Drugs, devil worship, a cult, brutal murders and nine life sentences. At the age of eighty-three, in a prison hospital in the United States - Charles Manson.
His name was used to scare naughty children in the United States; rock stars used fragments of his speeches and ideology, sometimes even his last name, in their compositions for greater effect. And a documentary about his life and family was nominated for an Oscar. The rule that it’s either good or not good about the dead is not about Charles Manson. We are talking about one of the most shocking, terrible and cruel maniac killers in modern history.
I am a child of the streets, a little homeless tomboy. My mother is a 15-year-old girl from Kentucky who didn't have a husband. All she knows is that his name is Scott, that he married someone else, and that he fathered Charlie.
Charles Manson was born on November 12, 1934 in Ohio. His mother Kathleen Maddox was 16 years old at the time, she was not married, and to this day there is no reliable information about who exactly the child’s father was. At birth, the boy was named "nameless" or "some" Maddox. A week later he was given the name Charles, and later, when Kathleen got married, he received the surname Manson.
In fact, no one raised the child: the mother abused alcohol and was engaged in prostitution. And when Charlie was six years old, she was convicted of armed robbery. The boy was sent to relatives. Manson immediately had problems with his studies: he began to break the regime, and then the law, at a very young age.
- My uncle said: we don’t give up and always fight to the end. He couldn't stand Yankee schools. When I was nine, I set fire to the school, I wanted to change it.
In '42, Kathleen was released early. The moment when she hugged her son upon returning from prison, Charles later called the only happy memory from childhood. The family idyll did not last long: his mother tried to place Charles in a foster family, and then placed him under the care of the state. Since then, the child was in special institutions for boys, from which he constantly ran away and tried to hide, stealing cars and bicycles. Manson spent eight of the first 19 years of his life behind bars.
In between prison terms, Manson managed to marry twice, and had a child in each marriage. While in prison, Charles became seriously interested in music and became obsessed with the idea of conquering Hollywood. After leaving prison in 1967, Manson began to gather like-minded people around him. Mostly those whom life, like him, threw to the sidelines. At that time, hippie culture was flourishing in the United States: drugs and open relationships helped Charles convince. For example, in the fact that a war was coming between blacks and whites, he called it “Helter Skelter” (chaos, turmoil) after the Beatles song and said that we need to take blacks by the hand and teach them to kill.
“I told them: if you want to do something, leave something sinister behind.” I’ll tell you the same thing now: if you’re going to do something, do it well and leave something sinister for last. Leave the world a sign that you were here. Have a nice day!
By 1970, the Manson family numbered more than 30 people. Among them is musician Dennis Wilson from The Beach Boys. It was his help in Hollywood that Charles hoped for. But the show business story didn’t work out. The main source of income for the commune was robbery and drug trafficking. The group has a conflict with a black dealer, and he becomes the first victim of the Manson family. Musician Harry Hinman was next. He dies from torture; on the wall of his house the killers write in blood “Political Pig.” Cruel and perverted methods become the signature style of the group.
The most famous was the massacre in the house of director Roman Polanski. Charles Watson, accompanied by three girls, brutally killed 5 people, including the filmmaker’s wife, who was nine months pregnant. The next day, the criminals go on a new case and deal with the family of the owner of a supermarket chain. They will again leave slogans written in blood on the walls.
“I see blood every day: every day someone is shot, someone is beaten to death, someone is stabbed to death.” My whole life has been filled with this. And it doesn't make me emotional. Put a mountain of hundreds of corpses in front of me - there will be no reaction.
The trial of members of the Manson family received widespread publicity. Manson's outrageous performances appeared on the front pages of newspapers, and this only added to his popularity. Fans of the maniac went out on pickets calling for the release of their idol. They considered him innocent and called him a fighter for justice.
As a result of the trial, seven members of the Manson family were sentenced to death in the gas chamber. In 1972, the measure was replaced with life imprisonment. Most Manson spent his time in the California State Penitentiary in Corcoran. There he studied music, painting and wrote books. He was even allowed to marry 26-year-old fan Afton Burton, but thanks to a journalistic investigation that proved that she was motivated not by love, but by selfish motives, the wedding did not take place. Manson also gave interviews - in his characteristic informal form. He got confused in his testimony, contradicted himself, and sometimes the reporters themselves lost the thread of the conversation. But not once did the cruel killer repent or regret what he had done.
The world-famous serial killer Charles Manson gave an interview to the press that he is going to marry a 25-year-old girl in the near future, and, according to him, the age of 79 is not a problem for him. Read on.
