aquarius, two well versed in astrological lore and the other drawn more by the beauty and supposed truth of the Aquarian-age concept. - Babel41 (talk) 22:19, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Passage in question: Interpersonal relationships cell, second sentence: "Those in the New Age movement accept women's complete equality in all aspects of society including religion and the complete acceptance of one's sexual orientation, whether heterosexual, homosexual (gay or lesbian) or bisexual and gender identity, whether cisgender, transgender, or intersexual as a means of spiritual development".^{[citation needed]}

Action taken: Besides being without a source, this paragraph – which constitutes the enire "Inerpersonal Relationships" cell - fails to address any relationship issues other than those directly involving gender and sex. I have no idea why the author feels a need to enumerate all the different sexual and gender orientations. Therefore, I have replaced this material with a fully-sourced paragraph that includes sex-role and women’s-empowerment issues, but covers other issues as well. - Babel41 (talk) 22:19, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

"Lifestyle" section

Passage in question: Music sub-section, second paragraph, first sentence: "The style began in the 1970s with the works of free-form jazz groups recording on the ECM label; such as Oregon, the Paul Winter Consort, and other pre-ambient bands; as well as ambient music performer Brian Eno and classical avant-garde musician Daniel Kobialka".^{[citation needed]} [N.b.: The next sentence should probably also be covered, either by this cite or by another.]

Action taken: This unsourced paragraph appears to be largely a recap of portions of Wikipedia's "New Age music" page, which is itself imperfectly sourced. Fortunately, the information in the paragraph in question is very standard fare. So rather than eliminate this paragraph, I have added citations to two standard book-length guides to New Age music. - Babel41 (talk) 22:19, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

"Reception" section

Passages in question: None.

"Social and political movement" section

Passage in question: New directions for the 21st century sub-section, end of first paragraph: [The current New Age political project differs from the earier one,] "... in part as a result of learning from the criticisms that had been directed at the earlier wave of New Age political actors".^{[citation needed]}

Action taken: Although I think it is obvious that New Age political people learned from their left- and right-wing critics, I can find no credible source that makes that point. It is implicit in Satin, Anderson, Gerzon, Annie Gottlieb's Do You Believe in Magic?, and other texts, but that is not good enough for Wikipedia (or any real encyclopedia). I hope someone can prove me wrong and will restore the omitted passage with an appropriate cite. But until someone can, I think it is best to suppress the passage as editorial POV. So that is what I've done. - Babel41 (talk) 02:45, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

I agree. Nice job.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 01:12, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

Result

Result: Kept. The issues have been resolved.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 02:57, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

This is your Founder speaking to you. What was once lost is now found. I've been away for too too long. It is good to see Portal:New Age now even though the founders of Wikipedia used to give me advice from the [of New Age].

The new first paragraph of the entry says just about nothing. It's utterly uninformative. --TheCunctator We who are reporting unbiasedly on New Age are presenting New Age POV, and welcome other non-New Age POV as well. Since I realize skeptical POV exist, those references were in place, and removed by whoever. Check the revisions. And, I restored a decent first para, C, which was simply deleted by one of our illustrious collaborators. User:BF

One Small Problem

The article states "The New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century."

This is not true. No such movement exists.

David Lloyd-Jones (talk) 17:57, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

Since I last checked your progress I still note the absence of Music on this article. It has become a new wave of easy listening music which has become very popular in the mainstream media. If anyone has any ideas speak up.

If not :

Then, as it was, then again it will be Though the course may change sometimes Rivers always reach the sea [[1]]

BF (talk) 17:00, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

The Old Image

http://imgur.com/lmQB52z

Put this as the main! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Moreovaltine (talk • contribs) 01:32, 29 September 2014 (UTC)

Well... #1 It's not obvious what that image has to do with the New Age movement. How does it explain the subject? #2 Who has the copyright to that image? Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and this would need to be established first. Grayfell (talk) 07:45, 29 September 2014 (UTC)

I was the editor responsible for removing the original image (of clouds and the moon) and replacing it with the current lede image (of a New Age gathering in Bosnia). I had hoped that the need for this substition was obvious; the first image has nothing to do with the New Age movement, beyond a very emic understanding of the New Age movement having cosmological and astrological implications and associations. Other than that it is simply decorative, and hardly appropriate for an etic encyclopedia article on the subject of the movement. While we could have a legitimate discussion as to the appropriateness of the image that I have added as a substitute, it should be clear that it is at least a great improvement given that it depicts the subject matter at hand. Midnightblueowl (talk) 23:49, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

No Criticism section?

New Age is often criticised as wishy-washy blather. Many articles on WP include a Criticism section. This one doesn't. It should. 86.135.115.218 (talk) 02:52, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

The Reception section contains criticisms from a wide range of cultural perspectives.Lumos3 (talk) 11:13, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

It, quite noticeably, lacks a subsection of atheist\skeptic\materialist\scientific (pick the most appropriate) views. — Jeraphine Gryphon ^(talk) 11:28, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

For further information about the topic, see Wikipedia:Criticism. All is One (talk) 02:31, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

I have just added a section on the New Age as a social and political movement, and it includes a sub-section of fairly pointed criticisms from both the left and the right. - Babel41 (talk) 00:45, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Political criticisms seem insufficient. Criticisms that should be mentioned include belief in psychics, crystal healing, channelling with the dead, homeopathy and other claims refuted by science. Additionally, it should be mentioned in the article that New Agers are often scammed into buying useless products like "aural measurement devices" "healing crystals" and get sham procedures like "DNA light activation" for "Theta Healing." A more critical tone is adopted for the Scientology article, and a similar tone would be appropriate here as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.194.83.60 (talk) 15:29, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

I guess that new-age is so special that it doesn't feel that it deserves a criticism section. It might get its feeling hurt. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.12.2.174 (talk) 20:05, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

Naropa?

Is Naropa new age? I thought they were specifically Buddhist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Spaceboss (talk • contribs) 17:46, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

Why and how I slightly restructured this article

Dear viewers and editors, - The length of this article has increased by well over 50% (84,000+ to 133,000+ bytes) since 23-28 June 2013, when it underwent its Good Article (GA) reassessment. (I helped us maintain our GA status, see item #12 above.) The structural changes I have now introduced sharpen the article's focus on the New Age movement as a whole – without eliminating one sentence of the existing material. I also think my structural changes have made the article easier to grasp & follow. Please share your thoughts!

