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Interestingly though, in my Life Sciences class last year, almost no one had heard of them. There is something to be said about over-specialization in the sciences. But that’s a discussion for another day.
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Transcript
Hello CultureCrew, this is Joshua Hwang delivering another 90 Seconds to Culture podcast.
Jonestown: Suicide in the South
In a large metal vat, they prepared a mixture of grape Flavor aid, valium, chloral hydrate, and presumably cyanide. That day, November 18, 1978, just over 900 members of the Jonestown cult drank this poison mixture, infants included, and died silently in the beautiful scenery of Guyana.
The Jonestown suicides were the largest loss of American civilian life in a non-natural disaster until the September 11th, 2001 attacks. Jim Jones was the leader of the Peoples Temple religious group or cult, which created a new community named Jonestown in Guyana, west of the capital Georgetown.
After US Congressman Leo Ryan, came to investigate the community after reported complaints among his followers. He planned to leave with the few who wished to leave the cult, and a surprisingly approving report. On the airstrip however, Jones ordered the killing of the defectors and the Congressman’s party. Making Leo Ryan the only US Congressman to die in the line of duty.
Shortly after, Jones initiated the “revolutionary suicides” by saying that “all was lost” and that death would be preferable to invasion by capitalist pigs.
The significance of this event is the sheer numbers and rarity of such an event. While you may remember the Heaven’s Gate cult, where members thought by committing suicide they would board a spaceship behind the Hale-Bopp comet, a relatively small 38 members committed suicide. It is not everyday that cult members commit suicide on such a large scale.
Sources / Further Reading:
Wikipedia: Jonestown
Jonestown “Death Tape” - Not for the faint of heart.
[tags]jonestown, suicide, mass suicide, history, popular culture, religion, cults, podcast, culture[/tags]
(image from La Tête Krançien via flickr)
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{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
There are many things which are very popular in their time and then fade into obscurity. Events in the somewhat distant past are comical in this sense because there are older adults who remember it but younger adults who don’t.
Today, the Great Depression, the sinking of the Lusitania and the immense popularity of boxing, all well-known to anyone who lived in the early 20th century, are by and large confined to history books.
Before them, at the turn of the previous century, there was a craze about bicycles, which many presumed to be the focus of future wars, and pedestrianism, in which multi-day footraces of absurdly long distances were staged and covered with the passion of the Daytona 500 in a red state.
Of course, specializing in science or business has its drawbacks. My brothers, who studied accounting and engineering, did not know the year Columbus landed in the Americas. I work with someone who had never heard of Laos. Of course, then there are liberal arts graduates who ask if soldiers inside the South Korean portion of the DMZ are South Korean or North Korean.
On a related note, I always thought it was weird when kids asked me if I was (or my parents were) from South or North Korea. Although I have met one North Korean refugee, dictatorships usually don’t allow such escapism.
I feel like the Great Depression people have at least heard about. I don’t know how important pedestrianism remains though. Anyways, it is so… pedestrian.
… Hello? Is this thing on?
The same craze doesn’t exist for indoor marathons at Madison Square Garden. It’s dead.
I just wanted to add that Jim Jones’ son is a survivor of Jonestown, and has given a number of incredible interviews regarding the inner workings of the cult as well as his father’s mind. The most notable one that comes to mind is one he did on the hour which took up the entirety of the show.
Ballin’.
To Josh and his followers,
I made the mistake of neglecting to check the updates on this site for 3 whole days. Yesterday, after not becoming more cultured in 90 seconds, I went to a trivia event and was sorely punished.
Jim Jones came up in one of the questions and I did not know the answer. When I checked 90secondstoculture.com today, I found everything I needed to know and more!
Let this be a lesson to all: check daily.
@Adeel: Good, finally.
@Junk Trunk: Isn’t it interesting how respected or at least credible George Stroumblkajdfslkjaepoulos has become?
@Jenna: Seriously, everyone should. This is a sign!
strangely, eric brought this topic up at dinner tonight for 2 reasons.
#1: cnn is doing a special this week about jonestown… although we are not exactly sure why. the anniversary maybe?
#2: the phrase “drinking the kool-aid” which is starting to make its way into pop culture. e.g. “many american youth are really drinking the obama kool-aid”
holla!
Yes, the anniversary was pretty recently, on the 18th of November.
I hadn’t heard that phrase used before, but I love it. As you know I am now referring to myself as a post-Modern linguist (or is that a cunning linguist), and I love new phrases and words.
Incidentally, I’ve been trying to get the word “ebola” ameliorated to mean really cool. Like how “sick” is cool. So far it hasn’t caught on.