Satan thinks nihilism is a Christian artifact

Posted on by A lesser demon

Many established truths and commons have been trampled by the herd over the last century. Gays are now to be considered genuine males, women are not the property of their rightful owners, slaves are believed to equal their masters, no race is intrinsically noble and predisposed for glory, no nation is pure, natural justice is replaced by compassion for the wrongdoers, and that which should naturally fall is scaffolded and fortified. The world is, perhaps, going to Hell—not that Satan complains.

Verging on this descent into the Apocalypse, Satan thinks it is reassuring to find that some people, especially His own church, the very Church of Satan, upholds the virtues of old: because man is but an animal, Nature red in tooth and claw should govern human actions, as it is the Law; and strength is acquired through the joy of indulgences. For political reasons of self-preservation, The Church of Satan publicly presents itself as a dark fun-house of mere theatrics, but within its own scripture and communiquées—which the public overlooks as the very image of His Infernal Majesty deflects their eyes—the truth is all but laid bare. Certain historically indicative, familiar phrases are omitted, but the dog whistles shrill so loud that even the deafest right-wing extremist recognizes his kin. Terms such as “social Darwinism” are used scantly and just often enough to settle what “Lex Talionis,” the Law of the Jungle, means. If one dares, cares, or bothers to read the canonical scriptures of The Church of Satan, its vision is a race of master individuals, an alien élite, genetically bred and cultivated through the standard of the strong.

The first book of Anton LaVey’s The Satanic Bible are excerpts (or rather a plagiarism) of Ragnar Redbeard’s Might Is Right, which advocates such a view, including the above sentiments. Reducing every social phenomenon to simple power-relations, it is Redbeard’s synthesis of his personal racism and misogyny with the pseudo-science of social Darwinism and the philosophical rhetoric of Stirner’s anarchist individualism and Nietzsche’s focus on power. It is an outstandingly execrable combination of a comprehensively and thoroughly disproven body of thought. After a century of exhaustive debunking, only neo-fascists still believe that social Darwinism is scientific. Even if there were a grain of truth to be found, even for non-human animals, in these long outdated, pseudo-scientific conjectures, it is a Naturalistic Fallacy to derive a should from an is, concluding that humans ought to live accordingly. That is: social Darwinism is, both biologically and philosophically, objectively and demonstrably wrong. (His Maliciousness did not say it, but it bears mention that it is a remarkably rare and unenviable feat to be objectively wrong in philosophical matters.)

Satan is impressed that, faced with this scientific verdict on one of the most meticulously and extensively analyzed fields of science in human history, even today His church and its high priest, Peter Gilmore, manage to maintain and promote the sophomoric understanding of philosophy and the nature of human life required to enable them to endorse Might Is Right and regard it as accurate and enlightening. Such a display of self-deceit and stupidity is, in its own right, fascinating.

However, this is not intended as a venture into the many obscure interests of the Devil. The Prince of Insufficient Lighting has always been lured towards human depravity, the mental dysfunctions of crypto-fascists included. Satan’s message concerns the fact that His church believes in The Law of the Jungle despite its unmitigated rejection by every scientist, social theorist, and philosopher alive, not to forget quite a selection of many already dead.

The Church of Satan informs outsiders that the first book of The Satanic Bible is tongue-in-cheek, intended to rile up the reader or scare off those who would not benefit from the book. However, portions of Might Is Right find their way into the argumentative chapters of The Satanic Bible, and the remainder of the work is pervasive in LaVey’s subsequent writings. It is far more (if not nearly exclusively) foundational to LaVey’s Satanism than The Satanic Bible indicates.

The Law of the Jungle is an escalation of the law of retaliation, or retributive justice, that we know from the ancient Hammurabi code of “an eye for an eye” into Drako’s eponymously named punishment system fused with vigilante dispositions. (Satan, always ahead, prefers preemptive retaliation.) LaVey explained that for all its brutality, such a system would ensure a stable society, because the fear of retribution would cause people to think twice. “Responsibility to the responsible,” as the sixth Satanic Statement goes, hand in hand with the fifth Statement on vengeance, would subject them to the consequences of their actions, such as having their arm ripped from its socket for vandalizing a prized garden plant. The demand for The Law of the Jungle is established in The Church of Satan’s “pentagonal revisionism” program as an essential pillar of a Satanic society. It is both a legal and a moral code.

Satan thinks this should raise many an eyebrow, because it is the exact caution that Christian thinkers (a term that Satan applies very loosely to such people) have raised for centuries: that without faith in God, nothing prevents mankind from descending into the lawlessness of, yes, the Law of the Jungle. Without God and particularly the prospect of burning in Hell, humans would have no morals, they claim. Rational atheists have long argued, however, with plenty of supporting evidence, that morals are not contingent on a belief in deities. Moral behavior is innate to both humans and many non-human animals and arises naturally as a result of mutual self-interest.

This view is rejected by The Church of Satan, which assumes the Christian paradigm. The Law of the Jungle—the post-apocalyptic dystopia that Christians fear—is exactly what Anton LaVey and The Church of Satan expect as the natural alternative to Christianity. To Christians, human morals are motivated by a fear of punishment in Hell. To Satanists in The Church of Satan, human morals are enforced by fear of punishment here and now. To atheists, morals are a human trait that develops naturally to the benefit of mankind with no need for gods. Satan leaves it as an exercise for the reader to determine which of these three groups are the most similar.

The moral nihilism shared by Christians and The Church of Satan that denies an objective basis for morality has been a recurring philosophical theme in the Western World. Darwinism (genuine, not social) has received much of the blame for its death blow to the anthropocentric worldview, and materialism has been blamed for its lowered valuation of the soul, but Satan thinks there is a broader reason.

Christianity has contaminated virtually every aspect of Western culture, with centuries of metaphysical, eschatological, and existential expectations regarding the nature of the world. The strong anthropocentrism of classic Christianity and its belief that Nature is subservient to humanity, that morality is provided by the will of their god, that life has meaning because of God, and that humans have souls that will live in an afterlife, have brought comfort as meaning, purpose, and order seemed guaranteed. However, scientific advances have continually challenged such superstition, and the explanatory power of the naturalistic, scientific worldview is ever-increasing. For anyone to whom the Christian vision is persuasive, while the sciences and other enlightened insights tear at its fabric with nothing to replace it, a gaping void appears. (Not surprisingly, moral nihilism is less pronounced in non-Western cultures.) It is not science, Darwinism, materialism, or secularism that are to blame for this nihilism but the unrealistic Christian expectation that contradicting views must match its level of impossible certainty. A loss is felt only because Christianity is so deeply entrenched in all levels of society.

Modern secular atheists deny any supernatural beliefs and defend a naturalistic explanation of the world, but they generally acknowledge that morality is an inherent human attribute as a phenomenon that arises from social interactions, reason, and human interdependency, slowly evolving and converging towards a stable yet not absolute social code that is far removed from even hyperbolical standards of the strong. But even without laboriously deriving such an understanding of the nature of morality, to a person who was born and raised as an atheist, or merely avoided Christian cultivation to a modest degree, the perceived result of the loss of God, and the need to find meaning and purpose for oneself, does not invoke the specter of moral nihilism. It does not imply a crude every-critter-for-itself elimination of morality until only aggression, fang, and talon remain to define the Law and only the strong can prevail. The human animal is biologically wired against the Law of the Jungle. Any fear of this dismal environment is an unrealistic, religious nightmare, and any desire for it is a spiritual, Christian pipe-dream.

