Ep.1: Starting With Pride

# Satanists Nextdoor Podcast
# Episode 1: Starting With Pride

[Lilin Lavin]
Welcome, dear listeners, to Satanist Next Door. We're your hosts, Lilin Lavin and Tommy Lavin. Whether you're an open-minded curious onlooker or a fellow Satanist seeking camaraderie, our goal is to share our personal experiences and delve into the intricate tapestry of Satanism in our daily lives, occasionally inviting other guests to share their unique perspectives, leaving no pentagram unturned.

We'll explore how our beliefs shape our views on society, dive into struggles and triumphs we've encountered, and reveal the humanity that unites us all. So grab your favorite chalice and join us on this captivating journey. Satanist Next Door is ready to peel back the curtain and offer you a glimpse into our world, one captivating episode at a time.

[Tommy Lavin]
Hello, listeners, and welcome to the very first episode of Satanist Next Door. And since we are kicking off our episode in June, um, month of pride, we thought that the first episode should focus on pride, LGBTQ+, community, and um, you know, the things that are actively going on. We have our pride flag up in front of our house and I guarantee you that fucking thing is not coming down.

[Lilin Lavin]
Exactly.

[Tommy Lavin]
It is, it is staying up and, you know, again, I say that because we live in a very conservative neighborhood. Um, you know, we've got Trump flags and shit like that everywhere. So.

[Lilin Lavin]
Not currently. I mean, they are in people's backyards, but they were everywhere.

[Tommy Lavin]
They moved them to the backyard so you could still look at it, but you know, not quite feel as embarrassed.

[Lilin Lavin]
When they're drinking with their friends, they can sit together and lament over the times when Trump was great.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. Um, you know, but there's so, so because of that and so far I, I would say on our nightly walks and this is really kind of sad. I see sports flags.

I see Republican flags. I see a lot of American flags, which that's fine. Um, you know, but I think we are the only house with an LGBTQ flag currently.

[Lilin Lavin]
That we've seen. It's a pretty decent sized neighborhood. So I won't say I've looked at everyone's house, but unfortunately, no, I don't think I've seen any other ones.

[Tommy Lavin]
So I am kind of waiting on the note from the homeowners association. Um, and I'm going to, but we have a plan. Yes.

I'm going to take, walk around and take pictures of the hundred other houses with other flags on it and tell them when those flags come down, then we'll talk about ours.

[Lilin Lavin]
I hate to be preemptive because we assume that it will happen, but my, my hope is that it will not in fact happen. And we'll be very pleasantly surprised. So suburban conservative neighborhood outside of Houston, definitely concerned about it, but we'll, we'll report back at the end of the month and, uh, hopefully it's a big nothing burger.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yep. Yep. Yep.

[Lilin Lavin]
So, but yeah, let's talk about, let's talk about, well, of course the Stonewall riots, right? You can't start talking about pride without talking about how in June in, uh, you know, 1969, we had the Stonewall riots and that's what kicked this all off. And it's kind of disheartening in a way to recognize why that all happened and where we still are at this point in time.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, no, we, I, I always kind of say this in, in, um, you know, we made so much progress forward and then these last few years it's been backward, you know, uh, especially since 2016, but even after then it's just this snowball effect of going backwards and attack and, and fear mongering and, and you know, what lens, you know, like you, you, you had mentioned at one time while we were talking is, you know, once they got rid of Roe v.

Wade, they knew, they knew it was open seed.

[Lilin Lavin]
Well, they felt, I feel like they, I hate doing the they thing. I feel like people that are focused on going after individuals in, in marginalized communities felt more confident once they had attacked women's liberation, women's rights, where they're saying, you know, your bodily autonomy is now a fair game. You know, trying to get into privacy, all these things, they, they feel a lot more confident now that they've shown that they can affect change in their direction.

And I do feel like now they've pushed the narrative towards the, the LGBTQ plus community, especially the trans community, because they, they have a good, uh, like hook line on it with, oh, they're grooming kids, they're pedophiles, they're mutilating children's genitals, all these horrible things that they keep repeating over and over again, which is misinformation and absolutely outright lies.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And I feel like that whole conversation, um, kind of started with the bathrooms, you know, it was four or so years ago, maybe that it probably longer, longer, getting older. So, you know, years kind of mush together.

But yeah, I mean, that was like the big thing that started this big, oh, you know, we, we've got an in here and they, they went after the whole bathroom sort of thing, which is just stupid as hell. Because honestly, if you look at a trans man, do you, do you really want a trans man going into the women's bathroom? If you know, think about Sunday morning church, you're there, you're with your family, your wife, everybody goes into the bathroom.

