Engardio's Article about Jw's in USA Today.... (page 2)

Junction-Guy

Mr Engardio, if you are reading this, Im about to do a little "knocking" myself. In fact Im gonna knock a few of the JW's court cases into the gutter, where they belong.

I commented on my own topic that the documentary that will air on PBS will not make
any converts to JW's. I said that the filmmaker avoided making controversial statements
but let the participants in the documentary make those statements. I said that it was
not a JW propoganda film. I stand by those statements, but I also said that his website
is another story.

Engardio's problem is that he wants the approval of JW's and non-JW's for his film. That's
normal. He wants to sell DVD's. I think he knows the issues, but not as well as most
ex-JW's. He's a homosexual that used to knock on doors, pushing WT literature, but never
got baptized. His mother is not told to shun him.

I still recommend that the film be shown, as it will start JW conversation. Such conversations
lead to the word "cult" and statements of "strange beliefs" and "I hate them ringing my bell."
But we understand that you can't separate their Supreme Court fights out of their deeds and
say that they fight for rights. They fight for their own survival, and they take away their member's
rights.

While I hope that the film is shown in most places, I can fully understand the passion in folks to
want to stop it. I have fastly come from fully supporting WTS to realizing that everything they
taught me was a lie. But I wonder if those protests are just helping the film. Even there, I
recognize that helping the film will hurt the WTS. So what I am saying- this is a tough controversy.
I don't know if I will try to get my wife to watch it or not. It's not anti-JW, so it won't push anyone
out of WTS anymore than it will bring them in.

Junction-Guy

I want to see it myself, just out of curiosity. Then I can decide how to pursue it.

We need to get PBS to pick up a story on the blood issue or the pedophile issue.

The thing that irks me about this "knocking" video is how it was presented. It is almost like they want people to feel sorry for the JW's like they are underdogs.

Honesty

"Knocking" makes me really feel sorry for the JW's.

They are being exploited and don't even realise it.

OnTheWayOut

It is almost like they want people to feel sorry for the JW's like they are underdogs.

It does try to do that, but it only succeeds with the German concentration camps story.
Otherwise, it just makes people feel sorry for JW's having to follow such a strict and
dangerous policy on blood, and makes people feel sorry for them having to go knocking
on doors.

Gerard

...accept the fact that outside groups will benefit from their legal victories.

I'm sick and tired of the JW propaganda saing that they have improved my own Civil Rights. All thay've done is to benefit the WT to earn the right to wake me up on a Saturday 8AM.

TD

"They would never protest an abortion clinic, bankroll a campaign against gay marriage or vote to restrict what they view as "sins." They believe that Jesus commanded Christians to stay out of politics and all war, including culture wars. Jehovah's Witnesses do use the courts, however, to protect their Christian way of life."

Not a terribly clear thinker, this fellow. What exactly does he think the JW "...way of life" is if not a religious subculture?

How exactly would he describe the clash between those that would blare an incendiary message from a sound car outside of a church on a Sunday morning vs. those that would restrict this as an abuse of free speech and a disturbance of the peace if not a culture war?

(Of course this assumes he has actually read any of the 1930's and 40's court cases.)

edmond dantes

Oh Dear! Oh Dear! That's a bit like praising the Natzis party for their right to march through the streets of Germany in the thirties, distributing hate everywhere they went, and telling everyone that they and only they have the right answers.They say they are theocratic when we all know it's a dictatorship.

Do you think for one minute that if the JWs' were ever in power (as if )that they would allow any other voice to be heard. The latest rumour I heard was that the dead annointed are going to come back at armageddon and help invisibly with the slaying.Correct me if I'm wrong; Can it be right for them to win rights which would be denied to their opposers.

It's one thing to have healthy debate but to go around saying, if you don't enter our ark you are dead meat and so are your toddlers and babies if you do not join us. This is in effect what they preach from door to door.

Edmond.

The wanderer

Dear Jeff:

Thank you for posting this article. As you made
mention it maybe somewhat one-sided, but it is
not a bad article.

I was wondering about this point within the
article though.

"Jehovah's Witnesses have argued 62 cases before the high court. Only the U.S. government has argued more. Jehovah's Witnesses won 50 of the cases, breathing life into the Bill of Rights and setting precedents for the civil rights movement."

There maybe some truth to this I guess
give credit where credit is due.

Your friend,

Richard

(The Wanderer)

kid-A

Engardio's editorial, like his watchtower propaganda flick is completely and utterly absurd and one-sided. This outrageous idea that the JWs have been "stalwarts" of constitutional freedom due to their determination to be able to legally sacrifice their children to a publishing corporation is enough to induce nausea.....

There are THOUSANDS if not TENS OF THOUSANDS of splinter religious and non-religious "fringe" groups in Europe, Canada and the USA that have fought their respective governments in court for the right to practice their lunacy free from governmental intrusion. Is Engardio claiming, with a straight face, that because of a couple court cases involving the JWs that this has somehow shaped civil liberties in the US or any other country for that matter ????

Oh, you're right Mr. Engardio! Here I was thinking someone like Martin Luther King was an important figure in the evolution of civil liberties in the US, when I should have been thanking Judge "Booze" Rutherford all along for my freedoms! God bless the freedom to harass my neighbours on their property trying to hawk cult-rags! Let freedom reign! God bless the freedom to legally "sacrifice" the lives of my children on the whim of a board of senile old farts sitting in Brooklyn! Let freedom reign!

It comes down to this: The only "freedom" the WTS has won has been to allow themselves to set up a private, parallel universe with its own internal legal system, fascist mindset and "ruling" class all within the broader context of a free society.

I cant BELIEVE USA today would print this putrid vomit on its pages.....

Engardio's Article about Jw's in USA Today....

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