• Manson, 7-9 p.m. Monday, History Channel

• Durham County, 10-11 p.m. Monday, WPXM-Ion 35

Labor Day television this year should come with a warning label from Friedrich Nietzsche: ``If you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes into you.'' Monday night's television goes to some deep, dark places, both real and fictional, that are likely to leave even the strongest stomach with a queasy feeling that has nothing to do with picnics.

``Queasy'' is far too mild a word for Manson, a History Channel documentary marking the 40th anniversary of the murderous outburst of the 1960s' most toxic flower child. Charles Manson, a manipulative career criminal who attracted a band of hippie followers and molded them into a band of sadistic assassins bent on triggering a race war, was convicted of nine murders and may have been responsible for three dozen or so more.

The need for another documentary on Manson and his infamous ``family'' -- particularly one that relies heavily on extensive re-creations -- may not be obvious. The story has been told many times, most notably in the book Helter Skelter by prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi and his writing partner Curt Gentry, and the two riveting TV miniseries based on it.

But what makes Manson worthwhile are lengthy interviews with two of the so-called Manson girls, Linda Kasabian and Catherine Share. Kasabian stood lookout during the Manson family's slaughter of actress Sharon Tate and four others; she later left Manson, turned state's evidence, and provided key testimony against him. Share wasn't directly involved in the murders, but later served five years in prison for trying to hijack an airliner and kill passengers until Manson was released.

Now in their 60s, the women often seem tinged with disbelief at their own actions as they recount their involvement with Manson. His commune on an old movie set in the desert outside Los Angeles was virtually a right-wing caricature of hippie life: group LSD trips punctuated by orgiastic, polygender sex, all of it directed by Manson like some deranged auteur of the freakout.

``No one else touched anyone else or kissed anyone else or made love to anyone else unless Manson told them to do so,'' says Bugliosi, also interviewed extensively in the documentary. ``The subversion of sexuality was one way he broke down ego. He realized they would do whatever he wanted them to do if they had no ego.''

That included stealing from former family members, shaking down drug dealers and dangling sexual bait in front of a motorcycle gang Manson wanted to recruit as soldiers for the coming race war. In the lyrics to the song Helter Skelter on the Beatles' 1969 White Album, Manson had detected a confirmation of his prophecy that blacks were about to rise up and slaughter whites, leaving him to rule what was left of the world.

``It wasn't that Charlie listened to the White Album and started following what he thought the Beatles were saying,'' says Share. ``It was the other way around. He thought that the Beatles were talking about what he had been expounding for years. Every single song on the White Album, he felt they were singing about us.''

When Manson's nascent dreams of becoming a rock 'n' roll star fell through (he actually wangled some studio time, with surprisingly decent results: Manson includes a clip from one of the recordings), he decided to hasten the race war. On his orders, family members slaughtered a total of seven people over two consecutive nights, leaving racial rhetoric scrawled in blood at both crime scenes.

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