Archive for the 'New York City' Category
March 19, 2011
Lately, challenging people’s prejudices has gotten much harder than it used to be. Once it was easy and fun. Over the years it became much more difficult. Lately, it often seems to have become almost impossible. For whatever reasons, it seems that most people today are a lot less willing to consider new ideas than most people were, say, back in the 1970’s.
Nevertheless, even today it is still possible to make progress in counteracting specific prejudices, if one is willing to be persistent about it.
Here’s a brief history of some of my major successes and failures at challenging people’s prejudices over the past few decades:
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Posted in anti-Satanism, gay rights, New York City, Pagan, prejudice, Theistic Satanist interfaith discussion, trends, Wicca | 4 Comments »
Tags: NYC Pagan Pride festival
March 15, 2011
Another post by Anya Kless has called my attention to the following: (1) Fun Facts For the Deity-Owned by Laura Patsouris, Patheos, January 26, 2011, and (2) God-Owned: Humans as Pets by P. Sufenas Virius Lupus, January 26, 2011.
I can relate to the experience of being “God-owned,” although I’ve tended to use different terminology to describe it.
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Posted in New York City, Pagan, Reconstructionism, religious trends, Theistic Satanism, Theistic Satanist interfaith discussion | 6 Comments »
Tags: Anya Kless
March 13, 2011
Anya Kless, author of Lilith: Queen of the Desert, has written a very interesting blog post titled Samael: God of the Left Hand. Among other things, she confesses:
I don’t know if I’m ready to say that anyone who works with Satan is actually working with Samael (or one of His faces), but it seems quite possible. Considering the eye-rolling I used to do about Satanism, it’s actually rather ironic that, if the Satanists are right, I’m working with Him. Gods are funny that way.
I am, of course, relieved to see that past-tense “used to.” She also references a website called “Severity of God” (about Samael) by a LaVeyan Satanist who is also an Aztec reconstructionist.
Anyhow, Anya Kless’s post is an interesting compilation of lore about Samael, plus a brief account of some of her own personal spiritual experiences involving Samael.
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Posted in Church of Azazel, New York City, occult, Pagan, Satan, Theistic Satanism, Theistic Satanist interfaith discussion | 4 Comments »
Tags: Anya Kless, Samael
February 12, 2011
I recently ordered a copy of American Exorcism: Expelling Demons in the Land of Plenty by Michael Cuneo, who teaches anthropology and sociology at Fordham University in the Bronx, here in New York City. According to various reviews (listed near the bottom of this post), Cuneo’s book is an in-depth study, from an open-mindedly skeptical point of view, of exorcism as practiced by both Catholics and Protestants here in the U.S.A.
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Posted in Against Theocracy, Catholic, Charismatic, Christian, Christianity, civil rights, New York City, Pentecostal, Protestant, religious trends, Roman Catholic | 10 Comments »
Tags: exorcism, Michael Cuneo
January 27, 2011
(revised February 10, 2011)
Here in New York City, there is a Cult Hotline and Clinic run by the JBFCS (the Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services). They provide various helpful services to ex-members of “cults” and to estranged families and friends of “cult” members. They are, as far as I can tell, the only place in New York City that offers such services.
Truly harmful religious groups certainly do exist, and it’s good that there are at least a few places, like the JBFCS Cult Clinic, where people who have been hurt by such groups can get help. But the website of the JBFCS Cult Clinic associates Satanism in general with “cults,” even though the vast majority of Satanist groups (or, at least, most of the ones I’ve run into) do not fit the JBFCS Cult Clinic’s definition of a “cult.”
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Posted in Against Satanic Panics, anti-Satanism, crime, cults, gay rights, GLBT, LaVeyan Satanism, LGBT, New York City, prejudice, Satanic panic, Satanism, Satanisms and society | Leave a Comment »
Tags: Arnold Markowitz, JBFCS Cult Clinic, religion
July 12, 2010
A church in the Bronx that had been burned down by arsonists last year, Glory of Christ Church, has been rebuilt and held its first worship services in the new building yesterday, according to several news stories yesterday and today.
In news stories back in December about the arson itself, there was quite a bit of unfounded hullabaloo about the arsonist being a “Satanist.” In today’s news stories — or at least the online versions — the word “Satanist” does not appear, but one story does describe the culprit as “a Satan-loving arsonist.” Even “Satan-loving” is unfounded.