Here is a summary of what I've done:

1. and 2. Definitions and History. No structural changes entered, but note the new sub-section I added to the Definitions section earlier today, "The movement."

3. Demographics. Have made this its own section, for clarity's sake. It had been a sub-section of the old "Lifestyles" section, but demography is the study of the characteristics, often choiceless, of the people involved in a group (in this case, New Agers). It is therefore substantially different from the description, analysis and critique of their beliefs and practices – the subject matter of the rest of this article.

4. Spiritual beliefs and practices. The old "Beliefs and practices" section. Keeps the sub-sections that are most specific to the spiritual component of the New Age movement (i.e., Theology, Self-spirituality, Astrological cycles, and Ethics-Afterlife). However, I have moved the Healing and New Age Science sub-sections to the new "Cultural beliefs and practices" section, #5 below, where they are on the whole a better fit.

5. Cultural beliefs and practices. "Lifestyles" is an inadequate and somewhat condescending term for this section. The New Age movement was/is dedicated to creating a new culture (see Kyle, Ray-Anderson, Ferguson, Lipnack-Stamps, etc., etc.) and so I have given this section a title that properly acknowledges that goal. It retains all the material in the old "Lifestyle" section (except for "Demographics" which – you may recall – is now a separate section, #3 above). The first two paragraphs of this section, which had gone unlabeled before, are now entitled "Fairs and festivals" and "Approaches to financial prosperity and business." In addition, this section now includes the Healing and "New Age science" sub-sections from #4 above, as they are on the whole a better fit here.

6. Political beliefs and practices. This is the old "Social and political movement" section, which used to sit at the bottom of this article – following "Reception" – for no apparent reason. Its title now parallels those of #4 and #5 above. This section retains the first and third of its three sub-sections, "Late 20th century" and "New directions in the 21st century." However, I have moved its middle sub-section, "Political objections at century's end," to the "Reception" section, #7 below, where it more properly belongs. And I have retitled that sub-section "Political thinkers and activists," since it discusses the ways many political thinkers and activists – not just critics – received New Age political beliefs and practices.

7. Reception. This section discusses how the various New Age beliefs and practices have been received. Hence I have retained all the sub-sections from the old "Reception" section – sub-sections covering Popular press, Academic, Christian, Pagan, and Native American responses. In addition, I have moved the newly entitled "Political thinkers and activists" sub-section here, as discussed under #6 above.

8 – 11. See also, References, Further reading, External links. No structural changes entered.

So – I think our article is now much better structured and easier to navigate. Wikipedia is a proudly democratic enterprise, so please share your thoughts about what I’ve done. - Babel41 (talk) 05:25, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this to the talk page, Babel. I've reverted most of these changes for now as I think that any such major reform needs to be debated first, but I'm not saying that all such changes are worthless. I'm quite concerned by the division of "Beliefs and practices" into "Cultural beliefs and practices" and "Spiritual beliefs and practices". This is making a (somewhat arbitrary) distinction that simply does not exist in the academic literature on the subject (for instance, Hanegraaff deals with it all in his magnum opus on New Age without any such distinction). What makes one belief-based activity "spiritual" and another "cultural"? What is the criteria for such a division?

I'm also somewhat concerned by the "Social and political movement" section. It makes little or no use of academic source material (bar the odd use of Kyle) and instead appears to be effectively a list of primary sources strung together through what could be considered WP:Original research and WP:Synthesis. Personally I think that we should be rid of it unless it can be reformed using the work of professional academics as a basis (and most of the academics I am familiar with do not discuss the New Age as a socio-political movement). If there is disagreement on this point then I am happy to take the issue to RfC to get some further voices in on this issue.

Where I am favourable to the changes is in the idea of allowing the "Demographics" section to be stand-alone. That seems to make sense to me and I have no objections to it. Moreover, your point about the problems with the term "Lifestyle" are well taken and we should probably consider an alternative. Best, Midnightblueowl (talk) 14:36, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

I've since restored a number of the formatting changes with which I agree (although if someone else disagrees with the changes then they can always be reverted once more). Midnightblueowl (talk) 19:26, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Midnightblueowl, your edits seem to be making Babel41 nervous ... please see User talk:Dank#Urgently need your help / advice in an editing dispute. FWIW, Babel did a good job of responding to a lot of input from many editors to get Mark Satin through FAC back in the day. Babel, MBO has also been easy to work with, across a wide range of articles at FAC. I hope you two can find a meeting of the minds, and it would be nice to see this article at FAC some day. - Dank (push to talk) 14:57, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

Dear Midnightblueowl, - My once "virtual mentor" on Wikipedia, Dank, apparently wants us to try to resolve our differences before going to any sort of formal third-party process (see above). So I am placing my "Four issues" statement below, where you might care to comment on it and others can comment as well. Best, - Babel41 (talk) 23:56, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

Four items that need resolving ASAP

I helped us maintain our GA (Good Article) status during the 23 – 28 June 2013 reassessment, see item #12 above, and I appreciate Midnightblueowl's ("M's") many terrific subsequent additions to this article. There are three issues, though, where we are in profound disagreement– M. has reverted some my work, and I have reverted two of M's reversions – and there is a fourth issue (#3 below) on which I need definitive outside advice. These issues are not trivial: they affect the use-value and shape of the article. I am therefore now appealing to Wikipedia's dispute-resolution people for an objective and final determination on these issues. If you care to comment below, I suspect Wikipedia will consider your comments in reaching its decisions [n.b.: this was written before Dank's note above, urging resolution here first. Very New Age of him, really! So your comments below will definitely matter]. Thank you for reading and thinking about these four points – all of them central to the use-value of this article. I look forward to your comments on each of them. - Babel41 (talk) 05:35, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi Babel41. I've added subheaders for your four points, to make it easier to answer them point-by-point. I've noticed the discussion between the two of you; I'm not sure yet if I'm able to give my opinions; I'll first have to read the various edits. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:04, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for expressing your concerns in such an intelligent and constructive manner, Babel. I shall add my responses below, at the appropriate junctures. Midnightblueowl (talk) 14:22, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

@BigJim707:; @John Carter: this might interest you given what I understand to be your interest in 'cults' and 'new religious movements'? Midnightblueowl (talk) 14:53, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Sources

1. Academic sources should not be the only, or even the primary, sources used in every part of this article. To use only academic sources is to ignore other reliable sources with different perspectives, and leads to overemphasis on the esoteric.

