Posts by OneEyedJoe

2

Child sexual abuse and a loving God.

by Tenacious in

i'm having a hard time reconciling how such a loving and merciful god would require someone as innocent and helpless as a child or an adult for that matter, in order to properly establish a claim sexual abuse, having the need to produce another witness that actually witnessed the abuse.

how ludicrous is this?

how can the holy bible, the divine word of god, make a requirement such as this?

OneEyedJoe

I don't think the bible actually indicates that this rule applies to sexual abuse. If I remember correctly, it was more for cases of fraud. There is a rule in the bible (which has it's own problems) that if a woman is raped and no one is around, the man who raped her has to take her as his wife. This indicates that her word that the man raped her would be sufficient in this case.

Honestly, though, there are so many other problems with the bible that don't rely upon subjective interpretation to see. There are a hundred reasons that show it's not the word of god before you get to the (mis)handling of child abuse cases as a result of (mis)interpretation of certain vague scriptural rules.

22

How do you respond to JW family?

by Laika in

jw
friends

for those who have left and are still in contact with jw family, how do you usually respond when they bring up jw stuff, i.e.

start talking about the nearness of armageddon or things like that.. i usually say nothing and just let it pass but i'm considering changing tact to something more confrontational, less because i want to change their mind and more because i find it tiresome.

thoughts?

OneEyedJoe

Well I'm still in, but I think I'm in somewhat of a similar situation - I can't stand the constant JW talk. Depending on the topic being discussed I'll either ignore it entirely (sometimes I have to excuse myself to keep my sanity) or if I feel like I can say something to shut them down without it blowing back on me too much, I'll do it.

For example, the other day I was with some family and they were talking about my elderly grandfather and how he'll need to be put in a nursing home soon and someone brought up a recent WT study article (actually I think it was two in a row) about caring for the elderly and one said something like "Wasn't that such a great article!? It was so good because a lot of people just don't want to think about getting older so they don't prepare for it at all." I just said "I don't think it's that they don't want to think about it so much as it is that they've been told their entire lives that they would never get old." You shoulda seen how fast they changed the subject off the cult talk after that.

18

Definition of "Active Publisher" depends on the context

by Simon in

i don't know what the current definitive rule is that determines whether someone is viewed as an "active publisher" or not.

i've seen comments suggesting that it is reporting a certain minimum number of hours per month which seems reasonable.. what is interesting is how they change the definition of what an active publisher is based on the context.

normally, you are never doing enough, however much you are doing, and too little or some missed reporting will get you a talking to.. but note how they class 'active' in one of the latest body of elders letters:.

OneEyedJoe

George said what I was going to - this has always been the definition of "active" as far back as I can remember. The point remains, though, that the WTS does seem to get a lot less strict about things when they're looking for cash. I'm sure they'd take money from the ghost of ray franz where he to offer it.

As for the idea of not reporting because of this, I say do the opposite - make up time for as long as you're forced to be in. The more "active" pubs there are that aren't donating, the greater the disparity between what they ask for and what a publisher is inclined to give will be and it might just make a few wake up. There's a limit to how much they're going to get no matter how much they ask for so I don't think there's any downside to reporting time from that perspective.

79

March JW Broadcast: Once again disparaging Higher Education - this time in the Music Video.

by cappytan in

i will have the music video separated shortly.

will post the link once it's done..

OneEyedJoe

Ok, so that was pretty disgusting. Thanks for the warning 1:08. Education and a career - pretty bad stuff. Hmmm.

That guy must not be very good at his job if he can't keep up with the workload. Maybe he should've invested in a little extra education.

58

A Question for Underground Apostates, How Many Are There?

by Village Idiot in

when i first came to this forum i was of the belief that those of us who were still in due to family reasons were few in numbers perhaps one in a thousand in the jws.

soon i came to the realization that there were many more.

we have dozens of posters here who are mentally out but still in.

OneEyedJoe

Because of the steadily increasing levels of apostate-related paranoia and propaganda that's constantly force-fed to congregations across the planet on a daily basis.

Has there been much of an increase? To me it seems about the same as ever.

12

How did you find the truth? - the loaded question.

by user100 in

had dinner this weekend with a jw family and met a bunch of new jws.

one of them who was not very talkative at all and out of the blue asked me how i found "the truth".

i answered how my family has always been starting with my great grandfather.. then he clarified his question.. he said something about how this is a great question and people always talk about their spiritual heritage.

OneEyedJoe

Whenever I'm asked a loaded question like that, I've taken to restating their question without the phrase "the truth." I just can't stomach it to support someone calling it the truth these days. I honestly think that's the worst part about being around JWs these days - the constant "the truth" this and "the truth" that. It's gotten to the point that I have to excuse myself to stay sane.

I've also found that honesty in this situation can be a fun way of shutting people up. "How did you find the truth?" "Well my parents raised me as a JW so I didn't have much choice." Usually you get an uncomfortable silence and a quizzical look before they change the subject. Most JWs' faith is so thin that they're too scared to explore a topic if it looks like it's not going to result in getting 100% positive feedback about the cult.

Also, another fun way to approach this type of situation is if you find someone that was recruited and you find out (as is often the case) that it was after some traumatic event in their life try saying something like "Wow, you're really lucky you found the JWs. After something like that, I bet it was hard to think clearly - if things had been a little different you might've ended up a mormon or something!"

48

Just woke up

by Doctor Who in

new to the site.

currently i am a ministerial servant and was told i was appointed to be an elder.

i told the brothers i was not ready for that assignment.

OneEyedJoe

Welcome! I hope you'll find this to be as good a source of support in a difficult time as I've found it to be. My advice would be to take your time and go slow. As it turns out, Armageddon isn't imminent, so you've got time to figure out how you want to handle things as you come to grasp fully the situation you're in.

Go slow especially with trying to wake up any family. If you push too hard you could succeed only in alienating them and pushing them further in.

I wish you the best of luck in your journey!

27

Does anybody know what the "special broadcast" to all the Kingdom Halls (canada) is about on march 22?

by hoser in

jw
friends

heard about it today just not sure if i should go

OneEyedJoe

It's the zone visit like we in the states got in November. Basically a couple GB members and helpers go on random rants and do puff pieces about how great everything is going in the ministry with the carts and real estate development.

15

Donations

by FadeToBlack in

i think that since i am the sole wage-earner in our household, i need to make it clear to my wife that i don't want any of my hard-earned wages going to the wt.

i know she makes a monthly contribution to an animal shelter and i am fine with that.

what do you think?

OneEyedJoe

FTB -

That's pretty rough. Sorry to hear it's gone that way for you. It's probably a small consolation, but it's not your fault. It's actually quite commendable that you're continuing to stick it out, but make sure to take care of yourself too.

58

A Question for Underground Apostates, How Many Are There?

by Village Idiot in

when i first came to this forum i was of the belief that those of us who were still in due to family reasons were few in numbers perhaps one in a thousand in the jws.

soon i came to the realization that there were many more.

we have dozens of posters here who are mentally out but still in.

OneEyedJoe

I just realized that my earlier post might be a little pessimistic. I was only thinking of the regular attendees. There are probably 3 or 4 that show up occasionally. Now they certainly aren't all awake. Most likely they're still indoctrinated but just know that they're unhappy in the cult so they stay away. One might be awake though.

My estimate would be that on any given Sunday there's probably about 0.25-0.5% in attendance that are properly awake. Obviously the awake ones are going to attend much less, so I wouldn't say that's a small number.