And then all of a sudden this dude walks into the bathroom, you're going to lose your shit. But that's exactly what you asked the community.

[Lilin Lavin]
Not even asked told, told, well, it's weird to me because no offense, like the trans man thing, definitely they don't harp on it the same as trans women. And they're so ardently focused on what these, these aren't women and they don't belong and blah, blah, blah. Okay.

So what are you saying? Where would you prefer them to go? You want to put them in the men's room so that you can what abuse them?

I don't, I don't understand what it is that they're asking for, because I don't know about you. But when you look at some of these trans women, they're gorgeous, right? They don't want to be in the men don't even want to be in the men's restroom.

And then you, and then you've got these really incredibly handsome trans men. And then are you saying you'd rather have them with your girlfriend in the bathroom? Because maybe you want to double think that because these are relatively attractive guys that we've got walking around and, you know, maybe they'll have a second thought about, you know, what they're involved with.

[Tommy Lavin]
But well, and again, I kind of go back to what the hell are all of these conservative Christians doing in the bathroom? I mean, because to me, the bathroom is you go into the bathroom, you use the bathroom, and you leave. And, and, you know, and every trans person I've ever known, and some have come into the bathroom with me.

They went into a stall. I went to the back, you know, it's, it's weird. It's like, what do you all think happened?

Is it like, I just wonder what's going on in their mind? Is it like, they think like the door opens and it's like, I mean, I would be okay with that if that was the reality. You know, it's a fucking party in the bathroom.

You know, everybody's in there doing blow and fucking well, we're not talking about that time period, sir.

[Lilin Lavin]
No, but I mean, that happens in regular bathrooms anyway. But I don't know what it is exactly. You've got the narrative that there's these bearded men looking over the stall at your children.

What the hell are you talking about? Number one, most trans women I know aren't out there with beards. Most.

I mean, if you do, you rock it. That's your thing. But most trans women are women.

They look like women. If you're not looking for weird details, you're not normal. I mean, even if you are looking for weird details, they don't really look different.

And I think that's what trips them up is because you'll have people that are maybe a bit more on the gender fluid side of things, and they can't quite tell. And that's when they freak out because, oh, I think I finally found one of those trans folks in the bathroom. And they lose their shit only to find out it is actually a female trying to use the restroom.

And then they end up, there was a whole situation. I think it was a movie theater or a restaurant. Don't quote me on that.

It was one or the other. And a very gender fluid woman, very gender fluid though, biological female, in the restroom with their friends.

[Tommy Lavin]
Anna Karen.

[Lilin Lavin]
Anna Karen. I'm not trying to trope. But Anna Karen just immediately loses their mind.

You don't belong in here. You don't belong in this restroom. And the person's like, but I am a female.

Like, this is the correct. You're not. You don't belong here.

Blah, blah, blah. And this is like where they wanted this to go, right? The uncomfortable encounter.

They're going to force people to, I don't know, pee out. I don't know what it is they want from folks. Honestly, do they not go to the fair?

Do they not go out to parks? Do they not use like the unisex restrooms that everyone's been using for, I don't know. A port-a- front, you know, you just go in and use the damn bathroom.

And I don't know. What is it that they think is happening? I'm going on the bathroom thing way too long.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, I did challenge, you know, I kind of challenged this on Twitter. At one point, I was like, and I actually asked, what is it you want them to do? I mean, you know, what's your solution?

And their answer was, you know, what you would expect. It's a shitty answer. It's like, well, nature can take it.

I don't really care what they do. Well, obviously, you do care what they do.

[Lilin Lavin]
We wouldn't be here if you didn't care.

[Tommy Lavin]
We wouldn't be here, you know, and it's like, so yeah, I mean, yeah, I guess we kind of went off on the bathroom tangent for a little. But the reason why is it seems like that's where this new attack narrative sort of started.

[Lilin Lavin]
That's one of Yeah, and then the whole groomer thing, which I mean, I could go off on some stuff there. But grooming isn't happening at drag shows or drag story hour or you know, these are not the areas that we have to worry about. I can count like I have not enough fingers and toes to discuss all the sexual impropriety happening at churches and police officers and youth groups.

And I mean, but when you look at it, there's it seems like there's another bunch of them every day. And it's coming out of unfortunately, churches. And I'm not going to say it's every church.

I'm not going to say all religious people are pedophiles. But there's a flipping frick ton of pedophiles apparently hanging out in the churches.

[Tommy Lavin]
Well, there's enough of them that the the hashtag not a drag queen is almost always either trending or it's really easy. It pulls right up for me when I go to type it. Because every day, like you said, I see multiple reports of a Christian youth minister, a Christian pastor, a priest, men and women, men and women, men and women, a Boy Scout leader, a police officer, a teacher.

