I know I am a better person today than I ever was as a JW.
Now that's a helluva statement for an agnostic apostate to make!
Posts by Terry
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8IS DOUBT always an indication of moral failure---FAITH vs. DOUBT?
by Terry inis doubt always an indication of moral failure-- faith vs. doubt?.
human survival depends upon a rigorous balance between perception and the means of testing first impressions.
nature’s own test is that of eater and eaten.. inside the food chain, predators blend with their surrounding habitat.
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172
Are You Raising An Introvert?
by darth frosty inits not easy being an introvert in an extrovert worldespecially when youre a kid.
it is even more difficult if none of the adults in the kids life recognize that the child is an introvert.
this doesnt happen only when the childs parents are extroverts, but also with introverted parents who have never understood their own introverted nature.. .
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Terry
I was extraordinarily introverted until I reached Federal Prison and got the opportunity to study two fantastic people--and to imitate their approach to social interactions.
I learned to "fake it" until the behavior became normalized.
I don't think you can learn personality development from a book or a lecture. It has to be modeled by flesh and blood with whom you have daily contact.
To this day, internally and naturally, I am an introvert. But, like a reformed alcoholic, I take it one day at a time:)
People who know me well, would swear in a court of law I'm lying about introversion. I take that as a tribute to how well I've learned my lesson :) -
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The Remarkable Story of Lili Boulanger
by Terry in_____________the remarkable story of lili boulanger____________.
there are stories that cannot be written and shouldn't be told because the truth of those stories cannot be embraced on first hearing.
this is the life of a real person who appeared and vanished as though only dreamed up by an overly emotional writer.. lili boulanger was born to a father 77 years old, yet they formed an adoring bond almost from the moment she drew her first breath!
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Terry
Yes, indeed! Her work reminds me how many a genius was born and died in obscurity. Mozart came close. Van Gogh owes his fame to his brother's wife!
We live today in an era in which everybody has the opportunity to be heard and loved. There was no internet at the time of Lili Boulanger. I suspect, were it not for the fame of her sister, I wouldn't have discovered her or her story and music. -
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What does the rise of Donald Trump tell us about the USA?
by fulltimestudent ini thank one of my former lecturers for drawing my attention to this overview.. after some 100 years, living out its "manifest destiny" dream, as the hegemon of the world, what has this 'dream' done to/for the usa?
the approaching presidential election provides an opportunity to examine this question.. and what of all the appendage organisations (like the wts) that rode across the world on the hegemon's coattails?.
the answer may be here: http://www.vox.com/2016/3/1/11127424/trump-authoritarianism.
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Terry
The Topic has as a premise a basic fallacy.
It is a Category Error.
Talking about "America" is like talking about "Christianity" because there ain't no such thing--except as a concept.
The article you referenced feels like it was penned by a fringe radical POV rather than a neutral journalist. I did some checking.
Vox senior correspondent Amanda Taub
in each of the articles I've read takes the point of view that Terrorists were created by their victims. That's right, blame the victims.
Radicals exist within every microcosm in some degree.
We are not supposed to blame ISLAM for terrorists, right?
Then why blame America for Manifest Destiny?
Manifest Destiny? Are you serious?
The phrase appeared in an article in a very obscure magazine in Texas in 1845. The article was on annexation of Texas--not the World at Large! It was published in the July-August edition of the United States Magazine and the Democratic Review.
Not one person in a thousand would have read it. It couldn't have influenced people who didn't read it, could it? No.
So, it's silly to extrapolate backwards through actual history and try to make this a rallying cry of an entire nation.One wonders how solution oriented it is to lock the barn door after the horses have run off.
This approach to problem solving harkens back to a time when women who were rape victims were blamed for wearing the wrong clothes because it meant they were "asking for it." This is wrong-headed for rape and just as wrong for terrorism.
What does the USA have in common with a rape victim? Both have been terrorized by radicals.
