What's up with the Satanic Panic, in a nutshell.
Around the 1970's, conservative Evangelicals began weaponizing a number of conspiracy theories against anyone who wasn't a conservative Evangelical. These conspiracy theories were essentially repackaged witch hysteria (IE, the conspiracies pushed by early modern witch hunters) and antisemitism (especially blood libel).
The core conspiracy theory was that a global satanic cult was working behind the scenes to manipulate politics and lead people away from Jesus. The exact practices of the cult depended on who you asked, but common allegations were practicing human sacrifice (including plenty of child sacrifice), drinking human blood, engaging in sex slavery, producing CSE and snuff films, doing drugs, and having orgies.
Some examples of claims made by people who claimed to be ex-members/survivors include:
- Neopaganism was created by the global satanic cult, and Aleister Crowley was their main agent in this.
- All neopaganism and modern witchcraft is a slippery slope to human sacrifice and "hardcore satanism."
- All media that depicts magic or the supernatural in any way is part of the satanic agenda. Yes, literally all of it. Yes, even that.
- Homosexuality is part of the global satanic agenda.
- Rock and heavy metal music are part of the global satanic agenda.
- Fluoride, artificial sweeteners, and various food additives are actually mind control drugs.
- Electromagnetic waves are used to control people's thoughts.
- Marxism was created by the global satanic agenda.
If you know anything about QAnon conspiracy theories, you might notice that some of these look awfully familiar. This is because QAnon was another manifestation of Satanic Panic. They updated "electromagnetic waves" to 5G, and largely replaced homosexuality with transgender, but it's the same thing.
The conspiracy theory about cultists creating mind controlled slaves by inducing dissociative identity disorder through torture (all that Project Monarch stuff) is purely a product of the Satanic Panic. People's supposed "memories" of this abuse were generally produced via recovered memory therapy, which is now known to be more effective at implanting memories rather than recovering them. No serious investigations ever produced any evidence of the supposedly widespread and incredibly elaborate torture of tens of thousands of children.
Now, there have been actual isolated cases of what might be considered satanic ritual abuse. But they do not constitute evidence of a global satanic conspiracy. Rather, they constitute evidence that the perpetrators were inspired by the conspiracy theory.
Additionally, they had a very pseudoscientific view of DID, and the horrible practices allegedly used to induce it and create mind controlled alters were pure pseudoscience, as were the alleged symptoms that someone might be a victim of satanic ritual abuse and just didn't remember it. Everything from autism to having conflicted feelings about your abuser to liking BDSM could be construed as a sign that you had been ritually abused. With a bunch of therapists fully convinced that thousands of people had been ritually abused and armed with hypnotic techniques that allowed them to implant memories of abuse, you can see where things could turn messy in a hurry.
Those who claimed to be former satanists/SRA victims were extremely clear in their assertions that this global satanic conspiracy really did exist, and that the only way to escape and stay safe from it was to accept Jesus. Tales of demonic attacks that could only be stopped by the power of Jesus were common, as were other claims of grandiose supernatural power.
In short, the Satanic Panic was - and still is - a means of demonizing anyone who isn't a fundagelical Christofascist, and scaring anyone who already is, into remaining such. Many of the conspiracy theories have made their way into supposedly progressive circles, so you'll occasionally come across the Project Monarch stuff in DID communities, or see pro-LGBTQ people subscribing to conspiracy theories about the wealthy elite drinking blood or adrenochrome.
But make no mistake, there is no "grain of truth" these allegations of a global satanic conspiracy. There was no "time before all of this was corrupted by evil agendas." It was all created by people with with hateful agendas, and continues to be perpetuated by people with hateful agendas. And that's all, folks.