When this article passed its GA reassessment, its focus was on the New Age movement as a whole. If you go back to the edit at 29 June 2013, you will see that the article contains sections referring to the three principal aspects of that movement, "Spirituality," "Lifestyle" (i.e., Culture), and "Social and political" (Politics, really), and that those sections are fairly balanced in length.

Over the last year, Midnightblueowl ("M.) has added a tremendous amount of material from academics – primarily religious studies scholars, mostly from Europe. In addition, M. has deliberately and assiduously pruned the article of non-academic source material.

Alas, there are costs as well as benefits to this. On the one hand, M. has added greatly to our understanding of those New Age movement activists who are deeply immersed in esoteric practices. On the other hand, M.'s insistence on using only academic sources (in practice, mostly religious-studies academics from Europe) has made it difficult to convey vital information about all the social, cultural, political, and even non-esoteric, sweetly-spiritual aspects of the movement … because these aspects are either not covered or not the main interest of the scholars M. wants this article to rely on now. All these areas have been covered much more intently by the "non-academic sources" (M.'s phrase) that M. has been systematically eliminating from this article.

The result has been to seriously distort Wikipedia's portrait of the New Age movement as a whole, by overemphasizing its esoteric aspects. This is especially apparent in the crucial "Definition" section, where M., clearly a brilliant person, repeats Latin phrases from one of his/her favorite scholars of religion, while failing to report on definitions from even such non-academic foundational texts as Marilyn Ferguson's The Aquarian Conspiracy – an imbalance I tried to rectify in my "Movement" sub-section, which M. immediately reverted (see #2 below).

If we were writing an article about a distant or settled subject – the Italian Renaissance, say, or the theory of gravity – then M.'s insistence on using only academic sources would make sense. However, it does not make sense when we are dealing with a movement that is contemporary and whose meaning and use-value is still a live subject of debate among many different types of thinkers and social actors.

Under these circumstances, we need to avail ourselves of a variety of reliable sources. Yes, academics must be included – in my contributions to this article I made use of 13 of them (albeit mostly Americans amd mosrly not scholars of religion). However, we also need to avail ourselves of other reliable sources, including college textbooks, non-academic books from responsible publishers, and mainstream newspapers and magazines. Such sources can and do provide a fuller and therefore more accurate portrait of the New Age movement as a whole, than do academic sources alone.

I am not trying to create new rules for aspiring Featured Articles (FAs) on Wikipedia. I am really just recounting what Wikipedia already does in FAss that deal with recent movements. Consider the Harvey Milk article, which is now not only FA but semi-protected. It is a good analogy to our article, since Harvey was an iconic member of another movement that rose up in the 1970s and 1980s and is still playing itself out and being debated – the U.S. gay movement. The editors could have confined themselves to academic books and articles about Harvey and his cause; there is no lack of them. Instead, they also availed themselves of books from major publishers, books from specialist publishers, quality magazines like Time and The New Yorker, big city newspapers, and more. The result is an article that is more many-sided and illuminating than any one kind of source – even books by gay academics, or all academics! – could possibly have provided us with.

Sometimes non-academic sources and even, gasp, academic sources, are opinionated rather than objective (i.e., are either obviously sympathetic to or obviously dubious about their subject matter). Wikipedia permits appropriate use of these as well. Here is the relevant passage, from Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources, emphases mine:

Biased or opinionated sources: Wikipedia articles are required to present a neutral point of view. However, reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject. Common sources of bias include political, financial, religious, philosophical, or other beliefs. Although a source may be biased, it may be reliable in the specific context. When dealing with a potentially biased source, editors should consider whether the source meets the normal requirements for reliable sources, such as editorial control and a reputation for fact-checking. Editors should also consider whether the bias makes it appropriate to use in-text attribution to the source.

I hope you will now agree with me that non-academic reliable sources, even properly identified opinionated reliable sources, can be used in this particular article. This is pertinent not just to our article in general, but to the specific major contributions I have made that M. has reverted, discussed in #2 and #3 below.

Babel41 (talk) 05:35, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

pffooo... difficult topic! Personally, I prefer academic sources, but I can see a rationale to using other sources as well. But there is a danger of original research and too much info/text, so it would depend on what's being expressed. Non-academic sources can be used to illustrate info; on the other hand, with such a broad topic as New Age, restrictions qua sources may aid the clarity of the article. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 07:42, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

I believe firmly that this encyclopaedia article should rely very heavily on the academic sources provided by those scholars of religion (including historians, anthropologists, and sociologists) who have spent years researching the New Age and who have published on the subject in peer-reviewed journals and monographs. These are the individuals who best understand the movement, who best appreciate its relationship to earlier forms of esotericism and religion, and who best understand its place within contemporary society. In this they are a far superior source of information than, say, a journalist whose acquaintance with the New Age may be more fleeting, or a New Ager who is seeking to promote a particular emic viewpoint. (There may be a slight bias toward European scholars at present, but there are certainly American scholars being cited here, and a further immersion in the academic literature should help to rectify any such geographical bias).

That is not to say that these are strictly the only type of sources that should be used. There may well be other reliable sources produced by reputable press sources that we could utilise. There may be journalists active in the mainstream media who have published material worthy of citation, although I am a little concerned by the citation of, for example, a 1987 article from Time magazine, which very few people will be able to access should they desire to do so and which may have been written by someone with comparatively little understanding of the New Age. However, even if we do use these other sources, academic sources should be given primacy; as the article existed at the time of its GAN and GAR, they were barely present and there are still sections of this article where their usage is very scanty. I have tried my best to correct this serious omission and will continue to do so in future.

