{"id":34293,"date":"2013-07-28T21:47:59","date_gmt":"2013-07-28T21:47:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alternativejonestown.com\/?page_id=34293"},"modified":"2026-02-26T14:41:52","modified_gmt":"2026-02-26T22:41:52","slug":"koolintro","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=34293","title":{"rendered":"Drinking the Kool-Aid: An Introduction"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"06-01a-koolaid\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The expression \u201cdrinking the Kool-Aid\u201d is now deeply embedded into American slang. While its origins are painfully understood by most of the people who visit this site, it\u2019s also true that no one knows when or in what context it first entered our slang lexicon. As time passes, two other characteristics of slang will occur: its earliest meaning will morph into a multitude of derivatives \u2013 indeed, that has already begun to happen \u2013 and fewer and fewer people who use it will know where it came from.<\/p>\n

This past year saw the publication of several Internet commentaries on the use of the phrase than in the past, most within two months of the 2011 anniversary of the Jonestown tragedy. The blogs and articles included:<\/p>\n

\u2022 Kool-Aid, Hemlock and Confucius<\/a> by Rodney L. Taylor, Ph.D., The Huffington Post<\/em>, 26 April 2012
\n\u2022 Would You Drink The Kool-Aid?<\/a> by Pamela King Cable, Southern Fried Woman<\/em>, 15 January 2012
\n\u2022 Don\u2019t \u2018drink the Kool-Aid\u2019<\/a>, by Meghan Daum, The Los Angeles Times<\/em>, 17 November 2011 <\/p>\n

The LA Times<\/em> piece \u2013 the one which received the most publicity \u2013 also received the most response, much of it chastising the writer for being politically correct or merely inappropriate. The comments are summarized here<\/a>. The comments reflect the recent shift in the use of the phrase: the anonymity of the blogosphere seemingly encourages often uncivil \u2013 if not viciously angry \u2013 discourse, and many writers have increasingly adopted the phrase as a weapon of attack against those who dare to disagree with them.<\/p>\n

Finally, Forbes Magazine declared the expression \u201cdrinking the Kool-Aid\u201d as \u201cthe most annoying business jargon of 2012.\u201d \u201cThe expression means to blindly accept something\u2014such as a company\u2019s \u2018mission statement\u2019\u2014and it\u2019s nearly as bad as the notion of robotic allegiance itself,\u201d the magazine said in its announcement<\/a> of the \u201caward.\u201d<\/p>\n

This listing<\/a> presents other recent efforts by writers or bloggers to consider the context of the phrase itself, to explain its origin, or to argue for the care people should take in using it.<\/p>\n

This website also has a collection of articles and reflections<\/a> on \u201cKool-Aid\u201d as an image and as an expression.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The expression \u201cdrinking the Kool-Aid\u201d is now deeply embedded into American slang. While its origins are painfully understood by most of the people who visit this site, it\u2019s also true that no one knows when or in what context it first entered our slang lexicon. As time passes, two other characteristics of slang will occur: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"parent":34356,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-34293","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34293"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34293\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":134112,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34293\/revisions\/134112"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/34356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}