So it boils down to a person in the position of power, manipulating is manipulating and is actually taking advantage of children. And none of them, as I've seen, are drag queens, or, you know, part of the LGBT community. Yeah, I got an argument with somebody who who tried to say because the police officer molested a young man that it was gay.

And I said, Okay, so what you're saying then is every time a man sexually assaults a or rapes is the better word, because it is a child cannot consent. And it's raid every time a man rapes a female child, then that's heterosexual problem, right? And they wouldn't know.

No, that's no, you can't.

[Lilin Lavin]
It can't have one doesn't matter what the pedophilia is wrong, no matter what. I don't care what you try to blanket it as there's this group of nasty people that try to pretend it was part of the LGBTQ community. I'm sure you've heard about it.

They're called maps. You are not part of the LGBT community. You're not part of any community.

You shouldn't be part of a community. I'm sorry that you chose to to have this. Maybe you didn't choose.

That's a shitty way to put it. I'm sorry that you're a pedophile. I don't know why the hell you're a pedophile.

You could probably get some help and maybe deal with that before you hurt people. But the minute you've crossed that line, you are a danger to society and you don't have a place the end.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, period. And again, not part of the LGBTQ community. And they're trying to demonize the LGBTQ community with things that are mostly happening in the Christian conservative community.

[Lilin Lavin]
And to be fair, just like pedophiles are in every single community. I have no doubt that there's plenty of great people that want to do good things, healthy things for children in the Christian community. But there is way, way, way too many weird sexual abuse issues to the point where they have their own insurance for it.

And that should have been the warning sign right there. Maybe you're not doing enough careful scrutiny before you allow people to be in positions where they're working with children. But perhaps you should start to address that in a different way instead of getting insurance for the inevitable sexual abuse.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, I mean, and people bring up Satanists all the time. They're like, oh, Satanist child abuse. Well, here's the difference.

Let me lay it out real, real simple for you. Every single branch of modern Satanism, there is a definitive no when it comes to any sort of harm or sexual inappropriate anything with a child.

[Lilin Lavin]
Or anything at all. Consent is the biggest. You break consent.

It's one of the biggest things. If you want to call it a sin, whatever you want to call it, it's one of the biggest breaches that you can have within the Satanic community. Consent is what we're built on.

Bodily autonomy. You cannot have bodily autonomy or personal, you know, personal accountability or any of the things that we believe in without that consent. And so anything that takes away the consent from anybody or anything, even animals, you cannot beat, harm.

You're supposed to do the best you can to never be an abusive dickbag, period.

[Tommy Lavin]
And a child cannot consent.

[Lilin Lavin]
So, no.

[Tommy Lavin]
Animals can't consent.

[Lilin Lavin]
Children, drunk people.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And so here's the difference between the Christian community and the Satanic community. The Christian community has an insurance plan for this.

They generally take the person and they move them to a new church or something like that, or they do whatever because God forgives. The Satanic community, if you're caught, you are kicked out, the authorities are called on you, and you are never getting your ass back in. It's just you are done.

We do not put up with that shit, period. The end.

[Lilin Lavin]
There is no room for it. And that's where I get really messed up on the forgiveness concept. If you feel as an individual that it's the only way that you can move forward for you and you need to forgive people, that's fine.

But to demand forgiveness when it comes to being assaulted or that as a kid that somehow maybe you were wrong or as a test or God this or God that, I'm sorry, no. You do not just mandatorily have to forgive someone that harmed you. And in that case, ever.

You never have to. If you need to move on, fine. But you never have to forgive them.

And I hate that there's people that are put in a position where they have to feel like that's necessary.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And so we go from bathrooms, we then we go to book banning. You know, I mean, now we're banning books left and right anything with with anything having to do with, oh, two guys kissed in this book.

And all of a sudden, it's pornographic. But yet, okay, we've got millions of other books where a guy kisses a girl and that's okay. Why is it okay that a guy kisses a girl in a book?

And that's fine. And that's a very good nighttime story. But if a guy kisses guy, all of a sudden, it's porn.

You know, again, I kind of wonder what happens in these people's heads. But you know, no, it's the same fucking thing. It is two people love each other.

And you have, you know, a lot of times some of these books are our parents. And you know, it's a it's a family of two gay men. And you know, like my two daddies or something like that.

And all of a sudden, they this book is pornographic. Why is it pornographic? Because it has two men in it instead of a man and a woman.

That's not pornographic.

[Lilin Lavin]
And sometimes they try to get you on like books like this book is gay, which they're saying, Oh, this is an elementary schools is teaching about oral sex and bubble. It is not rated in the elementary library range is not available. You say show me which which library Well, it's you know, this library over here that is that is a high school library.

