Satanic Panic 2: The Sequel
There’s nothing new under the sun…including religious boogeymen.
Welcome to the first edition of A Good Girl’s Guide to Surviving the Apocalypse! Along with being something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately, my first topic also gives me the chance to share a little bit about myself and the background and perspective I’ll be bringing to these posts. Whether we’re about to do some serious exvangelical trauma bonding or you’re about to be super thankful for your boring and normal childhood (or anywhere in between) — thanks for reading and subscribing!
What were you doing between the years 1990-2000?
What were you watching, listening to, and talking about or (if you’re a millennial like me who was a quiet, deeply observant kid) overhearing the adults in your life talk about?
Your answers are probably a good indicator of whether or not you feel a weird sense of déjà vu in 2023. (And it has nothing to do with the return of bucket hats or the Hamburgler.)
In 1992, I was seven years old. My TV time was dedicated mostly to The Price is Right, America’s Funniest Home Videos, TGIF, and obsessing over the U.S. women’s gymnastics team at the summer Olympics.1 Oh, and The Mighty Ducks. (I had a massive crush on Joshua Jackson.)
1994 brought The Mighty Ducks 2, obsessing over Olympic figure skating, and my cassette copy of The Lion King soundtrack that I listened to on repeat. My parents allowed me to be into The Lion King, on one condition: that I understood everything about the movie that was bad.
From their direct warnings and overheard grumblings, I learned that Rafiki was a witch doctor monkey using voodoo rituals to divine that Simba (*spoiler alert*) wasn’t actually dead, “Hakuna Matada” was perilously close to being hippy new-age philosophy, and if you paused the movie in just the right spot, the word SEX appeared in the sky.2
(Clearly Disney had some sort of agenda and was trying to indoctrinate young people, and constant vigilance was required in order to protect the children.)
One of my mom’s3 favorite topics of conversation when I was growing up was spiritual warfare. Specifically, all the ways you could inadvertently let the devil into your house, or worse — your mind.
I remember lying in a bunk bed at a student retreat one night (as a kid, I often got to tag along on high school youth group trips because my parents were youth leaders at our church), and overhearing my mom telling one of those my-sister’s-coworker’s-cousin sort of stories about some woman whose friend went to Egypt on vacation and brought back a small cat statue as a gift for the woman’s daughter. A string of creepy occurrences followed until the mother concluded the statue was possessed (because the Egyptians worshiped cats and this statue was obviously a real-life idol) and got rid of it.
My mother’s running list of all the ways Satan could infiltrate a person’s psyche included the popular game Dungeons & Dragons, which she and my dad warned all the youth group students against playing. But with me, she took those warnings a step further.
What’s the common denominator of most youths who play D&D? A love of fantasy. Hence, fantasy became a “slippery slope” and the genre was largely outlawed in my house — particularly anything involving magic, which might give one the irresistible urge to join The Occult and roam the mountains performing secret rituals and sacrificing small animals.
This meant that not only was I not allowed to read Harry Potter, I also wasn’t allowed to read The Chronicles of Narnia.4 While a villainous, evil witch *might* have been forgiven, C.S. Lewis’ inclusion of mythological creatures like satyrs and centaurs — portrayed as good guys! — was unacceptable.5
Also banned: Star Trek, Star Wars, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings and (I found out after getting in huge trouble for watching it) The Princess Bride.
Long before the internet made the spread of misinformation so easy, my mom was a member of the Conspiracy Theory Book Club, a few of which she made me read as well.
When I was around 12 years old, it was a book that claimed vaccines didn’t actually cure or protect against anything. That diseases like diphtheria, measles, and polio were on the decline long before vaccines became standard; it was improvements in hygiene that really eradicated them. But this was a secret the government didn’t want you to know, because the government was in league with all the doctors and big Pharma to make money. (And by the way, if you got vaccinated, it would eventually kill you because vaccines were also full of chemicals that would give you cancer!)6
When I was around 14, it was a book on the satanic influence of secular music, the African voodoo origins of drumbeats, and the impossibility of “Christian” rock-and-roll.7 My mother wouldn’t even keep this book in the house for fear of potential spiritual repercussions — the book’s cover featured an illustration of the devil and contained photos of popular musical artists flashing “devil signs” (aka 🤘) and album covers with satanic symbols — so the book lived outside in our shed when no one was actively reading it.8
The obsession over covert satanic symbolism at this time went so deep that anything with moons or five-pointed stars was frowned upon, and I remember my mom talking about boycotting Proctor & Gamble products over their logo.9
But it wasn’t just books stoking fear and paranoia. The 700 Club was on our TV every afternoon, accompanied by Focus on the Family with Dr. James Dobson and Rush Limbaugh on the radio. From these programs I learned that the government could, at any moment, swoop in to take good Christian homeschooled kids (like me) away from their parents on fake child abuse charges and force them to go to public school so they could be taught the devil’s theory of evolution and have their pockets stuffed full of condoms.
Also, the government was going to take away all of our guns and declare martial law…the gays were destroying America…Democrats were murdering babies…feminists were dangerous…the Christian family was in peril and American Christians in general were being persecuted left and right.
