Blanche Barton

Blanche Barton is presented as Anton LaVey’s secretary and biographer and as a principal voice explaining the Church of Satan’s understanding of Satanism. In interviews gathered in 1994 and 1996, she addresses the gap between that philosophy and the Satanism attributed to Norwegian Black Metal, while also acknowledging points of contact between Satanic and fascist aesthetics. Her comments give the book an insider’s perspective, but they remain her interpretations of the movement and its audience, not a neutral account of every participant’s beliefs.

Identity and Role in the Interviews

The book introduces Barton alongside LaVey in a discussion intended to clarify what Satanism means to its adherents and how it relates to Black Metal. It identifies her as his secretary and biographer and presents their comments as a concluding contribution to the book’s analysis of Satanism. Her role is therefore both relational and interpretive: she speaks in close association with LaVey, yet offers her own judgments on the movement’s religious language, political associations, and musical appeal.

The interviews were conducted in 1994 and 1996, and their placement gives Barton a particular function in the book’s structure. The preceding discussion considers how Satanism became a public concern in Norway and how Black Metal participants adopted the label. Barton’s remarks then shift the focus to the distinction between that usage and the philosophy articulated by LaVey. The result is not simply a description of an organization, but a contrast between competing ways of defining the same term.

Distinguishing Satanism from Black Metal

Barton argues that Black Metal participants who call themselves Satanists often accept a Christian definition of Satanism rather than the conception associated with LaVey. In her account, they define the identity through the framework of the religion they oppose. This makes the dispute more than a question of style or affiliation: it concerns which tradition supplies the meaning of Satan, and whether opposition to Christianity still leaves Christianity’s categories in control.

Her position is made in response to LaVey’s criticism that many so-called Black Metal Satanists appear essentially Christian in how they understand the conflict. Barton reinforces that distinction by locating LaVey’s break with the inherited definition in the founding period of his movement. She does not claim that every Black Metal musician has the same beliefs; rather, her remarks challenge the equation of theatrical anti-Christianity with the philosophy she represents. The book thus places her testimony beside a scene whose participants often sought to present themselves as more extreme than established Satanists.

Fascism, Aesthetics, and Judgment

Barton describes the connection between Satanism and fascism as an unholy alliance, while treating the relationship as one of attraction and contact rather than simple identity. She notes that people from different backgrounds have approached the Church of Satan, and that the anti-Christian character of National Socialist Germany, together with its public drama and staging, can appeal to Satanists. At the same time, she distinguishes that attraction from a racial doctrine: in her account of Satanic judgment, people are evaluated on individual merit, and every race contains leaders and followers.

Her formulation leaves a tension visible rather than resolving it. Barton says Satanists may push the balance toward fascism or in the opposite direction depending on circumstances, presenting them as forces of disruption whose political direction is not fixed. LaVey, in the same exchange, identifies aesthetics as the principal common ground: the visual and theatrical languages of National Socialism and Satanism can overlap. Barton’s comments therefore neither erase the political danger of that overlap nor treat shared spectacle as proof that the two ideologies are identical.

Anger and Defiance

Barton also describes anger as a posture of resistance to a God who permits tragedy. In her account, the Satanist’s stance is one of continuing defiance toward such a figure. The statement frames Satanism not only as a set of claims about identity but also as an emotional and oppositional position: its defiance takes shape against suffering and against the religious authority understood to permit it.

When LaVey says he can empathize with Varg Vikernes burning a church, Barton’s comment about anger provides a nearby interpretive context, but the book does not present her as endorsing that specific act. The distinction matters: her general account of defiance is not evidence that she directed, participated in, or approved of a particular crime. The interviews instead show how the language of anti-Christian anger could be discussed within the Church of Satan while violent acts associated with Black Metal remained a separate subject of controversy.

Music as Motivation and Influence

Barton’s most direct account of music concerns the responses she says the Church of Satan receives from listeners. She describes letters from young people who want music to become more blasphemous and more openly hostile to Christianity, with no compromise. She compares its function for them to a source of motivation and focus, and reports that some say the music led them toward Satanism because it made them feel powerful.

Her description presents music as more than an expression of an already settled belief. For these listeners, it can supply an initial threshold: LaVey adds that if they do not take a further step, the sound may remain only noise, but that the music can serve as a tool for those who do. Barton’s testimony therefore links musical intensity to identity formation and possible action without establishing a single path for every listener. In the book’s broader account, her perspective helps explain why Black Metal could attract people seeking uncompromising religious opposition, even as she disputes the movement’s understanding of Satanism.