The fact that 79-year-old Manson lives quietly side by side with America's most notorious scoundrels is one of the strangest and most scandalous statements in an interview that was prepared for two years. The magazine describes Manson as "a superstar and a symbol with the face of pure evil, second only to Hitler." The most striking detail of the interview was the announcement that Manson would marry his 25-year-old “fan” named Star, as he nicknamed her.
This girl moved closer to the prison where Manson is sitting when she was 19 years old.
She carved an X into her forehead, a sort of symbol that unites all followers of Manson, who has a swastika tattooed on his forehead. This couple poses in prison, where the serial killer will most likely end his life. But most of all, the public was shocked by how much the Star resembled another girl from the gang of Manson followers - Susan Atkins.
Susan Atkins in the 60s.
She was Manson's lover and one of his followers who, on his orders, committed brutal murders, including the murder of Roman Polanski's wife Sharon Tate, who was 8 months pregnant. The star says she doesn't look anything like "that Atkins bitch." Susan Atkins died in prison in 2009.
The star runs several websites on which he calls for the release of Manson. She says that she always knew that she would be his wife.
“I’ll be honest, Charlie and I are getting married. We don’t know when, but for me it’s very serious. Charlie is my husband. He told me to give this to you. We haven’t told anyone yet.” But when Manson himself was interviewed, he was not so interested. “Oh, she’s just trash. You know, trash. We're just playing for the crowd."
The star was born in St. Louis, Missouri, into a religious family. Her parents locked her in her room if she refused to go to church. Then she became addicted to drugs. In high school, a friend told her about Manson, and the Star decided to write to him. At 19, she withdrew $2,000 in savings and hopped on a train to California.
Now she visits him every Saturday and Sunday for five hours a day. She says that not only do her parents not hate him, but they even invited him to stay if he ever gets out of prison. “I want us to be alone, but there are always so many people in this visiting room.”
“But this is the only time I can see him. It's hard. But everything is changing. Who knows what will happen next? Manson and the Star communicate with 63-year-old Craig Carlisle Hammond, who tried to smuggle a mobile phone into prison in March of this year. This raised concerns that Manson had too much freedom.
If this marriage takes place, it will not be the first for Manson - he already has two ex-wives and at least three children.
He married Rosalie Willis in 1954, but they divorced in 1957 when he was jailed for auto theft. After being released from prison in 1958, he married prostitute Candy Stevens. But she filed for divorce when he went back to jail.
In the interview, Manson also hinted that he is more "flexible" about his sexuality than he previously said. “For me, sex is like going to the toilet. Whether it's a girl or not doesn't matter. I don’t play this boy-girl game.”
Among the victims of the Manson “family” was actress Sharon Tate, the wife of director Roman Polanski. In 1969, Manson's followers (Manson himself was not with them, but they acted on his orders) came to their house when Sharon and her three friends were in it. It was a real massacre. Sharon Tate died with 16 stab wounds to her body. She was eight months pregnant.
The very next night, the “family” brutally murdered a random family of entrepreneurs Liino and Rosemary La Bianca in their home in Los Angeles. In the photo: Sharon Tate and Roman Polanski.
This cruelty was so thoughtless and brutal that the notoriety of Manson and his family spread throughout the country and beyond its borders. Manson always claimed that society made him who he became.
In the indictment, the prosecutor said Manson acted “erratically.” After the hearing, he was sentenced to life for the murder of Tate and seven others.
.
It was prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi who advanced the theory that Manson encouraged his followers to start a "race war" after which the blacks who would have won it would beg him to become their leader because they could not lead themselves.
Manson loved the Beatles. That is why he nicknamed one of his brightest followers, Susan Atkins, Sexy Sadie, in honor of the Beatles song. Pictured: Susan Atkins in court. She participated in all eight of the "family" murders.
His future wife, nicknamed Star, bears a striking resemblance to Susan Atkins, although she herself denies this and treats Susan with disdain.
Manson did not support the prosecutor's theory of a race war. "It doesn't make sense," he said. Pictured: Manson followers (from left) Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkle and Leslie Van Hooten in 1970 before their trial on charges of involvement in eight murders.
After the Manson verdict, the prosecutor wrote a 600-page novel called Clueless, which has sold 7 million copies since 1974. This made the prosecutor a millionaire.
Now the prosecutor lives in California, fights cancer and periodically gives interviews. “There are so many psychos in the world, much worse than Manson, so why are we still talking about him?” - he exclaims.
The star shaved her head and carved an X into her forehead in honor of Manson.
Manson always stated that he did not inspire anyone to murder, that the followers themselves were to blame for everything. “If you talked about murder, and this murder took place, then you are guilty,” the prosecutor says to this.
Photo: Manson in prison in July this year. The bruise was caused by him falling from a bunk.
Manson still remembers Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor who did everything to get him convicted. He's still angry at him.
