Sparlock: The Sociology of the former Jehovah’s Witness community

by Las Malvinas son Argentinas 33 Replies latest jw friends

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  Las Malvinas son Argentinas

  NC and cofty: What bothered me more about the video besides the blatant attempt at throwing guilt and shame at the young boy, was the portrayal of Caleb’s mom. She undoubtedly is the Society’s idealised JW mother. Scrubbing the floor when she could have been better portrayed making dinner, exercising, or reading a book. Then she changes into a skirt for the family study. But I digress. Perhaps Sparlock is the defining moment of the material after all, like a famous line from a movie. All I can do is describe how I interpreted the video on a personal level.

  sd-7: I’m not even sure this video will go down that well even within the JW community. Some will think that it’s for kids and not pay as close attention as the Society would normally want them to. As for the children to whom this is directed to, they have plenty of more entertaining things to watch. What this effectively does is force parents to throw out the Pokemon and Harry Potter type material (if they even had it in the first place) and replace it with more vanilla forms of entertainment.

  cedars – Have your fun. This was my take and contribution on the Sparlock phenomenon. Some may agree, and some may disagree. I was just hoping that Sparlock himself would do me the honour of commenting on my thread. Who says I don’t have any sense of humour in this? Do pass the word onto ‘him’, though!

  wasblind – I’ve been cut off to ‘protect’ the integrity of the organisation, so that’s how I feel. In hindsight, I probably should have switched pronouns on that one from the collective ‘we’ to the individual ‘I’. The JWs cut off everyone as if they were a diseased body part, when in reality the disease is within. The amputated limbs represent only a simplified analogy, and not any part of an extended allegorical philosophy.

  jookbeard: I knew the Anglo-American world power beast as described in the Society’s Revelation books had substance! The Malvinistas, Hollywood activists, and Sinn Fein must have their own composite symbol in Revelation. I think I’ll read those materials more closely now.

  mindseye: Yes, sometimes you must be absurd to prove an absurd point. We certainly have no shortage of that.
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  DT

  "The Ex-JW community has handled it beautifully, having a lot of fun along the way. I hope we can keep it going!"

  I keep reminding myself that most Witnesses haven't even heard of Sparlock yet. Most District Conventions haven't happened yet. We know the EXJW reaction to Sparlock, but we really don't know what the reaction will be from loyal Witnesses. It may seem that Sparlock mania has already peaked, but we can't predict what the ultimate reaction will be.

  It's a grand social experiment. Other religions and cults have invented villians in the past (like Satan), but I'm not aware of any that have tried this in the age of the Internet, certainly not in such a ridiculous manner.
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  wasblind

  Alright Emily I got ya,

  but think of them as doin' you a favor,

  because as we both agree, that Organization is the disease that you are now

  cut off from
• 

  NewChapter

  NC and cofty: What bothered me more about the video besides the blatant attempt at throwing guilt and shame at the young boy, was the portrayal of Caleb’s mom.She undoubtedly is the Society’s idealised JW mother.Scrubbing the floor when she could have been better portrayed making dinner, exercising, or reading a book.Then she changes into a skirt for the family study.But I digress.Perhaps Sparlock is the defining moment of the material after all, like a famous line from a movie.All I can do is describe how I interpreted the video on a personal level.

  Oh trust me. I AGREE---especially having been one of those JW mothers. But it's just too many words---and not catchy at all. SPARLOCK just sums up the whole thing for me. It's something we all understand here, and all of the consolidated messages rolled up into this one symbol. Outsiders may not totally get it, but we do. He has been sent to us to help the healing. LOL
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  kurtbethel

  Humans have an inclination to use symbols and logos to condense a big idea into something concrete and tangible. Just as the watchtower name and logo are a symbolic shorthand for an authoritarian organization that erodes humanity from its members, Sparlock is a symbol that, at a glance, holds the concept of something treasured that was taken by force or craftiness from one by that organization. The exact details vary by individual, but the overall concept can be easily applied. It resonates on a conscious level and greatly on a subconscious level.

  I was never in deeper than being a study, and I can see that. For me, Sparlock is that lost innocense and hopefullness that gets crushed by the system.
• 

  dgp

  Las Malvinas wrote:

  Sparlock most likely originated in the extremely limited and doctrinally challenged mental thought processes of one of the Society’s anonymous writers. Sparlock in of itself is of no great consequence. The sub-culture that produced such a dull tool for the masses is of more concern to me. They can release more and more of this drivel, and it will make little further impression upon me

  The problem is the impression things like "Sparlock" will make upon the minds of children, not on the minds of those who already understand just how wrong that DVD is. Exposing that is also a way to criticize the sub-culture that created it. And, whether it was made by one of the anonymous writers or not, it got approved by the Governing Body, at the very least by a majority vote (two thirds).
• 

