Tarot Legality

practical magic

Hi, I've spent a portion of my day reading old threads here pertaining to the legality of tarot, "fortune telling" and other forms of divination in the US, Canada, and elsewhere, and to put it mildly I'm really confused.

Take, for example, Section 365 of the Canadian Criminal code which makes reference to fortune telling, which says:
Every one who fraudulently
(a) pretends to exercise or to use any kind of witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment or conjuration,
(b) undertakes, for a consideration, to tell fortunes, or
(c) pretends from his skill in or knowledge of an occult or crafty science to discover where or in what manner anything that is supposed to have been stolen or lost may be found,
is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction.

...yet I know that there are tarot readers reading in Canada, and in my province specifically there is one who charges $30 for 15 minutes, $60 for 30 minutes... and if tarot itself were illegal, I doubt my local Chapters' selection of tarot decks would be growing. Yet there is a lot of talk about tarot in relation to this chapter of the Criminal Code which is still on the books and is still (although rarely) being used.

I tried asking a local tarot reader (one who charges money and reads in a shop) what exactly they do to avoid coming on the wrong side of this, but she was no help. I'm just starting to gain confidence with tarot and I would love nothing more than to say "yes" to the requests I've said to read for charitable events, but I want to do it right... and as I say, I'm confused. One website says that even reading for free is punishable under the law. Isn't there an incredibly thin line between "fortune telling" and any type of divination?

I know that you all can't offer legal advice, but if you're in Canada, or another place with a similarly archaic law, and you read tarot... what's your experience?
 

laurence

Hi!

I also did some research about It.
Althought i don't read professionally, I wanted to know how It works as a business.

I hope a professional tarot reader from Canada will be able to properly answer your question.
I think there is one thing you can do to protect yourself is to mention " for entertainment purpose only" . And It's applicable in Canada if I am not wrong. This way no one can wrongly attack you for performing Tarot and other stuff.

Regards.
 

practical magic

Thanks for your response. :) I don't even want to do it as a regular source income, to be honest, I'm fine with doing freebies for friends, but I do want to be able to confidently say yes, and do tarot, when asked for the occasional charitable event, or on my own site, with all proceeds going to charity.

I wasn't sure if the "for entertainment purposes only" thing applied to Canada and couldn't seem to find a definitive answer either way... I'll have to dig into it further.
 

Sherilyn G

Hi, I've spent a portion of my day reading old threads here pertaining to the legality of tarot, "fortune telling" and other forms of divination in the US, Canada, and elsewhere, and to put it mildly I'm really confused.

Take, for example, Section 365 of the Canadian Criminal code which makes reference to fortune telling, which says:
Every one who fraudulently
(a) pretends to exercise or to use any kind of witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment or conjuration,
(b) undertakes, for a consideration, to tell fortunes, or
(c) pretends from his skill in or knowledge of an occult or crafty science to discover where or in what manner anything that is supposed to have been stolen or lost may be found,
is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction.

...yet I know that there are tarot readers reading in Canada, and in my province specifically there is one who charges $30 for 15 minutes, $60 for 30 minutes... and if tarot itself were illegal, I doubt my local Chapters' selection of tarot decks would be growing. Yet there is a lot of talk about tarot in relation to this chapter of the Criminal Code which is still on the books and is still (although rarely) being used.

I tried asking a local tarot reader (one who charges money and reads in a shop) what exactly they do to avoid coming on the wrong side of this, but she was no help. I'm just starting to gain confidence with tarot and I would love nothing more than to say "yes" to the requests I've said to read for charitable events, but I want to do it right... and as I say, I'm confused. One website says that even reading for free is punishable under the law. Isn't there an incredibly thin line between "fortune telling" and any type of divination?

I know that you all can't offer legal advice, but if you're in Canada, or another place with a similarly archaic law, and you read tarot... what's your experience?


