Why would they want to shed publishers?
They are more likely to hide the money and try to increase the money flow into the organization.
What Would It Take To Prove......
by metatron 33 Replies latest jw friends
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JeffT
I had not thought of this aspect of what they're doing before. However, for a couple of years I've thought they were not very interested in new recruits. Sure, they're still doing field service of some sort; but the material they are presenting does not appear to be serious about attracting new members. I've been reviewing available assembly programs and most of that is aimed at internal issues, not the public. In fact most of it would send anybody with the brains God gave gravel running away screaming.
As noted above, the real wealth of the WTBS resides in its real estate. If they can push out a bunch of the "weaker" R&F concentrate the hard core in fewer Halls and sell the rest, the stand to make a pile of money.
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BackseatDevil
You might take into account the modus operandi of the organization up until this point. Something happens. After it happens, the organization assigns some importance to this.
Here are two things to consider:
ONE:
It has been a LONG standing problem of keeping people IN the organization. This was a problem 20 years ago. If you ever wandered how they can boast so many millions of new baptisms, but only increase in size by 4-600,000? That's because so many publishers fade, leave, or get disfellowshipped (numbers NOT included in the yearbook... ever).
To counteract this trend, there were a series of talks about 'half the JWs are in the organization to test the other half' and 'those inactive will not survive armageddon' etc., etc. Of course this didn't work.
So, you might be SOMEWHAT right, but I don't think it's a purposeful shift. I think it's one they are forced to make, but they are going back and making it LOOK as if it's a purposeful shift.
TWO:
The WTBTS is a PUBLISHING company. So think of the recent trends in publishing companies, newspapers, etc. Printing has never been faster, easier, or cheaper. Print on Demand books are made for cents a copy and they flood sites like Amazon.com. Everyone (including myself) gets their news from online, New York Times App, CNN.com, or if I'm on my period The Huffington Post. NOTHING is printed anymore.
So if one is predominately a printing company, of course you're going to invenst in machines that can spit out several million copies of a book and deliver them in under a week. Fact is, it doesn't take 8 people on three machines to print a book anymore... it takes 3 people and 1 machine. BUT, no one is reading print anymore. I'm sure if the JWs hadn't developed this sick form of literature dependency, they probably would have downsized with everyone else after the economy crashed.
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Crazyguy
The org is not trying to get rid of anyone, they just want to to be loyal to them. They know most are stupid and not thinkers. If they really wanted to bleed off those not loyal they could just remove shunning and many would quit.
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Vidiot
sir82 - "But it seems that their actions toward the rank & file are an attempt to make things at least superficially easier, as though they are desperately trying to hang on to as many as possible."
You'd think so, at first.
It has been documented, however, that making one's membership in a particular group more difficult seems - almost paradoxically - to inspire more staunch devotion and loyalty to the group rather than less. It's not too hard to understand why; the member who's done considerably more than the bare minimum for the group is often therefore more inclined to keep doubling down in the hopes of seeing a "return on his investment".
Now, I won't deny that the unquestionably shallow changes they've implemented (and are still implementing) have made it superficially easier for R&F loyalists (perhaps they're subconsciously regarding the easing-up of activities as a reward for their loyalty), but I would argue that these very same changes are also giving the fence-sitters and conscious-classers more and more subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) reasons to head for the door, particularly because (to varying degrees and for varous reasons) they're already inclined to do so.***
Think about it a second; which situation is harder to leave? One in which you've invested a significant amount of time, personal sacrifice, and commitment, or one that you have not?
Not to mention that hard-core JW loyalists these days are considerably soft compared to those from the WTS's "golden age"; they stay in more out of fear than anything else, whilst I suspect that "lukewarms", fence-sitters, and conscious-classers feel far less afraid of the WT heirarchy than the former, therefore feel far less afraid of leaving.
x
***Just as one example; it seems to be emulating "Christendom" more and more, so where's the special incentive for a casual member to stay?
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OneEyedJoe
There's also a lot of added liability of having a bunch of folks who are only 50% in. The fence-sitters are the ones who end up filing lawsuits when their kids get molested, the faithful "wait on jehovah." The fence-sitters file lawsuits when the org steals their congregation (menlo park) but the faithful will just go along with it. The fence-sitters don't donate much and demoralize the faithful who do. The fence-sitters show the faithful that maybe they can be happy without throwing themselves fully into the cult.
There is definitely a case that could be made for shedding the fence-sitters and getting down to a fiercly loyal base. It might be that they'd actually have more money if they drop the fence-sitters and push the loyalists to donate more, once you consider that they'd likely be able to avoid a lot of lawsuits if they've only got the super-loyal in the ranks. Even if that's not the case, it's seems pretty certain that they'd have a better percentage margin than they do now without the fence-sitters.
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Vidiot
OneEyedJoe - "There's also a lot of added liability of having a bunch of folks who are only 50% in. The fence-sitters are the ones who end up filing lawsuits when their kids get molested, the faithful "wait on jehovah." The fence-sitters file lawsuits when the org steals their congregation (menlo park) but the faithful will just go along with it. The fence-sitters don't donate much and demoralize the faithful who do. The fence-sitters show the faithful that maybe they can be happy without throwing themselves fully into the cult."
Good catch, I hadn't thought of that.
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Vidiot
Crazyguy - "If they really wanted to bleed off those not loyal they could just remove shunning and many would quit."
If the WTS implemented drastic reforms like that, they'd run too high a risk of experiencing an AOG-style fragmentation and mass exodus that they'd never really recover from.
However, managing the exodus by introducing incremental changes that make it easier to be a hard-core loyalist whilst subtly giving the "lukewarms" less and less inclination to stay (and thusly more and more inclination to go) is far more likely to end up with something salvageable.
Remember, the WTS's top prioroty and primary goal over all others is its own survival.
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Vidiot
KateWild - "...they very well might be reducing numbers and DFing more easily and making the RI process more difficult. IMO personally I think it's because there are too many relishing in the power of being an elder..."
Has it occurred to you that having elders who relish that power and act accordingly would, as a natural outcome, end up serving an overarching goal to reduce overall numbers?
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sir82
However, managing the exodus by introducing incremental changes that make it easier to be a hard-core loyalist whilst subtly giving the "lukewarms" less and less inclination to stay (and thusly more and more inclination to go) is far more likely to end up with something salvageable.
Which takes us back to the OP.
How can you tell the difference between organizational incompetence vs. a well-planned strategy to merely appear to be stupid, to cull the weak?