Canadian singer Celene Dion has been accused of Satanism. Not because she worships the devil or practices witchcraft or supports religious freedom or anything like that, but because she has recently released a line of unisex clothing. Oh, the horror! Apparently, all you need to do to become a card-carrying Satanist is to sit on the sofa in sweat pants. Maybe that's why fundamentalists are up in arms about Satanists being everywhere, because let's face it - sweats are very popular.
It also makes for smart sales. If you don't need separate versions of your clothes for men and women you can save a lot on production costs. Then, when you sell it at the same prices as comparable gender-typed clothes you make more money. As if you really need separate versions of sweatpants for men and women - the whole point of them is that they're loose and comfortable, so they don't need to be fitted.
But let's dig deeper into the stupidity here. Does the existence of unisex clothing items really constitute Satanism? I mean, considering that unisex clothing has existed since forever, is Esseff's point that it's been "demonic" the whole time? Some fundamentalists would probably agree, since Deuteronomy 22:5 (NIV) reads "A woman must not wear men's clothing, nor a man wear women's clothing, for the Lord your God detests anyone who does this." But clothing that is unisex is neither "men's" nor "women's." So even if you read this verse absolutely literally and are convinced that it should apply to people in the modern age, you're talking about something like a neutral food under kosher. Shellfish are worse.
Also, are we really at the point with these nutters where if you put numbers on something that automatically makes it "occult?" That's kind of insulting to real occultists like me. In fact, when we write out numbers as part of a sigil or a seal or whatever, they are carefully thought out according to correspondences and the like and not just sprinkled willy-nilly. What's really going on here is just "anything I don't understand is occultism," and let's face it, according to the these statements Esseff doesn't understand very much. He must truly live in his own demon-haunted world, and that's probably terrifying for him. But it also means it's hard to take anything seriously from someone so ignorant.
Whether the clothes are ugly or overpriced is a whole other issue. But it has nothing to do with demons or Satanism, and everything to do with crass consumerism.
“I’m convinced that the way this gender thing has spread is demonic,” said Msgr. John Esseff, a priest and exorcist in the Diocese of Scranton, Pennsylvania. “It’s false. I don’t even know how many genders there’s supposed to be now, but there are only two that God made.” The article also accuses Dion of hiding occult iconography in the clothing itself (“one pair of sweatpants has a number 3 on one knee and a 6 on the other. Three 6’s?”), suggesting that the range is not only “disturbing” but also “hideously ugly”.
“Who would pay $77 for a baby blanket with skulls or $161 for a jacket that looks like a trash bag?” asks the article’s author Patti Armstrong, a statement that suggests she is seemingly unfamiliar with the work of Demna Gvasalia. While Dion is yet to comment on the whole fiasco, she has previously said that the line was intended to enable “younger people to grow on values of equality with the freedom to strengthen their own power of personality based on mutual respect.” Which sounds a lot more reasonable than an evil spirit attempting to manipulate children through a range of casual, unisex leggings but there you go.
It also makes for smart sales. If you don't need separate versions of your clothes for men and women you can save a lot on production costs. Then, when you sell it at the same prices as comparable gender-typed clothes you make more money. As if you really need separate versions of sweatpants for men and women - the whole point of them is that they're loose and comfortable, so they don't need to be fitted.
But let's dig deeper into the stupidity here. Does the existence of unisex clothing items really constitute Satanism? I mean, considering that unisex clothing has existed since forever, is Esseff's point that it's been "demonic" the whole time? Some fundamentalists would probably agree, since Deuteronomy 22:5 (NIV) reads "A woman must not wear men's clothing, nor a man wear women's clothing, for the Lord your God detests anyone who does this." But clothing that is unisex is neither "men's" nor "women's." So even if you read this verse absolutely literally and are convinced that it should apply to people in the modern age, you're talking about something like a neutral food under kosher. Shellfish are worse.
Also, are we really at the point with these nutters where if you put numbers on something that automatically makes it "occult?" That's kind of insulting to real occultists like me. In fact, when we write out numbers as part of a sigil or a seal or whatever, they are carefully thought out according to correspondences and the like and not just sprinkled willy-nilly. What's really going on here is just "anything I don't understand is occultism," and let's face it, according to the these statements Esseff doesn't understand very much. He must truly live in his own demon-haunted world, and that's probably terrifying for him. But it also means it's hard to take anything seriously from someone so ignorant.
Whether the clothes are ugly or overpriced is a whole other issue. But it has nothing to do with demons or Satanism, and everything to do with crass consumerism.
1 comment:
Funny you should mention kosher. Jews who keep kosher strictly separate foods into michh (milk) fleisch (meat) and parve (neither). So unisex clothing fits right in, Talmudically.
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