Wondering what the deal is with those creepy-looking masks that keep popping up at the “Occupy” protests?
Well, beyond just being a rather cowardly way of saying “Look at me!”?
 

 
They’re actually an allusion to Guy Fawkes, the 16th century English Catholic, who, along with his fellow conspirators, planned to blow up Parliament in 1605. The failed “Gunpowder Plot” was an attempt to restore a Catholic monarch to the throne. When the conspiracy was revealed, Fawkes and several others were executed for treason.
Over time, Fawkes became a folk hero of sorts, and today the whole episode is celebrated by the British on November 5th as “Guy Fawkes Night”, with bonfires and fireworks.
 
It’s doubtful that the present-day protesters are aware of the centuries-old connection. They’ve adopted the Guy Fawkes’ mask from a stylized version made popular by the 2005 movie, V for Vendetta. The film features an enigmatic lone anarchist who, in the graphic novel on which it is based, uses Fawkes as a role model in his quest to end the rule of a fictional fascist party in the UK.
British graphic novel artist David Lloyd, who created the original image of the mask for a comic strip, apparently thinks the OWS masked miscreants are pretty hip. From BBC News:

“The Guy Fawkes mask has now become a common brand and a convenient placard to use in protest against tyranny (“tyranny”? )- and I’m happy with people using it, it seems quite unique, an icon of popular culture being used this way,” he says.

 
Yeah, real cool Dave.
Sorry, but I can’t help feeling there’s something more sinister lurking behind these masks.
 
Earlier this month, Rob Taylor, at Pajamas Media, wrote about a specific group of lowlifes that have adopted the mask for their own purposes – purposes which aren’t exactly well-intentioned: ‘We Are Anonymous, We Are Legion’.
 
“Anonymous” is a loose-knit cyber-group of hackers who have been crawling around the darker corners of the internet for several years. Excessive pride in their techno abilities probably fueled the drive to exhibit their “talents” to us lesser mortals. Taylor describes some of the stunts they’ve managed to pull off (threatening innocent citizens, hacking an epilepsy support forum with malicious intent). “Anonymous” is clearly moving into the realm of cyber-terrorism.
 
Taylor’s article includes a creepy video of a masked goon with a menacing voice talking about taking out the “Banksters”. I’d rather not embed it – seriously bad vibes – but you can watch it HERE.
 

 
Evil? Or just a hacker hoax? Even Taylor, who states up front that he’s not a Christian, finds it unsettling…

Anonymous spends a little over eight minutes making the case for violence against bankers and the mass murder of Wall Street workers…
In the video you’ll notice that the speaker disparages the idea of freedom, which should surprise some of Anonymous’ more rabid fans. But what I found most chilling were the frequent allusions to homicidal mob violence being divinely inspired.
 
What divinity inspires mobs to lynch unarmed people?

 
These cyber-thugs recently announced that they were planning to “erase Wall Street from the internet” on October 10th. Although that date has come and gone, the threat remains:

Anonymous helped organize the Wall Street Occupation movement, encouraged hundreds of people who can barely care for themselves now to congregate in New York, and now wants to create a catastrophe there that members hope will cause untold chaos. This is not so much a protest as a plot to murder those people. The aftermath of a successful takedown of the markets by Anonymous will not look like the glorious revolution these protesters are imagining; it will be akin to a zombie apocalypse as panicked city dwellers find the intricate web of services that keep them alive disappearing with the malicious keystrokes of people watching and laughing from hundreds of miles away.

 
Many of the commenters posting after Taylor’s article think he’s blowing things out of proportion, and discount the possibility of any real danger. Secular skeptics tend to be dismissive of the existence of true evil:

Anonymous is a joke, people. It’s a little internet epithet that’s meant to say “hey, I know common web references”. There is no organization. People like that “we are legion” line because it’s fun and edgy.

 
“Fun?” “A joke?” Pardon me for not laughing. “We are Legion” (from Luke 8:26-37 and Matt.8:28-34) doesn’t elicit much humor from Bible Clingers like myself. That’s what the demons that Jesus exorcized called themselves.
 
Evil isn’t something to dabble in because it’s fun and edgy.

Taylor asks What “divinity” inspires mobs to lynch unarmed people? None. The inspiration comes from a much darker place.
As Mikhail Bakunin, one of Karl Marx’ cronies, said;

“The Evil One is the satanic revolt against divine authority… Socialists recognize each other by the words, “In the name of the one to whom a great wrong has been done… Satan (is) the eternal rebel, the first freethinker and the emancipator of worlds.”
 
From: Progressive Satanic revolt: from “nothingness” to worship of Satan ~ Linda Kimball

 
Vade retro me, Satana!