Jim Jones and the River Below

On this day in 1978, 909 people took their own lives under the direction of Jim Jones in Jonestown, Guyana, by drinking a concoction of kool-aid and cyanide.  Crazy stuff.  It’s easy to imagine that these people were all gullable, brainwashed idiots who’d long ago lost their minds, because it offers something in the way of an explanation (lazy at best) for the tragedy.  But we know the story is much more complicated.  Jones was appealing to many because he stressed racial and social equality, the dissolution of private property, and anti-capitalism in a time when those possibilities seemed infinitely more entrancing than their active social alternatives (sounds vaguely familiar).  Proof of Jones’ appeal can be seen by the fact that even guys like Harvey Milk, the first openly-gay man elected to office in the states, vouched for him up until the near end (Milk wrote a letter of support for the People’s Temple to President Jimmy Carter less than a year before the Jonestown Massacre).  Anyway, nothing offers pause for reflection like mass suicide.  For a short documentary with some relevant Jones preaching, go here.  Otherwise, just listen to this, because it’s fucking badass, and I see as a nice sonic compendium to this discussion.