#Mass Suicide

[starrysharks]

"it happens all the time, it happens all the time", a tautology of self-delusion - a one-way love affair that turned me into a weak rabbit

[clemsfilmdiary]

Suicide Club / Jisatsu sākuru (2001, Sion Sono)

自殺サークル　（園子温）

Also known as: Suicide Circle

5/10/23

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

The Jonestown Massacre , November 18, 1978

[titleknown]

KAIJUNE NEO: HOLY DIVER

...God fucking dammit I missed it. I think I was drugged, and not in the fun way. Probably wouldn't have been at the entrance in the rain if it were in the fun way.

I'd been rooming with the monks for a while, since probably after the Virgin Killer incident, but before the debacle with Ocean Man. And now they were all dead, strewn across the place row-by-row like war poppies in a mandala of suicide.

One time when phoning back, the site asked me "What religion were they?" because the boss is as incurious as a bag of drunk turkeys, but my answer is "buddy, take your pick."

I think a lot of people turned to God after the monsters, and I think a lot of god-fearing people turned to each other across lines. Well, the good ones anyway.

I know, I know about the fucking prophet, that fucker's next in line. But I digress.

The temple's old. I can smell the old stone and the old wood replacing older wood. I talked with Sammy, and they said that the place was older than most major religions. Maybe even older than people.

But it was alive with people, that's for sure. Sammy the know-it-all, Jane who cheated at cards (And was a shit liar), Randy the young convert, the old master with the stone mask who bummed cigarettes off his second in command (I never did get their names), all of them dead.

The red and white decor made the blood look like a pattern. A part of the scenery, like the grim patternwork of the bodies. It's so fucking elegant, god dammit. Of course it was going to be a pattern, this place was made for sacrifice!

I looked down, trying to see a familiar face. There was nothing. Not the dull surprise of a dead sleep, not a rictus rigor-mortis, every face had been blanked smooth not to mar that precious fucking pattern.

They'd told me. I'd known about it. I knew I couldn't prevent it. The had their goals in mind, they saw the horrors outside, and they were going to fucking do it. Maybe that's why they put me up front after that fucking "tea," so I could walk through to that sentiment. through the pattern of people I'd been growing fond of over the last months to the center for that thing they were summoning.

It was some protector for humanity, chasing that dragon of hope, fed with a pound of flesh of the human soul. I've never been one for sacrifice. But I've never been one to come up with any better options, not in a world like this.

The lights grew brighter at the center. The place was designed to let light in, but I don't think light bright as a summer's day coming in through a rainstorm has shit to do with architectural planning.

And through the horrors of death, up the marbled-red steps, through the line of bodies, I saw it.

There's that moment in the bible where Job, a man exposed to all the cruelties of the divinity, all the horrors a man can endure from God's bad side, is taken by God when he asks "Why?" and sees the Leviathan.

A titanic thing, the serpent beyond serpents, from before nothingness was parted for light and dark to emerge, a thing primordial that existed aeons before and will exist aeons after.

And he gets it.

I think I know how Job felt at that moment, in some small way.

I saw the great beast at the center of the temple, the resplendent dragon of crystal and metal, the divinity made of mortal death blazing halos and beams of light, of aeons amalgamate and aeons to be amalgamated.

Before it flew off, it looked at me. I don't know if it was the mind of whatever god-thing it had been before or the humans making its form, but it looked at me.

God I hope it doesn't still bum fucking smokes...

-D.W. Devlin, Gonzo Journalist #1.5

-----

So, yet more Kaijune, named after the song Holy Diver! Which apparently was about a guy begging a messiah figure not to leave them according to the writers, but which I always interpreted as a devil mocking someone for their descent into corruption.

Both interpretations kinda converged into this figure with a holy nature and heroic intentions but a dark origin.

And, for the record, DW Devlin's is this universe's version of the reporter of the same name y'all might remember from my older Kaijune entries, he's a multiversal kind of recurring character, like Sans Undertale or the Marx Brothers!

Ability Notes: She has control over light, in particular the ability to store and release it in powerful short-range "halo fields" and long-range beams, with her most powerful application being releasing it in a "death blossom" from her crystals; eyes and mouth. She also has the ability to "fly," though it's really more like swimming through light.

Fun Trivia: In-universe it's Devlin's fault that all the monsters have Jojo-type musical theme names. He used it in an article once and it sort of stuck. He apologizes and regrets it every time he has to hear that someone's mom got eaten by Disco Duck (More terrifying than you'd think) and so-on.

Holy Diver is also known to steal a packet of smokes whenever she ends up crashing into a store that sells them.

And, in that grand (exceedingly late) Kaijune tradition, this character and all related narrative elements are under a CC-BY 4.0 license, as long as I, Thomas F Johnson, am credited as their creator.

[porterdavis]

You first dude.

[rjptalk]

THE JONESTOWN MASSACRE'S 43rd ANNIVERSARY

Today is the 45th anniversary of this event and we haven’t learned much in this near half century. We have come so far and learned so little. I post this every year. We need to remember how bad we can be and be better. We can be better. We need to try harder. Out of this 45th year following the Jonestown Massacre came the saying: “Drink the Kool-Aid” or “Don’t drink the Kool-Aid.” Or, “He drank…

[bouncinghedgehog]

[vavandeveresfan]

When the redesign of one of your favorite villains looks like he runs Heaven’s Gate.

.

(for those who don’t know about Marshall Applewhite)

[exowitch]

I CANT CLEAN THE BLOOD OFF THE SHEETS IN MY BED

[cyberneurotism]

[randomwikiarticles]

The Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ,[1] originally Peoples Temple Full Gospel Church and commonly shortened to Peoples Temple, was an American new religious organization which existed between 1954 and 1978 and was affiliated with the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). Founded by Jim Jones in Indianapolis, Indiana, the Peoples Temple spread a message that combined elements of Christianity with communist and socialist ideology, with an emphasis on racial equality. After Jones moved the group to California in the 1960s and established several locations throughout the state, including its headquarters in San Francisco, the Temple forged ties with many left-wing political figures and claimed to have 20,000 members (though 3,000–5,000 is more likely).

The Temple is best known for the events of November 18, 1978, in Guyana, when 909 people died in a mass suicide and mass murder at its remote settlement, named "Jonestown", as well as the murders of U.S. Congressman Leo Ryan and members of his visiting delegation at the nearby Port Kaituma airstrip. The incident at Jonestown resulted in the greatest single loss of American civilian life in a deliberate act prior to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Because of the killings in Guyana, the Temple is regarded by scholars and by popular view as a destructive cult.

[starrysharks]

don't hop aboard that scheme of hers; wouldn't you prefer... a lie-ridden side, full of dark secrets to hide - and yet, revealing them is our talent and pride!

[poz-patrol]