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Jones: So what he [former Temple member John Head] did do, he killed himself. But it’s just puzzles me that a District Attorney [John Van De Camp ] would uh, dignify this stuff. They’re also trying to accuse him in the press. The Los Angeles coroner [Thomas Noguchi], who I’ve never met nor do I know, nor do I suppose anyone in this church knows him, accusing him of uh, being in conspiracy with us to conceal the true reason of this man’s death. Well, I uh– I tell you that is uh, frightening. Even though we will be vindicated, if there’s any semblance of reason left in this society because we had nothing whatsoever to do with his committing suicide. And I don’t know how they hope by their– by the stretch of their imagination to achieve anything that would portray us in a bad light, other than they’re trying to perhaps trying to sensationalize and cause more disunity in the sou– in the south in Los Angeles. Interesting that it’s in our Los Angeles correspondent reports. And when our attorney Charles Garry checked it out, it was [Marshall] Kilduff, the same old character. He wasn’t the Los Angeles correspondent, no, he was just a reporter in San Francisco. And it (unintelligible word)– In further investigation (unintelligible word) that he is the one demanding investigation of the coroner.
And now they’ve come up with some new letter that this young man was supposed to have written before he died, a suicide note, and they’re accusing the coroner of concealing that letter. I wanna to tell you, it’s very eerie, very eerie. If there’s a letter, it’s probably been manufactured, because the coroner would’ve had no reason to conceal anything, in that he didn’t know us and we didn’t know him. He isn’t a socialist, and we would’ve never been involved in anything even remotely connected with murder. So I don’t know what– what possible thing they have in mind. I’m too honest to even be able to explore their devious mind. But it seems they are so anxious to uh– to reflect on us, that they’re willing to pull down a coroner with them. Interesting enough, the coroner is Asiatic. As I recall. Isn’t he, Asiatic?
Crowd: Agrees
Jones: So it all figures in the configuration, I guess.
So that’s the news topic tonight. We’ve had silence in the news until today, and now we are being– Said this district attorney is opening the case of a young man that once was with Peoples Temple. Whereas the actual fact was the district attorney is being pressured by one Marshall Kilduff, and he said “Friends–“ The district attorney told one of our contacts. Goodness knows who those friends are. I remember that uh, the head of the Jewish, uh, community relations counsel, said that she had information at one time that he had Nazi connections, and then came up with the Nazi name of Klineman [likely George Klineman] who he had found to be one of our principal sources of all of this. Klineman, who lives in an– a big estate in Sonoma County, and surrounded by sp– uh, spotlights and a fence about eight foot high, and all sorts of vicious dogs. What he is trying to conceal in that mansion, little do we know. But we can very much suspect, but he has absolute Nazi connections, so we’re told. And no one seems interested in that, no one seems interested in printing that whatsoever, except the Sun Reporter, and our own paper. No one had been true and loyal through this entire ordeal, except Dennis Banks. And he again pledged last evening that he was willing to do anything that we needed. And we told him that we wanted him to get to freedom.
Crowd: Scattered applause
Jones: So I told you, I told you–
Crowd: Applause
Jones: –that I would let you know the good with the bad. I don’t know particular what this is, I don’t– I don’t suppose we’ve gotten down the road to fascism to such a degree that they can frame uh, us in the reference to a dead man who commits suicide, but if it’s a fascist state, then anything can be done, and usually is done. Did you discuss– Did someone discuss the Rosenberg case [Ethel and Julius Rosenberg] before I got here?
Crowd: Responds.
