Posts by OneEyedJoe

62

November 8th Special Meeting

by Chris Tann in

jw
friends

anyone have any leaks on this three hour meeting we are having early november?.

.

OneEyedJoe

BTW have there been any regional conventions so far, with "regional" on the schedules and references in the BOEs?

This summer's conventions had regional convention on the program.

They just announced last night that the meeting will be 3 hours long and will be live streamed to the KH at 3 pm saturday. It will include a WT summary. There will be no sunday meeting.

When our PO/COBE/whatever did the announcement last night, he said that it would be an "update on our preaching activities." I'm not sure if that was in the letter, because he seemed to be riffing a bit at that point, but maybe this could be the change to the ministry that everyone's been passing around roumors about? Most likely, I'd bet they'll just take a bunch of meaningless statistics and use it to try to assert that 'we have the truth' and 'certainly we can see jehovah's blessing' etc. etc.

I'll probably hang out in the back and play angry birds on my tablet. The only upside to all this is that I can be sure that my wife won't try to make me go out in service that morning. 1 cult activity a day is usually plenty for her, so in the end I'll get out of 2 hours of service (and all the associated driving/prep time) and the sunday meeting, so I'll actually end up with more time this weekend than otherwise, assuming I would've gone out.

300

ALERT: NEW LAWSUIT settlement - $13 MILLION

by Watchtower-Free in

http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/135m-awarded-to-bible-teacher-gonzalo-campos-alleged-abuse-victim-jose-lopez-281031832.html.

(published thursday, oct 30, 2014).

thursday, oct 30, 2014 updated at 11:58 pm pdt.

OneEyedJoe

These settlement amounts in the millions is this a USA court thing? I know of some cases in Canada, but they are not in the millions of dollars. Does anyone know of any case in Canada that was awarded this sum?

Yeah, us 'mericans! love to litigate. And it's not worth no one's time unless someone gets a couple mil'

Normally I'm pretty disgusted at the size of the settlements/rulings awarded to people (a great example is when someone was awarded millions because they spilled McDonald's coffee on themselves) but in this case I'm OK with it.

Bleed 'em dry. Death by a thousand cuts.

300

ALERT: NEW LAWSUIT settlement - $13 MILLION

by Watchtower-Free in

http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/135m-awarded-to-bible-teacher-gonzalo-campos-alleged-abuse-victim-jose-lopez-281031832.html.

(published thursday, oct 30, 2014).

thursday, oct 30, 2014 updated at 11:58 pm pdt.

OneEyedJoe

Yeah, from a logical standpoint it makes perfect sense to change policy to get rid of the 2-witness rule in cases of sexual abuse. I think the issue is that they've worked so hard to make their stance seem biblical, they're digging in their heels because capitualiting now would be to admit that the bible isn't the best standard for justice. Also, from a short-term perspective, it's in their best intrests to conceal the pedophiles in their ranks, as their exposure would have been damaging to the donations coming in from the congregations that were affected. It's coming back to bite them in the ass now, though. When you think that you're backed by the almighty himself, you tend not to capitulate to external pressures as easily.

I have a feeling this lawsuit won't stand if their statement that they were unable to be present to defend themselves is true. There will be a number of appeals, but hopefully in the end they just end up paying more.

Actually, notice the suble use of "Jehovah's Witnesses" in the statement. They are the WatchTower Bible and Tract Society - but they try to shift the focus onto their believers instead of their legally registered and legally responsible corporation.

Maybe they do have a little conscience after all. They can't bring themselves to lie and say that the WTBTS abhors child abuse, since that's definitely not true.

14

Do you have hope for mankind?

by noontide in

jw
friends

let me start off by acknowledging that my current mood/thoughts reflect the fact that ive watched a few documentaries recently (blackfish, surviving progress, etc.

) and they got me thinking about the future of mankind.

mainly the question, do i hold out hope for the future of mankind?.

OneEyedJoe

Every generation thinks the prior generation is hopelessly old fashioned and the next generation are stupid and doomed. I suspect things will keep getting better for a good while.

43

Apostate with the HIGHEST ENTERTAINMENT VALUE has to be this lady

by Terry in

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swgzcvh3rns&feature=youtu.be.

she is magnificent!

katie kitten.

OneEyedJoe

She's pretty good. And she nailed it with her prediction of a campaign to tell people to go to their website!

59

Does The State Have The Right To Quarantine Someone Because They Might Have Ebola?

by minimus in

jw
friends

no doubt you have heard about the nurse that thumbed her nose to the state and went out of the house in spite of being ordered to stay at home.

what is your opinion on this?.

.

OneEyedJoe

Did she have any symptoms? But wasn't she tested and no Ebola was found in her blood? Is this approach medical or scientific? Do only people in those countries have Ebola?

