Did anyone watch the PBS special about the Jonestown massacre?

[RiffRandell]

I did, and it was disgusting, disturbing and vile.

[Maddy McCall]

1. I remember seeing all of that on the news as it happened.

And all the specials on JONESTOWN and Jim Jones that were on TV right after it happened.

The guy still scares me...I'll never forget all of those bloated bodies...mothers lying beside children...that appeared on the news back then.

Terrible tragedy.

:(

[RiffRandell]

2. Yeah, it was terrible.

I was 7 years old....my rents told me he "convinced people" to drink the poison kool-aid. He did, but many parents went along, and the 3 that escaped told how his guards were pouring it down babies and toddlers throats. It was so sad. Then the coward shot himself in the head.

Thanks for responding.

[Maddy McCall]

3. Actually, you are correct...it is JONESTOWN.

LOL. Forgive my terrible 4-decade old memory.

:rofl:

Let's both go edit our posts so we don't look like dorks. :D

[RiffRandell]

Lol! And I thought I had too much wine!

[Maddy McCall]

9. I think I'm hitting senility at 40.

God help me when I'm fifty.

:rofl:

But, yeah, I was like 12 or 13 when it happened. I was at my grandmother's house in Texas...I think that was my first adolescent brush with real-life horror.

[RiffRandell]

12. Lol! No big deal--I act senile at 37! n/t

[begin_within]

8. PBS once did have a special about the Jamestown Flood, and it was excellent.

That was another senseless tragedy that could have been prevented, and hurt the poorest and most innocent people while the rich escaped scot-free. Like a Katrina in miniature.

[wildhorses]

4. you mean jonestown

that was his last name, right:shrug:

[Maddy McCall]

5. Hey, she had it right to begin with.

I said Jamestown and she "corrected" her post...she was right all along.

Blame me for it. :D

[wildhorses]

7. good grief

:rofl:

[Zookeeper]

6. The Jonestown documentary on PBS this week was...

excellent. The History Channel has a program on cults that spends a fair amount of time on Jonestown, but it isn't as well done as the PBS documentary.

My kids watched most of it and later that night, my 12 year old said, "That was scarier than any horror movies I've seen! Every time I turn around I'm afraid I'll see Jim Jones!"

[Maddy McCall]

11. I'll see if I can find it on our suck-ass local PBS channel.

We rarely get good shows that other people get.

:(

[BlueIris]

21. Your 12-year-old nailed it, right there.

Scarier than (almost) anything I've seen. I think watching Andew Card announce that Bush was keeping the White House was scarier (although not by much).

[RiffRandell]

10. Another thing I couldn't believe was that a senator

was shot and killed! Am I right?

[Left Brain]

14. I believe you're talking about

Rep. Leo Ryan who was shot on the airstrip. He went down there to help the people who wanted to leave.

[Nicole]

15. Leo Ryan from California

but not a Senator.

[Maddy McCall]

16. Yep. Leo Ryan - California.

REad this article. His legal counsel Jackie Spier recalls that day...she was shot, too, and she still has the bullets in her body. After being shot, she was left on the tarmac for 22 hours, assumed to be dead.

Can you imagine that? Like I said, real life horror.

http://www.caribbeannetnews.com/2003/11/20/jonestown.htm

[momophile]

13. over 900 people killed, right?

I did a paper on it in high school but I don't remember all the facts.

Amazing stuff. I haven't seen the PBS special but I'll look for it.

[RiffRandell]

17. Yup. I think it was like 987.

DISGUSTING. It really made me so angry that people handed over their babies/kids to die. I did not know that part of it prior to watching it. One guy that survived watched his wife give their son over. It made me cry.

[momophile]

18. to think how easily we use the phrase "drinking the kool-aid"

or something like that, when the reality is that nearly 1000 people died and many of them were murdered. Just amazingly disgusting.

[BlueIris]

22. Okay, seriously? I don't think I'm going to be able to use that phrase anymore.

And at the end of the documentary, I was thinking about DU's sheep-drinking-Kool-Aid-through-straw icon and realizing for the first time that it's actually in pretty bad taste.

[BlueIris]

23. Yeah, that was a real testament to the power of cult brainwashing.

The power Jones had over his followers could not even be broken by his demand that they sacrifice their children.

The part of the interview with the male survivor who watched his wife hold their son while cyanide was injected into the infant's mouth was just insane. I did not hear real emotion in his voice as he spoke, or tried to cry, indicating to me that he probably had never done any significant processing of his own feelings of guilt and responsibility regarding the death of his family.

[Oeditpus Rex]

19. That was a hell of a couple of weeks

Nine days after Jonestown — which was huge news in the Bay Area since Rep. Ryan was from San Francisco and the People's Temple was there before Jones moved it to Guyana — SF mayor George Moscone and supervisor Harvey Milk were shot to death in city hall by supervisor Dan White.

Oy.

[Zookeeper]

25. I had just moved to S.F.....

just in time for both of those tragedies.

Such profound shock and sadness! (And anger in the case of Harvey Milk and Moscone.)

[BlueIris]

20. Yes. It really unnerved me.

Before last weekend, I had only read about it. Seeing footage of the cult victims, as well as Jones, hearing the audio from November 18--terrifying. I was shocked by two things: how easy it was for Jim Jones to order everyone to their deaths, ("The vat, the vat, the vat..." in such a casual, enthusiastic voice) and how in the interviews with survivors, two out of the five cult members who escaped from the massacre after the infamous Kool-Aid had been passed around still would not condemn Jones or the cult. The hold he had on them was that strong.

[SeattleGirl]

24. Yes, I watched it, and it was so disturbing. I had seen a couple of

others which were also distrubing, but for some reason, this one really got to me.