My daughter and her friends were saying they were Satanists to piss off the "normal" kids. So I had her look up TST's 7 fundamental tenets. Now she really is one.
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.
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.
The Satanic Temple is incredibly based. I've been a member since they started trolling Iowa legislators a year or two ago with Iowa Satanic Temple School in response to the school choice nonsense.
Me and my wife are both Members of the TST and we're wholeheartedly proud of it. They are doing such great things for religious equality and attempting to stop the overreach of Christianity within our schools and government. We donate to them regularly and I'm so happy to be supporting a group that is genuinely doing great things for our individual rights and the betterment of our communities as a whole.
As far as membership goes, yes kids are allowed. You can buy a membership card and certificate on their website, or you can just go and participate in one of their public events as long as the event doesn't mention any age requirements. My local chapter definitely does family friendly events.
They organize events on Facebook groups in my area typically. Just search for TST and your state name and you should be able to find a local chapter that does some sort of events.
In this thread: people who have never taken a deep dive into the myriad forms of ethics and morality that have existed throughout history
Like, a whole bunch of the arguing in this thread boils down to "when does utilitarianism overrule moral absolutism" or "is it always the case that one should use deontology, vs consequentialism, vs virtue ethics"
These are really complicated questions that have been considered and discussed at great lengths and I see a lot of comments in here making statements assuming one or the other is absolutely correct, without addressing the underlying justifications for their personal ethical and moral convictions
As someone who grew up in a conservative Christian church and became an atheist as an adult, I still have an innate emotional reaction to the name The Satanic Temple that I struggle to get over, even as I’ve fully gotten over earlier emotional reactions like making jokes about Jesus the same way I might about anything else (which I couldn’t do at the beginning of my atheist journey).
Good on your daughter for not caring about that and fully evaluating it based on its tenets.
I didn't know they were purely atheistic. I though it was religious, but subverting the christian interpretation of the bible so that Lucifer/Satan would actually be the good guy, written about by unreliable narrators.
I even had a whole circular theory about it. Like, Lucifer being the angel that brings the light of reason, and the serpent who argue that humans should, in fact, know right from wrong... and who would have been cast out for rebelling against a malevolent god who thinks wanting to use reason to determine and enact justice rather than blindly take it on "faith" that the unfair natural law is part of an inherently good yet unscrutable "plan" is an unforgivable sin of pride worthy of eternal damnation... A malevolent creator who'd have used this 'faith' flaw in our brains to build an army of authoritarian followers, and manipulated the narrative to systematically assassinate the character of an "adversary" that is actually our best ally in any struggle for self-determination and justice against the oppressor.
I read waaaaaay too much into the name. Now I'm actually a bit disappointed.
Edit: wait am I thinking of another form of satanism?
Edit2 : nevermind, apparently I'm describing a blend of Luciferianism and the Church of Satan. Imma take whatever appeals to me, add a bit of discordianism to make the incompatible bits stick together better and I think that's gonna be my religion for a while.
Edit3: apparently it gets me even closer to the Our Lady of Endor Coven.
I'll be honest, when opening this thread I was not expecting people to not universally agree on tenet number 3 there. I was even going to make a joke on your first paragraph and how they might take issue because of that tenet because nobody can be that absurd, right? RIGHT?
The pro-eugenics stance that Lucian has is obviously very problematic and it would be nice if he were removed. Otherwise, yeah. Never met a Satanist I didn't like.. My mom even sent me a tshirt she bought while passing through Salem a little while ago.
Problem with them is while you can admire their core values, the shock value imagery and unnecessary allegories taint what would be an otherwise great idea.
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.
The struggle for justice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions.
Justice is not always preferable to laws and institutions. If you deliver justice to one, but weaken an institution that materially helps thousands, is that desirable?
One’s body is inviolable, subject to one’s own will alone.
This I strongly disagree with. The community has a right to the use of individuals, according to the needs of the community. If your arm is stuck blocking an essential passage off, even if through no fault of your own, the community does have a right to remove your arm, if need be, to serve the needs of the community.