Posts by OneEyedJoe

24

Conditioned to fail

by Jordandemm in

jw
friends

just want to say hi and a big thank you to all that post in this site.

it has been extremely tough waking up as a born.

but in slowly removing any doubts about leaving this man made religion.

It's definitely difficult to make normal friends after leaving. The way we made friends as born-in JWs is not really normal, at least in my experience. Most of my friends growing up were practically assigned to me because they were from strong spiritual families. Making normal friends seems (to me) to be a much slower process and it's hard to get used to. If you're still in school, that will probably make things easier, though since a lot of people around you are in the same boat. The key seems to be just to force yourself to try. If something doesn't work don't get discouraged and keep putting yourself out there.

If you still have some lingering phobia of "worldly" people that can make things difficult too, but the only real solution is to sort of throw yourself in and you'll probably find that not all worldly people are bad people. Some are, but so are some JWs as I'm sure you realize. If you find yourself thinking that someone hurting you in some way is because they're worldly, remember that that's almost certainly confirmation bias. Look for examples of good "worldly" (aka normal) people and you'll definitely find some.

Good luck to you! Hang in there...I won't lie and say it's easy, but it can be done.

6

Where my cleaners at?

by dubstepped in

jw
friends

i was just wondering who else on here cleans for a living.

we all know the dubs' penchant for cleaning, so i was wondering if my wife and i were the lone cleaners on here.

we've cleaned together for 15+ years now.

OneEyedJoe

My mother cleaned houses for probably 15 years before she went to college to get a masters degree (I guess she must realize on some level that the cult isn't doing anything for her) and I spent a few summers working for her in highschool. That's been a while ago now, though.

41

Are you angry for having been a JW?

by Half banana in

i remember seeing the ex-jws parading around outside the assembly like lepers holding placards of hate.

we were the righteous and enlightened ones... and they were lost in outer darkness.

just dont look at them was the standard response to their unwelcome presence..

OneEyedJoe

I don't know his anyone can have any involvement with the cult and not be a little angry upon waking up. I'm mostly angry about having been systematically lied to for my entire life.

The difficult thing is that there's little outlet for the anger... Protesting only reinforces the persecution complex. I'll probably never run into anyone who's knowingly exploited the cult for personal gain so being angry at some GB member that may just be a victim of the indoctrination too doesn't have much use. Being angry at yourself is pointless... My parents were just doing their best, no matter how misguided they were... What do you do with the anger? There's no useful outlet for it, you just gotta wait and hope you can let it go, I guess.

40

New Geoffrey Jackson statement on Royal Commission's webpage!!!!!!!!!!!!

by Viva la Vida in

jw
friends

check his signature... it looks kind of childish/feminine (at least in my part of the world)... is this a grown man's signature for you?.

http://www.childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au/downloadfile.ashx?guid=9d0ca1dc-1bd6-41c4-9cfc-b1d616d1cc65&type=exhibit&filename=stat.0670.001.0001&fileextension=pdf.

OneEyedJoe

Has he had a stroke? His face seems to be quite asymmetrical and his childish scrawl seems to support the idea.

Seems like he took the coward's way out here - seem somewhat agreeable to change and review when before the commission, then retreat and have one someone else write up a hard-line rebuttal for him to sign and send on.

43

Deconstructing Splanes 'Generation' explanation

by Splash in

at around 4 minutes into the september 2015 video splane said "for the man and the baby to be part of josephs generation they would have had to have lived at least some time during joseph's lifespan.".

this is the lynchpin of the wt argument, that two lives must overlap to be considered the same generation.. let's take an example of twins who are born just a few minutes apart.

obviously, these twins are the same generation as each other.

OneEyedJoe

Even if you want to accept a generation as spanning essentially two lifetimes with a small period of overlap, how do you determine when the overlap is to occur? Jesus said "this generation" will not pass away. Not "your generation" or "their generation" - "this generation." In the "primary fulfillment" of this, he was talking to his disciples and saying the current generation that witnessed his physical presence would not pass away before the destruction of jerusalem. In this case, if you want to apply an overlapping generation type thinking, the overlap would have occurred not at some point after he spoke the words, but when he spoke them. Someone born 10 minutes before Jesus made this pronouncement could be included in "this generation" and someone who died 10 minutes after could be included.

It's the same with 1914 - if there's an overlap, that's when it happened. We could consider all those who died just after 1914 to be a part of "this generation" and we could include all those born just before 1914 to be a part of it as well. So, in essence, this would be the generation doctrine that they ditched in 1995, which is why that one at least made some sense. They talk about a generation being a group of people who's lives overlap, which is certainly not a definition supported by any scripture, but even if you give them that, they're still wrong.

They're using two definitions of generation and mixing them up - one definition would be the people born in a certain time period, the other being people who's lives overlap in a certain time period and they're trying to say it's people born in a certain time period plus those who's lives they overlap with at a second unspecified time period.

It's just so effing stupid. It makes me so angry that anyone is stupid enough to just accept this as if it makes perfect sense. I get how people can be fooled by the explanation of the blood ban or about birthdays and I'll even give them the numerology BS that gets them to 1914. But the explanation of the overlapping generation nonsense is just so thin and full of holes (none of which require special knowledge/research to find as is the case with 607, blood, etc) that I just don't understand how anyone can listen to it and not be left with more questions than answers.

36

Could "this generation" inspire a new "1975 debacle"?

by Island Man in

i think that it's possible that they're getting ready to issue a new end time date insinuation like they did with 1975. now i know what some of you are probably thinking: why would they be so stupid as to repeat such a mistake, knowing what happened in 1975?

well here're two reasons why i think they could do it:.

first, it's important to remember that they are deluded.

