The People's Temple In Jonestown, Guyana

On November 18, 1978, in Jonestown, Guyana, over nine hundred members of a religious sect called the Peoples Temple died along with their leader Jim Jones. In a related incident, a California congressman and some news reporters died after visiting the religious compound. Jim Jones created and governed The Peoples Temple in Jonestown. Jones was a preacher who started his church group in Indiana, moved to California, and then moved to Jonestown, Guyana. Jones had a “vision of a Communist community” in Jonestown, where each individual could live free of racism, poverty, and social injustice. Some members loved living in Jonestown, while others hated being there and wanted out. However, Jones did not want anyone to leave. California congressman,
Leo Ryan, and several news reporters decided to visit Jonestown because they heard bad things were happening there. During Congressman Ryan’s visit, he announced to the members he was willing to take anyone back to the United States who wanted to go. When Ryan and his group of people arrived at the nearby airstrip to leave, some of Jones’ armed men attacked them. Five people died including the Congressman, while others were severely injured. Back at the “utopian” village, Jones created a drug induced drink with cyanide to kill the remaining Temple members including two hundred and seventy-six children. In order for one to comprehend the meaning behind Jonestown, one must analyze the findings of various sources who investigated the subject over the past thirty-six years. Next, using primary and secondary sources, one should examine the supporting arguments that demonstrate Jonestown was a mass murder, not a mass suicide. Finally, one must consider the counter arguments that exist as to why some think it was a suicide, not a mass murder. By employing both primary and secondary sources such as scholarly books, historical records, eyewitness accounts, and government records, this paper will prove that Jim Jones was responsible for the people dying in Jonestown. The myth is it was a mass suicide, when in reality it was a mass murder.
People around the world were shocked on November 18, 1978, when over nine hundred members of a religious sect, committed murder and suicide in a jungle commune located in Jonestown, Guyana. The people who built this utopian village followed a charismatic preacher named Jim Jones. Jim Jones originally launched his church, The Peoples Temple, in Indiana during the 1950s. He was a white preacher whose followers were predominantly working-class, poor African Americans and white people. People around Indiana filled the church pews to hear his sermons on social justice and racial equality. Later, in the early 1960s, Jones moved his church to Northern California. Jones’ primary purpose for doing so, was due to a vision of a nuclear holocaust he felt was coming. He later moved his church to San Francisco. While in San Francisco, the mission of the church emphasized healings and miracles, racial justice, and the justification for social action based on the life and teachings of Jesus. In addition, they focused on drug rehabilitation, medical care, childcare, and feeding the hungry. Over time, Jones and the church became a political force in the San Francisco area, another sign of Jones’ growing influence. As a result, they helped elect Democrat candidates to various local government positions. “The Temple’s success was evident during the 1976 presidential campaign, Rosalynn Carter, wife of Democratic Party candidate Jimmy Carter, visited the temple.” Helping to elect friendly political candidates to office led to other benefits for Jones. When worried relatives of church members began to call for investigations of Jones and the Peoples Temple, the same politicians refused them and no investigation took place. In the mid 1970’s, Jones and his followers moved to Guyana to build a utopian community, calling it Jonestown. Jones’ stated goal was to create a better life for his followers and their children. They hoped this agricultural project would become self-sufficient and would become “heaven and earth.” The members of the Peoples Temple believed in Jones and his message of hope. In the end, however, they made a bad choice, as Jim Jones isolated his followers from the outside world and eventually caused them to commit “revolutionary suicide.”
To this day, the legacy of Jonestown is a mass suicide, mass murder, or even both combined. Much evidence exists that shows, in reality, it was a mass murder. A common definition of a mass murder is a group of innocent people killed by another individual or individuals. First, when Jones was a child, he was obsessed with “death and religion.” Next, when Jones was preaching his church sermons, he asked people to call him “father” or “dad” and preached he was their best friend. Anything Jones said, the people believed. On the other side, Jones used drugs such as “amphetamine and barbiturates like pentobarbital to reduce stress and allow him to sleep.” Jones “knew he was a bad guy,” he just never came out to admit it because he did not want “anyone to know the truth.”
Jim Jones had power and control over many of his people.
