William Hoffman write the article “50 Years of the Satanism and the Church Goes Largely Unknown,” Inverse, April 30, 2016 AD.
It is typical of a person who clearly knows not that of which they speak and so ends up misrepresenting Satanism and peppering contradictions along the way.
He notes, “The Church of Satan gets a bad rap for, well, worshiping the symbolic character of all evil in the world…few people really understand what makes one a Satanist” and Hoffman is one of those few.
Just about every article I read about Satanism is nothing but an uncritical platform for Satanic PR: literally giving Satanists an open forum to make any claim they will in an utterly unchallenged manner—do, for example, Christians get away with that?
For example, William Hoffman writes, “Anton Szandor LaVey founded the Church of Satan in 1966 and it’s less of a religion and more so a philosophy. It’s based in Atheism…” before we continue, note that he had already noted that Satanists, contextually LaVeyan Satanists, worship “the symbolic character of all evil” symbolic, of course, since, “It’s based in Atheism” and we are also told that “their conception of Satan includes a list of nine statements defining him as a symbol.”
Yet, the familiar demon-cat was out of the bag when Anton LaVey’s girlfriend Jane Mansfield’s son was mauled by a lion and Anton congregated his congregants so as to petition their “brother Satan” as a personal being for healing (see here).
Now, “It’s based in Atheism…” was continued with “…and skepticism of things that can’t be proven by science” and yet, “Ashley S. Palmer, a 31-year-old Reverend in the Church of Satan, tells Vice members of the church are encouraged to believe in magic and they perform rituals…In fact the seventh of 11 Satanic Rules of the Earth written by LaVey, says members should acknowledge the power of magic and to doubt it brings consequences” which are things that, apparently, have been proven by science—or, something.
Lastly, we come to the rub of it all as we are constantly told by pop-culture that Satanism is merely pop-occulture, nothing to see here, move along, “Satanic panic” and all that.
But there is that little murder in the name of Satan thing which LaVey assured his flock is a-okay (see here).
Well, William Hoffman is somewhat dismissive of this issue but does end up making some relevant admissions. He notes that LaVeyan Satanism believes in “taking gratification in sin and choosing vengeance over turning the other cheek.”
Also, “no animal sacrifices or drug abuse is condoned by the church” but we were just told that they believe in “taking gratification in sin” which logically means that they could be lying about well, anything such as the claim that “no animal sacrifices or drug abuse is condoned by the church.”
He notes that “the rituals do sometimes include wishing for the death of people who have gotten away with crimes, something Palmer said he classifies as justice.” In fact, one of LaVeyan Satanism’s rules is “If a guest in your lair annoys you, treat him cruelly and without mercy.” Also, “Do not take that which does not belong to you unless it is a burden to the other person and he cries out to be relieved,” of course, with “cries out to be relieved” being a subjective interpretation: hey, the way that guy with the Porsche is scratching his ear makes me think that he wants to be relieved of his car.
Another rule is “When walking in open territory, bother no one. If someone bothers you, ask him to stop. If he does not stop, destroy him.”
Another rule is “Do not harm little children” but, oops, oh yeah, well, there is that thing about “taking gratification in sin” so, there’s that. Also, note that Satanists, such as The Satanic Temple, openly and loudly support harming little children since they support abortion.
And so, we end up with more uncritically regurgitated Church of Satan PR.