punkofnice,
I researched all this with some colleagues back in the 90s. You might want to sit down and hold onto something before you start reading this.
Russel started a series of corporations. There were 50 stockholders who could vote. This number never changed. Russel gave away "stock" in exchange for contributions but that stock was not voting stock. He later got most of that back anyway.
The New York chapter also started a bunch of corporations, but all of those are subsidiary to Russel's corporations. The WTBTS now has hundreds of interlocking, dependent corporations, trying to trace ownership through that mess is not easy. They did this for a reason.
The governing body members do not own stock and cannot vote the stock. They own NOTHING.
The stock passed to whoever the original stockholders left their shares to when they died. This has happened several times since the early days.
Russel was a master scam artist. As was Rutherford, as was Knorr.
The WTBTS on many occassions has waived the spiritual requirements and brought people in to Bethel because of a person possessing skills that were required.
Back in the early 90s a 'brother' came into the truth and was accepted to Bethel and was making key decisions in a very short period of time. I think it was less than one year from first studying to being at Bethel. This man prior to this was one of the top real estate professionals in New York city. Look at the real estate transactions by the WTBTS in New York since then. They have made billions of dollars in profits because of this real estate trading. Now, no one is going to tell me that a bunch of elderly people with no business background, most of them were janitors, made all these deals on their own. There is no way that happened.
There are so many scams to cheat people out of money. Remember the assembly parking ticket scam? They tell the convention center facility managers that parking will be free, then they sell "parking tickets" at the kindgdom hall. They did this because if they charge for parking at the facility, they have to share that money with the convention center. I know for a fact that this is a scam because the Augusta Ga. convention center manager forbid JWs from every renting his facilities again because of this theft. I worked their part time at the time. Then came the mandatory vountary contribtion for literature. When you pick up literature you have to make a contribution to cover it, but then when you place the literature you have to ask for a contribution which you also put in the donation box. Any time a Kingdom Hall gets built the local congregation is on the hook for all the money plus interest. Assemblies are a money making opportunity because the WTBTS representatives guilt the attendees into giving donations by lying about the finances of the assembly on the morning of the last day. But they leave out the donations of the last day in the numbers they report to the attendees.
Now, here is the thing that really makes you want to scream. They tell elderly JWs to donate their assets to the WTBTS in their wills.
Every Witness is told at least twice a year to set a goal on how much they will donate per month to the local congregation. Any excess is sent by the local congregation to the WTBTS in New York.
Now, here is what most JWs do not know. The WTBTS pretends that they are barely making it. Some colleagues and I researched this in the early 90s, and if you have kept up with the real estate trading in New York since then, the WTBTS has a net worth of over 100 million dollars. I usually say "tens of millions" because most people find this number shocking. The WTBTS has a very diversified investment portfolio. They own land, buildings (which produce income through rents), antique automobiles, stocks, bonds, commodities, artwork, jewelry, precious metals, rare coins, you name it, they own it.
Now, here is what most JWs do not understand. The people who control this wealth are not the governing body. You have to go back to the original 50 stock holders. It is the group of people that owns this original stock today that controls the assets. I don't have the research artifacts any more, I lost interest in the WTBTS back in the 90s and all that research was on a computer that I later sold, but this is not that hard to figure out.
The governing body members are fools. Some know that they are liars and some don't know. But, they are still fools. Some of them have deluded themselves into believing that they really do speak for God, some of them know that this is nonsense. But, the owners of the stock and the lawyers call the shots. I don't know if the governing body knows that these people exist or not. They have to know that someone besides them owns the stock and has the voting rights.
Here is why I know that "spiritual" men are not behind this. I know some spiritual people. I never knew any JW who was a spiritual person. A truly spiritual person does not have to tell you that they are spiritual. You know that they are. A truly spiritual person would never do any of the for profit things that the WTBTS does. Never. I followed the spiritual path for a while but I realized that I can never be like any of these spiritual people. I'm not sure why exactly. They have something inside them that I could never have.
Also, there is something about the WTBTS' literature that is very profound. I have read all of their literature that I could find with an open mind. Before the internet I was a subscriber to the book lists of about fifty or so large used book resellers. Now, these same book sellers are on Amazon and sites like that but before the internet they would mail you their book lists every couple of weeks or so. Or, you could tell them to let you know if they found a certain book.
I have a cousin who is not a Witness and never had an interest in them but for some reason he had all of the studies in the scriptures and other historic JW books. I think my grandfather had the studies in the scriptures and left them to my cousin. My cousin lived with my grandparents.
Now, I am not trying to brag here, just saying what happened. When I was in the 7th grade a teacher taught many of us how to speed read. When I was researching the WTBTS and Bible Students literature I read over a thousand watchtower magazines and I read every book of theirs that I could find.
And this is what I figured out. You better sit down. The tone of voice that comes from their literature is evil. And it is propaganda. Some of the highest quality propaganda that you can find anywhere. On a level of Hitler and the NAZIs. About tone of voice. Whenever you read a book, you sense the writer's tone of voice. Some writers are good enough that they can establish the tone of voice on purpose. Others have a single tone of voice that comes through in everything they right.
The literature of the WTBTS ALL has the same evil tone of voice. Now, when you read their literature for true understanding you have to forget the pretty pictures of the happy people in paradise. You have to forget that these are "Christian" authors. And just pretend that you found a magazine or a book with the cover ripped off and you have no idea who wrote it. And listen to the tone of voice.
This literature talks to the reader like the reader is some kind of idiot, the literature is very condescending and insulting. The reader is assumed to be dishonest. The reader is assumed to probably die at Armageddon anyway if they don't do exactly as they are told.
This literature makes my skin crawl because I know what is going on. There is someone or something behind the authorship that we never get to see. No, not Satan. No, not the demons. I don't know exactly how to explain this. One thing I do know. The authors of this literature know that this is a scam. They know that it is propaganda. The WTBTS literature is propaganda on a level of quality of the writings and speeches of Hitler and the NAZIs. This is world class propaganda. I don't think for a second that the governing body are smart enough to produce such world class propaganda. But, someone involved in their literature production is smart enough, and evil enough and a good enough propagandist.
I am sorry but I don't know the precise technical terms to explain this more scientifically.
If you have the time take a cross section of their books that span a long period of time, and read them all, then you will see the same disrespectful, dishonest, condescending tone of voice in all their books.
So, master propagandists who control a huge networth and the goal of everything that they do is to grow the membership in order to grow the rate of increase of the net worth are in charge and I do not believe that this is the governing body. The governing body is a bunch of elderly janitors.