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Posted in Church of Azazel, crime, New York City, Satanism's criminal fringe, Satanisms and society | 1 Comment »
Tags: arson, Bronx, vandalism
May 22, 2010
[Sigh!] I just now unapproved yet another comment, from Axis Sallyboy X. that was in gratuitous violation of WordPress’s terms of service, and of my own desire to keep this blog G-rated, for the sake of search engine rankings and such. I’ll now paraphrase and respond to the substantive parts of the comment.
In response to my request for more info on how (according to an earlier comment by Sallyboy) Anthony Anderson was brutalized by the police, Sallyboy wrote that, before the vandalism/graffiti incident, Anthony Anderson had been doing office work at the 105th police precinct (92-08 222nd Street, Queens Village, NYC), first as a volunteer, then as an employee. Once he became a “Super Duper Special Trustee,” according to Sallyboy, Anderson was used as a sex slave by the entire staff at the precinct.
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Posted in crime, New York City, Satanism's criminal fringe, Satanisms and society | 1 Comment »
May 18, 2010
On another blog of mine, someone identified as “Axis Sallyboy X” posted a fervent comment on my post announcing the Church of Azazel’s statement against violent crime and vandalism. Unfortunately, the comment was full of expletives plus some implied threats, which are not in my interests to allow, as they are likely a terms-of-service violation.
So I’ve deleted the comment. Below is an edited version of the comment, followed by my reply:
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Posted in Catholic, civil rights, New York City, racism, Satanism's criminal fringe, Satanisms and society | 3 Comments »
March 12, 2010
Below is a copy (minus contact info) of a press release I sent out today regarding a murder case that will be featured on “America’s Most Wanted” tomorrow, for which the currently-suspected perpetrators are a small group of “Satan worshipers.”
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Posted in Against Satanic Panics, Church of Azazel, crime, New York, New York City, Satanism's criminal fringe, Theistic Satanism | 2 Comments »
Tags: America's Most Wanted, Kimberly Simon, Oneida County, Satanism
September 21, 2008
Phil Orenstein posted a reply, here, to my post More about the controversy over the Khalil Gibran International Academy (KGIA). Phil, I’m sorry about the delay in moderating your comment, which was posted during my recent hiatus from this blog. Anyhow, here is my further reply.
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Posted in Islam, Islamism, Muslim, New York City | Leave a Comment »
Tags: Debbie Almontaser, Khalil Gibran International Academy, Phil Orenstein
May 31, 2008
My post The “Stop the Madrassa” Coalition and its campaign against the Khalil Gibran International Academy has been quoted on the FrontPage magazine site in an article titled Fantasizing “The New McCarthyism” by Phil Orenstein, FrontPageMagazine.com, Friday, May 23, 2008.
Islamism (the totalitarian ideology) does pose a real threat. But it’s a threat that needs to be addressed with surgical precision, not blind hysteria.
Alas, Phil Orenstein’s article comes across to me as hysteria-mongering: a flood of accusations against various people, combined with a blatantly fallacious dismissal of the civil rights concerns of Muslims. But his article has inspired me to research several topics more deeply this past week, including hate crime statistics and the recent history of bigotry against both Jews and Muslims.
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Posted in Abrahamic, Against Theocracy, anti-semitism, Islam, Islamism, jew-haters, Muslim, New York City | 2 Comments »
Tags: Daniel Pipes, Debbie Almontaser, Khalil Gibran International Academy, Phil Orenstein, politics, religion
April 29, 2008
When I first ran into the “Stop the Madrassa” Coalition’s blog last week, I was inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt that they may have had a valid church-state separation issue regarding the Khalil Gibran International Academy (KGIA). I do think it’s important to uphold separation of church (mosque) and state.
However, the more I’ve looked into this matter, the more it seems to me that the “Stop the Madrassa” Coalition is crying wolf. Their one valid complaint is the Board of Education’s unwillingness to provide complete information about the curriculum to the general public. On this matter, their arch-scapegoat, the Khalil Gibran school’s founder and former principal Debbie Almontaser, agrees with them, as I learned last night. She too wishes that the Board of Education and the school’s current administration would be more transparent, to allay public fears.
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Posted in Against Theocracy, Islam, Islamism, Muslim, New York City | 1 Comment »
Tags: Debbie Almontaser, Khalil Gibran International Academy, politics, religion