60: Dungeons, Dragons, and Satan Worship

2022/10/26

Chapters

The episode begins with the host discussing how Satan was perceived to have infiltrated various aspects of life, including board games and music, leading to widespread panic and fear among parents.

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner and more.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow. Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory. ♪

Hi friends, welcome to Halloween 2022. How's it going? Great. My name is Bailey Saring and it's time for the best time of the year. Thunder, lightning, all the Halloween stuff at Michael's Craft Store. This month, we're going to be talking about all things spooky ooky, like Satan. Me, hi.

clowns, mummies, and oh yeah, witch hunts. So sit back, relax, and let's talk about that hot, juicy Halloween history goss. Let me explain to you how I got here. So,

When I was growing up, Smurfs were on TV. They were cool. They were living, right? And if you don't know what a Smurf is, it's like those little tiny blue characters. They lived in like a cute little house in the peaceful forest. And their goal was to outwit an evil sorcerer and his scruffy looking cat. You'd turn on the TV every Saturday morning and what would be on

All smurfs. And I don't know where. My mom comes in and she tells me to turn it off. And I'm like, why mom? Smurfs. And she said, you are not allowed to be watching the smurfs, goddammit. They are the work of the devil. And I said, I didn't know the devil spent time drawing cartoons, but okay. And this wasn't the first time I was told that Satan was behind something. Something I loved. Lucky charms. Forget about that devil looking rainbow man. Leprechauns? Ugh. Satanic.

Why? Because all of that magic and wizardry. Christina Aguilera, temptress. A temptress by Lucifer himself. I bring up Christina Aguilera because I could remember when her Dirty album came out or Stripped, excuse me, Stripped. Everyone wanted it.

I was not allowed. So naturally, I had to find out who decided that the devil is just in things. You know, I'm pretty sure the Bible doesn't say like, thou shall not listen to Xtina. So I got to digging around. Like, why were all of our parents

freaking out about the devil and Satan when we were just trying to enjoy cartoons or eat cereal, listen to the stripped album, you know? And this also reminded me of something I've talked about over on my murder mystery makeup. Remember satanic panic? I love a spooky rhyme. So satanic panic was brought up in multiple murder cases in the 80s and it made people terrified of stuff that they thought was the work of Satan.

They were believing that Lucifer was lurking all around us, just tempting all the children in town. So I kind of knew what it was, but I wanted to know why, when, how, what was the actual story behind Satanic Panic? Well, it turns out,

"Someone remembered that something happened." Michelle. Oh yes, Michelle remembers. That is where our story starts today. If you didn't know, because I sure didn't, "Michelle Remembers," it's a book. So the year is 1980. The place, Victoria, British Columbia. Do, do, do, do. Wait, no, 'cause that's in, they're in Canada. They're not British.

Whatever, I just like that song. Anyway, so British Columbia, Victoria, you get it. A 31 year old woman by the name of Michelle Smith, she seems to be struggling with something internally. So she goes and she sees a psychiatrist. Now this doctor, his name is Dr. Lawrence Pazder started using the technique hypnosis on her. Now he's hoping that this will help uncover any repressed memory she may have.

So the two would end up spending over 600 hours together with the goal of helping Michelle through whatever trauma she seemed to be struggling with. Over time, memories slowly but surely started to trickle out. Remember, she's under hypnosis, right? So when you're under hypnosis, you're like half asleep.

I think. I'm not sure. I've never done it. Have you done it? Let me know down below. Thank you. One that came back to her, she remembered being five years old and something dark was going on all around her. A split second of another memory comes back. Now she's surrounded by people chanting.

Then another flash, cages all around her, animals being sacrificed. Now the doctor starts asking Michelle leading questions like, are you being sexually abused or were you being sexually abused? And she's like,

Yes. And she starts sharing these memories. I'm going to use quotes here because we're not sure, but she starts sharing these memories with her doctor and he starts coming up with his own theory or belief as to where Michelle's trauma really seems to be stemming from. So Dr. Padser believes that Michelle was struggling with something called trauma.

