Theistic Satanism: Home > Politics > Nazi > Debates with neo-Nazi Satanists



My debates with neo-Nazi Satanists:
How I've opposed neo-Nazism in my online forums

by Diane Vera



Copyright © 2006 Diane Vera. All rights reserved.



Neo-Nazis don't participate in my Theistic Satanism Yahoo groups very often, at least not openly. I can recall only three or four occasions on which a neo-Nazi did openly participate in my Theistic-Satanism-ethics-and-politics forum for a while. Two young men ended up leaving neo-Nazism, although not immediately.

When dealing with neo-Nazis in my Theistic-Satanism-ethics-and-politics forum, one thing I've always done has been to get very strict about enforcing my forums' rules against personal insults. This meant both (1) that the neo-Nazi was not allowed to post any crude racial slurs and (2) that anyone responding to the neo-Nazi was not allowed to resort to personal insults or ad hominem arguments such as calling neo-Nazis "trailer trash." This rule forced everyone to think and to post real arguments rather than just off-the-cuff visceral reactions.

That no one was allowed to insult the neo-Nazis personally was, in itself, something the neo-Nazis just weren't used to at all, and it probably threw them off-balance. They're used to people just insulting them and not paying any attention to their ideology.

In my debates with three neo-Nazi Satanists in 2003 to 2005, I made the following arguments, among others:

  1. I pointed out the inherently conformist and anti-individualist nature of neo-Nazism and how that's bad for Satanists. (See Satanism and Nazism: Some reasons why they aren't compatible and A relevant Mein Kampf quote.)

  2. I struck at what I see as one of the core ideas of anti-Jew racist ideology, namely the allegation that Jews themselves are the most racist and nationalistic people on Earth, and hence that everyone else too needs to be as racist and nationalistic as they are, or else we'll all get slaughtered or enslaved by the Jews. The simplest counterargument is to point to the existence of lots of anti-Zionist Jews, both on the Left and among the ultra-Orthodox who believe that the state of Israel is illegitimate because it was founded by someone other than the Messiah.

    I also pointed out that the vast majority of Zionists aren't Jews but Christians who believe in Dispensationalist theology  -  which isn't exactly pro-Jewish in other ways, because it also encourages Christians to try to convert Jews. So, the U.S. government's pro-Israel policies do not constitute proof that Jews are in total control of the U.S. government (even though Jews, as a group, are indeed influential out of proportion to their numbers).

  3. I pointed out that liberal Jewish activists have been among the staunchest defenders of religious freedom, at least in thie U.S.A., benefitting all religious minorities including Satanists.

These are the kinds of arguments that I figured would be most likely to get through to a Satanist who was leaning toward neo-Nazi beliefs.

No neo-Nazi has ever given me a good counterargument. The neo-Nazis in my forums were not immediately convinced by my arguments either. However, two of them did leave neo-Nazism eventually. What finally got them both to leave neo-Nazism was that they happened to become friends with some Jews. I like to think I may have helped open their minds to the point where they would even consider becoming friends with some Jews.



Back to: