[K1NGWARREN]

Royal Navy to allow devil worship
Monday, October 25, 2004
LONDON, England (CNN) -- A devil-worshipping sailor in the Royal Navy has become the first registered Satanist in the British Armed Forces.

Chris Cranmer, 24, a technician serving on the Type 22 frigate Cumberland, has been officially recognized as a Satanist by the ship's captain.

That allows him to perform satanic rituals aboard and permits him to have a non-Christian Church of Satan funeral should he be killed in action.

Cranmer, who is single, has been in the Royal Navy for four years and was promoted leading hand -- the naval equivalent of corporal -- in July last year.

http://www.cnn.com/2...ship/index.html

This dude is single?!?! No way!

[Vwing]

This dude is single?!?! No way!

That was funnier than the article. Kudos.

[barend]

WELL IT'S ABOUT TIME...

and it gives a new meaning to the line from RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS 1991 song 'Sir Psycho Sexy' :"there's a devil in my dick and some demons in my seamen"

I wonder what a military satanic funeral would be like...?

[J m HofMarN]

You know the Wiccans in my school always used to be asked whether or not they worshipped the devil. I wonder what people say if you reply in the affirmative. This guy gets away with it but over here I'd imagine you'd be burned for a witch.

[barend]

we have a decent number of satanist here...

nice people.

[Jordan]

Satanism is stupid label. They are more like extreme atheists. They believe in nature and not God or even a supernatural evil (satan).

I think they adhere to raw primordial instincts or something. There is no good or bad in nature. Or something like that.

[Chefelf]

Damn, I was just about to post this when I saw K1NGWARREN beat me to the punch. Thanks for the link, Jordan.

[WalrusOfPlastic]

Oh crap. When president W finds out about this he'll cut off all foreign relations with Britain and form a coalition to "eradicate the heathens".

[Vwing]

Satanism is stupid label. They are more like extreme atheists. They believe in nature and not God or even a supernatural evil (satan).

I think they adhere to raw primordial instincts or something. There is no good or bad in nature. Or something like that.

Are you sure Jordan? I mean this is a subject I know VERY little about, but I have known of a couple of satanists, and they seemed pretty much to worship, well, Satan. I think they just like Satan more than God or something. Anyone wanna help out on this one? *looks at Civ*

[Creaux]

In my expereince, Civ is right

[Jordan]

I'm pretty confident that they don't believe in supernatural events. They believe that it is possible to harenst power from coming in contact with your dark, primordial side.

[barend]

the atheeism thing is not true...

they belive in lycanthropy for fucks sake so the no supernatural thing is not so true...

the real fundimental difference is that satnic church goers believe in self worship... so they beieve in god... they just don't care for him... generally.

but once again... i'm not going to quote from the biography of anton lavey... it's too much work.. and it's somewhere in my flat, but i'm not sure exactly where...

[Helena]

I don't know anything about Satanism, but it seems fair enough to me. If you're going to have freedom of religion, you can't make exceptions just because you don't happen to like a particular religion. As long is the guy isn't actually conducting human sacrifices or anything...

[Dragonspawn]

Satanists suck, athiests rool!

[civilian_number_two]

Thanks for the compliments, those who left them. I frankly know very little about Satanism. I can never get past the home page of their official website. From what I gather, they DO believe in Satan, or a "Dark Force," and they like purple and pictures of themselves wearing robes and animal-head masks from some goofy British fertility ritual out of a bad 70s horror film (or of course from a good seventies horror film). These are the guys, by the way, who keep stores like this open.


They seem a load or pretentious poseurs who never got that punk was about rebellion, not conformity, or who took Goth too far and made a full-blown religion out of it.

That's official, anyway. Jordan is right that there are all sorts of libertarian groups out there that call themselves Satanists, and who distinguish themselves in many cases from Laveyans. While Laveyans seem to make no bones about opposing Christianity, some folks focus on "being in touch with nature." I have a garden that I keep pretty nice, and I like to walk my dog through the University Endowment Lands, so I may just give those fellows a call.

Jordan's claim that Satanists don't actually believe that Satan exists, or is any sort of deity, is backed up by common opinion, also seen here. The official site seems to say otherwise, but again it's hard for me to get past the Hell's Angels imagery and the hillarious picture of head-shaven Lavey holding what looks to be a knock-off of Bilbo's knife from the Hobbit !!! Incidentally, I'm really looking forward to Peter Jackson'sThe Hobbit, if it ever happens.

I do like the pictures of large-breasted women wearing (if anything) cheap Goth-inspired PVC and smearing their cleavage with fake blood. I like the endorsement of things they like, redefined as Satanist, like The official church's reviews of George Carlin books. But even all that can't help me past the idea that these are folks who took role-playing games too far. I mean God bless 'em: they found a way to get laid; they gave me an excuse to try out hyperlinks in my posts; and they don't draw nearly as much water as the other religions do (noone has yet declared a holy war in the name of Satan, so they have that).