Posts by Pole

28

Comments You Will Not Hear at the 12-19-04 WT Study (Abbreviated)

by blondie in

comments you will not hear at the 12-19-04 wt study (november 15, 2004 issue)

review comments

will be in black and parentheses ().

Pole

Actually, a nation of Christendom is any country where the main religion purports to be Christian.

It's easy to write off an entire country as a bunch of evil doers by classifying it as "a nation of Christendom". While it still makes some sense to say Iran is "a nation of Islamdom", I wonder which western country could be nowadays described as a "nation of Christendom". The only Chritian-like thing most citizens of such "nations" have in common is perhaps Christmas, which is also "celebrated" in one form or another by most atheists anyway.

Czech Republic is 60% atheist, so is it a nation of Christendom?

Poland is said to be 94% Catholic, but if you ask real people around, it turns out that you have 10-20% of zealots, 10-20% of relatively active Catholics (many of them elderly anyway), and the whole rest of "inactive" Catholics, atheists, agnostics and other.

The term "nation of Christendom" is an archaism which has been used by the WT for at least the last 55 years and has lost sociological validity. They should update their lingo. Just look at this gem from the 1950s. Doesn't it ring the bell? THe same propaganda, same labelling, same stereotypes:

*** w50 3/1 p. 68 A Call to Praise ***

Nevertheless, in the nations of the earth, particularly in Christendom there is today a great pretense at praising God. Imposing church buildings and temples are everywhere to be found, with paid clergy to direct man?s praise.

Pole

28

Comments You Will Not Hear at the 12-19-04 WT Study (Abbreviated)

by blondie in

comments you will not hear at the 12-19-04 wt study (november 15, 2004 issue)

review comments

will be in black and parentheses ().

Pole

Just look at the level of idiocy this propaganda contains:

Today, the nations of the world,

the nations of the world. Huh? So the world is made up of nations? And the unique characteristic of nations is that they are "of the world". Thank you so much for this enlightening observation.

including those of Christendom,

Huh? So what are those nations of Christendom? Italy? Ireland? Poland? Surely not France or Sweden? Is the US a nation of Christendom? In what sense so? Please someone give me a clue. Ha. They must have meant the Vatican State! But it's not a nation, is it?

reflect the corrupt condition of ancient Israel.

I guess it doesn't take much courage to depict ancient Israel as the prototype of all evil. What a piece of utter bs anyway.

While some people prosper, many are

Do I sense populist marxism here?

ruined financially and damaged emotionally by the immoral practices of dishonest leaders

Neo has already commented on it.

of big business,

Like the WTS is always staying clear of it. If it wasn't for "big business" and financial markets how would they invest their big bucks?

politics,

No, the WTS never took part in world politics. Except when they needed a library card.

and false religion.

ditto.

Pole

40

JW reaction to the UN coverup

by redskymedic in

so, if you handed a jw a copy of the un report on the wtbs involvement, how do they react?

are they able to explain this away?

just curious.. red

Pole

When I first brought this issue up with my elders they had no clue bout it. But they still had elaborate justifications. I realized with horror that even the nicest JWs are programmed to deal with the truth about the Truth.

They have a very generic algorithm. The content of the information you present is unimportant. The question they ask is this: "Is this information

a) upbuilding
b) destructive

to the organization?".

If the answer is b then why should we believe it?

Simple.

Pole

30

2004 Service Report - Analysis and trends for 2005

by truthseeker in

jw
friends

by now, most of you will have seen the scanned images of the watchtower's service report for 2004. i do not have the feb 1st magazines, so i cannot speculate further on the reason for not issuing the report in the january 1st 2005 wt.

looking at the figures, there are some trends that should be considered very disturbing to the wt leadership.

although baptisms increased marginally by 3,571, the difference between the average number of publishers and the number of baptisms is eye-popping indeed.

Pole

Blondie,

Congregations started getting too competitve and finally in the 70's the monthly quota of 10 hours monthly per publisher was dropped officially and the charts disappeared. I found an old one stored away in a closet in one KH when I was doing spring cleaning.

Maybe this will go the same way.

Imagine the kind of disappointment it would create. If we get excited by the Annual report, then how much more so do active witnesses? When the annual reports disappear the JWs will have nothing to live for. No partaker ticker figures to speculate about, no reports of "China opening". If the WTS is becoming more and more corporate then yearly reports are the only reason they exist for.

I think the obsession with stats is one of the shot-in-the-foot kind of arrangements, similar to the doctrinal monopoly held by the FDS class. NObody has the slightest idea of how to solve this problem and frankly nobody important in a FDS position cares. It's their end anyway.

Doing away with congregational reports was easy, because there was an easy excuse (competitive attitudes, etc). Of course there are also possible excuses for doing away with the annual ones, but I think it will come as part and parcel of some greater organizational shakeup, perhaps only after the FDS Unicorns cease to exist.

47

Somebody- Please Help Me UNDERSTAND?

by upside/down in

i understand there is a ton of anger out there toward the wts and dub's, and rightly so... what i don't understand is this notion that there is an evil conspiracy on the part of the wts and dubs as individuals to subjugate and control the unwary (or however you want to label us) for some evil sinister purpose.

i know what they are doing and agree it's wrong but to what purpose- i mean you can look at televangelist and see what's up with them (follow the money).

but what's up with the dub's.