Is the entire population of the U.S. guilty of "Asking for it?"The people of America have little or nothing to do with the policies of a President and his Military advisors and their often Jingoistic exploits abroad. Most often, the really unfortunate Black Ops, such as under Reagan (Iran-Contra) aren't even known by the President himself!
So, forgot the hegemony as far as dragging the American people into it.
Ideology splits people down the middle!
What Dems do the GOP decry. What the GOP does, the Dems decry.
Half the country, at any one moment, is displeased with what the other half is enthusiastically endorsing.Hillary lovers don't appreciate Bernie Sanders. Bernie lovers are dead set against HIllary.
The Republican establishment really dislikes Ted and Donald down to their toenails.The voting population is pretty much stuck with lousy choices, no matter what.
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Steven Hassan's interview on a new fictional cult film, "The Path" Fact-Checked: The Ugly Truth Behind Real-Life Cults
by AndersonsInfo inhttp://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2016/03/the-path-cults.
the path fact-checked: the ugly truth behind real-life cults .
part of hassan's interview: "a lot of the older cults that have been around for a really long time, like the jehovah’s witnesses, for example, and even the mormons, are having a really hard time with young people growing up in the age of the internet, because they’ve been basically telling lies to their followers about their history, and now people can easily find out what’s true and not true, and look at their own literature and copies of their own literature.
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Terry
The first thing which struck me about THE PATH is how authentic the structure and dialogue felt. TV and movies almost never get religion right. Two things authors cannot do, 1. Write smarter than they are 2. Create believable "spiritual" situations if they are non-believers.
This TV series comes closest to being Scientology without simply stealing or parodying. I find it compelling. -
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"But WHY would you want to know those things??"
by stuckinarut2 ini ran into an older sister who has always been very sweet.. it was a friendly chat...yet she pushed for a reason why my family have been missing from meetings for some time.
the question was deflected, until it just had to be said: "well, there have been some troubling and disturbing issues about the society especially the way things were handled during the royal commission, as well as many other issues".. she quickly cut in and said "but why would you want to know these things?
its best not to research and look at those sort of things - so we don't get upset!".
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Terry
Why would you want to know those things?
"If we choose to close our eyes we are choosing to live in darkness."
Hypocrisy is having one set of values for others and a different set of values for ourselves. If we go from house to door expecting others to listen to disturbing facts--why would we carve out such an exception for ourselves? -
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The Remarkable Story of Lili Boulanger
by Terry in_____________the remarkable story of lili boulanger____________.
there are stories that cannot be written and shouldn't be told because the truth of those stories cannot be embraced on first hearing.
this is the life of a real person who appeared and vanished as though only dreamed up by an overly emotional writer.. lili boulanger was born to a father 77 years old, yet they formed an adoring bond almost from the moment she drew her first breath!
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Terry
_____________The Remarkable Story of Lili Boulanger____________
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There are stories that cannot be written and shouldn't be told because the truth of those stories cannot be embraced on first hearing. This is the life of a real person who appeared and vanished as though only dreamed up by an overly emotional writer.
Lili Boulanger was born to a father 77 years old, yet they formed an adoring bond almost from the moment she drew her first breath!
What now to tell you that you would believe?
What if I told you her mother was a Russian princess?
She was.
What if I said her family was swarming with musicality surrounded by great music and the finest composers and performers?
They were!
1892 was an unusual time in world history, especially in Paris.
As to Lili herself?
The remarkable French composer Gabriel Faure', her mother's music tutor, discovered the 2-year-old Lili possessed perfect pitch and an insuperable attraction to everything musical. Yes, 2 years of age when the average child is learning not to mess their own diaper and will perhaps soon be able to walk--Lili was already glowing with a prodigious promise of something extraordinary!
Her 77-year-old father was a teacher in the Paris Conservatory. Do you suppose he and his wife would see to it that Lili would have only the most sublime encouragement? Yes, you would be right! Lili learned to sing, play piano, cello, violin and harp instructed by the most finest of teachers.