Or in some instances, that is a middle school library. And those are places that they belong. Are they for all children?

Are all children mature enough to handle certain content? Maybe not. But that's where you as a parent are supposed to be involved in the things that your kids are discussing or questions that they may have.

Because let me tell you, 1314 15 year olds are thinking about talking about what their friends they're curious about sex. And if you're going to pretend they're not, then you know, there's bigger issues. But the funny thing about book bands is just the stupid stupid thing.

Charlotte's Web, believe it or not banned book. Why was Charlotte's Web a banned book? It was a natural and blasphemous as humans are the highest level of God's creation.

And so animals talking required it to be banned. And then more egregious. If you look at the way these laws are dovetailed, it goes after communities of people of color, black people, you know, when you talk about books like The Bluest Eye, where you're dealing with very deep situations where you have black people that talk about how they didn't feel like they were beautiful because the beauty standards were so wrapped around, you know, Caucasian looks, and you're taking these books away. So you're taking away kids ability to see themselves in literature to make sense of the world to find commonalities with people that are struggling with the same things that they've In the gay, you know, LGBTQ community, it's so detrimental, because they can't necessarily talk about at home, they can't necessarily share that with their friends, maybe they're not ready, they're not comfortable.

And so this literature, this world that they can safely explore who they are as a person is maybe the only place that they can safely see themselves and realize that they are normal, that it is okay, that it's safe to be who you are, and they find strength. And it allows them to begin that journey to hopefully be able to share that with people and to live a life where they feel they can be their genuine self. And you take these things away.

And these these kids have nowhere to go.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, you remove their safe space, because like you said, a lot of times home is not a safe place for them. I mean, it's sad that still in 2023. Yeah, there are so many LGBTQ children who do not feel safe at expressing their feelings at home, because their parents are going to shame them or something like that.

And you should be supporting your children, you should be, you know, you should be there as a parent to support them, not shame them. And you know, if that is the direction that they are, are honestly feeling, you know, that's who they are, you're not going to change that by shaming them, you're going to make them feel depressed, you're going to make them suicidal, and then you take away their books. And so there's the other safe thing that's gone.

And what we're going to have is an increase in suicides for LGBTQ youth.

[Lilin Lavin]
Well, exactly. You look at groups out there, and I was so happy to see that Moms for Liberty was listed as a hate group, because it is. They're out there saying we're here to, you know, protect kids.

Well, you're definitely not out there to protect those kids. You're definitely not out there trying to protect their lives, because what you're doing is directly harming them. And by taking away the ability for kids that aren't part of the LGBTQ community to understand and empathize with people of the community, you're also taking away that that portion where kids can see, hey, they're just people like us, they're just trying to live lives, they have the same curiosities as we do.

You're destroying so much more than just taking away a book. You're not protecting anyone. And then they yell, you know, the Bible still belongs in school, my ass.

Do you know what's in that book? I mean, did you actually read it? You got adulteries in there.

You've got pedophilia, rape, you have incest, murder. Yeah, there's all manner of messed up stuff, babies being killed by angels, and, you know, people offering up their daughters to protect angels from being, there's so much crazy, it's crazy. And I'm not going to harp on the Bible entirely, because I know, you know, it's important book to a lot of people.

And you can have that, that's your thing. It's not my business. But when you start to put it out there and legislate based off of it, and push that on other people who do not believe in it, there's a problem.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And, and a lot of these laws are based on religious doctrine.

[Lilin Lavin]
Interpretation.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, interpretation of religious doctrine, right. And I mean, I went after Greg Abbott on it, because he's signing all these laws to protect parents and parents should make the choices. No, no, you're signing laws for one group of parents, I Christian extremists or evangelical Christian parents.

And that is who you're focused on. And everybody else can basically go fuck themselves.

[Lilin Lavin]
Pretty much. I mean, here we are, I am constantly outspoken. And the Texas GOP was putting out all this stuff about how we're protecting trans youth by stopping them from being able to get the care they need.

And they ended up blocking me on on Shitter, because I just kept harping on it. I'm not going to back down when it comes to the trans youth have very few voices and even parents that protect and do support their kids are being told, you know, parent choice, parent choice, unless your kids trans. And then we're going to tell you exactly how you should care for your kid, not the doctors who, you know, maybe have a little knowledge about biology and chemistry and the way things are supposed to work.

And and it pisses me the frick off, because you want parents to be in charge unless they disagree with you. And that's that's your stance. No, you're being a frickin bully.

And you're abusing kids.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And then you're going to go after the hormone loss. I mean, the hospital in in Austin, you were telling me about Dell Children's.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, Dell Children's in Austin, it was a department that they ended up losing a bunch of doctors and the doctors treated trans youth to help them. And it wasn't just hormone therapy. And they definitely weren't gender mutilating, whatever the fuck that means, because you can't mutilate a gender.

