No. 244 - Drinking the Flavor Aid

This morning I was listening to a program on PRX Public Radio about "the Jonestown massacre."

I learned that on November 18, 1978, 912 followers of American cult leader Jim Jones, founder of the Peoples Temple, a quasi-religious organization, died in a remote South American jungle compound called "Jonestown" in British Guyana. Some members were shot, others were forced to drink poison, but most willingly participated in what Jones said was an act of "revolutionary suicide." 

The tragedy at Jonestown resulted in the greatest single loss of American civilian life in a non-natural disaster, prior to the events of September 11, 2001.

This event was responsible for coining the term "Drinking the Kool-Aid." This phrase is used to describe someone who becomes a firm believer in something and accepts an argument or philosophy wholeheartedly or blindly.

Almost all of the followers of Jones that died that day were given a deadly concoction of a purple drink mixed with cyanide, sedatives, and tranquilizers. Evidence gathered at the Jonestown site after the incident indicated that rather than Kool-Aid, a similar powdered drink called Flavor Aid was used in the massacre.