Ashley posted about Mrs. Bardot being a racist for speaking out about animal sacrifice in a muslim festival, this is what I was going to comment with at first, but decided to make a post for the bulk of it:
You completely omit any details about what she wrote. I'd be very intested to know what she said that was supposedly racist. Seeing as how it was a letter published in an animal welfare journal, and how she was complaining about a festival, she was probably doing something more a long the lines of speaking out against acts that could be perceived as animal cruelty that might be part of such a festival.
--actual comment left
It was probably regarding the festival "Eid ul-Adha" (wikipedia redirects searchs for "Eid al-Kabir" to this, and the article says that "al-Kabir" is another name for "ul-Adha" the second name meaning "the Big Eid", probably similar to calling christmas "the big day") in which muslims present an animal sacrifice to god in thanks. This sacrifice is likely what she complained about. Legally speaking, they are, in the US (as well as the majority of European nations), perfectly within their rights to slaughter animals for religious purposes, because america doesn't care about animals... I myself find the sacrifice of animals to be pointless, because, "mystically speaking" you'd probably get a good god damned deal more energy for your magical tea party out of a human sacrifice then an animal, but even that's pointless because, as it's all about release of energy for various rituals, you get even more fucking energy from exploring your own psyche and embracing your own emotions when performing your ritual.
Anyway, she has every right to speak out against this act, as it could certainly be construed as animal cruelty, depending on how the animal is slain. At the same time, they have every right to sacrifice animals for their religion.
Why does this bring to mind an old satirical role-playing game entitled "Kill Puppies for Satan?" Also, why does everyone accuse us (satanists) of sacrificing everything from animals to babies to hookers, when in reality no real satanist has done these things, while plenty of mainstream religions have a good deal more blood, both of animals and children, on their hands than we do? I speak of the moronic superstitions that hang around my religious persuasion to this day from the era of the Satanic Panic.
"The Satanic Panic", ie: the rash of "Satanic Ritual Abuse" accusations which surfaced in and plagued the courts of the late 70's-early 90's, leveled serious allegations at the Church of Satan, Temple of Set, Sinagogue of Satan, and any other person who called themselves a satanist along the lines of "they kidnapped/raised me, brainwashed me, raped me, forced me rape others, etc. ad nauseum" and dragged our budding little circle of misanthropes through the mud almost irreparably. In fact, as I said, the superstition that satanists kidnap people, brainwash them and rape them persists to this day in the small minds of the terminally weak. Even when we can reply with "The FBI has never found any proof of a world wide satanic plot involving kidnap, rape, murder, molestation and ooky rituals in the woods," people still think this what we're all about. The people running around saying that they "kill for satan" aren't helping either. However, there is a double standard here. If a christian gets arrested for blowing up abortion clinics in the name of god, how many people are going to think that all christians blow up abortion clinics for god? Now compare that to some nutjob, whether here or across the pond in Sweden, who "kills in the name of satan" and the media fall out of that. So if one christian blows up abortion clinics he's whacko, nutty, or, more charitably, "misguided," while if some corpse-faced heavy metal singer with long blonde hair and an almost indiscernable unfamiliarity with proper language says "Ya, I kills in the name of satan" we're all labeled as dangerous nutjobs and people start running around screaming "oh noes the satanists are comings!! run!!!11!! don't let them drink your precious bodily fluids!!" Not only that, but when satanic metal singers in Sweden burn down a church, they do it in a drunken stupor at night when no one's around to die in the blaze, and when they kill some one, they kill just that one person and, again, in a drunken stupor! Meanwhile, the christian abortion-hating nutjob picks the most busy part of the day and blows up a clinic with anywhere between 20 and 50 people in them!
More than this disparity, the whack-jobs who blow up abortion clinics are actually christian, while the nutjobs who burn down churches, kill priests/hookers/etc aren't actually satanists! Not a single satanic church, temple, or what-have-you will acknowledge them as satanists, and they are operating under their own warped little mind not even going by any established form of religious satanism(and there are plenty to pick from too).
Back to the point, a LaVeyan Satanist, or a satanist belong to a derivative sect(ie, real satanist) would not, ever, sacrifice an animal or molest a child, animals and children are held as the most pure forms of life force around as they have not been shackled with taboos, repression, or other such things, and while this very quality makes them absolutely perfect sacrificial subjects, we tend to just about worship life force and the pure expression of it, free from repression or taboos, and thus would not do something so sacrilegious (if such a thing exists in a religion that just about serves as a mockery of religion itself) as to use it for our own ends against the will of the being. There is also the fact that far more energy can come from the investment of the ritualist's own emotions and desires, be they rage, lust, compassion, or other such things, into his ritual.
Ritual sacrifice came about as a way to release the energy that was generated by such things as appreciating and desiring a nice ass that just walked by, or the enjoyment of a nice bloody steak or the like in a nice little socially acceptable way. It is the tool of "white-lighters" too afraid of their own natures or energies to release them into the ritual. What does it say about these unenlightened masses that they are more comfortable with spilling blood, another's, at that, in a ritual than their own seed?
So I posted this on a class blog where we pretty much have free reign, but I'm wondering how coherent it is...