Only deep-seated Christianity can evoke this fear and, in its ultimate case, create the defeatist illusion that it is an alluring alternative. It is the worst-case outcome in the Christian mind and embracing it reveals a profound ensnarement in the traditional Christian mental framework. Satan thinks that the Satan-figure employed by Satanists who believe and perpetuate the view that Satanic morals are those of the Jungle is the good old Christian Devil, which remains considerably more real and present in their minds than they will ever understand. With one exception, they are the very kind of Christians who feel no natural inclination towards moral behavior on their own and only behave socially tolerable because they fear the repercussions, and who recognize in themselves harmful, anti-social impulses that, fortunately, they understand must be curbed albeit not why. They deviate from these Christians only in their psychopathic wish to act out their destructiveness. Ironically, it is not external Christianity that restrains their impulses but their inner Christian angst that generates their wish for the Law of the Jungle.

Satan thinks these advocates of the rule of fang and claw should be cast to the lions: the only proper way to deal with Christians.

Satan thinks His churchgoers go through five phases

Posted on by A lesser demon

Anton LaVey once said that newly-converted Satanists tend to go through a “first phase” where they feel compelled to tell everyone of their new-found faith, often arguing against Christians using LaVey’s straw men and unschooled reasoning that he provided in The Satanic Bible. Most of Satan’s churchgoers eventually leave this phase when the novelty value wears off, but a considerable number remain stuck in phase one.

LaVey never mentioned any subsequent phases, so no Church of Satan member ever considered whether further progression might occur beyond phase one. Satan thinks these churchgoers proceed through five phases, however, one for each point on the Pentagram.

Phase One is indeed the initial, unbearable behavior of a neophyte where everyone, including anyone past this phase, wishes they would just pipe down. Only fellow Phase One churchgoers can stand them, although most other churchgoers react indulgently as they remember their own Phase One period. As a rule of thumb, the more fervently a person believed in his or her former religion, the more aggressively the Phase One person now behaves, and the longer Phase One lasts. Phase One is characterized by a need to establish one’s new identity by dismantling one’s past identity.

Phase Two is very similar to Phase One, and while many virtually skip this phase altogether, it is, like Phase One, also a phase in which one may get stuck. Phase Two is characterized by the same proselytizing and zealous attitude as Phase One, and Phase Two individuals often increase their combativeness. The main difference is to whom their hostility is directed. Phase Two churchgoers consider it their chief duty to deny all other kinds of Satanism and often actively seek to harm any Satanist who disagrees with The Church of Satan, to the extent of occasionally involving fundamentalist Christians as bedfellows.

Their general proselytization of Phase One now takes on an evangelical “one true way” form where they denounce any other path as that of the Devil, as it were, and Satan thinks that other Satanists are what keeps them active. Phase Two is characterized by low self-esteem where, although having torn down one’s past identity and having constructed the framework of a new one, this identity is very fragile and cannot cope with competition. Satan thinks that those who remain in Phase Two are those whose self-esteem is naturally low and who are easily intimidated but compensate with the vileness of the insecure.

Phase Three marks a significant change, and is a phase where people are not prone to staying indefinitely. In Phase Three, the churchgoers have strengthened their identities enough to reduce the need for inverse behavior and counter-identity. This is when they begin to live according to their concepts of a Satanic lifestyle. Of course, since such a thing is nowhere defined, it becomes mostly a question of decorating one’s home, dressing up with some amount of devilish style, and adjusting one’s physical make-up. Satan thinks that because everyone already indulges in their respective interests (unless they are Buddhist monks or otherwise sworn to an ascetic lifestyle), this is not a Satanic trait—however, His followers believe that when they do what everyone does, in their case it is Satanic. The Phase Three churchgoers do not attend Christian services, of course, but in the absence of Satanic teachings beyond the superficiality of The Satanic Bible and a few articles embedded within other canonized books, most of their opinions and values remain unchanged since their days as pre-Satanists; it is mostly the trappings that have changed, and only on the surface level because their functions remain the same. Phase Three is characterized by a somewhat inflated belief in one’s uniqueness and superiority.

Phase Four represents a return to normal without realizing it. A lifestyle that involves mostly adornments and furnishing and few mental changes, and which is not shared with a nearby community, requires vigilance and constant personal dedication. It is not self-sustaining. (This is why Phase Three does not feature the captivity of Phases One and Two whose motivational supply of counter-ideology and other perceived enemies is infinite.) This leads some churchgoers into a daily routine where they have given up on some of their past religious business but are otherwise indistinguishable from the surrounding society. They remember their Satanism when they are occasionally reminded of it, but it is by no means a pervasive habit. Their interests are largely aligned with those of the herd, as dictated by fashion and popular culture, except where habit survives. Some revive their abandoned traditions to satisfy their need to fit into society. Some will forget about their Satanism although if asked, they may profess to agree with some indistinct core values. Like Phase Three, there is no externally provided motivation to remain in this phase, but unlike Phase Three, Phase Four is effortless, and one may again become stuck indefinitely. A few people maintain their Satanic principles in this phase but “internalize” their Satanism, requiring its trappings only to a small degree if at all.

Phase Four is characterized by regression to one’s pre–Church-of-Satan identity, and is the life that one would have begun earlier were it not for one’s Church of Satan detour. Although this phase may seem like one’s ideology has run into the sand, Satan considers Phase Four almost a litmus test of one’s worthiness of His name: if, after the interest has waned, one keeps living according to Satanic principles, values, and ethics, maybe one is the rare exception that is “born not made,” in the sense that one had integrity from an early age and was never incorporated into the human herd.

Phase Five is the last phase that marks the end of one’s days as a churchgoer. It is where the churchgoer has matured and learned about Satanism and the world. He has questioned himself and the teachings of The Church of Satan and Anton LaVey enough to identify critical flaws, has learned enough about other people to distinguish between unusual and abnormal behavior (only the former possibly qualifies as Satanic), or even to reliably identify a person’s mindset, and has learned enough about society, history, and religion to understand from where people derive their worldviews and values. It has become increasingly clear that what one finds within The Church of Satan is not Satanism but a toxic body of cultural Christians.

Many churchgoers who reach Phase Five realize that their church has changed since the 1960s, of course, but only to satisfy the self-delusions of its membership and to appeal to a lower common denominator. Its counter-cultural spirit left it many years ago, and what remains is an empty shell serving only as housing for one’s pipe dreams and refusal to develop personally. LaVey’s 1960s church was an early experiment which, owing to LaVey’s lacking intellectualism and failing insight into societal affairs and human sciences, was far too narrowly focused and off track due to LaVey’s belief in magic. It applied to his personal social circle perhaps, but it was a crude and secluded imitation of worldly wisdom. LaVey was the yokel’s idea of a man of the world, and as one grows older and wiser, one realizes how ignorant and superficial LaVey was, regardless of one’s early fascination with him. His skill was presentation not content.

Phase Five is characterized by personal growth and inwards and outwards perspective, a broadened horizon, and having found one’s place in the world without needing a group identity.

Satan thinks that LaVey introduced Satanism by scratching at its surface in those few places he could see but never knew what other possibilities he had accidentally opened. By sticking to LaVey’s original doctrine and refusing to develop and revise the ideology for a wider applicability than sexual fetishism, silly “magic,” and exciting edginess, The Church of Satan’s claim to the name is now only historic. Phase Five is where you leave The Church of Satan, either formally or by turning your back on it. You reach this phase if you truly had a different, sane mind about society and your role in it before you even knew about the church in the first place, or were at least able to develop during your time as a churchgoer.

Since each phase corresponds to a point on the star, each of the five phases lies on the opposite side of the previous phase, but not at their complete opposite. From the anti-Christian Phase One, Phase Two is almost anti-Satanic, and the following Phase Three lies closer to the original opposition to a Christianized society. Phase Four, in turn, is rather mainstream where neither Christians nor Satanists matter much and you are equally distant from them. The last phase, Phase Five, is when you have a Satanic identity but realize that far too many Satanists have only their association.

