Need help with Watchtower quotes from the Guardian

by jerome 14 Replies latest watchtower scandals

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  dungbeetle

  LOL @ TOH
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  stephen Bates

  Thank you for your interest in the Guardian newspaper, of which I am the current religious affairs correspondent. I wrote the articles about the Watchtower and the UN in the newspaper late last year.
  I don't know of any "history" between the Jehovah's Witnesses and the newspaper before then.
  The Guardian is a British national daily newspaper which has daily sales of about 400,000 and a readership of approximately one million. It was founded in 1821 in Manchester to campaign for Parliamentary reform and it has remained on the moderate left of British politics ever since, though it is not aligned to any political party. I do not know what is meant by apostate in this context (apostate from what?) but although the Guardian was founded by non-conformists, it is now thoroughly secular and ecumenical in its approach to religion.
  The old hippie should be aware that, although the paper was originally the Manchester Guardian it dropped the place name from its title about 40 years ago when the paper's main operations moved from Manchester to London.
  The Guardian Weekly is a digest of articles from the newspaper (and the French newspaper Le Monde and the Washington Post) which is published from London mainly for overseas subscribers. The company also publishes the Observer, which is a separate operation and is a long-standing British Sunday newspaper (sales about 450,000 weekly).
  From experience, any quotations used by the Watch Tower's publications should be treated with caution since they are often taken out of context, may have appeared many years ago and may even be distorted through selective or partial quotation. They may also be taken from articles by contributors who do not necessarily represent the newspaper's editorial line (we publish a wide range of political and other views and so could very easily be carrying articles by Yasser Arafat and Benjamin Netanyahu - not natural bedfellows or likely to express a uniformity of views...) And, of course, the use and interpretation made of such quotations by the Watch Tower's publications may not bear any resemblance to the context in which they were written.
  I wrote to the Watch Tower's public relations director earlier this year asking whether the organisation was preparing to credit the Guardian or make payment for its use of our copyrighted material but strangely have received no reply from the organisation for its filching....
  Interestingly, however, the Watch Tower seems to have been quoting more regularly and with apparent approval from the Guardian in recent months since the UN articles appeared. I cannot quite understand the logic of this but it clearly means that we are regarded as a newspaper of veracity, merit and serious purpose, worthy of quotation, so this may reassure any members in good standing who see the UN articles.

  Best wishes,

  Stephen Bates
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  Englishman

  Interestingly, however, the Watch Tower seems to have been quoting more regularly and with apparent approval from the Guardian in recent months since the UN articles appeared. I cannot quite understand the logic of this but it clearly means that we are regarded as a newspaper of veracity, merit and serious purpose, worthy of quotation, so this may reassure any members in good standing who see the UN articles

  I think, Stephen, that they are just creeping in an attempt to curry favour with the Guardian in the vain hope that you will be told to leave 'em alone!

  Englishman.
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  stephen Bates

  Maybe you're right, Englishman, but, as you know, that's not how newspapers such as the Guardian work. No one here is going to tell me to lay off the Watch Tower if I think there is a story worth telling....

  Steve Bates
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  Gozz

  The April 22, 2002 Awake! Issue has the following:

  Page 6, Paragraph 3: Regarding the decline in believers in Britain, the newspaer The Guardian says: "Christianity has never looked worse shape."

  Page 6, Paragraph 8: The Guardian makes the following observation: "The Roman Catholic church had a deplorable record of colluding with fascism throughout the 20th century, form the congratulations it bestowed on General Franco after the Spanish civil war, to its recent efforts on behalf of General Pinochet". The Guardian also noted that Pope Pius XII, the wartime pontiff, "was happy enough to come to an arrangement with [Hitler] and steer clear of potential embarrassments like denoucing the Holocaust."

  Page 11 Paragraph 3: Many have complained, as The Guardian noted, that "priests are more interested nowadays in raising money than in pastoral visits."