Manson speaks more than obscenely about his victims: “She (meaning Sharon Tate) is a Hollywood star. How many people has she killed on screen? She achieved everything with her body. And if she is such a beauty, then why did she end up in bed with another man when everything happened?” In the photo: the prison where Manson and 15 other especially dangerous criminals are kept.
The scary thing is that Manson is allowed to make as many calls as he wants, as long as they don't exceed 15 minutes and are recorded. Pictured: Manson aged 34 in 1969, after he was arrested.
Eric Hedegaard, who interviewed Manson, remembers calling him in prison quite often.
You can call Manson at almost any time of the day or night. It is not prohibited.
Hedegaard recalls that, at times, their conversations reached dead ends because he could not understand what Manson was talking about. Manson once told a journalist that killing people is good and for the greater good. environment. “If someone is killed, it is God’s will. Without killing we have no chance."
Craig Carlisle Hammond is another Manson "fan".
He recently tried to smuggle a mobile phone into a meeting with Manson.
Rumors that Manson is being given special honors in Corcoran prison have been circulating for a long time and persistently.
They say that its visitors are allowed to eat popcorn, which is simply unthinkable, because we're talking about about a brutal criminal who was sentenced to life.
During an interview with the magazine, Manson tucked into chocolate bars, pumpkin pie, popcorn, strawberry cheesecake and peanut butter - all organized by his beloved “wifey” Star.
Every morning, Manson leaves his cell, goes to breakfast, picks up a bag of food, returns to his cell, has lunch, sleeps again, goes for a walk, and then plays chess with other prisoners.
He then has dinner and returns to his cell at 8:45 p.m. At the same time, Manson complains about the air conditioning in prison, which “is just killing me.” The journalist recalls that Manson admitted to him that he wrote a song about his prisoner, which was called "In My Cell", but then the Beach Boys allegedly stole the song, changed the words and changed the title to "In My Room". Naturally, this is nonsense. In the photo: a drawing by one of Manson's fans.
Manson often moves using canes, but the journalist notes that the serial killer often dances and walks quite nimbly.
Initially, Manson and other members of his “family” were sentenced to death, but they were lucky - the Supreme Court of California declared the death penalty unconstitutional, and the sentence was changed to life
Manson had several opportunities to apply for early release, but was always denied. The next petition can be submitted only after 15 years, when he will already be 92 years old.
Manson gave up television, but used to enjoy watching Gunsmoke and Sesame Street (in Spanish).
Manson has long been recognized as a failed musician who was crazy about the Beatles. He loves to play the guitar all day long.
Every year he receives thousands of letters. He sometimes responds to requests to sign his photo. Then he captions it: “The hippie cult leader made me do it.” You can’t call him a model prisoner - during the time he spent behind bars, he violated the rules 108 times.
At times, he has breakdowns where he yells: “I’m a criminal, I’m a gangster, I’m a rebel, I’m desperate, and I don’t shoot in the air as a warning.”
About how the public accepted his murders in 1969, he says: “Yes, everyone has their own opinion, everyone remembers it in their own way. Sooner or later we must accept someone else's point of view. But this point is only part of the puzzle.”
Proving once again that he has not lost his ability to intimidate and disgust, 79-year-old serial killer Charles Manson gave an interview in which he spoke about his bisexuality, plans to marry a 25-year-old follower, how he runs a gang of serial killers and rapists straight from behind bars and, of course, that he is innocent. The interview is being prepared for publication in Rolling Stone magazine.
(Total 43 photos)
1. The fact that 79-year-old Manson lives quietly side by side with America's most notorious scoundrels is one of the strangest and most scandalous statements in an interview that was prepared for two years. The magazine describes Manson as "a superstar and a symbol with the face of pure evil, second only to Hitler." The most striking detail of the interview was the announcement that Manson would marry his 25-year-old “fan” named Star, as he nicknamed her.
She carved an X into her forehead, a sort of symbol that unites all followers of Manson, who has a swastika tattooed on his forehead. This couple poses in prison, where the serial killer will most likely end his days. But most of all, the public was shocked by how much the Star resembled another girl from the gang of Manson followers - Susan Atkins.
She was Manson's lover and one of his followers who, on his orders, committed brutal murders, including the murder of Roman Polanski's wife Sharon Tate, who was 8 months pregnant. The star says she doesn't look anything like "that Atkins bitch." Susan Atkins died in prison in 2009.
4. The star runs several websites on which he calls for the release of Manson. She says that she always knew that she would be his wife.
“I’ll be honest, Charlie and I are getting married. We don’t know when, but for me it’s very serious. Charlie is my husband. He told me to give this to you. We haven’t told anyone yet.” But when Manson himself was interviewed, he was not so interested. “Oh, she’s just trash. You know, trash. We're just playing for the crowd."
