OneEyedJoe

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Posts by OneEyedJoe

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  8

  Signature Quote - what do you think?

  by Muddy Waters in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i apologize for the self-serving nature of this post.. i first said this to a lovely person here to encourage her and add a bit of humour to a harsh situation, but i've fallen in love with my own words, ha, and would like to use a variation of what i said to her as my new signature quote.

  it's a bit long, and could become tiresome eventually, but do you forum members think that you might like (or could tolerate, heh) seeing this on my posts?.

  .... "may god, or the universe, or airborne spaghetti, or energies or wavelengths or frequencies, or quantum particles that somehow attract things to us, or telepathic manipulation by aliens -- bless you.

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  OneEyedJoe

  But personally, I'm not really much of a fan of signature quotes!
  

  This is hilarious. Thank you.
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  8

  Sickening opportunists!

  by username in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  ok so i just had to go over to the darkside (jwtalk) and see what is the latest buzz.

  i wish i hadn't now because i'm blazing mad at the jw's reply to the current refugee crisis.. am i the only one who thinks this is really sick?.

  op:.

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  OneEyedJoe

  For one, they have an awkward group dynamic. If you want to preach to an Eritrean or Arab, you will have to get him by himself. They seem to feel some sort of obligation to protect each other from our preaching campaign, unless you speak to them on their own, then they're not so defensive.
  

  He could almost be talking about someone trying to help a JW to wake up.

  As for the comment about satan blocking this, that doesn't really bother me too much...but I guess I'm a little numb to it since my wife hasn't been too shy about stating that she believes satan has mislead me.
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  35

  Why did you choose Jehovahs Witnesses?

  by vinman in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  i'm wondering why ones on this forum initially became jw's.

  if you were born in, why did you make it "your own"?

  if you became one later, what was your draw and driving force?

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  OneEyedJoe

  Born in. I don't think I ever "made the truth my own" (well I did, just not "the truth"). I waited until I was 19 to get baptized because I was waiting until I felt a need to do it. I knew all the doctrine backwards and forwards but it still didn't feel right to me. If god wanted to kill me because things didn't sit right with me and I acted accordingly, then he was no god that I wanted to serve.

  One of my biggest reservations was the rules around dating (it seemed stupid to make kids wait until they're dating with a view to marriage since I'd seen that lead to hasty marriages a number of times. Also, how do you ever really get to know someone if you have to be chaperoned all the time?) and the apparent lack of girls that had any ambition in life beyond getting married and maybe pioneering. Then I met one that was going to college and wanted to do something with herself beyond be in the cult. She barely ever talked about cult stuff, which was great for me. I fell hard and then she broke up with me (in hindsight, I think this may have had something to do with my father). One day, while I was emotionally distraught from the break-up, my father walked into my bedroom and started talking about her but didn't take long to get to his point - he asked me "Did she know you weren't baptized?" I said "It never came up so I assume she didn't" His response was "What do you think she would've thought if she knew?" And that was it - I thought this must be a message from god - he showed me that I could find love in the cult but took it away because I wasn't baptized. I'd never be happy unless I was baptized. So I went for it at the next convention. At that point I was stuck and just trying to make it work.
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  43

  New here!

  by Mandy97 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  hi guys !

  hm.. i'm new in this website !

  my name is mandy and i just want to meet new people!

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  OneEyedJoe

  An apostate is anyone that was a JW at one time but left. I myself would be considered an apostate. If you'd like, feel free to message me to chat. I don't know any French though so it would have to be all English, but it sounds like that's what you're after.
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  53

  What's the craziest thing someone INFORMED on you about?

  by Londo111 in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  the culture of jws as encouraged by the watchtower is one of informing on one another, reporting to either the elders or ones designated head.

  whats the wackiest thing that someone reported on you?

  im not talking about a black-and-white watchtower rule that would land you in a judicial committee, but some judgmental nonsense that someone thought they should turn you in about?.