SRA. That's right. Now this is no STD. No. Nay nay. This stands for Satanic Ritual Abuse. She's like, "What the hell is that? Oh shit." SRA was a term created by Dr. Pazder because of the hours he had spent with Michelle. He truly believed that she had suffered abuse while in the hands of the Church of Satan.

which would explain the animal sacrifices, the dark energy, the sexual abuse, the chanting. Oh, it all made sense to both of them. That's it, that's the answer. So Dr. Padster is like, well,

There's probably a thousand other Michelles out there who too may have been part of some type of satanic abuse. People need to know this story. So Dr. Padser and Michelle work together and write a book sharing Michelle's repressed memories that she had uncovered.

But not only that, the book was also suggesting to readers that maybe you too have been part of this and you don't even know it yet. So the two of them released the book in 1980 called Michelle Remembers. Now this book ends up being a huge hit. I mean, this is new to people. Satanic rituals? Abuse?

You know, like on top of that, a credible doctor is saying that this is real? What's gonna happen? People are freaking out, of course. And it's not long after the book's release that it trickles down its way to America and it gets into the hands of the middle-class mother. So a ton of people are reading these, okay?

And then the word of mouth, right? Hey, have you read that book? Michelle remembers. Oh my God, when it's not. You have to read it, girl. Go get it. So everyone is reading this book. People are obsessed because come on, this is America. Land of the free, home of the Jesus.

This, to a lot of people, had confirmed what a lot of them felt like they had already been thinking, that the devil is starting to win the battle of good versus evil. Now, America was going through some major growing pains. The 1950s were the time of the housewife, the white picket fence, beautiful family of four with like a dog.

named Spot and like a dad named Roger who works nine to five at the bank and coaches Little League. But then the 60s roll around and the counterculture shows up. During this time, people start experimenting with mind altering substances. I'm talking drugs, baby.

People are expanding their minds, creating cool music, hanging out with Manson. Cults are a thing, et cetera, et cetera, you know? And while most people were hanging on to the idea of what America should be, this younger generation was ready for change and change was a coming. Choo choo.

You get it? Because I'm a train. I'm the train of change. And I'm coming. So the country gets involved in Vietnam War. Crack and cocaine shows up on the streets. Drugs are declared public enemy number one. Rock music gets more popular. And then President Nixon is caught being a naughty boy. So he resigns and just flies away in a helicopter, you know? And the country is like, what in the world is happening? So much change. It just seems like chaos. Like,

Who is in charge here? The chaos of America was making a lot of people very uncomfortable. And this continues into the 1980s where we get heavy metal music and questionable cartoons. Smurfs. But it wasn't just cartoons on television that was new. The '80s were big time for televangelists.

great. Televangelists were essentially pastors on television sharing the word of God while you call in and you donate your recent paycheck for Jesus. Not only that, they reached a much larger audience and kind of put more fear into people watching. Like, Satan's gonna get you, you know? The wilder the claims, the bigger the audience, the more cash they bring in, right? So they're preaching to huge audiences to be

Be careful about sinful temptations all around. Watch out on television, in your kids' games. You gotta make sure that your kids present themselves to the world in a godly manner. You don't want your kid looking like Satan's little dumpster squirrel. They were telling parents to keep an eye out on their children because they could easily go down the wrong path. Children. So the parents are keeping a closer eye on their kids because the devil is all around with his temptations.

So parents get honestly a little bit more paranoid about what their kids are playing with, right? What they're watching on TV. I mean, it goes all the way down to their fricking board games. Ma!

Not my hungry hippos, Ma! It's not Satan, Ma! This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

This is an ad by BetterHelp. What?

What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better, even when it's impossible to make time for them. Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow.

Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere. And the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory. Free shipping.

Let's jump back a few years to 1974. Movies like The Exorcist and Rosemary's Baby, which all have to do with Satan possessing young children. They're out in theaters bringing millions, millions of dollars across America. People are just loving Satan possessions. And Satan seems to be on the rise. And then a new fun and alluring game hits the shelves in a Toys R Us nearby.

