LOL...Hey Poztate,
YES...Without a doubt..It is true. Remember the claim is a LIFETIME of reading the Awake is equivalent to a college education.
I was actually thinking of addressing that but then forgot when I wrote the post. I was thinking the same thing as you - that maybe a LIFETIME of Awakes might be able to match four years in college.
Actually, though, now that I've given more thought to it, I really do think that even a thousand years reading the Awake could never come close to a college education. Even if we grant that the Awake has totally unbiased reporting on a complete range of topics (which we know is not true), their articles can never build on one another. You never get to All About the Cheetah -- Part 2. It would be like reading the first couple pages of every book in the library. You'd know a tiny amount about a lot of subjects. But that's not meaningful knowledge. That's trivia.
College is all about learning and thoroughly understanding a subject. Awake is about giving you two or three pages of facts and trivia and then tying it in to the New System somehow. I just can't believe there was a time I bought into it.
And it's amazing how strongly the anti-college propaganda works. I was talking to my cousin, who is kind of on the fence about what to do with the Witnesses, and he seemed interested in studying Math and Computer Science. I encouraged him to go for it. But he started talking about how professors just rant about their own opinions, and they're not really interested in the students, and so on and so forth. I was shocked - I mean, here's a guy who has never even been to college, and somehow he has all these opinions.
So for any JW lurkers out there, let me tell you, college is a tremendously powerful educational experience. It is nothing like what the Witnesses describe. Go down to your local community college, sign up for a course or two, and check it out. Education is one of the best things you can do for yourself.
SNG
