I know you feel a bit bombarded with questions, but please if you could clear up just a couple of things for me that would be appreciated since I found your posts on the issue especially interesting.
I must admit this whole "UN Scandal" bores me to tears and I have avoided most posts on the issue right from the start. However, from the little I have read I think there are some holes in the defense of the society you have provided on this issue.
I share the attitude of many who have the general reaction to the whole thing - "so what?" After all, the society have to work with governments and cooperate with various agencies. Isn't this just a case of the Witnesses cooperating with the 'powers that be' where it is prudent to do so? The fact that they also think the UN is the scarlet-coloured beast is neither here nor there. They also think that Britian and America constitute one of the beasts of Daniel, yet cooperate with them also. That is my general attitude, and I think apostates have made way too much of this issue without thinking through the arguments and implications clearly. That having been said, I want to raise three points with you:
1. You provided magazine articles from the WT in the 1990s that were generally down on the UN as if this confounded the apostate claim that the Witnesses skewed their literature to support the UN during the period. But I think this shows you have missed a key point in the debate. The claim was specifically that the society presented pro-UN articles in Awake! magazine to the UN as evidence of their support, while at the same time maintaining their traditional stance on the UN in the WT magazine. So your citations from the WT do not refute this claim that the society were talking out of both sides of their mouth during the 1990s - they rather support it. This is an especially damaging allegation, if true, since it shows that the society takes us all for fools. The UN are fools for believing the pro-UN articles they were presented from the Awake! while they were not exposed to the rhetoric from the WT aimed at a Witness audience. And the ordinary Witnesses are taken for fools because they were not told the real reason the pro-UN articles in the Awake! magazine.
2. How important is a "non-governmental oganisation" status anyway? It doesn't exactly mean that they became a part of the UN in any meaningful way, does it? Well I don't know the answer to that, and I suppose you could argue the minutiae until your hair goes grey. But what is the society's own judgement on the matter? Well, have you read the WT study article from the early 1990s in which the Catholic church was lambasted for their association with the UN? What is especially interesting is that they quote a specific source to confirm the church's "support" for the UN. The quote does not specify in what capacity they worked with the UN, but some apostates on this board located that source and - you guessed it - the nature of their "support" was that they were affiliated as an NGO. So whatever way you cut it, the society are at least guilty of doing the very same thing that they specifically criticised the Catholic church for - the very definition of hypocrisy.
3. You say that for most Witnesses you know the "UN scandal" is a non-issue. This surprises me. Do Witnesses generally discuss such things in your congregation? I just can't imagine Witnesses in my congregation having an open and frank discussion on this issue - or any controversial issue for that matter. When I expressed some very minor doubts to a sister some years ago, I was reported to the elders immediately and grilled in "the room" until they gave up trying to get me to talk. I have kept stum ever since. Is it because you are an elder you can get away with discussing such things with other Witnesses, or do you only discuss it with trusted friends? I am really curious to know how your experience of how much Witnesses talk openly about such things can be so different from mine.