Ah, good old YouKnow, such a reliable source of Apologist Dub Contortionism!
Hardly anyone has an honest opinion about anything of importance that wasn’t craftily pre-packaged and handed to them by someone else whose job it is to craft public opinion.
Wouldn't the Watchtower be exactly that thing you are talking about? They sure know how to craftily pre-package information!
The intention of the media is to present the illusion of impartially informing, all the while pandering to prejudice and ignorance in order to persuade to a particular point of view.
Ignorance? Define ignorance.
Dateline’s presentation of the Watchtower’s child abuse issue was a case study in the black art of media propaganda.
LOL
From the very beginning of the presentation Dateline was intent on giving the public a negative impression of Jehovah’s Witnesses by portraying us all as oddball crackpots whose religion revolves around the doctrine that we don’t celebrate birthdays and that all non-believers are possessed by the Devil and that we want them all to die.
Dude, I was a Dub for 15 years, and barring a few other doctrinal oddities, that is indeed what Jehovah's Witnesses are all about. Deal with it.
If the programmers had wanted to they could have, for example, highlighted the fact that Jehovah’s Witnesses are known throughout the world for our peculiar beliefs that war and killing are wrong and that thousands of Jehovah’s Witnesses have gone to prison rather than violate the law of Christ.
Many other religions also have similiar views and their members have gone to jail for similiar things too. How does that make the Dubs special? And by the by, they are not violating the law of Christ - Christ's only commandments to us were these two: 1) Love God, and 2) Love your neighbour. That's it.
Obviously, the media mind-control apparatus had no interest in presenting the viewers with an accurate picture of Jehovah’s Witnesses.
And what exactly would an "accurate" picture look like? You've gotta take the good with the bad!
The most shocking and disgusting aspect of the Dateline program, in my opinion, was the airing of a snippet of a private conversation that was recorded without the victim’s knowledge.
The things the Tower have done to preserve their image make this little thing look decidedly unimportant.
Such underhanded smear tactics should be offensive to all people.
Yes, and so should requiring two witnesses to convict someone in the Congregation of molestation. DING DONG, anybody home?
The government, for instance, has to get a court order to tap into private phone conversations of suspected criminals, because in a nation that ostensibly values personal freedoms it is generally recognized that people should have the freedom not to have their private conversations taped without their knowledge and played back in order to vilify or entrap them.
If you've got nothing to hide...
Not only did Bill Bowen reveal himself to be the lowest sort of slithering weasel who was willing to violate all accepted standards of ethical behavior in that regard, when he used his position as a trusted elder calling Bethel about a confidential case in order to gather damning information, the Dateline producers were all too willing to abuse their power by crossing that boundary as well.
So which was worse, him gathering damning information, or the damning information?
Probably the most significant aspect of the Dateline program is the influence of apostates upon the production.
Well, all these people were in good standing when the program was made, and only now are some of them being disfellowshipped. Therefore this is a blatant lie. How unbecoming of you, YouKnow. You are more intelligent than this, man!
The Armageddon illustration from the Watchtower’s brochure of horrified people falling into a crevice was obviously supplied to the Dateline producers by apostate JWs in order to inflame public opinion.
As opposed to it being supplied to them by people who come to their doors on Saturday morning? This isn't exactly something the Watchtower hides from people!
And the absurd spin on disfellowshipping was absolutely ridiculous.
Disfellowshipping people for speaking up about abuse is even more ridiculous!
First, the show presents disfellowshipping as a fate worse than death in order to outrage people that the abuse victim was disfellowshipped.
Technically, for a Dub, disfellowshipping is worse than death.
But, later, the program admits that child abusers were kicked out also, but that they were later welcomed back. “How dare they extend mercy!”
Only some, my friend, only some. Usually, depending on their pull in the Congregation and how many "witnesses" there were to the act, they don't even GET disfellowshipped. Hello?
So, as apostates are prone to do, both sides of the issue are used in an accusation, whereby disfellowshipping is portrayed as an atrocity, and not disfelowshipping or reinstatement is also presented as an outrage. It’s a classic apostate technique that is constantly demonstrated in this forum.
Yeah, as well as that other classic apostate technique, the uncovering of the real truth.
The greatest disservice of Dateline propaganda is the way viewers were left with the suggestion that the next time Jehovah’s Witnesses knock on their door that one of them is probably there to rape their child.
This was not the impression I got. Last time I checked, all the victims were ALREADY JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES! That, I felt, was pretty clear.
Unquestionably, the Watchtower has a child abuse problem.
I agree fully.
No doubt the Society wishes it had handled things differently.
Couldn't have said it better myself. The greatest enemy of the Watchtower is the Watchtower!
But, the most outrageous aspect of the Dateline production was that the child abuse victims were shamelessly victimized again by those whose obvious intent is to exploit their unfortunate situation in order to persuade the public not to listen to our message the next time we call.
And what a message it is! "Join us or you will die! And we'll begin telling you what you can and can't read, watch on TV, and listen to! Become one of us today, our tailored mind-control programs will ensure you lead a spectacularly depressing and boring life selling literature for a publishing company and believing you're going to Paradise just like those terrorists who took out the WTC!"
What a fine message indeed!
"Vaccination has never saved a human life. It does not prevent smallpox." The Golden Age, Feb 4 1931 p. 293-4 - The Sacredness of Human Blood (Reasons why vaccination is unscriptural)
