RECENTLY, we learned that Wanderlust Tours Guyana led by Roslyn Sewcharran is set to pursue a fresh (in recent memory) initiative bearing the title “Jonestown Memorial Tours.” For her efforts, she received some scratching criticisms and derision along with some potent defenders, albeit with different literary slants and advocacy focus.

The three main critics that readily come to mind are all revered for their body of work in their chosen field of endeavour; Media expert Mr. Kit Nascimento, local Literary icon Neville Bissember and former US Congress Woman, Jackie Speier, a Jonestown survivor.
However, support and/or sanction for the project came from Ruel Johnson, himself a literary giant, the Guyana Tourism Authority and the Ministry of Tourism. Let me quickly hasten to add that I am in full unreserved support of this venture by Miss Sewcharran and others.
Bissember’s essential argument, as I understand it, is that we should not try to conjure up “macabre imagery” of a massacre that took the lives of almost 1,000 people through fanciful and glamorous (my words) tours which can negatively paint and overshadow the new and exciting oil discovery and production agenda that is begging for all the efforts we can give to it.

Celebrate what is possible in the bright new horizons rather than hark back to a dark past. Kit Nascimento’s approach is that it is almost a subhuman instinct to profit off the sufferings of people and a desecration of their memory to organise profit making tours to the site where human beings drew their last breath under tragic circumstances.

Congresswoman Speier’s arguments are similar to Kit’s but she claims first person sufferer’s pain and trauma.
It would be counter intuitive and probably downright foolish to make the claim that the site at Jonestown does not hold significant historical value. Thankfully, I do not construe that any of the detractors are making this claim directly.
That said, their advocacy amounts to an erasure of all the memories of Jonestown from our history. Let’s take Bissember’s postulations for example. If we follow his proscription, the Jonestown site will be permanently reclaimed by the jungle or left to be squatted upon or host an entirely new and unsuspecting civilisation; but whatever you do, do not mention its dirty history. I think this approach is a greater desecration to the memory of those who lost their lives and an attempt to sanitise our history which holds potent lessons for future generations.

Already, we see valuable offshoot from the work of Ms Sewcharran, in that, no less a person than Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo has taken notice and has indicated at his weekly press conference that the recent Jonestown debates led him to do some deeper research; today he is more knowledgeable.
The Vice-President is a major policymaker and is now armed with more information that can shape policies and possibly enshrine laws that can make Jonestown nearly impossible to repeat. Making Jonestown a visitable guided tourist site will do more for our history than any book can narrate.

Further, many tragedy-ridden, historical sites around the world discovered new aspects and new details not previously documented when they were opened to guided tours. I cannot subscribe to the “hide and pretend it away” model espoused by Bissember. Instead, we should confront the dark and uncomfortable truths about our past and appropriately preserve, commemorate, visit and learn about the sites of tragic events of the past.

On the false moral high ground that no one should turn a profit by telling the stories of human tragedy has long been debunked in every country on earth. The fact that Kit Nascimento is uncomfortable with it should not be sufficient reason to dissuade Wanderlust Tours.
I personally have been on profit making guided tours for which I purchased tickets from private operators to, for example, several former concentration camps in Germany, former slave auction ‘stables’ in Ghana, the former prison of Nelson Mandela in Cape Town South Africa, various sites of the Nanjing Massacre in China and the former New York twin towers aka 911 memorial.

I live in Guyana but yet I never had the opportunity to visit Jonestown because, the personal expense is huge, and I would still need someone to explain what I am looking at, aka a personal tour guide. They are not common in Guyana and they are not cheap.

So, Ms. Sewcharran’s efforts will make such an adventure more cost effective to ordinary people, provide employment for a string of people in both upstream and downstream businesses, open new aspects of Guyana to the world and possibly persuade the Government of Guyana to invest into officially making the site a jungle museum.

I don’t understand why such influential people would wish we never see or mention Jonestown ever again. Kit’s position is further set at naught when one considers that Jonestown site is already being profited off of.
There are over a dozen movies and mini series created about Jonestown that made millions of US dollars for the content creators. Just this year, in fact, currently streaming on Hulu is a mini movie featuring no lesser personalities than Stephen Jones, the son of Jim Jones and Jackie Speier, then personal Aide to Congressman Leo Ryan who was killed in Jonestown.

Ms. Speier later became a US congresswoman. I do not have any evidence of either Jones or Speier being paid to participate in the venture, but it is common for Hulu to handsomely reward or share viewership profits with those who play such central roles in their production.
Even so-called learning and documentary channels which package the Jonestown Massacre as “docuseries” has raked in millions in sponsorship and advertisement revenues.

All of these for-profit efforts that exploited the Jonestown tragedy are by non-Guyanese and I do not see where either Speier, Bissember or Nascimento has condemned these efforts, but the moment a Guyanese makes an attempt to monetise a crucial part of our history the critics are minted.
The Jonestown tragedy is as much American history as it is Guyanese. Americans have profiteered off Jonestown to the tune of millions for over several decades, yet it has not tainted their ability to harvest their natural resources, develop their historical sites, sullied their entertainment industry or vulgarise the sacredness of the memory of those who died.

Yet somehow Kit et al think that a Guyanese tour guide taking groups of researchers, tourists, adventurers and curious sojourners into the jungle at a fair price is somewhat objectionable to the memory of those who perished at that site.
I support Ruel’s position, Roslyn’s efforts and the choice by TAG and the Ministry of Tourism for approving this venture. In fact, I will go on that tour, and further, I call on the Government of Guyana to start investing in the preservation of the site as a major historical tourist destination.

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.