Jim Jones was fucking crazy!

[Reverend_Smitty]

I'm watching something about Jonestown on the Biography Channel, and damn he was one crazy motherfucker!

[bridgit]

1. you're damn skippy...

:hi:

[enigmatic]

2. His Hero was Elmer Gantry

That says alot right there..

[Reverend_Smitty]

yeah good point

[leftofthedial]

3. obligatory comment about religion and its relation to sanity here

[evlbstrd]

4. Ya think?

:think:

[MidwestMomma]

5. Dang it...that's what I was going to say!

He was a crazy mo-fo

[Reverend_Smitty]

7. Well I figured it couldn't be said enough

[MrModerate]

6. Let's see . . .

Charismatic demagogue, owning politicians, running off to the jungle, enslaving the faithful, growing paranoid, murdering congressmen, organizing a mass suicide . . . fuckin' crazy? Could be.

Sadly his political buds were dems, including the current senior senator from the Golden State, Di Fi.

[Floogeldy]

8. Hmmm . . . Does KOOL-AID come to mind?

Now you know from where the political use of the name came.

Don't grow up too quickly. ;)

B-)

[Reverend_Smitty]

10. I knew all about him before...

but I guess it is cult night on Biography Channel, and it just reminded me how god damn crazy that whole thing was

[elshiva]

9. They are coming out with a new play about Jonestown.

Tragedy he was evil!

[evlbstrd]

12. I watched it on all happen on the news when there was news.

It was horrifying to think people could be led that way. But we see examples of it everywhere and all the time.

[elshiva]

14. Yes. Jones' son was saying that about the play. He said something

about how people in this country are so easily led astray!

[Reverend_Smitty]

15. no doubt...

this is the home of the sheeple!

[evlbstrd]

17. The White zone is for loading and unloading only...

[elshiva]

18. ??? but still LOL!

[evlbstrd]

21. The Central Scrutinizer from Joe's Garage.

Kept everybody in line.

This is the CENTRAL SCRUTINIZER... You have just destroyed one model XQJ-37 Nuclear Powered Pan- Sexual Roto-Plooker And you're gonna have to pay for it! So give up, you haven't got a chance.

[elshiva]

35. LOL!

Bwahaha!

[johnnie]

11. LOL!

This cracked me up. Sorry. Yeah, he was a little tipsy in the brainology department. Sadly, too many people followed that shit for brains.

[Reverend_Smitty]

13. I'm not really sure how someone can get sucked into a cult

but I suppose a lot of it has to do with taking advantage of people who don't have the highest self-esteem and need to follow someone like that.

[elshiva]

16. He promised a utopia for poor blacks.

[murielm99]

24. At the time, someone called them the "loose change" of

the sixties. I find that far too dismissive of the ideals of the original members of Jones' church. I think that any religious and social movement can become twisted into a cult, if the wrong person takes charge. I think that some of the people who poured their hearts and souls into this church found it impossible to leave, not only because of Jones' charisma, but also because of their own personalities. Cults attract certain types of people. They attract the idealistic, and those who want others to do their thinking for them and supply all the answers.

Jones started out as a Disciples of Christ minister. (My former United Methodist Pastor told me that he tried to enter a UMC seminary, but was rejected for not passing the psychological testing).

Jones was mainstream at first. The Disciples of Christ have always been integrated. They seem to stress social justice.

Jones worked with politicians in San Francisco to help the elderly and poor. He was respected. He attracted black people because he seemed genuine, and white people who were idealistic. He attracted people of all colors who were searching for the right path to God.

One of those searchers was a friend of mine. Her name was Barbara Hoyer. I met her my freshman year. She lived two doors down the hall from me. Barb became a social worker in San Francisco. She came from a religious home, but she rejected her parents' traditions. She had a helping type of personality, and a streak of idealism a mile wide. Like many of the men and women at Jonestown, she was in love with Jones. He had a sexual and physical hold over his cult members.