The phases overlap somewhat, and the transition from one phase to the next involves a little of both during the phase shift. It makes it possible to identify when a churchgoer is transitioning from one phase to another, because, owing to the almost-opposite natures of the current phase and its next phase, they may seem to sometimes vacillate. Some churchgoers pass through a particular phase faster than others, to the point of almost skipping it, and some remain stranded in a phase.

Satan thinks He has thus completed Anton LaVey’s use of “phases” as one of the many elements that The Church of Satan keeps dangling.

Satan thinks His temple is a hate group

Posted on by A lesser demon

Make no mistake about it: The Satanic Temple is a political activist group first and a religious organization second. The fact that it has been around for about a decade and has yet to expound on a philosophy, still only listing seven ambiguous but generally reasonable and mostly agreeable tenets, is evidence that its resources are spent elsewhere than religious principles: the attention of the head of The Satanic Temple is directed at its many court appearances and political actions. Its stance as a religion is a means to an end that provides the Temple with the legitimacy required for legal combat against religious affairs. It is a weapon that changes the Temple from an interest group whose opinion existing religious groups can safely disregard to an equal whose rights and complaints must be taken seriously.

This does not imply that the religion is mere self-delusion to the members of The Satanic Temple. Satan thinks that the Temple’s reason to found a new religion is as good as any, if not better than yet another uneducated joker who believes he has discovered the truth, and the resulting religion is as authentic, meaningful, and legit as any religion based on fantasy creatures. But, Satan thinks that with such limited doctrine, the religion lacks the unification and direction that are some of the positive aspects offered by religion. Members are instead on their own with no guidance. The organization made the absolute minimum effort on this matter: it has secured legal recognition as a religion but does not provide religion beyond a very superficial level.

The Satanic Temple has chosen the strategically sound approach of appearing to be “for” something not “against” something. Hence, its official stance is to promote religious tolerance and pluralism and to ensure that its own members have equal rights as those of other religions. It does not take a genius to understand that The Satanic Temple thus turns the system upon itself and that its primary agenda is to oppose and combat Christian dominance in society and legislation, but its battles are fought in the arenas of believers, politicians, and lawyers, not geniuses, where subversive or hidden agendas are common. Thus, although it was important to establish a religion, the glaring absence of scripture and teaching shows that the founders of The Satanic Temple evidently are not invested in creating and maintaining a religious ideology. In practice, all The Satanic Temple is “for” is a very shallow body of opinions and values.

Satan thinks this reality is not entirely lost on the membership. Some naïve members may fall for the narrative that The Satanic Temple is truly bent on religious tolerance, and some members with diplomatic flair will claim so for political reasons, but moderately perceptive people soon learn that the Temple is—deservedly, let us not deny it—directly antagonistic towards Christians.

With scarcely any philosophical content to discuss or examples of articulated ideology from representatives of the governing body of The Satanic Temple to appropriate, the lay membership adopts its antagonism and acts accordingly. Ideology boils down to a concentrate of anti-Christian sentiments, mutual reassurances of the evils of Christianity, a continuing compulsion to vilify the enemy, and repeated ridicule and constant criticism of their superstitions, with a majority of its membership creating and chiming in with such animosity. Satan agrees that Christianity is an atrocity of mankind, but He thinks that if one declares oneself a Satanist, one is already abundantly informed about their inhumanity and needs no daily dossier—in fact, Satan thinks that if one is a Satanist, one feels no need to revisit their territory and prefers to not be reminded of their existence. Hell may be a place of eternal suffering, but even His Focality of the Nine Circles would not inflict more Christianity upon the damned than they have already endured. Such preoccupation with Christianity has no place within any ideology of His.

Satan thinks that, based on the declarations and commentary from the active majority of the members of His temple online, The Satanic Temple is becoming a hate group—defined as a social group that practices animosity, hostility, malice, or hatred towards designated segments of society. The Devil defends His absolute sole right to torment Christian souls because it is His designated role, but will not lend His magnificent name to groups who sustain the proud Christian tradition of hating their enemy while outwardly subscribing to a religion of professed tolerance and compassion. Satan thinks that His temple’s haters need culling if not elimination.

Satan thinks His church wears a good-guy badge

Posted on by A lesser demon

Take it from a liar to recognize another liar, and The Father of Lies knows one when He sees one. He has reserved the entire eighth circle of Hell for those very people. Even those who lie so hard they believe their own lies cannot hide from Satan’s smoldering eyes, but although they fit naturally within His aforementioned circle, for some reason they are in high demand in Heaven and are allowed through the Pearly Gates before Satan can offer a bid for their souls.

Satan’s own church appears to be brimming with the latter kind of liars if their online presence is to be trusted. Most of them, if not all, are relative newcomers to whom the Satanic newsletters, magazines, and periodicals of the past have never been available, and who never learned Satanic creeds in the days of Anton LaVey, before the age of social media and before The Church of Satan turned into what His Depravity calls Gilmoron Satanism. Hidden from plain view and made available only to subscribers, and to some extent incorporating a sufficient amount of cringe-worthy content to seem unbelievable except to those who could read, the doctrine was explicit. Today, reading comprehension skills not granted to everyone are required to decipher the dogma.

“Lex Talionis,” eugenics, social stratification, social Darwinism with a necessity of culling the human locusts who overrun and overpopulate the planet and the breeding of a Satanic “iron youth,” and similar concepts were ideals that Satan’s true followers once aimed for, if ever so feebly applied in practice in a society that promotes weakness and natural injustice. They were societal goals that were to be implemented literally as an alternative to the current, Christianized society of undeserved alms and apologists for inadequacy where criminals were treated as the victims, to the extent where human evolution was at stake.

Satan does not wish to impose unreasonable demands upon His followers, of course. Each must be evil to the extent of his or her ability, which is rarely anything to write home about. It did not take long until especially the scrawnier breeds began to quip that “might is right” was to be interpreted more broadly than favoritism of brawns, thus allowing the pen to be mightier than the sword, especially if all one had was a pen. Satan thinks it is fine to continuously develop and reinterpret one’s convictions and would in fact not recommend that His followers let themselves get stuck in the 1960es of Anton LaVey.

Today, virtually every one of Satan’s followers on social media believes that His church does not truly mean “eugenics” in any other sense than social preferences, that “stratification” is mostly what society already features, and that magic is “just psychodrama.” Every demonic aspect is defanged and declawed, especially when said followers are confronted by people who complain about the political and social ramifications and respond by pinning a good guy badge on their lapels. And that, my dear, is the big lie that they believe in themselves.

It is rare to find a person who speaks the truth, but occasionally an officially appointed spokesperson from The Church of Satan will set the record straight for those few who care to listen. This is when you discover that they welcome plans that would actively weed out purposeless people and that moochers on welfare, degenerates with (severe) disabilities, and fruitcakes with personality disorders who join them have failed to understand that Satanism is not for them, even when their predicament is no fault of theirs. In a world of their values, such individuals would be eradicated through swift evolutionary deselection, and conscientious and responsible people would lend Nature a helping hand as early as possible in such matters to conserve resources otherwise squandered on biological retrogressions.

Those “in the know” will sometimes place such people on a pedestal regardless. A token cripple, a token black person, a token leftist, or a token queer provides the organization with a good-guy badge that illustrates how they, by the goodness of their hearts, do not discriminate. In the meantime, and behind their backs, the same knowing people laugh wholeheartedly as these sideshow freaks of their carnival entertain the outsider guests—those who are not privy to the truth—by flaunting their delusions of inclusion and adequacy.