6. Now she visits him every Saturday and Sunday for five hours a day. She says that not only do her parents not hate him, but they even invited him to stay if he ever gets out of prison. “I want us to be alone, but there are always so many people in this visiting room.”
7. “But this is the only time I can see him. It's hard. But everything is changing. Who knows what will happen next? Manson and the Star communicate with 63-year-old Craig Carlisle Hammond, who tried to smuggle a mobile phone into prison in March of this year. This raised concerns that Manson had too much freedom.
He married Rosalie Willis in 1954, but they divorced in 1957 when he was jailed for auto theft. After being released from prison in 1958, he married prostitute Candy Stevens. But she filed for divorce when he went back to jail.
9. In the interview, Manson also hinted that he is more “flexible” with his sexuality than he previously said. “For me, sex is like going to the toilet. Whether it's a girl or not doesn't matter. I don’t play this boy-girl game.”
10. Among the victims of the Manson “family” was actress Sharon Tate, the wife of director Roman Polanski. In 1969, Manson's followers (Manson himself was not with them, but they acted on his orders) came to their house when Sharon and her three friends were in it. It was a real massacre. Sharon Tate died with 16 stab wounds to her body. She was eight months pregnant.
11. The very next night, the “family” brutally dealt with a random family of entrepreneurs Liino and Rosemary La Bianca in their home in Los Angeles. In the photo: Sharon Tate and Roman Polanski.
12. This cruelty was so thoughtless and brutal that the notoriety of Manson and his family spread throughout the country and beyond its borders. Manson always claimed that society made him who he became.
13. In the indictment, the prosecutor said that Manson acted “erratically.” After the hearing, he was sentenced to life for the murder of Tate and seven others.
4. It was prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi who put forward the theory that Manson incited his followers to start a “race war,” after which the blacks who would have won it would beg him to become their leader because they could not lead themselves.
15. Manson loved the Beatles. That is why he nicknamed one of his brightest followers, Susan Atkins, Sexy Sadie, in honor of the Beatles song. Pictured: Susan Atkins in court. She participated in all eight of the "family" murders.
16. His future wife, nicknamed Star, bears a striking resemblance to Susan Atkins, although she herself denies this and treats Susan with disdain.
17. Manson did not support the prosecutor's theory of a race war. "It doesn't make sense," he said. Pictured: Manson followers (from left) Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkle and Leslie Van Hooten in 1970 before their trial on charges of involvement in eight murders.
18. After the Manson verdict, the prosecutor wrote a 600-page novel called Clueless, which has sold 7 million copies since 1974. This made the prosecutor a millionaire.
19. Now the prosecutor lives in California, fights cancer and periodically gives interviews. “There are so many psychos in the world, much worse than Manson, so why are we still talking about him?” - he exclaims.
20. The star shaved her head and carved an X into her forehead in honor of Manson.
21. Manson always stated that he did not inspire anyone to murder, that the followers themselves were to blame for everything. “If you talked about murder, and this murder took place, then you are guilty,” the prosecutor says to this.
22. Photo: Manson in prison in July of this year. The bruise was caused by him falling from a bunk.
23. Manson still remembers Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor who did everything to get him convicted. He's still angry at him.
24. Manson speaks more than obscenely about his victims: “She (meaning Sharon Tate) is a Hollywood star. How many people has she killed on screen? She achieved everything with her body. And if she is such a beauty, then why did she end up in bed with another man when everything happened?” In the photo: the prison where Manson and 15 other especially dangerous criminals are kept.
25. The worst thing is that Manson is allowed to make as many calls as he wants, as long as they do not exceed 15 minutes and are recorded. Pictured: Manson aged 34 in 1969, after he was arrested.
26. Eric Hedegaard, who interviewed Manson, remembers calling him in prison quite often.
27. You can call Manson at almost any time of the day or night. It is not prohibited.
28. Hedegaard recalls that, at times, their conversations reached a dead end because he could not understand what Manson was talking about. Manson once told a journalist that killing people was good and good for the environment. “If someone is killed, it is God’s will. Without killing we have no chance."
29. Craig Carlisle Hammond is another Manson “fan”.
30. He recently tried to smuggle a mobile phone into a meeting with Manson.
31. Rumors that Manson is being given special honors in Corcoran prison have been circulating for a long time and persistently.
32. They say his visitors are allowed to eat popcorn, which is simply unthinkable, because we are talking about a brutal criminal who was sentenced to life.
33. During an interview with the magazine, Manson devoured chocolate bars, pumpkin pie, popcorn, strawberry cheesecake and peanut butter - all organized by his beloved “wifey” Star.