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  OneEyedJoe

  I always kept my nose pretty clean (read: my childhood was rather dull) so I never got reported on that I know of. Though I did recently hear a first-hand account from a couple in their 30s of being informed on for going to see the movie twilight. Their elders put together a local needs part about movies and spent much of the time specifically talking about twilight (without saying the name of the movie in an apparent attempt to avoid making pharisiacal rules).
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  26

  Do you feel embarrsed?

  by The Rebel in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  when you look through a keyhole, and see the person you once were?.

  as for myself, i am just pleased i have mended my ways.

  i realise ( now) my time as a witness was a keyhole that looked in to the ground, and licked the elders arse.

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  OneEyedJoe

  As a JW, I was always embarrassed. I knew things didn't quite add up but it just had to be the truth. It embarrassed me to believe something that I couldn't explain, especially when so much time at meetings was spent mocking adherents of other religions for that very thing. I'm also sorta ashamed of who I was for much of my time as a JW - I was a self-righteous prick. But I've changed once I realized the error of my ways so I'm too worried about that. Besides when you grow up with adults telling you how you know more about the bible than any worldly person I don't know that there's much of a chance not to turn into a bit of a prick about some things.

  Looking back, the thing I'm most embarrassed about now is just that it took me so long to really investigate things. I was so close to waking up in my late teens, if I'd done one google search I would've been out.
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  6

  Stop Using Old WT Library - Any Confirmation?

  by berrygerry in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  https://www.reddit.com/r/exjw/comments/3lw5cx/new_letter_from_ccjw_is_a_doozy/.

  on reddit.. i've been expecting this.. any confirmation?.

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  OneEyedJoe

  I wonder how many JWs will twig the fact that the Borg is sanitising its own older material so that the cracks and glaring errors won't be accessible to the newcomers. I am reminded of information control in Orwell's novel 1984. Oh! the wonder of modern technology.
  

  No one will notice. They'll just fawn over what a blessing it is to be a part of such a modern organization that's taking advantage of technology! They also won't stop and realize that a DVD with online updates is technology that's about 10 years old at least.
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  78

  Need Help with Blood Transfusion Illustration

  by Dissonant15 in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  please, who can provide an intelligent rebuttal to the following illustration?

  i always thought it was bullet-proof:.

  "if your doctor directs you to 'abstain from alcohol' would you be ok to have it injected into your veins rather than drink it?

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  OneEyedJoe

  Fun fact: sometimes the medical treatment in extreme cases for alcohol withdrawal (you know, for someone that the doctor might've instructed to "abstain from alcohol") is to administer alcohol intravenously. So their illustration immediately falls apart. If your doctor tells you to abstain from alcohol, there are still situations where that same doctor might inject alcohol into your veins. If anything, that illustration proves the point that if something that you would normally abstain from becomes medically necessary then an exception should be made.
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  11

  Fading policies and doctrines

  by Saltheart Foamfollower in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  first a clarification - this is not about policies on faders etc.

  it is about how the borg allow policies and doctrines to fade rather than correct them and apologise for mistakes.

  here are two examples of what i mean:.

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  OneEyedJoe

  They try things to see if it sticks and if not, they drop it. I think that's how most cults evolve - they're not lead by psychologists that are experts on manipulation, they just try lots of stuff and stumble upon things that work and keep doing it. The JWs didn't start out with DFing, but they tried it and it worked so they kept it up.

  Another idea that they've allowed to fade away is the 7000 year creative day. They've never said they were wrong but they've stopped talking about it and a CO recently gave a talk in which he acknowledged the age of the universe as being 13.8 billion years.
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  10

  "I would rather have Questions that I can't answer, instead of Answers that I can't question"

  by stuckinarut2 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

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  how very thought provoking this quote is, especially in the context of witness doctrine!.

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  OneEyedJoe

  That would have to generate something in most of them, right?
  

  Probably not, especially not the current generation of JWs (those under ~35 years old). Most of them don't have questions, they just sort of listen and accept everything in the KH and then they go off and live their lives not thinking about it. The only way this quote is going to make someone think is if they have experienced asking one of the many forbidden questions and being shut down with social pressure and receiving no answer. Without am emotional connection to the quote based on some experience (or some question that they're too afraid to ask) they won't give it another thought.