Jones: All right. That’s a good example. Why someone that couldn’t even draw as well as a sixth grader, some replica of a atomic bomb, from five years of memory and supposedly even in spite of A.E.– Atomic Energy Commission reports that no secrets had b– enabled the Soviets to build their bomb. Nothing that the United States had revealed or any secrets that came out of the United States in any way, shape or form had uh, contributed to the building of the bomb. Nonetheless they put the Rosenbergs in jail based on a sketch out of a man’s mind that was never shown– allowed to be revealed to the public. Only given camera v– camera view, which meant that the attorney subsequently could not even appeal the case. (pause) For the sake of Americans, North Americans, I hope we’re not headed for that kind of era, because it got so dangerous that’s when the Rosenbergs went to their death, and clasped their precious babies, eleven- and twelve-year-old children, I think they were younger then that [Robert and Michael Meeropol, six and 10, respectively]. I’m a little vague on that, but they were very young, reaching through that net of fence, not to clasp, and they couldn’t clasp, and they put their hands up– I shall never forget the clutch– the– the clutch of love, the desire to touch, and could not reach through to touch their children. Neither could they reach through to touch each other, as they parted and were taken down that lonely road to the gas– to the electric chair.
Persecuted, prosecuted and murdered, without a scintilla, not a shred of evidence. No attorney would represent them, no left group would associate with them, even the Communist Party USA disassociated itself from them, and they stood alone, with the exception of one incompetent Emanuel Block. A civil attorney who had never been in– before, as I remember, involved in criminal litigation. And he stood up before the court and the jury, which would co– obviously prejudice anyone, against the defendant. He said “I’m a patriotic American first, and the defense attorney for these two secondly.” Which would imply somehow that his role as a patriotic American was being somehow jeopardized by defending these two. One of the most damaging things he did in that dark era of the McCarthy period, was to uh, not use normal appeal processes, or to render objections that were absolutely damaging to the Rosenbergs. The judge even – [Irving] Kaufman – who was a bigot himself uh, introduced his (unintelligible word), he said, “This is an unusual stance for a defense attorney.” He said, “Not in view of my situation and the circumstances,” which was again the statement from their own defense attorney’s mouth, enough to hang them.
That was the McCarthy era. Some of you forget it and some of you are so blasé, you don’t think it’ll ever happen again. Some of you think you can go on back to life and its routine, and somehow you could uh, eat your McDonald hamburgers and go swimming, golfing, or whatever, and not be affected by that! And I find that most peculiar to me, how anyone could dream that a– a society that’s already proven that we are on the very– at best the edge of a McCarthy era, at the worst the middle of one, when we are now faced with a young man who left our church, ridiculed and blasphemed this cause and my own principle, and then his own conscience destroyed him and caused him to leap off of a building, and how you can possibly connect that suicide to murder is a shocking, shocking consideration. And that’s what they’re trying to do. They’re trying very hard to suggest that we as a church were involved in the murder of this young man, when he was a suicide. And as I say now, they accuse a coroner who didn’t know him from Adam’s (unintelligible word), and who I never knew, and no one in our church knew, unless you knew him on your own. Trying to accuse him of concealing a letter. Very interesting that a letter would emerge now, what is it, two years that he’s been passed? Very interesting that a letter all of the sudden emerges, and this Asiatic coroner is supposed to have suppressed this evidence. Now you know that’s bullshit.
Crowd: Right.
Jones: No coroner would take the risk of suppressing any kind of evidence. If we were his friends, if he was a socialist, if he were paid, that kind of loyalty I’ve never seen, except for me. And being that he wasn’t a socialist and we didn’t know him, and he would have no possible reason to try to conceal anything that would reflect on Peoples Temple, then there must be some sophisticated thing that they’ve manufactured. It’d be interesting to see what’s in that letter. That letter that wasn’t found two years ago, but now all of the sudden comes up, conveniently. Again, it’s gonna be interesting to see how they uh, put that body and any member of Peoples Temple together. Looks like we should have some day in court, although they’re maybe counting on us being so maligned that we won’t be back there to defend ourselves, and trying to frighten off our supporters by making us murderers. And I’ll bet– I’ll bet that some of you have relatives that will believe it.
Crowd: Calls out.
Jones: I’ll bet that many of you have relatives that will believe it.
Crowd: Calls out.
