hi how are you
i hope you’re having a wonderful day my name is bailey
sarian and today is
monday which means
you guessed it it’s murder mystery and makeup monday
if you are new here hi how are you
that’s great
every monday i sit down i talk about a true
crime story that’s been heavy on my
knock in and i do my makeup at the same time
if you’re interested in true crime
and you like makeup
i highly suggest you subscribe and i’m so
excited to be here because i am
going to talk about a cult woo
i love cults
i just am fascinated
by them i’m very interested in them
they’re fascinating i mean
wow cults wow i tried my best to
simplify it as much as i could because jim
jones had the most random ass life he was everywhere
especially his childhood was just like
wow what the fuck’s going on it was so random
and then later down the road there’s a lot of
there’s a lot more people involved with what goes on
and i left them out because
honestly it will get really confusing so i’m just
focusing on jim jones and his
story i will stop rambling
i missed you guys i’m happy to be here
and let’s get
right into it i was reading a biography
about jim jones
and his upbringing
stuff and like
so random this guy was so wow wow
random he at one
point like he stayed or
lived with like a kennedy
during the summer
i don’t know how and there wasn’t much information
about anyways okay let’s
i’m getting
ahead of myself i’m just
excited okay so let’s just get right into it
jim his parents were
laneta jones and james jones
james was a veteran of
world war one
and was living on disability
payments from being a
victim of a gas attack in the war
it was said that he was emotionally absent
and rarely showed any affection
towards his
jim’s mother
her name was laneta
she was more of a free
spirit she didn’t care for religion
or any sky god
she called any god sky god
you get it anyway
so she didn’t care for religion at all
and she just
didn’t believe in anything
which was not a
thing for women to be free
thinkers or to be
thinking like this at the time so it was like
she was the
weird one on the
block you know like oh don’t go to her
house because
she doesn’t believe in anything you know she’s
she has an opinion
stay clear so she also liked to keep to herself
she kept herself busy
and was constantly working it was
said that she had no maternal instincts and that she
honestly had no desire to even have children
and loneta then became pregnant
and gave birth to
james aka jim
warren jones
and he was born on may 13th 1931
so the family
ended up moving to
lynn indiana
and jim would describe his
childhood as loveless that his parents were
never around
he was always home
alone and his parents just
didn’t care about him
his mom didn’t want to be a mom
she would keep herself busy
by working all of the time his father was just
he was sick
it was said that he was an alcoholic but
i don’t know i couldn’t
quite get clarification on that one in high
school jim was
known to wear his
sunday clothes almost
every day he
would wear a
white pressed
shirt and nice
slacks that most people
would save for
going to church you know
church slacks
so he was wearing this
every day to
school jim said that he participated in some sports
and he even formed his own baseball team
with the kids on his block
he wasn’t really good
at any of the
sports but he
was really good at forming teams and being
the leader mm hmm
which honestly though i mean that’s great
whoa not in this case
now as a teenager jim said that he explored
the different churches in town
he went to as many churches as he
could and he
would just go
sit in and see
what they were preaching what they were
saying and he just wanted to know as much as he could
about the different options and
different religions out there because there were a lot
so jim would just hop around and he would
he was just trying to find the right fit
the religion
or the church
where he felt like he belonged something that he could
stand by jim
would carry a
bible with him
everywhere he went
and also as a
teenager he
would go out
in the street like the main center
where a lot of people
shopping and
stuff and he
would be preaching
preaching the
bible he was very passionate
about it at the
age of 17 jim he got a job at a hospital
and he was working as
i don’t know the actual
like job position but you know he was like a helper he
would often
clean up vomit
he would help with moving newly deceased
or handling
disposal of amputated limbs
so i don’t know how i went from
throw up to
amputated limbs but that’s kind of what he did
at 17 which is like it was
whatever okay but jim said this is like
where he just thrived
and he was now considering getting into
medicine because he just
loved it so in 1948
while working at the hospital that’s
where jim met
a nursing student who was also working there
her name was
marceline they got
along really well and
ended up dating
and marceline said that she was attracted
to him because he was just such a caring caring
individual he just loved
everybody and he
truly believed that everybody was equal
and it was his
responsibility
to devote his life to helping
others like that’s what he was
telling her you know and she just fell in love with him
so after dating for
quite some time they
ended up getting
married in june of 1949
and marceline was under the
impression that
was christian
a christian man and believed in god but
after they had gotten
married she noticed
you know things had
changed or maybe
like she didn’t
quite fully