My understanding (I could be wrong) was that she had a fever (as measured from her forehead) upon arriving in the US, but the fever was likely because she was flushed and angry at the time it was taken, a later measurement of her internal temperature showed no fever. She's continued to be asymptomatic, with multiple blood tests showing no ebola.

To me, this mostly seems like a political move, and a poorly thought out one, at that. I do believe that the government should have the ability to forcibly impose quarantine, but I don't think this one was done properly.

32

Recent Update - Service Report

by Da.Furious in

on oct. 22, eight brothers were released from prison in turkmenistan by presidential amnesty.

(see 2014 yearbook, p. 31) the ninth brother is still imprisoned, but it is hoped that he will be released shortly.

some were already in prison for three or more years and had been severely mistreated.

OneEyedJoe

the area I am at the # of witnesses appears to be shrinking.

Same here.

When I was a kid (lived in the same area) there would be a congregation splitting every couple years, and constant complaints about how full the KHs where (in some cases there would be 7 congregations to a double auditorium KH while they waited for a new one to be built). There was apparently huge growth in the area all through the 90s and early 2000s. A lot of the growth was just due to the growth of the city in general, but there where probably 3-6 baptized in my congregation at every convention and 1-2 for every assembly. Now, I can't remember the last time we've had a congregation split. The KH that used to never have less than 6 congregations in it now has 4. There hasn't been anyone baptized in our congregation in years, and the last assembly with over 1000 in attendence saw 3 born-ins baptized.

They may be growing, but it's not here, and if they're growing in any developed coutries, it's not by more than 1% annually and poised to start declining.

59

My Relief

by Smart in

what a massive relief!

thank god i have just found this site the other day!

i don't know where to begin!

OneEyedJoe

It's interesting reading the experience of a more recent convert, as I was born into the cult myself. A lot of the stranger things (you need to wear a suit, you need to report your time, etc) just seem normal when it's been that way your entire life.

They love-bombed you until you were locked in (baptized) at which point they switch and just saddle you with as much "priveledge" as they can. I'd echo the sentiments of others here, if you have no family in the cult, just stop going. They only have power over you if you give it to them. Personally, if my wife wasn't so indoctrinated, I'd dissassociate myself just to shock the congregation...in your case, though, everyone would probably assume that you relapsed and were disfellowshiped and no one would think anything of it. Just stop going, and if any non-elders call, maybe share a little TTATT (the truth about the truth) with 'em.

It's so remarkable to me that everyone's journey out of the cult is so different. For me, it was entirely problems with the doctrine, but for others it's issues with pedophiles, injustice in the congregation, or the importance of status to having any social circle, or like you expressed, the clear lack of personal concern for you until they decide that they need to push you to "confess" something.

Be grateful that you saw the cult for what it was so quickly. Many get married to a JW, or employed by one, and end up trapped for the sake of those relationships. Regardless of that, though, it's definitely a mindf*** waking up to the reality of the cult. I encourage you to seek out your family and true friends outside of the cult and get their support ask you remove yourself. Humans are social beings and huge changes to our social structure can be tramatic, so be prepared. I wish you the best of luck with your exit and continued sobriety.

32

Recent Update - Service Report

by Da.Furious in

on oct. 22, eight brothers were released from prison in turkmenistan by presidential amnesty.

(see 2014 yearbook, p. 31) the ninth brother is still imprisoned, but it is hoped that he will be released shortly.

some were already in prison for three or more years and had been severely mistreated.

OneEyedJoe

I'm going to guess that in reality out of every 10 baptisms, perhaps 1 is a result of someone actually knocking on the door. All the others are kids, family, friends, co-workers or current witnesses.

I suspect you're pretty close. Of course any time there's a talk on informal witnessing (or whatever the hell they're calling it now...) they'll always end with "of course the door-to-door work will always remain our primary method blah blah blah"

It's pretty clear that the door-to-door work is just about keeping people busy.

18

their beliefs and practice's don't tally- tonights book study

by purrpurr in

tonights book study in part is about jesus throwing out the merchants and money lenders in the temple... how do they manage to tally that up with asking for funds for all their various projects?

it seems hardly a meeting goes by without some kind of money plea?

don't they realise that they are doing the same thing that jesus got so angry about and threw out of the temple?

OneEyedJoe

I'm ok with the money part as they can't force us to give. The part which got to me was paragraph 8 onwards about man-made rules

Particularly the part about how the religious leaders of the day demonized non-jews and encouraged predjudice against them. I was sitting there thinking "is anyone else hearing/reading this?" How is the frequent encouragement to limit your association with non-JWs (often followed with condemnation of their acceptance of homosexuality, casual dating, premarital sex, etc) any different from this?