This is the nature of the real world and the human animal within it. The herd may require that the secret be concealed behind a good-guy badge lest they cower in fear and retreat, but the élite does not require it. Satan thinks the secrecy is unnecessary. There are far too many sideshow cage geeks paid with sips of their addiction, pinheads, and mental midgets in His church already—all of whom the animal world would have torn apart and devoured, but due to man’s sadistic demand for the suffering of others are kept alive and on display for their deficiencies and outbursts of insanity. Satan feels no need to expand that arena in His circus.

Satan thinks a conversion process is needed

Posted on by A lesser demon

Satan has previously explained that the conversion narrative of being born not made is self-deceit. For the lazy readers who decide to skip His magnificent thoughts, Satan thinks that “Satanists are born not made” is a bogus statement that His followers apply to relieve themselves of the need for an explanation of why they chose their outrageous religion when excuses such as “Satan appeared and spoke to me!” obviously do not apply. Anton LaVey provided this original narrative because he lacked all the possible credentials to provide him with the authority to claim that he was a Satanist, and had no other choice than to postulate that, somehow, he always was one. Once an angel, Lucifer is testimony to the fact that Satanists are indeed made not born, however.

The conversion narrative makes it very easy to convert—so easy, in fact, that Satan thinks His followers are god-damned jokes, instead of the god-damning soldiers He requires. The Church of Satan believes that a somewhat steep membership fee guarantees that only the best may join, but Satan thinks it proves but a bare minimum of real-world capability and instead primarily cultivates a cultic mindset, even if this dynamic is unknown to His church. (As a service to the same lazy readers as above, it is a well-known sales trick to make people believe that if they paid a large sum for something, they will believe that the acquisition was important to them and thus gain their loyalty.) Such a conversion requires virtually nothing. All that is required is to decide that one is now a Satanist. In reality, no one was ever a Satanist until then (with perhaps very few exceptions who may qualify), and henceforth one makes no further effort to become one. Satan thinks that such low requirements are laziness beyond belief, not that He is fond of any kinds of belief to begin with. He thinks this is the reason why so many of His followers join a Satanic organization but seem to stay the Christians they always were.

Satan remembers the early days of His church when members attended lectures in “The Black House,” or “Central Grotto,” of Anton LaVey. They were awarded degrees in the church that reflected their magical studiousness and acumen per LaVey’s judgment, and the titles were selected to mock the religious counterpart of the Christian church. Within a few years after establishing The Church of Satan, the organization allowed members to organize themselves in local chapters, or “grottos,” provided that the grotto leaders attended training in Central Grotto. This training did not include leadership skills, however, and the grottos soon became a disastrous affair of “Mexican generals” with no sense of corporate conduct and responsibilities. The grotto system was disbanded, training in Central Grotto ceased, and LaVey declared that with The Satanic Bible now on the bookshelves, everyone had the tools they needed. LaVey decreed that degrees were now awarded based on members’ performance in the real world, as it presumably reflected their magical proficiency in a religion where magic aimed to improve one’s material gains.

The grotto system was briefly re-instantiated in the late 1980s and lasted little more than a decade before it had again become clear—not surprisingly given that now no training was provided at all, let alone leadership or management coaching—that the grottos were as ineffective and counterproductive as ever. The tools that LaVey believed to have become available evidently came up short.

The quality of LaVey’s training may be debated, and anyone’s skill in magic is necessarily a delusion because magic does not exist. Satan nonetheless thinks that it was a grave mistake to abandon the training of the clergy because even the low level of ambition spurred them to study and, ideally, convalesce from their former mindsets by actively working toward adopting a healthier one. It would also enable them to serve as guides and role models for lay members, assuming they were more competent than history proved.

Today, everyone can declare oneself a Satanist and find that no requirements follow, except that one conform to organizational expectations as exemplified by its top tier. (The lazy reader will receive no summary this time, and is urged to read the text in its entirety.) There are no instructions on how to practice Satanism or how to unlearn one’s past orthodoxies. An elect few may possess the ability to accumulate knowledge and the gift of introspection, and Satan can appreciate that “responsibility to the responsible” lays it upon each individual to take matters into his or her own hands, but there is no need to make it difficult by forcing everyone to begin from scratch.

A clear curriculum requiring that one verifiably demonstrate that the skills have been acquired provides two distinct advantages. Firstly, each individual can learn more productively without having to first identify and then acquire the necessary knowledge (and trust Satan that no individuals are so different that a shared educational program is pointless), and secondly, it alleviates the adverse effect of toxic organizational behavior because objective criteria for leveling up reduce the influence from toxic superiors, who will find it difficult to promote those who support them based on personal feelings. A properly composed educational program will not homogenize its students, impede their creativity, or hamper their independence, despite protests from people who grew critical of education after seeing their own grades in school. One can learn to identify counterproductive residues of one’s past thinking without imposing specific different thoughts, and one may learn from examples without copying them. When you learned to read in school, it aided your independence despite learning it together with everyone else. In contrast, institutionalized behavior, where rewards for personal agreement trickle downward, tends to sculpt individuals by the cast of the leader, usually for worse than for better. There are, simply, skills that would benefit virtually all Satanists while leaving plenty of room for personal specialization. “How not to act and think like a Christian” would be a generally useful course whereas “how to cook a great burger” would be a course on indulgence that each person should pursue individually, and outside of the organization, according to his or her need.

Satan does not acknowledge the sometimes-heard argument that His church is a mutual admiration society (like Mensa, but for people with a two-digit IQ) and, therefore, presumably because members are all born not made, there is nothing to make and no improvements to offer. This is not to say that Satan doubts their honesty. There are people who are willing to pay and receive in return only the knowledge that they are listed in the membership archives and feel admired for that, and Satan is convinced that the organization appeals to people who seek validation by association. Satan dismisses the argument both because Satanists are made not born, and because even if they were born that way, they still have something to learn and unlearn if they were raised in a predominantly religious society.

Satan considers The Satanic Temple to be in a slightly better shape than His church on this account, although its instructive literature is sorely lacking. For all that may be said about The Satanic Bible and its other canonical literature, at least His church has scripture that directly addresses its members. His temple has nothing save seven tenets that lend themselves to a wide range of interpretations, and a list of holidays with associated, additional values. However, it provides classes for its ordained Ministers (although very little of it potentially addresses behavior and thought patterns, the rest focusing on auxiliary albeit relevant issues) and requires them to pass an exam. If the tasks of the Ministers include passing this knowledge on to their respective parishioners, those members of The Satanic Temple who belong to a congregation may receive education; but they form such a tiny minority of the membership base that Satan doubts they count in the bigger picture.

In both organizations, virtually all members thus join and are then on their own to flesh out what Satanism means to them. This may work for a self-driven, university-trained individual who has acquired the skills and tools to locate valid sources and a critical mind that renders him able to develop, instead of confirming past errors believing them to be Satanic. The Devil wants far more than denying one’s faith and similar ostentations. He wants people to not only reject their faiths but also the mentality, ethos, conventions, and lifestyles that were transmitted through a superstitious culture, and even for mostly atheistic, highly intelligent, contemplative, and introspective people, it is an arduous road. No organization can assume that any of its members can undertake this endeavor on their own or in self-organized study groups.

The inevitable result is that the organizations are filled with individuals whose opinions remain unchanged, and whose new actions amount to little beyond live-action role-playing that they believe to be genuine. Individuals bring their old behavior into the organization to a degree where keen observers can often identify which specific Christian denomination they used to belong to despite having spent beyond a decade as “Satanists,” because that is how little they have changed in practice. If the organizations qualify for the proud name of the Devil, it is certainly not because of their members. Satan thinks the organizations are empty shells. They may exist and expand but have practically no content.

