View full lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/why-do-people-join-cults-janja-lalich Today, there are thousands of cults around the world. Broadly speaking, a cult is a group or movement with...
========== When Reverend Jim Jones founded
the Peoples Temple in 1955,few could have imagined
its horrifying end.This progressive religious movement
rose in popularity and gained supportfrom some of San Francisco's
most prominent politicians.But in 1977, amidst revelations
of brainwashing and abuse,Jones moved with several hundred followersto establish the commune of Jonestown
in Guyana.Billed as a utopian paradise,
the colony was more like a prison camp,and when a congressional delegation
arrived to investigate its conditions,Jones executed his final plan.On November 18, 1978, 909 men,
women, and children diedafter being forced to drink
poisoned Flavor Aid.That grizzly image has since been
immortalized as shorthand slangfor single-minded cult-like thinking,"Th...