A board game called Dungeons and Dragons. First, parents are like, "Yay, go play your game of sorry in the basement with your friends. Dinner's at six." What I'm getting at is parents didn't really think anything of this little board game. That is, till the neighbors got together and started chatting a little bit. "Hey, did you know that your son is playing that D&D game pretending to be a demon?" "Yeah, he's doing that after school, Cindy."

Dungeons and Dragons, they're all pretending to be demons. Now parents were told that D&D stood for delusional and dangerous. It's a wild jump, my God. To be fair, kids really love this game. They got really into it and they still do to this day. It's said to be a very fun game.

You could play nonstop, right? Spend hours together playing this game. And parents at the time just could not understand. And they also thought that kids playing this game was actually an introduction to Satanism. I thought Dungeons and Dragons was some kind of BDSM game, honestly. Like I thought that for a long time.

It's not. You know, dungeons and dragons, right? But it's not. In reality, it's a game about magic and wizards. Who would have thought? It's a fantasy tabletop role-playing game, Bailey. Again, but when you say role-playing game, I think like, are you gonna be the dragon or the dungeon? Anyways, but naturally parents took it to the extreme. When they heard this game had magic and wizards,

Mm-mm, game over. They lost their shit. Satan is speaking to my child through a table game? Jesus, Jesus. Take the wheel, take the wheel. Okay, so that game came out and then the year 1979,

Listen, this is where things get a little fucked up. Real fucked up, actually. Let's talk about this. We're in the town of East Lansing, Michigan. It's just west of Detroit, I guess. Hey, how are you doing, East Lansing? Anyways, a freshman named John Dallas Egbert has just moved into his college dorm at Michigan State University. Now, he was born in Ohio and came from a pretty well-off family. John had been ready to go to college for a while because he was a little smarty pants.

People would even go on to call him a prodigy. And to be fair, I think he was because at the age of 12, he was fixing computers for the freaking army. Yes, the United States Army at 12. I don't even know how they found him. Isn't that illegal? That's like child labor or whatever. But...

When John got to college, he was ready to focus on computer science. So he's at college, you know, and if you've gone to college, you know how it is. Kids are doing kickstands left and right. The beginning of college freedom from your parents is like, let's fucking rage, you know? I don't even know if people go to classes. I think they do and they just fall off. Everyone's having a good time, except there's one little problem. John is nowhere to be found. He's not at his dorm.

he's not showing up for classes, where could he be, right? So at some point, his parents are contacted and they show up on campus to search his room. And that's when they find a creepy little note. All it says is, quote, if I go missing, cremate my body. Oh.

Now the police rule this as a suicide note, but the problem, like there was no body. Where was John? So John's parents are worried sick. They have no idea what's going on. Was he abducted? Did he commit suicide? Kidnapped? Is there a ransom? Did he run away? There's so many questions running through their heads and there's no answers. No parent is just going to be like, well, okay, he's not here.

guess it's time to go home, you know? So the family decides it's probably best if they hire a private investigator. So they come across this highly recommended PI named William Deere. After sitting down and interviewing him, they decide this is our guy. And they were right. Like William was well known for going in hard, leaving no stone unturned. And that's exactly what John's parents wanted, right? To find any answers as to what happened to their son.

So where does this PI start? Well, William Deere's first stop was to check out John's childhood room, hoping to find any clues or any leads possible, right? Who is he? This John kid. And William Deere discovers something he believes is a clue. He comes across...

That demon board game. He's heard of that demon board game. It's called Dungeons and Dragons. This is in John's room. Oh, shit. Now at this point, John's disappearance has been shared nationwide. So everyone was invested. The smart, promising young man from a good, wealthy family

just disappear? This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

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So the private investigator feels that it's important to update the public on what he has discovered. And he shares with the press that John was into Dungeons and Dragons. And let me tell you, the press loses their goddamn mind. They run with this one detail and it becomes the whole story.

