Some of my readers may be too young to remember the Satanic Panic that happened in the 80's but I remember it like it was yesterday. This panic was caused by Christian fundamentalists who actually believed that Satan and his minions had control over all of our lives. In their minds young women were being kidnapped and forced to breed babies so that they could be sacrificed in the name of the "Dark Lord" himself. According to these fundies this was something that was happening across the board and it didn't matter what walk of life you came from because Satan was somehow hiding in the shadows and pulling all the strings. Doctors, lawyers, school teachers (you name it) they were all a part of this grand conspiracy to take over the world.During this time the Devil was of course leaving backward messages on Rock & Roll albums so that kids would commit suicide when ever they listened to the lyrics of people like Ozzy Osbourne or Judas Priest. Both Ozzy and the band Judas Priest had to go to court and defend themselves over these silly accusations. Also if your child listened to Rock & Roll or Metal and became hooked on drugs you can bet it was those evil Satanic musicians manipulating the young fragile minds of the youth so that they could do the Devils bidding.
When the FBI started to to investigate these allegations they didn't find any evidence to back up any of the claims the Fundies were making. Personally being a musician myself if I where going to put something backwards on a record it would be something like "BUY MY MUSIC, MAKE ME A MILLIONAIRE" it certainly wouldn't be kill yourself. If all the people who buy my music killed themselves after listening to it then I'd be out of a job.
If you think these crazy ideas are over and done with your wrong because there are still nut cases who actually believed the end of the world was going to happen a couple weeks ago. Well I got news for you Armageddon is coming but it will be totally different than what the fundies are telling you. As science and technology continues to explain how and why the world works and the great mysteries in life no longer are mysteries you can bet this will upset the Fundies to the point where they will have to make some kind of stand. The mark of the beast will not be 666 it will be a cross instead and that's when the shit will finally hit the fan. If you don't have the mark of Jesus then your one of THEM that will be their battle cry. If you don't believe this is possible just go back and read your history books and see how the fundies treated Darwin, and Galileo they were seen as heretics. Both of these men could back up their arguments but that didn't matter because all that matters to the fundie is their belief in "god" and to hell with science.
Satan in Hebrew means adversary and that's the way I see him. I reject the Christian interpretation of him and see him as a symbol of freedom and liberty. He is the one who questions and opposes and stands against hypocrisy. The true "SATANIC PANIC" will come when people use reason and logic as their guide rather than rely on books written two thousand years ago. If you want to know why people hate the Devil so much it's not because he goes around telling lies, it's because he has this nasty habit of telling the truth.
'Dif-tor Heh Smusma': -MerlinRavenSong
