The Power of Jones' Manipulation and Control over Others

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Jim Jones
In the world, there are many charismatic leaders (evil or good) who have led and inspired people to change their basic beliefs and lifestyles. A good example is Adolf Hitler, who used to excite the crowd when he was still young. Before Hitler assumed power, he had not killed anybody. People saw him as a gifted person, admired him, and identified him as the savor of the Germans. Hitler appealed to the masses, and many people listened to his speeches. He drove hope and change, but these were eventually shattered. This can be put in light of Jim Jones, who invoked such similar emotions to his audience. Just like Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein, and the likes, Jim Jones also formed a cult of personality around himself. Jones depicted himself as an agent of change who could bring change that people want. However, he had no clue regarding how to solve people’s problems. He was simply convincing because he had self-assurance. This paper examines Jim Jones’ brutal force of being a motivational speaker and how he manipulated the rules of the society for the benefits of his own power.
Moral Psychosis
Jim was a charismatic leader, although was a paranoid person with delusions of persecution and criminal activities. He was suffering from something called “Moral Psychosis,” and his developmental history can reveal more information. Jones was a very lonely and unhappy child because his parents neglected him (Pretorius 207). He developed religious concerns during his early childhood and he married when he was still young for 18 years to marry an older woman. All these disclosed his earnest longing for a new large family and maternal love. He needed a new father, new mother, new children and a new family. This explains the reason Jones established a new church to form a big family, and he adopted several children. Doing this way, Jones was trying to compensate for his lonely and unhappy childhood. His followers identified him as a father, and Jones became a powerful leader of his group.
Despite appeared compassionate to others, Jim had a pathological belief of superiority complex. He often became extremely angered when criticized. For example, when he was young, a friend annoyed him and left the church. Consequently, Jim shot the friend using his father’s gun. Jones was obsessed with tyrannical figures such as Joseph Stalin and Hitler, who undermined his increasing interest in social issues and politics (Chidester 397). He had a sense of insecurity, and his paranoiac personality demonstrated this. He feared being abandoned by people who loved him and would frequently become jealous when his wife showed attention to somebody else rather than him. At some point, Jim disavowed God for permitting injustice and poverty to cause human problems. He even threatened to kill himself if his wife prayed. When his wife introduced him to the Laurel Street Tabernacle, his beliefs encouraged him to assist the vulnerable minorities, and he became a pastor to them.
Jones’ Moral Psychosis can be understood better by Freud’s explanation. Freud examines the source of religious feelings. The need for religious feeling arises as a result of infant’s helplessness as well as longing for a father (Freud 12). Freud refers to religion as a neurotic need to resolve the childhood conflicts and the need for an all-powerful father figure (13). Religion emerges when ideas are formed from a person’s need to pacify his helplessness and to build material memories of his childhood helplessness. According to Freud, the function of religion is to exorcise terrors, to reconcile fateful cruelty troubling people, and to compensate for the absence and challenges of civilization (14).
The Power of Jones’ Manipulation and Control over Others
Humans created civilization as a tool protect them from unhappiness, yet civilization is the biggest source of human unhappiness (Freud 34). Freud says that in the society, liberal freedom is the most vital thing that people want (37). People typically become neurotic when they cannot tolerate sufferings and frustrations that society imposes in its cultural services (Freud 39). In connection to Freud’s ideas, the American society was becoming more chaotic in the 1950s. The nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union and Joseph McCarthy’s war against communism caused many fears among American citizens. The civil right movement was also active holding demonstrations. Many Americans increasingly became disillusioned with chaos and societal issues. Out of these confusions, Jones created revolutionary ideas that appealed to anxious Americans. Reiterman and Jacobs view that despite Americans feared communism and the Cold War, Jones claimed that communism was the most appropriate tool to solve problems troubling Americans (76). Because of his vision of a possible nuclear attack, Jim decided to look for safe areas around the world. He relocated his Church to Guyana and was happy with the government’s socialist ethos. He later relocated his Church to California. However, it was also revealed that Jones was relocating to these places because he was evading paying taxes for his business projects.
Jim’s passionate attacks on racial segregation and the contradictions, disgraces, and abuses of American capitalism attracted people who attended Temple services. He dreamed of a Utopian society where people are treated equally, and this attracted many people to join his Church (Reiterman and Jacobs 43). Jones was a great motivational speaker who made people believed in him. He utilized his oratory power to build increasing control over his members. He urged members to sell their properties and hand over their assets to the Church. This was the initial step of placing Jim into a significant, powerful position over others. The Church membership increased from many hundreds to about 20,000 at the Church in San Francisco where Jim relocated the Church.
Jones was brought up in an exile society where he understood the problems that minorities encountered. Advancements made in technology and science had mixed blessings for people’s happiness (Freud 44). The blacks felt being outcasts, and such feeling developed the sensitivity of their troubles. Such attitudes gave Jones insightful understanding how the Blacks and those who pushed for the Civil Right Movement felt that the society isolated them (Reiterman and Jacobs 69). This enabled Jones to develop a place where these people felt they belonged where each person was treated as special. This was how Jones attracted many people from different backgrounds who realized that something better was awaiting them, and Jones provided that. Jones was able to gain trust from these people and was ready to assist them. In this way, Jones developed a place where people felt they were accepted without being judged. This was the foundation for the trust that these people started having on Jones.
Freud questions the role of the society if it is not to satisfy the human pleasure principle and to create happiness. Civilization must provide happiness to fulfill its key objective of bringing peaceful relationships to citizens to live in peace with each other (42). This can be related to Jim’s control over people because most of his followers came from vulnerable places and broken homes (Chidester 399). Freud claims that the structure of civilization must meet the needs of the natural feelings and processes of human development and eroticism (43). If this is not fulfilled, repression results will cause discontent among citizens (Freud 44). When Jones established the People’s Temple, the Church not only created a home for these people, but also it was a symbolic representation for the improvements made in their lives. They had something to associate with because the Church transformed lives of many vulnerable people who showed loyalty, trust, and faith in Jones.
How Jones Managed To Acquire Great Wealth
Jones was a good in public speaking. He first managed to make a reputation for himself as an evangelist and healer when he joined the ministry at the Laurel Street Tabernacle in Indianapolis (Chidester 59). He later established a religious congregation known as Wings of Deliverance, after abandoning his position as a pastor of the Laurel Street Tabernacle due to the church’s resistance to being a racially mixed congregation (Winter 121). He later renamed the Wings of Deliverance as People’s Temple, which was known as for its social activism and support given to the disadvantaged people. Jones served as the re...