The media publishes headlines like "Game cultists still missing." And then there's "Dungeons and dragons cult may lead to missing boy." Oh, and another great, "Fantasy turned real life may have killed student." And a side note on this, no one had even confirmed if John was dead. Hey, it sold newspapers. Remember that episode we did on yellow journalism where it's like, nobody really gave a rat's ass about the truth. It was just like, are you gonna sell me newspapers or not? That's this.

They ran with it. People love Satan. Well, they don't love Satan, but like, you know, if a story involves Satan, they want to read all about it. Anyway, the PI searches the college campus looking for any leads as to where John could be. He searches high. He searches low. He even goes into weird tunnels under the school where like a lot of kids would hang out. And that's where he would come across some graffiti. Oh, shit. Not just any normal graffiti. This seemed to be

satanic looking symbols relating to the images he had seen from Dungeons and Dragons. Once again, this PI goes to his favorite people, the press, and he's like, hey guys, I found some questionable images, which further keep fanning the flames that Dungeons and Dragons was somehow to blame for John's disappearance. Anyway, somehow during this media frenzy, the press discovers that John had been struggling with his mental health

and also was under stress about his sexual identity. With this in mind, the press decides to run with it. They put out there that they believe John was gay, essentially outing him. Not even essentially, they're straight up outing him just to sell papers. Now this further cemented in some people's minds that being gay was also somehow satanic. Like don't play Dungeons and Dragons, it might turn you gay.

Eye roll. Later on, we find out that unfortunately, John did have demons of his own. He was struggling from depression, but not in the way that the press wanted to paint it.

because to those vultures, this promising college student went missing because of his involvement with Satan. So months go by, months go by, nobody has answers. The PI is still looking for John and finally in Morgan City, Louisiana, John was found alive. What? Yes, alive. John tells the PI that he was in hiding.

You know, like, he's like, "Why would I want to come forward when the media was making all these crazy stories about me?" Or whatever, you know? Like, why would anyone want to come forward when the media was just going nuts? And the fact that they were also maybe outing him, putting out the narrative that he might be gay. The whole country knew his business, and that is everything John did not want. So the PI reassures John, like, "Don't worry. I won't tell anyone your secret. I won't tell anyone I found you."

Bye. He tells his family anyway, and Jon thinks it would be best if he laid low for a while. So he does that for about a year. Jon was having a hard time coping with the pressure of bad press all around him and everything that was going on. Even though it was proven that everything that had happened with Jon had nothing to do with Dungeons and Dragons and everything to do with his depression, it didn't matter.

It finally reached a boiling point and John decided to take his own life in 1980. What did we accomplish here? Do you guys feel good about yourself, press? Media? Do you feel good about yourself? Fucking assholes.

To make matters worse, the P.I. decided to write a book about the whole case called The Dungeon Master. Yeah, which as you may be able to guess, was about how Dungeons and Dragons led John down a satanic path of self-destruction. And it made the P.I. a shit ton of money and he became a celebrity. And look...

If you aren't paying attention, let me just remind you, this whole thing wasn't even true. John was just struggling with depression and just wanted a minute to be left alone. And this PI wrote this whole book about nothing, about D&D. It's just a shitstorm. It's a circle jerk. It's just never ending. It's like, what the f- And he's making a ton of money off of this-

Poor man who took his own life. Like, anyways. Circling back to Dungeons and Dragons. Now you would think that D&D might have taken a big hit from all this, but guess what? Of course not, it didn't. There's no such thing as bad press. D&D was sold out everywhere. People were like, what?

Let me get in on this. I wanna like do that. Sounds cool. Sales soared and the game became cooler and edgier than ever before. I mean, what happens when you tell a bunch of kids they shouldn't do something? They go even harder and nothing goes as hard as heavy metal. And this, my friends, is when Satanic Panic. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking.

Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance. It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts.

discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner, and more. So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24, 7, 365 days a year so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere. And the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash Dark History today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Dark History. Now let's get back to the story.

