naked ladies at the door!
various stages of undress, including absolutely nothing on.
my response was to be cool, go into my presentation and sneak a peek when i thought it wouldn't be noticed.
You'd hear the odd story occasionally about semi-naked women answering the door, but it was always other people, alas. That was the Holy Grail.
I do remember calling on a man who answered the door dressed as a woman and stumbling through my presentation as quickly as possible.
two djs, posing as the queen and prince, prank a nurse into divulging info on kate.
nurse is later found dead, apparently suicide.. -----------.
'jacintha saldanha, the receptionist who was duped by two australian djs who were pretending to be queen elizabeth and prince charles in order to get information on the duchess of cambridge's pregnancy, has been found dead.. the woman's body was found at an address close to king edward vii hospital in london, where the duchess was being treated, according to the u.k.'s daily mail.
I agree with Rip Van Winkle - there have been plenty of worse pranks played on TV and radio, plenty far more likely to cause someone to commit suicide or suffer a heart attack. But I don't see many people complaining about these - like the ghost in the elevator prank. The difference is that some people love to be wise after the event.
What I think is descpicable is that news outlets like the Daily Mail have led a witch hunt on the DJs, who will be traumatised enough already. How come it's so bad to play a prank on someone who might react very badly to it, yet it's okay to inspire hatred in the DJs who might even be suicidal themselves because of this, without all the death threats and criticism? What if one of them commits suicide? I guess some people would be very happy.
I also think the hospital have done a very good job of deflecting blame from themselves on to the DJs. The management should surely take a large amount of blame - do they have a protocol for family members phoning up, particularly when it came to the royal family? If so, why wasn't it communicated to all staff who might have answered the phone? There has surely been a massive error on the part of the managment. If they hadn't made such a basic error, pranksters wouldn't have stood a chance of getting through and the suicide wouldn't have happened.
i know this has been discussed before but i think a fresh thread on this will be enjoyable.
When it comes to UK COs, a few that I remember:
Clive Upton: extremely unpopular, nicknamed "Clive Uppity". I can still hear the strange way he pronounced the hard "th" in "with" s the soft "th" as in "path" - it sends shivers down my spine (not that his pronounciation was the reason he wasn't liked that). I realise this doesn't mean anything to 99% of those on the forum.
Peter Withers: nice, down-to-earth guy - well liked.
Chris Jolley: very tall guy with one leg longer than the other, as I recall. He was the last CO we had before I left. I had, I thought, cleverly avoided him by planning my exit for the week after his visit, but he came back to see me about six months after I'd left. He raised a few points against my arguments and, after he left, I had the "audacity" to look up counter-arguments, print some info and get it back to him through my father at the next meeting. He was disgusted at what he considered apostate material.
like most people reading this, i was convinced that by 2014 the new system would 'definitely' have been operating for at least a decade.
now that i know this is not going to be the case i am going to have to think of some way to recognise 100 years of wts let downs and failed predictions.
there is no point fretting over the past so i think it will be a good time to celebrate.
I remember saying to a fellow JW back in about 1997 that I would give it all up in the year 2020 if the big A hadn't come by then. The feeling back then was that "the generation" would not just have to have been born but of an age to be able to appreciate it. He laughed in a "I can't believe you said that" kind of way, but he's out now too, I found out afterwards.
Thanks goodness I didn't decide to wait that long!
just for background, i da'd 12 years ago and i'm now an atheist/agnostic.. i normally avoid answering to the jws (i can usually tell it's them because i hear two sets of incredibly moving footsteps coming up the stairs to my flat) or they do a quick "magazine presentation" and then they're off.
on one occasion a few weeks ago i answered and the guy seemed up for a discussion.
i said i was an atheist, a lengthy discussion ensued and he "placed" a creation /evolution leaflet with me.. i was expecting a call and, after avoiding them a few times, i finally answered.
Just for background, I DA'd 12 years ago and I'm now an atheist/agnostic.
I normally avoid answering to the JWs (I can usually tell it's them because I hear two sets of incredibly moving footsteps coming up the stairs to my flat) or they do a quick "magazine presentation" and then they're off. On one occasion a few weeks ago I answered and the guy seemed up for a discussion. I said I was an atheist, a lengthy discussion ensued and he "placed" a creation /evolution leaflet with me.
