Truth be told, I haven’t exactly needed to come up with a pen name because I’ve found myself using two monikers more than anything else when I’m not using my own name: (Oerba Dia) Vanille or Serah (Farron), depending on where you find me. This might surprise some people given that I’m… a bit more careful than most about what I publicly post, but I haven’t conclusively come up with a “pen name” that is uniquely mine as much as I use monikers that pay homage to favorite characters of mine from, up until this point, video games that I love. My Discord name happens to be Vanille, and that one was easier to snag because Discord assigns numbers after your name (Name#Numbers), which means that you can probably get the “name” that you want on Discord without having to work hard at it. As for my domain, I was actually surprised that this URL wasn’t registered. Both happen to be favorite characters of mine in the Final Fantasy XIII series.

At any rate, a lot of Satanists have come up with pen names for themselves because they are not in positions to where they can “out themselves” as such — they may not have supportive family members, it may be perilous for their job if that information were to become public knowledge attached to their real names, or for any number of reasons. I wish that we didn’t have to live in a world where one’s religious views, or even lack thereof, meant that we had to safeguard ourselves against others’ criticism, but we still do, even though I would like to take the time to point out the irony in Christians claiming to be persecuted because of their religious views when they are anything but in today’s world. I don’t feel like I can openly wear my necklace from The Satanic Temple in a lot of situations, or even a shirt. I don’t quite feel like I can openly wear some of my other Satanic jewelry (over my shirt, of course, since my skin allergies are that bad) because someone might recognize the lore it comes from and attempt to start something with me “in the name of Jesus”. I don’t feel like I can tell a whole lot of people what my religious views honestly are. So I definitely get the appeal of having a pen name, and have begun to give it some thought, just to have one in the back of my mind in case I ever do authentically need one. (Some people call them “Satanic names”, heh.)

I suppose something will come to me in due time, something that just sounds so right I go, “That’s the one!”