The Pseudo-Satanist

Undoubtedly, the word “satanist” had been around since about 5 minutes after the word “Satan” came to be. But make no bones about it, the term “Satanist” as a recognized individual of the established organization/religion came into existence from Anton Lavey and the Church of Satan. There are plenty pseudo-satanic groups that you can find on the internet who will claim pre-existence to the Church of Satan, boasting their pretentious and fictional bullshit of how their teachings were handed down by the “ancient ones“, perhaps even the devil himself. Their facade of a religion is usually composed of dorks who spent more time focused on Dungeons & Dragons in high school than they did on girls. (For the record, I enjoyed Dungeons & Dragons, but pussy was always priority #1) Sometimes they are organized by former members of the Church of Satan, who were disillusioned when they realized that the Satanic Bible wouldn’t help them to conjure up demons to smash their enemies for them, or aid them in gaining entrance to the elusive vagina. When reality sets in, rather than seeing the obvious, that they are losers and will always be losers, they opt to go their own way and form a new organization, where they can be a king surrounded by other losers, as well as fat chicks.

Upon establishment, the pseudo-Satanists will begin by concocting a story of how they were secretly entrusted with the true history and knowledge of Satanism. Then starts a campaign of Lavey-bashing and how he isn’t a real Satanist. (Isn’t that odd? The inventor of Satanism? Not a real Satanist?) They become a walking manifestation of escapism fueled by a creative imagination, faithful and gullible followers, and the influence of one-too-many horror films. They intend to strike fear into the hearts of man when they call upon the name of Beelzebub! Oh, the horror.

In the Christian realm, a former pseudo-Satanist will gain much praise and attention from church-goers when he tells the congregation of his former life as a Satanist priest! Have you ever noticed that they all used to be Satanists priests?? You never hear some evangelist claim, “I was once a Satanist deacon” or “I was a Satanist altar boy”. Watch Bill Mauher’s “Religilous” sometime. On top of being a great movie, you’ll notice that at one point, as Bill is questioning the members of a truck-stop church, one of the truckers claims to have been a former Satanist priest, as if that is a title that they hand out upon becoming a member.

When I was growing up in a Christian family, most of our entertainment had to be Christian-related. We didn’t listen to secular music so we listened to albums by Amy Grant, Keith Green and other Christian artists, including a record by an evangelistic comedian named Mike Warnke. As far as Christian comedians go, this guy was really famous. He started his ministry in 1973 with a book he released called The Satan Seller, in which he claimed to have been a former satanic “High Priest”. He described being part of orgies, rapes and summoning demons. Fortunately, God saved him. He went around the country telling his tale to full houses of believers and eventually obtained a career as a Christian comedian/evangelist whose testimony won thousands to Christ. Oddly enough, it was a Christian magazine that started an investigation into Mike’s life in the early 90’s and discovered that it was all bullshit. He had made it all up. These fabricated stories of former Satanist priests are all too common in evangelism. Allow me to share with you how this comes to pass.
First, you start off with an average dork. He is socially inept. He never fits in with the cool kids. He lacks confidence in himself. He’s never kissed a girl. No matter what he does, he is never accepted. A dork is born a dork, and almost never overcomes his social handicap.

But then one day, after a life time of wanting somewhere to fit in, he is invited to church by some local Christians. They tell him that God will accept him, just as he is. They always say that but its obviously bullshit. The first thing you have to do to get into heaven is change your beliefs and repent. They never tell queers that God accepts them as they are (word on the streets is, God hates fags). But I’m getting off track. Anyway, our dork finally sees an opportunity at social acceptance. So he joins the church and gets involved in every area of church that he possibly can. He tries and tries, but still feels as though no one is paying any attention to him. And that is because they aren’t. I recall that even as a Christian, I was annoyed by dorks, as were many of my old Christian friends. But if that particular dork is observant, he will notice that even amongst Christians, everyone loves a good horror story. If you don’t believe me, just observe the attendance of any church throughout a year‘s time. Notice how whenever they do a study on or watch a movie on Satanism, the attendance reaches its maximum. It never fails. Those people want to hear about all that spooky stuff too; especially the rape parts. Now that’s exciting!