But they weren't out there giving sex changes. They were such a strong strict criteria for the way that care is carried out for trans youth and involves counseling. It involves lengthy periods of exploration to help understand each individual child's need, because each trans child has a very specific need that will not replicate between kids.

And and there's a lot that goes into that. And to sit there and pretend that they're just doing, you know, surgeries on kids. That's just bullcrap.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, I mean, I've always, I've always been of the mindset of if you can't win your political or religious debate or your stance without lying, you're on the wrong side. You know, and that's what we see time and time again, is lies, lies and fear mongering about the LGBTQ community. Just, you know, like you said, gender mutilation.

And I mean, they paint this horrible picture. And it's lies. It's just not happening.

And, and, you know, but there's horrible things that happen in churches. And that's okay, we're going to paint over and gloss over that. But we're going to tell a bunch of lies about this community in order to demonize it.

And you kind of brought it back in one conversation to, you know, Germany, the way that they the pink triangle that they started giving out when and you know, that was not everyone knows about it.

[Lilin Lavin]
A lot of people do I think at this point, but during during that whole period of time, one of the groups they went after were gay individuals, and they would give them these pink triangles to identify them and separate them. And they made it I think it was one of the avenues that they made is palatable to start going after people. And you see it, unfortunately, replicated in Florida, with some of the ways that they've done their laws, where you have individuals that they're easier to demonize, you know, they start talking about they're pedophiles, they're grooming kids, they're assaulting kids, they're, they're this, that and the other.

And then I was, I tried, I wanted to be happy because they had this pedophile law where they wanted to, you know, essentially be able to give the death penalty to what they were deeming as, you know, child predators, which good, I mean, I'm not gonna say I think the death penalty is a great thing. I think there's probably other ways to address violent crimes and such like that. But with pedophiles, it gets tricky, because I don't know, there's a lot of positive you can do with them.

But then they started saying, well, these are groomers, and they're pedophiles. And if you put the two together, they're setting up a very ugly situation where they could technically go after people in the LGBTQ community and say, well, look, they're predators. And they've already set that up in people's minds to be true.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
And so that's a slippery frickin slope that people really need to pay attention to, because that's, that's not okay. And we can't ever set that up. These are these are people living their lives.

They're, they're in their mind, you know, when you're a trans woman, you are a woman, you know, you're living a life of a woman, when you're, when you're a man, you're a trans man, you're a man. And they've had to live this alternate life up to the point where they were able to finally transition. And now they can finally, it's not, you know, a psychological only life that they're hidden away, they get to finally be themselves.

And sometimes I think, you know, you're excited to finally be that gender, you've always seen yourself as to actually have that physique, you've always seen, and you live a little bit more daring, like Dylan, they get mad. Oh, she's so childlike. And she acts like a kid.

No, she's a woman that's excited to have, you know, the experience to try on dresses to have her figure to be excited about all the girly things that she's always wanted to be able to do. And now she can look at herself and say, Oh, my gosh, it's me. It's me.

It's the me I've always seen. And so of course, she's elated. She's finally able to live her life.

You know, of course, she's excited. She should be.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, yeah. I mean, the lot. It's like Florida and Texas.

I swear they're in a competition to see who can be the most bigoted and, and, you know, the worst state and pass just the ugliest laws there are. And it's a constant competition between these two states. They're states that are pretty scary to live in.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. I mean, our oldest daughter, we've talked about before, she's a bit more gender fluid. I think she leans a little towards male often.

And I get scared because she goes out and she's very outspoken. She should be comfortable, confident, outspoken about things. But, you know, you see these people that are pissing their pants over the fact that, you know, are you a man?

Are you a woman? Why are you in my bathroom? And I get scared that she'll end up in one of these confrontations where there was that issue that recently happened where two people were at a golf, those putt putt places.

And they're, you know, two, two women, and they're in a relationship and they're holding hands and doing the things that young people do when they're in love. And this lady, this little freaking wench of a woman decided that she was going to call her buddies, the cops, because they were doing this in front of her kid. And they ended up getting arrested.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, they kissed.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. Oh my, oh my God. A couple kissed.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, a couple kissed.

[Lilin Lavin]
Well, holy fuck.

[Tommy Lavin]
And she called her cop buddies. And it was outside of Houston. And she called her cop buddies and they came and they actually went to arrest these two women.

And I think Tizzy did a video on it. And so if you haven't checked that video out, you should go, you know, search through Tizzy's thing.

