My Twitter bio includes the words “Hail Satan 🤘“.
Except I don't believe in Satan (nor in his evil enemy, Jahwe)... So why the hell the did I put put it there?
So, first of all: Satanists don't believe in Satan. Just read their FAQ:
Satan to us is a symbol of pride, liberty and individualism, and it serves as an external metaphorical projection of our highest personal potential. We do not believe in Satan as a being or person.
Yup, a symbol. They chose this one, because it's controversial, that's all it is 🤷🏼
But that being said – I'm not even a Satanist. I do agree with most of their philosophy (and despise some parts of it), I own a copy of “The Satanic Bible” by LaVey (and I find it unbearably boring), and I follow their Twitter account (it's smart and hilarious!). But that's pretty much it. I've never visited any temple, never witnessed any ritual, didn't bother to become a member, and in my daily life I don't really bother thinking about Satanism too often.
Until, that is, a random Christian sees something I wrote online, checks out my bio to find an ad hominem to use, and replies with something along the lines of “yeah, but you worship Satan, so what do even know?! 🤡”
And that's the point: I don't believe in Satan, but I know that this person does. And they are scared of him.
I've spent too many years of my life suffering because of their mythology – not being able to be myself or do things I wanted to do – just because I had been indoctrinated into being scared shitless of some horned imp with a pitchfork.
I say “Hail Satan” not because I actually praise a nonexistent character from a horror book, but to show Christians that I'm not afraid of their imaginary enemy. Those two words represent my victory in the fight for liberation of my mind from their indoctrination.
I say “Hail Satan” just because I'm proud of the fact that I'm not afraid to say it anymore.
Oh, and there's one more thing: if you read the Bible, you'll find out that Jahwe is actually the bad guy in this story...
The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. (Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion)
So on the off chance that the Christian mythology is actually true (it's not, let's not kid ourselves 🙄), I'd rather make sure that I won't end up in the Celestial North Korea.
Call it a “Reversed Pascal's wager”, if you will 😉