I was not surprised to learn that Barb had died at Jonestown. That kind of a movement was a magnet for people like her. That kind of soul-sucking movement has always been with us, and is not going away. I worry that one of the crazy televangelists will turn his followers loose on us before causing them to self-destruct.

Jonestown is personal to me. I use the term Kool-Aid drinkers as freely as anyone. But I often think of Barb when I do. This website has very good information about Jonestown. It is the best I have seen.

http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/

[elshiva]

36. Thanks for the link. SORRY about your friend.

[johnnie]

20. Well

Look at how many "voted" for georgie. I guess it is easier than we think.

[Kire]

19. he's running for mayor of West Chester, PA

An amazing Democrat, he was the faculty advisor to the College Democrats last year, he rocks!

http://www.wcjim.com/

..oh, you mean, that other Jim Jones...

[Blue_In_AK]

22. Powers Boothe was a great Jim Jones in the movie. n/t

[SoCalDem]

23. I watched it as it happened and my best friend was involved

in a wacky evangelical movement at that time.. She and her husband had just sold HER car, so they could donate the money to the "Father" of their "church group".. He had plans to create a 'special community' where they would not be 'bothered' by others..

I called her and said.. TURN ON THE TV AND PAY ATTENTION...

About a month later they dropped out of that 'church'..

[murielm99]

25. Your friends were lucky to have you.

I wish I could have done something about my friend. I knew she was involved with Jones, too.

[anitar1]

33. Do you remember a magazine called New West?

At least I think that was the title. It was an excellent magazine. They exposed Jim Jones almost 2 years before the Jonestown tradgedy. I remember reading about it at the time. This is when Jones was in Redwood City, Ca. I guess people want to be taken care and told what to do. Very strange how they are sucked in under the guise of "religion". Fascinating.

[SoCalDem]

26. I was really scared for them ..They were catholic and

got involved in some charismatic group..She once even told me that her son Craig (he was 8 at the time) had seen Jesus in his room one night, and that he prayed in tongues...:eyes:

He actually told MY son, that he just said that to "please his Mom & Dad"..but sooer or later he would have come to actually believe it..

[Elidor]

27. "Let's don't hear me say hate is your enemy...love has practically caused

"Me to just get you destroyed. If I had hated a little more, just a little more...we woulda had a little less trouble. 'Cause I look at life a little differently. Sure you got love, principles! But don't say, hate is my enemy - what's that saying, what's that word? Hate is my enemy and I gotta fight it day and night and what else is the other line?

"Love is the only weapon? Shit! Bullshit! Martin Luther King died with love! Kennedy died talking about something he couldn't even understand! Some kinda generalized love, and he never even backed it up! (unintelligible) Bullshit! Love is the only weapon with which I got to fight! I gotta helluva a lotta weapons to fight! I got my cars! I got compasses! I got guns! I got dynamite! I got a helluva lot to fight! I'll fight! I'll fight!"

-From a tape of the final night, as heard on A3's dance hit, Mao Tse Tung Said

[mark414]

28. oh yeah!

[BlueIris]

29. I've only seen one documentary on Jones.

It included absolutely terrifying snippets of recordings of his final sermons. Scared me so bad, I can't watch anything else about him.

[2008]

30. Like how?

I mean, other than killing 900 people.

[Zuni]

31. That is where the phrase "drinking the Kool-aid" comes from

[NawlinsNed]

32. Yeah, but his parties are to die for!

*golf clap*

[necso]

34. Yeah,

but the insane can wield great influence on the weakminded, the immature, the naive, the fearful and the ignorant (and any other persons who can't see through the bullshit to the essential madness, are unable to resist -- or are predisposed to believe).

And absolute certainty always has a ready audience in those who do not wish to have, or who cannot handle, doubt or uncertainty.

Put these things together with a well targeted (and "packaged"), timely marketing-campaign, endlessly reinforced -- and "the sky's the limit*". That is, if you have no scruples... And there the insanity can really help.

*: An old saying. Clearly, the sky is no longer the limit... Weapons are (perhaps) coming to an orbit near you.