Jones: I saw some black bitch– if you’ll excuse the uh– in the letters I has going over, and I go over the letters coming in and going out, some black bitch writing someone, Sister Belle, from New York. Black bitch. And she said, uh, I read the negative things about your church in New York Times. And I thought, when does a black person ever believe anything that a white goddamn newspaper has to say? We’ve forgotten who we are, we’ve forgotten where we come from, and uh, The New York Times article was one of the great masquerades of all time, because the man that wrote the article, wrote a very decent article, and the owners took his article and twisted it and put in things they wanted, and he even, with some conscience, tried to show what he really had done by releasing his original artic– article to The New York Times Service which appeared in such papers as The Press Democrat, and it was really a very laudatory article. Praising me for being a Marxist, bringing up Mother’s [Marceline Jones] quotations about me, and it was a very decent article. But by the time it left the reporter’s hands and got to The New York Times owners, which is supposed to be one of those fair, liberal newspapers, like some of you are still in this church, are liberal socialists, uh, you are liberal socialists who are Saturday night revolutionaries, who wanna play around and do your thing, all the rest of the days, and can talk about a future, goddamnit, when we’re living in the midst of fascism.
Crowd: Calls out, applause
Jones: I’m not talking about a revolutionary future, I’m talking about a self-indulged future. Talking about doing your thing. Whole lotta folk do that. Jann Gurvich was telling me about her uh– her dad [Lou Gurvich] who is Jewish, Russian Jew, but hates Jews, telling her how bad Jews were, used to read to her how lowly, only people that were pure were the white Christian, the white Anglo-Saxons, and he would read from books to her telling her about the supremacy of the white race. And I heard that sell-out Jew on the phone patch the other night, and I thought, well, if a Jew could do this, Jesus Christ knows what those Jesus Christ followers would do, those white good Christians would do. He made racial statements even there, and was re– referred to this work of the– of this black country in a demeaning way, and so cold and so calculating, and so capitalistic, and they always accuse us communists of using “the end justifies the means” rationale. He was so low down, that he told her that uh, her mother was dying of cancer. When it didn’t work, because I said the men– the medical often dis– oughta– that it be authenticized that it be medically verified. Well, huh, you uh, asked me to verify anything. And she said to her daddy– I said, well, I assure you he’s doubting your word. He’s questioning her all along the road, he– she certainly had a right to question him. Well, her mother wasn’t dying of cancer, because today there’s a telegram from Mama. The third treatment didn’t work and the threat treatment didn’t work, and the breath treatment– These fuckin’ no good, sons of bitchin’ capitalists, they’re always talkin’ about what communists will do, and then the lowest (unintelligible word) pricks ever walk, because they’ll do it just to manipulate their own family to do what they want, for no moral reasons, for no purpose, no good, no decency, they just lie. That’s a terrible thing to tell a child, that their mother is dying of cancer.
Crowd: Calls out.
Jones: Maria Katsaris had the same thing, good pr– preacher, minister, father said that her– he was dying of cancer, please come home. But when she wouldn’t come home, and I said I knew that he wasn’t dying of cancer, just as I knew Mrs. Gurvich wasn’t in the state that he suggested, when she said, “No,” he came all the way to Georgetown, try to raise hell. That’s a lively cancer patient.
Crowd: Calls out.
Jones: It’s a wicked, wicked world. I don’t know what any of you would want to think of going back into western society, or western creature comforts, and attempt to enjoy the benefits of a bourgeois society that seems very rather uh, sickening to me, appallingly sickening to me. That some in this day and age could think about enjoying the benefits of capitalism, when it means that all around you, blacks and Jews, minorities, and a Japanese or an Asiatic coroner can be hung right along with us, and he’s apolitical, I think he’s a Republican, but anything to get us, don’t make any difference who they have to walk over, say I – I – I’m a clean, I’m – I’m – I’m clean, I been no communist, my relatives are clean, yeah, but if they’re black, they just like (unintelligible word), and Asiatic, they’ll use them, destroy them! Don’t make any difference who they have to destroy, as long as they’re trying to get at Peoples Temple.
