The Victims of the Manson Murders
What happened in Paris on 13 November 2015 is not unique. I don’t mean in terms of terror attacks. I mean it in terms of people who are brainwashed to believing an ideology that makes them do things they never would have done before.
Particular to ISIS and the example I will discuss are a belief that murder will make the apocalypse start. Sometimes, there is religious overtone to this, and sometimes not.
An example of this is Charles Manson and members of his “Family” who were convicted of nine counts murder of and conspiracy to commit murder, in 1971. Although Manson himself was not present at the time and place of the actual slayings, he was convicted along with his followers who had stabbed, beaten and shot the victims:
Sharon Tate Polanski and her unborn son (she was eight and a half months pregnant on 9 August 1969, the night of the murders). Before she was stabbed to death 16 times, the killers hanged her from the celing beams in the living room of her home. At autopsy, her fetus was found to be a perfectly formed, healthy boy.
Voytek (Wojciech) Frykowski (d. 9 August 1969) – stabbed s total of 51 times, shot twice, and beaten over the head with the butt of the revolver, which broke in the process.
Abigail Folger (d. 9 August 1969) – stabbed 28 times.
Jay Sebring (d. 9 August 1969) – hanged along with Tate, shot and stabbed seven times.
Steven Earl Parent (d. 9 August 1969) – shot four times in the chest and abdomen.
Leno LaBianca (d. 10 August 1969) – stabbed twelve times with a chrome-plated bayonet.
Rosemary LaBianca (d. 10 August 1969) – evidence showed that many of Mrs. LaBianca’s 41 stab wounds had, in fact, been inflicted post-mortem.
Gary Hinman – “As described in the book Helter Skelter, Hinman was killed over money and property that Manson claimed Hinman owed the Family. It also served as the first of a series of murders committed by The Family to start Helter Skelter, a “war” that Manson had preached to his Family that would happen in the summer of 1969.” (See: Bobby Beausoleil)
Donald “Shorty” Shea – (d. 26 August 1969) The location of his body was not discovered until 1977, nearly a decade after his death.
A documentary that I found today on Netflix called “Manson’s Missing Victims” proposes that there may be more victims, as yet unfound. Manson boasted of at least 35 killings. Some of the identified victims were: Donald “Shorty” Shea, Gary Hinman, and one of the defense attorneys, Ronald Hughes.
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Wiki can sum it up faster than I can. I’ve read Bugliosi’s “Helter Skelter” – the definitive account of the case – many times.
“Manson believed in what he called “Helter Skelter”, a term he took from the song of the same name by the Beatles.* Manson believed Helter Skelter to be an impending apocalyptic race war, which he described in his own version of the lyrics to the Beatles’ song. He believed the murders would help precipitate that war. From the beginning of his notoriety, a pop culture arose around him in which he ultimately became an emblem of insanity, violence and the macabre. The term “helter skelter” was later used by Manson prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi as the title of a book that he wrote about the Manson murders.”
Those responsible for the Paris attacks also follow a belief system that tells them that murdering innocents will begin the apocalypse in which they, like Manson and his followers, are the only ones who are true believers, and hence, will survive.
Note: In British English, the term “helter skelter” refers to a playground slide. That’s what the lyrics of the Beatles song are about.