[Lilin Lavin]
It was always a good time.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, it's, it's been in the month of June that he did it. And, and he was actually looking for the two women because he wanted to be able to help support them legally, make sure that all charges were dropped against them and things like that. But you know, that was just what did they do?

They kissed? They kissed Are we, are we back in the 1960s where kissing, you know, if you're gay and you kiss in public, it's, it's illegal. I thought we moved way past that.

[Lilin Lavin]
We have thankfully, and the younger generation is so good about being outspoken and putting up with way less crap. But unfortunately, we have a lot of very loud people in positions where they get to make a lot of annoying things for everyone's life.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And you said something right there, which was the younger generation. And I want to give this younger generation huge props.

I mean, Gen Z and I don't know if 14 year olds are still considered Gen Z or not, but the younger generation, you all are kicking ass because the younger generation has become so inclusive and so accepted. And they just look at it as so what if this person's gay? So what if this person's trans?

They are who they are. And in their parents' childhood, that wasn't the way things were, you know, and it was, it was a very scary time. And, you know, like you mentioned before, our oldest daughter, she's gay.

And even as a dad now, I'm still scared at times, because again, we live in a very scary state. If you're, you know, in the LGBT community, there are a lot of very mean, vindictive, violent people in this state. And I get worried for my daughter, but I don't get as worried as I would have been worried in the 1980s, or the 1970s or even the 1990s.

So things have gotten better. And part of that is the youth. And that's why the Republican Party is so afraid of Gen Z.

Oh, yeah, they're trying to put in voting laws and because they know that the things that they're doing, and the things that they are doing, when I say they, I'm not talking Gen Z, I'm talking about Republicans and the Christian nationalists and all that. They know that they are wrong, right? They're on the wrong side of history.

And this is going to come back and bite them. Right.

[Lilin Lavin]
And it should, it should absolutely. And I hope that as the upcoming generations begin to get into politics, that they they don't fall for these traps, and that they do continue to actually be these people and stand up for marginalized communities and to support one another. I mean, granted, there's always going to be crappy elements in every generation and every group of people.

But I have seen a lot of things that I'm incredibly hopeful about and proud of, especially when it comes to our youth.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, yeah. And it is it is good to see the youth being so strong, even though I know there's still families that reject their children. And as a father, I absolutely cannot fathom rejecting my child.

Our daughter came out to us at what 14 somewhere in there. And it wasn't any sort of fear. You know, she didn't it was she was literally still kind of discovering herself.

[Lilin Lavin]
No, it was kind of funny. Honestly, it was one of those situations where her and her very good friend, who's now her fiance, they were very much spending a lot of time together. And at some point, I said something along the lines of, so when are you guys gonna just come out with it and let me know that you're dating?

And she hadn't really said anything. And you know, we're we have a relationship where that was not like an ugly conversation. We were both kind of laughing and but it was just so obvious.

They were really cute together. They've been together almost 10 frickin years at this point. But it was just one of those things.

We're like, okay, so we kind of see what's happening here. So yeah, when are you going to just come out and tell us but we were always the safe house.

[Tommy Lavin]
You know, when she was in high school, you know, she was part of GSA, the Gay Straight Alliance.

[Lilin Lavin]
Great organization. I wish all schools had them.

[Tommy Lavin]
I wish all schools would have those.

[Lilin Lavin]
And if you're age appropriate, let me refrain before someone says something like, well, there they go.

[Tommy Lavin]
They're grooming. Yeah. Yeah.

age appropriately. This was in high school.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yep.

[Tommy Lavin]
And the GSA kids would actually wind up seeing our house as a safe place because they could come over to our house and just be themselves, right? They didn't have any judgment from parents. You know, it was you are who you are.

If you want me to, you know, if you tell me how you want me to address, yeah, tell me how you want me to address you. And I will respect that.

[Lilin Lavin]
I might screw up, you know, but just just poke me and let me know.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, you know, and so we were always really the safe house there. So it was nice that our daughter felt comfortable enough with us to to come out. You know, oh, yeah, she started to, to really coalesce who she was.

Yeah.

[Lilin Lavin]
But it's a discovery. The minute that you as a parent, and I'm not going to tangentialize this, but as a parent, your job isn't to relive your life or to vicariously explore things you never got to through your kid. They're experiencing their life for the first time and figuring out who they are.

And our job is to support them and give them guidance and to not be malicious assholes.

[Tommy Lavin]
You would think it would be so easy. You know, yeah, it's like, seems like common sense, you know. But But again, just huge props to to the younger generation.

Y'all. Yes, you're kicking ass. Keep doing what you're doing.

Keep supporting the inclusion forward. Keep moving forward. You know, I know it feels probably like the weight of the world is trying to push you back as schools are trying to put stuff in.