Hey Joan, you look really cute. If you can't see Joan, come over to the YouTube, my YouTube channel where you can actually watch this podcast. But Joan has a really cute costume on. I'm sorry, Paul. Paul looks cute, but he didn't really show up. He didn't put in work, Paul. Sorry. But Joan over here, she like tried and we love that. Look at it, Paul's getting real pissed. Okay, battle is on between you two. Anyways, we're back to the story. The year, 1982.

Okay, so just imagine, go with me on this journey, because this is a fun one. Close your eyes. It's 1982. You're a young kid, a teenager, let's say. You're a teenager living in Iowa, home of the corn. You grew up in this small town, and you're going to go see your favorite musician, someone you've looked up to your entire life, the greatest musician of all time.

Who's that? He's a god to you. Ozzy Osbourne. You know? So you get to the stadium. You're so excited, you're about to pee your damn pants. You force your way to the front of the crowd. Women are taking their bras off and throwing it on stage. And you think to yourself, this is it. This is my moment to give Ozzy my gift.

I'm dying to give him my gift. So you reach into your wrangler's back pocket and pull out a stiff, dead bat. Yeah, like the bat, like an animal. You pull that out. Now you scream to the stage, Ozzy!

and then you grab that bat and you throw that shit on stage, your life is made. The crowd goes wild. Is that a bat? And you're like, fuck yeah, I brought a bat. Top that. And you're like, where do you even get a bat? Well, I don't know. You know, what Ozzy Osbourne does next would change the heavy metal genre forever. So Ozzy's on stage. He's screaming the lyrics to Crazy Train or something. And then he sees like this bat fall right in front of his feet. He's like, what the fuck? So he's like,

So he leans down, he picks up the bat's limp body, chomps his teeth down on the bat's neck and rips its head off, leaving Ozzy's mouth dripping and

"Bat blood and guts." After that, all bets were off, bitch. So the picture of Ozzy that was circulating around, he had like blood smeared all over his face, just confirmed the fears of parents all across America that heavy metal music equals Satan or heavy metal music is satanic. I mean, look at him, him being Ozzy. He literally just performed a live animal sacrifice in front of thousands of people. This took place in the middle of America

Satan was attacking the Heartland, you know? He's coming for us. People are worried. The conversation around heavy metal is really amping up, that they're satanic and they make Satan-loving music.

And heavy metal bands are into this because if it scares parents, it makes kids and teenagers want it even more. So they kind of like lean into it. So guys like Ozzy and other heavy metal bands are like, yeah, just fucking let's go with it. Why work against it? Bands like ACDC start putting out songs like Highway to Hell or even Ozzy putting out lyrics like, quote, I was born mean. By the time I was 12, I was killing. Killing for Satan.

The devil or even satanic symbols were on album covers, posters, t-shirts. I mean, this was a big F you to the people who were saying the devil has infiltrated every corner of America. Despite their efforts, heavy metal music was getting more and more popular. So a bunch of good Christian mothers, you know, them little angels doing the Lord's work, they decided, you know what, enough is enough. We have to do something about it, you guys. Grab your purse.

Let's go, we're going straight down to the president's office. We could just like talk to him, right? We just knock on his door, the president of the United States? Great, see you there. A few powerful, wealthy, well-connected women go to Washington, D.C. and make their way to the Capitol building with a purpose. They sit their little butts in front of some senators and proceed to say, do you know what our children are listening to? We need more control over what they are listening to. The senators were like, yeah, yeah.

This is how the whole parental advisory label was born. You know when you buy, you know, I don't think you're buying CDs, but when you used to buy records and CDs, there was that label that warned you that there were naughty or inappropriate lyrics in the album. Yeah, that came because of these bozos. And parents across the country are doing a happy dance. They're like, we did it. High five.