Crowd: Calls out.
Jones: A coroner who (unintelligible word) it a good success, and thought he’d probably had it made, but his name’s bein’ made mud right this very moment in the press. We don’t mind , ‘cause we expected to be made mud. We’d be mighty discouraged with these sons of bitches were sayin’ good things about us.
Crowd: Cheers and applause.
Jones: I told (unintelligible) it’s one of a good story, good story. I said, “No, no it’s not really a compliment,” you better get yourself (unintelligible word) because you’re gonna get such bad press. You will never see the light, when they turn loose on us. I warn you. I warn you, I told you it was comin’ long before it came.
Crowd: Cheers and applause.
Jones: So how many times I’ve prophesied, and people forget it. Interesting these people try to make us out now, thieves. And I take peoples property, and yet here we have three, four million dollars worth of property, sitting here before we ever got here. Now anyone with their right mind, if the American people were thinking, they wouldn’t buy that bullshit, but they’re not thinking. How can a man be a thief when he put three or four million dollars into a beautiful community of buildings and medical traffic, medical uh, facilities and all the things that you have here, farm implements, tractors, the– innumerable host of tools and instruments that you can’t begin to lay the value. (unintelligible) four million, perhaps five million dollars US. Now if I was dishonest, why wouldn’t I have taken that five million dollars and gone off to Monte Carlo? Why in the fuck would I be down here, listening to 700 people’s problems, watching their aggravation, see how they– so many of them don’t consider uh, anything I do but it– want to steal and cheat from one another, and rob and do everything dishonorable, why in the hell would I, in the 700, and then worry about feeding 700, when most dads will run off when they have seven to feed, by God.
Crowd: Cheers
Jones: (Cries out) You know, anybody that was thinking at all, anybody had an ounce of insect intelligence, would know goddamn right, that Jim Jones was a good man, that this is bullshit, that you don’t take 700 people clear across the world and locate them in a lovely community, and pay every one of their expenses, and feed them every goddamn day, and be a thief. Nobody ever (unintelligible) that way.
Crowd: Cheers
Jones: (unintelligible) But the American public is so apathetic and so stupid and so brainwashed and so programized, that you (unintelligible word) programized. (Calms) Shit, they’re the ones that are programized. They’re programized that there’s such a degree, that they justify any goddamn thing that their government does, and the newspapers do, makes no difference. They’re in a terrible shape. Bullshit, some young– some man and I was uh, reading some article, uh, I don’t know which magazine it was, about someone that had spoken out against the uh, Bible and uh, Jesus Christ. He lost his uh– his call before the teachers credentialing body and lost his teacher’s license, a loan was suddenly called due from the bank. It saying someplace in uh, Illinois. And all he said that the Bible was a bunch of superstition. And they went after his ass. And I mean they nailed him, and finally had him charged with some sort of uh, pornographic – uh, not obscene reference – obscene reference on uh– on a media. Just because he called the Bible, uh, some damn foolishness or something like that, I don’t know it, his exact quote, damn foolishness. And the man is simply being broken financially, and everything, because he touched the great totem. They talk about us being programed, we don’t believe in bullshit gods.
