DRINKING THE KOOL AID
The idiomatic expression, “drinking the Kool-Aid”, was originally a reference to the
Merry Pranksters, a group of people associated with novelist
Ken Kesey who, in the early 1960s, travelled around the United States and held events called “
Acid Tests”, where
LSD-laced Kool-Aid was passed out to the public (LSD was legal at that time). Those who drank the “Kool-Aid” passed the “Acid Test”. “Drinking the Kool-Aid” in that context meant accepting the LSD drug culture, and the Pranksters’ “turned on” point of view. These events were described in
Tom Wolfe’s 1968 classic,
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.
[4]
It is also now closely associated with the
1978 cult suicide in
Jonestown,
Guyana.
Jim Jones, the leader of the
Peoples Temple, convinced his followers to move to Jonestown. Late in the year, he then ordered his flock to commit suicide by drinking grape-flavored
Flavor Aid laced with
potassium cyanide. In what is now commonly called the "
Jonestown Massacre," a large majority of the 913 people later found dead drank the brew. (The discrepancy between the
idiom and the actual occurrence is likely due to Flavor Aid's relative obscurity, compared to the easily recognizable Kool-Aid.) The precise expression can be attested in usage at least as early as 1987
[4]. One lasting legacy of the Jonestown tragedy is the saying, "Don't drink the Kool-Aid." This has come to mean, "Don’t trust any group you find to be a little on the kooky side," or "Whatever they tell you, don't believe it too strongly."
[5] It seems to be in this sense that commentator Bill O'Reilly uses the expression. He calls those who disagree with him "Kool-Aid drinkers" when he wants to imply that they accept an incorrect point of view without question, or that they have no understanding of the facts or reality of a situation.
[6]
