Most of us went back to Bethel, thinking we wanted to make it our life long career, what better place to be right before 1975, when god was coming back to kick some ass? That dream ended for the vast majority after just few months there, when they found out that something was very wrong. Otherwise why would anyone want to leave a spiritual paradise? With only 2-5% staying after their 4 year commitment, and a very big percentage leaving before their time was even up. The average stay there in 1974 was only about 5 months. It was not a happy place, they were leaving in droves.
Getting a girlfriend and having sex, was looking better all the time. Hey! The Governing Body were doing it, all the bethel, the "heavies" were doing it. ....we wanted it too. Just why do you think Knorr got married? Did he get married for companionship? NO! There are over 1,500 "brothers" back there he could have that with them. He could do things with them ,sit around and talk about the bible.......or go to a movie .......there were plenty of "brown noses" for that.............Did he get married to have children?.....NO!.........it is forbidden to have children at bethel .......................Did he get married to be with that one person forever? No! He was going to Heaven and she wasn't. So why did he get married? It sure looks like good old....... S.E.X.......to me. Hey, even Germans like sex too.
So he and his buddies were able to enjoy that privilege. I say privilege, because not everyone was permitted to have it. Knorr came up with the rule (After he got married) that if you want to get married and stay at Bethel, you needed a total of 14 YEARS of full time service. So you were forbidden to get married for any reason for 4 years period, NO matter what, add another 10 years if you wanted to stay..........I didn't say FORBIDDEN did I? Opppsss, I guess I did. But the BIBLE says that only those that have "fallen away from the faith, would be FORBIDDING others to marry!" 1 Timothy 4:1-3..............so that can't be right.......Oppppss...I forgot the old double standard rule kicks in again, at this time! Another bethel Catch 22
They would say....... well you signed an agreement! Yes you’re 19 years old and you should have known what you were signing, right? Some would say. Well, you could always leave before your time. Yes, if you didn't mind the reproach and the shame and the punishment. Punishment for getting married? YES, the punishment for leaving before your time was up was, you could not pioneer for 6 months. So if you couldn’t pioneer you would lose your 4-D classification. That’s means in 1970 you would go back to a 1-A classification! S0 if you got called up, (The draft) guess what? You were going to jail!
There was NO! “Thank you, brother for the two years you did spend here.” There was “Bend over and get your prison uniform ready.”
So just why am I so upset about all of this. For one reason it caused plenty of hardship and heart ache. Plus all the unhappy marriages and all the unnecessary trips some poor souls had to make to the hookers on 8th Ave............and even DEATH to some ...as I will tell you about in my last chapter..........Come on guys....... Wouldn't you think, a LOVING organization would have peoples best interest at heart?...................as in "OH......Brother we are sorry to hear you are having a hard time here at Bethel..........and so you would like to leave?......GO, my friend and be in peace and may God be with you, and thank you for the time, you did spend here with us and of course, you can pioneer if you like"
But that sounds like something Jesus would say.
Oppssss ...........Did I say loving organization............Let me think.........Yes! I think it says somewhere in the Bible......."By their LOVE you would be able to recognize them"......boy isn't that true? There was no real love there. It started at the very top and worked its way down to the local KHs.
All the double standards......unwritten laws.......and bull shit.....it was just too much for most of us. I say most of us because, there are some there that LOVE that kind of bull shit and fit right it In. Yossairan said it in Catch 22..."Let the Bastards thrive!”
So most of us, we just wanted to find a little love and leave after out "tour of duty" was up. As the "brother" said.........."Just keep your mouth shut and do your job".........then get the hell out!
So, back to girlfriends and Bethelites...............As I mention, there was only one guy I knew, who had a girlfriend before he went to Bethel and "made his time" there, that was Roy Baty. Part of the reason for that, was she was only 15 years old when he went there, in 1970............So she was waiting for him and he was waiting for her….to grow up.
That was tough for guys like Roy with girl friends back home, because........you only got 2 weeks’ vacation a year, (you got no vacation your first year)............so you got a total of 6 weeks in 4 years..........many guys like myself, only got 4 weeks in 4 years. The reason being, Instead of taking our last two weeks’ vacation, we would just shorten our 4 year stay by two weeks. So I came on March 21, 1970............now, I could leave on March 7, 1974........The thought being, that any day NOT at Bethel........... WAS a vacation!
So that leaves us with our next group...........Guys that got girlfriends while they were at bethel. There were so many Bethelites in the New York City area that by the time you got there, anything decent was already "snapped up" years ago. Since many of the halls 10-20 bethelites in them, the competition was tough! With 60-70% of the halls being Black and Latino.........and 80% of the bethelites were white, the saying was "The longer you’re there.... the whiter they look." So it was a 14 year old white girl, or a good looking black sister....If you had a car the selection got a little better with upstate New York, Jersey or even New England. But for the vast majority it was the women from good old N.Y.C.
We saw it all too, every possible combination...... The 19 year old white guy from Iowa, getting married to the 36 year old, 250 lb. black sister with 2 teenagers 13 & 16, his step daughter was just 3 years younger than him! There were guys who got "caught in closets" with bethel housekeepers........Which was unusual because most of the sisters that were called to bethel, were beat with an ugly stick.
We joked about it and said that Knorr, once a month, would get all the applications of sisters, who wanted to cum at bethel (sorry, I meant come to bethel) He would get all the bethelites in the upper dining room and have a slide show. He would show a slide of some good looking pioneer sister from California and ask? How many of you guys want this sister to come to Bethel? The place would go crazy with noise..........he would throw the application away..................Next slide up was of some "Dog" from Iowa.....how many want this sister? You could hear a pin drop ......He would say.....call her in now..............I tell you that man was a genius.....he knew, what we were all about. For him good looking sisters just meant more problems.
I’ll had many sisters (even special pioneers) come up to me and ask me why they haven’t been called to bethel. I’d tell them. “You’re too attractive.” They thought I was kidding….nope!
There was a guy in the service dept. who ran off with DO wife..........There were married sisters who left their husbands for some single young bethel boy. You know all the stuff you would see in any Kingdom Hall.
Bethel tours were nice..............But most of time they were very sad.........You would see these great looking sisters go through on tour...............They would give you "the eye"...........You would give them "the eye"..........Then they would get on the bus and leave............No way to meet them.......Sometimes you would see them later that day in the Bethel home, hanging around with some "Nerd" from their home town........They might have asking the nerd "Don't you know any other Bethelites?” Sure they did but they were geeks too.
Sometimes it worked out great. I saw the love of my life. The lady I would marry, standing in front of the "ink room" in the summer of 1972 on a bethel tour!
More about love and sex at the big house tomorrow.
From anecdotal evidence, the vast majority of JWs were clearly having way more sex than I was.