Crowd: Cheers
Jones: We don’t believe in this. But they are so programized, that you say anything against their fucking Mother Mary, are you the blood of Jesus? You just don’t say anything about that. Because that’s sacred. And how could anyone ever believe such foolishness, except they be ‘programized’. How could anyone ever believe in a loving God, when two out of– out of three babies are starving to death. Jesus Christ, before the Chinese communist revolution, eleven out of thirteen children, average of a thirteen-children family, only eleven [two] would survive. Out of every one thousand births, the moment the baby was born, malnutrition was so severe, the mother of three hundred and thirty two died. Thirty three percent died at birth, and before they get to seven years of age, (calls out) eleven out of thirteen were dead! (Calms) The Seventh Day Adventist missionary’s child rebelled against the shackles of religion, and spoke on it a couple of days ago, telling about how she’d watch her dad would take her to the steeple and knock down Chinese from getting into the steeple of the American church that was established in Hunan Province. Would knock them down! And she watched– she watched with her own eyes, one hundred thousand people drown, and she watched with her own eyes, as a seven-year-old children and older people grabbing on the dike and climbing up on the dike, and another thirty to forty thousand starved to death on that dike, and her dad would never move out of the steeple, but stand there and pray. Talk about us being programized, he’s a programized. I’d like to cut the throat of that goddamn religious bunch.
Crowd: Cheers and applause
Jones: Peace. And all those who have any vestige of religion, be whatever form it is, I don’t care what kind of form it may be, you have various names and you call it Christ force and mystical force and meditating, contemplative bullshit, all that, how in the h– fuckin’ hell you can believe that there’s anything in– unique in us that is of any spiritual worth. How you could believe this, this damn stupid programization bullshit brainwashing that’s come from the system. The only value we can build for ourselves is through a socialist society and then step it up to communist society, otherwise there’s no difference between us and the beetle out there, or the flies that get batted down, all the other precious animals that run through the jungles and then be preyed upon all the days of their life, you’re no different than a goddamn animal, I’m no different than a goddamn animal, that’s why we should not put ourselves up to such importance as we do. That’s the only problem some of you have, you really, really feel sorry for your fuckin’ self. You feel sorry, you don’t have what you thought you did have. You got so much more, you got 700 people to fight for you. I don’t need 700 people to fight for me, sometime, some place, I don’t care where you were, it– Even if McCarthyism wasn’t returning to America, even if fascism wasn’t returning to America, someplace down in lonely America, you need somebody to fight for you, and if you’d live there, you’da had nobody. Now you have 700 comrades that’ll stand up and fight with you.
Crowd: Cheers and applause
Jones: (Conversational) Interesting, interesting, interesting, that anyone can deceive themselves into believing that you deserve better, even if you had better. When I get to feeling sorry for myself– and believe me it would be easy for me to feel sorry for myself, how very easy it would be for me to feel sorry for myself. Some of you do get to go to rest at night, and you only have a department or a bit of a program. I’ve got the whole goddamn thing resting on me, and cannot sleep because I don’t know what’s goin’ to break loose in some part of the camp. Hear a clap of thunder, wonder if it’s a gun. Because I’m such a vivid realist. Say, ah, you’re too realistic, yeah, well, if I hadn’t been so realistic, some of your asses had rotted in jail. (Clears throat)
Crowd: Applause
Jones: Peace. If I had not been so apprehensive and willingly paranoid, some of you woulda been in lots of trouble. I seem paranoid, when I’m the least paranoid of all, because I don’t give a shit who slips up from behind my back at anytime. I don’t give a goddamn. That’s one reason I just don’t like people around me, they want to put petitions around me, I don’t give a shit who blows my brains out. Least one moment I’d like to have a little air, a little air, to shut doors and windows and shutters, I’ll die of a heart attack with that kind of shit. So I’ll take my risk that someone’ll blow my head open. It doesn’t bother me, ‘cause one who is a zero doesn’t have paranoia. I don’t give a shit what people do to me, but I give loads and loads and tons and tons of care about what they do to you. So I am so paranoid that nothing gets by this old hawk. I don’t miss it. You think you pull your bullshit games, and you think I don’t have a right to test you in a fif– fifty thousand ways. I’ll test you, because I’m concerned about you, I’m concerned about saving everyone here, I’m concerned about the children and I’ll test you, and I’ll watch you. If you’ve made a mistake, I’ll watch you. And I don’t apologize for it, and you think I’m not watching you, and I’m watching you (draws out word) every minute, every minute, because I owe that to the collective. But watch you, uh, if you’re going to do something to me? No, never, never. Other than the fact that it affects this great family, with all of its faults, I saw us with a battle cry, I saw us when the camp was encircled. I saw you willingly put up your hands, and say, “I will defend Dennis Banks, even though it means more trouble. I will protect this child, even though it may mean our life.” I shan’t forget that many willingly and enthusiastically voted and tearfully mixed their tears with mine, full well not believing that tomorrow would ever come. Some of you, it was play, but to some of us, it was goddamn real.