What I am most concerned about is the use of non-academic emic sources throughout sections of this article, i.e. books and articles published by New Agers. This sort of material was very prevalent at the time of the GAN/GAR and I have done my best to expunge it in place of academic sources. These primary sources are great source material for academics to study, but they are basically inappropriate for the purposes of this article. I for instance do not think that Marilyn Ferguson's definition of the New Age is something worthy of presentation to the reader of this article (although it may certainly be valid on the article about Marilyn Ferguson herself); I am particularly concerned that her definition is introduced to the reader before they are even introduced to academic definitions. I must stress that this article does not exist to promote the New Age, or any particular perspective that exists within the New Age milieu; by selecting certain emic authors for citation (on what criteria are they selected?) we are surely doing just that. Nor, of course, should it promote any particular anti-New Age voices (although at present there appears to be little problem on this front). It is an encyclopaedia article and should be rooted in scholarship produced by experts with demonstrable credentials. Midnightblueowl (talk) 14:55, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

There exist a rather large number of academic sources, many of them dealing with the new religious movements as well, which deal with this topic, sometimes at serious length. There are also a few reference works in other areas which devote a good length of time to the topic. That being the case, maybe one way to proceed might be to find what the reference sources dealing with the topic say, and, where possible, find some source other than the reference source itself which says pretty much the same thing. There might be a few cases where the reference sources draw a quick comparison to other topics or make observations not to be found elsewhere, but they could probably be cited to the reference source without any particular problems. John Carter (talk) 17:20, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

"The movement" sub-section of the "Definition" section

2. My "The movement" sub-section of the "Definition" section should be retained. It provides a different, an equally valid, and an arguably more mainstream definition of the New Age movement than the scholarly definitions offered by Midnightblueowl.

At 15:26 on 14 February 2017, M. reverted the entire 6,748-byte "The movement" sub-section that I had inserted at the top of the "Definition" section. I added that sub-section at 3:43 on 12 February 2017, with the following explanation:

(→‎Definition: Adding a new sub-section w/some basic definitions of the modern New Age movement. European religious scholarship is useful, but we also need views from a wider range of sources here.)

When M. reverted that sub-section on 14 February, he/she did not provide an explanation. Instead M. reverted my material via the very same edit by which he/she reverted the structural changes I had introduced later that day. And M. did not explain why he/she had reverted the "Movement" sub-section. Here is M.'s edit in full”:

14:26, 14 February 2017‎ Midnightblueowl (talk
— User: contribs)‎ . . (126,565 bytes) (-6,672)‎ . . (Reverting recent major structural changes. See Talk Page.)

You will see that M. said nothing about the "Movement" sub-section on the Talk page, either. Therefore, I have reverted M.'s reversion. If M. reverts it again before you have a chance to look at it, I have left it atop my Sandbox, User:Babel41/sandbox or https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/User:Babel41/sandbox

My rationale for developing and including the "Movement" section is exactly as I stated on the Revision history page: without material from a variety of reliable sources – and not just religious studies scholars – the "Definition" section is seriously skewed. Specifically, it presents the New Age movement as a largely esoteric or alt-religious one. It does so because that is the way M.'s favored scholars see it.

Of course, there is nothing "incorrect" about that! But there is another way that credible sources have defined the New Age movement, and I present that way in the "Movement" sub-section. There, you will see it presented as a spiritual and a cultural and a political movement … with the spiritual aspect not necessarily being deeply sophisticated (let alone esoteric), and the cultural aspects often taking precedence over the others!

How could this be? Because in the "Movement" sub-section I draw on a wide variety of reliable sources (see #1 above) that attempted to define the New Age movement as a whole. I do draw on a U.S. scholar of religion (Kyle), and I draw on an academic historian from Australia (Mayne). But I also draw on articles from major mainstream magazines, Time and The New Republic, and from a big-city newspaper, The New York Times. And I draw on non-academic books from reputable publishers: one by a professional journalist (Annie Gottlieb, Simon & Schuster), one by a professional sociologist and a psychiatry professor (Paul Ray and Sherry Anderson, Random House), one by professional futurists who consult with Fortune-500 companies (Jessica Lipnack and Jeffrey Stamps, Doubleday), one by an Austria-born scientist turned philosopher (Fritjof Capra, Cambridge University Press), and more.

I am not an either-or guy, I am a both-and guy. I think Wikipedia is that way too. Therefore, I think it's great that M. has provided this article with rich material on how religious scholars have defined and understood the New Age movement. But theirs is only one way to define and understand it, and my more diverse mix of reliable sources presents a different way - and perhaps a more balanced way and the one that is more popularly understood. So I hope you will allow my "Movement" sub-section to stand. Between M. and I, I think we have, indeed, captured the essence of the New Age movement.

Babel41 (talk) 05:35, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

I've read your "The movement" section, but to be honest, I find it unclear. It reads more like an essay, with a string of topics:

Breadth - 'many commentators [...] it is breadth' (no sources), with one example (why an example, if there are no sources for "many commentators"?);
reception - "bizarre or utterly fantastic";
Kyle's attempt of definition, which moves into a start of a history of new Age;
Goals of the New Age movement;
Et cetera.

I'm sorry, but I didn't even finish reading this section; it's not sufficiently coherent, I'm afraid. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 07:51, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm sorry Babel41, but I have to agree with Joshua Jonathan on this one. The sub-section does not work terribly well; it reads like a jumble of different quotes from a disparate array of sources (some rather questionable) that have been randomly strung together. What is the criteria that has been used to determine what should be included here? Why does it randomly throw "Kyle credis [sic] Ram Dass with helping to initiate the movement in the early 1970s by popularizing Eastern spirituality" into the mix? (This is a fact that we already include in the History section). There are various sentences in there that aren't referenced. I really do not think that we should keep it. Some of the material within it may well work well if moved elsewhere (particularly that from Kyle), but as a whole I really think this section needs to go. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:01, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

If it's okay, I am going to go ahead and once again removed this section, Babel. Given that both myself and Joshua have raised strong concerns about it, it is clearly controversial and according to the Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle, the best thing to do is to remove it at this juncture. There will have to be a consensus reached before it is reinstated. I'm happy to continue discussing the issue in the meantime, however. Any readers here can of course see a copy of the disputed section here. Midnightblueowl (talk) 18:20, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

From what I remember, there is no particular clearly identified "definition" of the New Age, although I do remember at least one source which identified a number of specific characteristics (I think it was a dozen total) which tend to be common among New Age movements and which could help identify them. If there isn't a clear, concise, "definition" of the New Age to be found in any source specific source, maybe identifying common characteristics might work better. John Carter (talk) 17:23, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Politics-section

3. The Politics section should not be eliminated; it covers a recognized part of the New Age movement. However, it should be rewritten in order to meet Wikipedia's No-original-research, No-syntheses, and FA guidelines. I will do this, but I need your comments / advice first.

