- Hi friends. I missed you. I know! I know. 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 & Makeup Monday. (theme song) If you are new here, hi, how are you? That's great. Every Monday I sit down, and I talk about
a true crime story that's been heavy on my (tongue click) Noggin! 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,
because I’m here for you every Monday. I can still say that. (crunch) Yeah. I can still say that! You can’t take that away from me. So last week we talked about... Oh yeah nobody, because I wasn’t here. Sorry about that. last two weeks I missed, I know, whoops, LOL JK. But we moved, we moved, I know. And it wasn’t technically supposed to happen
until the end of this month, July. But (mumbles) you know, life. Anyways, so we ended up moving,
and then that kinda just threw me off, and then we didn’t have internet,
first world problem but you know I-- hi, I’m on the internet so. I appreciate you guys for
being patient with me. And for those of you who were not patient well, I’m here so shut up. Like jeez, let me eat my apples. (crunch) But I’m here today, 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,
very interested in them. They’re fascinating, I mean. Wow, cults, wow. But, before we jump into it,
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for partnering me on today's video, but most of all,
a big thank you to you guys, because without you I wouldn’t be here
making this video right now, so thank you. I love you. If you're ever curious as to
what I’m using on my face, I do list it down in the description box, right below this video there’s
a little description box, click it, shows it. Today's video it might be
the longest video ever, I don’t know. I tried my best to simplify it
as much as I could. This could easily be a three-part video because Jim Jones had
the most random ass life. He was everywhere, especially his childhood was just like wow, what the fuck is going on? It was so random. And then later down the road,
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’m gonna clip my hair back. Am I? Yeah. I was reading a biography about Jim Jones
and his upbringing and 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 -- (laughs) I'm getting ahead of myself, I’m just excited. Okay, so let’s just get right into it. Jim, his parents were Lynetta Jones
and James Jones. James was a veteran of World War I 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 son. Jim's mother, her name was Lynetta,
she was more of a free spirit, she didn’t care for religion
or any "Sky God", she called any God "Sky God". Sky God, you get it? Any who, 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 it’s just
"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 Lynetta then because 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. You know, his mom didn’t wanna 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. Mhm. Which honestly though, I mean that’s great,
well 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, you know, 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 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
would be 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-- Hm, I don’t know the actual like
job position but, you know, he was like a helper. This is helper. (tongue click) 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... 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 Jim was Christian, a Christian man and believe 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 belief were. Jim would tell her that
he didn't believe in her God and they would get to like really
heated arguments over it, just over their beliefs, and because divorce was
heavily frowned upon, Marceline knew that
it wasn’t even an option really, okay. If you had a divorced it was like
"Oh something's wrong with her". Marceline just decided that
she was going to 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 seems 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 seem 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, and he knew 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. Jim just found like this new calling, remember he was like
"I'm going to be a nurse or something", well now he was like
"I'm going to be a pastor". Yeah, so this was his new calling,
he was gonna be a pastor. So, Jim was a student pastor for about a year, he would just kinda gonna grow frustrated,
because he wanted you his own thing versus being told what to do,
so he was like "I’m gonna open up on my own church, and
I'm going to 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 want to 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
like 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 like
all the paperwork and keeping things organized, schedule like, 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 are 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! 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 will 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!". He's really like amping everybody up,
like it's a concert, he’s like "Yeah, healed". Mhm, 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 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, he was "Like oh shit,
I'm on to 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 like, 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,
then people don't know he was, that they weren’t going to believe his healings
right out the gate, you know? So he instead let a few
close people in on like what was really going down
with his healing powers, oh yeah. So Jim would bring in friends, people who
attended his own church, and use them as audience plants, who would pretend to be suffering
from something and then be healed. For example, one couple
from the audience like stood up, and like talked to the rest of the church and said, "Oh we used to have like
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 healings evolved over time, from small
things like again, the headaches and whatnot, to now curing cancer, mhm. At one church he brought in an audience plant, and the person who was cured,
would jump up and down and they will 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-- (laughs) "Community Unity", I like that actually,
why’d 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 "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 seeded in Indianapolis, 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, kinda 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 like "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, 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 a 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 word spread that like, "Hey, if you co-operate with Jim Jones
