‘After School Satan Club’ causes a stir at California elementary school – By Eric Ting (SFGATE) / Nov 19, 2022
A new after-school club at Golden Hills Elementary School in Kern County’s Tehachapi, called the “After School Satan Club,” is drawing community outrage.
That’s largely the point.
For years, the Satanic Temple, a group the Washington Post described as a “nontheistic religious organization advocating for secularism and scientific rationalism,” has been launching these clubs in public schools where evangelical Christian groups — namely, the Good News Club — have their own meetings.
In 2001, the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Good News Club when a New York school district sought to prevent the group from holding meetings on school grounds after school hours. The Supreme Court ruled that the district could not discriminate against groups based on their viewpoints, and because comparable secular groups were allowed to operate, the Good News Club must also be accommodated. The ruling not only opened the door for religious groups meeting in public schools, but also for the proliferation of After School Satan Clubs as intended counterweights. The clubs created controversy in Moline, Illinois, and Lebanon, Ohio, earlier this year.
