Your thoughts on Satanism and the petition for a Satanic statue.

[Esquilax]

Esq, as others have said here, that statue was meant to be provocative/satirical. If they had chosen some other random creature to be their symbol, it wouldn't be offensive, which is why they chose what they did.

Sure, others can say that all they want. They may even be right. But unless they're the actual Satanists involved here then their words cannot be taken as proper representation of the motives of the group. They actually explained what their motives were, and yes, they were attempting to make a point, but that doesn't make your argument here any less absurd.

What's happening here is that your religion stole iconography, names, and concepts from other religions and used them as the basis for the devil figures in christianity, in an attempt to quite literally demonize the figures they cribbed from. Centuries later, Eliphas Levi creates an image supposed to represent a Crusade-era pagan idol, calls it the Sabbatic Goat, and it becomes Baphomet. The name, imagery, and mythology surrounding the creature is drawn from numerous sources, none of which are specifically christian, but somewhere along the line you and christians like you get this idea in your head that goat-headed male figures belong to your religion and so, in defiance of all history, decide that Baphomet can't be his own thing, hes gotta be your specific devil and anybody who uses the iconography is thinking specifically about your religion. Because Satanism isn't a real thing with its own history and culture, right? It's just a fake thing, something to get at your religion, and has no content of its own. How reductive.

This is exactly the problem, and it's exactly the reason why they want this statue up. So many christians have this overly simplistic conception of other religions and cultures, like christianity is the only legitimate one and all the others are just faking to defy you. You just assumed that the figure up there had to be your devil, there was no room in your head for the idea that another mythos might have a goat-horned figure in it; in the space of a few sentences you dismissed centuries of culture and stories and people because it seemed impossible to you that people might just have their own traditions that don't ultimately connect back to yours. You're so used to christianity being the ground state of being that the idea that a figure that kind of looks like one from your religion might belong to someone else's is outlandish to you.

So yeah, you thought it was Satan, and I think it's reasonable to assume that a lot of other christians will do that too. But it's not the Satanist's fault that you're ill-informed, nor is it their job to kowtow to your misconceptions. Christianity is not the assumption around which all other conversations must be structured, they don't need to develop a whole new set of iconography because, through no fault of their own, something they already had kinda reminds you of something you don't like. Do you understand how completely self-centered that is? They've gotta alter their icon of choice because it raises uncomfortable parallels to you? Doesn't matter what it actually means, just that it reminds you of something and is therefore offensive?

Baphomet, variously, symbolizes wisdom, peace, and the drive to create. It's actually an extremely fitting symbol even for satirical Satanists trying to make a point, and it looks pretty cool to boot. Yes, I suspect the associations it raises are part of the appeal, but it's unnecessarily reductive to boil it down to just those, especially when it would be just as easy to actually put a statue of Satan there. It's not like that could have been forbidden, but instead of doing that they chose another figure with meanings of its own that fit better with their mission statement and embody something positive just generally.

You're missing the point: what Baphomet does there isn't to make you think of Satan, it's to demonstrate just how willing you christians are to misunderstand. All that dominance has gone to your head in ways you can't even detect.