About That Kool-Aid
Julia Scheeres, on writing about the Jonestown Massacre.
The more I understood what actually transpired in Jonestown, the more offended I became by the notion that Jones’ victims “drank the Kool-Aid.” I felt a duty to defend them, to tell the true story of what happened in Jonestown…
That unfortunate phrase has worked its way into the cultural lexicon, but few young people know of its Jonestown origins or how offensive it is to Jones’ victims…
As you’d imagine, the phrase offends survivors. It reduces a mass tragedy to the level of banality…
Is it time to stop using the phrase, “drink the Kool-Aid”? Setting aside questions of sensitivity and appropriateness and how long, the answer to this specific question is no. The time to stop making this joke would have been the first time someone made this joke — if it’s inappropriate or hurtful now, which is hard to deny, then if anything it was more hurtful yesterday, last year, and thirty years ago. I suppose you could argue that it has always been time, and therefore it is technically still t — [A MAN DRESSED AS A LAPTOP BURSTS THROUGH THE WALL AND SHOUTS:]
