Naysayers and the "Big News"

by avishai 19 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  avishai

  Many of us don't see the legal ramifications of this info., or even the importance of changing the blood doctrine. 915 people died in Jonestown. It's highly likely that as many, many of them children die PER YEAR as a result of this policy.

  Now, many have also lost heart about other cases, because there has'nt been much media attention lately, plus there was a post, or a message from bethel that stated that the WTS won all the child molestation cases. MOST of them are STILL ONGOING!!!! These things take YEARS.

  I know many of you are tired, hurt, and emotionally and spiritually scarred, and we would ALL like instant gratification. However, the people I have helped get out of the WTS did'nt get out from me dropping all the info. at once on them. They did'nt believe what I said half the time.

  I helped them out from dropping many small hints over YEARS!!! Eventually, some of them grew those seeds themselves. The seeds of beautiful doubt and the promise of actual facts. It takes awhile, and it probably did for most of us too... My doubts did'nt pop at once and go "This is all crap!!!" Even after I was basically out, the deprogramming process took a loooong time. It's still happening, not as traumatically, and now it's fun to root out the fallacies that happen in my head.

  Give it time. And also, before you talk negatively about someone else's efforts, ask yourself what are YOU doing to help. Get off the couch and write a letter. Go evil slaving, put silentlambs brochures in the mags at the laundromat. Go help someone in need.

  Speaking of helping someone in need, I think the one thing that pulled many of us out was COMPASSION!!! As a kid, It KILLED me to think of all of the others who were'nt JW's all getting killed. And later, it did the same for me to see how the less fortunate, widows, orphans, children, poor people were treated in an org. that was supposed to love equally, fully and unconditionally. It was compassion for your fellow man that compelled many of you to go door to door and save others. And many of you were chided by the less compasionate in the cong. for helping those less fortunate, or worldly. Don't let the harm and emotional scars from the org. kill that. Let's USE that compassion, that patience, those inate abilities to HELP others, who are as we once were.

  I love all of you, Sam.
• 

  Confession

  
  Great post, Avishai. While I'd probably have advised a bit less pre-hype concerning this announcement, it is good, valid information that will add just one more straw on that camel's back of mental captivity.

  I believe the greatest possible outcome is in seeing the Society alter policy on blood transfusions. If they do so, it will be perfectly obvious to most active JWs that it was an attempt to protect itself from lawsuits.

  When the WTS instituted the Voluntary Donation arrangement, many JWs knew it was an attempt to sidestep tax liability. But so what? Many of us just thought it was a wise move.

  In this case? The Society will have changed policy on an emotionally charged issue that resulted in the deaths of thousands. It will be plain that those deaths weren't important enough to affect policy. But protecting themselves financially will be!
• 

  YoursChelbie

  ((((((((((((((((Avishai))))))))))))))))))))

  Everything that is worthwhile takes time.

  Thanks for that reminder.

  YC
• 

  undercover

  Maybe we should resurrect these threads in a year (provided they die down by then) and then every year to see how much progress has been made. If it fizzled and died, we can study it and find another way to use the material maybe. If it took off and started a chain reaction that caused some major changes, well I may have some crow to eat. But rather that, than people dying for not accepting blood.
• 

  avishai

  I resurrect the Child molestation/dateline stuff quite a bit. If it's not in people's faces, it's often forgotten.
• 

  wiegel

  I have not been able to get the entire essay "Jehovah's Witnesses, Blood Transfusions, and the Tort of Misrepresentation" to read yet, but reading the excerpts alone has given me hope for others.

  How so? Only a few weeks ago, a member of my family who is a witness said "If my husband and I had "a sliver of a doubt that this was the truth, we would be so outta here!" Did she know what she was saying? Pretty loaded comment. What I heard is that they are "burdened, tired, worn-out, exhausted, and would love to dump the whole load".

  "A sliver of a doubt". I know that so many feel this way and are just ready to bolt, I know that was me when I read CofC. It exposed the LIES, not arguing doctrine etc, but showing the truth about how it works at the top. LIES.