I was expecting a call and, after avoiding them a few times, I finally answered. We went over much the same ground again and today he came back for a third visit.
Most of this time the discussion is on the creation argument. It's tempting to bring up something like 1914 or 607 but that would be a giveaway. I asked him today how long he believed humans had been around. I was surprised that he said 6000 years as I had suspicions the WTS had backtracked on this were keeping the length of the Genesis "day" vague in light of the indisputable scientific evidence. We also got on to the flood and I again said that flies completely in the face of everything science knows.
I said a few times that he needed to look outside of what his literature (and the carefully selected scientific quotes therein) said to look at what science in general thought. Of course, he said they did all the time, which was rubbish - at least they're not looking in the right place. He did close by saying he was going to go away and look at the "secular view" on the flood and the 6000 years.
It's not as if I think I have much chance of planting seeds of doubt in his head, but I guess I find the discussions interesting - although less and less so with each visit. It's interesting to be on the other side of the fence from where I was. Mind you, if I were the pioneer, I'd have given up on me by now!
I guess if I get bored with the discussions, I'll just bring up 607 and I won't see them again.
actually, this is my second post as i replied to a thread a few moments ago, but it turns out i originally registered eight years ago but had never posted.. i left in 2000 (from a newport, s wales, congregation) having been brought up in it from about the age of three.
initially, i was obsessed with research and posting to forums but got over it after a few years and just rediscovered this site a couple of days ago.
i just thought it would be worth posting my account of leaving in case it helped others.. i always considered myself to be "strong in the truth" and genuinely believed it,, but i suppose the amount of suppressed doubts had been mounting up and i think it was the summer of 1999 when i first thought of leaving.
Yes ThomasCovenant, I don't doubt I was viewed as being crazy or the devil incarnate. I think I heard from someone else who escaped after me that I had started worshiping trees or something like that! Goodness know where they got it from and I'm sure there was plenty of talk.
I do remember my discussions with some of the elders being quite deep and scientific sometimes and some of my arguments may have sounded like science fiction if it went over their heads.
But I'm not bitter about it and don't really bare any animosity. It's the relgion, not them after all and I would have been exactly the same at one time.
As for getting as many as 3-4 visits, I think it was only because they wanted to get a statement of disassociation from me. I was probably trying to be careful not to walk into it too easily. But they got what they considered was what they wanted after a couple of months as, as I found out later, they announced I'd disassociated myself, although I think they termed it quite loosely.
Someone asked what the main doctrinal issues were for me. Well, apart from obviously the kangaroo (although I don't remember that one!), a big one was the whole 607 or 537 date, which was the only way of supposedly tying "this generation" to our time and that was based on false history.
Another was that they believed (at the time, though I think they may be hedging their bets now), that humans had only been on the earth 6000 years ago. Again, this was quite "backed up" by the literature, which only told you the evidence they wanted you to know about.
actually, this is my second post as i replied to a thread a few moments ago, but it turns out i originally registered eight years ago but had never posted.. i left in 2000 (from a newport, s wales, congregation) having been brought up in it from about the age of three.
initially, i was obsessed with research and posting to forums but got over it after a few years and just rediscovered this site a couple of days ago.
i just thought it would be worth posting my account of leaving in case it helped others.. i always considered myself to be "strong in the truth" and genuinely believed it,, but i suppose the amount of suppressed doubts had been mounting up and i think it was the summer of 1999 when i first thought of leaving.
Lozhasleft, I've sent you a PM, but just to clarify in case it confuses others - I never went to any assemblies in Manchester - not my area.
actually, this is my second post as i replied to a thread a few moments ago, but it turns out i originally registered eight years ago but had never posted.. i left in 2000 (from a newport, s wales, congregation) having been brought up in it from about the age of three.
initially, i was obsessed with research and posting to forums but got over it after a few years and just rediscovered this site a couple of days ago.
i just thought it would be worth posting my account of leaving in case it helped others.. i always considered myself to be "strong in the truth" and genuinely believed it,, but i suppose the amount of suppressed doubts had been mounting up and i think it was the summer of 1999 when i first thought of leaving.