Five, we solved Satanism. But little did they know that this whole thing would backfire in a huge way. So these parents thought that, you know, this would ruin these bands forever and no one was gonna

no one was gonna be able to buy these albums. Instead, millions of kids went out to record stores searching for albums with these labels. Because if you got your hands on one, it was kind of like a badass badge of honor. All the parents did was make these bands and record companies even more popular because kids were seeking them out and

Satan wins again. Whoops. So while people like Ozzy and heavy metal rockers were chewing the heads off of bats and hailing Satan on stage, there were rumors that other musicians were getting in touch with the devil in more subtle ways. Have you guys ever heard of those secret messages that you can only hear when you play a record backwards?

Well, that's called backmasking and it got extremely popular. In 1981, a Christian minister named Michael Mills went on a Christian radio talk show and he like went through a whole bunch of popular rock songs claiming like each one had a secret satanic messaging with the goal being to bring America's youth to the dark side.

One famous example is from Led Zeppelin's iconic song Stairway to Heaven. If played in reverse, a part of the song is said to say, quote, Here's to you, my sweet Satan, the ones whose little path would make me sad, whose power is Satan. He'll give those with him 666. Like, what does that even mean, you guys? Like, my God. But honestly, like, most of the songs that they played backwards just sounded like chaotic

gibberish. They were just reaching. This guy was bored. He had too much time on his hands. If you play music backwards- Like, what are you doing? No one's doing that. Relax.

Right? But this whole backmasking thing actually gave a lot of musicians a great idea. They're like, "Hell yeah, we should actually code messages into our music. Great idea, guy." And this made paranoid parents lose their goddamn minds. The problem is that when musicians started to actually do this, it made people caught up in the satanic panic go,

Well, how do we know what's the devil and what isn't? And guess what they decided? It's all the devil. And it just made people more curious and freaking pumped to hear the crazy shit. So more people would buy records. So every time someone brings satanic panic into the conversation and tries to eliminate it, they only make it worse. The simmer becomes a boil and baby, the- This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking.

A boil is ready to bubble over. Now we're in Manhattan Beach, California. It's a beautiful, picture-perfect beach community right on the Pacific Ocean. This was considered like

the perfect place to raise a family, until a bombshell accusation in 1983. A call comes into the 911 dispatcher center. On the line is a frantic mother. Her name's Judy Johnson. And she's reporting something very disturbing. She says her young son attends a preschool called McMartin Preschool. And she says that her son was sexually assaulted by one of his teachers there. Oh,

Now before this, McMartin School was a trusted family-run institution. No accusations of wrongdoing throughout the years. Judy makes a 911 call, right? And she's making some wild accusations. So of course, police, like they waste no time. They respond right away. One of the first things they do is send out a scary letter to 200 parents with children at the school.

It says that someone has reported child abuse and the parents should ask their own children if they had experienced anything like that as well. Parents lose their freaking minds and start pulling their kids out of the school and putting them into therapy, which honestly, smart move, right? Therapy is never a bad thing. If you hear that sexual abuse is going on, I'm not a parent, but I couldn't imagine I'd flip. People are kind of thinking they're doing the right thing, but let me tell you, pfft.

Not with this story. The young children of McMartin Preschool were put through hundreds of hours of intense therapy. The therapists were using puppets and dolls with private parts asking like, "Hey child, point to where the teacher had touched you."

And they were also asking children to describe what happened at school. Early on, most of the kids are like, "I don't know what you're talking about. I wasn't abused. Can I go home now?" Normally, these kids probably would have been released. Parents are convinced that the devil is here trying to get their kids, so the therapist grills them even harder and starts asking leading questions. The therapist uncovers some rather interesting stories.

No one was expecting. For one, some kids start talking about animal sacrifices that were happening right in front of their faces. They're bringing up horses, giraffes, rabbits, and even the classroom pets were being killed, allegedly, in tunnels beneath the school for all to see. And then some kids reported that they were taken on wild field trips to the local cemetery where they were forced to dig up dead bodies. Yeah, preschoolers digging up dead bodies. That's a field trip. Am I right?

Some kids even described being taken from their classroom down into like this tunnel system that ran under the preschool where they would be sexually abused. And the cheering on top of all these terrifying things that the kids were saying, well, they said that the teachers at school sometimes flew around the classroom.

flew flying around the classroom and they did this all in the name of Satan. I know when these kids are bringing up that their teachers are flying around the room, I had questions, but there were no answers. Like where'd that come from? That'd be cool. I'd be like, what's sick?