understand what jim’s
religion or beliefs were jim
would tell her that he didn’t believe in her god and
they would get into like really heated arguments
over it just over
their beliefs and
and because divorce was heavily frowned upon
marceline knew that
it wasn’t even an
option really okay if you got a divorce it was like ooh
something’s
wrong with her
marceline just decided
that she was gonna
stick it out
or at least try to
understand exactly what jim
did believe in
or maybe she
could like convert him you know
often jim would take marceline
to the local
black and african american churches that were in
their city jim said that he was like really
drawn to them because
it wasn’t so
stiff the white churches he had been to
they were just so
boring and people just seemed like they had to be there
versus wanting to be there but at the
black and african
american churches people there were jumping singing
dancing during worship
and just seemed to be having a really fun
time and not acting like they had to be there
so when jim found
these churches
he just fell in
love love and he knew that
this is where
he had to be
the one church that he
ended up like
becoming a member of they welcomed him and
his wife with open arms
and in 1952
jim was 21 years old at that time
he was actually
hired as a student pastor for the church kim just
found like this new calling remember he was like i’m
gonna be a nurse or something well now he was like
i’m gonna be a pastor
yeah so this was his new calling he was
gonna be a pastor
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so jim was a student pastor for
about a year
he would just kind of grow
frustrated because he wanted to do his own thing
versus being told what to do so he was like i’m
gonna open up my own church
and i’m gonna open it up in indianapolis
so he did just that and
he liked the freedom of it because
preach what he wanted
to preach and not be told what he had to do he didn’t
wanna be told what to do
at jim’s church he
pretty much
blended christianity with a new
age spirituality
and radical
social justice
which attracted a very
loyal following
now jim’s congregation was
known for being racially
integrated which was not a
thing yet at this time there were
white churches
and then there were the
black churches
and there wasn’t such thing as
mixing going on
but jim didn’t like that and he
truly believed that everybody was
equal and he wanted everybody welcome
in his church
his wife marceline also worked
alongside with
him and she was the one who was on top of
all the paperwork and keeping
things organized
schedule this
sunday we’re gonna talk
about this that
sunday we’re
gonna talk about
i don’t know
jesus doing
stuff the next
sunday we’re
gonna talk about
jesus doing more
stuff so she
was in charge of that the church itself was very
successful and the location
that they were staying at
it was becoming way too
small for all of
their new members
so they were looking into expanding
into a much larger area
so the current
area that jim’s church was in
it was a low income community
and he knew
like he couldn’t ask the community or the members for
money or donations
to get a bigger place
because he knew like a lot of them were struggling
instead he needed a better plan
a better plan he needed a better plan and his plan
was to up his performance
that’s a good plan
right jim needed to wow
the crowds and he
could do this by performing miracles
right i mean that’s how you wow a
crowd miracles
you got miracles at your church wow
mirror so jim
would command
people in the
crowd you know he’d call
random people
and he’d be like i command your headache to vanish
and it would
or he would command
coughs to stop
he knew that people
wouldn’t believe
his miracles
right off the bat
until he had gained
their trust
so he started
with coughs and headaches
right he started
small but jim
would declare that
these people were healed
he would be yelling
healed by the
power of god has
granted through him
it’s really like amping everybody up like it’s a
concert he’s like yeah healed
word got out i mean people were talking
hey this guy over here he’s healing headaches
you gotta go see him it’s wild
and people were coming in and jim
would then this is how
where the money comes in
he was passing around the
collection plates
and that’s how he would
start making
more and more and more
money and he
was like oh shit i’m onto something here you guys
now it’s said that like jim didn’t feel
fully guilty
i guess because like he wasn’t doing anything
bad was he yeah
so he was making a lot of
money all of a sudden
jim would occasionally go to different
local churches
and do little
guest spots
going around to
these different
churches and whatnot it was also introducing jim to
a bigger crowd
jim knew that
going to these new churches
and people didn’t know who he was that they weren’t
going to believe his healings
right out the gate
so he instead let a few
close people in on
what was really going down
his healing powers oh yeah
so jim would
bring in friends
people who attended his own church
and used them as
audience plants who
would pretend
to be suffering from something and then be healed
for example one couple from the audience
stood up and
talked to the rest of the church
and said oh we used to have a serious
heart defect
and because of jim
we are all better cured wow
and it was just to
prove to the
other audience members that
again he could heal
i mean it worked people were like what his feelings
