Have JW's changed their tactics for talking with atheists?

by SickofLies 14 Replies latest jw friends

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  SickofLies

  I attended a meeting with MASH (McMaster Association for Secular Humanists) the other day where we had an excellent guest speaker, a professor from the University of Toronto who founded and runs TalkOrigins website. For those that would like to see the lecture titled "Evolution a theory and a fact" I will be posting it on-line in the next day or two and will post the link in this thread.

  Back to my question, after the speech when we took the speaker out for drinks we were all sharing experiences talking about how TalkOrigins helped us and the issue of JW's came up, people there were telling me that when JW's come to their door now if they state they are an atheists or don't believe in the bible they simply stop the conversation and go away.

  Is this an official change in tactics for the JW's? It would be great if it were, I can think of only one reason for not wanting to try and preach to the new atheists out there, that being that people who do are getting persuaded by their arguments and leaving the church.

  Has anyone else heard anything like this?
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  Anti-Christ

  Yes, I have notice this a few times "back in the day" about 5 years ago. I think it depends on the person, I know I have tried to debate it once and a wile but now that the tables have turned I would like to debate with a JW, especially now that I know a lot more on the bible. It's funny, the more I learned on the bible the less I believed in it.
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  nvrgnbk

  I think the strategy is...

  talk louder.
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  Junction-Guy

  I dont know if this in anything official, but my personal opinion is that most JW's would consider an atheist a "lost cause" and would effectively use their time to target another demographic---The casually indoctrinated, occasional church goer. Someone who is only slightly familiar with the bible, and who does not have any strong opinions on christianity one way or the other.
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  metatron

  Unofficially, there is a movement in the direction you described. They simply tell themselves that evolution is foolish and walk away

  thinking that the atheist is deliberately deluding themselves. They see no need to argue about something they consider absurd.

  I know that this is the reaction of some C.O.'s and others.

  metatron
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  nvrgnbk

  They must think that atheism suggests a "poor" heart condition.

  Not "correctly disposed" and all that.
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  sir82

  It's also a reflection of their poor training.

  JWs are trained to "prove" their points by referring to isolated Bible texts. If the audience doesn't believe the Bible, doesn't accept its "authority", the JW is floundering. He doesn't have any training or skills in reasoned logical debating skills, so there's really nothing more for him to say.
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  Liberty

  I may have run afoul of this new tactic when a pair of JWs were visiting my inactive relatives to "encourage" them. I had known the elderly JW of the pair as a child so my relatives thought I should come in and say hello since I hadn't seen him for nearly 30 years. I came in expecting a bit of catching-up-small-talk but right after the introductions the younger of the pair asked if I was baptized. I responded that I had never been baptized even though raised as a JW because I was a skeptic about everything biblical.

  The younger of the pair seemed keen on talking to me as my horrified relatives looked on. We had a nice discussion on the Creation story while the elder JW directed his attention to my relatives. At some point the elder JW had had enough of my rebuttals and cut the younger JW off by reading me a scripture which basically called me a fool and quickly got up to leave as I said his scripture had as much authority to me as the Book of Mormon did as they were retreating out the door.

  I had assumed that I would have a better chance as a straight up Bible skeptic in keeping the discussion going than as a rabid anti-JW spouting what I knew about the corrupt nature of the Watch Tower Society, but I was wrong. I wish now I had taken a more aggressive approach since I was cut off anyway. Apparently Atheists aren't afforded any more discussion time than an Apostate.
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  MikeA

  Ahhhh, this is where I have the most fun, but unfortunately I guess my house has been tagged as atheist in some way by the local JW's. I am a reasonably well-educated scientist and used to have a ton of fun bantering with unsuspecting JW's who made the mistake of calling on my domicile :)
  
  I am currently an agnostic, but I guess to JW's that equates with atheist. Where I had fun was asking them to "convince me" that God exists. On one memorable occasion, I kid you not, both of the JW's were so confused by what I was saying, one of them lost her lunch on my front porch while the other began to cry. Needless to say, that appears to coincide with the house becoming a place to which nobody should go.......
  
  I love debating evolution, science in general, and the meaning of the word "THEORY" and how it differs so radically with what most of the population (particularly the religious part) seems to think it means. It becomes really obvious, very quickly, that many people really need to go to a high school level course in any science and learn a bit about what the terms mean. Yeah..... I have alot of fun when they let me.
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  drew sagan

  The answer is simple.
  
  Jehovah's Witnesses are really only interested in converting people who already hold some sort of Christian belief. Anything less that a person who has already been involved with Christianity and the JWs arguments loose their power.