A utopia is a perfect world or society. Many groups and organizations leave normal society to create their own perfect community. A dystopia is the total opposite. This can be caused when a utopia goes under total control of the leader. The Peoples Temple cult aimed to start a utopia of its own, intergating blacks and whites in a common space. Things went well until their leader, Jim Jones gauned total power over their minds and spirituality.The Peoples Temple was mostly successful. Although the followers of the cult ultimately committed a mass suicide, mostly the group gained many followers and helped to integrate hospitals and churches, during a time where America was segregated.
The cult started off as an interracial congregation and later moved to a jungle in Guyana to seek a utopia. They moved into their own compound, Jonestown, to isolate themselves from the outside world. The goal was to build their perfect world.
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“The group was started years before with the avowed vision of abolishing racism. Although it was headquartered in San Francisco, its members sought to found their own utopia in a nondescript plot of South American jungle near Georgetown, Guyana. The commune they created was in honor of the cult’s founder and religious leader… Reverend Jim Jones” (Harrary). The church often traveled to recruit new members, but this trip was final and many never saw the US again. They moved from the United States to establish their own peace in Guyana. They believed in racial intergration and achieving a utopia community. During this time blacks and whites were still segregated. The Peoples Temple church welcomed people of all backgrounds. “The people who enrolled with Jim Jones and his Peopes Temple were looking for community, searching for meaning” (Gilmor). They gave people meaning and purpose, that’s what made the church appealing and attractive. The church infasized unity and togetherness in the world. The Peoples Temple believed in racial integrated community. The Peoples Temple was unsuccessful because all of the members were eventually forced into committing a mass suicide. When the Congressman Leo Ryan, journalists, and reporters from the US came down to investigate Jonestown some memebers decided they wanted to go back to America with their families. This outraged Jim Jones because he felt that he was being betrayed. This resulted in armed members having a shoot out with the US officials. The congressman and some members that tried to escape were killed. When the chaous erupted Jim ordered his people to drink the cyanide laced Kool-Aid. “As he began to abuse amphetamines Jones became paranoid about attacks on his person…Jones ordered everyone in Jonestown to drink cups of liquid that contained cyanide. When it was over, 900 people were dead. Jones was found with a bullet in is temple” (Dockterman). He told them that if they couldn’t live in peace then they should die in peace. Because they were brainwashed, they obeyed. The Peoples Temple gained a mass of followers while in Indianalopis.They often traveled to recruit new members. People were attracted to the church and trusted Jim Jones because he preached equality. He had charm and knew how to touch people with his words. “The leader of the cult, Jim Jones, began preaching about social equality, lifting up and other socialist principles in the 1960s. He amassed a huge following in Indianapolis” (Dockterman). The church recruited hundreds of people each year. They were successful in getting people to join follow their teachings of social change. The Peoples Temple believed in racial equality and helped racially integrate hospitals and churches.
This is something that seemed tabo during the 60’s, where America was still racist and segregated. Jim Jones and The Peoples Temple helped to break mant social barriers. “He helped to integrate churches, hospitals, restaurants and theaters…was one of harmony and equality rooted in communism” (Latson). The church had blacks, whites, Asians, etc; they wanted a “rainbow” family. They loved and welcomed all people into their community.
Although The Peoples Temple ended when its followers committed a mass suicide, thcult was mostly successful because they gained hundreds of followers a year and helped to racially integrate hospitals and churches. The Peoples Temple was a church that eventually formed into a cult. They traveled to create a utopia with racial and social equality, on a plot in Guyana. This all came crashing down when Jim Jones started abusing drugs and eventually forced his memebers to poison them to
death.
The cult had many beliefs that our human bodies were only vessels, occupied by members of the “Kingdom of Heaven.” They believed that Marshall Applewhite was a link between their cult and their god. It was said that god spoke to them through Applewhite. He was considered an equivalent to the Christian religions Jesus. And that people need to follow him as people had followed Jesus 2000 years ago. The cult believed that their time on earth was only a schooling to learn how to become a member of the kingdom of heaven. Do (Applewhite) taught them that in order to leave behind this world and move on to the next, people had to give up their family, sensuality, selfish desires, your human mind and your human body if necessary.
Dystopia is a society where something is flipped from our normal society, making everything else different and worse than we can imagine. Harrison Bergeron is a good example of a dystopia because it changes one thing that makes that society worse than ours. In the society of Fahrenheit 451, reading books is illegal. This changes how people retain knowledge and see the past that their society was once in. In our society, books are not illegal to read.