evolved over time from
small things like
again the headaches
and whatnot
to now curing cancer
mm hmm at one church he brought in
an audience
plant and the person who was cured
would jump up and down and they
would be celebrating that they were cured even
though they
never had cancer in the
first place the whole
thing is fucked up
but because of his new fame he was
bringing in more
money a lot of
money and now he
could upgrade to a bigger
building so jim purchased a larger
building that
could hold up to
700 people and this was in
indianapolis
this time his church was called community
unity but this new
community unity
i like that
actually why did he change it oh i know i know i’m
about to tell you because the new
building that he moved into
already had the word of
temple carved into
stone on the outside of the
building it was a jewish
congregation before that but that’s when
jim just decided to name it the people’s temple
so during this time economic
segregation was deep seated in indianapolis and
and jim made it
his goal to integrate african americans
and the black community into
every aspect of indianapolis
jim was passionate
about equality
and he would go with some of his church members
kind of like a mixture of people
and they would go to local
white owned restaurants and shops
and fight for
their equality
so a lot of shop owners
would tell jim
no we don’t want
black people here
jim decided to use the church
members and himself not even use i mean they wanted to
because they
would have peaceful protests in
front of the restaurants
until eventually
the shop owners or the restaurant
owners gave in
and served all races
now here was
the interesting part that i didn’t even know
about and i thought was
very interesting when businesses actually agreed to
allow everybody into the restaurants or business jim
said that he
would give them hundreds of customers and he
would make sure that they made tons of money
because they allowed this to happen
you know so jim
would hand out flyers
to his church members
with the list
it had a list of restaurants who supported them
and would accept african americans or the
black community
equally into
their business
so they had this
good list going
and also all of the members went there
these businesses
benefited from this advertising
and words spread that
hey if you cooperate
with jim jones over here
you’ll make mad
money so just let the people in
and his church people became some of the best friends a
small businessman
could have because
they were making
money the whole
story i mean i’m
obviously giving you just like a little
breakdown this is a side note
i’m giving you it’s very
vague you know but oh he really like went out there and
they would have their
um where’s my
brain what is this
am i churning butter
what is this the sign
peaceful protests and just
standing with the sign
outside of these businesses and
fighting for equality
and jim was really passionate
about it and
he went to many restaurants and businesses and he was
dedicated to this
so jim presented himself as the
voice of reason and went
after more businesses to change
their policies pretty much to keep the community
segregated remember how
earlier in the
story i said he
would go out and preach on the streets
he was preaching
about equality for all because
the community of the city was
still very segregated and as a
teenager i mean
it’s just like wow
so in 1965 jim his wife
i think they had kids by this time
oh my gosh wow bailey
anywho but they
moved to eukaya
california and they put
money towards a new
place to hold the people’s temple
about 50 to 60 church members
did follow the church out to california
which is what they were hoping for
in the year 1969
jim’s church
wasn’t as popular
as he was hoping it
would be by then
so jim was really feeling down and sad because
it wasn’t poppin
like he thought
and also on top of that
the marriage between his wife
of 20 years marceline
it wasn’t gone well it was crafting
the couple at this
point they had four children
one of them was
their biological child and
three were adopted
jim was just
fully focused on his church you know
and obviously marceline
put her focus
on her children
jim ended up having an affair
with one of his much younger church
member fangirl
and this was
going against
everything that he was preaching he
would be telling the audience members
like you know don’t
don’t cheat on your wife or husband
it’s wrong it’s a sin blah blah blah so
of course jim is doing this himself and he’s
thinking like shit
if the church members
find out that i’m having an affair
there it would be game over
so instead he went to his wife
marceline and told her the truth
marceline had some
issues with her back
which had left her bedridden
most of the days and because of this she wasn’t able
she wasn’t able to sexually satisfy him
because her back hurt
well i’m sorry
it wasn’t just like
her back hurt she was bedridden
and like yeah
so she wasn’t able to sexually satisfied him
so jim told marceline
i love you i
still want to be
married to you it’s just you
know look i have this girl on the side who’s
going to give me the
sexual part
of the relationship that you can’t provide for me
jim was able to set it up in a way that made marceline
understand and just accept it
it was just sex
and not an emotional relationship so
marceline’s like
okay i guess
she i don’t
think she really even had any option to be honest
or she gonna say no and then what
leave him where she
gonna go i mean her
