Re: Australian cult: Anyone recognize this?
Date: December 01, 2007 11:34AM
Well, I've thought it over a little, and it's like this: on the one hand, I do respect and understand most ex-JCs reluctance to come out publicly to testify of their experience with David and The McKay Family Business/Jesus Christians cult. It'd be analogous to a rape victim refusing to appear in court to face and accuse her attacker; it'd be a difficult experience (to say the very least) to try and relive and give an account of, traumatic all over again. So I respect and support that unwillingness, on the one hand.
On the other hand, however...well, I'll explain this way: there was a man named Charles Garry, a prominent civil-rights attorney, who was in the seventies one of the two lawyers for Jim Jones' People's Temple, the other being a man named Lane. All indications point to the FACT that Garry knew of Jim Jones' homicidal plans and in fact had to talk him out of holding a mass murder/suicide under different circumstances about a year before Senator Ryan's visit to Jonestown. He knew that Jim was holding them hostage. Charles Garry could have blown the whistle, so to speak, and stopped Jim Jones from instigating his own final solution. Marceline Jones too, for that matter, she knew full well that her husband was nuts, dangerous, and she could have acted to somehow to stop her husband from ordering what was to come. There's a lot of blood on Garry's hands. Marceline (like Cherry) I am not sure about, victim or participant? Garry was culpable to it and a participant in it, even while out the other side of his mouth he was telling the world that Jonestown was paradise, the SOB. In fact, he also was one of Jonestown's few survivors because he lied to some guards and got out of there. Why didn't Garry and Mrs. Jones do something to stop Jim? Why did so many men and women allow Jim Jones to have sex with them publicly, spank them publicly, torture children publicly? Why would they all allow those horrors to happen? Why would Garry and Mrs. Jones not say something to the authorities in order to prevent 914 people from dying? The answer is, basically, that they all had an interest in believing in Jim Jones. Forsaking the Temple would have meant sacrificing a lot of things, not the least of which was their respective livelihoods. See? They had too much to lose at that point, later on in Jonestown.
What I am saying is, if you know of some homicidal or suicidal ideations on David McKay's part, know of some hint of violence, coercion to the end of some physical suffering or extreme sacrifice ("laying down your life for your friends," etc.) know of DM ever alluding to or speaking of suicide, murder, violence, abuse, exploitation, whatever like that: for God's sake, other people's lives are at stake here, and if something really bad happens with or to the JCs....I'll put it like this: if you knew of a man who was going around the country infecting unsuspecting partners with HIV, and in fact you yourself had been infected by this individual, and you knew where he was, who he had been with etc., and you didn't speak out, then all of the subsequent infect-ees whose HIV-positive status you could have prevented by speaking out about the creep in the first place, well, I say that you have been irresponsible and their blood is partially on your hands. In other words, you'd have a moral imperative to speak up for the good of society.
Has McKay ever mentioned the possibility of killing or being killed/martyred in his writings and among his victims/members? Of course; his stuff is replete with allusions to death and violence.
You ex-JCs could have information or could be able to recount experiences that could save DM's future potential victims a lot of time and trouble, and possibly save lives in the long run. You have a moral imperative to do something if you can, otherwise the blood is on your hands too. You are a participant in DM's abuse whether you actually condone it or not.
Sorry if this post is a little rambling, it's only that I want to put a fine point on what I am trying to express, you see.
Everyone connected to this is a participant whether they realize it or not. Silence equals death. This is my opinion, frankly and with deepest respect.
Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/2007 12:01PM by zeuszor.