Was the Economic Collapse of 2008 and the obvious Money Grab by the Organization a Coincidence?

by My Name is of No Consequence 8 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  My Name is of No Consequence

  Let me start off by saying that the Org has always been trying to get money. But is it a coincidence that they have been so in-your-face about it since 2008? In 2008, most of the world experienced an economic drop-off that it has not witnessed since the 1930’s and is still struggling to recover from.

  Since then, there have been so many changes with the Org. Many of which were implemented after 2008 and I think that they can all be tied back to money. I don’t believe that this was a coincidence. I think that that the Org has lost a lot of money with bad investments in hedge funds and are now scrambling to make it up. Add to that the numerous abuse lawsuits that the Org continues to deal with and it is not that far of a stretch to think that the Org sustained massive losses during the Economic Collapse of 2008.

  I guess the biggest question would be is: If the Economic Collapse of 2008 did not happen, would all of these changes have occurred?

  I look forward to reading your posts!
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  JeffT

  There isn't any way to know for sure, but I suspect not. I think the big factor was the loss of income from magazine sales. Up until 1990 magazine sales were what we business people refer to as a "cash cow." They were selling millions of dollars worth of magazines a month, there was no downside, publishers paid for the mags whether they went to the public or not. With a supreme court decision that year, those sales would be taxable. Rather than pay taxes on the sales the WTBS decided collect a "donation" instead. Income plummeted.

  IMNSHO what we're seeing now is an effort to replace that lost income. Also my opinion - they should have just paid the taxes, they could get some MS to do the paperwork for free, and they would have kept the income stream.
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  My Name is of No Consequence

  @ JeffT:

  That is a good point about the literature. My only counterpoint to that would be that they haven't charged for literature since the early 1990's like you mentioned. If that was the main reason for the recent money grab, then shouldn't it have happened way before 2008?
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  aintenoughwiskey

  I think it's a number of factors that all play into it. I have a couple. One is that closing the wallet or purse is the only passive aggressive option available to joe publisher. They are continuously, whipped, and embarrassed. The ones who want a decent living wage and pursue some wage skills are treated like crap and called greedy. The contempt for the publisher comes through loud and clear, and they are voting with their wallets.

  I would say the the other is a general downturn in the economy, coupled with the fact that only growth is in poorer nations. The Watchtower Inc. is like a financial mushroom about to collapse under it's own weight. Hence the begging.
  
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  Vidiot

  I'm not a big believer in coincidence, so I say no.
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  nelim

  I'm not sure whether all of the changes are necessarily related to money. Maybe some of the older GB members died and a "new generation" have a slightly different vision? I mean the FDS = GB thing, the prominent JW website and logo, the TV broadcast stream, dropping the anti-types etc; they seem to want to attract more attention to themselves. Perhaps without the downturn this also would have happened? To me it points more towards trying to make JWs proud of themselves and of the org... so that they won't leave as quickly.
  
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  JeffT

  If that was the main reason for the recent money grab, then shouldn't it have happened way before 2008?

  Again, I don't think so. The GB are hide-bound in how they do things. It would have taken some time for them to even notice that flogging people for donations wasn't working, then formulate a response to the problem, then implement the response. And, I don't see how what happened in 2008 would have led them to doing what they're doing now.
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  Crazyguy

  The down turn caused thier investments to go in the toilet, donations by the members have slowed big time. The tax man of many nations desperate for revenue is and has started changing the rules he can get more from people including non prophets like the borg. The Borg is desperate that's why they sold off most of new York. Now they may of Stade off disaster but thier obviously changing so their solvent in the future.
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  WTWizard

  I hope they have fun trying to steal ice cream money from children. I wonder if they are going to start ruling that letting your children have ice cream instead of donating the money to the Worldwide Damnation Fund is stealing, and treat it accordingly. And, if ice cream is now "stealing", those lattes are not safe either.

  Have fun trying to maintain the illusion of 8 million (out of which maybe 6 million are either fake or do not belong there) once they get too grabby. Take their ice cream away--and often that is the only thing that remotely resembles fun that children ever have. I hope they don't get anything at all after that stunt--and all the worse when the dollar finally becomes toilet paper.