Diary of an embryonic Satanist: April 2009

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Fun with blasphemy

I'm reading a lot about Satanism. I've finished Anton LaVey's The Satanic Bible and The Satanic Rituals, as well as several freely available documents on tikaboo.com. (Actually, I had already read The Satanic Bible once, many years ago, but only looked upon it then as light entertainment.) Well, when I say "read," I mean quick reads. I guess right now I'm trying to get exposed to as much Satanic literature as possible, as quickly as possible. I'm not trying to learn everything all at once, but instead get an overview to help me plan out how to proceed further. To put it another way -- you've heard the saying, "don't miss the forest by looking too close at the trees?" Right now I'm not looking at the trees, but the forest.

I've already found out that, although many Satanists disagree in varying respects with LaVey, his ideas, and the organization he founded, the Church of Satan, just about every Satanist I've talked to has recommended his books. I think that this is good; it seems to me (and I'm far from an expert) that whether one agrees with all of the LaVeyian variety or not, he gives a good overview. Whether I'll join the Church of Satan, join another organization, or stay "independent" is something I have yet to determine, but I already like many of LaVey's ideas, and I'm sure I'll use some of them in whatever context I end up in.

I've also been looking over Diane Vera's website, theisticsatanism.com. As is apparent from the name, Ms. Vera is a theistic Satanist; some Satanists are atheistic. That's something I've gotta sort out in my mind too, exactly where I stand on that question. For the past couple of decades, I've called myself an atheist and believed it, but part of that was because of a fervent belief in science, rationality, etc. -- for a long time, I didn't even allow myself to consider any other possibility other than atheism. I felt that even considering any other possibility would somehow be treasonous to my allegiance to rationality, empiricism, etc.

But lately -- and by "lately" I mean over the past few years, not the past few days -- I've come to believe that there is evil in the world, beyond that which is present in people's hearts, minds, and actions. To put it another way, I think that there is such a thing as "Evil," separate from any person, and that sometimes it operates through people. (And no, I'm not talking about "nine-eleven," or anything of that nature; I'm talking about things far more subtle than that. To explain what I'm getting at would require enough bytes that I'll reserve it for a later post.) But whether that evil is willful, or whether it just is, is something I'm still sorting through.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, in this context, "Evil" does not mean "Satan." Any Satanists reading this already know that, but for other readers, I'd better make that clear. And where anything like "Good" might fit into this, well, that's another thing I'm sifting through.

So as to where I stand on whether I'm a theistic or atheistic Satanist, at present I'd have to say "I guess I'm atheistic ... well, probably ... err, maybe?" But I have done a lot of thinking during my life on philosophy, the nature of existence, the meaning of life (it's "forty-two," right?), religion, and all the rest of it, so I've got a few prior conclusions to toss into the mix. And some things are clicking into place.

Meanwhile, as I'm getting the lay of the land, I've already found something I can start doing now, courtesy of Ms. Vera. She gives a great explanation of the power of purpose of blasphemy at her website. So great, that rather than restate it all here I'll just summarize then point you to her web page. Briefly, it's to bring those last nagging doubts out into the open and face them down. Think of a child who, for a time, really believed that stepping on a sidewalk crack would break Mom's back ... and is now long past that belief but still takes care to avoid cracks, just in case. That's the idea; get the kid to step on the crack, prove to himself that it's just a crack, nothing more, and purge himself once and for all of that nagging fear. Ms. Vera's page on this is at

http://www.theisticsatanism.com/rituals/blasphemy/purpose.html

To me, this makes a lot of sense -- and my academic degrees were in psychology, so I'm not just talking from a personal and intuitive level. (BTW, I've been away from working in the psych field for many years.) The emotional and rational components of a belief don't necessarily line up with each other; in fact, they often don't. That's not necessarily unhealthy in itself, it's just normal. But it is something that needs to be acknowledged and dealt with.

I'm not eager to try out complex rituals just yet. To me, that seems like attempting Michael Jordan's moves while I'm still learning to dribble the ball; not just useless, but counterproductive. But I realized that here's something I can use immediately. While I'm working on getting the lay of the landscape and planting my feet planted firmly on the ground within, I can also get some psychic cleansing done.

So I started off with a simple blasphemy. I Googled for images of Christ on the cross. I found a very nice one and printed it. Then I took it to the bathroom and pissed on it.

