Latest / Brett Keane and Eve Show / Atheist Killer Jim Jones By Matt Powell
Transcript
- 0:00Chances are you've heard the saying don't drink the kool-aid.
- 0:05It refers to Jim Jones, a cult leader who gave his followers
- 0:09cyanide laced punch, resulting in the mass murder suicide of
- 0:13more than 900 people. But why would so many follow him
- 0:16to their deaths? Started as an effort by a
- 0:19charismatic preacher to build a new society.
- 0:21But it ended, of course, with the tragic deaths of more than
- 0:24900 people. The Reverend Jim Jones, born
- 0:271931, died November 18th, 1978 with 913 of his followers in the
- 0:35jungle settlement of Jonestown, Guyana.
- 0:39How did it happen? What was the basis of Jim Jones
- 0:45frightening power over his followers?
- 0:48If his story is told again, will it serve as a lesson for now?
- 0:54Jim Jones wasn't a Christian. He was an atheist, and Jim used
- 0:58to have people bring the Bibles into the church and he would
- 1:02throw them down. He would stomp on them, he would
- 1:04spit on them and he would talk about using the pages for toilet
- 1:08paper. He got behind the pulpit and
- 1:11would cuss and swear to his followers.
- 1:13But he would also make statements like there is no God.
- 1:17He He literally said that from the pulpit.
- 1:19He said that there is no God but socialism.
- 1:22Socialism is God. There is no God.
- 1:29I see some there's some still not aware of what God is.
- 1:35God is perfect freedom, justice, equality.
- 1:38And thus the only thing that brings perfect justice, freedom
- 1:41and equality, perfect love, and all of its beauty and holiness
- 1:45Is socialism. So God.
- 1:50He even said in a recorded interview with the FBI that my
- 1:55Bishop knows that I am an atheist.
- 1:57He went on to say that there is no heaven up there.
- 2:00He preached this that there is no heaven up there, and so we're
- 2:05going to have to make heaven down here.
- 2:07He told people that there was no resurrection, that nobody's ever
- 2:10going to come to save us. There's no heaven for nobody's
- 2:14going to come out of the sky. No, no order come to save us.
- 2:16There's no heaven up there. During one of Jones's sermons,
- 2:25he stated that he came in the phenomena of religion to get
- 2:29people out of religion and in the meantime I come in the
- 2:34phenomena of religion to get people out of religion.
- 2:39Even Jim Jones's wife said this. Jones had not been lured to the
- 2:43ministry by deep religious faith, but because it served his
- 2:47goal. Of achieving social change
- 2:49through Marxism. Jim used religion to try to get
- 2:52some people out of the opiate of religion.
- 2:55She also said that Jim Jones slammed the Bible on his desk
- 3:00and declared that I've got to destroy this paper idol.
- 3:06Don't trust these religious souls wanting to get us put out
- 3:11of the denomination because we were atheist, which we are, and
- 3:16we done all these things, the Bible, and spit on it and pissed
- 3:19on it. I don't recall ever pissing on
- 3:20it, but I will. I've shipped on it now.
- 3:25I really want you to let this sink in, Jim Jones had said that
- 3:29have nothing to do with God, have nothing to do with that
- 3:32sky. God, have nothing to do with
- 3:34this Bible. That's what he said, word for
- 3:37word. You can look it up.
- 3:38You can see it on FBI recordings.
- 3:40Have nothing to do with God, have nothing to do with that
- 3:43sky. God have nothing to do with this
- 3:45Bible. The worst enemies we've got are
- 3:47preachers. The worst enemies we've got is
- 3:49religion and it's churches. That's the worst.
- 3:52Jones also said that he wished for a moment that everybody
- 3:55would wake up to what he had said and just for a moment think
- 4:01that there is no God, he says. And then maybe we might do
- 4:05something to help ourselves. I would rather you call me the
- 4:09devil because he had the sense to rebel.
- 4:15He had the good sense to rebel. We're Satanists.
- 4:18We start off being atheists and then decide that we are our own
- 4:21gods, the center of the universe.
- 4:23And so Satan for us is a symbol of freedom, liberty and pride,
- 4:27which we think is a wonderful thing.
- 4:29The only thing that brings perfect justice, freedom and
- 4:31equality, perfect love, and all of its beauty and holiness is
- 4:35socialism. And I suppose that's why Jim
- 4:41Jones said that socialism is God.
- 4:45He says there is no God but socialism.
- 4:49I'm amazed that I have as much power as I do to people not
- 4:53paying any attention to me. Otherwise some of you will sit
- 4:56right here. You say you don't believe in
- 5:00God, but you really do. You substituted your sky God in
- 5:07me. But don't you ever insult me by
- 5:11calling me your creator sky God. I am a saviour because I saved
- 5:17everybody that comes to me. But don't call me your creator,
- 5:22skydive just for a moment think that there's no God.
- 5:27Then maybe we might do something to help ourselves.
- 5:38I was the lawyer and attorney for the notorious Jim Jones.
- 5:45You know who they were? Not Christians.
- 5:48Jim Jones did not believe in God.
- 5:54It was a cult. He was a Satanist.
- 5:59Indeed, if he believed in anything, he believed in the
- 6:04communist ideology which he proclaimed his last will and
- 6:08testimony, leaving everything to the Soviets.
- 6:12We're looking back. I remember the headlines around
- 6:15that time, and it was you almost couldn't even get your arms
- 6:19around the idea of what had happened there.
- 6:21It's unfathomable. I don't, and I don't think
- 6:23there's been anything like that since.
- 6:25It's just it's so many minors, over 300 children.
- 6:27Yeah, so sad. Might the lesson of Jonestown
- 6:31help people avoid the danger? People were tricked, and I
- 6:35believe that most people can be tricked.