34. Every morning, Manson leaves his cell, goes for breakfast, picks up a bag of food, returns to his cell, has lunch, sleeps again, goes for a walk, and then plays chess with other prisoners.
35. Then he has dinner and returns to his cell at 20:45. At the same time, Manson complains about the air conditioning in prison, which “is just killing me.” The journalist recalls that Manson admitted to him that he wrote a song about his prisoner, which was called "In My Cell", but then the Beach Boys allegedly stole the song, changed the words and changed the title to "In My Room". Naturally, this is nonsense. In the photo: a drawing by one of Manson's fans.
36. Manson often moves using canes, but the journalist notes that the serial killer often dances and walks quite nimbly.
37. Initially, Manson and other members of his “family” were sentenced to death, but they were lucky - the Supreme Court of California declared the death penalty unconstitutional, and the sentence was changed to life.
28. Manson had several opportunities to apply for early release, but was always denied. The next petition can be submitted only after 15 years, when he will already be 92 years old.
39. Manson gave up television, but used to enjoy watching Gunsmoke and Sesame Street (in Spanish).
40. Manson has long been recognized as a failed musician who was crazy about the Beatles. He loves to play the guitar all day long.
41. Every year he receives thousands of letters. He sometimes responds to requests to sign his photo. Then he captions it: “The hippie cult leader made me do it.” You can’t call him a model prisoner - during the time he spent behind bars, he violated the rules 108 times.
42. Sometimes he has breakdowns when he yells: “I’m a criminal, I’m a gangster, I’m a rebel, I’m desperate, and I don’t shoot in the air as a warning.”
43. About how the public accepted his murders in 1969, he says: “Yes, everyone has their own opinion, everyone remembers it in their own way. Sooner or later we must accept someone else's point of view. But this point is only part of the puzzle.”
It may seem inconceivable that a man accused of serial murder would turn into a counterculture hero. But for some, Charles Manson became just such a symbol.
Shortly before going into deep opposition herself, radical communist Bernadine Doorne, secretary of the terrorist group The Weathermen, told those gathered at a Students for a Democratic Society rally:
Finishing off these rich pigs with their own forks and knives and then having dinner in the same room is amazing! "Meteorologists" understand Charles Manson.
Gypsy and other members of the “Family” were invited to evening radio broadcasts, where they sang Charlie’s songs and publicly cursed the prosecutor’s office for “mocking an innocent person.”
Stretching the privileges of his own defender to incredible limits, Manson gave a huge number of interviews to the independent press. Several radio stations also interviewed him by telephone from the county jail. And on the list of his visitors, among the “witnesses based on the investigation materials,” there were now some well-known names.
“I fell in love with Charlie Manson the first time I saw his angelic face and sparkling eyes on TV,” said Jerry Rubin (one of the founders of the radical International Youth Party and the Yippie movement).
Taking advantage of the break in the Chicago 7 trial, Rubin traveled around the country to give lectures and visited Manson in prison, after which the likelihood of Manson using destructive, subversive tactics in his own trial increased sharply. According to Rubin, Charlie chatted incessantly for three hours straight, telling him, among other things, the following:
“Ruby, I don’t belong to your world. I spent my whole life in prison. I was an orphan, too ugly for anyone to want to adopt me. Now I’m too beautiful to be free.”
“His words and courage inspired us,” Rubin later wrote. “Manson’s soul is easy to touch because it lies right on the surface.”
And yet Charles Manson - a revolutionary martyr - had an image that not everyone would dare to openly support. The same Rubin admitted that he was simply infuriated by Manson’s “incredible male chauvinism.” A reporter from the Free Press saw in Manson a complete hater of both Jews and blacks. And when one of the interviewers compared Charlie to the political prisoner Huey Newton (a fighter for the rights of African Americans who advocated armed uprising, the founder of the extremist Black Panther party. In 1967, Newton was tried for the murder of a police officer, which sparked a wide campaign “ Free Huey!”; in 1968 he was released due to multiple procedural violations during the hearing), he asked with obvious annoyance: “Who else is this?”
Thus, Manson's support group, although loud, was small. If newspaper and television reports are to be believed, most of the young people who were lumped together by the media under the guise of “hippies” were quick to disassociate themselves from Charlie. Many said that the ideas he embodied - violence, for example - directly contradicted their beliefs. And the majority scolded him, suffering from “guilt by appearance.” A young man complained to a New York Times reporter that it was now almost impossible to hitchhike:
“If you’re young, have a beard or just long hair, drivers look at you like you’re a homicidal maniac from that California crowd and step on the gas.”
