Someone who identifies as being involved with the Church of Satan asked me in a private discussion forum:
“Is it normal for [Setians] to have a hard time moving on from Satanism? They’re free and clear, why bother addressing Satanism at all?”
One of the running themes in Foundation is a process of cultural collapse while a small group of people are attempting to extract what information about their civilization is essential for survival after the collapse. It becomes a significant test of assumptions, requiring much redaction and realization about what matters and what was “additive” from individuals, cultural practice, etc.
I’m one of those types that tend to look at the entire genealogy of the ideas that have shaped me while evaluating the things that were personal to the thinker, the things that matter, the ethical implications, etc. It’s mostly a personality quirk of being someone with fast recall and an encyclopedic-style memory. If I have to live with all of this stuff in my head, I’m prone to evaluating it before transmitting it.
I am more of a “transcend and include” type when looking at developments. Excluding the influences of the past that shaped ideas that have shaped me seems dishonest. At the same time, I don’t expect someone to have worked with ideas from any thinker to the depth or manner that I may have personally, so I tend to look for the things that may matter and extract them. That’s probably an academic discipline bias. My background is in anthropology, particularly human origins, and passing on the essential discipline insights without forcing someone to know 45 citations is a skill that needs to be honed.
LaVey is by no means the only person whose work I’ve treated in that fashion. I’m fairly well versed in Crowley’s material, most post-Crowley Thelemic movements, Chaos Magic, and some stuff too niche to mention. When I do this with LaVey, it tends to raise more hackles for better and worse.
As far as Setians and the 1966-1975 Church of Satan period, those are our roots. Past that, not so much. Individual Setians are on their own in determining what, if anything, is of value from LaVey, the early Church, etc. Most Setians I’ve known for over 25 years had a largely ambivalent attitude. Their interest in being Setians was, in many cases, despite our roots in the Church of Satan, not because of them. In that sense, it is much less concerned that Setians can’t move on from LaVey than they’ve simply ignored him.
Setemheb 