You know, they're, they're, they're making, you know, they're, they're making medical laws more difficult. They're making counseling more. I mean, they're in Texas, they're trying to replace counselors with chaplains.

You know, they're really trying to push religion into the school and and trying to push anything LGBTQ out.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah. And I'm going to tell young people, if you don't like those laws, if you're affected by things like chaplains, push back. Don't be afraid to write letters.

Don't be afraid to to go ahead and tell the superintendents and other adults, I'm not going to accept this. If you want to do peacefully protesting and walkouts, I definitely encourage that. We have the right to peaceful protest.

It's written into our constitutional right. Then we have the right to exercise those rights. So don't be afraid to stand up for things and stand up against things that are wrong, like chaplains in schools, unless they're going to make them inclusive.

And they're to allow people of many faiths. It seems like right now it's focused on Christians specifically. And unfortunately, it looks like they went through focus on the family geared programs.

But, you know, push for other representation. You know, there's there's Muslim kids in school, there's Hindu kids in school, there's, you know, Buddhist, there's there's so many different kinds of people. And it's school is supposed to be a secular space where you get to learn and focus on learning, not, you know, fighting about faith issues and things that don't belong there.

But if they're going to do it, push for the inclusivity, ask for that. And ask representation, you have that right, and you're okay to do that.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, I mean, you've been following some of these laws in Texas, you know, that that they've been trying to push through. And I think you had said a lot of them did not pass, which is great. You know, they're going to continue to try, they use Project Blitz, you know, they've really been using Project Blitz since what, like, seems like 2016-ish or so.

[Lilin Lavin]
If you haven't looked into it, look it up. It can be a rabbit hole. So be careful the resources that you're utilizing, compare notes and check evidence.

But Project Blitz was just all about getting the churches gaining power throughout the system. And they're much more outspoken. I think it was Jason Rapert recently came out and just blatantly said, Christians run for everything, run for everything that you can, you know, every office that's available, from the school boards on up, run.

And that's what they're doing. And I'm not about theocracy, we're a pluralistic nation, and Christianity definitely has its place there. But not making laws, not being legislators, not deciding to put their faith in front of people, you're there to represent everyone.

And if you can't move your faith aside and do that, then there's a problem, and you probably shouldn't be representing a diverse group of people.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, and there are some Christian denominations that are very LGBTQ friendly. And then you have the evangelical militant branch, which unfortunately is the one that seems to be growing and really pushing a lot of this hate and these laws, you know, and trying to push America into a theocracy.

[Lilin Lavin]
That's the whole point of Project Blitz is to move America very much more dominionist, where they believe that, you know, the world is really gods, and that God should rule everything. So it's kind of scary when you think about it like that. Because again, we're not we're not all Christians, right?

So why should we be living based on their faith? And it's not so many interpretations of that specific faith, just like many others, you know, whether it's the Jewish faith, or the Muslim faith, or there's so many different interpretations. And if that's the way you choose to live, great, you can do that you could decide for yourself based on those laws that you've believed in for your your religion, but probably not for for other people.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And you know, again, it's, it's just, it would be great, except for the fact that they are targeting and demonizing the LGBTQ communities, and promoting lies, just I mean, vicious lies.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
And, and that's the part that it's like, no, you know, what what happened to love your neighbor and get along and accept and no judgment and all of that sort of shit, you know, that that went out the window? Well, I mean, it's all judgment.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, recently, well, not very recently, but recently, when it was representative Zoe Zephyr, when on Montana, they were so spiteful to the point that they put her out in the hallway, because they didn't want to listen to her because she was so outspoken. And because she was so strong in her representation of the LGBTQ and specifically trans community that they had her out there in the hallway outside the chamber, working from the bench.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah. And then not only that, then, okay, so it's bad enough, she has no office, she's working in the hallway, then a bunch of these people got together and brought their memo in. Yeah.

And said, Oh, you know what we can do, we can go to their early and we can all sit on the benches. So Zoe doesn't even have a bench to sit on. And so he has to work standing up in a hallway, just making it so uncomfortable.

It's, it's so bigoted. And it's open, blatantly outward bigoted. And everybody, you know, I shouldn't say everybody, but there is a good portion of people that are okay with that.

And I don't understand it. And again, you know, I called my parents out on bigotry when you know, that was an uncomfortable conversation. Yeah, it was.

But you know, they said some, they said some and they did some not so very nice things around my oldest daughter. And I'm sorry, if I'm not giving my parents a pass, nobody else is giving getting a pass. And I don't have the best relationship with my parents.

But still, they're still family. And I don't give anybody a pass. If you're going to be a blatant bigot.