By the time she was 19, Lili was competing for the Prix de Rome.
During her performance, she collapsed due to illness! She was diagnosed with intestinal tuberculosis. Now this is tragic enough already--is it not? So young, so talented and with such great promise but living in an age when the science of medicine was unequal to the task of restoring her health.
I will now disclose an even greater tragedy; she would only live 6 more years.
Her beloved father had died when she was only 6--so great a blow--and now with only a few more years to carry on with her second great love: music itself! What could she possibly accomplish? After all, this was not a time for women to rise to the top of any profession. And, being so young and so ill would prove to be no advantage. What can I say to you now that will make this story worth the telling?
Read on, my friend....read on!
First, as an aside, I shall now reveal that her older sister Nadia would grow up to be one of the great music teachers and a composer in her own right.
Among Nadia Boulanger’s students we find stellar greatness in the likes of Aaron Copland, Philip Gass, Astor Piazzolla, Quincy Jones, Michel Legrand, Virgil Thompson, Burt Bacharach, Daniel Barenboim, Robert Russell Bennett, just to name a very few!
Had Lili lived longer--what might she have done? We cannot know that, but, we can now give our full attention and consideration to the very reason I have elected to tell this story to you.
I had not previously heard of Lili Boulanger and neither have you, I suspect. Quite by accident I was researching her older sister and ran across Lili's own extraordinary music.
One cannot talk about music to others except to say idle things and to grunt opinions.
What I will do for you is one simple thing. I shall give you a reason for curiosity in exploring the compositions of Lili Boulanger--and this for a very good reason: this young ill-fated musical prodigy was fully up to the task of imbuing her own work with an incredibly intense love of life. Her music is delicate, rapturously melodic, numinous with mystical emotion and incredibly well orchestrated.
Oh, I failed to mention. . .!
Lili drove herself to recover enough strength to compete for the Prix de Rome again and was the very first woman to win the prize! Her sister, Nadia, passed away in 1979 and was laid to rest beside Lili in Montmartre.
But, enough with words!
Try her music and be transported from this Earth to a vision of oneness with life, nature and the eternal. Let the music wash over you and absorb this brief voice of a young woman so soon departed from life.
Let us celebrate her in the transcendence of her genius!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5YQD7XEaEs
Why not explore her other works as well!
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True or False .... The JW Religion was Started by Amateur Self Avowed Bible Theologians ?
by Finkelstein in.....who were able to propagate their self devised bible theology by utilizing a printing plant which they themselves were the head editorial writers .
c t russell and the man to follow him j rutherford, were both not academically trained bible theologians but they certainly were inspired businessmen to the fact, charlatans of their own era and time.. the return of jesus christ and a new world order to replace an old wicked world order, was just too much of a marketable and tangible concept for those men to just leave alone.
they exploited the already existing belief in the bible already structured within the population to where they preached their created version of the gospel, the rest is now history as well their many self devised albeit commercially appealing failed doctrines .
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Terry
And speaking of Religion and Amateurs . . .
Religion is insignificance ritualized.
Worship is man's reaction to anthropomorphic awe.
At the core of religious ritual is a quaking appeasement by a lower life form of a higher one. (God=highest in the food chain.)
A sort of bribe transacts. I'll do this and that and it will demonstrate my abasement.
The BROKERS of this power struggle (between pathetic trembling wimp (mere man) and the being so awesome he/she/ it can wipe you ) inserts himself into the transaction.
These BROKERS tell you how to negotiate your lifespan and afterlife entitlements and how much it will cost. (i.e. Broker's fee).
Who are these Brokers? They are gamers, flim-flam artists half-drunk on their power to convince you of what they come up with. Some are simply
well-intentioned mopes who are self-deluded, but, canny. Like a drug dealer who not only deals but uses.
What is the baseline? How do we separate the honest broker from the flim-flam artist?
