From: tangyapple	Date: December 24th, 2005 08:36 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I'm going to read this more fully when I have time. :)

Meanwhile, have you seen this site? I haven't read *everything* in it, but it looks interesting.

	From: vexen	Date: December 25th, 2005 11:46 am (UTC)		(Link)

It looks like a good freethought/Humanistic style web portal; it's like an American-centric version of the British-centric British Humanist Association and other reason-based publications.

I don't know if you'd get much from my waffle, it's more of a sermon than anything new! Just a new take on some well-known (for Satanists) concepts!

	From: tangyapple	Date: December 27th, 2005 02:46 am (UTC)		(Link)

Well, I'm going to organize my time better next year so I can do a little more reading, but only on the things that truly interest me... your links included!

From: siniquitous	Date: December 26th, 2005 01:28 pm (UTC)		(Link)
Honest Satan

Hi ya Vexen long time no speak, 'Happy' [or 'Unhappy' LOL] Longest Night to you

I like this essay of yours very much, but at the same time something feels very wrong as if it was leading to a glorious conclusion but missed the mark. You know, that frustration one feels when one mixes the recipie according to the book but the final outcome doesnt turn out as the picture, and you cant understand why, but when you look closer one finds that you didnt let it stand long enough, or the yeast was too old, or you added just a bit too much fat because there was'nt enough butter.

Perhaps the 'pillars of goodness' could read differently, such as Fangs, Forebearance, Fucking and Affection. Life may be cruel but it is also caring, and it is the interaction of both these two forces, that has built the alter upon which we sit, and it is equaly our appreciation of 'love' that refines our reaction to 'hate'[and vice versa], and the adversity we endure in this world. It is through this understanding that we are enabled so perfectly, just as it can also destabalise us so grossely. You state that "A sombre altar to truth would include symbols of blood, struggle, love and violence", and Ive heard many a wican style neo-pagan state the same thing, but then focus almost entirely on love, just as your own essay seems to focus on pain and carnage. I would like to see this balance throughout.

Neither pain came before pleasure, nor hate before love, nor foolishenss before intelligence, nor sorrow before happiness. Our noblest selves arise not only from bloodshed and violence, but also from compassion and love, one without the other would be a universe in chaos indeed, and there would be no food chain, no nobility, in fact there would be no alter to sit upon, and no humanity to sit upon it. It is not only upon carnage that we sit, but we also sit upon those principles that preserve life. Yet ultimately the truth is, both are the same, and it all leads to dis-ease, dissatisfaction, frustration and discontent, however much we try to manipulate existence for our own pleasures, be it through bloodshed or peace.

Satan for me, is hir that transcends this duality, and constantly reminds us of our limitations, untill at long last we choose to step off this cyclical round that is our endless craving and need to validate our empty existence, and eventualy discover hir is at our very core simply 'being', without qualification, without musts or must nots, without good or bad, in a 'place' that is unconditioned, without compulsion for one thing or the other, free to indulge or not as one sees fit. Satan is very honest, but I must admit I think much of Satanism is not natural enough.

Sa Ta Na Ma
Sin

PS - You quote Donna Black in your article, is she not also one of the moderators on the Satanism UK Forum. I got myself thrown off that site [with no warning or discussion] about 18mths ago for pointing out dear Old Anton plagerised other writers, to write the Satanic Bible. To be honest I was realy suprised that Satanists would censor another member for making such an innocuous, harmless and well known statement, or even censoring at all - but then for all their talk of freedom and honesty, fangs and flesh, many Satanists it seems, are as much a product of their own insecurities and compulsions, as those they criticise, LOL, again proof positive of a rather less than natural process happening within modern Satanism today.

	From: vexen	Date: January 5th, 2006 03:49 pm (UTC)		(Link)
	Re: Honest Satan

Heya Siniquitous, you're right it has been a long time!

Glad to see you're still around.

I'm not quite sure what you're saying about compassion & love, but it sounds like I agree with it anyway.

From: (Anonymous)	Date: January 11th, 2006 09:05 pm (UTC)		(Link)
Re: Honest Satan