The dork notices this phenomenon. As someone who has been invisible to the congregation for so long, he now knows how to gain their attention. So one day, our dork is in a small group in church and they’re all discussing how they “came to know the lord”. When it comes to the dork’s turn, he gains the attention of everyone in the room by saying, “I was once a Satanist priest…” Suddenly, everyone is interested in him. Everyone in church wants to hear his story, and they want everyone else to hear it too (so they don’t seem like the only perverts around). Before you know it, he’s adored by churches everywhere, as he is asked, time and time again, to tell his tale. People become saved by his lie, so he is able to justify it to himself.

Satanism is great for the church because it gives them a physical devil to be afraid of. I used to love going to church as a kid on that day of the year when they would show the movie about how Satan was using heavy metal music. It was the only way I could hear some of my favorite bands! I remember hearing how Satanists would stalk the high school hallways, looking for the unpopular kids who were lonely and didn’t fit in, and how they would try to recruit them. It never occurred to me that that is actually a Christian tactic. “God will accept you as you are.” The truth is, Church of Satan does not recruit. Unlike Christianity, we Satanists do not believe Satanism is for everyone, and if you’re not clever enough to find it on your own, you are most likely not welcomed anyway.

Pseudo-Satanists are growing in number everyday. The internet allows for so much pretentiousness that anyone can start a club and say that they are the true originators of Satanism. Pseudo-Satanists want you to be scared of them, thinking that they have some power over you. They dress extra scary, and use as many frightening symbols as possible. They give themselves names of demons on their online profiles, as well as titles such as High Priest. But they are not truly scary, for they look like what the average person thinks they should look like, and once its anticipated, its no longer scary. I was always one to dress in all black and have long hair, even as a Christian. Its just my style. I don’t wear black because its evil. I wear black because its sleek and sharp, and it comes in handy that black has a bit of a slimming effect.

Recently I cut my hair short and tossed out most of my heavy metal concert t-shirts, and went shopping for some nicer clothing. I even added some color, including a bit of white. I dress a bit more upscale now, sharper and more sophisticated. People ask me why the change and my response is simple. Because I don’t want to be predictable. Let me put it to you another way. Think of a really good suspense/thriller movie. From the beginning of the movie, you are trying to guess who the killer is, but in a well done movie, its always the character you never thought it would be. Its always the nice, friendly clean cut guy. Then, there is the guy who you did expect to be the bad guy. He had long hair and was greasy and big. He had the look of a killer but he turned out to actually be a good guy. That’s when we see what is truly scary; when the outcome doesn’t go with the plan. Pseudo-Satanists are so obvious that its ridiculous and you can hardly take them seriously. But when you meet the nice clean-cut man, who seems so courteous and intelligent, you will find yourself confused when I unbutton the top button on my shirt and reveal the Sigil of Baphomet around my neck (that’s the goat head pentagram for the satanically challenged). Now they are truly afraid, for I have not stuck to their plan. They are in unknown territory, and the common man must demonize all that he does not know or understand.

We, the truly Satanic, the truly elite, will never follow the plan of mainstream society. However, we will not necessarily be so obvious as the pseudo-Satanist. Perhaps, its time for pseudo-Satanists to embrace their true selves and return to their original title, “Nerds”. It would definitely alleviate much confusion.

As for the former pseudo-Satanists who are ever so popular in the Christian world, I suppose they will always be around as long as their religion remains. After all, their religion would crumble without an enemy to fight. In order for their god to be real, his foe must be real. In order for the devil to be real, he must have followers in the flesh for the Christians to point fingers at. It is an essential fact, so that the Christians may view themselves as being “not so crazy after all”! But we are quite comfortable with being your “scape-goats”. In fact, as I’m sure you’ve guessed, we’re quite fond of goats.

Those, who are wise, will see through the bullshit. Those, who fall for the pseudo-Satanists trap, will not be missed.