  Las Malvinas son Argentinas

  DT: You brought up a point I had not considered. A good portion of JWs haven’t even been exposed to this material yet. We can all speculate on what the ultimate reaction will be. I would imagine that families with young children would dutifully pass on this material to their children to watch. Most Witnesses have already been sternly warned about anything to do with magic and the supernatural, so I don’t see the masses drawing anything new out of this, which is why I think this video will be ultimately disregarded by most and added to the increasing pile of rubbish they already have in their collections. For example, I can’t see my mother watching this personally more than once, if even that, and she’s one of the most indoctrinated members that I know. She’ll have a copy, but will tell herself that this isn’t for her and stick it next to her old bound volumes. This will be disseminated within the minds of children, and most JWs wouldn’t immediately make the ‘Sparlock’ connection. They’ll know that there was a lesson involved, but their minds are already dulled to the point where I suspect that much information passes through their thought processes without retaining much of anything new.

  NC: I get the whole ‘Sparlock as a symbol’. Part of the reason for my post was to analyse what makes it a symbol, even though the lesson given is a rather minor one when compared to other Witness doctrine. You’ll get thrown out immediately for having a cigarette or being alone in the same room with a member of the opposite sex. I’m not even sure what they’d do to you if you owned a Sparlock-type toy other than privately insist that you get rid of it. The true lesson of Sparlock I would imagine is that it illustrates perfectly how petty and aloof the Society is. People are having trouble supporting themselves financially in this day and age, women and children are being abused, but they want to make absolutely certain that members don’t have anything to do with fictional magic characters.

  dgp: Naturally I am concerned about the children and what effect it will have on them. It’s yet another example of why this religion is especially not suited for children. What else can they possibly do to make their young despise the religion which was forced on them? Can’t they just be satisfied that these children will become peddlers of their literature door-to-door for free? What harm does a magic toy really do? Are they going to start believing in Sparlock over Jehovah? The only explanation is mind-control. If they could get away with banning all forms of entertainment, I’m certain that they would. They want as little distractions as possible from getting people in their full-time service. Vacation pioneering? Why not? The real magic toys are their own literature and the aura of the organization. I knew someone who thought demons were coming into her home, so she placed WTs all around the house to ward them off. Another told me that if she were ever in danger of being raped, she would run to the nearest Kingdom Hall as soon as possible. You can’t fix this religion. It’s rotten throughout, and has always been so.
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  Phizzy

  "You can't fix this religion...." too true ! "It's rotten throughout and has always been so" Spot on again !

  The thing is though that the community here, on JWN, has spotted an opportunity perhaps to wake some up who are in the religion. The whole video is so over the top "Culty" that anyone with a modicum of common sense and a teeny weeny bit of cognisant dissonance must say "WTF ? I mean WTF?, this is crazy !"

  So the more we parody it on the Net and laugh at it and show that only a seriously deranged cult would produce such crap, the more JW's are likely to wake up.

  At least, I certainly hope so.
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  sd-7

  sd-7: I’m not even sure this video will go down that well even within the JW community. Some will think that it’s for kids and not pay as close attention as the Society would normally want them to. As for the children to whom this is directed to, they have plenty of more entertaining things to watch. What this effectively does is force parents to throw out the Pokemon and Harry Potter type material (if they even had it in the first place) and replace it with more vanilla forms of entertainment.

  True enough. Most JWs won't notice anything odd about it, save maybe the dad having a near-doorstep Bible study with Caleb over something as simple as tracking dirt in the house. I think that would've bothered me a bit even as a JW, because this little kid is getting hit over the head with scripture over extremely trivial matters. I think that sort of treatment invites rebellion in the future, the kind that probably is far more potentially self-destructive for Caleb than it needs to be. Or he'll be a zealot and one day make videos like this for his own children...

  I just visited my JW mom recently, and it seems she'd gotten into that Sparlock sort of mode in putting all her 'bad' movies and games in a box and getting them out of the house. Not sure she'll throw them away, but could be the convention will move her to do just that. So even though Sparlock will not even remotely be noticed by JWs as it has been by us, what was done to Caleb is really being done to adult JWs as well.

  I think Caleb's mom represents the Society and Caleb is any JW, and it's the same sort of manipulation that happens from "the spiritual mother". There have been pictures in recent WT magazines of teens or young adults throwing out their music or movies for the same reasons given to Caleb.

  My expectation for my own home is that it'll be yet another movie to put on the TV as the kids play around and maybe look at the nice colors but don't really notice anything meaningful about it. They're not old enough for this scenario to happen yet, so...like many other kids who see this, it's going to become old news in a short while like most other WT-produced stuff. Who knows? Might even show up in a few months on a Service Meeting part, but that'll be about it.

  --sd-7
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  Twitch

  A thoughtful and well written opening post.