The irony of this is that Manson never perceived himself as a hippie, equating pacifism with weakness. If members of the "Family" absolutely needed a label, he told his followers, then it would be much better to call them "slippy." If you remember the secret missions they practice “by stealth and crawling,” this option is very suitable.
It was alarming that the “Family” continued to grow. The group living with Spahn increased noticeably. Every time Manson appeared in the courtroom, I noticed new faces along with the members of the Family I already knew.
It can be assumed that many recruits were attracted by the sensation; like moths, they were drawn to the flame of someone else's glory. But we didn't know how far they were willing to go to get the attention they wanted or to be well received in the group.
When I first spoke with Gregg Jacobson on the eve of the grand jury hearing, the first thing I wanted to do was identify the connection between Manson and Melcher.
In my second conversation with the talent seeker, I discovered to my amazement that since meeting Manson at Dennis Wilson's house in the early summer of 1968, Jacobson had had more than a hundred long conversations with Charlie, mostly about his philosophy. As an intelligent young man who occasionally encountered hippies and adopted their lifestyle, Gregg never joined the Family, although he visited Manson at Spahn's ranch many times. Seeing some commercial potential in Charlie, Jacobson considered him an "intellectually stimulating" personality. This side attracted Gregg so much that he often introduced Manson to his friends - such as, say, Rudy Altobelli, the owner of 10050 Cielo Drive, who rented housing to both Terry Melcher and Sharon Tate.
“Charlie is a real chameleon,” Gregg explained. - He often said that he had a thousand faces, and he used each one; He has a separate mask for everyone.
He could relate to everyone on their own level, from ranch hands and Sunset Street girls to myself.
Including the jury? - I thought about it and decided that if Manson puts on the mask of a peace-loving hippie at the trial, with the help of Gregg I will be able to rip it off. Jacobson believed that under all the masks Manson was hiding his very clear and rigid beliefs.
What are their sources? - I asked.
“Charlie very rarely referred to any authorities when describing his philosophy,” Gregg answered. - But he did not hesitate to borrow an idea he liked from someone.
Did Charlie ever give direct quotes? - I asked.
Yes, he answered, from the songs of The Beatles and from the Bible.
Manson accurately quoted entire texts of the Fab Four, finding in them many shades of meaning and hidden revelations.
As for the Bible, he most often mentioned the ninth chapter of Revelation. However, in both cases the quotes were intended to support his own point of view.
The philosophical mosaic began to gradually take shape. The man I sought to pass judgment on lacked any moral restraint. Such people are extremely dangerous.
Did he say that killing another person is a bad act?
On the contrary, he argued that it was good.
What role did Manson play in his philosophy?
- In Charlie's conceptual system, death was completely absent. Death is only change. The soul is not capable of dying...
He talked about this constantly, spirit and matter, their relationship. He believed that it was all just in his head, that everything was subjective. Death is just a fear born in a person’s head, and that this fear can be removed from there, and then it will no longer exist,” Gregg explained.
And yet, when Jacobson once stepped on a tarantula in the desert, Manson flared up and reprimanded him. He scolded those around him for killing rattlesnakes, for plucking flowers, even for crushing stems of grass while walking.
It is possible to kill a person, but to harm an animal or plant is a sin. At the same time, he repeated that no evil exists, that everything that happens is correct.
Manson's philosophy was replete with such contradictions, which seemed to bother his followers little. Manson argued that each person should be independent, but at the same time the entire “Family” depended on him alone. He said that he could not advise or command anyone, that they all “must do as love dictates,” but he also asserted: “I am your love,” so that his desires automatically became their desires.
I asked Gregg about Manson's attitude towards women. This question particularly interested me because of the female part of the defendants.
Women have only two goals in life, Charlie said: to serve men and to bear children. But he did not allow the girls from the “Family” to raise their own offspring, since they would pass on their complexes to the children. Charlie believed that if he could destroy the barriers built by parents, schools, churches, and society, then he would create a “strong white race.” Like Nietzsche (whom Manson said he had read), Charlie believed in a race of “supermans.”
According to Charlie, Gregg continued, a woman can only be as good as her man. They are only reflections of their men, even their own fathers. A woman is a collective image; she accumulates within herself the men with whom she has ever been close.
Then why are there so many women in “Family”? - I asked. For every man there were at least five.
- Only with the help of women could Charlie attract men to his side. Men represented power, strength. Women were needed to lure them into the “Family”.
I asked Gregg about Manson's aspirations, his goals.
"Charlie wanted to make it big by making records," Gregg replied. - Not so much for the sake of money, but for the sake of the opportunity to convey your words, to make them common property. He needed people: for them to live with him, to make love with him. So he wanted to make the white race truly free.
How did Manson feel about blacks?