over here at his church," "you 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 break down. The is a side note. I'm giving you... It’s very vague, you know? But oh, he really like when out there
and they would have their... Where's my brain? What is this? (laughs) Am I churning butter? What is this? The sign, the peaceful protest. They’re just standing with the sign,
outside 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, 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. Any who, but they moved Ukiah, 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 popping like he thought, and also on top of that, the marriage between
his wife of 20 years, Marceline, it was, it wasn't going well, it was cracking. 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 fan girls. And this was going against everything
that he was preaching. He would be telling the
audience members like, you know, "Don't cheat on your wife or husband,
it's wrong, it's a sin, bla bla bla." 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, 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 bed ridden 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 was more, it wasn't just
like her back hurt, she was bedridden and like, yeah, so she wasn't able
to sexually satisfy 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 is 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?". (laughs) I don’t think she had any option to be honest, what was she gonna say? No? And then what? Leave him? Where's she gonna go? I mean her whole life revolved
around the church and Jim, she honestly, from what I read, it seemed
like she didn't have anything set up for herself, so it's like, even if she wanted to leave,
even if she did leave, it was like, what was she going to 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 old’s. Ay, up top". So Jim went to his church and just
told them what was going on. "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-sized following and was bringing in some good money again. Jim would travel with some members
to Los Angeles and Seattle, where he drew crowds in hopes to bring more
people, and attention to the People's Temple. So he was travelling 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?" "Well I was trying to get some bread at store," "stop and saw him do this like thing,
bought a $5 picture of him, hey", you 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 would mail people pamphlets about what
was going on in the church, all the healing 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 donations... Well they kinda did, they’re like
"If you wanna donate you can," "but you don’t have to". People were still donating money constantly, and because of the influx
of money that they were getting, the People's Temple decide to open up stores. Yes, stores. Where people, or members could donate
items they no longer wanted. So essentially like a
Salvation Army or a Goodwill, and they would sell
second-hand 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 racist were
trying to shut them down, and were threatening to harm them. So the mentality among
the followers was said to be "If you don't agree with us,
we're going to convince you," "if we can’t convince you,
you're the enemy". Which a lot of people have
this mentality now, am I right? Can I get an amen? God is good, god is good. Okay, sorry. So overtime, Jim became more
and more controlling or judgmental towards followers who do 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 church, like "Why you going to see that movie? "You should be donating that
back to the church", you know? Like just making them feel guilty. 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 kinda 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, wowing them with, you know,
his healing powers, and he was also preaching
in 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 the throat,
in preparation for Jim's healing. So they would like
open up their mouth, you know? Ah. And like swab it, try and clean it,
but in this process, the "nurse", she had a little bit, or he or she, had a
little bit of chicken liver, like in their hand, and they would drop it
into the persons mouth when they were swapping. Naturally, the person would gag and cough
it back up like "What the fuck?", and the "nurse" would then be like
"Oh my god, spit it out." "Spit it out into my hand!", and then they
would spit out into their hand, the "nurse" would call it the "cancer". She'd be like "Look everybody, the cancer!", and she be-- He or she, I’m sorry, 'cause sometimes it was a guy too. They would be showing the cancer off
to the audience, AKA the chicken liver, like "Oh my god you guys, look,
this just came out of him", and Jim would start yelling to spit it out,
and that their life has been saved. I mean he had his tricks. It worked, it worked. This is a side note, I totally messed up my eye shadow,
it looks like garbage. I’m so sad. 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
like 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 they 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 was 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 temples phone line. Jim would tell his followers that they all
need 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 beat 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 was one of them, like
"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 in 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 you cult members always
have to have sex with everybody, all the girls. 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 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 "Promise Land", where his followers could
live safely and freely without the worry of attack
from the FBI or the CIA. A 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. (sprays) Its location was convenient,
boats could make an easy trip from Miami to Guyana's capital
of Georgetown, which was a port city. And Jim wanted complete isolation
for his new mission, and Guyana was perfect 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 Promise 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 on to them, that they were going to 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 like
