I am deeply shocked by this affidavit that was given five months before the deaths in Jonestown. This is a huge document for anyone concerned with cults.
32. During one "white night", we were informed that our situation had become hopeless and that the only course of action open to us was a mass suicide for the glory of socialism. We were told that we would be tortured by mercenaries if we were taken alive. Everyone, including the children, was told to line up. As we passed through the line, we were given a small glass of red liquid to drink. We were told that the liquid contained poison and that we would die within 45 minutes. We all did as we were told. When the time came when we should have dropped dead, Rev. Jones explained that the poison was not real and that we had just been through a loyalty test. He warned us that the time was not far off when it would become necessary for us to die by our own hands.
33. Life at Jonestown was so miserable and the physical pain of exhaustion was so great that this event was not traumatic for me. I had become indifferent as to whether I lived or died.
I am also shocked because although the differences with cults like that of the Fellowship of Friends, are obvious, the similarities are equally obvious. For anyone who's been there, it is impossible not to recognize the similarities unless they are still "buffering" that reality.
The most significant issue as I look at it today, is that it is as if cults had “internalized” this experience and learnt to refine their methods so that the physical violence is not as obvious as in Jonestown while still reaching the same submission from its members. There is still the tendency to overwork and keep people exhausted by sleeping only six hours or less as “work on the instinctive center”.
My conviction and argument is that cults are managing to reach this status quo of complete submission by the members without the use of physical force and that people are not dying physically but psychologically. They are not committing physical suicide but psychological suicide. They do not stop functioning, they continue to “function” like automatons but having suppressed themselves from the picture in a process that eventually leads to death by severe illness, suicide or getting killed by the cult but worse than death to a living death for the whole of a lifetime.
It is very interesting that in milieu control environments such as cults, it doesn’t matter whether the “technologies” that are used are “beautiful” or “horrible”. One of the most interesting aspects about the study of the Fellowship cult will be how beauty and comfort are used to submit the members with exactly the same results as cults that use force and intimidation. The external appearance of well-being and beauty is so much more effective in maintaining and trapping new members.
I am so deeply shocked with this testimony because I am in a similar position to this woman but on a different scale. She was asking for help for the people in Jonestown, I am asking for help for the people in the Fellowship of Friends primarily but I will also present enough proof that what is happening in an accelerated way in cults, is happening in our societies. The killings and suicides of spontaneous attackers in schools, public offices and now the private industry with what has been made more obvious by the telecom suicides, all have the same ingredients. HOW to understand that is what is difficult for people who are not familiar with the problem and even for those who are as the fofblog is proving.
In society it is not that these people committing these crimes against themselves or others are in a cult, it is that they are suffering the same symptoms that people in cults are suffering: disconnectedness from themselves and other human beings; lack of community. Community is a word that has been all too manipulated and misinterpreted but this lack of “community”, of integrity, of wholeness, this sense of disconnectedness with humanity, this lack of hope, is what characterizes the “state of suicide” and is the major cause for these tragedies. These “young innocent criminals” killing other people in schools are the outer explosion of a problem that lives acutely in the whole of society. These men are killing others and then killing themselves but in killing others they are simply expressing their own frustration: it is as impersonal as their lives!
In cults the mechanics works inversely. The members have already psychologically killed each other inside: everyone is secondary to the guru, no one is human, the guru is divine and the members are infrahuman by not being divine like the guru, all the abuses on their being are justified so that they can become like the guru through “super human efforts”. And they have already died through self sacrifice to the guru.
How do we solve this in society? By becoming more human, each in our particular sphere no matter what our religion, nationality, class, race or education is. By organizing our economy in such a way that people begin to connect their lives to their work and by so doing regain their sense of self and social worth. Huge changes must take place in how we manage our economy and I must gladly acknowledge that Mr. Obama is showing clear signs of understanding the problem for which I am so deeply pleased. We will improve our situation as we free our realities from subjective hierarchical conditioning and understand that such things as food is food for all of us, not for those who can pay for it. That water is water for all of us, that the earth belongs to all of us and we are equally responsible for it. If some of us have to die of hunger, let it be the strongest amongst us, not the children.
