Fox 2 Detroit's pixelated image of a dead goat
Last night, Detroit’s local Fox News affiliate
shamelessly ran a report that engaged in speculative conspiracist fear-mongering, the likes of which have served to precipitate moral panics in our not-too-distant -- yet, apparently, largely forgotten -- past. The report claims that the body of baby goat was found, gutted and charred, outside a building on Detroit’s East Side. According to the report: “There is a rope around the goat's neck and two white chalk circles around the body, leading them to believe someone tried to sacrifice the goat in a possible satanic ritual.”
Knowing only that the animal is dead (it is not confirmed that the gutting and burning were not post-mortem), the report asserts that the goat “appears to have been sacrificed.” Why Satanism is believed to be involved is entirely unclear. The assertion appears to be based completely on speculative statements made by the locals who spotted the body, conveniently providing all the “expertise” Fox 2 Detroit needed to run the headline, “Baby goat found gutted, burned in suspected satanic sacrifice.”
With the paucity of details in this poorly-hacked, under-investigated report, it is difficult to offer a theory of what may have actually happened -- a fact Fox 2 Detroit should certainly have had the professionalism to realize before spreading potential panic -- but to assert Satanism as the culprit is journalistically irresponsible in the extreme.
False reports of Satanic cult crimes -- rampant during a modern witch-hunt spanning, roughly, through the 1980s to mid-nineties -- ruined countless lives as Conspiracy Theory and hysterical suspicion reached the hallowed halls of our secular court houses in an episode now referred to by sociologists as “the Satanic Panic.” Thoroughly debunked, this embarrassing throwback to medieval social purges nonetheless still provides the “factual” background for what most people think they know about Satanism. To be sure, there are plenty of self-proclaimed experts in “Satanic crime” to this day, though rational people (and journalists) should be made aware that their “evidence” has never held up to scrutiny. The evidence for Satanic crimes almost universally matches, in method and quality alike, the support of claims regarding abduction by extraterrestrial beings: “recovered memories”, unverifiable anecdotes, retrospective surveys collected from believers, and debunked claims unacknowledged as such. It is difficult to say whether it’s better or worse that Fox 2 Detroit failed to even reach out to one of these discredited frauds before airing a suspicion of Satanic criminal cult activity.
There is, it turns out, no known, recognized Satanic doctrine that prescribes animal sacrifice, though some ignorant paranoiacs will mindlessly lump Santeria, Voodoo, or another obscure practices into a category of “Satanism,” in an effort to establish whatever credibility they can toward their claims of sanguinary Satanic behavior. Actual self-identified Satanists, from Anton LaVey to the membership of The Satanic Temple (for which I act as spokesperson), specifically condemn animal cruelty in no uncertain terms.
Before we turn our suspicions toward little-known misunderstood and obscure religious practices, let’s take a look at what the Bible says on the topic of religious sacrifice:
Leviticus 4:23
and the sin he has committed becomes known, he must bring as his offering a male goat without defect.
Leviticus 23:18
Present with this bread seven male lambs, each a year old and without defect, one young bull and two rams. They will be a burnt offering to the LORD, together with their grain offerings and drink offerings--a food offering, an aroma pleasing to the LORD.
Leviticus 23:20
The priest is to wave the two lambs before the LORD as a wave offering, together with the bread of the firstfruits. They are a sacred offering to the LORD for the priest.
Numbers 28:30
Include one male goat to make atonement for you.
These Old Testament passages eerily correlate to the alleged crime cited by Fox 2 Detroit, yet I doubt they would have headlined suspicions of a rogue Jewish cult on the prowl, regardless of whether or not the locals had aired such fears themselves. Nor should they, of course, as to do so could give impetus to irrational and misguided retributive action taken out, all too often, on the innocent and entirely uninvolved.
The fact is, nobody yet knows why this goat’s body was found in the condition it was in at the location where it was apparently dumped. We do know, however, that irresponsible reporting, like that displayed by Fox 2 Detroit, has caused regrettable and destructive delusion-based uproars in the recent past.
This isn’t the first time an animal corpse has stirred the fearful imaginations of those whose exposure to urban legends remains uncorrected. This past February, a reporter in Oklahoma reached out to me about a series of alleged “cattle mutilations” that local residents determined were indicative of Satanic cult activity. Claiming that “officials” had ruled out natural causes of death, I wrote back, via email:
You show me "unusual cattle deaths" and I'm sure I can show you an irresponsible panic-monger who has no concept of the natural decay process of animal corpses. Oddly enough, cattle mutilations have traditionally also been reported to be a common element of extraterrestrial activity, and is sometimes linked to UFO reports. Neither the UFO claim, nor the Satanic cult cattle mutilation claims should be taken seriously by reasonable people. There were spates of cattle mutilation reports that took place during the 70s and 80s that were alternatively "explained" by extraterrestrial activity or Satanic cults, but investigation yielded mundane explanations. The missing organs are usually easily explained -- by any forensic analyst familiar with the decay process of animal corpses -- as the result of disease, buzzards, or insect-feeding. Bloating of the body often yields splits in the skin that are mistaken for incisions. Maggots and blow-flies clean out the soft tissues, which can be mistaken for organs being taken.
Is there any real evidence that Satanists could be involved in the death of these animals, other than the fact that they are dead? I know of no Satanic doctrine that would advocate for the murder of animals, other than possibly for self-defense, or food -- and even then it should be carried out in the most humane manner possible. In fact, the self-identified Satanist demographic is, I find, inordinately populated with firm believers in animal rights. Anybody who murders animals for some belief in satiating some sanguinary supernatural being is not a "Satanist", but a superstitious and psychopathic idiot. I personally feel that animal abuse should be punished far more severely than it is today. This is not despite my adherence to a Satanic philosophy, but a very part of it.
Unprepared to give up so easily on such a salacious story, the reporter persisted in claiming that natural death had been ruled out, though she continued to describe the state of the corpses in exactly the condition I had explained to be natural decomposition. Finally, she attempted to dismiss my analysis on the grounds that the farmer who owned the cattle insisted that the cattle had been rendered in this state overnight, not allowing for that level of natural decomposition. Suspecting that the farmer was merely desperate to bolster a claim that he was now quite invested in, I offered a $1000 challenge. If we -- the reporter’s venue and myself -- could both agree to a trained third-party forensic analyst to inspect the animal bodies, I would pay both the analyst fee and a $1000 prize if the puzzling “incisions” and missing organs turned out to be the result of something other than decomposition.
The reporter never responded to my offer, and the story never ran. Of course, as Fox 2 Detroit seems to have failed to have reached out to any reasonable, responsible expert -- either in actual modern Satanism or forensic analysis -- they ran their story unhindered by good sense, circumspection, or correction.
If you are as disgusted as I by Fox 2 Detroit’s irresponsible, potentially harmful reporting, please let them know at wjbkwebteam@foxtv.com
Be sure to include the link to their story in the text of your email: http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/...