I contributed the bulk of the Politics section in 2012. It emerged from the 2013 GA reassessment with few alterations. Subseqently, M. made several wise edits, which I appreciated. However, at 20:39 on 5 December 2016, M. reverted the entire 21,000+ byte section (at that time, over 20% of the entire New Age article!), and M.'s entire explanation on the article's Revision history page was:

This material does not appear to actually be directly revalent to the New Age movement, and does not appear to be linked to it in RS by academic authors.

At 3:01 the following day, I reverted M's reversion, stating the following on the Revision history page:

This material covers an integral part the New Age mvmt & is properly sourced. Academics are cited & so are other legit. Wiki sources.

My reversion stood at the top of the Revision history page for 24 days. Not one of the over 450 New Age pagewatchers chose to revert it. So I thought my explanation had carried the day.

In M.'s comments above, however, d. 14:26 on 14 February 2017, M. returns to his/her original objection:

I'm also somewhat concerned by the 'Social and political movement' section. It makes little or no use of academic source material (bar the odd use of Kyle). … Personally I think that we should be rid of it unless it can be reformed using the work of professional academics as a basis (and most of the academics I am familiar with do not discuss the New Age as a socio-political movement).

I am astounded by that statement. The Politics section as it stands refers to NINE books or chapters of books that were written by academics and published by academic or university presses, all of which treat the New Age, sometimes referred to as a "spiritual" or "transformational" movement, as having significant political content (see Boggs, Cloud, Gaard, Jamison, Kyle, Mayne, Slaton, Stein, and Woolpert). There are also four references to books or chapters of books authored or co-authored by Wikipedia-notable academics but published by non-academic publishers (see Groothuis, Melton, Ray and Anderson [present on W. under The Cultural Creatives, fails to note that A. was a prof. at U. of Toronto], and Zizek).

To eliminate the Politics section would be to eliminate the perspective of all these academics, not to mention all the non-academic sources cited in that section, and not to mention all the examples of New Age political thought and activity that are properly cited there. Even Marilyn Ferguson's Aquarian Conspiracy, an international bestseller aimed at mainstream audiences, included a chapter on politics.

In M.'s comments on 14 February 2017 above, he/she also added a new objection to the Politics section, and tagged it accordingly:

[It] appears to be effectively a list of primary sources strung together through what could be considered WP:Original research and WP:Synthesis."

I accept that there is some truth to this claim (though it is exaggerated). I drafted the Politics section five years ago, and I remember hoping to make it the definitive starting point for everyone wanting to research the political side of the New Age movement. Looking closely at it now, I can see that I may have been too zealous, not letting my reliable secondary sources serve as the basis for the points raised there. In addition, I think the section as it stands may be too detailed and could benefit from some pruning.

I would like to perfect the Politics section accordingly. I am sure I can get a non-OR, non-Synrhesized, and de-cluttered Politics section up for us within two weeks. Before I put in the work, I would like answers to the following four queries. I look forward to your responses – and to getting on with this important task!

Babel41 (talk) 05:35, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

To clarify my position on this issue, I am certainly not intrinsically opposed to the existence of a "Politics" section of this article. However, I have read quite a few academic studies of the New Age phenomenon (about thirty, thus far), and have added citations from those to the article. In doing so, I have found there to be no discussion of "New Age politics" as a distinct phenomenon. The Handbook of New Age, co-edited by Darren Kemp and James R. Lewis and published by Brill, contains chapters on a wide range of New Age issues, but there is nothing on "New Age politics". Nor are there any chapters on this subject in Steven Sutcliffe and Ingvild Gilhus' edited volume on New Age Spirituality: Rethinking Religion (Acumen, 2013) or Sutcliffe and Marion Bowman's Beyond New Age: Exploring Alternative Spirituality (Edinburgh University Press, 2000). Perhaps I have just read the wrong academic books and articles. Alternately, perhaps academic specialists who have devoted much research to the New Age do not recognise there as being a distinct phenomenon known as "New Age politics". If the former is the case then it can be rectified and we can have a "New Age politics" section that is properly cited to academic publications. If the latter is the case then we should not have a section on "New Age politics" at all.

Moreover, at present, this section relies heavily on original research, or at least original synthesis. There are far too many statements like "In the 21st century, writers and activists continue to pursue a political project with New Age roots" that are not cited, let alone cited to academic studies. That's original research. There are many other statements that just don't seem terrible relevant—"On the right, some worried that the drive to come up with a new consciousness and new values would topple time-tested old values.[315] Others worried that the celebration of diversity would leave no strong viewpoint in place to guide society.[315]" How is this relevant to New Age? Maybe it is, but we need evidence, and good evidence. Right now this section feels like synthesis. As I understand it, this article has taken Mark Satin's (idiosyncratic?) concept of "New Age politics" and then used that as a basis on which to build a section full of material that Babel41 has felt to be relevant and connected to Satin's ideas. Again, this feels like synthesis and if I'm being brutally honest it does not belong on a Wikipedia article; it should be scrapped. In my view, the best thing to do here is to get rid of everything in this section that is not cited to a publication produced by an academic press; that would be a really good starting point upon which we can build. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:26, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

I've done some delving, and found a 1995 article by Kyle titled "The Political Ideas of the New Age Movement", published in the Journal of Church and State. I shall add useful information from it into the article. Midnightblueowl (talk) 16:59, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Query a - OR and synthesizing?

Do you concur with M. that OR and Synthesizing are major problems here?

It seems to me that this section suggests two topics: a "New Age political movement," and the influence of New Age thought on politics. As for the first: is there a "New Age political movement"? As for the second: are concerns with environment, humanisation of the working place, etc., specific New Age influences, or are they a 'general' development in our culture? I'd say that "issues which are of focal concern in the New Age movement have also entered the political discourse, such as ..."

The alinea "Other books that have been described as New Age political include [etc]" seems undue to me; it's a string of book titles, with one secondary source per title which supposedly says something about politics in this title. To say that The Celestine prophecy is "new Age political" is Trumpian (sorry to say so). I can't check Mayne's book, but The Celestine Prophecy is a collection of nonsense; to see any political statement in this which may be noteworthy for an encyclopedy seems far, far undue to me.

