Talk:Jonestown/Archive 5

made a few edits

made a few edits to clean up grammar or to increase clarity. rather than put a reason for each one I'll just explain them here. i didn't change the intent of any statement. i also added a tag for in-line citations, because there are very few. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.182.136.11 (talk) 18:13, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Reason for article creation

This article was created to move the usual conspiracy theory crap that surrounds any mass killing to its own article, away from the mainstream history.

The Jonestown massacre is well documented to the extent that we have actual audiotapes of Jones speaking to his followers to encourage them to commit suicide, and we even have audiotapes of at least one member arguing with him. We have eyewitness accounts from survivors which support the content of the audiotapes. Thus, I find it difficult to believe that the CIA was involved in the massacre.

On the other hand, it would not be surprising to discover that the CIA was watching Jones. After all, the man was an admitted socialist. But it is difficult to believe that Ryan would have gone to Jonestown if the CIA had a spy actually within Jones' camp. Ryan surely asked the intelligence community for information before flying to Jonestown, and if they had any, why would he have gone?

And as for CIA involvement in the massacre itself, well, if you believe that then you'd better watch out for the Black helicopters. Farcast 04:00, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

What if the CIA wanted to eliminate Ryan? 173.75.156.27 (talk) 00:20, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

Beyond the usual, there are two reasons for the conspriacy theory craziness with Jonestown:

(1) Mark Lane, the father of the modern wacky conspiracy theories (Rush to Judgment, JFK) was an attorney for the PT at the time. In fact, he'd visited Jonestown several times, pumped them up about "CIA conspiracies" against them, wrote long memoranda on it for Jones and was actually there on the final suicide day (escaped into the jungle) as Jones spouted crazy lines on the PA system consistent with Lane's theories. Where Lane goes, nutty theories follow. And Lane gets paid. The Temple paid him $6K/month to come up with the crap Jones used.

(2) Because of all of the Soviet Union-PT involvement, some Russian authors published conspiracy theories in the Soviet press ("Jonestown Carnage"). One can only speculate on the reasons (the allegations had zero evidence, to be honest), but it might have been because the Soviets were desperately worried about a huge PR hit since they'd actually sent their own acting ambassador into Jonestown the month before the suicides and he essentially praised the place as a glorious socialist paradise. Mosedschurte (talk) 03:48, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

CIA interest in Jonestown isn't far-fetched. The US/USSR Cold War struggle in Central and South America is well documented beginning with the Cuban Missile Crisis and continuing through to the fall of the Sandanista regime in Nicaraugua. Jones's words during the suicides was that the "GDF" (Guyanese Defense Forces) were on their way to torture and kill them. Jones had more than $1.5 million in cash on hand, which CNN says was intended for the Soviet Embassy. The U. S. Government propbably had an interest to see the thing shut down to reduce risk those there. Possibly it saw the 900 citizens as easy hostages in the event of a crisis, like the Iran Hostage crisis that occured in the Middle East less than a year after Jonestown. 69.255.0.91 (talk) 19:00, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Richard Dwyer?

The name is introduced here as a possible CIA operative. But neither here nor in Peoples Temple is there any explanation of who he was and what role he is known to have played in relation to the cult. Can someone who knows the story add this info? --Alvestrand 06:33, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Almost nothing. He worked in the US embassy in Guyana. He was one of the members of the Ryan delegation to Jonestown. Great obsession has occurred with him by the conspiracy generating crowd because Jones, in his slurred speech, is heard stating repeating that they should get Dwyer out of there, and when someone responds in a confused manner, Jones repeats that he means Dwyer. In reality, Dwyer was shot in the buttocks at the Port Kaituma airstrip. Given the apparent confused reaction to Jones commands about Dwyer, Jones was likely confusing someone else (maybe Garry) for Dwyer. Dwyer may well have also been a member of the CIA, but that would be hardly surprising for an embassy worker in semi-hostile country with ties to the Soviet Union. In fact, it would be more surprising if it had turned out that no one in the embassy had CIA connections. All of which are realistically irrelevant to Jones "Red Brigade" killing people at the airstrip, and the mass cyanide ingestion in Jonestown on November 18. Mosedschurte (talk) 22:14, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Second sentence ?

The second sentence of the article tails off, incomplete, before the (presumably) next one, which begins with 'Early reports ...' Although I've read this incomplete bit several times, I can't figure out what it is saying, so hesitated to try and edit. Ironical, considering the topic! Can anyone clarify? Thanks. whitestarlion (talk) 18:05, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Also curious about the strange gap in the second sentence. 173.75.156.27 (talk) 12:57, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

Please fix the introduction

I'm not familiar enough with the subject matter to even begin to attempt to fix this, but I have read this article. I still don't know WHAT the conspiracy is. The introduction should summarize what the conspiracy theory theorizes. One or two sentences at the start that explain what the theory alleges occurred. Could someone more familiar with the subject matter take a stab at this? Lot 49a^talk 17:51, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't know much, but I know I google... and that may be-ee all-ll I need to kno-oooow....

In all seriousness, took a stab at rewriting the article to make it a bit more cohesive. I didn't want to add too much but I answered some of the questions put up in the discussion as best I could find. Entire thing still needs work, but maybe this is a better frame to start hanging shingles on. 173.75.156.27 (talk) 00:22, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

NPOV vs narrative prose

This: "Let's ignore all the other possible alternative explanations for the events of Jonestown, and focus on just one man," seems excessively narrative for wikipedia.