The damages that we see in all spheres of life, the damages to nature and ourselves, are major. We have not been living in vain, we have huge damages to respond for from previous generations as much as our own. That is life. Just like an adult realizes that she or he has committed many mistakes, it is good for us, the human beings of today, to realize that WE human beings have committed enormous mistakes. And as all extreme phenomena, we have also conquered great achievements that will help us deal with the no less considerable damages.
In order to begin such a work it seems that one of the first steps is to acquire consciousness of OUR selves. The problems we have are not one nation’s problems or one individual’s, but ours. We each have all the problems and we all have each person’s problems and achievements. The polarity of this reality is certainly to our advantage. There is more love than hatred, more life than death, more people still sane and not acting criminally but the process of social deterioration is such that we must become conscious of it as quickly as possible so that the tragedies don’t continue to happen without there being anything done to avoid them which is what we see everyday even as we take our car out of the driveway.
How we look at crime needs to change. As we EACH take responsibility for OUR irresponsibility, we come to terms with crime not as THAT which can be labeled on someone else’s head for subsequent decapitating but as an event that could have been avoided if we had not allowed for it in our carelessness.
This will bring changes towards our relationship to evil. We must begin to embrace the understanding of making mistakes not as evil but as mistakes. As we become more compassionate with our mistakes and those of others, we will be less inclined to “criminalize” them and separate our selves from the responsibility.
In rationalizing our relationship to evil, cults and authorities will not be able to submit people through guilt for their mistakes, mistakes that they are hardly responsible for. Victims of abandonment and abuse are the major “criminals” of our societies; we are each and every one of us, responsible for them.
The realms of good and evil need to be “rationalized”, “humanized” so that people stop being manipulated by catastrophic pseudo religions. Everything about our lives needs to be “humanized” so that we find the divine in our lives.
We have not lost the divine. It breathes still in every life. It is in the water we drink and the fire behind all processes. But in the materialistic age we are under, millions of us have lost the connectedness with our selves and others and because of that disconnectedness, we have become “depressed”. Depression is both a disconnectedness with the rest of the world and a weakening of the sense of one’s self and leads to destruction and crime. No one can act criminally when they are healthily connected.
If we look at the article in which Judith Butler talks about how we have solidarity for those of our kind but act criminally against those who are not in our circle as the Jews are acting against the Palestinians, and the Germans acted against the Jews and everyone in every nation or walk of life tends to act in groups, we can begin to understand why, in our times, it is NO longer possible to think of ourselves in terms of anything but human beings. Not Jews or Germans or Arabs or third world or first world but people: human beings.
We are One. Our problems are one. Our solutions are for all of us. Private property in the capitalist sense is a crime. There is no such a thing as individualism. Isolation is not an option. The individual exists as an individual in his objective relationship to the whole and the whole exists as an objective means for the individual to develop himself. If the whole is appropriated by a few, too many individuals cannot develop. I am not only talking about food and physical things, I am talking about EVERYTHING, particularly, the right to speech, self-expression….. in one word: ART The sphere of civil rights is actually the sphere of the artistic-emotional in the life of individuals and society. It is actually the sphere that makes CULTURE possible. It is not ART what the government has to finance as the independent activity of a few privileged individuals with education, it is ART in the life and freedoms of people that needs to be protected, art in our lives and the way we live it, art in how we develop our selves through our jobs.
Art today is the privilege mainly of the privileged. Art is a necessity for every human being. It should be present in every single activity. It is ART what people in capitalism and communism have been robbed from when they have to labor repetitively in uncreative jobs that have been disconnected from “life”, “culture” and have been reduced to “making a living”. “Making a living” is the deadliest ingredient of our times. People cannot just “make a living” they have to “live a life”. They are totally different things. Those “making a living” like every one of those persons that just committed suicide in the French telecom company, have been submitted to a life without ART, to a life without an emotional valuation of their existence, to a life without connectedness with themselves or the rest of the world INCLUDING, their company.
Being a “professional” in our times, means working in totally depersonalized companies in which everyone is just a number under the “supervision” (the name itself is telling: super-vision) of someone above in the hierarchy who makes sure the job is done no matter at who’s cost.
