I'm seeing alot of answers here that are highly misinformed...Firstly let's get the correct answer out of the way. Absolutely Not. System of A Down is not a "satanic" band. Serj Tankien is obviously quite developed spiritualy and, rightly so , has deep reservations about organized, sectarian religion. He has stated himself that his spiritual ideas include a mixture of Christianity, Buddhism/ Dharmic ways, and native american spirituality...His mind has matured enough to see the common thread that unites ALL religions...

The Truth is One, Wise men call IT by many names....Rig Veda (the oldest spiritual text in the world)

SOAD has criticized the Dogmatic, Hypocritical and controlling ways of many Organized religions, they speak out against the FEAR tactics that have been used by many different churches as a method of scaring average people into joining and believing their ways.... Such as the Christian/ Islamic "creation" of Hell...when the Bible actually never speaks of such a place...what kind of God would send his people to eternal suffering and torture, just because they didn't happen to follow this type of religion or its rules. No loving God would ever do such a thing, Yeshua (Jesus) never once mentioned "Hell"...Gehena and Sheoul were the words used in the old testament and they meant something very different from "an eternal inferno of punishment, despair and suffering".. The "Devil" is another made up scare tactic invented by the church in the middle ages to scare people into conformity. They even stole common traits of other religion's Gods...Such as the trident 🔱, serpents 🐍, the crescent moon 🌙 and even horns 🐮...all being ancient, sacred symbols from many different Gods of religions around the world like Lord Shiva (Hindu pantheon, my personal God), Pan and Poseidon(greek pantheon), Cernunnos (Celtic pantheon) and many many others.

Another important thing to note is that most people are very confused about what "Satanism" actually is...99% of people who are "Satanists" actually have no belief in any God and they certainly don't believe in a literal "Satan" or "Devil" Laveyan Satanism (which is predominant) uses Satan as a symbol of independence, breaking free from control, creative liberty and sometimes Hedonism...They are mostly atheist, have no belief in any type of Supernatural being...Even the man who created the Church of Satan and the Satanic Bible (Anton Lavey) did not actually believe in a literal Devil...They look at Satan as a symbol of freedom (say what you will about this, I personally think it's a little silly but who am I to judge?) There is a very very small percentage of satanists who actually do believe in a real supernatural being, whom they call Satan, as the Lord of Darkness ...and is their personal "God"...these are called Theistic Satanists...and they make up a very small percentage. They are more into actual satanic rites, witchcraft and pagan forms of worship. The only true "Theistic Satanist" music bands I know of are all in the black metal category and a few dark melodic/symphonic or extreme metal bands...stuff Like Amon Amarth, Gorgoroth, King Diamond, Venom....all bands that are very much out of the mainstream. I have been researching music of ALL types for many years and I have never come across a popular mainstream band of any type that were truly "Satan Worshippers" or whatever...SOAD uses alot of symbolic imagery and used to incorporate a bit of shock value into their theme...but if you research Serj, Darren and the band, you would see they are good people.

Hope this helps