All of this was potentially a sign of the End Times. And when the End Times did come, the government would try and force us to get The Mark of the Beast (right after they took away our guns and enforced martial law). And if you took The Mark of the Beast, you’d go to Hell, so you’d better be sure you knew what that mark was so you could avoid it. The most popular theories were that it would be some sort of chip inserted into a bank card, or more extremely, into your person — maybe secretly through something like a vaccine.
(Oh, and the anti-Christ would probably be the Pope.)
What’s the point of me telling you all of this?
When I look at everything happening in the United States in 2023, it feels an awful lot like Satanic Panic Part 2.10 And let me tell you, this sequel is not self-aware and it’s derivative as f*ck.
I was raised to be the original horror story’s Final Girl — the sweet, innocent, virginal good girl destined to survive and save as many people as I could along the way.11
But eventually I grew up and realized all the fear was manufactured. A clever ploy for power — over people’s attention, votes, and wallets. (There’s nothing quite so profitable as manufacturing fear and then selling protection.)
There’s an advantage to all of this though, despite the lingering anxiety: I know what the real villain looks like. I know the call is coming from inside the house. And I know to never go into the creepy basement.
My reason for sharing this is the same purpose I have for all my writing: to throw my thoughts out into the world in the hopes they make a difference for somebody. That one person will feel seen and encouraged to keep pushing back against the fear. That when I (and people with similar stories) tell our loved ones that the news articles or videos or Facebook posts they’re listening to and sharing are bullshit…they’ll listen. That when we say history is repeating itself with increasingly dangerous consequences…people will believe us.
Because we already experienced it all — the propaganda, the “what the government doesn’t want you to know….” conspiracies, the secret information with which to go ye therefore and make disciples, all the homophobia and racism trying to disguise itself as morality and equality — the last time it was in fashion. We have the trauma and trust issues to prove it.
And much like velour tracksuits and low-rise jeans, we’d rather not go through it again.
📼 Renfield. It’s Hot Fuzz meets Warm Bodies in a campy horror take on the story of Dracula. Come for Nicolas Cage (and Awkwafina, and Ben Schwartz) and stay for the hilarious commentary on breaking free from toxic relationships.
📚 Now that I’m not so scurred of spooky stories, I’ve gotten really into layered, well-written horror novels. Especially ones by marginalized authors using the genre to explore deeper themes, like the examination of colonialism and cultural identity in She is a Haunting.
🏳️🌈 It’s pride month y’all! And I’m here for all the sapphic romance (on screen and on the page). My new favorites: Portrait of a Lady on Fire for a gorgeous period film, Sizzle Reel for a slow-burn spicy read, and Imogen, Obviously for sweet YA bisexual panic.
I wrote this sentence and my 37-year-old, recently uncloseted bisexual brain had yet another “Ohhhh…” moment. 😂
Urban legends about Disney’s subliminal sexual messages were the film version of “If you play the record backwards…”
It’s difficult to talk about my childhood without feeling guilt over shining a negative light on my mom. My childhood wasn’t all religious trauma and I have a lot of happy memories, too. I still have a (no longer close, but functioning) relationship with my mom, and I recognize that throughout my childhood, she really was doing everything she thought was best for our family. There’s no getting around the fact that my mother was the driving force in our strict, conservative, religious household, but I try to remember what Abraham Piper says about holding empathy for conservative parents.
If you put a bunch of 90s church kids in a room together, the conversation will inevitably turn into a competition of whose childhood entertainment rules were the weirdest/strictest. So far, with this little factoid, I am undefeated.
I’m pretty sure my mother once referred to C.S. Lewis as a “false prophet.”
New fear unlocked! One that would follow me and impact decisions I made about my health and the health of my children for decades. Fun fact: I didn’t get a single ultrasound during either of my pregnancies because I read one article that said they cause a fetus’s cells to heat up, leading to birth defects. (I probably don’t need to tell you this, but…that’s total BS.)
At this point in writing, I had one of those “Am I making this up?” moments, where I started to think my memory must certainly be exaggerating things. So I searched “90s christian book on the evils of rock and roll” and found the book. Turns out the author’s views really were as ridiculous as I remember.
And if you read the current top (and shockingly recent) review on Amazon, apparently my mom wasn’t the only one with this opinion.
Yup, Christians have been boycotting things for ridiculous reasons for like, ever.
“Satanic Panic” isn’t just a catchy phrase, it’s an actual thing that happened (and that literally ruined a lot of people’s lives). If you grew up in the 90s, it likely impacted your childhood — even if your family wasn’t religious.
Now I am (among many other things) the queer liberal democrat feminist who owns tarot cards, is outlining a witchy fantasy novel, watches the occasional horror film, listens to music with swear words, and raised two nerdy teenagers who love to play D&D. Some people would see that as a failure, I call it a victory.
Ashley - you survived! Having not grown up in church, I didn't realize that the craziness in the WEC these days is simply retro '90s - thanks for the guided tour! 💕