The HONEST BROKER treats religion, theology and his fellow believers with the highest respect. How? He gets as close to the scientific criteria of theory & practice as possible. Universities are established. History and precedent are honored and taught. Levels of mastery are ordered and maintained and licensed the same as in Law or Medicine. A religious counselor, for example, must study counseling and have knowledge of psychology and family therapy.
The Dishonest Broker is the AMATEUR. They have a sneering contempt for the honest broker and cut corners by pretending they've scored an end run around scholarship by GOING DIRECTLY TO THE SOURCE. The worst fraud perpetrated is pretending they've been directly SELECTED BY GOD to receive inside information! Why? No college, no exams, no learning languages, no peer review, no Master's thesis defense--in short, they COUNTERFEIT their bona fides! The Amateur religious counselor knows nothing of human psychology and could care less. Any human weakness merely means there is sin, weakness and a need for more strenuous effort.
That is what I mean by distinguishing the Amateur from the Bona Fide theologian, the honest broker.
This does NOT mean the man with a Master's Degree is not full of birdshit. It means he's intellectually honest enough to treat the birdshit as though
it were the Word of God and well worth 3-5 years of hard study!
If the founder of Jehovah's Witnesses (really Judge Rutherford who co-opted the platform built byC.T.Russell's fortune) had been intellectually honest about believing he had a red telephone hotline direct to Jehovah's heaven (with the spirit of Pastor Russell on the other end!) he'd have NOTICED HOW WRONG HIS TEACHINGS WERE and stopped making stuff up! But, he IGNORED is many errors. He simply didn't care about what was true.
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True or False .... The JW Religion was Started by Amateur Self Avowed Bible Theologians ?
by Finkelstein in.....who were able to propagate their self devised bible theology by utilizing a printing plant which they themselves were the head editorial writers .
c t russell and the man to follow him j rutherford, were both not academically trained bible theologians but they certainly were inspired businessmen to the fact, charlatans of their own era and time.. the return of jesus christ and a new world order to replace an old wicked world order, was just too much of a marketable and tangible concept for those men to just leave alone.
they exploited the already existing belief in the bible already structured within the population to where they preached their created version of the gospel, the rest is now history as well their many self devised albeit commercially appealing failed doctrines .
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Terry
What is an Amateur but a person who does something because they love doing it rather than a specially trained professional serious about study?
What would you expect if you went to the Emergency Room at the hospital and an Amateur doctor examined you and recommended surgery?
Would you trust them because they love what they are doing? Or, would you...umm..oh, I dunno sort of want a 2nd opinion by a REAL doctor?
Or, what if something went wrong with your expensive automobile and your next door neighbor walked up and peered under the hood and suggested
some radical repairs nobody else ever heard of? Would it be worth trying? Would you turn it over to them? Naw, didn't think so!
One of the big problems with the Amateur is they have nothing at stake except their ego. They didn't invest time going to special schools and earning a degree and passing strenuous exams. They don't have multi-thousand dollar student loans to pay off. They don't have a brick and mortar establishment to operate out of with insurance indemnity against malfeasance. There are no watchdog agencies guarding you against their malpractice.
An Amateur is just a big grin and a lot of opinion and not much else!
Until it comes to Religion.
What about Religion founded by an Amateur? What would the doctrines look like? Would they seem normal or slightly off-center?
Would you expect an amateur theologian to come up with some really wild, weird and crackpot "truths" they'd defend? Sure.
Why? Because, like the amateurs who write books about the Kennedy asassaination, imagination is all it takes to reach a conclusion. Evidence can be bent, warped, twisted, ignored or misunderstood. Amateurs read other amateurs for ideas. Why? Because they aren't schooled in difficult texts by real experts.
Religious amateurs go with their whims, deuces wild and end up so far away from mainstream they are convined they MUST REALLY BE ON TO SOMETHING.
