For those unfamiliar, The Satanic Temple is an atheistic organization. Here are its tenets. I often ask people what they disagree with and get very little in the way of meaningful response.
THERE ARE SEVEN FUNDAMENTAL TENETS
I
One should strive to act with compassion and empathy toward all creatures in accordance with reason.
II
The struggle for justice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions.
III
One’s body is inviolable, subject to one’s own will alone.
IV
The freedoms of others should be respected, including the freedom to offend. To willfully and unjustly encroach upon the freedoms of another is to forgo one’s own.
V
Beliefs should conform to one’s best scientific understanding of the world. One should take care never to distort scientific facts to fit one’s beliefs.
VI
People are fallible. If one makes a mistake, one should do one’s best to rectify it and resolve any harm that might have been caused.
VII
Every tenet is a guiding principle designed to inspire nobility in action and thought. The spirit of compassion, wisdom, and justice should always prevail over the written or spoken word.
https://thesatanictemple.com/blogs/the-satanic-temple-tenets/there-are-seven-fundamental-tenets
DO YOU WORSHIP SATAN?
No, nor do we believe in the existence of Satan or the supernatural. The Satanic Temple believes that religion can, and should, be divorced from superstition. As such, we do not promote a belief in a personal Satan. To embrace the name Satan is to embrace rational inquiry removed from supernaturalism and archaic tradition-based superstitions. Satanists should actively work to hone critical thinking and exercise reasonable agnosticism in all things. Our beliefs must be malleable to the best current scientific understandings of the material world — never the reverse.
https://thesatanictemple.com/pages/faq
She’s 13. Does anyone know if she’s allowed to become a member? The website isn’t clear on that.
Maaaan I hope you don’t live in the Bible Belt… because if so, you just royally screwed your daughter when it comes to meaningful associations in school.
When you hear hoofbeats think horses, not zebras.
When the majority of people hear Satanist, they think Anthony LaVey and the Church of Satan - Satanism.
I hope she makes that distinction instantly and incredibly clear to everyone around her.
Seeing as the OP’s daughter and her friends were telling people they worshipped Satan just to piss them off in the first place, I suspect she’s already got a healthy amount of social support. Besides, the Bible Belt is chock-full of hyper-religious, xenophobic idiots, and they don’t count as “meaningful associations.” Nothing to be lost there.
Pretty sure there’s no such thing as a meaningful relationship with a person who would judge you based on your religion, and she’s better off finding out early who her friends really are.
We’re talking about 13 year olds here, not 30 year olds. I have one. They judge each other based on the absolute dumbest shit. The site they got their Jordans from, how many followers they do/don’t have on whatever platform, whether someone’s text message bubble shows a certain color.
Don’t get me started on the ‘shooters’ that worship Satan and don’t even own a pair of Jordans.
Thankfully mine is aware that none of that stuff matters, and I try to convince them not to get it any thought, and always be friendly to everyone regardless, but they’re still heavily judged by their peers for all of that, they feel it and to them societal rejection is still one of the worst emotional pains they’ve experienced so far, so we still get constant requests to buy this thing or that thing for them because it’s what’s cool this millisecond.
Kids aren’t the brightest, their brains are still developing until they’re in their 30s, and the emotional turmoil it takes is still incredibly real to them, regardless how little thought you want to give it.
Just because to you “it’s just middle/high school” and “it won’t matter to them in 10 years” doesn’t negate the tears and heartbreak that are so very raw and real to them, right now.
When you are able to think for your self, school is always going to suck. Best you can do is encourage them to find a friend or two on the fringes.
There is a tremendous amount to unpack here. I’ve got my fingers crossed that this is satire.
There are no meaningful associations to be had in school other than friends gained. Take your tongue off that boot for a moment and try thinking for yourself for a change.
Their entire head is up their ass, so I’m not sure the boots are a problem anymore.
Friends gained is what I’m talking about, numbnuts. You associate with people before you become friends with them. Friendship doesn’t happen overnight, and it happens much less if you’re the school outcast because “she’s a Satanist and her dad baptized her in blood” or whatever rumors are about to start flying around once her current friends confirm it’s true.
By then, no amount of explaining the rationalization of the difference between the CoS and TST will un-outcast her.
Thankfully middle- and high- school aren’t forever, but many outcasted kids just off themselves because to them, so far it has been forever and they don’t know any better.
Signed, the formerly outcasted middle schooler from the Bible belt who is fine as an adult but wishes my parents would have thought about the consequences of their actions.
When was the last time you were in school, 1965?
2008… In the bible belt as specified and clarified in the initial comment. You?
Edit: I didn’t even realize this was the atheism sub. The collective of teenagers and adults damaged by religion and still haven’t found a healthy way to cope, so they circlejerk about it to seethecope.
Protip: talk therapy works, and fits within a staunchly materialistic worldview.
Laveyan Satanism is a step better than gothic satanism (that is, enemy cultists in Hollywood movies, and what churches imagine they’re fighting against).
That’s true, Lavey is meant to be like an antidote to Christian guilt, however I’ve met some real arseholes with giant egos who were super into it.
Laveyan Satanism hasn’t aged well, but it seems to have come out at the same time the Necronomicon was published in paperback (ghostwritten, I think) and we were seeing all the allegedly factual books like Michele Remembers (featuring SRA) and The Satan Seller in which Mike Warnke confesses to be a part of the cabal of the Satan industrial complex (and admits to participation in some pretty serious violent crime, if the book was assumed to be not fiction).
These days, my take on Satanism is to look at the things that the churches have attributed to Satanism (Rock-and-Roll; TTRPGs, particularly Dungeons and Dragons, Fantasy fiction like Harry Potter, but once including Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia, LGBT advocacy, marital aids, sexual health, video games and so on.)¹ Contrast Jesus’ résumé (same sources) that suggest the Peacekeeper nuclear tipped ICBM is godly, as are the two Bush-led wars in Iraq, the presidency of Donald J. Trump and the bench appointment of Brett Kavanaugh. Comparing the two, I think Jesus is the god of established hierarchies, and Satan is the god of the people. I guess it makes sense, since Satan is something of a revolutionary.
¹ Among the fun contributions by Satan (according to the Church) are tandem bicycles (which allowed common folk to travel about and see other cultures and get cosmopolitan ideas) and trashy romance novels, which encouraged women to read and were accused of the same things TTRPGs and video games would be accused of later, particularly confusing vulnerable minds about what is real and what is fantasy.