Give me a break. The Peoples Temple evolved from being a church congregation to eventually being a socialist group, and Jones evolved from reverend to dictator. Jonestown closer resembled a concentration camp than any utopia. Members were forced to work long hours with mediocre food, couples were not allowed to have intimacy (relationships had to be “approved”), those who spoke out were silenced into zombies with drugs, or by being shoved into a box for several weeks, and kids who acted out were given the “well treatment,” where they would be held upside down, and someone would be at the bottom of it, ready to pull them down below the water as a means for scaring them. Their screams would then be broadcast throughout the compound. Jones also regularly performed what he called “White Nights” where he would sound sirens and force all members to the pavilion, and then tell them the CIA and U.S. government were going to torture and kill them all (meanwhile he would have his own men go into the jungles to fire shots as proof), and the list goes on. Jones was a really sick bastard, and why anyone would follow this idiot to the remote jungles of Guyana is beyond me, considering there were many signs of his lunacy well before leaving.
Seductive Poison is a very fast read, and Layton tells of this information well, though the writing itself has some clichés like: “I must descend again into the darkness…” but this isn’t the type of book one reads for literary writing. One of the most interesting points about Jonestown is that the thing Jones accomplished is that he got members to fear each other. No one was allowed to voice his or her real feelings or opinions, lest be severely punished. Jones would also claim he was sending out people to pretend that they wanted to leave, so if someone came up to you, claiming they wanted to leave, you would then need to report this person, and those who did not, Jones would know you were “a defector” and one who was not true to “The Cause.” So no one trusted anyone, and ultimately most (with exception of a fortunate few) were forced to drink the poison on November 18, 1978.
The reason Layton’s book is significant is because she was able to escape from Jonestown months before the mass suicide took place, and it was she who publicly reported Jones, and who gained the interest of congressman Ryan, who upon going down to investigate, was then shot by Jones’ people as he and a number of others were readying to leave. Not long after the shootings took place at Port Kaituma, Jones ordered the mass suicide of over 900 of his followers. The most disturbing thing is that the children were done first, and whole families perished that day. Though again, why anyone did not read the signs beforehand and know to stay the hell away from Jones and his camp is beyond me. So while Layton provides a good first-hand account, readers might have trouble sympathizing with her, because one has to wonder why she could not only bring herself, but also her dying mother to Jonestown (who died of cancer ten days before the tragedy, and did so without any pain medication since Jones himself confiscated all of it for his own use).
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