So these kids were literally living Michelle Smith's satanic ritual abuse memory. Evangelists and people who had been the loudest about satanic panic were like, see, we told you guys it's happening in our backyards. The children, save the children. Now get this, multiple preschools in the area shut down because everyone's scared. Everyone's thinking like, I don't know, like all preschools might be bad. So it's looking real bad for the McMartin preschool.

Based on the police investigation and the therapist's reports, LA County attorneys bring criminal charges against the school.

By 1984, 360 children were claiming to have been abused. And usually where there's smoke, there's fire, right? I don't know, maybe. So whenever the trial takes place or whatever, everyone goes to the courtroom, okay? Everyone in town wants to know what the F is going on. Hundreds of kids are there, even more parents. It's just chaotic.

Reporters have their cameras focused on the building. It's a trial of the century. People at home are just eating their popcorn, waiting for the trial to confirm their greatest fear. The community has been taken over by Satanists who are trying to corrupt their children. Sure, during the pre-trial for this case, which lasted 20 months, a bunch of weird shit starts to come out. Like, weird shit. First of all, Judy Johnson...

The hero mom that blew the whistle on this horrible school of saintness? The one who like started this whole thing? Well, news breaks that she fully made up the story about her child being abused. Shit. Now, there was an expert witness to speak to this, but turns out they weren't really qualified to speak on the matter. And not only this, she claimed that her son's abuser, the teacher, she said he can fly, which is where the kids got the idea that their teachers could fly.

I don't know. And then she said, "That abusive teacher has been drilling holes into my son's armpits." And people were like, "What?" And then it comes out, Judy Johnson was actually a very sick woman. Yeah. Well, my thing is like, if she's saying that they're drilling holes into her son's armpits,

I mean, you know, I want to believe the children, of course, but it's like, why don't you want to just look in a kid's armpit and see if that's true? Did nobody check? Okay. Anyways, she was a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic who was also struggling with alcoholism. So you'd think, you know, hey, case closed.

Sorry about that. But what about the other 359 kids who said crazy stuff had happened to them? What about that giraffe they supposedly sacrificed for Satan? Well, all that, guess what? Lies. It was all lies. And remember how those kids went through hundreds of hours of therapy? Well, it was more like a full-blown interrogation than therapy. The kids were being emotionally manipulated and they were asked leading questions. Questions like, are you sure you didn't see your teacher fly?

with her eye twitching. "Susie said she saw the teacher fly. Are you saying Susie is a liar?" These are preschoolers. These kids pretty much believed into thinking the satanic abuse actually did indeed happen. After years of investigation, millions of dollars, and an insane amount of press attention, not one piece of concrete evidence was ever presented at trial.

Not making that up. They didn't have one little piece of evidence. Nothing. They never found any tunnels. They never found any sacrificed animals. The kids never took any field trips to the graveyard. And all those terrible things the kids said happened. Well, it turns out they were just repeating what their parents were telling them to say. Which is so weird. Like, why would you tell your... I don't understand that. But here's the real kicker. The doctor from earlier who wrote Michelle Remembers. Remember? Remember?

He and Michelle met with the parents and children from McMartin Preschool and pretty much coached them on exactly what to say. And wouldn't you know, their story sounded a whole lot like Michelle's. And I mean, they were kids, they're babies. Usually when an adult tells a kid something, they listen, right? I don't know. I don't have kids, but that's what I assume. I hear that kids are like sponges.

I have a sponge, so I know what that's like. See, I'm a parent. A few years after the trial ended, a bunch of psychologists came out with studies showing people can easily be convinced of things that never happened. And this is referred to as false memory syndrome.

And if you're basing a whole case off of it, for example, like the McMartin Preschool case, it can be very dangerous and misleading. By 1990, every charge against the McMartin Preschool employees were thrown out, and all these charges against the teachers were dropped.

