
Neptune, god of the oceans and tempests, a channel for spiritual enlightenment, creativity and compassion or entrenched delusion and dishonesty. A shape-shifter, it feigns weakness and timidity when in reality it has a ferocious streak which oversees wars, epidemics, disasters and lies of significant magnitude.
One example is the recent upsurge in anti-vaxxers which was triggered in 1998 exactly at the time when Neptune moved into Aquarius. Aquarius the sign of science plus Neptune the sign of duplicity is not a good combination. It started from the now-disgraced medic UK Andrew Wakefield’s Lancet article in 1998 suggesting a link between the measles vaccine and autism. That was later characterised as “the most damaging medical hoax of the 20th Century.” And also called ‘a disinformation bomb.’ It has led to a sharp drop in vaccination rates and the resurgence of measles in several countries. Wakefield, himself (no birth date sadly) was born in 1957 when Neptune was again on a cuspal year moving into Scorpio.
The majority of prominent anti-vaxxer’s charts have strong/afflicted Neptunes. Robert F Kennedy Jnr has Sun Mercury opposition Uranus square Neptune; Jamel Holley has Saturn Sun Mercury square Neptune; William Tebb, an early anti-vaxxer had Sun Mercury square Neptune. Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey have strong Mercury Neptune hard aspects.
Religious groups (Neptunian) as well as populist rabble rousers have been prominent in many anti-vaccination campaigns leading to a surge in polio cases in Pakistan, Nigeria, Italy and the Philippines with HPV-vaccine resistance in Japan.
Another example of a Neptune Ingress would be the phenomenon of yellow journalism = exaggerations of news events, scandal-mongering, or sensationalism = popularised by William Randolph Hearst in the 1890s who made his first foray into the newspaper business a few years earlier as Neptune moved into Gemini, which is an apt description for a truth-twisting business, especially as it was then amplified by corrupt Pluto.
Not quite in the same category but interesting, the birth of the psychoanalytic movement came as Neptune moved into Cancer in 1902 and Sigmund Freud started to hold weekly professional meeting with other interested doctors. It burgeoned into one of the most influential movements of the 20th Century, extending out into the arts as well as healing. The first barbiturate was also produced. Neptune spreads ideas for good or ill; and in this case arguably undermined the family (Cancer) by focussing on individualism.
It got me pondering about the years of Neptune’s shiftover into a new sign, as will happen in 2025 into Aries. Every time Neptune has moved into a new sign over the past 150 years there were events of considerable magnitude, in the early stages. in addition to the above.
1861 Neptune into Aries coincided with the American Civil War.
1914 into Leo for World War 1. Plus Charlie Chaplin’s first film; and another narcotic analgesic developed.
1929 into Virgo for the end of the Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression. First colour television demos and first BBC TV transmission.
1942/42 into Libra during World War 11 when the Holocaust got under way.
1957 into Scorpio when Sputnik 1 became the first satellite to orbit the earth. H2N2 flu killed 1 million globally (Saturn was square Pluto then as well).
1970 into Sagittarius when the first Earth Day was celebrated for environmental protection.
1984 into Capricorn when the Ethiopian famine killed 1 million, triggering BandAid/Bob Geldof and a global charitable effort.
1998 into Aquarius for the Kosovo War start, and the 2nd Congo War which killed 5.4 million, the bloodiest conflict since WW11. The Good Friday Agreement brought peace to Northern Ireland. European Central Bank switch over to euro currency.
2011 into Pisces for the Arab Spring, Bin Laden killed, Kim Jong Il dies. Stock Exchange slide with European Sovereign Debt and USA financial crisis. Occupy Wall Street protests.
Not quite what you might expect from Neptune but there are common themes in the changeover years.
When Neptune was first discovered on 23 September 1846 there was an exact and extraordinarily powerful and brutal Yod of Pluto in Aries sextile Neptune Saturn in Aquarius inconjunct Mars, giving a hint of its attributes.
See previous post August 27 2019 for Neptune in Aries.
Do pitch in with any additional thoughts and I’ll add to the text as it goes.