3 Tarot Decks I Will Never Buy (Again)

 

Before we dive in, I want to state for those who may use this opportunity to ostracize me and exclude me from the Internet tarot community that these are just my thoughts and opinions. You may be in love with a certain deck, and that’s okay. We all have different tastes in art and cards. You’re welcome to disagree with me. But these are just some of my reasons I will never use certain tarot decks and why I will never buy (again) certain decks. I am not doing this to be trendy, but to be a voice in the community for those who agree with me on the reasoning why I choose not to purchase these decks or use them in my tarot practice. The Queen has spoken.

My goal this year is to be more open with my opinions within the tarot community. So let’s start by sharing my opinions on three tarot decks I will never buy or will never buy again.

My first deck I’m never buying again is any Radleigh Valentine/Doreen Virtue decks.

Doreen Virtue was once a famous oracle and tarot deck creator in the 90s and early aughts. She renounced her spirituality and became a Christian in early 2017. Doreen’s decision to denounce her oracle decks, books, and courses tore apart the tarot community. The internet’s opinions went from supporting her path and wishing her well to a boycott of all of her decks and books.

My opinion, which I never shared with anyone outside of my circle, is that she is allowed to change her path, but she has no right in calling people who use tarot demonic, evil, and that tarot and oracle decks are from the Devil. I was unhappy about her saying her decks and books were evil and that she betrayed her work. So I took my first oracle deck I ever bought, Magical Unicorns, and threw it in the trash. It took me several years to let go of my other decks, but eventually, I got rid of them all. I donated them either to Goodwill or to my local used indie bookstore. Radleigh Valentine is a famous tarot reader who took over Doreen’s decks and made them his. While the artwork is pretty on the decks, it’s still Doreen’s work, and I don’t want to support a fellow tarot reader who stood by Doreen Virtue. If Doreen Virtue had any integrity, she would have had Hay House stop publishing her decks altogether. 

I also never liked how Doreen Virtue and Radleigh Valentine said the tarot is scary. This point of view was mostly Doreen's, but tarot is not meant to scare you. It is for waking you the fuck up! There are scary cards, but they don’t deserve the renames like most decks use (like, for instance, in The Cozy Witch tarot, the Devil is renamed Toxic Witches). I guess I am just a traditional reader. Radleigh Valentine and Doreen Virtue renamed The Devil, The Hanged Man, and The Tower in all of their decks and tried to put a positive spin on the cards. While a positive spin is fine, sometimes it gets so cheery and positive that it feels like you’re spiritual bypassing or sugar coating things. Sometimes the harsh truth is what's needed.

Next up, we have The Modern Witch Tarot by Lisa Sterle

Another deck I purchased. I saw the art floating around on the Internet and my favorite tarot YouTuber, Kloee Taylor, used it a lot in her readings. So I plopped down my money on Amazon and bought it.

While the artwork is beautiful, and I love the diversity in body figures, cultures and races, I hated the way the deck shuffled. The deck I received was overly glossy, which a lot of reviews on Amazon have complained about. I ended up gifting this deck to a friend after I posted I couldn’t connect with it well.

This was back in 2021 when I purchased it. I haven’t re-purchased the deck as I don’t think the cardstock changed, as much as I would love to support this creator and her beautiful deck. I will re-consider the purchase if there is a different edition of the deck where it’s printed on different cardstock that’s not overly glossy.

And last, shocking to absolutely no one if you haven’t been on my Instagram and seen a similar post. The number one deck I will NEVER buy is... The Wild Unknown Tarot by Kim Krans.

I’m not one to follow the crowd. I never understood why this deck was so popular. It’s not colorful. The illustrations are simple and don’t spark my imagination or creativity. Heck, I can’t even connect with it when other tarot readers use it.

I find the symbolism to be askew from the traditional Rider-Waite-Smith, and it calls itself an RWS deck. I would say The Wild Unknown should be its own divination system. It shouldn’t be a tarot deck. But here we are...

To me, the Wild Unknown tarot deck seems to be the bougee tarot deck. That all middle-class white women got to have in their collections and say, “Look at me, I read tarot! Aren’t I special?!” As for this white woman who has been reading tarot for 23 years and not when it got popular from YouTube and TikTok? Nope! Not my deck, not my tarot practice. And didn’t American Eagle once sell this deck in their stores in the mall? LOL. Bougeeeeeeeee.

While I am happy everyone is getting into tarot and that I can come out of the closet, and people are more open-minded to tarot, and this deck is probably one to thank for it getting it into the super mainstream, I will never bow down to The Wild Unknown. The Wild Unknown tarot will never enter the Queen of Swords’ lair.

Tell me below what tarot decks you will never purchase or buy again? I’d love to hear your thoughts!