According to Gregg, Charlie "thought they were on another level as a race, and whites were on a higher level." This is why Manson so vehemently condemned sex between blacks and whites: “by doing so, people disrupt the course of evolution, mix different nervous systems, less developed with more developed. Black people's only job is to serve to the white man" But blacks had stayed at the bottom for too long, Charlie said. Now it's their turn to seize the reins of power. That's what Helter Skelter was all about, this whole black and white revolution.
The founder of the notorious Family sect, Charles Manson, is 84 years old. The maniac, often called simply Charlie, was a true symbol of the decline of the frivolous and hopeful 60s. The most famous crime of the Family was the brutal murder of actress Sharon Tate and her friends. The massacre of the Hollywood elite shocked American society and exposed the underbelly of the psychedelic and sexual revolution. Seemingly innocent experiments with the expansion of consciousness and preaching of free love overnight turned out to be the basis for a cruel and senseless cult of violence. At the same time, Manson gained an army of fans who unexpectedly admired the demonic image of the killer. Songs, films, books and even operas are still dedicated to Charlie. And T-shirt sellers literally got rich on prints with Manson’s portrait. “WORLD 24” is about how a serial killer became a real icon of mass culture.
Before becoming the founder of the cult, Charlie dreamed of becoming a musician. Actually, in search of fame, Manson moved to California from his native Ohio. The future serial killer tried to play psychedelic folk that was more relevant at the time, but without much success. True, at some point he managed to make useful contacts and almost became a member of the Beach Boys. Fortunately for the latter, they managed to escape from the Manson commune in time, taking with them several demo recordings and a bouquet of sexually transmitted diseases.
Charlie didn’t understand why the producers didn’t like his songs, but he didn’t despair and continued to compose in his free time from preaching. He deified music in the literal sense of the word and in every possible way encouraged the creative experiences of his followers. But fame among music lovers came to the “Family”, of course, only after a series of brutal murders. Archives of those years, along with Manson's songs written in prison, are still published by independent labels and are in demand among cassette and vinyl collectors.
Just as for the European leftists of the 60s, Mao was not just a dictator, but a dictator who writes poetry, so for the counterculturalists, Manson became a radical killer with a guitar at the ready. In The Psychic Bible, Genesis P-Orridge, one of the fathers of industrial music and also the creator of his own quasi-religious cult, openly talks about the fact that young intellectuals of the time were interested in the “Family”. Founded by P-Orridge, the Throbbing Gristle group actively used recognizable images of militaristic Germany in their performances, chose the emblem of the British Union of Fascists as their logo, and turned to the occult and the revelations of Manson. Young musicians who announced the creation of a new direction, which they called industrial, were instantly labeled as Nazis. Of course, everything was much more complicated: the cult of personality, brainwashing, violence and leaderism became for TG and their successors a metaphor for total control over the collective consciousness. A striking example of clever manipulation, clearly referring to the experience of cults, was the song United, the first widely known single from Industrial Records. Its monotonous, measured rhythm is superimposed with innocent lyrics calling on people to unite. The naive listener has no idea that this hippie anthem is composed of quotes from Charlie Manson.
The figure of Manson is also invisibly present in dark folk - a direction that broke away from industrial. Charlie owes this genre to perhaps his most famous songs, perhaps the quintessence of the entire movement. This is All Pigs Must Die by Death In June. The word “pig” was written on the walls of the mansion in which the Manson family massacred the pregnant Sharon Tate and her acquaintances, and the lyrical hero of the song does not hide that he is going to punish the rich, as they did in August ’69. All Pigs Must Die has become somewhat of an internet meme these days. Indeed, if you don’t remember the context, a melancholic and brutal ode to hatred of artiodactyls can seem more than funny.
Manson and his comrades unwittingly damaged the reputation of not only musical radicals, but also mainstream artists who did not even think of flirting with shocking themes. The beginning of the glorious tradition of delving into the musical preferences of maniacs was laid in the same house of Sharon Tate. After themselves, Manson’s students left not only a message about pigs, but also “decorated” the walls with the words Healter Skelter - the misspelled title of the Beatles song (the closest Russian translation in meaning and literacy is “Kovordak”). Journalists latched onto this detail with pleasure, accusing the Beatles of inspiring a whole gang of maniacs. The Fab Four never managed to rid the song of its ominous flair, so one of the most famous songs of The Beatles forever became known as “the one that got Roman Polanski’s wife killed.” Charlie himself happily confirmed in court that without Helter Skelter there would not have been that bloody night that put an end to the “summer of love.” Moreover, in honor of this song, Manson named his own ideology, which claimed to be a religious and political doctrine. It consisted in the fact that in the future there would be a war between whites and blacks, in which the latter would win, and only a select few would survive this interracial Armageddon. The “chosen ones,” of course, meant those who would accept the teachings of Helter Skelter and bring about the beginning of the great war. At least that’s how Manson believed the message of the four “horses of the Apocalypse” from England.
