Tarot Certification with the TCBA (v. 2.0?)

benebell said:

An ethics compliance certificate may not end all that, but with enough clout and support from the tarot community, the existence of such a certificate CAN be made well-known enough to the mainstream that they will begin to start asking for it before a reading starts. Also, if a tarot reader does NOT comply with that ethical code, then the client could in fact report it to this governing organizational body.

I was kind of hoping the TCBA did that. Oh well.

GoldenWolf: I'm curious how many of the names on the TCBA members lists actually went through each level of examination and how many simply were awarded honorary titles. It would be nice to see that distinguished somehow on the website. Having just the names there like that without any further explanation, especially if what you say is true and so many of the better known ones were just granted the titles, is borderline misrepresentation. That's disappointing to know.

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Frankly, there are not enough TCBA certified readers for the organization to have sufficient clout to act as a governing body. Even if a client reports a questionable or deceptive practice, the TCBA has no legal authority to suspend a reader or forbid him or her from doing business. That would require licensing and reghulation at the level of state or local government. The most TCBA could do would be to suspend or cancel the reader's membership in the organization. Reporting readers who lift "curses" or insist a client needs a pricey "protection talisman" are better reported to the fraud division of the local police and/or the Better Business Bureau to stop the illegal behavior.

If the TCBA had exceptions for published books as Tarotbear mentioned, then perhaps that is how Mary Greer, Rachel Pollack, Lon Milo DuQuette and many other authors who were published (long before anyone could be an author simply by "publishing" an ebook) before being made grandmasters attained that status. I'm not implying that any of the folks mentioned above don't deserve that status given their contributions to this field. Certainly the TCBA can answer this question more accurately than I can since they post a "Highly Regarded Members" page on their website no doubt to attract people to the program and give it an air of legitimacy. I would assume they have adequate records on this issue.

One reason that the older members here are less than enthusiastic about the certification process is that there were serious questions raised many years ago about the process itself, the funds that were being raised as a result of it, the independence (or lack thereof) of the certification board with regard to another tarot organization which endorsed the process. Perhaps those threads are now in the Members Only area. When I read them, this site and all the subforums were free to everyone. It appears that the current TCBA regime has no connection or affiliation with the folks in charge back then. However, people remember that sort of thing long afterwards. I comment on this not raise doubts in your mind about TCBA, but to let you know why many of the long-time members aren't as open to the process as some newer members. it's not just because we are set in our ways lol.

I agree with the above post to widely to quote it. Although I do not consider myself an authority on Aeclectic, I have been here since 2004, on and off, and can recognize that in a community such as this, although free and open, it too has "leaders" of a sort; highly recognized and knowledgeable members who's opinions are sought after. While many of these are known, at least to me, as usernames only, their body of work on the forum itself has propelled them to this sort of status.

Like published authors receiving honorary membership in the TCBA, their recognition has been earned over many years, but here it is a "purer" sort of celebrity as the only factor is their posting of knowledge and insight. Like in any other field, there are experts and run-of-the-mill pop experts. The former are embraced while the latter usually don't survive for too long in the cold light of a forum such as this. The TCBA, on the other hand, as it published its honorary names publicly, would seem to value primarily sales figures.

And by the way, I don't vehemently disagree with you, as this isn't a topic that directly affects me, but a theoretical one. I assure you my comments, as riled up as they may sound, really aren't, but just my own foot-in-the-mouth way of expressing myself. When I first came to the forum I used to add "in my opinion and no one has to accept it" to every paragraph I wrote, but I've since gotten too old for that, so I hope it is understood, even if not said.

I just came over to quote from another forum, as a heads up (I will put this in several threads..)

Watch out for the Tarot Certification Board of America. It does not appear to have changed much from the time when it crashed in a scandal (and almost brought down the ATA along with it). Now, it has been listed as an attack site, which installs malware on your computer (which is why I'm not giving a link to it). According to Google, it has already infected the ata-tarot.com site (which is listed as safe).

I went on using a virtual machine and Linux (for double protection), and see that they list the names of the ranks as copyrighted. Well, that's a lie. You can't copyright a title. If anything, you can trademark it, but they're making legal claims now that are totally false

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I am not for manditory certification for professional readings. But if it happened would that mean, no more" for entertainment only" disclaimers?

I think certification is ridiculous.. Tarot reading is an art in the vein of story telling... One person's art is another person's rubbish so how do you certify something like that? If someone gets some use out of a reading I've done then it's a good reading but who can say that other than the person whom the reading is for?

This is the reason I left TABI - I got a certificate from them saying I could read cards because I did a certain number of readings and the mentor from TABI said they were OK.. They weren't for that mentor so how did he or she know they were OK? At the time I was using a TdM too and none of the TABI mentors at that time read with TdMs or had ever read with TdMs, they all used RWS variants (not sure if they do now), so that made their certificate even more worthless, in my opinion....

If I want to find a tarot reader who is good then I will ask around the people I know who've had readings, for recommendations.. From what I can see, a certificate in tarot reading means absolutely nothing other than that you have access to a book of tarot card meanings and have the capability to copy those meanings down or learn them parrot fashion (and that is not reading tarot).

Until a Tarot board is in some way recognized by the government they really have nothing to offer a professional reader. Money would be better spent on taking a Tarot course that will give you some sort of recognized certificate of completion as this will be more meaningful for prospective clients.

Money is even better spent assisting your local chamber of commerce as this will give you better standing in your community.