I like what you say here.
This is pretty much the way I see it. I also think that everything exists, therefore, how can it be unnntaural. There is personal preferance that which a person does not prefer;but whatever exists in the cosmos[be it material or immaterial, thought/idea,feeling,word,deed,action/reaction, all things} all opposites exist and therefore are all natural. I think both Satanists/Luciferians and other LHP'ers as well as Neopagana and other RHP-ers would all do well to admit these facts and find balance and moderation, plus LHP'ers/Satanists/Luciferians in my personal opinion need to stop acting as if charity and kindness are bad things or unnatural things, made up things{fuck man, all emotions are part of uor brains, they are all equally valid}, neopagans need to stop focusing on only love and pretty flowery thigns too. The problem I see is that on both sides of the fence peopple are pretending that their views are more natural, and yet-both oppsotes exist in nature in one form or another-hence-they are all natural.It's all a matter of preferance. Many LHPers seem to think that we need to basically revert to what we were before we evolve dinto humans{this is not to make other animal species less or worse than us, just at different evolutionary stages}, Humans are humans, they are not other levels of animals, we should be the balanced and emerging into reason and compassion mixed w/a few animal insticts that we are. This isn't about the law of the jungle or social darwinism, because we are human animalsm we have a different lvel of reaosning capiacity{though many of us choose to ignore this reasoning capiacity, I aim this accusation at both RHP-ers and LHP-ers}, humans are a new lvel of sentience and reasoning power animals,rather than try to force ourselves to evolve into pure love and pure flowery crap and rather than trying to force ourselves to revert to what our pre-historic ancestors were w/social darwinism, we should find and be the balance, for that is what stage of natural evolution we are at.]
Love/hate, kindess and mercy/justice and vengeance,anger/joy,choas/order,pride and humbleness,charitable impulses and selfish impulses, balance all the opposites, be human and be at the stage of evolution that our specie sis currently at, just "be".
I think most Satanists/Luciferian/LHP'ers as wellas most Right Hand Pathers don't get this common sense balance and hence they accuse each other of hypocrisy, and yet both are equally hypocritical.
Reason is abandoned for stupidity by both sides. Balance my friends, balance is what the human race is about. We can choose to want to destroy ourselves and other species or we can choose to better ourselves as sovereign individuals and as a species and make existence better for ourselves and the other animal species we have a duty to protect since we need somany resources to keep goin in our current state of evolution.

Plus I also agree w/you about the hypocrisy of many modern Satanists whenit comes to Laveys and the CoS's hypocrisies beeing pointed out. I think that alot of Satanists have more allegiance to Lavey and the CoS then to themselves and the principles of what the four crown princes represent.

In Reason{Lucifer by name}:
Bill Baker

	From: hiddenpaw	Date: January 5th, 2006 03:04 pm (UTC)		(Link)

A great long peice about humans deluding themselves and you go deluding yourself that we're at the top of the food chain.

	From: vexen	Date: January 5th, 2006 03:46 pm (UTC)		(Link)

We hunt all species, and are hunted by none except for opportunist kills, we *are* the top of the food chain. And by a very long way; there is no amount of pack-hunting by animals that even comes close to turning a human group into prey. We are the top of food chain: We eat animals, that eat fish, that eat bacteria, etc.

At each level of the food chain, the digestive system gets more complicated at the energy gain from eating the next level down goes down: We are at the top biologically, philsophically, sociologically, in all the areas of strength, intelligence, ability and teamwork.

What species are you saying is above us in the food chain?


Secondly,

Even if we were *not* the top of the food chain, then I would not be "deluding myself" in saying so, because it says so in the best biology books from GCSE to Degree-level; there is serious and voluminous scientific data all providing evidence that we are at the top of the food chain: It is far from "delusion" even if we discovered that we weren't at the top, it is a fact backed up by much evidence.

	From: hiddenpaw	Date: January 5th, 2006 04:44 pm (UTC)		(Link)

We get predated on by viruses, parasites and thoes bacteria things you were saying were at the bottom of the food chain some of which we are begining to find we have seemingly little or no defence against.

So much for school books. I hope you weren't assuming that human arrogance stops at GCSE level.

	From: vexen	Date: January 5th, 2006 05:18 pm (UTC)		(Link)

All animals suffer from viruses and bacteria; they are the bottom level of the food chain by definition: They are "primary" sources of life which are absorbed/eaten by the next layer up on the food chain; a virus does not eat an animal.

	From: hiddenpaw	Date: January 5th, 2006 06:07 pm (UTC)		(Link)

In what sense do Bacteria, Viruses and parasites not eat animals?

They may not eat the whole of an animal, but then again neither do we.

Some may need to work in groups to have detrimental effect on thier pray, but then again there are many pack based preditors.

Some may feed without killing. Your a goth so I'm sure you can think of a preditor that does that.

Is the food chain a chain, a circle or even some sort of complex grid? It has to be said that which ever we are in no clear cut way at the top.

	From: vexen	Date: January 5th, 2006 06:26 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Bacteria & viruses act on a cellular level, they don't hunt, they're the closest thing to brownian motion a living cell can get.



The food chain is a ladder, not a circle. It isn't simple; but it is more a ladder than anything else.

Firstly, the food chain is about the energy gained from sunlight, moving it's way up the ladder:

In short:

Primary: Organisms that survive on the sun & water i.e., plankton
Secondary: Organisms that eat plankton
Tertiary: Organisms that eat single-cell species

etc...