whole life revolved around the church and gym
she honestly
from what i
read it seemed like she didn’t have anything set
up for herself so it’s like she even if she wanted to
leave it even if she did
leave it was like
what was she gonna do
but then get this get
this jim then went to his church
and he told the members
what was going on
and he just kept it honest
got up there and said hey everybody
god is good
and so are 19 year olds hey up top
so jim went to his church and just told him what was
going on i’m having
i’m sleeping with this
chick over there she’s
right there everybody i’m having an affair
and he was just really honest but
jim’s followers the church members they actually really
understood and they supported the decision
the church had a lot
of ups and downs throughout the years but jim just kept
going in march of 1970
he had a pretty good size following and was
bring in some good money
again jim would
travel with some members
to los angeles
and seattle
where he drew
crowds and hopes to
bring more people and attention to the people’s temple
so he was traveling a little bit further to perform
these miracles that he was doing
he would set up temporary
booths outside
venues where he would give
sermons and sell
photos of himself for 5
and he was also healing people at these
sermons so people were just like wow
have you seen this jim jones guy
i was trying to get some
bread at the
store stopped and saw him do this like
thing bought a five dollar
picture of him
yeah know and like people were just talking i mean
he was getting a lot of hype
during this time jim
would have the people who are
watching the
sermon fill out
paperwork with like
their name and mailing address on it which they
would turn into him
when they were done filling it out
he ended up
using that as
marketing material
he wouldn’t mail people pamphlets
about what was
going on in the church
all the healings that they had accomplished
and also received donations through the mail
because he was doing such big
great things
at his church they
never actually like
asked for money
they never asked for a donation well
they kind of did they like
if you wanna if you
wanna donate you can
but you don’t have to people are
still donating
money constantly
and because
of the influx of
money that they were getting
the people’s temple decided to open up
stores yes stores
where people or members
could donate items they no longer
wanted so essentially like a salvation
army or goodwill
and they would
sell secondhand
clothing there and a lot of the church members
would work there as well
work at the
store also they
would serve
free meals in low
income areas and one of the most
impressive programs was one that
sent teens to college who couldn’t afford it
so the people’s temple
they would use
their donation
money again
to pay for college
for people who couldn’t afford it
but it covered
books tuition
and they also purchased
houses which they
ended up remodeling
into dormitories
so the students had free housing and meals
like it seemed
i mean what i was reading i was like wow good for you
so they had some very
impressive programs
now eventually
the people’s temple
would establish permanent
churches in san francisco
and los angeles
many of the people who worked at the churches
were members
who then stepped up
and felt the calling to be a part of what jim was doing
jim would put fear
into his followers telling them that
racists were trying to shut them down
and were threatening
to harm them
so the mentality
among the followers was
said to be quote
if you don’t
agree with us
we’re going to convince you
if we can’t convince you you’re the
enemy end quote
which a lot of people have this
mentality now am i
right can i get name in
god is good
god is good okay
so over time
jim became more
and more controlling
or judgmental
towards followers
who did not
spend all of their time
dedicated towards the temple
so going out to a movie
was prohibited
and it was better
to give that
money directly to the church like why are you
going to see that
movie you should be donating
that to the church you know like just making them feel
so jim also
discouraged
romantic relationships
because it was distracting
they should be at the church
he also told them that they shouldn’t be
drinking or doing drugs because
it weakened
the will as well as the body
couples who joined the church were allowed to remain
that way but time together was
limited by temple chores and duties
it kind of duties
duty it kind of
sounds like
scientology
he would keep them busy around the church making them
clean making them just do shit
and they would
do it and his followers did pretty much whatever he
asked of them
part of the
reason was belief in the temple and its purposes
so then the people’s temple
ended up buying a
bunch of buses it was like
about a dozen buses and they
would make trips from san francisco to los angeles
then seattle
and while on the road jim
would make appearances
at different churches
allowing them with you know his healing powers
and he was also preaching and
fighting for equality
the healings were always a high point and
still he was
using insiders to be healed
from the audience
jim would also sometimes call out names from an
index card announcing that this person was unaware
of a cancer that was in
their system
and then a temple nurse
would be dispatched into the
crowd to swab
out the person’s
throat in preparation for jim’s healing so they
would like open up
their mouth you know
and like swab it try and
