What is the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the word "satanism"? Is it the band Rammstein? A group of black-clothed youths gathering at the cemetery at the dawn of light? Or maybe it's a witch, throwing animals into a pot to make a possession potion?
The 1980s Satanic Panic saw Christian fundamentalists push the idea that evil cults were systematically abusing children in rituals and committing widespread murder, and successfully convince the general public through sensational news coverage.
While religion can be a beautiful thing, those Christian groups typically misrepresented the Church's beliefs and practices in order to fabricate a real-world villain behind the conspiracy for the media. And we can still see leftovers from this time.
They're especially evident in a recent Reddit post where the user Dreammare56 asked others, "What's the stupidest thing [you've] ever seen a religious person call 'satanic'?"
From Coca-Cola to a microscope, here are some of the most ridiculous answers.
#21
I remember a lady saying she refused to eat mushrooms, they were satanic because they grew in the dark.
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145points
#22
Star Trek. Mostly, I think, because my racist uncle couldn't stomach a black woman and an asian dude being functional members of a spaceship crew.
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142points
#23
Unicorns. Their horns are the sign of satan. I wish I was making this up.
142points
#24
Wifi. Because they didn't understand how it could work without wires.
135points
#25
A microscope. An acquaintance of mine called a microscope a “gift from the devil” because it makes people question the divine plan.
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132points
#26
A toothache. "The devil is trying to enter my body." Was the quote. Initially i thought they were making a weird joke. They were serious.
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131points
#27
My very religious aunt once referred to Hooters as “satan's snack shop”.
Her husband was a frequent visitor and she found the receipts in his truck lol
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128points
#28
Back in the 70s it was a lot of stupid: bar codes. The little symbol on Proctor & Gamble products. Yoga and/or meditation. Lots of different music by different artists. My small town Christian private school had a particular teacher who was absolutely dying mad about his students' fondness for Michael Jackson, AC/DC, and other bands of the time.
The funniest one of all was dancing. The joke around my (conservative Christian) college in the 80s was that sex was outlawed because it could lead to dancing... for some bizarre reason the administration thought dancing was totally evil.
126points
#29
My mom called my art satanic because I drew dragons and wolves with horns when I was a kid.
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126points
#31
My mom was terrified I'd accidentally summon a demon playing yugioh.
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114points
#32
I wanted to learn to play the violin as a child but was told I couldn’t because it was the devil’s instrument.
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112points
#33
“Masters of the Universe”. It was back in the 80’s. My crazy, over the top, religious aunt said ,” it’s satanic! There is only ONE master of the universe and it’s god!!!” 6 yo me rolled my eyes so hard, I’m sure you could hear the noise it made.
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110points
#35
My dad wouldn't let me watch anything that had magic or monsters because he thought it would let demons into the house. This included power rangers, Ben 10, H20 just add water, harry potter, scooby doo and more.
The most ridiculous one was not letting me watch Jessie on Disney channel. This had no magic or monsters but he thought that the pet lizard one of the characters had represented the snake that deceived Eve into eating the apple.
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103points
#36
F**king Hello Kitty. Some religious f**ktards from my sister-in-law's family, took away all the Hello Kitty toys from my niece and burnt them because... sigh... there is a demon in the sumerian mythology who, just like the famous cartoon cat, has no mouth, so Hello Kitty is obviously daemonic.
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102points
#37
Oh man.
A paperback copy of Frankenstein's monster with an illustration of the monster on the front.
The experience of feeling desire for black men.
Pokémon.
Yoga.
Source: grew up in a fundamentalist Christian community rampant with ignorance and bigotry of all kinds.
102points
#38
i was once wearing my hat backwards and got called a devil worshipper.
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100points
#39
My wife's mother pulled her out of the carebears movie when she was a kid because the bears were casting satanic spells out of their stomachs. My wife still holds a grudge.
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94points
#40
I saw a sign yesterday that called fat people who eat excessively, satanic.
The guy holding the sign was at least 100lbs heavier than I am, and I'm 230lbs. Also, the sign didn't make any sense to begin with...
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93points