To them, he was God. He promised them a better life in Jonestown. He made them believe he could heal people who were sick or injured. He did not have these healing powers. He faked all his miracles. Again, his people believed him. Jones seemed to hypnotize them. Jones also kept his people living in fear. He tried to keep individuals from leaving the People’s Temple, because he did not want them to report the truth of Jonestown. Instead of allowing his people to move freely, Jones controlled them. The people followed Jones’ commands without hesitation or questions. Jones was a narcissistic individual, only interested in himself and how much power he had over his people. He was also mentally ill.
Before Jones and his followers went to Guyana, he told them about how Jonestown was a better place to live. He said it was away from the United States. Since it would be out of the United States this meant they would be free from capitalism, free from racial inequality, and they would get to live in a socialistic society. People liked the sound of all those promises Jones was making. He incorporated presentations to demonstrate the effect Jonestown had on others. He commercialized in order to get followers down to
Guyana.
While in Jonestown, before the congressman and reporters came to visit, Jones had a meeting and told his people about the congressman and reporters coming out to see them. Jones said whatever questions the reporters asked, they needed to lie and pretend Jonestown was the best thing that ever happened to them. The reason for this was to influence the congressman into reporting back only positive things, not the truth of what was really going on.
While in Jonestown, Jones would have suicide drills called “White Nights.” People stated White Nights were to prepare them for the possibility of real life crisis like death. Temple members say there were only a few times when the “community armed itself with weapons.” Jones would keep the Temple members up all night going through step by step procedures they would need to take in case of an attack from the outside world. During these meetings, Jones discussed the topic death. These people had no choice or say in what they wanted to do with their lives, they were controlled every inch and had no escape.
On the day of November 18, after the congressman, his reporters, and some Temple members left Jonestown to get on a plane to fly home, Jones held his last meeting. This time, he told his people if they “cannot live in peace, they must die in peace.” He told his people someone on the plane with the congressman, reporters, and Temple members was going to “shoot the pilot.” He lied when he told them he did not plan it. He told them he had never lied to them, when all along he had been lying. He told his followers they need to “be kind to the children, be kind to the seniors, and take the potion like they used to take in ancient Greece,” and they “are not committing suicide; [it is] a revolutionary act.” He warned them if any of the children lived, he was going to have them “butchered.” His plan was to turn weapons on all his followers, and force them to drink the poison. While Jones was preaching about the revolutionary act, his trusted followers were mixing the “cyanide-laced fruit punch.” Jones made the people line up and drink the fruit punch. Some willingly drank it, while others drank it against their will. The kids, of course, had no choice; the members injected the kids or held them down. Laura Johnston Kohl wrote an article Was It Murder or Was It Suicide and stated, “We cannot say that the children who died that day committed suicide.” The rank and file Temple members were unaware of Jones’ final death plan. Jones and his leadership group knew temple members would not willingly kill themselves or their children. Jones’ goal was to make sure there was a record that said his followers agreed to commit suicide, but in reality, they did not agree fully. They were forced. Today if someone is suicidal, people are encouraged to seek help via counseling or to take medication. However, for those in Jonestown, talk of suicide was only encouraged with the belief that one’s death would be like martyrdom. The last person to die was Jim Jones, with bullet holes in his head. Either he shot himself, or someone else did it for him.
The most reliable person that knew Jim Jones more than anyone else was his son Stephan. Stephan was lucky enough to go to Jonestown before his father had arrived. Even Stephan thought Jonestown was the best thing in the world. Stephan helped build the utopian community before Jones and his followers arrived. In an interview with Stephan, he said, “When dad got down there, overnight it became a different place. Work went from being means of production to means of control.” They worked less, the food got worse, when the work was finished, your free time was his time. Stephan mentioned control was a part of Jones always speaking out to his people through the microphone, but more importantly, it was about the praise of his people. Stephan said his father’s world “rested in his perception of your perception of him.” As long as Jones’ members acted as if they believed in everything he was saying, they were safe. In an article called Like Father, Like Son written by Stephan himself, he tells a story about the night his dad took him to a woman’s house and how in the end his father told Stephan that she was going to be his new mom. Jim also told his wife about where he took Stephan the next day and everything that happened during the night. In the interview with Stephan, he said the night just mentioned was the breaking point in his father’s and his relationship. He knew then something was not right about his dad. With all the trouble and horrible things Jim Jones did while he was alive, Stephan admits he hated his father while he was alive and years after he died. Stephan even admits his father was a controlling, sick individual. Stephan, in the interview, said daily he thought about killing his dad, and they even talked to each other about it. Stephan’s brother almost did kill his father once, but Stephan kept him from doing it. Stephan has gained awareness of all aspects of his life because of everything that happened in Jonestown.