The owners don’t EXIST. They are too busy spending their millions. The company is a supra-human structure that people depend on, just like members in the cult depend on the unaccountable supra-human guru. The relationship is already in regular society. The adaptation to such status quo is already in members before they join the cult. The unaccountability of bosses, authorities, governments, GODS, is what people in society have already accepted by the time they join the cult.
Cults are the cancers of today’s society but the causes of such cancers are in society and stopping cults by force will not stop the causes. They will serve us, like illnesses serve us, to understand our selves better and continue our search for healthier, more human forms of life.
Here is this most impressive testimony by Deborah Layton Blakey, a woman who tried to save the nine hundred people of Guyana.
Affidavit of Deborah Layton Blakey
The threat and possibility of mass suicide
June 15, 1978
By Deborah Layton Blakey
I, DEBORAH LAYTON BLAKEY, declare the following under penalty of perjury:
1. The purpose of this affidavit is to call to the attention of the United States government the existence of a situation which threatens the lives of United States citizens living in Jonestown, Guyana.
2. From August, 1971 until May 13, 1978, I was a member of the People's Temple. For a substantial period of time prior to my departure for Guyana in December, 1977, I held the position of Financial Secretary of the People's Temple.
3. I was 18 years old when I joined the People's Temple. I had grown up in affluent circumstances in the permissive atmosphere of Berkeley, California. By joining the People's Temple, I hoped to help others and in the process to bring structure and self-discipline to my own life.
4. During the years I was a member of the People's Temple, I watched the organization depart with increasing frequency from its professed dedication for social change and participatory democracy. The Rev. Jim Jones gradually assumed a tyrannical hold over the lives of Temple members.
5. Any disagreement with his dictates came to be regarded as "treason". The Rev. Jones labelled any person who left the organization a "traitor" and "fair game". He steadfastly and convincingly maintained that the punishment for defection was death. The fact that severe corporal punishment was frequently administered to Temple members gave the threats a frightening air of reality.
6. The Rev. Jones saw himself as the center of a conspiracy. The identity of the conspirators changed from day to day along with his erratic world vision. He induced the fear in others that, through their contact with him, they had become targets of the conspiracy. He convinced black Temple members that if they did not follow him to Guyana, they would be put into concentration camps and killed. White members were instilled with the belief that their names appeared on a secret list of enemies of the state that was kept by the C.I.A. and that they would be tracked down, tortured, imprisoned, and subsequently killed if they did not flee to Guyana.
7. Frequently, at Temple meetings, Rev. Jones would talk non-stop for hours. At various times, he claimed that he was the reincarnation of either Lenin, Jesus Christ, or one of a variety of other religious or political figures. He claimed that he had divine powers and could heal the sick. He stated that he had extrasensory perception and could tell what everyone was thinking. He said that he had powerful connections the world over, including the Mafia, Idi Amin, and the Soviet government.
8. When I first joined the Temple, Rev. Jones seemed to make clear distinctions between fantasy and reality. I believed that most of the time when he said irrational things, he was aware that they were irrational, but that they served as a tool of his leadership. His theory was that the end justified the means. At other times, he appeared to be deluded by a paranoid vision of the world. He would not sleep for days at a time and talk compulsively about the conspiracies against him. However, as time went on, he appeared to become genuinely irrational.
9. Rev. Jones insisted that Temple members work long hours and completely give up all semblance of a personal life. Proof of loyalty to Jones was confirmed by actions showing that a member had given up everything, even basic necessities. The most loyal were in the worst physical condition. Dark circles under one's eyes or extreme loss of weight were considered signs of loyalty.
10. The primary emotions I came to experience were exhaustion and fear. I knew that Rev. Jones was in some sense "sick", but that did not make me any less afraid of him.
11. Rev. Jones fled the United States in June, 1977 amidst growing public criticism of the practices of the Temple. He informed members of the Temple that he would be imprisoned for life if he did not leave immediately.
12. Between June, 1977 and December, 1977, when I was ordered to depart from Guyana, I had access to coded radio broadcasts from Rev. Jones in Guyana to the People's Temple headquarters in San Francisco.
13. In September, 1977, an event which Rev. Jones viewed as a major crisis occurred. Through listening to coded radio broadcasts and conversations with other members of the Temple staff, I learned that an attorney for former Temple member Grace Stoen had arrived in Guyana, seeking the return of her son, John Victor Stoen.