Crowd: Applause
Jones: Peace. (Pause) I went about this circle so many times, I thought I cannot look at my people again, and yet I want ‘em to feel comforted as much as possible. Dragging my body like it was a ton of bricks, every joint feeling like it was made of cement. But I wanted you to know, that your Father was near. (Pause) (Aside) What is it? Yes, yes. (Back to crowd) Wanted you to know, I was going to be with you to the end, and we thought that, and we felt that end so heavy upon us. (Pause) I told you long ago, I promised never to leave you, and never to leave you alone, and so I was keeping that promise as we wandered through daylight hours and night hours, keeping a camp, not knowing when someone was going to break in, and we came so close to dying, if just two officers had come up that driveway, you’d never – some of you – ever get to meet us here. That’s how close it was. Because we had been shot at, we had been photographed, we had had shots rain through here in the broad daylight, we’d had too much hell goin’ on, we had no contact with anybody in government, all the good leaders were gone, and sons-of-bitches were coming in and out of here, nailing stuff on our walls [reference to Stoen attorney Jeff Haas], heckling us, interrogating us, and even pulling our children aside and interrogating them. We had had it. And if one person that last night had walked up at that goddamn lane, if they’da come up there, they’da– they’da stayed a long time. I mean we’da kept ‘em. But fortunately people trusted Father’s mind and spirit and his principle, somehow kept that one almost fatal thing from happening, ‘cause they were determined they were going to come by broken tractors, they were going to come in here, gonna see Bishop Jones. And they can be mighty damn glad they didn’t come to see Bishop Jones that day.
Crowd: Applause
Jones: The greatest pain of that– that moment was I’d always given my life to give you peace, I wanted to give you security. I wanted to give you freedom from pressure and oppression. If I looked in your eyes and I cried and wept, I didn’t bring you here for this. I said it, I must’ve said it once, I said it a thousand times, I didn’t bring you here for this. And fortunately, compassion and hope won that day, but when you love people and you love freedom and you love truth and you love a family like this dad loves his children, you never know at what moment you may have to fight for another child. I’m glad to be alive to face these challenges, because I’m a revolutionary, and it– I have children here who are not revolutionary, that I love very, very much. I love you deeply and dearly, uh, but I know you’ve not gone through all the processes of suffering and pain and the learning experiences that I have that have made me a firm revolutionary. Yesterday when I announced to you, or the day before, whatever, time has no meaning to me anymore, I guess this is October, I wouldn’t know and don’t give a damn, but I’m not lost, my consciousness– It’s October third, going on October fourth. Anyway, when it was announced that this government – this small government – had cooperated with the United Soviet Socialist Republic, Russia, and Cuba, both of which have all kinds of military protection, this country has none, and when a few leaders of this county had cooperated with them in the attempted overthrow of the Nicaraguan hated dictatorship, my heart beat with pride. I thought, well shit, this could mean tomorrow that the CIA would land parachutes in here, or we could be attacked across the border, but my heart beat with pride. But when I announced it, I saw it brought solemnness to some of you. But to me it was principle, it was an opportunity, because we’ve seen so much of the technocrat managerial class element in this society really not truly trying to come to a socialist solution, we wondered if that could really ever be, that they’d make that kind of a courageous stand. So I don’t care how many bureaucrats we have to deal with at the low level. Matters not to me. You’ve got uh, a few brave leaders like that, that’re willing to risk their goddamn lives.