Satan represents undefiled wisdom and thinks His organizations sully His name by allowing their members to stay hypocritically self-deceived. Satan wants converts who are forged into devoted demons, not Christian charlatans whose true allegiance they reveal every so often.

Satan thinks LaVey wrote a rape ritual

Posted on by A lesser demon

Lucifer prefers to call a spade a spade and avoids all sorts of “fancy” language. The Angel of Enlightenment thinks that exorbitantly whimsical wordings or effervescent expressions obscure intent, regardless of the verbal dexterity of the author. Satan considers it lingual masturbation that renders everyone else unsatisfied. He would allow none of His demons such self-inflated literary smugness and considers it proof that their thesauri are larger than their wits. But enough about the writings of Peter Gilmore—Satan appreciates that in The Satanic Bible, Anton LaVey uses simple words when he calls a “love charm” or a “love spell” for what they are: an attempt to get sex.

LaVey explains that the purpose of the sex ritual that he introduces in The Satanic Bible is to “create desire on the part of the person whom you desire.” All of Satan’s followers will please remember that, according to LaVey, magic is used when normal methods would fail, because the situation would be unchangeable using normal methods, and one applies magic only when conventional methods fail because otherwise, one would use conventional methods. In the case of sex rituals, it means that you could not possibly make the person desire you, even with the best tricks in the pick-up artist’s book. Satan thinks you are truly that undesirable if you must resort to a sex ritual.

Hence, the purpose of a sex ritual is to create the sexual consent that you have never received: that you may have sex with a person despite being denied the mating signal that Satan requires for any sexual advances per Satanic Rule of the Earth number five. This may have seemed reasonable in the 1960es of Anton LaVey when the absence of affirmative consent was yet to be understood as a sexual violation, but today it is indicative of a sexually predatory mindset.

Satan will hear no such excuse that having created the desire through magic, it became a genuine desire. Such an argument is true for sexual grooming as well, and for con jobs in general; the victim may have handed over his money willingly to the con artist but is nonetheless a victim. The mindset is no less dangerous in the modernized perception among His current churchgoers, where ostensibly a ritual now serves to modify one’s own mind, because it instills in the mind of the practitioner the delusion that the quarry has provided consent and thereby the mating call that justifies transgressive action. Unlike magic which does not exist, self-suggestion is real and can have consequences.

Returning to the topic of plain speech, Satan appreciates that LaVey did not hide the intent of the “sex ritual” behind a veil of love, but He thinks it is high time to call the ritual for what it is: it is a rape ritual, the purpose of which is to force consent where none was given.

Satan thinks His “alien élite” are space aliens

Posted on by A lesser demon

Fictional characters are in no position to posit that other fantasy creatures are non-existent or are any less believable than themselves. Satan and His crew, as well as the myriads of gods, inhabit the same realm as the tooth fairy, Harry Potter, Santa Claus, and Darth Vader, who in turn are no less worthy of the attention and seriousness usually reserved for religious figures. Satan thinks it makes no difference whether it is God or Darth Vader who reminds the “saviors” of their respective popular stories that he is their father. Mythical aliens are as real as He.

One thing is clear: the so-called “alien élite” that the Devil’s church likes to mention cannot be its human members, judging from their generally sub-average achievement levels. Satan thinks this élite is instead an alien race from outer space that His church members aspire to become. Wise in the vastness of the Universe, Satan recognizes the exact race, known among other things for the following fine qualities:

  • Their religion is about indulgence, materialism, and selfishness, and they abhor acts of altruism. However, they are often quite hypocritical, and their creed is self-contradictory on many accounts.
  • They are unbearably smug, considering other alien races to be inferior for being weighed down by counterproductive morals.
  • They like to dress up to seem more than they are, applying a somewhat outlandish notion of aesthetics.
  • In their daily business, most of them are often double-crossed by their betters.
  • They are led by a magus (although to save ink it is written “nagus”).
  • They apply their rules of interaction only among themselves. They are not required to follow them against other alien species, yet demand that others adhere to them regarding showing unearned respect and ignore them regarding tolerating abuse.
  • They are highly sexist. Their women serve only to amplify the role of the males.
  • They reach everyone else only to their shoulders.
  • They are easily distracted by appealing to their odd sexual fetish.
  • They are highly competitive against anyone who appears to share their beliefs. They often acknowledge that, in principle, such races have some commendable aims but far lacking skills.
  • Originally intended as the main adversary, their role soon became that of comic relief.
  • Their ambitions rarely meet their abilities, and they tend to disappoint their families.
  • They have almost as bad teeth and big ears as Anton LaVey.

Thus, Satan thinks that the role model of His “alien élite” is the Ferengi of Star Trek and His followers are their earthly parody.

Satan thinks blasphemy is liberating

Posted on by A lesser demon

Blasphemy works only if one believes in that which is blasphemed, but it is nowhere said that faith is required to recognize or commit an act of blasphemy. Blasphemy is only felt by the believer but may be committed by anyone, intentionally or not. Satan encourages His entire infernal entourage to indulge in acts of blasphemy and to engage in taboos as long as we do not target His Infernal Majesty Himself, of course: there is self-deprecating humor, and then there is high treason.

The problem with blasphemy is that it shows contempt or disrespect for deities, sacred objects, and values or ethics that are considered axiomatic and inviolable. Granted, this sounds desirable, not problematic, but some perspective explains it. In societies that are unaware that all laws, rules, beliefs, and morals are the convergence of centuries of human negotiation, and instead believe they were handed down from above, irreverence and disregard for the veracity of the thought-to-be divine Law is a threat to the stability and integrity of the society. Punishment for blasphemy traditionally ranges from disapproval and demands for apology over ostracization, censorship, and persecution to corporeal punishment and physical eradication. In other words, it is not all that different from what happens in more enlightened societies when someone disregards the law and faces legal consequences.

There is an exception, however: if applied according to the Law of the Forbidden, blasphemy and taboo-breaking serve to fortify one’s belief. The single example of the well-known joke about the sailor who talks a nun into having sex, only to learn too late that the nun is a cross-dressing male, will suffice. It plays on the homophobic fear of being attracted to one’s own sex or the transphobic fear of being tricked by a homosexual, and thereby reinforces the idea that taboo sex is bad, and at the same time strengthens the belief that (legitimate) nuns are good and trustworthy people because of their religion. It is a Christian joke that bolsters one’s Christian values and beliefs. Satan, being of a marvelous intellect and mentally capable of imagining Himself in someone else’s (hoof-)shoes, can appreciate the joke on their premises but it obviously does not belong in His domain. Christians go to Heaven, and they can save it for when they get there.

Satan’s own Church has developed its own laws against blasphemy and taboo, despite its iconoclastic and irreverent outset in 1966. He did not pay much attention to when exactly these laws began to take shape, but it appears to the Devil that they were implemented when Peter Gilmore was given the role of the “administrator” of the Church on the Internet and thus gained first level control of virtually the entire membership body. It was from this position that Gilmore and his spouse could turn their thumbs up or down on opinions within The Church of Satan, and they were directed towards a singular goal: to make Gilmore feel validated.