clean it but in this process the
nurse she had a little bit
he or she had a little bit of chicken
liver like in
their hand and they
would drop it
into the person’s
mouth when they were swapping
naturally the person
would gag and
cough it back up like
and the nurse
would then be like oh my god spit it out
spit it out into my hand and then they
would spit it out into
their hand the
nurse would
call it the cancer
she’d be like look everybody the cancer
and she would be
he or she i’m
sorry cause sometimes it was a guy too they
would be showing
cancer off to the audience
aka the chicken
liver like oh my god you guys look
this just came out of him
and then jim
would start yelling to spit
spit it out and that
their life has been
saved i mean he had his
tricks it worked it worked
so around 1971
this is when jim began
abusing drugs on a regular basis
he would use
pills and liquids to provide
boosts of energy
during the day or in the morning
and then at
night time he
would take something to help him sleep
getting drugs was actually very easy
for him because some of his followers
could provide prescriptions to jim no problem
jim said that it was
pretty easy to hide
the fact that he was doing drugs in the
first place from his followers
but soon jim
would become very
short tempered
and his eyes were constantly
red and watery
which is what led him to wearing the infamous
dark sunglasses
24 7 he was wearing them all the
time now jim at first
to members he was very kind
caring genuine
wanted to help people
seemed like a good person
once he started doing drugs that’s when he was
becoming just very mean
possessive controlling psycho just paranoid everything
so i’m sure
there were members out there who probably put the
pieces together
but for the most part most members didn’t really
question it i guess
so jim’s wearing his dark sunglasses 24
7 and jim told
his followers
that he was wearing the sunglasses because his
inner powers
were so great that
the holy energy often
glowed from his eyes
and his followers
if they looked at him directly
the holy glow
would burn them and they could die
and they believed it
so they were like okay
also a side
effect from his drug
abuse was jim’s heightened
sense of paranoia jim
would preach to
his followers that the government was a danger to them
and that the fbi
and cia were tapping the temple’s
phone line jim
would tell his
followers that they all needed to be on constant
alert which
caused fear
and the followers felt just like really nervous
scared they thought that they were
going to be a
target of some kind of attack
the holy spirit
in my eyes will burn them and we will be protected
the church members
would call jim and his wife
marceline mom and dad
and their relationship was very
close with the church
jim and marceline
they were very frugal
and they never
drove like a new car
they drove like an old speed up
wagon i believe but
they never got new
clothes they only
shopped from the secondhand
store that they were running jim
would say that he
never wanted to give the
impression to his church that he was better than them
and that he
he was one of them
see i’m not
spending any
money i’m not
spending any church
money on myself or for things
it all went back to the church
over time jim’s
drug problem increased and he
would go on
to have numerous affairs
with other members
and believed
that he needed more sex
with a variety
of partners
and his ego was just increasing he believed all
women regardless of their
age and whether they
would admit it or not
but he believed that all
women were attracted
to him he was like they all want me
eventually almost all of the
women and jim’s
inner circle
would become his
sexual partner
they even considered it part of
their duties
to have sex with him
why do they do this
why do cult members
always have
to have sex with everybody all the girl like why
why do you have to do this
is that why people
start cults
so they could just
literally have sex with
tons of people
cause that’s how
like how it seems
so time goes on
and jim knew that he needed to do bigger and better
things for his followers
and he was also now looking for somewhere
that he could call the promised land
where him and his followers could live
safely and freely
without the
worry of attack
from the fbi or the cia
few members went out looking for a permanent
missionary location
and in october of 1973
they determined that guyana
south america
would be the most
suitable place
its location was convenient
boats could make
an easy trip from miami
to guyana’s capital of georgetown
which was a port
and jim wanted complete isolation for his new mission
and guyana was
perfect for that i mean they had a
population around 850 000
but most of them
lived along the
atlantic coast
and the majority
of guyana was
covered with
dense jungle
there were no connecting roads to the area
where the people’s temple
would be built
jim told his followers that
the promised land
mission site was a place
where everyone
in the temple
would go to
avoid american
martial law
and concentration camps
that would be soon taking over
he was preaching this to his
church members
telling them that this was
going to happen
that the cia
and the fbi were onto them that they were
gonna come in with a
bunch of guns and kill them all like he was putting
fear into his followers
every like meeting
just saying something you know and
people were getting just
paranoid with him
finally in may of 1977
jonestown was open
and ready for the members
