Editor’s note: This is the conclusion of a two-part series summarizing some of the sessions presented at the World Congress of Moral Panics presented by The Satanic Temple and The Grey Faction. The information presented during the conference highlights how the impact of any moral panic can have serious implications for minority groups, including religious minorities like Pagan and polytheistic faiths.
TWH – In a panel session on how to engage people who understand a different reality, the discussion at the World Congress of Moral Panics focused on how and when people understand “reality” differently, resulting in difficulties in interaction. One can cut certain people out of one’s life. That happens most easily with strangers. With neighbors, co-workers, and relatives, it becomes much more difficult. Others may consider outreach outside their echo chamber as necessary political work.
Carrie Poppy has spoken with ex-QAnon people about why they left. No one reported a sudden moment of clarity after a single discussion. They reported a sense of disquiet that had built up over years, until at one point, their belief collapsed.
Poppy said people who choose to engage with QAnon followers should avoid anger. “The more you mock them the more they dig into their belief,” said investigative journalist Mike Rothschild. “Leave the lines of communication open.” The goal should be to build enough trust to let them talk about their doubts.
Origins of the Satanic Panic
Gerard O’Sullivan and Donald Frew, two of the authors of “Satanism in America” (1989), spoke during a panel on the origins of the Satanic Panic. They deconstructed the rise of the panic in the 1980s.
In 1980, Michelle Smith and her therapist wrote Michelle Remembers, a story of a “survivor of Satanic Ritual Abuse.” She had “recovered” memories in therapy. Those memories involved the sacrifice of children and “Satanic Ritual Abuse.”
During the McMartin Satanic Panic, a Catholic priest approached Frew, a consultant on the paranormal. The priest was counseling families with children in the McMartin preschool.
The priest had concerns about what he was hearing. The children had reported a chant that they had “heard” during rituals. It went something like, “Circle, circle, circle seven, circle, circle, circle, one circle, always circle, circle forever more.” Frew was unfamiliar with that chant from Wiccan or Pagan circles. It did, however, sound like something out of “Michelle Remembers.”
That resemblance caused Frew to ask the priest about “Michelle Remembers.” The priest reported that McMartin parents were sharing that book among themselves. A few of the parents shared with Frew transcripts of the interviews done with their children.
An example of the questioning of the children involved was presented as follows.
“Were you tied to an altar, Tommy?”
Tommy replied, “No.”
“Are you sure you weren’t tied to an altar?”
“No, I wasn’t.”
“Billy has already told us that he was tied to an altar. You’re as smart as Billy, aren’t you?”
Tommy said “Yeah.” Then he began to fill in the story.
Indeed, therapy should lead to improved mental health not manipulate clients in the reconstruction of their experience to favor a specific false narrative. People who have retracted recovered memories do report worsening outcomes arising from “therapy.” The Grey Faction has published online the transcript of an interview with Ms. Roma E. Hart, a victim of recovered memory techniques.
Satanists of Color Coalition
Panelists in a session titled “Round Table with Satanists of Color Coalition” underscored that people of color were particularly vulnerable to accusations of Satanism and Satanic moral panic. Panelists Jayson Thomas, Ivy Loveless, Citlali Soona, Deborah Badie, and Michael Monstrum covered the historical realities of people of color during periods of moral panic and how these groups have been targeted because of racism, xenophobia, and colonialism.
People of color are also systematically disempowered from seeking medical and psychological services through long-enduring acts of abuse by medical research practices. The distrust is so deep, noted one panelist, that the medical system remains suspect even when relatives are medical practitioners.
Satanism, Stigma, and Mental Health
Professor Eric Sprankle discussed how stigma and pathologizing impacts Satanists. Psychological research on Satanism falls into two distinct categories. One category involves ritual abuse, dissociative identity disorder, and recovered memories. The other category involves research into the mental health of Satanists.
Sprankle searched PsychInfo, a tool used to locate published peer-reviewed psychosocial research, to compare research on different religions and mental health. He found the following:
|
Search Terms |
Results |
| Christianity and Mental Health |
1,147 |
| Buddhism and Mental Health |
593 |
| Satanism and Mental Health |
22 |
Psychologists rarely studied the mental health of Satanists. Most research on Satanism and Mental Health focused on dissociative identity disorder. The “treatment” for Satanism was to separate Satanists from Satanism. Treatments also included tattoo removal and avoiding heavy metal music. Almost none examined the mental health of Satanists.
Sprankle wondered how anti-Satanist stigma affected Satanists. He examined a non-random sample of 1,272 self-identified Satanists. He found that, like other religions, Satanism has mental health benefits for its members. People with strong social ties to other Satanists had fewer depressive symptoms.
Satanic Panic, Media Misconceptions and Evangelism
Panelists challenged beliefs that only conservative or fringe Christian denominations are driving Satanic Panics. Carrie Poppy noted that people would like to blame Satanic Panic on the right-wing, but the situation is more complicated. The Satanic Temple’s co-founder, Lucien Greaves, argued it takes more than just religious fanatics to create a moral panic. Moral panics only take off when enough people take up a so-called “moral cause.”
Nevertheless, there is a connection with Christian evangelism. In another panel, Stephen Bradford Long, a gay man, talked about growing up with his fundamentalist Christian and exorcist father. Long’s father helped to build an ex-gay ministry. Long is not out to his father about being gay or being a Satanist.
Carrie Poppy at Skepticon in 2018 – Image credit: Ruth Ellison Canberra, Australia – CC BY 2.0
Evangelicals consider homosexuality to be an “eroticized wound,” Long said. Some evangelicals believe that sexual abuse leads to homosexuality. Long searched his memories for evidence of sexual abuse. He developed a hunch about a family member. If he had acted on that hunch, it would have destroyed his family. A friend, now a drag queen, talked Long out of acting on that hunch.
Long went through many exorcisms to “cure” him. In 2007, he survived a mass shooting. Two friends were killed in front of him. It took him longer to recover from ex-gay therapy than it did to recover from witnessing that mass shooting. To help him get over the trauma of the mass shooting, his father wanted to take him to a shooting range. A self-described “walking casualty,” Long said that “ex-gay therapy” destroys lives.
As part of his search for a “cure,” Long became friends with a married “ex-gay” with children. That friend told Long that he felt like he was living a half-life and was “white-knuckling” it. Long said that “that conversation terrified me out of the closet.”
Fortunately, Long has unpacked his self-loathing with some fabulous therapies. Satanism allowed Long to embrace “his demonization as a positive thing.” He credits receiving cognitive behavioral therapy, having sex with strangers, and partying with crazy drag queens at 4 a.m. with helping him escape the traumas of his life.
The Wild Hunt is not responsible for links to external content.
To join a conversation on this post:
Visit our The Wild Hunt subreddit! Point your favorite browser to https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Wild_Hunt_News/, then click “JOIN”. Make sure to click the bell, too, to be notified of new articles posted to our subreddit.