Even though nothing came of the case, it was still the longest and most expensive criminal trial in American history at the time. They spent $15 million on nothing. Wow, you know, could have just gave that to us. We could have found something to do with it, but nope.

Satan got it. Who got that money? Yeah. Anyways, it wasn't just money that was wasted. Obviously, innocent lives were completely ruined and destroyed. I mean, children are probably traumatized from this too. Shit. People spent actual time in jail and their lives and their reputations were destroyed forever. And maybe that...

is the real work of the devil. You know? Since then, we've learned a lot about false memories. It's not just misremembering the spelling of like Bernstein bears or whatever. Researchers have shown that false memories can be implanted for significant traumatic events. We've also learned that certain things make false memories more likely, like using leading questions, what they did in the McMartin preschooler case. And also when hypnosis is used. Michelle remembers? Yeah.

And just to let you guys know, these tactics are still used today. I mean, there are many quote unquote therapists out there who think satanic ritual abuse is real. And like, maybe it is. Shit. I don't know. And use these tactics to try and treat their patients. So this whole story, because I was thinking about it and I was like, you know what satanic panic reminds me of? Choco tacos. Yeah.

Hello, obvious. Remember a few months back, maybe you don't, because I feel like nobody heard this except for like a small few people. But anyways, Choco Taco came out and was like, hey, we're getting rid of Choco Tacos. And everyone was like, no, not the Choco Taco. You know, just losing their goddamn minds. The company literally was discounting them because no one was buying them. And then all of a sudden these fans come out of the woodwork like, wait, my Choco's like, no.

I guess the fear of losing this delicious treat just really sent people over the edge. People went out, bought a shit ton of them, sold them online for thousands of dollars. And because of panic, the company is probably gonna bring them back. All of this was because of Choco Taco panic.

They did this with Twinkies too. Remember when Twinkies were going away and everyone was like, "Twinkies!" And then they go and they buy them all? Just shows you how strong the power of panic can be. So next time people are panicking about something, maybe take a deep breath,

Calm down. There you go. You're welcome. It doesn't matter if it's for the devil or for ice cream. Human psychology is wild and the brain can jump through some serious hoops to believe whatever the hell it wants to believe. Anyways, friends, I would love to hear what you think of today's story. But for me, I think my takeaway here is to just stay curious. Think for yourself. As silly as that sounds, right? You just got to think for yourself.

this mom mentality. If everyone's like jumping and attacking somebody for being a witch, being the devil, et cetera, et cetera. I don't know, maybe step away and think for yourself, right? Instead, maybe buy a ticket on the crazy train with Ozzy Osbourne and head to a Dungeons and Dragons tournament. You'll thank me later. Oh, also anybody watching, if you play Dungeons and Dragons, I'm looking to start my own D&D little crew. I'm looking for a dungeon master.

If you kind of, you know, you can like be my dungeon master and then, you know, it's a, however you take that. Open for suggestions on how to get a dungeon master for my board game.

Well, everyone, thank you so much for learning with me today. Remember, don't be afraid to ask questions and get the whole story because you deserve that. Stay curious. I'd love to hear you guys' reactions to today's story, so make sure to use the hashtag Dark History over on social media so I can follow along. Right, Joan?

Great. Join me over on my YouTube where you can watch these episodes on Thursday after the podcast airs. And also while you're there, don't forget to drop on by and catch my murder mystery and makeup. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. You make good choices and I'll be talking to you next week. Goodbye. This podcast is executive produced by Bailey Sarian, Kimberly Jacobs, Junia McNeely from Three Arts, Kevin Grush, and Claire Turner from Maiden Network.

Writers, Katie Burris, Alison Filobos, Joey Scaluzzo, and me, Bailey Sarian. Shot and edited by Tafadzwa Namarundwe and Hannah Bakker. Research provided by Xander Elmore. Special thank you to our expert, Evan Anderson with the Satanic Temple. And I'm your host, Bailey Sarian. Bye! ♪♪♪

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60: Dungeons, Dragons, and Satan Worship