The Seven of Swords Scammers as Imposter Syndrome
On Navigating the Wild West of colonial media
“Settler-colonialism is territorially acquisitive in perpetuity.”
- Glen Sean Coulthard, Red Skin White Masks
The Seven of Swords from the Smith Rider-Waite deck. It shows a figure tip toeing across the stage with five swords in hand, held at the tip rather than the hilt, looking over their shoulder as they head in the other.
There are some who prefer deception.
Those who think that by merely looking they can
see.
No, I did not message you for a reading on Instagram. No, I still cannot believe an actual entity (person, robot, algorithm??) is actually trying to not just lay claim to my labor, but actually take over my whole ass person. Colonizers steal, in perpetuity bitch! They are always ready to plant a flag where it doesn’t belong, and like a parasite eat the other.
Some platforms feel like being forced to interface with a parasite, hosting your creative selfhood, at the expense, exploitation and detriment of your body and wellbeing.
Obviously, like all colonial delusional logic, their claims cannot hold.
Baby, i’m Beatrix with a Hanzō sword. That scammer shit ain’t sharp enough.
As scammers, impersonators, snakes continue to steal not only the labor, but attempt to grab the likeness, the body, the precise place of the other, it is clear platforms like Instagram only maintain an architecture of colonial consciousness.
The Seven of Swords is under the domain of Saturn, and along with the Five and Six of Swords, arise to tell us that unlocking and moving through this gateway we must pass the test of authenticity. Each card tells us about the ways we respond to being misperceived. The Five is the victim / villain response, an attack by way narrative manipulation. The Six is a hiding, a here take this cover, be quiet and still, tenuous evasion. And the Seven is the wolf in sheep’s clothing, with a simultaneous offense and defense. Misperception isn’t accidental but functions toward colonial appropriation.
Saturn is a malefic planet teaching us the truth who we are and how to protect ourselves in a world of white supremacists, slavers, and jailers.
As I write, Saturn is at 28’ Aquarius, is in its own sign, in its own bounds, and in the decan syncretized to the Seven of Swords. And with the proliferation of scammers, snakes, imposters and doppelgängers on Instagram it has never been more clear,
Every platform is precarious.
Our shit is constantly getting co-opted, taken out context, flattened or just plain stolen. I call this the Seven of Swords IMPOSTER SYNDROME.
Imposter syndrome has plagued me my whole life but never like this. I’ve always done the MOST to be seen achieving, thinking that was synonymous with safety and belonging. I’ve been trapped by respectability and responsibility. And yet they aren’t enough to keep safe from senseless violence.
My Saturn return is tied to the Seven of Swords, a card of fugitivity. There’s a feeling of being abandoned, alone and fleeing to freedom. Moving in silence is strategic, protective and patient. I kept quiet to keep going.
But damn I’m tired of measuring my self-worth by assessing my intelligence to be worthy of any white consideration. I don’t want to live in austerity and I don’t want to live in denial. As Saturn matures me, I’m finding that play, superficiality, glamor, style and unapologetic expression are INSTRUMENTAL to survival and to transformation.
But in these precarious platforms, it’s consumption covering theft covering consumption. It’s always making do with the remains of stolen life. As the ever present audience to this blatant fraud, right in plain sight, it calls upon vigilance. I don’t know if it’s necessarily consumer responsibility that should be called upon, as we are all compromised under capitalist consumption, but i’m not interested in transactional exchanges.
I am a teacher by trade. Writing and divination, reading, are my craft. Yes, I’ve known personal exile, but my community’s care kept me alive. And in class, and in community we are responsible to each other. My classes, my readings, my writing are meant as investments into ongoing relationships of care. I believe that my students, my family and true friends are testaments to that.
Because of this digital Wild West, I have always been vigilant about how and where and on what platforms I share, precisely because of the flagrant fraudulence. But don’t we all have a deep need to share, to have something of ourselves, if only to know the gift of being received.
Reading and teaching about a red praxis of decolonial divination has meant investing my creative energy into platforms and projects that I own, that cannot be duplicated nor exploited. Like Erykah, I’m an analog girl in a digital world. Rather than be dictated by market forces to chase vitality in forms of condensed media and thus condensed expression, I have been growing a lot in private. And a lot of that work is forthcoming.
My Seven of Swords Saturn has taught me to be subversive, to code break, to repair past colonial borders that violently disrupt my mind-body-spirit. Instead of scrambling to keep up on IG or Twitter, I move to reorient, investing my labor into my classes, consultations, and writing toward a flourishing inside of Indigeneity.
Now more Saturn solidified in my project, my praxis and my capabilities, I turn again. I’m packing up my swords and putting ‘em elsewhere.
And so I present to you
The Red Read Newsletter.
(and that’s read as in the verb, to read, and not a homonym for red, (sorry gays!))
May it be my red thread weaving divination, media and the word through my shared lived experience. I reserve the right to revise, rescript and reweave with tarot. My intention is to share a creative writing habit with audience who can encourage me to accountability by simply being, by simply receiving the work. Better yet to read and engage, best of all to sign for a subscription plan.
My intention is to share my writing, point blank period.
I write what I need and share as its appropriate, necessary and helpful. I will write regardless of the platform but I’m hopeful that substack will be more amicable and aligned to my goals and ethos as a writer-teacher-diviner. I’m not here to make viral content, I'm here to build trust with readers. After reading :
“We believe that together we can build the most valuable media economy the world has ever known—an economy where value is measured not only in dollars but also in quality, in good-faith discourse, and in creating an internet that celebrates and supports humanity.”
in a recent substack reads, I feel a sense of promise, optimism and hope.
While I’m trying to work without being beholden by expectations, you may anticipate regular writing and reading. I aim toward a sort of epistolary catalogue of my divinatory praxis. How I live the tarot, how the tarot reads me and my world, and how it uncovers new voices necessary for the new articulations of an old wisdom.
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