people slowly
started making
their way out there
they had cottages
set up for people to live in but
unfortunately there
weren’t enough
for the hundreds of people that showed up
most of the followers all chipped in and helped
build more cottages the goal was to create a
self sustaining
utopia jim was in complete control over
everything there was no crop
planted no tools purchased without
his approval
if any of the followers wanted to be wrote
in like in a romantic relationship and be like
they needed to apply
for permission
first if any of the couples want to
break up or end
their relationship
it also had to be approved through jim as well
any incoming mail
was opened and read before
being passed on to the person it was addressed to
outgoing mail was also censored if
there were letters that said anything bad
about jonestown
or even just kind of
slightly like hey there aren’t enough cottages
the letter wouldn’t be sent
out and the follower whoever
wrote the letter
saying something bad
would be forced to rewrite
their letter
only giving glowing reviews of
their stay in jonestown
i kind of forgot to mention
so when jonestown
was first being
built and whatnot there were
church members who went out there and
built it it took a long time but during that time
that’s when jim was kind of preaching
to his members like hey we’re having this being built
start saving your
money we’re
going out there the people who wanted to go went
there were also a lot of members who didn’t go they
weren’t forced to
to go at all
and i’m not trying to come off as me like
victim blaming at all you know like oh they went on
their own free will
no i mean they
heavily believed in what jim was preaching
but there were a lot of members who decide like i’m not
gonna go but jim was like teasing it for
a long time
in the church
about what was
going on and how it was beginning
built and whatnot
so people were just getting really hyped
about it because they made it
sound like it was
gonna be this in amazing
place privacy at
jonestown was non existent
there was no privacy many of the cottages were
overcrowded
people on top of that just like kept
showing up to jonestown
but there was nowhere for them to stay
there was limited
water available
for showers and people were told to keep
their mouths closed
while showering because the
water was polluted
meanwhile jim over here
jim he had a much nicer
cabin you know and
he lived in his
cabin with his wife and a couple mistresses
they had a generator
for starters that
powered a refrigerator and some fans in his bedroom
and then he had some like soft
beds meanwhile everyone else
is just miserable because they don’t have any of that
he also had a camp
radio that was set up in his room
it was more of like an intercom
system because he
would make like announcements
to the people
outside in the community so he didn’t even have to
leave his room he
could talk to them
directly through there
that’s probably why he got fat
so jonestown was
actually being funded by his followers social security
checks that were coming in through the mail
but overall
money was tight
and the social security checks
weren’t enough so many of the followers
began manufacturing toys
which were cars and
trains but they were carved from wood
and then they
would be sent out to georgetown
and sold there
which actually brought in some money
but it wasn’t enough to like what they needed it for
like more cottages
and proper food
because food was running out and peanut butter and
jelly sandwiches were
what the people were living off of
also beverages were
limited they
would usually drink
water or kool aid because it was inexpensive
and could easily be
mixed in with water
jim would reward his followers with a single cookie
on sundays i’m
sorry but like
thanks for the cookie
anyone who was a rule
breaker would be forced to
sleep and eat
separately from the rest of the followers
they were also
required to run
everywhere the people who
the rule breakers
they were required to run
everywhere and no one was allowed to
speak or even look at them
the jonestown
population grew to over 900 people
which is a great amount that’s a lot of people you know
and all were
required to attend
nightly meetings
at these meetings he
would sometimes preach
but more often
he gave his
personalized accounts of recent us and
world news most of
which was made up with his imagination
which would
carry on until two or
three in the morning
his imagination
was keeping everyone
up it was drugs it was probably the drugs the people of
jonestown worked
every day until 6 pm
while music
would be playing over the loudspeakers
system but over time
jim was growing more
and more frustrated that
there wasn’t much progress being made within jonestown
and the followers were
becoming more unhappy with
their new lives because there wasn’t
it was too crowded
and there wasn’t enough food they were getting
a single cookie they were eating peanut butter and
obviously they’re not happy
sadly though it was not easy
for them to leave
their passports were locked up
and if you wanted to
leave you had to pay pay
for it yourself nobody was making their own
money and any
money that was coming in was being
taken away by jim to fund
jonestown so they just felt or they
essentially were trapped
some of the followers
were able to
sneak away and escape
and a few others
could afford to
leave but were made to sign
a contract stating that they would
never speak
against the church
some members who were able to escape