  Now, what really hit ME while reading the excerpts from Barbara is this:

  Excerpt #1 from "Jehovah's Witnesses, Blood Transfusions, and the Tort of Misrepresentation."

  Government intervention into religious exercise through meeting this test is rooted in legal precedent. In Reynolds v. U.S., one of the first decisions limiting religious freedom, the Supreme Court upheld a law criminalizing polygamy because of the state’s compelling interest in protection of the family unit.

  [3] Additionally, courts are now willing to allow aggrieved citizens to sue their church if it misrepresented a secular fact.[4] For example, one court has held a religious organization liable for misrepresenting its use of donated funds.[5]

  Similarly, the Catholic Church became engulfed in a flood of tort law suits following revelations that some of its priests sexually abused minors and that the church allowed known sex-offender priests to continue their posts.[6] ......

  I see the following quote as the real key to this new "tool" to expose the lies:

  "The essay examines the State’s power to protect its citizens by allowing followers and their families to pursue legal action against a religion when it misrepresents secular facts which harmed the followers."

  If this isn't loaded, I don't know what is. How about a financial accounting for the funds donated to the WWW (World-Wide Work)? How about an accounting for not informing their believers about the molesters in their midst? These are NOT doctrinal issues, they have to do with "secular facts". I am not a law student, but what I am reading seems to intimate that they may now be held liable for mis-information on a purely secular level - their "cut n paste" method of presenting their followers with half truths and statements totally out of context to further their own points.

  And there there is DUMBO - wouldn't they love to get their hands on this info?

  Well, that having been said, I think this is BIG NEWS, but it is just the beginning.........slivers of doubt to fill many quivers have just been ordered up.
• 

  TopHat

  How do I go about getting these silentlambs brochures ?
• 

  avishai

  They should be on the website.
• 

  luna2

  I was thinking along these lines when Barbara posted the Big News teaser. I wondered if it wouldn't be a bit like the UN news that, even being an inactive JW, I had trouble seeing the importance of it at first. I was so used to putting every criticism of the WTS down to apostates, "worldy" people eager to discredit the Society, Satanic persecution or over-reaction. I had to be shown how to think critically and hold the WTS to the same standard that they required for their followers....then it hit me full force.

  Same with the pedophile scandal. I even refused to watch the program on tv. I said to myself that it was a few incidents by evil, false JWs; that it couldn't be that the Society had done anything wrong on an organizational level. Ha! When I finally did some research, I was quickly disabused of the notion that it wasn't a problem that originated in the holy of holies, Brooklyn Bethel itself. I finally got it, but it took a while.

  With this too, it may take some hashing through for people, JW and non-JW alike, to see the possible impact that this may have on the WTS. I don't know if this will blow up into something big. I don't know if the non-JW world will see this as important. All I know is that for right now, this demonstrates, once again, that the WTS is dishonest...and the GB doesn't even seem to have much strength in their supposed convictions. Why do they need to have a faith issue propped up with secular medical opinion in the first place? Is it that the big wigs at Bethel are embarrassed to discuss something strictly on the basis of faith with nonJW doctors and hospital officials? So much so that they felt it necessary to make a pretence of having supporting opinions from people in the health field to back their assertions that blood isn't safe? Whoo Hoo, Jehovah doesn't want us to accept blood and, look, its not even good for us anyway. Praise Jah, who may make a possibly deadly rule for his followers, but really, its not deadly, its for our own benefit...and we can prove it (if we stretch the facts just a bit here and there). Pathetic.

  I hope that the information published in this article can be used in lawsuits against the Tower. I hope it becomes an embarrassment and a world-wide scandal. I hope it can free a few more minds. I hope. It won't happen overnight, but I'm hoping it will happen.
• 

  skyman

  People are bind if they can not see the HUGE potential for hurting the BORGE with this information. Being short sighted is more leathal to a person than nearsighted. Short sighted people prepare nothing, were the wise preson prepares for the future.