Even though Jonestown was a mass murder, some people were willing to commit suicide. A mass suicide is a group of people willingly giving up their lives for another person or cause. They did it in belief they were dying for a worthwhile cause. White Nights were “practiced suicide drills” where the temple members “pretended to drink poison and then fell down dead as part of a loyalty test to Jim Jones.” These drills were a “mental preparation, as well as a physical re-enactment.” It required the people to “accept the idea of suicide.” With all the audiotapes recorded and revealed (after the massacre), there was one tape in particular that was an “agreement with the plan to commit suicide.” Laura Johnston Kohl wrote an article Was It Murder or Was It Suicide. In it she wrote, “I know there was murder and suicide. Suicide – to me – is an adult concept. Adults – over 18 or 21 whichever ones considers [being] majority age – can and do commit suicide. Infants, children and adolescents [do not].” Agreeing with this quote, Jonestown had a few suicides, but the majority of the massacre was a murder. Children certainly were murdered but some people willingly gave up their lives for Jones. Many of these people believed suicide was the only option if they would be unable to live their lives in peace at Jonestown. They would rather die than give up their utopian dreams.
One person after another stood up and stated their willingness to die at that moment during a White Night meeting on an October night. Dianne Wilkinson said she would “rather have [her] dignity, than have to be on [her] knees begging for [her] freedom. And I’d rather take [her] own life.” Bill Oliver stated he “made the decision to commit revolutionary suicide. [His] decision has been well thought-out.” Shanda James was only 19 years old, but mentioned she had “chosen to commit revolutionary suicide. [She] felt that [she] would rather die than see [everyone] divided or torn down, and [she] would like to show the rest of the world that together is the only way, and [she] would like to die tonight.” These three individuals obviously were for committing suicide and greatly believed in Jones and everything he had to say. These people sacrificed their love and life to Jones. This is what Jones wanted and he got it. In “Understanding Jonestown and Peoples Temple”, it mentions that on the final night in Jonestown, more than nine hundred members drank the cyanide-laced fruit punch. Witnesses’ say some people unwillingly drank the poison, while others willingly drank the mixture.
Today, when someone says the word Jonestown, people associate it with the mass suicide/murder by over nine hundred people who drank cyanide-laced Kool-Aid. They remember how horribly Jim Jones treated his people and how he lied to them constantly in order to control their lives and their minds. A mentally ill individual controlled them. Jim Jones forced his members to give up their lives. Files from the FBI “clearly document, the community devolved into a living hell from which there was no escape.” On the other hand, eighty-seven members either escaped before November 18 or were not in Jonestown the day the mass murder happened. These were the fortunate members. A second quote from “Understanding Jonestown and the Temple Members” says that:
Tim Carter, a survivor, [who said] that members of Peoples Temple did not know in 1978 what they know today. A lack of information and failure to communicate trapped people in a world they did not, and could not, fully comprehend. If Temple members had known the whole story, they would have made different choices.
During the months leading up to that final night in Jonestown, the residents were forced to participate in mock suicide drills.
Jones preached to them constantly on the merits of revolutionary suicide. He told them that ordinary suicide would be selfish, but revolutionary suicide would send a message to the rest of the world. Over and over the residents practiced their drills to the point of accepting whatever Jones wanted them to do without question. The people of Jonestown sacrificed their lives, their time, and their love to Jim Jones. They believed everything Jones was doing was for the best. They never gave up hope, until the last day when death flashed before their very own eyes. Jim Jones betrayed them horribly. These people just wanted the best lives for themselves and their children. They wanted to live in a socialistic society, free from capitalism and racial inequality and free from the violence they believed was occurring in the United States. They believed Jones when he promised to take them away from this violence. It turned out in the end they did not escape from it at all. They all died because of the violence perpetrated on them by their God, Jim Jones. Without Jim Jones, most of those people would still be alive
today.