You're right free @ last, I could probably have held out as a "fader" but on the few (three or four) visits I had from elders, I was not intending to hold back from saying what I really thought.
It always struck me, incidentally, that despite having been so deeply involved in it and baptised in it 10 years, they only thought it was worth 3-4 visits to try to convert me back again.
actually, this is my second post as i replied to a thread a few moments ago, but it turns out i originally registered eight years ago but had never posted.. i left in 2000 (from a newport, s wales, congregation) having been brought up in it from about the age of three.
initially, i was obsessed with research and posting to forums but got over it after a few years and just rediscovered this site a couple of days ago.
i just thought it would be worth posting my account of leaving in case it helped others.. i always considered myself to be "strong in the truth" and genuinely believed it,, but i suppose the amount of suppressed doubts had been mounting up and i think it was the summer of 1999 when i first thought of leaving.
Cofty - probably not as hard as it was for me. They kind of faded away and continued to associate with some. So some would have just considered them "weak" while others may have thought they were bordering on apostasy.
My dad died in 2006 and, I assume, his was the funeral referred to in a post heere by "ThomasCovenant" in which he said people thought he had DA'd (http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/watchtower/beliefs/119187/1/Can-JWs-attend-Funerals-for-ex-Jws).
One elder in the congregation was, as I later found out, shocked that I left so I like to think that my actions at least played a part in his and his family later leaving the org too.
actually, this is my second post as i replied to a thread a few moments ago, but it turns out i originally registered eight years ago but had never posted.. i left in 2000 (from a newport, s wales, congregation) having been brought up in it from about the age of three.
initially, i was obsessed with research and posting to forums but got over it after a few years and just rediscovered this site a couple of days ago.
i just thought it would be worth posting my account of leaving in case it helped others.. i always considered myself to be "strong in the truth" and genuinely believed it,, but i suppose the amount of suppressed doubts had been mounting up and i think it was the summer of 1999 when i first thought of leaving.
Actually, this is my second post as I replied to a thread a few moments ago, but it turns out I originally registered eight years ago but had never posted.
I left in 2000 (from a Newport, S Wales, congregation) having been brought up in it from about the age of three. Initially, I was obsessed with research and posting to forums but got over it after a few years and just rediscovered this site a couple of days ago. I just thought it would be worth posting my account of leaving in case it helped others.
I always considered myself to be "strong in the truth" and genuinely believed it,, but I suppose the amount of suppressed doubts had been mounting up and I think it was the summer of 1999 when I first thought of leaving. Subconciously, I knew it wasn't right, although I could never bring myself to search the internet for "evidence". The reviewing of "apostate sites" would only come after I declared my leaving.
I was a pioneer, MS and, at just 26, being discussed as eldership material (as I later heard). I asked to be removed from the pioneer list, but they virtually said no so I carried on but just didn't put the hours in. For a few months in advance, I pinpointed the week after the visit of the circuit overseer as the time to come out of it (January 2000). All this time, I don't think anyone really suspected anything was up.
I was due to do a public talk the week after that circuit visit. It was all-new material and I hadn't prepared it at all. I think it was four days before the said public talk that I told the presiding overseer I was having doubts and couldn't do it. I had intended it to be a clean break but somehow ended up continuing to go to meetings for a further 3-4 weeks. Even after telling people I no longer beileved in it, they still had me continuing in my "priveledge" of doing the sound system, doing a prayer at a book study and went out on the ministry once.
Breaking away was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. I knew it would mean the end of almost everything I had ever known. I worked from home so had no friends at all outside the JWs. But for me, "fading away" (ie just not going to meetings but saying I still believed it) was not an option. I guess it's mainly my honest personality. I know many people continue in it for years without really believeing in it, but I couldn't do that - even if that meant being ostracised by everyone. I was still living at home, but I feared that my parents (who were witnesses) would throw me out of the house.
As it turned it, though, eventually both parents came out of it too, I believe mainly after many discussions with me after I'd left. Never underestimate the power of family ties. It is sometimes stronger than religious beliefs. They knew I wasn't daft and they were prepared to listen to what I had to say.