Animals are *way* up the top of the food chain, a summary you'll see frequently is:

Insects -> Fish & Rodents -> Animal Scavengers -> Animal Hunters

We are the topmost animal hunter; no other animal species hunts us effectively.


In another sense, it's about the /efficiency/ of consumption. Bacteria cannot eat highly processed sugars or proteins; hence, they are bottom (almost) on the ladder. Things that eat bacteria have simple stomachs (even single-cell stomachs), but with each step "up" the ladder, the efficiency of sun-energy distribution goes down.

If 10 000 plankton feed a small water-bourne insect, then:
1000 small water insects feed a fish in a year,
and, 100 fish feed a predator,

then you can imagine that the "predator" is in effect eating 1 000 000 000 plankton a year; all that sun-energy distribution gets more concentrated and less efficient as it travels up the food chain. In that sense also, we're on the very top, our diet is the most inefficient & we consume the highest plankton-mass of food per period than any other animal.

Digestive Systems: We can process 99% of all natural proteins and sugars, etc. When we digest something, we break it down (proteins into amino acides, fats into smaller fats, sugars into simpler sugars). With each level of the food chain, the proteins, sugars and fats get more complicated. The lower a species is on the food chain, the less complex chemicals it can consume - this ties in with sun-absorption; each step of deconstruction-reconstruction reduces the overall efficiency.

	From: hiddenpaw	Date: January 5th, 2006 07:56 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I suppose it is hard to claim that bacteria hunt, but do cows hunt grass?

Interesting It strikes me that the bacteria at the top of the chain are different to the bacteria at the bottom of the chain. If you want to define being in efficient as being the deffinition of being at the top remeber that bacteria, parracites and viruses get their sustainance from us but leave alot of us behind.

Of course it the real twist is that all this food you say comes from the sun (Certainly I would not argue with that for the most part) Eventualy the sun will consume this world and all on it as fuel. (Unless we get out of the way first)

	From: vexen	Date: January 5th, 2006 09:37 pm (UTC)		(Link)

The "life cycle" is what you're partially referring to, whereby all living matter is recycled into the Earth (Pagans love it), and fed on by the lowest creatures, and eventually sustaining us once again. The life cycle is a complex web & a circle, as you mentioned before. The life cycle is ultimately fuelled by the sun, like the food chain and much of the weather (some wheather and some life is fuelled from geonuclear heat).

	From: hiddenpaw	Date: January 5th, 2006 11:22 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Do not forget that You don't have to be dead and in the ground for bacteria to feed/predate off you. Paracites of course specialise in feeding off living beings. and if vultures and other scavengers are up the food chain from the animals that they eat then there is not real difference in the food chain sense between them and bacteria who feed off dead things.

	From: vexen	Date: January 6th, 2006 07:07 am (UTC)		(Link)

The further along the food chain you go, the less numbers of species there are. Massive quantities of biomass support fewer insects & animals, that support fewer large animals/animal predators, etc.

Viruses (non-cellular) & bacteria (single cellular) exist in massive quantity, with very very simple digestive systems, so are at the bottom of the food chain.

	From: hiddenpaw	Date: January 6th, 2006 10:53 am (UTC)		(Link)

Surely the food chain is not about simplicity, it's about what eats what. let's face it, a cow's digestive system is far more complex than a lions.

Any way, where are the vultures? They eat Lions. Paracites eat Lions without the lion even being dead.

I would suggest people have been saying there are fewer speciece towards the top because that's the way it looks until you start to concider the little creatures to small to be obvious that many people seem to be missing.

People seem to like stopping on the the food chain with us at the top as apparently us humans are cooler than any other species therfore any other creature that feeds on us must be cheeting.

	From: vexen	Date: January 6th, 2006 01:22 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Cows are not above lions on the food chain, lions are above cows.

It's part of the /definition/ of the food chain that each step you go up, the level below has more biomass. That each level requires more biomass below it is a fundamental part of the economy of the food chain; for that reason you can't put parasites at the top just because they attack cells of larger creatures; the food chain isn't about cell-by-cell; that's the "food web" and the cycle of life.

Humans are at the top of the food chain. There is no other species that consumes as much as we do in terms of biomass, or energy.

I'm only telling you what the food chain is; you don't have to like it but it's pointless trying to tell me it's something else: I know what the food chain is.

I don't care what peoples' reasons are for likeing or not liking the food chain. It still is an index of biomass dependance/digestive complexity/hunting & teamwork skills, etc; at the end of the day it would require much much more than a parasite or virus to go above predatory animals or human beings.

Are you seriously suggesting that cows are above lions on the food chain?