In this series, Newsweek reproduces the events that led to the Jonestown massacre day after day, just like what happened in 1978.
November 6, 1978: Killing is something Jones has been considering for many years.
After eight college students left the church in 1973, his murderous fantasies began in California. In a letter, the students told Jones that they were fed up with his double standards. While sleeping, he asked others to “redirect” their sexual energy into the cause. He advocated racial equality, but the temple leadership was almost all white. He claims to launch a socialist revolution, but few of his followers understand socialism.
Their departure and criticism made Jones lose his balance. He was worried that defectors would try to publicly denigrate him-so he began to question the loyalty of everyone around him, especially his inner circle, known as the “Planning Committee.” At a meeting one night, he asked the members if they were willing to “revolutionary suicide” to support socialism and protest capitalism. He suggested that they jump off the Golden Gate Bridge together; this shameless behavior will put tremendous pressure on their careers.
Earlier that year, Black Panther leader Huey Newton published a memoir called “Revolutionary Suicide.” This term was coined by him to mean risking death and fighting oppression. Jones misinterpreted Newton’s terminology to actually commit suicide as a form of “revolutionary protest.”
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The members of the planning committee were stunned. A church member who followed Jones from Indiana yelled: “If you want, go and commit suicide, but don’t let the rest of us get involved!”
But Jones will not let it go. He constantly emphasized his concept of “revolutionary suicide”. He insisted that good socialists should be willing to die for their beliefs. He quietly thought about loading the entire planning committee on the temple bus, letting them drive out of the Golden Gate Bridge, or loading a plane, and let someone shoot the pilot.
But then a better opportunity fell in his lap: Guyana. In the secluded jungle 4,500 miles from California—isolated from intervening relatives and reporters—he could accurately count more dead bodies. He sold the jungle settlements to his followers in biblical terms, calling them the “promised land”: a socialist utopia where they can get rid of all evils: sexism, racism, elitism, and class Ism. He told them that this is a place where the weather is “never too cold or too hot”, where “women will not feel any pain during childbirth”, and every family has a private cabin with plenty of food. Everything is for his followers to join Jonestown as much as possible.
Of course, he did not want to see his congregation flourish in South America. He fantasized about their death.
However, figuring out how to kill everyone will be a daunting challenge.
Julia Scheeres is an award-winning journalist and writer.Her books include Land of jesus with A Thousand Lives: The Untold Story of Jonestown.