I'm not a lawyer but, the above does say "fraudulently", and it also says "pretend". If you genuinely know your stuff, and list your service as for "entertainment only", then, I don't think it counts as fraud. I think you just have to be really honest, and be careful about what claims you make. Many people really do find it entertaining but no one likes to be misled.

I think, in modern times, that law is aimed at protecting people from con artists who don't know anything at all about reading the cards and do fake readings in order to scam money from people. I think this law actually protects genuine readers from the bad name that con artists could create for tarot reading.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...played-tarot-card-reader-improve-fortune.html

http://life.nationalpost.com/2012/1...spite-hundred-year-old-law-to-protect-people/

I've been doing free card reading in Canada for almost 30 years, and I have never been threatened with any charges or lawsuits. The cards themselves are certainly not illegal; they are very easy to find in stores.

The way I understand it is that making a prediction of the future is just one part of divination and not necessarily even the focus of it. While fortune telling is all about "seeing the future".

Is there a Small Business Centre in town that you could check with? They should be able to help you find out about the laws.
 

danieljuk

I don't read professionally read but the legality always used to scare me. These days I don't think it is so scary, how many people actually get in trouble about this? It's few if any at all! Most of the tarot readers with big websites online have a disclaimer policy, like Laurence said "for entertainment only", protect yourself from someone claiming you gave professional / legal / medical advice. Some places in the world and some states in the U.S, it's really is difficult to professionally tarot read but they still don't really prosecute! It's all very well to have a law about "fake mediums" but the court would have to prove it! There is really obvious examples of people conning others but if you stick to an ethics code and disclaimer, you are not going in to con people as a motive!

Some venues ask tarot readers to have insurance in case of liability, that is probably more of a risk than the other legality.

I know in the UK a professional tarot association claims to give legal and insurance help on joining. Perhaps something like that in Canada can help? Watch their charges though!

added: found a blog post discussing the Canadian law - http://mapletreedruidry.wordpress.com/2013/04/15/tarot-and-the-canadian-law/ doesn't really have an answer though about the divination law
 

Mark Lewis

You will have no worries if you are running an honest practice. This law applies more to fraudulent psychics who supposedly remove curses, promise to reunite lost lovers and engage in other psychic scams for extortionate sums of money. But even in these cases the law is not enforced very well since I assume the authorities have other priorities.

There are psychic fairs all over Canada which operate perfectly legally. However, there are certain provinces where you have to have a licence to operate. I used to have a licence for one province (I think Alberta but I just can't remember) but it has run out.

Many, many years ago there was a psychic fair in Montreal that ran into trouble. I understand the police chief at the time was a fundamentalist Christian who hated the idea of psychics and readers generally. Or so the story goes that I heard anyway, admittedly third hand. So it seems undercover people went in to have readings and charged various people. I think they got into trouble for dealing in health matters which quite rightly you are not supposed to do if you are not a doctor.

Anyway I understand they were all acquitted but the fair promoter got such a fright over the matter that he made every psychic give out a leaflet to all the clients in fancy new age language approved by his lawyers which supposedly made the whole thing legal. If I get time I will type out the leaflet here.

Mind you it didn't stop the harassment of the fair. Suddenly the Fire Chief got involved and sent his people in to inspect the booths for the slighest violation. However it all died down and the fair is running to this day. Or at least I think so.

The bottom line is that from what you are saying you will have no trouble whatsoever. Incidentally which province are you based in?
 

Mark Lewis

Oops! I didn't notice how old this thread was! So much for my psychic power!
 

tarotbear

Anyway I understand they were all acquitted but the fair promoter got such a fright over the matter that he made every psychic give out a leaflet to all the clients in fancy new age language approved by his lawyers which supposedly made the whole thing legal. If I get time I will type out the leaflet here.

I'd like to read that ....
 

seven stars

No witches allowed in Canada?
 

Alta

There are at least two psychic fairs every year here in Ottawa, and the local pubs have palm readers and the local metaphysical store offers tarot, angel readings, past lives and the like. Can't be too illegal.