14. Rev. Jones has expressed particular bitterness toward Grace Stoen. She had been Chief Counselor, a position of great responsibility within the Temple. Her personal qualities of generosity and compassion made her very popular with the membership. Her departure posed a threat to Rev. Jones absolute control. Rev. Jones delivered a number of public tirades against her. He said that her kindness was faked and that she was a C.I.A. agent. He swore that he would never return her son to her.
15. I am informed that Rev. Jones believed that he would be able to stop Timothy Stoen, husband of Grace Stoen and father of John Victor Stoen, from speaking against the Temple as long as the child was being held in Guyana. Timothy Stoen, a former Assistant District Attorney in Mendocino and San Francisco counties, had been one of Rev. Jones' most trusted advisors. It was rumoured that Stoen was critical of the use of physical force and other forms of intimidation against Temple members. I am further informed that Rev. Jones believed that a public statement by Timothy Stoen would increase the tarnish on his public image.
16. When the Temple lost track of Timothy Stoen, I was assigned to track him down and offer him a large sum of money in return for his silence. Initially, I was to offer him $5,000. I was authorized to pay him up to $10,000. I was not able to locate him and did not see him again until on or about October 6, 1977. On that date, the Temple received information that he would be joining Grace in a San Francisco Superior Court action to determine the custody of John. I was one of a group of Temple members assigned to meet him outside the court and attempt to intimidate him to prevent him from going inside.
17. The September, 1977 crisis concerning John Stoen reached major proportions. The radio messages from Guyana were frenzied and hysterical. One morning, Terry J. Buford, public relations advisor to Rev. Jones, and myself were instructed to place a telephone call to a high-ranking Guyanese official who was visiting the United States and deliver the following threat: unless the government of Guyana took immediate steps to stall the Guyanese court action regarding John Stoen's custody, the entire population of Jonestown would extinguish itself in a mass suicide by 5:30 P.M. that day. I was later informed that Temple members in Guyana placed similar calls to other Guyanese officials.
18. We later received radio communication to the effect that the court case had been stalled and that the suicide threat was called off.
19. I arrived in Guyana in December, 1977. I spent a week in Georgetown and then, pursuant to orders, traveled to Jonestown.
20. Conditions at Jonestown were even worse than I had feared they would be. The settlement was swarming with armed guards. No one was permitted to leave unless on a special assignment and these assignments were given only to the most trusted. We were allowed to associate with Guyanese people only while on a "mission".
21. The vast majority of the Temple members were required to work in the fields from 7 A.M. to 6 P.M. six days per week and on Sunday from 7 A.M. to 2 P.M. We were allowed one hour for lunch. Most of this hour was spent walking back to lunch and standing in line for our food. Taking any other breaks during the workday was severely frowned upon.
22. The food was woefully inadequate. There was rice for breakfast, rice water soup for lunch, and rice and beans for dinner. On Sunday, we each received an egg and a cookie. Two or three times a week we had vegetables. Some very weak and elderly members received one egg per day. However, the food did improve markedly on the few occasions when there were outside visitors.
23. In contrast, Rev. Jones, claiming problems with his blood sugar, dined separately and ate meat regularly. He had his own refrigerator which was stocked with food. The two women with whom he resided, Maria Katsaris and Carolyn Layton, and the two small boys who lived with him, Kimo Prokes and John Stoen, dined with the membership. However, they were in much better physical shape than everyone else since they were also allowed to eat the food in Rev. Jones' refrigerator.
24. In Febuary, 1978, conditions had become so bad that half of Jonestown was ill with severe diarrhea and high fevers. I was seriously ill for two weeks. Like most of the other sick people, I was not given any nourishing foods to help recover. I was given water and a tea drink until I was well enough to return to the basic rice and beans diet.
25. As the former financial secretary, I was aware that the Temple received over $65,000 in Social Security checks per month. It made me angry to see that only a fraction of the income of the senior citizens in the care of the Temple was being used for their benefit. Some of the money was being used to build a settlement that would earn Rev. Jones the place in history with which he was so obsessed. The balance was being held in "reserve". Although I felt terrible about what was happening, I was afraid to say anything because I knew that anyone with a differing opinion gained the wrath of Jones and other members.
