I found this kinda interesting. It's not a news article, but an experience from a non-JW
#24.
Exodus 8:2 (Or; The Beast Shall Reveal Itself, And He Shall Be Norman Lear)I came home last Friday afternoon to find a man waiting on my doorstep.
"Hello," he said. Instantly, I went on my guard.
He was about fifty, with a face like a drunken bloodhound, red and droopy. Well-dressed, wearing a classy suede trench coat and Jaguar-driving brown leather gloves, he smiled his droopy, red smile at me. "Are you Benny?" he asked, referring to my brother.
Hesitantly, but slightly curious, I went inside and hollered for my brother. When I explained the situation, my brother also got concerned, because when you're seventeen, well-dressed men asking for you by name at the door can mean a lot of things (high-school principals, teachers, police, tax collectors, truant officers, homosexual love partners, etc.) but precious few of them are good.
He steps out into the bitter cold, and they engage in a conversation. The man smiles and talks and talks, and my brother gets an odd look on his face and makes a lot of non-word noises, like hmmm and errr and uhhh, trying to look thoughtful but failing miserably. He just looked put-out.
I spied through the glass (yes, I spied) and saw the man reach into a black leather briefcase. He passed some pamphlets over to my brother, who began to peruse them bemusedly.
At this point, I got it.
Giggling, I called for my brother's girlfriend, who was upstairs. I regaled her with a story from a few months' ago: a pair of Jehovah's Witnesses had wandered into the neighborhood, prowling around. Our old neighborhood was a magnet for such canvassing, and when we moved, apparently they followed us. Go figure.
My brother got 'the call' one day, and instead of shooing them away like most people do, he had a twenty-minute conversation with them, simply to humor them politely, eagerly accepting all the reading material thrust into his hands.
He thought it was funny to lead them on, of course, having no real interest in even entertaining the thought of joining up with such a sect. But, it would be rude to turn them away without pretending, if for a moment, that they captured his interest; and figured if he laughed about it after, no real harm was done.
Those with some life experience have already pieced the rest of the tale together, no doubt. For those of you playing catch-up, get out your mitt.
My brother's woman and I laughed our ass off as my brother, out in the cold, dealt with the bloodhound in the cow suit. When he came back inside, he got incredibly angry with me. Turns out he could hear our laughing quite clearly outside. Which means the Jehovah's Witness callback guy could too. My brother was furious for embarrassing him so, and promptly threw his copy of The Watchtower on the ground in anger.
Wait, hold on," I said. "Do you have any interest whatsoever in becoming a Jehovah's Witness?"
"No, of course not!" he responded angrily.
"Then I don't care."
And I don't. Can I help it if I find Jehovah's Witnesses funny? They're just so darn obtrusive. Not merely content with flagrant billboard ads, television spots and strange late-night AM radio programs like most religious denominations, they actually invade the sanctity of your home to push their spiritual wares on you.
You've got to admire that kind of tenacity. Or at least mock it.
(On a related note, a quick Yahoo search brings up more anti-Jehovah's Witnesses web pages than pro ones. Clearly, I am not the only one who thinks this way.)
The bloodhound just looked so sober, as if he felt weighted down by the arduous task of doing God's work of converting the non-devout. I felt sorry for the guy, really I did. People should have joy in their work and lighten up once in a while. People take religion way too seriously.
I used to date a girl who was a very practicing Christian, and many a theological conversation ended up with red cheeks and stomping feet and huffy faces and me not getting any. People get very uptight when their religion has the spotlight thrown upon it, almost like God himself reaches down with a giant hand and tightens everyone's sphincters so violently he threads the screws.
One is only allowed to argue theology if they adamantly play the role of the sinner and the heathen, and start the conversation from a losing perspective.
Not that that bothers me any. I'm not particularly devout. I'm just really interested.
It's this lack of humor that really turns me off in the end though. If you believe so vehemently in something, shouldn't you be able to laugh about it once in a while? Sure, I feel bad for having the bloodhound hear me laugh, but I wasn't laughing AT him. There's a difference, and I stand by it. He was a good guy, in a bloodhound sort of way. And he was only doing his job.
But, for all the bloodhounds out there that are considering paying me a visit, I am quite comfortable with my concept of the universe and my sense of spirituality. I don't seek salvation, I've got plenty of thought-provoking reading material and I've found everyone I need to find at this point in my life. It's just not my bag.
Does this inflated sense of self-satisfaction with my lot in life give me the right to mock organized religion? For the moment, let us assume it does, because otherwise I've got nothing to write about.
Also, I am slightly irritated, because now our house is on THE LIST, and to my knowledge, once you're on, you're on for all eternity. Now, they won't ever stop coming. My poor sweet innocent brother has condemned countless generations of our bloodline to the deadly curse of an unending stream of Jehovah's Witnesses, selling salvation for the stupid; i.e.. my brother.
As if salvation is something that can be sold on your doorstep. In my mind, this ideology is nothing more than the antithesis of our pseudo-American culture; spirituality delivered fresh to your door in thirty minutes or free. It's our fault such people exist, because it's our society, and we're responsible for its creations - good and bad. Not that Jehovah's Witnesses are overtly bad thing, or that I have beefs with this particular sect, or the Jehovah's Witnesses are any more insane than anyone else in this cock-eyed world today; just that the method of delivery seems to lack the spiritual and moral OOMPH most people seem to yearn for when choosing a belief system.
Maybe we've just lost the ability to appreciate anything that takes longer than five to eight minutes on high.
It should also be mentioned that in an effort to be impartial, I took a look at my brother's copy of The Watchtower. I must admit, it did fill my heart with a sense of joy. It makes me feel better about my prospects for writing works of satirical fiction for a living.
Of course, I could be wrong. Maybe I'm just trying to absolve myself of guilt for making fun of God's door-to-door salesman on the odd chance that I'm wrong and God really does hate blood transfusions.