All in all, this section lacks clarity and focus. Satin's book may be the most noteworthy topic here. It's subtitle tells a lot: "New age politics: healing self and society : the emerging new alternative to Marxism and liberalism." In this interview he says that "New Age spirituality has gone mainstream"; that's in line with my fremark above about a general development in culture. I think that that's noteworthy, inseatd of attempting to pieze together a stand alone New Age political movement. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:19, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

There are certainly some broadly political aspects of the New Age movement. If there are any groups within the broad New Age movement which emphasize those aspects, they could reasonably be called New Age political groups. And, I suppose, if you count Falun Gong as being a New Age movement, which I guess one presumably could, that group has a very pronounced political aspect at this time, which could reasonably perhaps make it qualify as at least in part a New Age political group. John Carter (talk) 17:28, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Query b - after improvement, keep the Politics section?

Assuming I succeed in doing away with the OR and the Synthesizing to your satisfaction, will one of you agree to support me in blocking further attempts to revert the Politics section?

See above: trim and clean-up. A short section which tells something about New Age ideas going mainstream (Al Gore!) is okay. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:20, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Query c - present sources are reliable sources?

May I assume that the 13 books and book chapters by academics, referred to earlier in this section, can be used as reliable-source references in the Politics section?

Depends on how they are being used. Google Scholar gives very little for "New Age politics" since 2013, except for references to Satin. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:24, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Query d - usage of non-academic sources?

May I assume I can use the other sorts of reliable sources I described in #1 above (e.g., books by non-acadenmics from reputable publishers and articles from significant newspapers and magazines)?

Rather not, when "New Age politics" seems to be an academic non-topic. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:26, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Aspects of my structural changes

4. Aspects of my structural changes to the article should be restored, as they make the article more coherent and easier for viewers to grasp the subject as a whole.

As noted under #2 above, M. reverted my structural changes along with my "Movement" sub-section. While he/she has since restored or adapted a couple of those chabges, there are two that I still think need to be restored. Please respond to each Item below. Babel41 (talk) 05:35, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Item a - beliefs and practices

The Cultural section should be restored and M.'s new "Commercial aspects" section merged back into it.

M’s objection, in his/her remarks above, is that my division of the unwieldy old "Beliefs and practices" section into Spiritual and Cultural sections is "somewhat arbitrary" – and that it "simply does not exist in the academic literature on the subject (for instance, Hanegraaff …)".

Pardon me, but my "Movement" section – reverted by M. – cites academic and non-academic reliable sources where such a distinction is made. And M.'s new division of the old "Beliefs and practices" section into a smaller "Beliefs and practices" section and a new "Commercial aspects" section is even more arbitrary: for example, how can one say that New Age fairs and gatherings (some of which were never primarily intended to make money) were "Commercial," but the "Healing and alternative medicine" arena, which often serves or supports (and in turn profits from) a multi-billion-dollar medical-self-help industry, is "Spiritual"?

I grant you that all such divisions are "somewhat arbitrary" – as Capra says ad nauseam, everything is interconnected. But so what? The question for us is how to present the mass of material in our article in such a way that its viewers, many of whom may be new to the subject, can quickly find their way around. That is why "my" suggested division of the mass of New Age beliefs and practices into three sections, "Spiritual," "Cultural," and "Political" – followed by a "Reception" section that addresses major elements of each in turn – is the best way to structure this article: it is the most coherent and the most readily understandable. Even though all these beliefs and practices may be, on some deep level, interconnected.

Babel41 (talk) 05:35, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

I also find a split into "Spiritual beliefs and practices" and "Cultural beliefs and practices" uncomfortable, while a split in "Beliefs and practices" and "commercial aspects" makes more sense to me. "Spiritual" and "cultural" are intertwined, while "belief" versus "commercial is a stronger division. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:33, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Item b - Politics-section

The Politics section should be properly integrated into the rest of our article (assuming I succeed in draining the OR and the Syntheses from it).

When M. reverted my "Movement" sub-section and most of my structural changes, he/she pulled my Political beliefs section out of the Spiritual beliefs-Cultural beliefs-Political beliefs-Reception sequence and returned it to the tail-end of the article. M. even yanked the "Political thinkers and activists" sub-section from the Reception section and returned it to the middle of the Politics section (under its old title), even though the subject of that sub-section is, precisely, how New Age political ideas were received by thinkers (including academics!) and activists.

Assuming I manage to redo the Politics section so it conforms to Wikipedia's policies of OR and No-syntheses (see #3 above), there is no reason to treat it as an orphan and place it at the end of the article. I have cited a broad range of reliable sources (including 13 academics) in the "Movement" and Politics parts of the article that do treat New Age political ideas as an integral part of the New Age movemenrt. Those reliable sources and their perspectives cannot be excluded from our article just because certain academics (in practice, largely scholars of religion) may have different valid focuses or perspectives.

Babel41 (talk) 05:35, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Well, the "Movement"-section is unclear, and the politics-section is unclear; what remains of them after clean-up and shortening may either be integrated (movement) or stand-alone (politics), but any way be shorter. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:35, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Babel that it makes most sense to have the "Politics" section above "Reception". Given that we apparently are in concordance on this point, I have moved the sections. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:39, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Response to the responses above

I am extremely grateful to Wikipedia for allowing me to express my reservations about certain aspects of this article (immediately above), and I am even more grateful to the senior Wikipedia editors who took the time to explain to me – and of course to the rest of us – why this article cannot be written or augmented in the ways that I wished (and that I had in part done).

I love the democratic aspect of Wikipedia. So it is decisive for me that not one senior Wikipedia editor joined this discussion to defend my points. Although my points are still convincing to me, I will spill no more ink defending them. In the next week I will try to revise my remaining contributions to this article in ways that conform to what the senior editors expect of all of us. Sincerely, - Babel41 (talk) 07:34, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

One thing that might be useful might be to see how other reference sources structure their articles on this topic. I find that the most recent edition of the Eliade/Jones Encyclopedia of Religion includes as named subsections of its article on the New Age the following: The possibility of personal transformation (less than 1/2 a column long); The coming of broad cultural transformation (1/2 column-2 page long); The transformation of occult arts and processes (1/2 column - 2 pages long); The self as divine (1/2 column - 2 pages long). The article on the New Age in Religion Past and Present includes the following named subsections: The Concept (>1/2 column), Religious studies (1-2 column - 2 pages, with a separate bibliography), Art, Music, and Literature (1/2 column - 2 pages, with separate bibliography), Practical Theology ("), and Missiology ("). Both of those sources are held in extremely high repute, and might be not unreasonable guides for structuring our content here. And it might be worth checking at WP:RX to see if the editors there can get copies of any other similar articles from other reference books, maybe including books on sociology or psychology or similar topics, to see how they structure their articles. John Carter (talk) 17:43, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

We had had great weather here for the past few weeks and I took a few weeks off to enjoy it. Sorry for the delay in responding. John Carter (talk) 17:43, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi John, thanks for your comments. Yes, this balmy weather is distracting for me too, not to mention an unnerving visit to the doctor and my first exposure to Ed Sheeran's haunting "The A Team" song & video on YouTube.