26. Rev. Jones' thoughts were made known to the population of Jonestown by means of broadcasts over the loudspeaker system. He broadcast an average of six hours per day. When the Reverend was particularly agitated, he would broadcast for hours on end. He would talk on and on while we worked in the fields or tried to sleep. In addition to the daily broadcasts, there were marathon meetings six nights per week.
27. The tenor of the broadcasts revealed that Rev. Jones' paranoia had reached an all-time high. He was irate at the light in which he had been portrayed by the media. He felt that as a consequence of having been ridiculed and maligned, he would be denied a place in history. His obsession with his place in history was maniacal. When pondering the loss of what he considered his rightful place in history, he would grow despondent and say that all was lost.
28. Visitors were infrequently permitted access to Jonestown. The entire community was required to put on a performance when a visitor arrived. Before the visitor arrived, Rev. Jones would instruct us on the image we were to project. The workday would be shortened. The food would be better. Sometimes there would be music and dancing. Aside from these performances, there was little joy or hope in any of our lives. An air of despondency prevailed.
29. There was constant talk of death. In the early days of the People's Temple, general rhetoric about dying for principles was sometimes heard. In Jonestown, the concept of mass suicide for socialism arose. Because our lives were so wretched anyway and because we were so afraid to contradict Rev. Jones, the concept was not challenged.
30. An event which transpired shortly after I reached Jonestown convinced me that Rev. Jones had sufficient control over the minds of the residents that it would be possible for him to effect a mass suicide.
31. At least once a week, Rev. Jones would declare a "white night", or state of emergency. The entire population of Jonestown would be awakened by blaring sirens. Designated persons, approximately fifty in number, would arm themselves with rifles, move from cabin to cabin, and make certain that all members were responding. A mass meeting would ensue. Frequently during these crises, we would be told that the jungle was swarming with mercenaries and that death could be expected at any minute.
32. During one "white night", we were informed that our situation had become hopeless and that the only course of action open to us was a mass suicide for the glory of socialism. We were told that we would be tortured by mercenaries if we were taken alive. Everyone, including the children, was told to line up. As we passed through the line, we were given a small glass of red liquid to drink. We were told that the liquid contained poison and that we would die within 45 minutes. We all did as we were told. When the time came when we should have dropped dead, Rev. Jones explained that the poison was not real and that we had just been through a loyalty test. He warned us that the time was not far off when it would become necessary for us to die by our own hands.
33. Life at Jonestown was so miserable and the physical pain of exhaustion was so great that this event was not traumatic for me. I had become indifferent as to whether I lived or died.
34. During another "white night", I watched Carolyn Layton, my former sister-in-law, give sleeping pills to two young children in her care, John Victor Stoen and Kimo Prokes, her own son. Carolyn said to me that Rev. Jones had told her that everyone was going to have to die that night. She said that she would probably have to shoot John and Kimo and that it would be easier for them if she did it while they were asleep.
35. In April, 1978, I was reassigned to Georgetown. I became determined to escape or die trying. I surreptitiously contacted my sister, who wired me a plane ticket. After I received the ticket, I sought the assistance of the United States Embassy in arranging to leave Guyana. Rev. Jones had instructed us that he had a spy working in the United States Embassy and that he would know if anyone went to the embassy for help. For this reason, I was very fearful.
36. I am most grateful to the United States government and Richard McCoy and Daniel Weber; in particular, for the assistance they gave me. However, the efforts made to investigate conditions in Jonestown are inadequate for the following reasons. The infrequent visits are always announced and arranged. Acting in fear for their lives, Temple members respond as they are told. The members appear to speak freely to American representatives, but in fact they are drilled thoroughly prior to each visit on what questions to expect and how to respond. Members are afraid of retaliation if they speak their true feelings in public.
37. On behalf of the population of Jonestown, I urge that the United States Government take adequate steps to safeguard their rights. I believe that their lives are in danger.
I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct, except as to those matters stated on information and belief and as to those I believe them to be true.
Executed this 15 day of June, 1978 at San Francisco, California.
(signed) Deborah Layton Blakey
Taken from the Rick Ross Institute.
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