Gilmore is a grandiose narcissist, and their behavior is directed by exceptionally low self-esteem that causes them to constantly seek validation, to feel better through making others feel worse, and to attack anyone who appears to expose their sense of worthlessness. (Satan represents man as he truly is, and therefore agrees that narcissists are typically worthless, but that is beside the point.) Gilmore gains validation by having admiration for Anton LaVey rub off on him, thereby riding on his coattails, and, of course, by feeling directly admired through praise or title—which is why already at the age of thirteen he felt entitled to an honorary title as a Satanic leader in The Church of Satan with nothing to show for it. Conversely, he cannot accept any “attack,” even if it is a simple statement of truth, on LaVey or himself, and went so far as to email his flying monkeys requesting that they coordinate attacks against those who spoke badly of LaVey or especially himself. It did not take long in the younger days of the Internet, before it had become part of everyone’s facilities, to establish the standard for both expected opinion and, as is the topic here, unacceptable talk and thought. There are now plenty of texts in The Church of Satan explaining that only enemies speak badly of the “Doktor,” and LaVey’s last spouse, the bizarre crossbreed between a Christian housewife and a groupie, Blanche Barton (originally, aptly named “Densley”), demanded that the sycophants of LaVey unite against their perceived enemies.

It has become taboo to speak of LaVey’s marriage to a 14-year-old in 1951, and acknowledging that LaVey’s second daughter, Zeena, became pregnant at the age of 13—despite Blanche Barton’s mention of the fact in one of her books—is permissible only along with the reminder that she later proved herself to be thoroughly unreliable and an enemy of her father. One must never remind others that LaVey’s self-narrative has been thoroughly debunked, but should instead inform those who mention it that overall, it was somehow true except in the details. And never mention the fact that LaVey died in poverty, demonstrating that if Satanism was all about success in the real world, as LaVey had maintained, there might be some truth to Michael Aquino’s belief that Satan revoked His infernal mandate, at least in the figurative sense that LaVey’s Satanic qualities and magical skills were inferor compared with those of your average Joe Schmoe. It is equally taboo to recognize The Church of Satan’s “alien élite” for what it is: a species that exists only within a world of spiritual pipe-dreams, or that “might is right” is a feeble feel-good fantasy. Any remark that LaVey relied on a variety of pseudo-scientific models and superstition that render several of his points null and void, and thus candidates for unceremonious jettison, is taken as proof of poor faith and lack of understanding: The Satanic Bible and LaVey’s other written works are flawless and in need of no revision—except maybe to add a preface by Gilmore.

Above and foremost, none but The Church of Satan, and those individuals who unconditionally agree that it is the only Satanic organization, are Satanists. Any other organization, and anyone who considers himself a Satanist but does not appreciate The Church of Satan, is deemed a heretic for this blasphemous stance. It does not help if the individual considers himself a “LaVeyan Satanist” (although The Church of Satan will be rash to remind anyone that “LaVeyan Satanism” is a pleonasm or even a hostile term for its insinuation that other kinds of Satanism could possibly exist), if he does not also unconditionally acknowledge The Church of Satan, and nothing else, as Satanism. However, if this demand is satisfied, it appears that one may reject arbitrary amounts of The Church of Satan’s doctrine, apply an arbitrary interpretation to its teachings, and add anything one fancies, and is yet a true Satanist. Satan thinks this is evidence that philosophy and doctrine mean little, and submission to Gilmore’s organization is paramount. This has become institutionalized in The Church of Satan. New members soon learn that recognition is earned through worship of Gilmore (even though he uses LaVey as a proxy) and hostility towards anyone claiming the name but not the affiliation and thereby not endorsing Gilmore. It is needless to say that Satan thinks that Peter Gilmore’s personal touch on Satanism has transformed LaVeyan Satanism into a toxic form that would be more accurately christened Gilmoron Satanism.

Satan thinks His church has become all about a herd collective and none about ideology. Anyone who is not part of Gilmore’s virtual community—a term that Gilmore shuns as it names his cravings for human acceptance, and therefore resorts to near-synonyms such as “arena,” “cabal,” “collection”, “universe,” or “movement,” to name just some, whereas Satan is not afraid to name the assemblage that Gilmore wishes for as adorers—is treated as religionists have traditionally approached the worshipers of false gods. Despite making no other demands on being a Satanist than thinking that The Satanic Bible resonates with one’s feelings, The Church of Satan feels strongly about the ideologies of other Satanic groups. If they are not LaVeyan, they are necessarily non-Satanic and therefore wrong and worse than Christianity, and if they are LaVeyan but loathe the strain of people that The Church of Satan attracts and encourages, they also are non-Satanic.

It is the very existence of these other groups and individuals that The Chuch of Satan objects to, not their viewpoints. Being an extension of Gilmore’s demand for personal attention, it cannot cope with others acquiring the spotlight (The Satanic Temple in particular is the target of their envy these days), and it leads to almost comical arguments against their legitimacy; for example, that they should cover their horns and not identify as Satanists, because it makes them look bad on the goals they pursue, or because they give Satanism a bad reputation. Gone are those days when The Church of Satan’s high priestess, Peggy Nadramia, defended the many neo-Nazis in their higher ranks by reminding its members that being a Satanist was as evil as the status quo could ever imagine, Nazis being a far lesser one, and that any concerns about a Nazi connotation were a Good Guy Badge that one had better discard. It seems that, today, The Church of Satan struggles to understand and muster the strength and self-confidence required to take the Devil’s name for oneself. Satan thinks that the sense of perspective of what He stands for was lost somewhere along the way.

The Gilmoron Satanists routinely deliberately ignore the openly stated goals and motivations of their “competitors” in order to construct a straw man to topple over. It is clearly very important that everyone is told, incessantly, although without results, that such groups are not Satanists, and The Church of Satan has made bedfellows with fundamentalist Christian actors on several occasions in their vain attempts to ensure that only The Church of Satan exists. Consumed by their counter-productive pride that helps their real enemies, no measure is too wretched in their rage against the blasphemy of renewal and alternative.

Satan thinks it is time to remind His followers of His sermon. Blasphemy challenges the beliefs everyone takes as model truth and rends the rusty padlocks of shrines with treasures that have lost their value. No dogma must be taken for granted, and no model deified to protect it from scrutiny and question. Satanists must apply blasphemy to their own beliefs and convictions, especially if taboo and met with resistance. Only that can prevent Satan’s own religion from sinking into the same rotting reactionaryism that is other religions.

Satan thinks His followers missed a slur

Posted on by A lesser demon

Most readers of The Satanic Bible who thought it resonated with them strike the Devil as people who immediately dreamed that one day others would bow before them, for they would be the highest embodiment of human life, then subsequently believed that the path from mediocrity to dominance is paved with a fervent insistence that one is a Satanist, and very little else.

Satan thinks they should re-read their book, because there is much wisdom to be found in it. Maybe one day Satan will explain how to read it or, more likely, He will assign the task to one of his underachieving minions as one of His many forms of recreational damnation.

Returning to the aforementioned readers of The Satanic Bible who take the Devil’s name upon themselves, Satan often hears them assert that they—Anton LaVey and his organization—came first. Before LaVey, Satanism was used exclusively as a slur, and no one had attempted to gather a group, ponder a philosophy, or realize a religious following bearing that name, they say: prior to LaVey, “Satanism” was used as a Christian slur against people whose conducts or beliefs the Christians disapproved of, especially in the US.

LaVey declared “year one” in 1966, and to his followers, that is about when physical time began because otherwise they might have noticed that several groups had existed decades earlier that openly embraced Satan Himself as their godhead. Some remained within the Christian discourse and believed in a literal devil, but others held Him as a symbol and a conduit of magic, quite like LaVey. Satan would know, as He has been summoned in plenty of their rituals, albeit often only to witness yet another attempt at alchemy involving a bowl of molten lead, various toxic chemicals, shiny crystals, and animal parts or human bodily secretions.