My inner reaction ... nothing. It was just a piece of paper. No terror, no feeling that I was betraying something, no fear of punishment. Not even a glimmer of guilt. Conversely, no feelings of liberation, triumph, etc. The end result was nothing more than an empty bladder and a piss-soaked picture. I went to bed right afterward and nodded right off to sleep, no tossing, no turning, no bad dreams, nothing.

This told me three things.

First, I rejected Christianity a long time ago, and I guess over the years, the rational component of that belief has already done a lot of "work" on whatever emotional components of Christianity were left. And I think this is in accord with my experience before embarking on Satanism. When I watched "The Passion of the Christ," it was nothing more to me than two hours of watching some poor bastard getting the living shit kicked out of him. I appreciated and understood how Christians would find it inspiring or even powerful, but I had nothing like that as a personal reaction -- it was like listening to the national anthem of some foreign country, knowing and appreciating what it means to the citizens of that country, but having no personal allegiance to it. Similarly, religious Christmas songs -- e.g., "Silent Night," not "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" -- do nothing at all for me; they're not a veneration of anything I care about at all.

The second thing I realized is that blasphemy, in this context, isn't that simple. It's not enough to merely perform an act, you have to bring yourself into the act as well. It's all too easy to internally divorce an act from its context and meaning; one might burn a flag while telling oneself that it's nothing more than a piece of cloth, for example. You have to bring your attitudes, your beliefs, your prejudices, your fears, etc. into the act.

I realize those might sound contradictory, but they're not. I'm firmly convinced that if I had any significant amount of Christian belief left in me, I couldn't have regarded the picture as merely a piece of paper. But in treating it as just paper, I missed the point. In order to scrape out those last remains of Christian belief, I'll have to "get into it" more; work myself up into something like a Christian frenzy, then perform the blasphemous act while having as close to a belief in Christianity as I can manage.

The third thing I got from this, which didn't occur to me until the following morning, was that act itself is absolutely necessary. Sorting out things internally is great, as far as it goes, but ultimately it has to be married to some action. One has to "practice what one preaches," "live ones beliefs," etc.

So, the big lesson here for me -- in order for the blasphemy to have real value and effect, one has to bring ones rational and emotional beliefs to the blasphemy, and marry those beliefs to an act. (I'm sure some of you with psych backgrounds may recognize this as the cognition/affect/conation triad, and I suppose I may be simply imposing my academic training on this situation, but it seems valid enough.) And I can already see that the same thing applies not just to blasphemy, but to every other ritual as well. Needless to say, that means rituals are a lot of work!

And so I'll try it again, but this time I'll get it right ... stay tuned ...

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

My PGP public key

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Begin at the beginning

Hello, world!

Since this is my first blog entry, I suppose it is only appropriate that I tell you a little about myself. In doing that, I'll also tell you about my reasons for doing this blog, and at the same time lay out some "ground rules."

I've started this blog because I am seriously exploring the idea of becoming a Satanist. I'm going to articulate my thoughts as I read about Satanism and speak with Satanists, and I hope to get comments from those who embrace Satanism or at least have some experience with it that's impartial and more than casual.

Some of you reading this may be shocked already. Of course, there will always be those who consider any presentation of Satan in a positive light to be outrageous. I've made no explicit positive statements about Satan and Satanism yet, but it's also true that the fact that I'm seriously exploring and considering embracing Satanism is, in itself, a tacit endorsement. If you find yourself angered for that reason, read on -- I'll address you in a moment.

But first, I'd like to address those who might be surprised for a different reason. Perhaps your initial reaction is, "hey, that ain't right. This guy's gotta be kidding. I've seen Satanists on the Internet before, and they all fall into two groups: fifteen-year-olds trying to piss off their parents, and adults making money off those teenagers. But this guy can't be serious. His name's 'Paul,' not 'ZpWn Ov LucYferr' or something equally idiotic. He writes in grammatically correct English, and he's fairly articulate. And where the hell is the heavy metal audio clip, blasting out of my PC's speakers at 160 dB? Where are the bloody, disgusting images? Where's Paul's photo of himself, dressed like a dork, staring vacantly into the camera while drool trickles down his chin? WHERE'S THE STUPIDITY?"

"Dude ... 'Paul,' if that really is your name ... you've got a LOT to learn about being a Satanist!!!"

