Meryll Sheena U.

Baqueros
BASS Political Science-3
PSYHCH 101 TF 10:00-11:30

A well-known writer and feminist Rita Mae Brown once said that The reward for conformity was
that everyone liked you except yourself. I have long questioned the word conformity as to how it affects
people in different ways. Same with the word groupthink wherein there have been numerous cases around
the world that took the lives of so many people just with the existence of this concept or this innate human
behavior.

According to Steven Breckler conformity is the most general concept and refers to any change in
behavior caused by another person or group wherein the individual acted in some way because of the
influence from others. Moreover, conformity is limited to changes in behavior caused by other people and
that it does not refer to effects of other people on internal concepts like attitudes or beliefs. Conformity
encompasses compliance and obedience, because it refers to any behavior that occurs as a result of others'
influence no matter what the nature of the influence.

Conformity may bring about good effects to humanity when it is for the common good of everyone
however there is always a downside to this when conformity is influence by other outside factors that may
be detrimental to a group of people. Take for example the case of Jim Jones, a notorious American cult
leader who led approximately 912 people including 276 children to drink a cyanide-mixed Kool Aid that
killed them. People who refused were injected using syringes and others were shot at gunpoint.

Jim Jones founded the Peoples Temple in 1950s, a religious group known for social activism and
for the services it provided for societys disadvantaged. Their purpose was more on accepting people that
society refuse to accept. The group was mostly made up of 75% black Americans, 20% white Americans,
and 5% Asian, Hispanic, and Native American. I would say that they started off pretty good with a good
purpose. Of course it is not so bad to actually belong to a group who accepts you. The feeling of being
accepted in a group of people or in an area is something that causes people to conform. A person is mostly
to conform to the rules and the way of living of a certain group just so they get to feel the sense of
belongingness something that is deprived of them in their family or in a society that they used to live in.
People who were recruited in this group were very religious where at first they worshipped and
acknowledged the existence of God and the Bible. The elderly were given assistance, the children were
sent to school, the people were basically provided with their needs and everyone lived in peace with each
other.

A few years after the founding of this group their number boosted to thousands and more people
were now part of them. People would usually give up their money and their property to Jones in exchange
of being part of the religious group. As it was heading to the right path, they made a sudden turn to the
wrong side of the road which started making the religious group not so religious anymore. Jones eventually
made himself the so-called-god of the Peoples rejecting the existence of God and the heavens as well.
And still people continued to believe this charismatic-orator and his so- called teachings. Soon enough
people started quitting and chose to live separate lives away from Jones. With the confession of some
people in a magazine article, Jones made his people move to Guyana in South America where they
transformed a jungle and made an agricultural project where they started living in a small community with
hundreds of his followers. Jones has been practicing sexual practices with both men and women and his
been taking drugs. People didnt have access to information outside Jonestown and was limited as ti what
Jones was telling them in a centralized megaphone around the area. Congressman Ryan heard about the
abuses in Jonestown and went there with a few people. But as soon as he left, he along with his staff were
murdered by the men of Jones. And that was then Jones started to feel anxious that his rule over his people
would come to an end and so he executed his plan, to make his people drink poison.

I have seen the documentary before at Crime and Investigation channel on television and back
then I questioned why those people conformed and complied with Jones and that it was very unfortunate
of them to waste their lives for an insane self-driven manipulator and cult leader. In Ciccarelli and Whites
book it talked about conformity and stated the reasons why people conform. In the case of the Peoples
Temple it was probably mixed with two kinds of compliance, the low-ball technique, where they first
committed to the church and as soon as they did they are sanctioned to comply with the rules and the
demands of their leader, and second, the thats-not-all technique wherein they were primarily promised to
worship God, then given acceptance and a series of benefits so they would continue to stay and comply.

There are two key reasons why people conform, first is the informational influence happens when
people change their behavior in order to be correct. In situations where we are unsure of the correct
response, we often look to others who are better informed and more knowledgeable and use their lead as
a guide for our own behaviors, in this case the leader was Jim Jones. And second is the normative influence
stems from a desire to avoid punishments or gain rewards.

Considering the current condition of the United States where there was a massive wave of racial
and social discrimination it was only a high time and comforting that there is one Jim Jones who actually
listens to the grievances of those people, what more could you ask for, you are accepted in a society and
you are also provided with support and assistance.

In my perspective I would hold the local government of Indiana accountable because I know that
they have primary knowledge of what was happening before it eventually got worse and they have done
nothing about it. Jones was operating in that state and a lot of issues arose however the leaders of the state
didnt take further action to investigate what was really happening. They could have prevented the mass
killing, they could have saved the lives of those people.