ur final extension of the social psychology of evil from artificial laboratory experiments to real-world contexts comes from the jungles of Guyana, where a very popular American religious leader persuaded more than 900 of his followers to commit mass suicide or be killed by their relatives and friends on November 28, 1978. Jim Jones, pastor of Peoples Temple congregations in San Francisco and Los Angeles, set out to create a Socialist utopia in South America where brotherhood and tolerance would be dominant over the materialism and racism he loathed in the United States. But Jones was transformed over time and place from the caring, spiritual "Father" of this large Protestant congregation into the Angel of Death-- a truly cosmic transformation of Luciferian proportions. For now, I want only to establish the obedience link between Milgram’s basement laboratory in New Haven and the jungle killing-field in Guyana.

The dream of the many poor members of Peoples Temple for a new and better life in Utopia were demolished as soon as Jones instituted forced extended labor, armed guards, the total restriction of all civil liberties, semi-starvation diets, and daily punishments for the slightest breach of any of his many rules that amounted to torture. When concerned relatives forced a Congressman and his media crew to inspect the compound, Jones arranged for them to be murdered. He then gathered almost all of those members who were at the compound and gave a speech that lasted less than an hour in which he exhorted them all to take their lives by drinking cyanide-laced Kool Aid. Those who refused were forced to drink by the guards or were shot trying to escape, but most obeyed their leader.

Jones was surely an egomaniac; he had all of his speeches and proclamations, and even his torture sessions tape-recorded -- including this last hour suicide drill. In it Jones distorts reality. He lies, pleads, makes false analogies, appeals to ideology, and gives assurance of transcendent after lives. Finally, he outright insists that they follow his orders, as his staff efficiently distributes the deadly poison to the more than 900 members gathered around him. Some excerpts from that last hour convey a sense of the death-dealing tactics he used to induce total obedience to an authority gone mad.

"Please get us some medication. It's simple. It's simple. There's no convulsions with it [of course there are, especially for the children].... Don't be afraid to die. You'll see, there'll be a few people land out here. They'll torture some of our children here. They'll torture our people. They'll torture our seniors. We cannot have this.... Please, can we hasten? Can we hasten with that medication? You don't know what you've done. I tried.... Please. For God's sake, let's get on with it. We've lived--we've lived as no other people lived and loved. We've had as much of this world as you're gonna get. Let's just be done with it. Let's be done with the agony of it. (Applause by the audience).... Who wants to go with their child has a right to go with their child. I think it's humane. I want to go--I want to see you go, though.... It's not to be afeared. It is not to be feared. It is a friend. It's a friend ... sitting there, show your love for one another. Let's get gone. Let's get gone. Let's get gone. (Children crying loudly).... Lay down your life with dignity. Don't lay down with tears and agony. There's nothing to death.... It's just stepping over to another plane. Don't be this way. Stop this hysterics.... No way for us to die. We must die with some dignity. We must die with some dignity. We will have no choice. Now we have some choice.... Look children, it's just something to put you to rest. Oh, God. (Children screaming).... Mother, Mother, Mother, Mother, Mother, please. Mother, please, please, please. Don't--don't do this. Don't do this. Lay down your life with your child."

The transcript of Jones’s last-hour speech on November 18, 1978, is known as the “Death Tape” (FBI no. Q042), and is available online here, courtesy of the Jonestown Institute in Oakland, California, as transcribed by Mary McCormick Maaga.

And they did; they died for "Dad." The power of charismatic tyrannical leaders, like Jim Jones and Adolph Hitler, endures long after their deaths, even though they have done terrible things to their follower. Whatever little good they may have done earlier, however, somehow comes to dominate their legacy in the minds of the faithful. Consider the example of a young man, Garry Scott, who followed his father into The Peoples Temple but was expelled for being disobedient. Listen to his brief statement as he called the National Call-that followed the broadcast of the NPR show, Father Cares: The Last of Jonestown, by James Reston, Jr. Listen to how he was punished for an infraction of the rules. But more importantly, listen to his articulation of his enduring reaction to this torment. Does he hate Jim Jones? Not one bit. He has become a "True Believer," a "Faithful Follower." Even though his father died of poisoning in Jonestown and he himself was brutally tortured and humiliated, Gary still admires and loves his “Dad”-- Jim Jones. Not even George Orwell’s omnipotent 1984 Party could honestly claim such a victory.

Gary: “Like a lot of other young people, I had my sort of rebellion against some of the doctrinal methods that were taking place in the church, and I rebelled, and for that I was punished to become a better Christian. I was physically abused. Beaten with a two-by-four. I was whipped. One of the big problems I have in life is I have a phobia against snakes and for one punishment I was tied up and a snake [a boa] was put on top of me and that was psychological torment that I had to go through for a while. And I was sexually abused as well.”

Moderator Bill Moyers then asked: “What did you see in Jim Jones when you were in the Temple that caused you to be faithful despite your treatment?”

Gary: “I think the guilt. I felt that I was responsible for everything that was taking place around me. If there was any bad attitudes or any bad feelings emitting from persons in the Temple, I felt that they were my actions.... I followed Jim Jones because he was a very caring person. And even today, you know, despite the fact that a lot of my friends, which I considered my brothers and sisters, died, and a lot of them were forced to their death, there is a very personal part of Reverend Jim Jones that still lives today. And even though I’m very frustrated and very disappointed by what happened to my father, there’s still a peace (piece?) here that I see in Reverend Jones. “

Like Orwell's protagonist, Winston Smith, Gary Scott seems “to have won a victory over himself.” In the end, they love Big Brother and Father Jones, alike. Powerful Authority Systems conquer individual personality systems more often than does the reverse.

©2006-2008, Philip G. Zimbardo