The Satanic Temple is set to sue Netflix over the portrayal of devil-worshippers in the witchy series ‘The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.’ The show features an ‘unholy’ statue which real Satanists claim is subject to copyright.
‘The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina’ is a darker, closer-to-the-bone reboot of the late 1990s sitcom ‘Sabrina the Teenage Witch.’ Far from the goofy magicians of the earlier series, the witches in the new show are full-on devil worshippers, who perform blood rites and eat human flesh – and praise Satan at every opportunity.
It’s that devil worship that has got the actual, real-world Satanic Temple riled up. In particular, they have objected to the use of the iconic Baphomet statue by the fictional witches.
Satanic Temple co-founder Lucien Greaves has little patience for ‘Sabrina’s Church of Night,’ calling the show “asinine Satanic panic fiction.” While it does, at times, proclaim the same values as real Satanists – free will above all – the rest of the portrayal is decidedly stereotypical, with all the dark grimoires, black cats and grim rituals in darkened woods.
Worst of all, however, Netflix showrunners decided to use the statue of Baphomet, iconic to the Satanic Temple, as a centerpiece in the fictional Academy of the Unseen Arts. Not only is it easily identifiable and associated with the Satanic Temple, it is also copyrighted, Greaves says.
It would be like depicting a famous real-life mosque as a base of terrorist operations, Greaves argues.
The nine-foot-tall Baphomet statue was unveiled in Detroit in 2015. It’s based on a 19th-century depiction of a deity that encompasses the “sum total of the universe,” featuring both male and female features, as well as symbolism for good and evil, day and night, unification and separation, and so on.
The statue used in ‘Sabrina’ is not actually a 100-percent copy, but comes close enough that the differences are negligible.
Now, Greaves and his followers want Netflix to not only remove the Baphomet statues from ‘Sabrina’ ads and the show itself, but also to come up with an explanation as to how it ended up in the series. Otherwise, it’s the worldly court.
The issue of real v fictional Satanism has divided opinions. While some support Greaves’ argument…
Others argue that the Baphomet isn’t the Satanic Temple’s property.
And ‘Sabrina’ writer Axelle Carolyn has flung the Satanists’ own tenets back at them.
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