Yeah, I'm gonna call you a bigot. And about by the way, me calling you a bigot, because you're a bigot is not bigotry. So you know, however, you wrap it up in a bow that Oh, well, these, these bigoted beliefs are okay, because of some book with a magic sky person, you know, or some pastor told me that no, it's still bigotry.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yeah, you know, bigotry, I don't care where you're coming from it. The perspective, if your perspective is about being hateful towards someone, if you want to be a racist or a bigot, you can't say, Oh, well, my religion, no, your religion does not support you being a hateful, bigot or racist person or prejudiced person and pushing it on other people. That's you.

And that's, there's no place for that. And if you believe that that's what you are faithful towards, you should really take a better look at who you are as a person, because that's pretty jacked up. Yeah, that was very uncomfortable with your parents.

And it's still kind of a weird situation. But yeah, it's it's just the way things have gone. Yeah.

[Tommy Lavin]
It's it's really sad, because my parents were never religious. I wasn't raised religious. And they just totally went off the deep end.

And now, you know, they, again, they made some very rude, some very bigoted remarks in front of our daughter, and I'm not gonna take that shit. I'm just not. It's, you know, my job is to protect my children.

And I don't care if you're my parent or not. If you start to harm my children, there is that there's a whole other side of me that you're going to be introduced to.

[Lilin Lavin]
That's what parents are for. They're there to guide, support, protect. And, you know, hopefully you do those things to the best of your ability.

[Tommy Lavin]
And again, that's, that's what, you know, that's the sad part, because that's what's missing from a lot of the people in the LGBTQ community is the support of their family. Their families should be loving them, supporting them, you know, and, and so many times, they don't get that. We saw that time and time and time again.

[Lilin Lavin]
But that's where individuals can step up and be there. You know, family is what you choose. Yes, I know that very well, because I, I have a very messed up family, you know, dynamic, but I have you and the kids and I have, you know, siblings.

And, you know, my sister, thankfully, is a great person that I, you know, I can have a relationship with, but it was hard fought. And I have a lot of other people that I consider close to me that are like family, because that's the people that stepped up. And that's the people that involved himself in my life.

And, you know, they deserve that too. So get out there, folks, if you're support the community and and be there for these folks, because they deserve that everyone deserves to have people that they know are there for them.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, exactly. Family doesn't have to be the people that birth, they don't have to be your, your direct blood descendant. Family is who you make it.

Yeah, you know, and and you can find family within a group of people. You know, our congregation, we have people that, you know, probably consider close to family. Absolutely.

You know, and it's, it's a good thing. And it's, it's one of the things that TST does.

[Lilin Lavin]
Well, I agree. There's, I mean, the ability to have a close knit group of people that you, you know, are there for you is nice. And I think it's harder when you identify as an other, like a Satanist, or when you're part of the LGBTQ community, because there's just so much prevalent negativity in the world that tells you that you don't have a right to that space.

And you do you have a right to friends and family and gatherings and get togethers and, and community. And it is, it's always going to be there. You know, that's one of the things I like about Satanism is we're not there to judge you as an individual.

The only time you're gonna run into a problem is if you are doing something dangerous or harmful, taking away people's bodily autonomy, hurting people, then you know, there'll be an issue. But outside of that, it's pretty hard to piss people off, you know?

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, yeah, it really is. But you know, I think, you know, again, this is our first podcast. We thought we should definitely cover Pride Month.

[Lilin Lavin]
Absolutely.

[Tommy Lavin]
As our first one. My hope is this one went pretty good. And that they just get better.

[Lilin Lavin]
Well, people let us know.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yeah, you know, and, and, you know, we're going to keep doing these. We're going to be talking about different subjects. Again, these are our personal beliefs.

These are from our personal standpoint, even though, you know, we're in TST. We're both ministers. We're not speaking on behalf of TST. This is our own personal belief.

[Lilin Lavin]
We are here as Satanists talking about our lives. And hopefully we get to involve a couple of other, you know, individuals. We know a bunch of really cool people that have we've talked to about having these conversations.

So we hope to bring you a lot of other cool perspectives as well. But at the end of the day, we're just people and we're just people trying to live and live the best we can, based on who we are and who we happen to be, in part, are Satanists.

[Tommy Lavin]
So with that, very happy Pride Month.

[Lilin Lavin]
Yes, live your genuine self and know that people will love and respect you. And if they can't, they probably don't deserve a place in your life. But you are valued as an individual for who you are.

[Tommy Lavin]
Yep, you're valued, you're loved, and you be you and that is the most important part. And just know that there are people out there supporting you and fighting for you every single day. Yep, that's right.

[Lilin Lavin]
And so with that, we will hail Satan you and wish you a very good whatever part of the day you happen to be in. And thank you so much for listening.