OneEyedJoe

I'm not sure another 1975 would work again. There's to much information online about the JW's and all their false prophecies. In fact there's so much info about the JW's online I doubt anything they could do or try would get many newbies to join. Religion is dying so it's a dead horse anyway.

What do you mean when you say "work?" I don't expect it would work to generate growth like it did pre 1975 but that wouldn't be the goal, at least not in first-world countries. In first-world countries the goal is different these days than in 1975, though. Now the name of the game is retention, not recruitment. I think setting a date would do wonders for retention - many with doubts would stick around just a little longer to see if it pans out. Once it doesn't they either leave (having bolstered the numbers much longer than they would have otherwise) or they stay and double down on their cult loyalty.

Hopefully religion and this cult continue their decline becoming nothing more than a sad stain on human history.

210

TV.JW.ORG (September 2015) - Generation explained again

by Designer Stubble in

guess the overlapping generation concept is difficult for most to comprehend.

david spane does his best to explain it again.

the cutoff date for this generation has now moved to 1992 (was once 1935), the year that fred franz died.

OneEyedJoe

Frederick Franz was baptized in November 1913, but was considered one of the Lord's anointed in 1914? I guess that means that newly baptized ones CAN be of the anointed.

Back then I think it was common for people to begin partaking upon baptism. Now not so much...

36

Could "this generation" inspire a new "1975 debacle"?

by Island Man in

i think that it's possible that they're getting ready to issue a new end time date insinuation like they did with 1975. now i know what some of you are probably thinking: why would they be so stupid as to repeat such a mistake, knowing what happened in 1975?

well here're two reasons why i think they could do it:.

first, it's important to remember that they are deluded.

OneEyedJoe

no. 1975 had a 7 year lead time. David Splane's spiel introduced the typical generation of Joseph. He lived to be 110. Anybody born (not just alive) during those 110 years is part of that generation.

My understanding (though I confess I haven't watched Splane's video) from the WT article about the overlap was not that they had to have overlapping lives, but that the generation applied only to anointed ones that had their "heavenly calling" overlap with the lives of anointed ones that had their "heavenly calling" prior to 1914. That's why fred franz was a good example for Splane's explanation because he would've been 21 in 1914 and likely had started partaking by then. So given that any overlappers would have to be partaking before 1992 to catch Franz (and well before that if you want to catch any significant portion of the first group of the overlap) that puts the minimum age of the second group of the overlap at ~40 today. But in 1992 almost all the partakers were much, much older (the youngest I'd ever met that was partaking then would be in his 70's now) due to the (now defunct) 1935 "sealing" of the anointed. So given that, the math works out pretty well to predict an end date of ~2034. That also has the convenience of matching the 120 years of Noah, which they've mentioned a few times in the last year or so.

Obviously, it could easily be twisted (just as they did with the original generation teaching) to extend the overlap well into 2075, but that's not what they're saying now (even in the literature they've said that the second group are themselves getting up in age) and I think they're more likely to set a date than to revise the teaching to extend the date (until they absolutely have to)

36

Could "this generation" inspire a new "1975 debacle"?

by Island Man in

i think that it's possible that they're getting ready to issue a new end time date insinuation like they did with 1975. now i know what some of you are probably thinking: why would they be so stupid as to repeat such a mistake, knowing what happened in 1975?

well here're two reasons why i think they could do it:.

first, it's important to remember that they are deluded.

OneEyedJoe

I think they'd risk losing too much credibility, even amongst JW loyalists.

I think I'd argue that they're not too worried about that. Afterall they did recently redefine the word generation with no relevant scriptural citation (even taken out of context the one scripture they cite doesn't support this 1+1=1 nonsense) and not too many people have gotten upset about it. And most that found a bad taste in their mouth are still trapped because "where else would I go?"

Additionally, it's entirely possible that they've done too good a job erasing 1975 with their revisionist history. The leadership themselves might not realize how big a deal it was. And in 10 years the only people who remember 1975 will be in their 60s at least and at that point I suspect that their mortality and their being unwilling to accept that they've wasted 50 (or more) years on a cult when they should've known better will keep them in. No one else will remember 1975 as anything more than a year that was occasionally mentioned in hushed tones in their youth. If they set a date in 10 years (my personal favorite is 2034, so 10 years would be about the right timing for them to start pushing it) no one will be thinking "here we go again" they'll be thinking "finally!"

Not saying they're definitely going to do it - I can just totally see it happening and I don't think anyone would object to it until after it passed. Even then they'd only lose the ones that weren't helping them much anyway. The very reason date setting works so well is because it's something that everyone should see through right away. The problem is that they get excited before they think rationally and then by the time they stop to use their reason they're already invested and they use their power of reason not to think objectively but to rationalize what they already want to be. After that, no one wants to believe that they've been duped by what is obviously bullshit so they stick with it.

18

Suicide Prevention Counseling

by MrCellophane in

in the 1980's when i was an elder, i don't remember the society providing any guidance to elders on suicide prevention counseling.

i realize much has changed since then.

can any current/recent elders update me on what the current position of the local elders would be if approached by someone in the congregation contemplating suicide and seeking help?.

OneEyedJoe

Not (never was) an elder but my guess would be to read some generic scripture about how god is your refuge, then lay on the guilt by explaining that suicide would result in loss of a hope of resurrection and then send them on their way.

I think I remember someone posting that a video was played at a recent elders school and the scene included the elders doing something about as effective as the above.