First, people slowly started to realize this may not be what they want yet have no option, leading to psychological torture. It was said to be that if anyone was caught running away Jim Jones and his guards would use tactical skills to torment the people into staying, basically scaring them into any other idea. Also, Jones convinced his people that they were under attack by the government and that the US wanted to shut them down, using brainwash. After hundreds of nights practicing the suicide he finally called the actual drinking of the cyanide-laced kool aid (Jonestown and peoples temple, chidster). The people of Jonestown were manipulated and brainwashed into thinking that the life they were living was a hell and that suicide would bring them to peace. Jim Jones had implanted false thoughts in their heads causing emotional distress and ultimately leading to the mental break down of killing their children and themselves. The people of Jonestown were taken to the level of abnormal living and held high reliance on Jim. It was because of all these adaptions that Jim forced on these people that they became a cult (Cult, Gallagher). Jim Jones is one of the main and biggest examples of the difference between a religious leader and a cult leader. Another key example of a cult that used psychological techniques to persuade people
...instituted fear into his followers by telling them that if they do not join his cause they will lose their souls forever upon the recycling of the planet Earth. Hence, the only way to save their soul was to rid themselves of their human nature. The last technique that Applewhite used to gain his students trust was institution of power and importance. Applewhite told his followers that he was a member of the evolutionary kingdom bought to earth in order to prepare its inhabitants for re-enlightenment; to teach them how to be saved and not “plowed under” with the others. (Initiation Video one) These behaviors, along with many others not discussed here allowed Applewhite and Nettles to gain and maintain control of their followers. Behaviors such as these can be seen in practice today, not necessarily in cults, allowing us to further explore how and why cults develop.
A cult society is an organization that basically disguises itself as a religion. In a cult, they normally perform rituals. There are usually many people in these societies. In Jim Jones’s cult, there were at least one thousand people in this community.
Jim Jones and his infamous cult entitled, “The People’s Temple,” holds an interesting value to social psychology. Jonestown is a topic that can relate back to many sociology terms and ideas. Jonestown can be related to social deviance, the effect of American culture on social groups, labelling theory, charismatic authority, and even shows how societal history often repeats itself. American society during the late 60’s-70’s is what led to the creation of Jonestown. Jonestowns downfall provided a lot of insight to the American public of how society needed to change, proving that the deaths of about 900 people weren’t for nothing.
Cults are becoming more and more of an issue for Jews every day. Many cults are beginning to target Jews. They say you can believe in Jesus yet remain a Jew, or many other things like that. It is important for people to educate themselves of these cults and their recruiting techniques so that they will not be taken advantage of by these cults. Cults now are very different than they were in ancient times though. The Jews, rather than being targeted by cults, were themselves a cult. In fact they were one of the first documented cults.
The People’s Temple was religious cult founded and lead by Jim Jones, based in Jonestown, Guyana. The converts belonging to Peoples Temple may have joined for various reasons differing from one another, yet the one common bond they all shared was Jim Jones. They loved Jim, they feared Jim, and eventually they died for Jim .
Jehovah witnesses have membership of 83 million. The governing body of the Jehovah witnesses is a group in Warwick, NY of elders. This group establishes doctrines from their interpretations of the bible. I was founded by Charles Taze Russell in the 1870’s.
Dystopia is a term that defines a corrupt government that projects a false image. Thus, in a dystopian society, making belief and comfort that the society is proper to its followers. One good example of dystopian society is the Hunger Games. The terms that describe that dystopia towards the Hunger games are a “hierarchical society, fear of the outside world, penal system and a back story” (“Dystopia”).
On November 18, 1978, a notorious religious organization lead by Jim Jones became international news. As a result of manipulation and isolation, Jim Jones influenced his followers to commit suicide. Not only, but his followers were utterly convinced that what they were doing was for a good cause, specifically, a political movement. With kool-aid and a dash of cyanide, 918 people, adults and children, ended their lives that day. The aftermath of this horrific event resulted in numerous documentaries, on of which being, Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple. Created in 2006, this documentary gives a thorough and accurate account of the events that lead up to as well as occured that day.
Utopia Vs. Dystopia Each person has their own vision of utopia. Utopia is an ideal state, a paradise, a land of enchantment. It has been a central part of the history of ideas in Western Civilization. Philosophers and writers continue to imagine and conceive plans for an ideal state, even today.
The idea of cults stands out for me in the reading. It was good for Lynch to draw the contrast between how we see cults today in the 20th century versus how cults were seen and operated in Antiquity. Today cult is often used to describe a negative aspect of a religion and their practices. One example I recall is Jim Jones and his followers who committed suicide by drinking poisoned Kool-Aid
be found in The Quakers move from a sect to a denomination in the USA
Utopia and dystopia can be viewed as a story, as utopia that can be a good person not the story, where dystopia can be the bad person in the story based on how they act. A utopía is an imaginary place where the government laws and social conditions are perfect, whereas dystopia would be different as an imaginary place where everyone is unhappy and they are usually afraid because they are not treated fairly. What a utopia is in a story is a person that's happy and does everything it is said, where dystopia does not listen and is harsh to everyone that is around that person. Utopia derolves into dystopia because it's needed for utopía to improve from a story if it's necessary in a problem from a story. It basically means that dystopia has to