And that’s all our lives are worth, not a goddamn, because chickens– Some of you ought to go out and watch the chickens die everyday, you’d see how important you are. You’d wonder if you were a son of God, you wouldn’t last about thirty chickens, if you’d stop worrying whether you were a son of God. You’d quit praying, and you’d quit meditating, and you’d quit all your bullshit, you wouldn’t have any religious thoughts, just one thirty chickens. Watch them as they look at the other chicken being carried away. Watch the panic and pandemonium, that Father tries to calm, as he has the children love them, and the– and Brother [Miller] Bridgewater said in agony, he said, “Oh Father, today, that the day might come, that we never had to eat meat,” ‘cause he’s the one that has to cut their head, and lay it gently down and watch that head take a minute and a half, opening its eye, (breathes heavily) gasping, (Cries out) some of your blind, stupid, delusional, narcissistic assholes that are not zero personality, I ought to require (calms) – and I think I shall – that everyone takes their tour of watching the chickens. Go with our children out there, some of the children, there’s one children, the Hicks child in there, I don’t know which one of them, I believe it was, yes, this child said it, he almost said it in tears, well, it’s a job that has to be done. Some of you ought to have to do it. You have to sweat like Pop [James] Edwards and Bridgewater, you ought to have to go down there, and you ought to have to pick those chickens because you’re blind, you think you’re better than a chicken, but when you see the agony in those chickens’ faces, and you see the pandemonium in those faces, as they watch a chicken being carried away, (Cries out) you’d know you’re no more value than a goddamn chicken! You know it’s most easier, (calms) no (unintelligible word) simple, rather, to cut your head off. They could cut your head off just as easy as a chicken’s head. And I’ve seen bodies crushed, good people, socialist people, I’ve seen them crushed, laying there and their tongue, I mean– uh, a human dies no differently than a chicken. Shift, please. A human doesn’t die one bit different than a chicken. No different than a dog.
You’ve ever seen a human die? Go watch that chicken die. And then you’d know that there’s nothing but Father, communism, and he is communism and there is no uh, differential between the two, there is no separating communism from Father and no separation of Father from communism. We will only ruch– reach the higher heights through political process, because we’re creatures of the dust, (Voice rises) we’re animals! Some of you still show very clearly you’re animals. We don’t deserve to live anymore than the chicken does! (Pause) (calms) I see chickens that gather down rather than be cool and peck, they get in the corner and allow everything to stamp on it, and die, and by the time they get here, even from our chicken coops, they’re already crushed to death.
And some of you, if I didn’t tell you, you wouldn’t even do a goddamn thing about it. We who have to inherit the chickens and go over there and kill them or take care of them, yet they don’t even think about it unless you tell them. Pack chickens in there like a concentration camp! Least it looks to me like you could do something for those precious things, before they die, to give them a little uncrowded, but every time we’ve had it up until now, the chickens have arrived crowded and crushed, and some of them crom– chomp– chomped to death, chomped to death. (Calls out) Well, now, that’s different. No, it’s no different, the concentration camps are just the same. (Calms) Those that were decent died, because they would not– they would not show themselves aggressive and harsh, they were gentle and thoughtful, and they would not fight over crumbs, and they’d not knock bodies down that they might live. They just withdrew from the battle and gave their food to somebody else. As many Jews– a lot such as [Francisco] Franco said the best Jews died. Only the sons-of-bitches lived, and that’s been true with a lot of you. Good people have died, good chickens. Some of you aren’t worth the value of a chicken. You ch– cheat, you lie, you’d do any goddamn thing in a corner, (voice rises) anytime you’re up against pressure? Anytime that you’re really called on to show your colors? You are a motherfucker! A chicken would protect their babies quicker than you, but a little pressure comes your way, and you’re a goddamn miserable sell-out. (Cries out) A chicken’s got more value than you, and yet you think you’ve got a right to live. Well, you no good son of a bitching motherfucker.
