hee.

Xenu =! Satan

I'm referring to the Crowley influence and the Hubbard's history with the Church of Satan.

Wait, maybe I've said too much. Well, it's not like we have anything that we could lose in a lawsuit.

Half the stuff I'm seen Christian churches do reviles me more than what Satanists are reputed to do.

We eat hunks of bread that may or may not be transubstantiated into the body of a nearly 2000 year old guy. Satanists kill cats.

Actually, Satanists rule.

I'd be curious to know more of the details about this. This is exactly the kind of group I see touted by the media/churches/etc as the Satanic cult bogeyman we're supposed to be afraid of.

I'll see if I can find details, but this is the late 80s in Oklahoma, so there's probably not a lot about it on the web. Short synopsis is that it was a group of white kids in Tulsa with ties to both skinhead groups in Dallas and white supremicist groups in eastern OK/western AR (one of which had ties to McVeigh). They weren't card-carrying members of the Church of Satan; I'd say they were more "devil worshippers," having this kind of syncretism of faux-Satanism and white supremacy. They finally broke apart after they a few of them got busted for beating up some black kids. But yeah, definitely devil worshippers.

"Satanist" is definitely a bogeyman term. The total number of true LaVeyan Satanists in America is probably not much larger than Wisconsin Synod Lutherans (400K), though there are probably a million who "claim" membership.

She's like a doctor version of me.

She totally is!

I am really enjoying How I Met Your Mother, but I think it's just because it's basically about me and my friends.

I'm quite sure I could find more than a few serial rapists who turned up at Church every Sunday and were quite good and singing the hymns.

Dennis Rader was a serial killer.

I'm referring to the Crowley influence and the Hubbard's history with the Church of Satan.

Now I'm confusing Good Omens character Crowley with the Satanic Church bigwig Crowley. One of them is more than a little embarrassed by Satanists.

We eat hunks of bread that may or may not be transubstantiated into the body of a nearly 2000 year old guy.

Little things, like the Inquisition come to mind. Also policies that lead to massive overpopulation in extremely poor areas. Those are things on the grand scale. I've had more than one friend have their life torn to shreds following church doctrine. Kids married at 18 and staying in very abusive relationships while the church encourages them to stay in the marriage and work it out while the husband is beating the wife in front on the kids. Divorce was simply not acceptable.

So yeah, don't get me started now how evil things done in the name of the Christian church can be.

Now the other side of this is that great things are done in the name of the Christian church. Still, good an evil both done with the same name on the headpiece. It's not the Christians or the Satanists that are evil, it's the fucked up humans and the things that they do to each other.

Sean, why do you hate America?

Okay, Jessica is trying to kill me by making me laugh so hard that I can't breathe and no oxygen gets to my brain.

I think a lot of people might feel that it's worse to be evil and do evil while hiding behind a think veneer or godliness or respectability. I know I do.

Then, of course, there are the people that think that their godliness and respectability makes their evil not evil. Nobody thinks they're the bad guy. Nazis loved their kids, too.

Of course, there I go, hating America again.

Albert Brooks says much the same thing in Broadcast News:

I love that quote. Which brings to mind a quote from a different Brooks:

James L. Brooks: Ned, I'm James L. Brooks.

Ned: Oh, can I call you Jim?

James L. Brooks: James L. Brooks is fine. How about some sponge cake?

Ned: Well, I can't see the harm...

James L. Brooks: With a brandy glaze?

Ned: Nooooooo!

James L. Brooks: Perhaps you'd like to go to a football game?

Ned: Well...

James L. Brooks: We don't have a team.

Ned: NOOOOOOOO!

It's not the Christians or the Satanists that are evil, it's the fucked up humans and the things that they do to each other.

Wrod. Times eleventy billion.

OH MAN! The moment when Bailey corners McDreamy in the elevator. She totally cracked me up and when Derek wanted to defend himself, and she held up her hand and was like "TZTZZTTT!" I do that to my students all the damn time.

The total number of true LaVeyan Satanists in America is probably not much larger than Wisconsin Synod Lutherans (400K), though there are probably a million who "claim" membership.

Well, that's sort of my point. LeVeyan Satanists are no different from any other peole, and many of them are perfectly nice people you'd be able to get along with just fine.

Satanic cultists who rape and kill people are mostly non-existant bogeymen. Killers and rapist who claim to worship Satan may actually do so, but that's really kind of secondary to the fact that they are rapists and/or murders.