Charlie's confession caused mass hysteria that spread far beyond the United States. Concerned parents rushed to study their children's music libraries in search of encrypted messages. It was the same Beatles who got it first of all. There is still a popular myth that if you play Revolution 9 from the White Album backwards, you can hear a man's voice saying, “Let me make love to you, dead man.” What this means is anyone's guess, but it sounds ominous enough to prohibit a child from listening to rock music.
And it is very significant that the first serious report about Manson and his family appeared not on the pages of a crime chronicle, but in Rolling Stone magazine. At the same time, Charlie began to have his first fans outside the sect. Charlie was seen as something more than a killer with the aspirations of a messiah; for many, he became almost a symbol of revolution, a rebellion against a rotten system that imposes a cult of consumption and serves the benefit of a handful of rich people. Charlie himself, it seems, did not expect such a turn. He gave interviews extremely rarely and did not particularly comment on his popularity. Apparently, he liked that everyone put into his image what they wanted to see in him. Bright to that confirmation is the laconic answer he gave to the question: “Who is Charlie Manson?” "I am nobody".
Media success was secured by the book “Helter Skelter,” written by prosecutor Victor Bugliosi and which became a bestseller. The chronicle of the investigation and trial of the Manson Family sold seven million copies - an unprecedented result for non-fiction at that time. The book has been adapted for television twice, most recently in 2004. Its author, who acted as the main prosecutor at the trial, managed to unravel the tangle of a series of murders committed without an apparent motive, but still did not understand how Charlie won the love of his followers. Not endowed with special talents, an unattractive petty criminal forced young people to destroy own lives and take the lives of others. But how? In the pages of Helter Skelter, prosecutor Bugliosi admits that the only reason was Manson's inexplicable demonic charisma:
“He had a quality that only one in a thousand has. Aura. Wherever he went, everyone flocked to him. I couldn't get anyone to go to the store and buy me a milkshake. But this guy... I don’t know what he is.”
The figure of Manson still attracts not only marginalized people or simply lovers of specific black humor, but also quite successful and serious artists. So, for about six months now there have been rumors that the story of “Family” will become the basis for a new film by Quentin Tarantino. The details of the project are kept in the strictest confidence, but some things do leak to the press. It is known so far that Tarantino’s film will feature a bloody scene in Sharon Tate’s house, and the director has invited Samuel L. Jackson to play one of the main roles. Harvey Weinstein was supposed to help with the work on the film. However, one can only guess whether the recent film, in the very center of which was a famous producer, will affect the release of the film.
Manson's appeal for cinema is clear - Charlie's cult provides room for fantasy for every taste: it has the plot of a hastily filmed slasher film, to the professional commercial success of a product like American Horror Story. But what is even more surprising is that the cult maniac found a place not only in mass culture and kitsch, but also in the academic environment. Quite unexpectedly, the image of Charlie was revealed by composer John Moran, who dedicated an entire opera, The Manson Family, to the maniac. This might seem like a curiosity, a random experiment, or a gesture of desperation in an attempt to somehow surprise the jaded public, if not for one “but.” Not just anyone but Philip Glass himself, an undisputed authority in the world of academic music, had a hand in creating the opera, and the role of prosecutor Bugliosi in the original production was played by Iggy Pop.
But one of the most successful attempts to penetrate the dark mind of a serial killer was made by Truman Capote. The author of Breakfast at Tiffany's visited Robert Beausoleil, the most famous member of the Family after Manson, in prison. Capote conducted a short but extremely succinct interview with him, in which Charlie is practically not mentioned, but at the same time he does not seem to leave his student’s cell. The writer was interested in only one question: how could Bobby, a talented musician and a promising young actor with an angelic face, buy into Charlie’s fantasies, bordering on drug delirium? It seems that neither Bobby nor his spiritual leader really knew the answer.
"T. K: Did you view Manson as a leader? Did you immediately feel its influence?
R.B. What are you talking about? He had his people, I had mine. If anyone influenced anyone, it was me who influenced him.
T.K. Yes, he was interested in you. So he claims.
R.B. What happens, happens. And all this is good.
T.K. Do you think that killing innocent people is also good?
R.B. Who said they were innocent?
T.K. Okay, we'll get back to that. In the meantime, tell me: what is your morality? How do you distinguish good from bad?
R.B. Good from bad? Everything is good. If it happened, it means it’s good.”
Eduard Lukoyanov
