Drinking The Kool-Aid

"Drinking the Kool-Aid" is a metaphor commonly used in the United States that refers to a person or group holding an unquestioned belief, argument, or philosophy without critical examination. The phrase typically carries a negative connotation when applied to an individual or group. There are two likely sources for the term: the first is the Ken Kesey Kool-Aid Acid Tests of the 1960s. The second source is the November 1978 Rev. Jim Jones Jonestown Massacre, where members of the Peoples Temple committed suicide by drinking a Kool-Aid like drink laced with cyanide.

The Acid Tests were a series of parties held by novelist Ken Kesey in the San Francisco Bay Area during the mid 1960s, centered entirely around the use of, experimentation with, and advocacy of, the psychedelic drug LSD. Kesey, along with the Merry Pranksters, a group of people associated with Kesey, traveled around the United States and held events called Acid Tests, where LSD-laced Kool-Aid was passed out to the public, as LSD was legal in the U.S. until 1966. Those who drank the "Kool-Aid" passed the "Acid Test". These events were described in Tom Wolfe's 1968 book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. However, the expression is literal. This source of the phrase may explain why some references to "drinking the Kool-Aid" are not negative, but, rather, refer to enthusiasm for a new idea. If someone "drank the Kool-Aid" then they are "tripping," i.e., hallucinating and are removed from reality.

Some survivors of the Jonestown incident object to the link between blind faith and the deaths of members of the People's Temple implied by the phrase, because some victims were murdered—forced to drink at gunpoint—rather than being convinced to commit suicide. In addition, Jim Jones had previously had many rehearsals for the event in which the drink contained no poison, which led to cult members believing the drink was harmless on the day that it did contain poison.

The phrase has been used in a variety of contexts to describe blind, uncritical acceptance or following. This usage began in limited circles in the late 1990s, and reached mainstream use in the late 2000s.