did speak up
some spoke to the
media about
their experience and what they thought of the church
this would lead to more newspapers
covering the
story and speaking out
against the practices of jim
jones of course
jim told his followers back at
jonestown that
troops were coming
to take away the children and that everyone had to
fight because
an attack was coming he had gotten word that the us was
was looking into him
because people were
speaking up and saying like people are
trapped out there so yeah they
essentially were coming but jim
twisted it and
said that they were coming to kill them and
stuff his followers
only got news
from jim himself so they really had no idea what was
going on in the
media or that people were
speaking out
about jonestown
tons of guns were
then being smuggled into
jonestown over time
jim had put together a security team
who set up around
the town they were set up to protect from attacks
but low key
they were there to keep everybody in
the followers were
becoming scared
because the security was now threatening to hurt them
if they didn’t
follow any of the rules instead of protecting
jonestown from the outsiders
they were attacking
their own people
if people try to get out of
jonestown this security
would shoot them
in february
of 1978 jim called all the people in to gather for
an emergency meeting
where he told the people that
soldiers were coming to attack
jonestown that the cia was on to them
and that they
would attack in a matter of hours
their intention was
to kill all of the followers
living in jonestown including the children
that’s how you get them
the children know
jim told them
rather than they be killed at the hands of
these monsters
that they must take
their own lives instead
that by doing this
it would rob
their enemies of any triumph
some of the
followers agreed that this was the best idea
but others who were just worn out with all the bs
just wanted to leave
large containers were brought
out and they were filled with like this
weird dark liquid
everyone was told to line up fill a cup
and drink this
drink mixture
would kill them in
about 40 minutes
jim was preaching
while the followers were forced to
drink the poison
and told them
their deaths
would be peaceful
whenever one had swallowed
swallowed their drinks
jim told them
quote you didn’t take anything end
quote and that it was all a test to see if they were
truly willing to die for the cause
as a reward the
loyal followers
were off for the rest of the day
it was said that nobody
stood up or got
upset with jim for this and that
the true believers
accepted what jim had done so it was just a test
lol this was the moment
jim knew he had complete control over his people
he really wanted to test them and
he did it the fact that
they were willing to die just because he told them to
he was like fuck
yeah so i’m sure i don’t know because
again i wasn’t there but
i’m sure that really just
boosted his ego
to say the least
during all of this jim was
still doing drugs
and was becoming more
and more paranoid
because back in the us parents of people living in
jonestown were concerned by strange
letters they were receiving
or the fact that they had received no letters at all
many people went to authorities
and pressed them
to investigate
jonestown please get my sons there my
daughters are
like please look into this in november of 1978 us
congressman leo ryan
he traveled
to guyana to inspect the people’s temples
activities and
the jonestown
compound itself he was investigating
rumors that some members of the cult were being held
against their will
and were being subjected
to physical and
psychological abuse
leo arrived
to jonestown on november 17th
and planned to return home that following day
when he went into
jonestown they
all were on
their best behavior
a mirror to try and impress him make sure
this congressman had nothing but good
things to say
about jonestown
and at the end of the day leo
was done and was
going to hop in his truck
drive out to a
small plane nearby
and then head back to the us
while he was leaving walking
to his car there were several temple members who
asked if they
could get a ride
with him because they wanted to
leave and he agreed
so they jumped into his car
and headed back to
where the airplane was so they
could go back to the us now
the security
who was there protecting jonestown
saw that this was happening
and because they were
trained or brainwashed
or just bad people
they believed that
these members were being taken
you know that jim was
right like oh my god the cia
guy did come and like take
these people or whatever and they’re
gonna be murdered
so instead the security
ended up shooting at the
truck to try and prevent them from taking
taking the followers
and just trying
to get them to stop luckily the people in the
truck were able to
drive off unhurt but now there was like this
sense of urgency to get the fuck out of there
they’re shooting at us we
gotta go like
we gotta go
so they get to the air strip
about to hop on to this
small plane but sadly
some of the followers
security showed up
at the air strip with
their weapons tons of guns
they shot and attacked the
the people who were trying to
leave and they
ended up killing five people
including the congressman and
three other members
of the press who were with him
and 11 people were wounded
at around 4 pm jim
spoke over the
camp loudspeaker to his followers announcing
a meeting in the pavilion
inside the people’s temple they
recorded almost
of jim’s sermons
