For my fieldwork I chose a group of Satanists in a book club Facebook chat, I don’t know why I chose that group, but I’ve always been fascinated with the idea of Satanism because they don’t worship Satan rather they fight for secularism. Satanists get a bad name in the media, being seen as witches who practice magic, and yes this was the case before 2013, but they are rebranding themselves as something different. Alas, due to this initial introduction they are still seen as bad and evil because of their old practices in the dark arts, and even things such as Tarot Cards being seen as an introduction into Satanism to my Hispanic family. This new age of Satanism though is reintroducing new ideas, and even the books which are spoken about in the Facebook chat are ridiculed if they mention magic in any way since that isn’t what the group supports anymore. I have noticed many privileges in joining this chat, when I first saw the books they were speaking about I was immediately drawn to go to Barnes and Noble to buy a book, but when I went none of those books were there. Instead, shelves lined with the bible covered the religion section of the store, this is where I noticed my first privilege. While I am an atheist myself, I come from a catholic family so if I wanted to know what my family believes in and what they stand for I can simply go to the religion section, pick up one of the myriads of bibles (containing the same words with different shells; hardcover or paperback or even leather). Another thing I can do is simply say I’m an atheist, and people won’t look at me funny but when I mentioned Satanism to my friends they all wished me luck, and were surprised when I said that the group was actually full of nice people. I don’t really have any fixed positions, I’m a pretty neutral go with the flow kind of person, I like to look at both sides before making a decision so I doubt that my views will conflict with their; especially since I share some viewpoints with the group (i.e reproductive rights, atheism/non-theism). For life history and personal experience, I will be talking about how I went to church, and I live by a church, but there aren’t really many churches for Satanists to come gather as a group to discuss their opinions. This all isn’t to say that this group is struggling, they have tax-exemption from the government like all other Christian Churches so they still continue to thrive in that area.

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