Well, I do have a lot to learn. But if that's your reaction, you have even more to learn about Satanism than I do. It's true that Satanism does attract its share of idiots, but so does Christianity. You wouldn't want all Christians, or even most, to be judged by the actions of Fred Phelps, would you? Well, it's equally true that Satanism and Satanists should not be judged by the actions of some fools. Without getting into it too much -- there will be plenty of opportunity for that later -- let's just say right now that Satanism is the celebration of the self. It's the acceptance and embracing of humanity's "darker" nature; lust, pride, greed, etc. Those things aren't sick, they're normal. They're healthy. And those things do not imply or lead to harmful behavior. He who lusts is not a rapist; he's a sexually healthy person. He who has pride is not a despot; he simply does not allow himself to be abused. He who has greed does not steal; he claims those things that are rightfully his, and works to honestly gain those things he desires.

Oops ... I said I would wait until later to address the folks who were shocked by any sort of a positive representation of Satanism ... but I see I went ahead and addressed them first. Oh well.

Now, as to why this web site doesn't look like it was designed by a cretin. It's that way because this is me. I don't drink blood. I don't dress in weird clothes. I've got multiple degrees, and I'm responsibly employed. I'm more likely to listen to Mozart than to any rock written after about 1985. I don't have long hair, and I don't have any tattoos or piercings. Although I despise the religious right, I vote Republican far more often than Democrat. I smoked pot in college, but haven't touched the stuff since then, nor felt any need to.

If you want to know who I am, don't think of the punk who rides his motorcycle down your street at 3 AM. Don't think of the junior high dropout next door who's got an iron spike jammed through his tongue (ouch!). And don't waste your time looking for needle tracks on my arms; Nazi literature on my bookshelves; or any of the other distinguishing marks of Loser Americanus.

Think instead of the smiling man in the conservative business suit who handles your mortgage at the bank. Think of the guy to whom the other eleven strangers instinctively turn when a dozen people are called upon to be jurors and a foreman must be selected. Think of the guy who's on your local city council; the one who never really campaigns for it, but does the job efficiently and has no trouble being re-elected year after year. Think of the friendly neighbor you wave at as he mows his lawn on a Saturday afternoon.

If you want to know who I am, don't think of Beavis or Butt-Head. Think of Mike Brady, or Cliff Huxtable, or even Ward Cleaver.

Well ... actually those three examples are a little misleading. I'm not married, and don't have children. (Those of you who might be worried about my corrupting little minds can resume breathing normally. And in case you're wondering; no, I'm not gay.) And I'll let you in on a little secret. My name isn't really Paul Davies. That's just the pseudonym I'm using here. You see, I'm savvy enough to realize that anyone in the US who publicly states any sort of sympathy for Satanism had better do a few things to protect himself. So if you're tempted for whatever reason to try to track me down and contact me, or "out" me to my friends and neighbors, or harass me, etc., give it up now. You'll never be able to figure out who I am, at least not unless I allow you to know. I've been around the Internet long enough to know that there are some real creeps out there, and I've also learned to be careful.

In being careful, I'll necessarily have to tell a few lies about myself. But while I'll lie about specific biographical details, I won't lie by implying false things through those details. My profile says I'm 45, and I am indeed 45 years old ... or maybe I'm 44, or 46 ... but I'm not 72 or 27. My name isn't Paul Davies, but that's reasonably close to my real name, I'm content to be addressed by it, and if you inferred from it that I'm an average white guy of English ancestry, you're correct. I'll tell you that I live in a small town in the Bible Belt; I won't tell you which one, but you can rest assured that I don't live in Boston or Minneapolis.

One other thing -- I grew up in a casually Christian household, and was a "Sunday Christian" until I became a young adult. Then, over the course of a few years, I abandoned it completely. But I didn't abandon it without examining it first; such beliefs should not be discarded lightly. I read the Bible, thoroughly. I studied the evidence. I examined the history. I contemplated the nature of existence and of morality. And having done so, I rejected Christianity as a warped and twisted fairy tale. So, a word to Christian proselytizers reading this. Don't waste your time with your usual kindergarten-variety pitches -- "have you ever read John 3:16?" ... "suppose you put a disassembled 747 in a box and shook it?" ... etc. I can promise you, I've already heard 99% of the so-called arguments you think you can throw at me, and I almost certainly know your Bible and your church better than you do.

Sorry about that digression. One unfortunate thing I've learned in my life about Christians is, they just have to try to shove their beliefs down everyone else's throats. So proselytizers, be warned; I won't tolerate you. As for all of the rest of you ... here I am; let's talk.

Diary of an embryonic Satanist

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Fun with blasphemy

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

My PGP public key

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Begin at the beginning

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