'Nuff said? | Forum

This is crucial because the society, and not only in some authoritarian shitholes, can punish the people who refuse to conform. People you value can reject you if you happen to act independent. You can lose a position and privileges if you disobey the rules you disagree with. It doesn't have to happen but it can. If it did happen, what would be your choice and how that corresponds to Satanism?

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Is there ever really a point where the Satanist "needs god most"? I say they are too busy walking alone to really have use for such ideas. 

Anna, my best (really my only) answer would be this: If conformity isn't a chain for me, then there's nothing for me to break. I would just need to be sure I'm not lying to myself.

CC, as you imply, the purest form of Deism (God created the universe then left it to its own devices) is compatible with Geraldo's formulation. I, for my part, would go a step further and acknowledge that a Deist could certainly be a Satanist. For all practical purposes, atheism and the purest form of Deism are indistinguishable.

You know... I meant the conformity that IS a chain but is the price for fulfilling your desire. I mean some difficult situation when you have to choose between realizing your goals and staying truthful to your own standards and values.

Some time ago I watched the movie "Unbroken." The main protagonist and the prisoner of the Japanese war camp is given a tempting offer; he can be released and even granted the life in luxury if he agrees to broadcast some piece of the Japanese propaganda. He refuses to participate in lies and returns to his prison camp where he's beaten and tortured but he prefers that to having his character broken.

Extreme situations like this one are unlikely but you get what I mean. Imagine, for example, that your boss offers you a promotion if you agree to report on your colleagues, including the one that is your best friend. Or the owner of this site says that you can post your insights here on condition you relentlessly praise him and kiss his butt. These are merely hypothetical situations but I mean anything that would make you abhor yourself but, at the same time, would help you to fulfill your desires or have your wishes granted.

In your second paragraph, the Japanese man has prioritized his desire to be honorable over any other desire, even life, freedom, or the avoidance of intense pain. In your third paragraph, if I accept the promotion and in return I snitch on my best friend, then I have prioritized my promotion over any desire to be honorable I may have, if any. 

I've come to realize that honor, for example, is only a chain if I perceive it as such. Even ambition can be a chain, if I perceive it as such, but isn't one if I don't perceive it as one. A key to attaining personal freedom is to realize there is only desire and the fulfillment (or lack of fulfillment) thereof. Aside from actual physical shackles, there are no chains that can't be broken by simply acknowledging them as arbitrary choices given weight entirely by one's own hierarchy of wants. I may still choose to suffer, but it will be my conscious choice, made in the full knowledge that I could have chosen otherwise.