Reputation
Some of those who believe in backward masking, along with some fundamentalist Christians, believe messages such as "Hail Satan" may subliminally inspire people to do evil, a view which may have received some reinforcement when the phrase was used as part of the vandalizing of churches, however its use then may have been the expression of a general anti-religious sentiment indicated by its use along with slogans such as "Think, don't Pray." Vandalism accompanying it may include the anarchy symbol or other slogans intended to shock, such as racial slurs. It may accompany symbols such as a swastika, inverted pentagram or inverted cross. Such vandalism is usually by rebellious young people rather than Satanists, whose activities are not often criminal.
Rick Ross, whose work involves studying cults, referred to the murder trial of Scott Peterson, in which the defense made the claim that the killings were by a "Satanic cult" rather than the defendant. Ross called this a ridiculous manifestation of the Satanic panic, referred to it as a "Hail Satan Pass", similar to the Hail Mary pass in football, a desperate and unlikely attempt.
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Famous quotes containing the word reputation:
“The relatives of a suicide hold it against him that out of consideration for their reputation he did not remain alive.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“The reputation of a man is like his shadow; it sometimes follows and sometimes precedes him, sometimes longer and sometimes shorter than his natural size.”
—French Proverb. Quoted in Dictionary of Similes, ed. Frank J. Wilstach (1916)
“Men will not give up their privilege of helplessness without a struggle. The average man has a carefully cultivated ignorance about household matters—from what to do with the crumbs to the grocer’s telephone number—a sort of cheerful inefficiency which protects him better than the reputation for having a violent temper.”
—Crystal Eastman (1881–1928)