Anyway. I am actually pleased with the way this article is now structured. Although I did not "get" everything I wanted, the biggest structural impediments to the article's being quickly grasped by new viewers (existence of the misleading Lifestyles section, burial of the Demographics material in the Lifestyle section, & placement of the Politics section behind the Responses section) have all been addressed. Although it is conceivable that another encyclopedia (or an anthology) may have done a better job of organizing all this material, I wouldn't hold my breath. And I trust the way the structure of this article has evolved over many years. It has progressed from complexity to (relative) simplicity, even as it's added more material and often more sophisticated material.

I suspect adding material on Falun Gong and other arguably relevant material from outside the West would stretch this article beyond its breaking point. The intro. does appear to confine the article to the New Age as it's perceived in the West. Perhaps you should add Wikipedia's article on Falun Gong to the "See also" section of this article. But, please do not consider me any kind of arbiter on this article. If you have a reliable source that connects Falun Gong to the New Age movement of North America and Europe, it could add spice to the article, e.g. in the "Decline or Transformation?:2000 - Present" sub-section. Good luck!

Fyi, I did check the structure of the "New Age politics" entry in Melton et al.'s New Age Encyclopedia before re-doing the Politics section earlier this week. It divided more or less neatly into ideas / groups / critique, as does our Politics section now (with the critique being in the Reception section). The "Texts" sub-section is intended to address Joshua Jonathan's concern that the New Age politics concept may be the product of only a couple of ideosyncraric writers. The title "Texts" may be too nerdy, so perhaps someone should drop the title and add that paragraph to the bottom of the "Ideas" sub-section. Or, conversely, create a "Texts and groups" sub-section and put the Texts paragraph at the top of that. I don't know; I'm too close to it now, and I suspect I've done more than my share of work on this article already. Best, - Babel41 (talk) 06:53, 11 March 2017 (UTC)

Further academic theories?

Would it be pertinent to include a section or so on various critiques and theories on New Age spirituality, individualism, and pop culture in this article? Thoughts like Jacques Derrida's Hauntology, Partridge's Occulture and so on might be useful. Occulture does not seem to have a Wikipedia page, however it expands Derrida's Hauntology nicely.

^[1] ^[2]

Rigidbodyratking (talk) 17:20, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

References

Broken citation, June 2017

There are 2 references to a footnote which says "Ray and Anderson, cited above", but there is no bibliographic entry to identify this source; I assume it was removed when the page was reworked. Could whoever did this, please fix it? JustinTime55 (talk) 13:02, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Outdated statement

Part of the statements about the supposed affiliation of New Agers to the Democratic Party of the United States, and opposition to the Republican Party, are based on a 1995 source. It is speaking about the political affiliations of New Agers during the Presidential term of Ronald Reagan (1981-1989). Nothing seems to cover changes in their political affiliations over the last 28 years. Do we have more recent sources? Dimadick (talk) 15:58, 17 October 2017 (UTC)

A valid point; I'm not sure if we have any more recent sources, so it is probably best that we add sentences ensuring that the date of the source is made clearer. Midnightblueowl (talk) 18:20, 17 October 2017 (UTC)

Yes, excellent point. I have just altered the relevant sentence (end of the first "Demographics" sub-section) so it now begins, "In 1995. ..." Even if more recent reliable data is found and used, I suggest we retain this sentence as it provides a useful snapshot of the era. - Babel41 (talk) 20:38, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

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God as the Self

This article talks about Paul Heelas. A long time ago, I was personally informed by Paul Heelas that he defined the New Age as seeing God as the Self. There could be a link to Self religion here. Vorbee (talk) 19:39, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

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Modified the wording of a section to improve accuracy

The position that new age science seeks to unite science and spirituality is non-neutral in favor of new age; "new age science" is a misnomer, as it is not science. It takes a sentence of reading through the science article to see this. 98.127.41.104 (talk) 09:26, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

- the article does not say "New Age science", it says "New Age approach to science" - Epinoia (talk) 14:57, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

p.s. - this is not to say that there is not New Age Pseudoscience (see Masaru Emoto), but the correspondence between real science and intuitive understanding of reality goes back at least as far as Fritjof Capra's 1975 book The Tao of Physics and Gary Zukav's 1979 book The Dancing Wu Li Masters - pseudoscience is not limited to New Age, as in the cold fusion fiasco 1989 - Epinoia (talk) 20:39, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

You seem to have reverted my edit on the grounds of a wording error in my explanation, but it seems that my point still stands; "seek[ing] to unite science and spirituality" does not accurately describe the "New Age approach to science," because science relies on testable explanations, which are almost invariably absent on matters of spirituality. I can think of no compromise, as my initial edit was incredibly minor as to the change in meaning, anyway. Added "purportedly" back, in lieu of a better solution. (also I remembered to log in yay)

EDIT: also, am noob and not sure where the revert button is so I undid instead which I think might be wrong but it seems to have achieved the same thing - Somniad (talk) 23:04, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

- it doesn't "purportedly" seek to unite science and spirituality, it actually does seek to unite science and spirituality - whether or not it is successful or not is another question - the intent is to find correlations between our intuitive understanding of reality and the scientific model of the world, it doesn't mean replacing or influencing scientific experimentation or proving spiritual beliefs through science - Epinoia (talk) 23:31, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

I had more reasons typed out, but this is going to become a fairly trivial series of reverts if I don't give up. Somniad (talk) 00:33, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

- you would need to add a source that states that "New Age science purportedly seeks to unite science and spirituality" - otherwise it is your opinion - see WP:RS, WP:VERIFY, WP:NOR - the New Age science section in the article is well researched and gives an overview of the different approaches and crticisms - Epinoia (talk) 00:45, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Add sidebar?