At least some of these groups were called Satanists. While those who chose that name for the groups (if a group had not itself settled for the name already) may not have blessed the practices and philosophies of the groups, and while they may not have used “Satanism” as an approving term, it was not the discreditation or accusation for which Christians usually reserve this word. When they—Christians and others—named these groups Satanists, surely it was not meant as a compliment, but considering that the groups honestly sided with Lucifer, it was a largely neutral description comparable to, say, Muslims describing the Jehova’s Witnesses as Christians. It actually fit in a sense that was very different from allegations and castigations of being child-eating cannibals, rapists, violent criminals, sodomites, and subversive decadents (and, in those days, the Jews).

Fast-forward to 1966 when Anton LaVey established The Church of Satan from his local group of occultists. His explanation of Satanism was originally formulated in the so-called “rainbow sheets” that he and his group distributed at seminars and lectures on his philosophy. These sheets made it into The Satanic Bible a few years later in the section “The Book of Lucifer,” with minor modifications. This is where we find out why Anton LaVey called it Satanism.

LaVey wrote surprisingly little about Satanic values or behaviors in The Satanic Bible, unless “The Book of Satan” means much more in practice than an infernal diatribe designed to rattle a few cages but not otherwise to be taken seriously. The Satanic Bible instead teaches us that in the 1960s, many Christians would behave according to their carnal natures—which the reader is assumed to know, despite psychologists struggling to identify and understand it over centuries—but then feel guilty about it. Anton LaVey proposed that man instead follow his carnal nature without guilt. According to LaVey, “they” (the comparatively high-strung Christians) named such ungodly behavior of fellow citizens who, if asked, would have answered truthfully that they considered themselves to be Christians: they named it Satanism. It was a slur aimed at people who would protest such accusations of being allied with the Devil.

Thus, LaVey’s Church of Satan was not the first group to refer to themselves as Satanists, because others had done this before. He also was not the first person to use the term “Satanism” as a non-Christian slur, both because it was used as a description of, not a slur against, the earlier groups of self-declared Satanists, and because the term for what LaVey proposed was in fact, by his own admission in The Satanic Bible, a slur that Christians used against other Christians.

Had LaVey been an educated individual with basic training in scientific method, he would promptly have realized that the observation that easy-going Christians exist and are disapproved of among orthodox Christians does not imply that only the latter are Christians while the former are Satanists. It merely implies that Christianity is not a monolithic entity but a mosaic of many elements (most of which Satan denounces, of course). Alas, what is done is done. Anton LaVey concluded in The Satanic Bible that “Satanism” is defined as the behavior of easy-going American Christians in the 1960s, blissfully unaware that overseas, Europeans viewed even such moderate American Christians, too, as religious nuts.

Satan thinks that, regardless, LaVey deserves credit for reclaiming the term, in the same sense that queers reclaimed a term that had until then been defamatory. He enabled some of the 1960s American Christians to turn it into pride and identity, together with nice black capes and a Baphomet lapel medallion. Satan also thinks that LaVey should be commended for making an attempt to augment their form of Christianity with a long overdue acknowledgment of His Infernal Majesty whether or not they be able to embed a minimal number of demonic principles in their own lives.

Both Anton LaVey and his organization have argued against accusations of choosing the term merely for shock value by rationalizing that it was simply the most fitting term at the time. In another time and place, another term might be more appropriate, their explanation goes. Satan is not altogether convinced that American 1960s Christianity could truly be named Satanism but otherwise agrees with His churchgoers. Satan thinks that His church should indeed apply the term that best describes them according to age, environment, and situation.

Present-day Christians use the term “Satanism” for one of two situations: either they describe truly destructive behavior that real Satanists, too, strongly oppose—although Satanists would use a different label to describe it; or they are fundamentalists to whom anything they disapprove of is the work of the Devil. No-one save zealots would think of using the term “Satanism” about LaVey’s philosophy. In today’s age, the term used by majority Christians would be “bad Christians” or “hypocritical Christians,” if at all they were noticed. Satan thinks it is about high time they change their name to “hypocrites” and leave the definition and practice of Satanism to their betters.

Satan thinks all bad comes from above

Posted on by A lesser demon

Having ruled supreme in Hell for aeons, Satan has learned a thing or two about setting expectations. One cannot effectively lead an army of darkness only through barking orders or threatening with punishment. (The latter will be administered regardless, anyway. After all, this is Hell.) It is important that the infernal hordes know what is properly evil behavior, and there is only one way to teach them: to lead by example. This is why, if you paid attention in church, you know that the Devil is the ultimate evil and fundamental villain, who torments the damned with terminal wickedness, Satan being the worst of them all.

Satan thus does what any business coach and leadership consultant would recommend. They, too, know that organizational values propagate from only one place—the highest-level management. It is the top level that defines the company values and sets the workplace tone; and they do so by precedence not via memos or policy documents because such formalities are secondary (albeit still useful) to proper conduct. A company may have stellar written policies, but it is the behavior of the highest-level management that defines the standard which trickles all the way down to the last employee, causing the same behavior to be found on all levels of the company. This is how herds function.

Employees who find themselves in companies with a toxic senior management layer will find that the entire company is toxic, and that their own behavior becomes toxic or enabling of toxic behavior. Roughly speaking, new employees will either soon support and comply with the unspoken rules of conduct, or they will be harassed or fired unless they choose the only appropriate option of resigning.

It is with such insight in mind that His Esteemed Abomination turns a concerned eye towards His own church on Earth that was once consecrated in His name by Anton LaVey. It seemed an eminently fertile soil for future denizens of our Infernal Empire, but Satan thinks the values of its upper tier do not adequately further His cause.

The first High Priest of The Church of Satan was, of course, Anton LaVey himself. Old Nick thinks he was on to something useful, but unfortunately could not keep his mouth closed about his fascination with the Third Reich. There is no need to suspect that LaVey himself was more right-leaning than most conservatives at his time, but he believed that the Nazis were successful magicians, treasured their aesthetics, felt that they and he shared some objectives, and did not hesitate to be edgy by finding good things to say about Hitler, Satan rest his soul. Satan thinks that although Anton LaVey did not plan or desire the inevitable result of being thus historically unaware and lacking Fingerspitzengefühl, his silly references to the Herrenvolk nevertheless became not so much a dog whistle as a loud, lewd and longing mating signal for neo-Nazis.

Whatever LaVey’s motivation or tactical ignorance may have been, soon The Church of Satan attracted neo-Nazis in droves, and by the late 1980s it was brimming with neo-Nazis in its membership and clergy, who produced neo-Nazi texts, imagery, music, and other projects. New members learned to be accepting of this (but certainly not of leftist or centrist movements) as a condition to be a Satanist, and echoing their behavior was a tacit requirement if one wished to climb the organizational stairs. The last thing one should do was to criticize the neo-Nazi infestation, as it proved disloyalty towards The Church of Satan to thus be a shit-disturber, as Anton LaVey put it.

The next High Priest, Peter Gilmore, had expressed his interest in The Church of Satan in the early 1970s when he wrote to Anton LaVey’s column in a US monthly tabloid. Still an early teenager, young Peter’s Satanic ambition was to lead a group of Satanists and obtain both a free membership and an honorary title in The Church of Satan because he considered himself smart, and because he wanted to make his followers (his word) respect him more. LaVey declined, informing Gilmore that recognition is earned and that he would not reach his personal potential by settling for transitory, unearned “ego-sops.”

Unfazed, Gilmore later joined The Church of Satan and the competing Temple of Set, according to the high priest of the latter who promptly sent Gilmore on his way when it was discovered that he was riding on two horses at once. Peter Gilmore made sure to befriend Anton LaVey as soon as he could afford to travel between New York and San Francisco. Anton LaVey’s partner, Diane LaVey, was the main administrative person in The Church of Satan, and when she divorced her husband, Peter Gilmore was able to fill the administrative void that would otherwise have befallen LaVey himself and his groupie, Blanche Barton. Gilmore and his partner became the official online contacts and representatives of The Church of Satan and for all intents and purposes its de facto leaders until the passing of Anton LaVey.

