THE debate on whether to make Jonestown a tourist attraction is taking place in Guyana amidst one of world history’s most painful tragedies –Israeli committal of genocide against the Palestinian people. When racist cruelties occur on such a colossal scale, humanity must never let it be forgotten.
We must preserve the memory of Gaza so future generations will learn from it and fight against if it should raise its bestial head in the future. We must preserve the memory of other genocidal bestialities like slavery and the Jewish Holocaust so humans could understand why they occurred and internalise the lessons.

No philosophy student will reject a monument to the victims of Jonestown because philosophy is about how the soul craves for human happiness and in search of that happiness the mind becomes a hapless and helpless victim of brainwashing.
The peoples of the world should be shown the lessons of Jonestown. I am not sure how this can be achieved, but it must be done because if not the mind can fall into the same trap of the victims of Jim Jones. I am not going to get into the debate of how Jonestown could be marketed as a tourist thing. What

I am willing to do is to argue vociferously that Jonestown must not be forgotten. It is an American tragedy that occurred in Guyana so Guyana has a deep, moving obligation to preserve the memory.
The reason why we build monuments is because we want people to know and remember the events behind the tragedies. When the genocide is over in Gaza there should be a large monument with the names of the 40,000 babies, women, journalists, doctors, nurses and aid workers who were murdered simply because they were of different genes to those who set out to kill them.

I believe whatever form and shape the preservation of memory of Jonestown takes there must be something out there about Jonestown that can guide the human mind to avoid the pitfalls of brainwashing. I definitely think there should be something physical on the site where the People’s Temple stood.
I believe the saddest and most tragic vulnerability of the mind is its susceptibility to brainwashing. There are forms of brainwashing that is subliminal but equally dangerous. Almost 99 per cent of sane, normal people live perfect lives without knowing the extent to which they have been brainwashed.
One of the most painful but successful episode of brainwashing that has saturated the history books and the media and by extension our minds is the factor that led to the end of the Second World War. As an academic, this pains me. The peoples of the world have been fed on the narrative that the Allied

forces brought about the end of Hitler’s war. The decisive factor in defeating the Germans was the Russian armed forces. Germany would not have been defeated if it weren’t for Russian forces that struck at decisive moments.
Sorry about this diversion from Jonestown to World War II, but the point is brainwashing is a recurring factor in the entire history of the world, and people looking for mental tranquility and peace of mind could end up losing their entire mind to subliminal enticement.
I would definitely support some form of physical structure surrounding Jonestown to remind not only Guyanese, but also the peoples of the world of how mentally fragile humans are. One form I think this can take is for the people who go to Jonestown as a part of a visiting tour to be given a talk by someone trained in psychology or philosophy.

Visitors should be exposed to how Jonestown met its tragic end and the lessons that should be learned. Jonestown occurred in 1978, but people searching for meaning in their lives have ended in similar cults like Jonestown. Ironically and most incredibly so, the daughter of the Congressman, Leo Ryan, who was killed at Jonestown, ended up in a similar cult.

Cults are impossible for modern society to eradicate because messianic figures will always lure lonely people who long to have pieces of their dreams that disappeared come back to them. The mind is about the perpetual search for happiness. If we don’t find it we end up in the company of god-like figures who brainwash us into accepting that they alone can bring the dreams alive once more.

When you read the works of Kafka, Koestler and the evolutionary biologist, E.O. Wilson, then you see how flawed is the human mind and that mind needs civilization to harness it. It is best that society does that rather than someone who thinks he is god. The US and Guyana must keep reminding the world about Jonestown.

DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.