To be blunt
I said this once before but was relatively nice about it. Here's the more blunt version, so if you are a devotee of astrology, prepare to be offended.
I was extremely physically attractive in my youth and charming and personable and SMART, so I learned early that it's a problem for people to simply take your word for stuff without you being able to credibly back up your advice with a list of good explanations.
I learned in high school other people think I'm smart so everything I say MUST be precious drops of wisdom and developed the dripping sarcasm voice to signal "This is a joke and if you were in physics class with me you would know that". My dripping sarcasm voice is so sarcastic, my extremely socially retarded aspie son figured out "Um...that doesn't mean what it seems to mean." even though most ASD people have trouble figuring out sarcasm because they tend to take everything literally.
I'm medically handicapped. No matter how well I get, I still make mistakes because:
A. I'm human and ...
B. I'm also sometimes extremely impaired.
I try to NOT make casual conversation online anymore. It tends to not go well. I tend to open mouth, insert foot when I speak off the cuff, then wonder why no one respects my opinions. Der.
Astrology and astronomy used to be the SAME thing. They diverged at some point and astrology mostly became bullshit where people want to believe that when the stars align, they will win the lottery having not bought a ticket.
The sun, the moon and other heavenly bodies in actual fact do really impact life here on planet Earth. The sun gives us sunshine and wind, the moon impacts the tides and most likely there are other observable cause and effect relationships between physical heavenly bodies and events here on Earth.
Most likely, "astrologers" during the middle ages were learned men who were advising kings because they were learned and they were covering their ass with "the stars say so" because having power puts a target on your forehead.
It's offensive to be a commoner who is smarter and more politically savvy than the king AND it's dangerous to have power but no authority or money to help protect you, but both kings and commoners alike were happy to go "He's just interpreting the STARS for me, so somehow that's different and we are ok with this."
I've written about that. See the link above at the very start of this piece and stuff it links out to.
There's no governing body overseeing astrology. There's no Board of Astrology, no University of Astrology. "Professional astrologer" means "I studied this independently and I'm smart enough to follow the heavy as hell math involved in casting charts by hand, so I can con you jackasses into PAYING me for my FUCKING advice."
I got paid at least once to cast a chart, ergo I'm a professional astrologer.
But these days any idiot can go online, put a birthday into a free online service and get the math done for them instantly and not know enough to know it's wrong.
I check every site with MY info before doing anyone else's chart to figure out how fucked up it is because I know my chart by heart, so I know when it doesn't account for something, it's off by an hour and the rising sign is wrong.
I was a homemaker who had dropped out of college to support my husband's career and getting paid to do astrology requires zero fucking legal fuck all. I contemplated becoming an astrologer to pay my bills because I'm smart, had no credentials and wanted a divorce and needed an income.
I actually made a stab more than once at developing some kind of astrology business because many years later I'm STILL financially distressed and have been the entire time. I WISH I could sell astrological services and easily pay my bills but I haven't managed to do that.
Probably in part because I long ago decided I'm not playing that con game of giving you MY opinion and pretending it's NOT my opinion, it's the STARS saying so. I concluded that my advice is good because I did therapy and I'm a learned person and the chart is a cover story for telling psych jobs I know what I really think of them without having them spit in my face.
Anyone giving astrological advice that is actually good life advice could make a career as a couples counselor or psychotherapist or other consultant. They probably don't because they need income now, don't have the credentials for a more "respected" advice-giving career and don't want to put in several years and potentially many thousands of dollars acquiring those credentials before making money off their advice.
Astrology is not entirely bullshit but it long ago stopped being "There's no light pollution, the moon's phases impact tides and weather and I am constantly aware of those things and can make reasonable inferences and advise the king to plant early or some shit."
These days, most people consult astrological charts for the following:
1. Please tell me money is magically coming somehow. AKA tell me I'm winning the lottery without buying a ticket.
2. Please tell me I'm going to magically meet the man/woman of my dreams and fall in love and live happily ever after because the stars aligned because I'm a lazy assed motherfucker who can't be arsed to sort my shit nor develop any relationship skills, so "magic" is my only hope I will ever have a good relationship to anyone, thank you.
3. Please explain to me why my life is so amazingly fucked up in spiritual language that blames the stars and past life and bad karma instead of telling me what an asshole I am and how I could GET THERAPY and try harder because I just want a fucking excuse and to be absolved of my sins and told I'm helpless and it's not my fault.
So a lot of years ago, I decided I will get a formal education and give my professional opinion as a certified whatever the fuck and call it "My professional opinion on x backed up by thus and such respectable college and these other spiffy credentials, BUT I'm HUMAN and make mistakes like ANYONE and if you don't like that opinion, feel free to get a SECOND opinion from someone else in this field OR a different field better yet who might see things I don't see."
Because I learned long ago people who think I'm smart and charismatic want me to be perfect and infallible and want to put their brain in idle and just hang on my every word and trust me to fix their shit while they don't bother to think or make any effort and whether it's ME or someone else, that shit doesn't fucking work.
So I blog to try to EDUCATE people and help them make better decisions for themselves instead of putting on a purple turban with gold stars and saying "Madame Doreen will see you now" and washing my hands of responsibility for MY PROFESSIONAL OPINION as a paid advice giver by saying "The stars say so." instead of citing psychological studies or similar to back up what I say with something you could check yourself to see if it holds water.
