THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SATANIC CULT INVOLVEMENT: AN ...

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are underground structures, secretly engaging in criminal ritual activity. It is sometimes
claimed that the former functions as a front for the latter, presenting a benevolent public
face, while hiding the malevolent reality ofunderground Satanism.
5.2.4 Child abuse awareness
Although there is a strong religious influence present in the anti-Satanism movement, the
appeal of the movement's ideology for secular society stems from a posited link between
Satanism and crime: "A society that believes it is bedevilled by crime may entertain
claims that the Devil lurks behind criminals, or at least that some criminals see
themselves as doing the Devil's work" (Best, 1991, p. 104). The crimes allegedly
perpetrated by Satanists include drug abuse, abduction, rape, grave desecration, animal
cruelty, bestiality, murder, and cannibalism. Frequently, innocent children are alleged to
be the victims of satanic crime. In this regard, Stevens (1990), Best (1991), and Nathan
(1991) attribute the fear of Satanism to collective anxiety and guilt about the welfare of
children. In the past two decades, this anxiety has been clearly defmed in terms of
deviant adults menacing child victims (Best, 1991). The recent historical identification of
child abuse in its various forms led to the eventual positing of a ritual sub-variety of this
phenomenon. This has been defined as "the involvement of children in physical,
psychological or sexual abuse associated with repeated activities (ritual) which purport to
relate the abuse to contexts of a religious, magical, supernatural kind" (McFadyen et al
cited in Bentovim and Tranter, 1994, p. 100). In the 1980's, an American organisation,
the Missing Children Movement, claimed that strangers abducted 50,000 children a year,
and antisatanists suggested that many of these were victims of satanic cult sacrifices
(Best, 1991). By displacing the cause ofthe problems characteristic oftoday's youth onto
a sinister organised cult, the threat can be externalised. Furthermore, collective guilt
about society's contribution to child abuse and neglect can be transformed into righteous
anger and suspicion ofthe occult underground (Bromley, 1991; Carlson and Lame, 1990;
Nathan, 1991; Stevens, 1990)