Pole

Briefly analyse the main characteristics of totalitarian systems and your conclusion will be confirmed in entirety:

In a typical totalitarian system a few are totally cynical, many are totally fooled. There are also those who I'd call subconsciously-cynical. Imagine you have been in the truth for 30 years. You are a Bethel elder in a higly respected position. You give great public talks (from the perspective of an avg JW) and derive a lot of self-fulfillment from it. You get food and shelter for doing it. You have lots of friends and a happy family.

Then you come across something that stirs doubts in your mind. And think just how easy is it to make them go away if your subconscious cynicism starts working. You've made huge emotional investments. You realize that if you voice your doubts you may get df'd and you end up as nobody. No social security, no friends, no respect, no family, no paradise, no Armagedon. You lose your promised position of a prince in the New System. :) You also lose your natural defense system against everyday stress and frustration (The end is just around the corner so there's nothing worth worrying).

All you gain is the truth about the Truth. Not even an answer to the "What's the meaning of life" kind of questions, but rather a whole set of fundamental questions. The problem is that you have been told a million times that you already have the one and only Truth. You have been told and reassured a million times that you know more than the brightest minds of the world. So most of the time most people's subconsciousness won't even let them verbalize all those considerations. It's to scary to face it.

Two women are watching the same piece of news. It's about a notorious rapist who has just been caught and there is irrefutable evidence against him.

The first woman says: This bastard sould be jailed for life.

The second woman says: They set him up! He would never do it. I know my son better than the police or anyone else.

The thing is she doesn't. She has devoted half of her life to her son, and now it looks like it's all been wasted.

45

Freedom or Bondage.....a Hard Choice for Many

by gumby in

lately something has bothered me as regards to many on jwd who wonder what to do, once they have found the organisation to be a destructive, mind controling sect.

aside from these ones deciding how to exit without causing a judicial meeting nor a stir among the publishers, it whether or not they want to risk their marriage and or family ties.. many on this site have related how their marriage fell to pieces because the dub mate could not accept their loved one "leaving jehovah", and they could never meet in the middle to save the marriage.

others who leave, push their dub mate away by their constant verbal expressions against the organisation...because they think they should....hence, the marriage falls apart.. here's the hard part i don't know the answer to.

Pole

I guess it's called a social lie. Something we do in dozens of different forms every day. We smile to the neighbors we don't like. We pretend to be interested in weather forecasts just to make a conversation with people we don't really know. Family members deserve much more time and effort.

Everyone has to ask themselves the question: Would you have shunned your spouse/close relative a few years back if they had known what you know now? Would you have needed time to understand their motives for leaving the "Truth"? How would you have reacted to well balanced, logical argumentation if too many facts about the WTBS had been revelead to you at one time?

Pole

16

Paradise, and the Garden of Eden

by Brownboy in

good morning,

questions for readers:

how many reside as kings and priests, along with christ, in the heavenly kingdom of god?

Pole

Dear Hamasinkas,

Is it possible that the name America was derived from the following two words?

Hamas (Arabic acronym meaning zeal for God)

Incas (Spanish, from Quechua inca, ruler, man of royal lineage)

Where did you take your course in etymology? The Theoocratic Ministry School?

Best wishes,

Pole

4

First love cooling off - how did you deal with it?

by Pole in

in the witness world there is a label for everything.

that's how things work in many systems with distinct totalitarian traits.

as a zealuos witness i believed in the homemade psychology provided by the writing department.

Pole

In the Witness world there is a label for everything. That's how things work in many systems with distinct totalitarian traits. As a zealuos witness I believed in the homemade psychology provided by the Writing Department. It helped me "explain" my emotional states in a TRUTHwise way.

As an example, when the initial brainwashing and self-delusion ceased to work its magic on me (about a year after my baptism) I badly needed an explanation of my state which would allow me to classify my gradual disappointment and put it in the WTS-accepted framework, so that I could deal with it without refuing "the Truth". Here is what the WTS cognitive scientists had for me:

Voila!!! So it was just my "fist-love" cooling off. That's normal... And I almost thought there was something wrong with "the Truth". Happily, it turned out my feelings were all bible-based! Or were they?

Well, it took me another two years to figure out that all their explanations ultimately put the blame on me, Satan or the wicked "System of Things". Then I reached the conclusion that there could have been something wrong with me, Satan and the wicked System of Things 50%, 60% or 95% of the time, but why did the Watchtower articles never said there was something wrong with the doctrine?

Questions:

Did you believe in the WTS explanations of your feelings about "the Truth" and other emotional states?

How long did they make sense for you?

When your "first love" grew cold, did you try to rationalize it the WTS way?

Pole

160

Say Something Jehovah's Witnessy........

by minimus in

jw
friends

i know there's no such word as "witnessy" but this can be a fun thread.

Pole

Someone has already posted the "New System".

I think the "System of Things" phrase is even better. Funny that they would usually use it with the "Old System" like in the "Old System of Things". I guess there's someTHING terribly wrong with the connotation of the word "THINGS".

160

Say Something Jehovah's Witnessy........

by minimus in

jw
friends

i know there's no such word as "witnessy" but this can be a fun thread.

Pole

Dear Shulammite maiden, so lovely and fair, ta da ta da....