True North

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Topics Started by True North

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  41

  Do you still call it "the truth"?

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  do you find youself still calling it "the truth" even though you are an ex-jw?

  for instance, in one posting i just read, the poster wrote "when i was in the truth..." .

  not a big deal, perhaps, but really not such a good thing either as it's a habitual holdover from the program of mental conditioning we were subject to.

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  Just read account of atheistic Ayn Rand cult -- so many similarities to JWs

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i just happened across an article titled "the sociology of the ayn rand cult" that was written in 1972 by the libertarian economist murray rothbard.

  (ayn rand was the author of the novels the fountainhead and atlas shrugged.

  ) as i read the article, i noted so many similarities with jws, particularly as regards practices of thought and behavior control (including disfellowshipping, shunning, dividing families, banning forbidden books, discouraging free discussion, claims to being the one source of truth, and so forth).

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  16

  To Randall Watters, Simon, and fellow JWD posters

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  to randall watters, simon, and fellow jwd posters:.

  i just wanted to say thanks for being here (and in randy's case, there at http://www.freeminds.org).. before discovering this site, i had been out of the jw org.

  for nearly 20 years.

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  7

  JW morality: is it from virtue or calculating self interest?

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  jws love to congratulate themselves for being -- as they see it -- morally superior to "worldly" people.

  however, if one does something right to get a reward (eternal life in paradise, status in the congregation) or refrains from doing something wrong to avoid punishment (death at armageddon, disfellowshipping), is that virtue or calculating self interest?

  is virtue only what one does and not why?

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  11

  Per Celtic's doom-and-gloom post: is it the end of the world as we know it?

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  in reply to the thread "if things turn ugly for the western world, will you run back to "mother"?

  ", celtic said the following:move to canada.

  wilderness, enough fire wood to last donkey's years in driftwood alone, hunt, fish, become self sufficient, go organic.

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  36

  If things turn ugly for the Western world, will you run back to "Mother"?

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  who knows what will come in the years ahead from terrorism, global warming, conflict over natural resources, proliferation of wmd, et al.?

  it's not hard to imagine truly horrific things happening.

  i don't think it's likely, but perhaps one day the major powers might even respond to religion-related terrorism by joining together to restrain or control religion under the banner of the u.n.. such events certainly could trigger a response from the fears/phobias that ex-jws may carry around with them due to years of wt indoctrination -- however much repressed these are at most times.

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  10

  Could there ever be another "hostile takeover" of the WT Society?

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i've read that back in the day, rutherford worked the legal system to take over the wt society in opposition to russell's final instructions.

  could this sort of thing ever happen again?

  another recent thread on this forum spoke of there currently being factions within the organization that take opposing views of many things.

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  28

  What happens when Bethelites are too old, infirm, or disturbed to work?

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  in barbara grizzuti harrison's book visions of glory: a history and a memory of jehovah?s witnesses (which is online at http://www.exjws.net/vg.htm -- i highly recommend it) there's an account of heartlessness at bethel that i found particularly troubling.

  it's in "chapter iv.

  accumulating wealth while the world refuses to die" (http://www.exjws.net/vg4.htm) and is as follows:.

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  34

  Did you ever actually make a JW convert from the door-to-door work?

  by True North in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  in all the years i went door to door as a jw, i never once had a study who went all the way to baptism.

  in the thirty years i've know my wife -- who has been a jw all this time -- she has never made a single convert from going door to door either.

  is this true of others on this forum?

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  6

  what is the fate of those who aren't preached to before Armageddon?

  by True North in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  recently i spoke with someone who says they were told that current jw teaching about those who aren't preached to before armageddon (in china, india, etc.

  ) is that such ones will be allowed a "second chance" in the "new order" (or "new system" or whatever it's called these days).

  in reply, i said i found it unlikely that this would be their teaching and that if so it would mean that even from a jw perspective, people would be better off if they were never preached to.

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