in a romantic relationship, and be like (kissing noises). 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 that was saying something bad,
would be forced to rewrite their letter, only giving glowing reviews
of their stay in Johnstown. I kind of forgot to mention, so when Jonestown like 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 kinda
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 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 decided
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 being built and whatnot,
so people were just getting really hyped about it, because they made it sound like
it was gonna be this 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 Johnstown, but there was nowhere for them to stay. There was limited water available for showers, and people were told to keep their
mouth 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, and 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 like an intercom system,
because he would make like announcements to the people outside in the community. So he didn’t have to leave his room,
he could talk to them like directly through there, that's probably why he got fat. So Jonestown was actually being funded by
his follower’s 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 will be sent out
to Georgetown and sold there. Which actually brought in some money,
but it wasn't enough to like, what they need 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 Johnstown
worked every day until 6 p.m., while music would be playing
over the loudspeaker system, but over time Jim was growing more
and more frustrated that there wasn't much progress
being made within Johnstown, 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 eating a single cookie, they were eating peanut butter and jelly. Obviously, they're not happy, you know? 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 for it yourself, and nobody was making their own money,
and any money that was coming in was being taken away
by Jim to fund Johnstown, 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 looking
into him, because people were speaking up and saying like people trapped out there. So yeah, they essentially
were coming, but Jim twisted it, and said that they're coming like
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 security team, who set
up around the town to protect from any attacks, they also prevented people
from leaving as well. They were set up to protect from attacks,
but low key they were there to keep everybody in. The followers were then becoming scared, because
the security was now threatening to hurt them if they didn't follow any of the rules, instead
of protecting Johnstown from the outsiders, they were attacking their own people. If people tried to get out of Jonestown,
the "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 the followers
living in Jonestown, including the children. That’s how you get 'em. The children though. 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. When everyone had
swallowed their drinks, Jim told them "You didn’t take anything", and that it was all the 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 want to test them, and he did it. The fact that they were we're 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, my sons there, my daughters there." 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 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 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 there, "They're shooting at us we gotta go",
like "We gotta go". So they get to the airstrip, about to hop
onto this small plane, but sadly some of the followers/security showed
up at the airstrip, with their weapons, tons of guns. They shot and attacked the people
who were trying to leave, and they ended up killing five people,
including the congressmen and three other members
of the press who were with them, and 11 people were wounded. At around 4 p.m., Jim spoke over the camp
loudspeaker to his followers, announcing a meeting in the pavilion. Inside the People's Temple they
recorded almost all of Jim's sermons, and any meeting 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 pilot, and it would be blamed
on the people of Jonestown, and it would soon bring
their enemies into town. The people have 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 like, you know, "One person was hurt, just 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 begged to be let go, they didn’t wanna like drink this poison. A few people in the poison line thanked Jim
for all that he done for them, all the followers drink
the poison 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 you
curious cats out there who are, but just know, just know it's horrible. It's just, oh. (disgusted grunt) 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, were the only ones who died from a gunshot
wound to the head, rather than a poison. I guess Jim just wanted to get it over with. What a 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 a week after the tragic event,
the death total came to 909 deaths. 909, 909. That’s a lot of people. This is a side note, when I first
heard about Johnstown, 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 hmm 5 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 insane. Investigators ended up
searching the compound, and over 60,000 printed pages, plus several
hundred tape recordings were taken and the FBI spent hours upon
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 has 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 body 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 11th, 1979. All of Jim Jones churches
were seized and closed down, as well as the many,
many bank accounts he had, hiding over $7 million, 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
Johnstown estate and whatnot, and also, they were trying to sue, because
they were trying to get help from the government to search this 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 then 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, I think it was 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 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. Let me know your thoughts down below. I appreciate you guys so much for
hanging out with me today. A big thank you to CaseTiFY for partnering
with me on today’s video. Oh, and let me know who you want me
to talk about next week. I hope you have a
wonderful rest of your day, you make good choices. Please make good choices. I’m glad to be back, yay! Okay. And I'll be seeing you guys later. Bye. (suspicious music)
