40 FT383marker of a culture in transition. In the
1960s Americawas stillfi nding its feet in
the post-war landscape. Itsyouth culturewas
coalescing into a distinct demographic and
the old institutions of government,family,
church and employmentwere losing their
potency. It is not surprising that significant
numberswould look elsewherefor a sense of
direction and personalvalidation. Esoteric
ideas have a habit of blossoming in so-called
secular societies when established structures
begin to lose theirgrip. In the case of
Charles Manson, though, while he couched
the inner life of theFamily in these ideas,
his overall intentions had little to do with
empowering hisfollowers. Rather, he worked
by imposing his willover them.
Manson often claimed to have magical
powers. His followers, many of whomwere
youngwomen in their late teens and early
twenties, spoke of Rasputin-likehypnotic
abilities.When, in mid-1969, he attempted
to move the Family deeper into DeathValley
to an isolated spot known as Barker Ranch,
Manson came up against onePaul Crockett,
a thoughtful prospectorwell versed in
religious philosophy. Crockett attempted to
“de-program” some of theFamily but he felt
the gravitational pull of Manson’s influence.
As heexplained toVincent Bugliosi, Crockett
believed the intensity of Manson’s control
“was all part of the occult”.^10 In reality,
Mansonwas a shrewd manipulator who
used a combination offl attery, persuasion
andforce to gain people’s confidence, then
their obedience. Hisrepeated riffwas that
the Familywere the “garbage people”, the
misfits whomeveryone –except Manson–
hadabandoned.They were special to him,
but only because society had deemed them
worthless. Having established this ‘Us and
Them’ mentality, it was easyfor Manson
to add to the mix his pseudo-religious
misanthropy. When ‘Helter Skelter’ came,
Mansonwould preach, and theworld
crumbled, itwould be theFamily whowould
take control of the kingdom. Provided, of
course that they stayed lo yal to Manson in
the meantime.
That Manson’s apocalyptic sermonising
eventually led to theTate-LaBianca
atrocities makes it easy to condemn such
cultish activities.The strange and terrible
saga of the ‘Love and Terror Cult’ seems
to make clear inretrospect where all this
fascination with the esotericwas heading.
However, Mansonwas not interested in
exploring esoteric pursuits out of curiosity
or the desirefor knowledge, ‘forbidden’ or
otherwise.From the start, his interestwas
focused on theexercise of power. He was
keen to open the minds of hisfollowers,
but only to then step in and dominate their
thinking. Elsewhere, within the occult scene
of the 1960s, one couldfi nd committed and
sensitive refusals of such authority. For
those attracted to the ‘cult of the occult’, the
Devil’s businesswas an invitation to step
away from the crowd andexplore a sense
of individual self-reliance. Charles Manson
spokeabout these ideas, but only came to
exemplify the authority, cruelty and violence
of the ‘straight’world at itsworst.
In the 50years since theTate-LaBianca
murders awealth of books and commentaries
have speculated upon Manson’s mindset and
his place within the culture at large. Itwas
RomanPolanski, however, who offered one of
the most immediate and insightfulresponses
to the case. Hisfi rst fi lm afterTate’s deathwas an adaption of Shakespeare’s bloody
tragedyMacbeth(1971).With its threeWeird
Sisters, thefi lm is saturated with magic, but
the witches are not the source of the terrible
events. All the malevolence andchaos come
from Macbeth himself: it is his obsessive
power trip that maps out a path to oblivion.NOTES
1 SimonWells,Charles Manson: Coming Down
Fast(Hodder, 2009), pp280-283.
2 Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry,Helter Skelter
(WW Norton, 1974), p76.
3 Gary Lachman,Turn OffYour Mind
(Disinformation, 2001), p6.
4 Wells, p239.
5 Nikolas Schreck,The Satanic Screen(Creation,
2000), pp137-9.
6 Nat Freedland,The Occult Explosion in America
(Michael Joseph, 1972), p14.
7 Wells, pp33-4; Jay Stevens, ‘Night Thoughts
About the Sixties’, inPeter O Whitmer and Bruce
VanWyngarden,AquariusRevisited(Citadel, 1991),
ppiii–vi.
8 Gavin Baddeley,Lucifer Rising: Sin, Devil
Worship and Rock ‘n’ Roll(Plexus, 1999), pp66-
78.
9 Ed Sanders,The Family(EP Dutton, 1971).
10 Bugliosi, p315.Adapted andextracted from James Riley,
The Bad Trip: Dark Omens, NewWorlds and
the End of the Sixties, 2019. Out now from
Icon Books.✒JAMES RILEYis Fellow of English
Literature at Girton College, University
of Cambridge. He works on modern and
contemporary literature and is the author of
the blogResidual Noise.BETTMANN / GETTY IMAGESABOVE LEFT: Musician, murderer and Family member Bobby Beausoleil on the steps ofKenneth Anger’s house at 1198 Fulton Street, San Francisco, in 1967.
Crowley’s ‘Do What ThouWilt’ is written on the door.ABOVE RIGHT: Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan,was another frequent visitor to the house.