When they predicted something wacky and IT DIDN'T HAPPEN wouldn't you expect to hear, "Aw, I was just enthusiastic--I didn't mean any harm. You shouldn't have listened to me so seriously."
Yep.
And with the Watchtower Society you have over a hundred years of Amateurs and more Amateurs teaching other Amateurs until stuff has to be changed, fixed, repaired, turned around and explained away constantly.
Why?
Because they do it for the love of the subject. They do because of their egos. They are easily self-duped.
That's what you get with amateurs.
______________________Professionalism means you are vetted.
It means there must be evidence, standards, testing, judgement and oversight.
Without a baseline you have nothing but imagination and rhetoric.
The JW's thrive on teaching ignorant people inside "tricks" that appear to refute a mammoth load of historical bullshit.
But, they don't go far enough!
The basis of everything they claim comes from that all-important BIBLE which has nothing but tradition on which to rest.
Non-experts who tell you what an ancient language really "means" are kidding themselves and you as well.
Jehovah's Witnesses are the blind leading the blind. When they fall into a ditch they call it New Light.
________________An amateur (Frenchamateur "lover of", from Old French and ultimately from Latin amatorem nom. amator, "lover") is generally considered a person attached to a particular pursuit, study, or science, without pay and often without formal training. Amateurism can be seen in both a negative and positive light. Since amateurs often do not have formal training, some amateur work may be sub-par.
Not to put too fine a point on it, dedicating your entire life and putting all your trust and hope in a Religious doctrine invented and sustained by Amateurs
is what got many of us former JW's into a bind.
The result is what tests the quality.
How fine a job have the amateur theologians such as Fred Franz and his magic chronology chart done in the long run?
The religion swarms around fake dates the way flies swarm around doggie poo.
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Politically Correct Wasteland
by freemindfade inthis was a comment i made from another post, but i would like to hear some people discuss this.
i know the social justice warriors will scream i'm some sort of trump supporter for what i say even though i don't agree with his ideas and no i am not voting for him... i accept this is a go to for them.. i think we have fallen into a pc vacuum.. criticizing someones religion = racism!.
telling someone to not be so sensitive = misogyny!.
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Terry
To nobody in particular, I say:
Let's face it, Topics containing controversy seldom bring out a well-reasoned, insult-free discussion free of pejoratives and Ad Hominem.I suspect it may sometimes be due to an inability to articulate the sense of what you're trying to get across.
This is especially frustrating when the person you are addressing simply will NOT take a moment to listen.
But, isn't there a significant difference between saying, "I disagree with you" and saying "You ignorant a-hole, you're completely full of sh** and I hope you die soon"?
:)
The anonymity of the Web bolsters a coward's courage.
Trolls and other catfish get their jollies by teasing a negative vibe out of a subject and spotlighting an individual for a pounding.
In the almost 12 years I've been on this Board, I've only tangled with about 4 posters with venom dripping from their yellow fangs :)When I'm feeling good, I ignore them. If I'm depressed or in a bad mood I might engage them. But--guess what? It is NEVER a good idea to engage a bully or psychopath.
The best place to settle differences is PRIVATELY one on one using the Personal Message.
Guess what? Narcissists won't do that because they like to show off and drain away the dignity and respect necessary to actually settle things, and they get off on negative energy.
I'm still learning to bite my tongue and avoid controversy.
Being negative and personal is a sickness in Society. I've never seen it worse than it is right now.
Here's how it works:If you don't exactly agree with me, then you are a worthless idiot. I'm going to publicly humiliate you!
That's not much of an argument!
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Nobody can blame you for wanting to have a say your way. That's normal. If more than one person complains about HOW you have your say--well, what can it hurt to reflect on the critique and grab a handful of self-awareness?
Humility is the scarcest virtue there is. I know I hope to have a little some day myself.
I enjoy opinions and insights and feel bad when any of us is in an aggrieved state of mind. It will all blow over and be forgotten sooner than you think.
I'm pretty certain, this too shall pass.