Should we add the sidebar Template:New Age beliefs sidebar since New Age is an important and large religious category it is helpful to have a sidebar with links to further readings.Mangokeylime (talk) 20:41, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Relation to postmodernism

On first sight one (e.g. I) can be confused that New Age and postmodernism are synonymous. Nevertheless, the only relation is a link to Postmodernism in New Age's "Other influences" section. My quick search shows that the question has been discussed before this talk page and outside of wikipedia (based on Paul Heelas, 1996). Can someone more knowledgeable comment on the relation and/or edit this article and the Postmodernism article? Cheater no1 (talk) 16:18, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

On religious beliefs as private property

"Its belief that all traditions are free for anyone to use, rather than the private property of particular communities,[clarification needed] has resulted in New Agers adopting and marketing the practices of other societies."

The only source for the idea that particular communities hold 'private property' of religious beliefs seems to come from the cited essay by Michael York. It's unclear if this framing should be presented by the article as fact or if 'New Agers' actually believe this. Possibly rephrase the article to emphasize that this is the opinion of scholars.

--MaferPues (talk) 13:28, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

I rewrote the section without the "private property" claims. Most religions recycle ideas from previous religions. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:33, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Rainbow Gathering picture

The Rainbow Gathering picture was removed and then restored - but there are some problems with the picture - it is a personal picture taken by a Wikipedia editor, it is not from a reliable source - there is no way to verify that it is a New Age gathering - there is no reference in the article to Rainbow Gathering, so there is no context for the photo, what is a Rainbow Gathering? - I agree that the photo should be removed from the article for lacking a verifiable source per WP:VERIFY - cheers - Epinoia (talk) 18:21, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

There is a correlation between these two terms online, although I could not find a definitive reference that says "Rainbow Gatherings" are "New Age". Wikipedia says "New Age beliefs are prevalent" at Rainbow Gatherings but does not provide a reference, typical, they should really do something. I am happy for the photo to stay but can not find a reason why, it's the vibe man. What really is New Age what really is a Rainbow, who can tell. Dushan Jugum (talk) 01:32, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Invisible Text

Someone deleted the invisible text in the lede. I restored it and made it into section headings. Apparently I made a mistake in formatting, but these do seem to be useful. Can these not be included?

*Septegram*Talk*Contributions* 19:39, 18 May 2022 (UTC)

All of that content has always been part of the lead, summarizing the full article. The hidden text has been there for a long time (who knows why) but it was not mis-coded headers. Schazjmd (talk) 19:47, 18 May 2022 (UTC)

Conflation of Hindu and Buddhist thought with New Age.

A concern I have with this article is what seems to be the conflation of Hinduism and eastern religions with New Age. The perspective of the article seems to be that any western interest in the ancient religions of the east constitutes an expression of New Age thinking. This is problematic as it denies the ancientness of these traditions and assumes that western interest in them is pathological and misguided. 74.103.194.107 (talk) 16:45, 1 September 2022 (UTC)

New Age, Aliens & Consciousness

New age is very individualized it can be a series or multiple series of new age practices.

Multiple Dimensions are usually brought up in most new age practices.

Universal alien species aka aliens their origins of different species outside of Earth such as aliens from different planets are brought into theories mindsets & practices. Such terms as starseed

New age mindset

Believing that one individual or a group of individuals is over a certain dimension, to raise the collective consciousness is a new age thought and belief pattern that is becoming more, and more popular. 2600:6C4A:717F:F8A5:15E1:9697:F5B8:7F57 (talk) 23:27, 29 November 2022 (UTC)

One thing or many things being artificially lumped together?

The article seems to lump together many disparate ideologies as one milieu while also, in several places, admitting that these people do not self describe as "New Agers." The article uses circular logic arguing that New Age "is typified by its eclecticism" while not giving any reason for all these various ideologies being grouped together under a single umbrella. Before reading the article, my understanding was that New Age only pertained to the idea of "Astrological cycles" very briefly described in the "Astrological cycles and the Age of Aquarius" section. It looks me like, rather than a unified movement or umbrella ideology, that people not understanding the beliefs and practices of certain (non-Judeo-Christian, non-atheist) white people have just mentally lumped them all together as "hippy stuff."

I suggest instead that the one thing unifying all these clearly distinct ideologies is that each has been a reaction against the lost of spiritual identity in modern, post-enlightenment materialism while also being unable to embrace modern Christianity. Many effects can have the same cause without the effects being classified as one thing.

The ideas of the article also smell of a kind of racism, as though the idea is, "All these white people aren't Christian, aren't atheist, and are doing very different 'spiritual' things, so it must be a singular movement." The fact that these people are described as getting ideas from ancient spiritual traditions indicates that the people described are individually seeking something missing in the broader culture and perhaps at times finding support with each other despite having differing beliefs rather than one movement which supports "supermarket spirituality" for each of its members.

IMO, either the entire article needs to be rewritten from the perspective that this is a conceptualization of a phenomenon (since apparently there have been academics who do conceptualize these various things as a singular), or the article needs to be split into several interlinked articles and reference that the behaviour, belief, or ideology has been described by specific individuals as New Age.

As support for my suggested rethinking of "New Age" compare the Japanese concept of shinshūkyō in the article Japanese new religions. Though these are completely different groups, the fact that so many groups have appeared since the Scientific Revolution could suggest similar causes as a reaction to the effects of the Scientific Revolution. 2604:2D80:DE11:1300:B19F:5802:1887:710F (talk) 20:31, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

"the lost of spiritual identity in modern, post-enlightenment materialism while also being unable to embrace modern Christianity." While I would not add it to the article's text, my guess is that the rise of the New Age movements, the spread of modern paganism, and the secularization of much of the Western world have a common cause. A considerable number of people find traditional versions of Christianity to be unappealing, and search for an ideology which would satisfy their spiritual needs. In any case, do you have sources to support the changes which you propose? Dimadick (talk) 08:18, 12 September 2022 (UTC)

So would is be okay to state that: "The New Age ideologies are a reaction against the lack of spiritual identity in an increasingly materialistic world. A world where people have lost the will and ability to embrace the idea of Christianity"? Also, could something be said about the way Christianity was made to seem of little value in the lives of people? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.29.103.48 (talk) 21:16, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

If there's a reliable source supporting it, probably. I'd have to review the source to form an opinion. Schazjmd (talk) 21:25, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

[1] ttps://contern.org/online-lectures/christopher-partridge-occulture-is-ordinary/

[2] ttp://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190466176.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780190466176-e-23

[1]

[2]