and any meetings they had which
they had hundreds of thousands of tapes oh my gosh but
sadly that means that they taped
their last and
final meeting
jim told the people that
he tried to give them the best life and that
one of the people on the
plane was going to
shoot the plane
pilot and it
would be blamed on the people of
jonestown and it
would soon bring
their enemies into town
the people had no idea
about what happened at the airstrip jim knew
because the security team came back and told him
but he spinned it and made it
sound you know
one person was hurt
one jim told the people that he had a solution
that he would
spare the children
from enslavement and the
seniors from
slaughter jim said that it was time for them to
drink the potion
that they were not committing suicide
but that it was a revolutionary act
many of the members refused
to move or beg to be let go they didn’t want to like
drink this poison
a few people in the poison line
thanked jim
for all that he’d done for them all of the followers
drink the poisoned
flavor aid mix
all of this was captured on the tape recording as well
you can listen
to it but i’m just giving you a little disclaimer it’s
gonna ruin your day it’s
gonna ruin your week it’s
gonna ruin your month it’s
horrifying it’s
awful and i
don’t recommend it but i know there’s a lot of
about curious cats out there
who are but just know
just know it’s horrible it’s just oh
so the next day the guyana defense
force troops went into
jonestown and
found a horrific
scene there were
bodies everywhere
some of them had markings
where the poison was injected
it’s believed that
these people
who had these injection
marks refused
to drink the poison
and were held down
and instead it was injected into
their bodies
oh my gosh they
found jim’s body
sprawled out on
stage in the pavilion
jim and one of his mistresses
don’t know why
we’re the only ones who died from a gunshot
wound to the head
rather than the poison
i guess jim just wanted to get it over with
dick originally the
local guyanese
government had reported
about 383 deaths
and word had got back to the us
where the media was
covering the
story so soon
after that american
troops went out to
jonestown to investigate
soon more and more
bodies were
found and away
week after the
tragic event the death
total came to
nine hundred
and nine deaths nine
hundred nine nine
hundred nine that’s a lot of people
this is a side note
when i first
heard about
jonestown i mean i don’t know how old i was or
whatever but
in my mind when i
think of a cult i
think like mmm
five to 10 people you know like
which is still sad it’s
still awful
but 909 people that’s a fucking lot he
wow wow you know like that’s insane i just i
still can’t wrap my head around it it’s just in
same investigators ended up
searching the compound and over 60 000
printed pages plus several
hundred tape recordings were
taken and the fbi
spent hours
about hours
going through it all
also in jim’s cottage they
found around 700 000
in suitcases
what were you doing with it
also he had a
bunch of different bank accounts which had
money in it like this guy had millions of dollars
no idea what his plan was
obviously he wasn’t
spending it on
jonestown months
were spent trying to
identify the
victims some
were identified through
fingerprints
and if they got lucky
dental records
but most of the
victims hadn’t been
to a dentist in years
many of them were too badly decomposed to identify
even though it had only been
about a week
but the heat and
humidity had decomposed the
bodies at a
rapid rate sadly
409 bodies were
never identified
the evergreen cemetery
in oakland california
offered ground for a mass
grave where
the 409 people were laid to rest
on may 11 1979 all of jim
jones churches were seized
and closed down
as well as the many
many bank accounts he had hiding over
seven million dollars
all the money was seized
by the government
and was used to repay
the victims families
the events at
jonestown constituted the
greatest single loss of american
civilian life in a deliberate act
until the tragic
incidents of 9 11
many of the family members
of the victims
tried to sue and
tried to get
money from jonestown
estate and whatnot
and also they were trying to sue
because they were trying to get help
from the government
to search his
place in the
first place and nobody did so
there were a lot of lawsuits to follow
and also there
were a lot of different members of the church
who were being sued there’s a lot more
to it as well than just this but for the most part
that is awful horrifying
tragic story
about jonestown
jim jones i don’t know what the
fuck happened to him because he
started off so good i don’t know what i think it
i think it was the drugs i
think money
and drugs just completely
derailed him
money and drugs tend to do this to a lot of people
money for sure does this to people
i was reading a biography
about jim jones
and truly it
sounded like he
started off as an amazing
person with a
great goal in life to really help and
serve people
and then it seems
maybe when when
the drugs drugs
the drugs and the money is
where he went off
track but it’s just like i don’t know
what happened
what happened greed
money and drugs i
guess i guess that’s the answer
i just can’t believe
those things can
truly make somebody do this
i appreciate you guys so much for hanging out with me
today i hope you have a
wonderful rest of your day you make good choices please
make good choices i’ll be seeing you guys later bye