Crowd: Cheers
Jones: (Calms) Peace. Go tell it to the chickens next time they come in tomorrow. While the freezers are being built up to protect you, so that you can live. You go back there and tell the chickens all why you should have a good life and why you should be able to enjoy yourself and sport around. Why you should have a kitchen, why you should be able to eat what you want. (Calls out) Go tell the goddamn chickens tomorrow, I dare you! (Calm but intense) Look at them while they wait to die, and tell them how much better life you deserve, ‘cause you die like a chicken, a chicken suffers, its squawk of its voice continues after the head is separated from it. It’s one of the most cruel, heartrending, painful experiences. Someone said “Father, why do you put yourself through it?” I said “So I can realize I’m no better than a goddamn chicken.” You hear them squawk after the head is cut off, all the way, while the blood is draining out, you hear that chicken crying, and they lay their head down, the eyes gasping open and shut and its mouth going open and shut, (calls out) for a minute and a half of agony, that you can eat, and some of you are not worth a chicken leg. You’re not worth a chicken wing. You’ve got so much goddamn selfishness, you ought to die and let somebody eat you.
Crowd: Applause
Jones: (Calms) Why do I say it? Why do I say it? Because I’m a partaker of it. The last thing, (small laugh) the easiest thing, the first thing. If you were hungry, the first thing I would do, would tell them to kill me, and put me in the uh, boil– boil me up and desalinize, take a little of the salt out, and you wouldn’t know who you were eating. It’s the only difference between human flesh and anything else. That’d be easy. So I’m not asking you to kill yourself anymore than I’d be willing to. That’d be a simple thing, and I would be the first response. If my children were hungry, and they had a chance to lead themselves – you, you are my children – I’d say to some trusted people, please cook me. That wouldn’t take any bravery at all. It’s so quiet in here. You know you’re so far from Father, you say you know Father, you know who Father is, bullshit. You really don’t know who Father is. But when you talk like this, everybody gets quiet.
Why would– you auto– automatically– automatically, anyone here should be willing to be sacrificed, that others could live, if it was a matter of starvation. That would be elementary. If you were 46, you should be glad to give somebody 35 years a chance to live a little longer, because he might be able to– or she might be able to do more for the revolution. And certainly, when you’re 46, no effort to think about a two-year-old. Gladly give your body, gladly whatever, shit. Be tortured, be- uh, the eyes sold, whatever. Do you know how much I love you? You don’t know. They said Jesus died for you. Shit on Jesus. He was a miserable failure. Because I uh– I would sell my eyes, and I’d sell everything I could sell, so I could keep using my mind for you as long as I could. And I’d sell myself piece by piece that you might live. I’d know what I’m talking about because I’ve already sold my body that you could live. I’ve given my body that you could live. I give my body to save you from the viciousness of one Grace Stoen., to save Tim Stoen’s image, and I’d died a thousand deaths and then had to endure her trying to take away my son [John Victor Stoen]. And was willing to go through that hell. I know what I’m talking about. I don’t only preach it, I live it. You say who (unintelligible word) mutation, Jim Jones, there nobody like you. Well, child, I feel just like you do. I came from an insecure home that you didn’t have, many of you. I had a cruel father [James Thurman Jones] who never gave me any love, and a mother [Lynetta Jones] who was not too affectionate, and never knew where the next meal was coming from, but I managed to give of myself to others.
Please listen to me and don’t be watching other things and bugs and other things at this particularly serious, sensitive time. I’d be very suspicious of you, if you continue to do that. (Pause)
Yet out of all that agony of insecurity, I’ve managed to make myself controlled. I’ve managed to make myself secure in finding you happy. Someone was griping about some little old con–inconsequential goddamn thing today. And I said you ought to just think of one person, (mocking tone) “Well, I know.” Said, what about a Billy Jones that stood and fought with a rudder, fought with a rudder ’til his hand could be cut off, trying to save our boat–
Balance of Side 1 blank
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Tape originally posted February 2016