Satanic/occult crime claims questioned

New York, NY - October 13, 2006 — Every Halloween in recent years, there have been TV appearances by people who are presented as experts on "occult crime" and "ritual violence," and who have given police-training seminars. But there are many scholars, journalists, and law enforcement personnel who reject many of the claims of these seminar presenters, and who believe that many probably-innocent people have been sent to prison for crimes that never even happened.

The website "Against Satanic Panics" (http://againstsatanicpanics.com), launched in 2006, aims to be a resource for scholars, journalists, and civil liberties acrivists on the "Satanic Ritual Abuse" scare of the 1980's and early 1990's and its mini-resurgence these past several years. It contains many links to news stories plus skeptical writings by journalists, law enforcement analysts, psychologists, and sociologists.

The "Against Satanic Panics" website is maintained by Diane Vera, who is also the organizer of a local Meetup group for law-abiding Satanists in New York City. She has also maintained a website about theistic Satanism (now at theisticsatanism.com, formerly on Angelfire) since 2002. She has been a Satanist since 1991.

The main page of the "Against Satanic Panics" website states, about the 1980-1995 scare, "The falsely accused weren't just law-abiding Satanists, nor were they just people of religions (e.g. Pagan Witchcraft) or other subcultures (e.g. goths) that have been popularly confused with Satanism. The vast majority of the falsely accused were ordinary mainstream folks."

In today's mini-resurgence of the scare, Diane Vera says that the probably-falsely accused include some Catholic priests, "as part of an overreaction against the way they previously were unfairly protected against charges of child sexual abuse."

How, in the opinion of skeptical observers, did so many false criminal accusations occur? A page about "The 'Satanic Ritual Abuse' scare of the 1980's and early 1990's" contains links to many writings by skeptics who say that many alleged child victims were questioned by child-protection social workers using very dubious means, such as asking them lots of leading questions and giving them "anatomically correct dolls" to play with. In addition, it was then common among psychotherapists to attempt to recover a client's repressed memories using methods which, the skeptics say, are more likely to implant false memories. For these reasons, many 1980's child sex abuse convictions have since been overturned, although many other people, convicted on the same highly-contested grounds, are still in prison.

For more information, visit http://againstsatanicpanics.com .

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