Cynthia Cleveland

Hostile Takeover: Building a Utopia

            Many of the utopias that we are introduced to are already well-established and thriving societies, but rarely are we given insight into how these societies began. After all, the point of a utopia is to put the best possible world on display, but it is troubling that we rarely get the answer to the question of ‘how?’ During the course of our studies thus far, the beginning of a new utopia is only present in Ayn Rand’s Anthem, when Prometheus relays his plans to establish his own free society, and even there it is only in its most basic stages of beginning. From this particular work of fiction, it is easy to deduce from the atmosphere created in the novella that the society is very much totalitarian, which gives the reader an idea of the conditions necessary to attain such a society; though this characteristic is not required, as evidenced by such established communities as Twin Oaks in Virginia. The difference lies in scale. Rajneeshpuram, an intentional community in Oregon during the 1980s, attempted to establish more than just a community, they attempted to build an entire society. Thus, the question stands, does totalitarianism lie at the root of utopian society?

            Recently, I watched a documentary titled Wild Wild Country, which recounts the establishment of the intentional community Rajneeshpuram in Oregon during the 1980s. Originally, this movement began in Pune, India, where Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, the leader of the Rajneesh commune, established his first intentional community during the 1970s (Urban). This failed due to financial woes and political feuds with the Indian government, which sparked the move to the American west to establish yet another community (Abbott 417). This community was focused on ideas of free love and self-fulfillment; many of the teachings are rooted in Eastern religious teachings, such as Zen Buddhism and Hinduism, combined with modern Western philosophy and psychology (Abbott 417). The intentional community garnered a larger than life following during its four short years in Oregon, amassing crowds as large as 15,000 during festivals, but long-term residents were reported at 2,500 at any given time (Abbott 419). Many of the residents sincerely cherished their community and insisted that it was peaceful and loving, though history tells us otherwise (Wild Wild Country).

            What was most alarming concerning the establishment of Rajneeshpuram was the criminality and violence that led to its eventual downfall, despite the reports of peace and bliss detailed by its followers (Wild Wild Country). In fact, it has been credited with the largest scale domestic bioterrorist attack in United States history to date, in a move to establish political dominance in the region (Wild Wild Country). This particular string of events was set in motion due to conflict with the township of Antelope (population 45), the closest community to Rajneeshpuram (Wild Wild Country). The local citizens, under the impression that this was to be a small-scale community, quickly realized that their neighbors were attempting to establish a much larger operation when they began buying all of the surrounding properties; at which point they vehemently expressed their dissent (Abbott 418-419). By that point they had amassed enough real estate in the area, and petitioned the local government for township incorporation, which was approved; even further, they eventually took over the small town of Antelope and renamed it Rajneesh, legally (Wild Wild Country). In retaliation, the Rajneeshees attempted to gain the majority of seats on the local city council—they attempted to rig the election by bussing in homeless people from nearby states, offering free room and board (Abbott 414). To make matters worse, to ensure that the locals were unable to vote, the Rajneeshees enacted the largest known bioterrorist attack in United States history—they contaminated the salad bars of local restaurants with Salmonella, effectively poisoning over 700 people (Kaplan). This got the Center for Disease Control’s attention and led to their inevitable dissolution (Kaplan).

            The link to totalitarianism in the establishment of a utopian society almost seems inevitable. In small, self-sustaining communities such as Twin Oaks, a utopia is entirely possible, but to build anything larger seems impossible without this type of manipulation. The Rajneeshees engaged in rigorous political activities against their neighbors and engaged in an act of bioterrorism in order to wrest political control of the city in which they wished to establish a permanent foothold. More so, their spokesperson Ma Anand Sheela, engaged in inflammatory and hostile rhetoric with media in defense of their way of life and insisted that their community would indeed spread and continue to thrive (Wild Wild Country). If this was indeed a free and peaceful community which sought reprieve from modern society, then it would have flourished. Instead, the community sought to expand its borders—in the literal sense—to accommodate its growing population of followers. This experiment then gives the sense that in order to establish a large-scale utopian society, there would indeed have to be certain characteristics of totalitarian authority present to account for resistance from the local population.  

Abbott, Carl. “Revisiting Rajneeshpuram: Oregon's Largest Utopian Community as Western History.” Oregon Historical Quarterly, vol. 116, no. 4, 2015, pp. 414–447. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/10.5403/oregonhistq.116.4.0414.

Kaplan, Michael. “How cultists used poison and politics to take over an entire town.” New York Post. 2018. https://nypost.com/2018/03/17/how-cultists-used-poison-and-politics-to-take-over-an-entire-town/

Urban, Hugh. “Rajneeshpuram Was More than a Utopia in the Desert. It was a Mirror of the Time.” Humanities, vol 39, no. 2, 2018. Web. https://www.neh.gov/humanities/2018/spring/feature/rajneeshpuram-was-more-utopia-desert-it-was-mirror

Way, Chapman & Maclain Way, creators. Wild Wild Country. Netflix series. 2018.