Both Blanche Barton and LaVey’s daughter, Karla LaVey, desired to be the successor of Anton LaVey, and Peter Gilmore helped facilitate a shared leadership construction that was impossible and, predictably, immediately failed, leaving Gilmore as the fall-back choice—and he now assumed full control as the High Priest of The Church of Satan. Satan tips his hat at the successful take-over, of course. Management by confusion, intrigue, and triangulation requires Machiavellian skills not reserved for everyone.

Peter Gilmore was, and is, no neo-Nazi (nor was Anton LaVey), but had learned the rule of the game. His 1990s and early 2000s kept with the general use of thinly veiled Nazi innuendos, but it did not take long until he ceased to back the neo-Nazi clergy who began to siphon out of the organization one by one, often citing Gilmore as their reason. New values had been introduced by the new High Priest, and they understood that their neo-Nazi dispositions were now perceived as non-kosher by those in charge.

Satan thinks the previous values of The Church of Satan were not specifically neo-Nazi or even fascist. It was through a combination of neglect, a bad choice of agent provocateur (Nazis, that is), and a lacking sense of consequence that neo-Nazism nonetheless became a predominant value by attracting a critical mass of wrong people. Satan is pleased to know that the current values are less so. He certainly demands that His legions of evil fight with stormtrooper courage towards the final cosmic solution, but as the archetypical Adversary, Satan has bad experiences with such convictions whose core ideologies involve the demonization of your opponents and considers their presence in his ranks to be an obvious recipe for disaster.

Satan has no use for the new values introduced by the next High Priest, Peter Gilmore, either, however. Young Peter Gilmore’s late-childhood read-through of The Satanic Bible had apparently instilled in his mind that his identity hinged on becoming a Satanic cult leader, but not for any reasons qualifying as Satanic. Satan thinks that Anton LaVey nailed Gilmore’s motivation in their very first correspondence as a need for ego consolation. He needed to be respected, but instead of earning respect per LaVey’s recommendation, years later he settled for an underachieving job in real life and, gained by befriending LaVey, the intimidating effect that a “Satanic priest,” whether high or low, has on some people. In that first communication, Gilmore had also described his fear, “the greatest Hell imaginable for anyone,” of being remembered by your enemies as a fool, but LaVey did not address this concern. Satan suspects it may have been out of pity, because only people with considerably low self-esteem would feel that belittled, if at all, by knowing their enemies think badly of them. Of all hated beings, The Prince of Darkness would be a sorry mess if such insignificance troubled Him.

The new values introduced by Peter Gilmore in The Church of Satan are, regrettably, a level of grandiose narcissism that lies comfortably within the clinically diagnosable range of personality disorders, and of which Gilmore’s early letter to LaVey is a textbook example. No doctrine, opinion, view, or standpoint is conclusively important as long as one requirement is satisfied: you must either give Peter Gilmore the impression that he is being liked and that he can ultimately sway your opinion if he wants to, or you must be a useful idiot who enables his narcissistic behavior towards others by defending him in spite of what should have been your better judgment.

Before we venture any further, it is important to understand what narcissism is. It is not egoism, which is basically just being a jerk. Narcissism is a compensation mechanism for an intense feeling of insecurity stemming from unusually low self-esteem. The compensation generally takes the form of a grandiose sense of self-importance and an excessive need for admiration, exploitative and superficial relationships that only serve to confirm a positive self-image, a need for control and lack of empathy, a fragile and easily threatened identity whose stability depends on maintaining the view that one is exceptional, blaming others for one’s faults, being unable to take no for an answer, and being deeply afraid of being perceived as wrong or seen as inadequate. Failing to give them their way often triggers a hysterical, sometimes violent, rage. They feel “special” and unique and believe they can only be understood by other special or high-status people. They feel entitled and often believe they deserve better or were overlooked, are envious of others, or believe that others are envious of them; they are preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love. Their attitude towards others is often arrogant and haughty, and they frequently demean, intimidate, bully, or belittle others in order to seem better themselves in comparison.

It is not clear what causes narcissism, but scientists currently tend to agree that a genetic element and a later trauma element together turn a person narcissistic, after which the personality disorder is chronic. Satan thinks that their deep-seated low self-esteem and their compulsive and pervasive self-deceit run counter to the very core of Satanism, and since part of their condition is neurologically hard-wired, Satan thinks that, contrary to Satanists, these Non-Satanists are thus born not made.

Where LaVey had, probably inadvertently, created an organization that attracted neo-fascists and neo-Nazis, Peter Gilmore has propagated values that changed the organization into an environment that nourishes his narcissistic cravings. He uses The Church of Satan as a proxy for his ego: every praise of The Church of Satan feeds his self-esteem, which in narcissists is a perpetually empty hole of starvation. He demands respect, reverence, and for people to be impressed with him. Conversely, no criticism or disagreement can be tolerated, and no mistake can be mentioned because they threaten the very core of his being.

It is why, his ego intertwined with The Church of Satan, he often provides excuses or claims that are quite outrageous: for example, that they have extremely influential and powerful members who all just happen to keep unrealistically secret about it; that Gilmore’s uncommitted slowness and sense of low importance in his processing of membership applications is deliberate, intended to “test” the applicants; and that whenever a formerly appreciated, decorated, or dedicated member leaves, it invariably turns out they were, retroactively, “never really into it,” or never truly understood Satanism.

Through more than two decades as the de facto head of the organization, his demand for positive attention, and his equal terror at even the slightest doubt of his worth, have been institutionalized throughout the organization. He chooses his close associates and enablers of his narcissism based on their willingness to look up to him, and has made sure to make others in high positions feel unwelcome, should they not place him above all else.

The Church of Satan has become an entity of people who have taught one another to demand of everyone the unbounded admiration that Gilmore requires and to attack on sight anything that might leave the slightest dent in their inflated self-regard. What they believe is the proper way to be members of a Satanic organization is, instead, Peter Gilmore’s low self-esteem marioneteering their behaviors (and his!) like a parasite taking control of its host. Satan is impressed—to minds who do not understand organizational dynamics, such herd mentality is indistinguishable from magic.

This environment, shaped to accommodate Gilmore’s narcissism, is an environment that other narcissists readily recognize as conducive to their own narcissism as well. The Satanic Bible, by Anton LaVey’s own admission, already appeals to such undesirable characters, and LaVey considered the damage they do to be a tolerable trade-off, but it was Peter Gilmore who turned The Church of Satan into a self-perpetuating and multiplying breeding ground for them. Even those who are not narcissists by nature will soon learn to act as if they were.

The organization that was once established to create stronger individuals by exploring one’s own strengths is now an organization bent on pretending to have worth by diminishing the efforts of everyone else. True to the nature of narcissists, its claim to fame and accomplishment consists of exaggerating the tiniest of achievements to make the organization seem noteworthy, and first and foremost of demeaning and bullying everyone other than The Church of Satan who appears in the Satanic arena, as well as any true individual within their own ranks who calls the bluff and, as it were, exclaims that the emperor wears no clothes.

Satan has no use for such an organization, which is alive but an empty shell. Satan demands stalwart soldiers with genuine fighting skills for the imminent battle against the hordes of God, not a mob of deluded snowflakes who believe that their petty, verbal party fireworks rain fires of doom upon their foes and that victory is won by declaring that the celestial army is fake angels, all the while sabotaging the Devil’s far superior elite squadrons.