Posts by Jeffro

53

JW Broadcasting—November 2015

by wifibandit in

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i09wzqof4zi.

ha!

that is supposed to make people go back?!

A couple of months after Geoffrey Jackson said under oath to the Australian Royal Commission that JWs who simply 'fade' are not hassled and that shunning is not the only way to leave the religion, they have a campaign with videos telling JWs to hassle 'faded' JWs.

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Jeffro

LostGeneration:

Semi off topic, but anytime I hear "lands" now regarding JWs, I think of Angus Stewart
Love how he cracked on the witnesses with a smirk on his face over their stupid usage of "lands"!

Ah yes... poor Mr. Spinks.

Q. I notice you use the word "lands" rather than "countries". Can you explain that?
A. I should know my geography better. How many lands are there in the world, Mr Stewart? How many countries? I've got an idea --
Q. I'm not here to answer your questions, particularly such difficult ones.
A. I apologise. You have asked me the question. I'm not certain how many countries there are in the world and how many lands, but it's simply - yes, I can't answer the question, but --
Q. What is a land? When you say there are Jehovah's Witness congregations in X number of lands, what do you
mean? Do you not mean countries?
A. It would include islands, so I think that is probably - it is probably not a significant point, but it would be 239 different islands or countries. I didn't write it. I'm not certain what it means.
Q. So you don't know why the language of "lands" is adopted by the Jehovah's Witnesses rather than "countries"?
A. Well, I don't think we refer - we use "islands", so whether there's some --
Q. Indonesia, for example - is Indonesia one land or however many it is, a thousand, lands, however many islands
there are in Indonesia.
A. No, you've got me, Mr Stewart. I couldn't explain. I don't know the reason.

He made things more difficult for himself by trying to deflect the question to how many 'lands' rather than defining 'lands' as he was actually asked.

Maybe they should add a section to the Correspondence Guidelines™ for when someone asks what a JW 'land' is.

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Jeffro

the girl next door:

For comparison, this is taken from the SDA 2014 Statistics: (notice "recognized" by the UN and Languages)
Countries and Areas of the World as Recognized by the United Nations 237

Without a list of what 'areas' they're referring to, it's not especially helpful. The SDA church has significantly more members than JWs, but because they are not a publishing company first (as is the JW corporation), you tend to hear less from them.

Languages Used in Seventh-day Adventist Publications and Oral Work 947

Their web page is a bit naff though. Where does one find their content in these 947 languages (more than JWs apparently)? Although having similar Adventist origins to JWs and just as ridiculous end-times beliefs, it's not as though the inaccessibility is a great loss to the world.

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Jeffro

eyeuse2badub:

Are they preaching in Syria? They could really use the "good news" in Syria! And I think that East Los Angeles considered a separate land also. How about Detroit? Those are some dangerous places that need the "good news".

They did previously report 'activity' in Syria (along with various other countries they won't admit to being in). On cursory examination, 1986 seems to be the last year reported.

Detroit?! You've got to be kidding. Way too dangerous!

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Jeffro

Also, they don't know where Christmas Island is.

According to the map in the latest Yearbook™, Christmas Island is in the Pacific Ocean. But that island (officially, Kiritimati Island) is a minor Island that is part of Kiribati.

Christmas Island () is an Australian territory (used for tormenting asylum seekers) located in the Indian Ocean. It is also renowned for the crabs that annually migrate across the island by the thousands.

Silly Watch Tower Society. Although in their defense, they are an American religion, so 'countries that aren't America' probably isn't their specialty.

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Jeffro

Up until 1997, the 'service reports' in the Yearbooks™ 'brazenly' referred to the 'lands' as "countries".

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Jeffro

Did they use to count the channel islands as separate lands? When did they stop?

Either the late 1990s or early 2000s if memory serves correctly. But it may have been in the service reports that used to appear in The Watchtower.

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Jeffro

Jehovah's Witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one UN member, of which JWs are present in 166). More than half of all JWs worldwide are in just 10 countries. Over 90% are in 45 countries.

To achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.

Tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the Society Islands, which is part of French Polynesia, which is part of... France. Ten other 'lands' are also overseas constituencies of France.
Britain's external territories make up nine extra 'lands'.
The Northern Mariana Islands belong to the United States, but are counted as three separate 'lands'; four other US dependencies are also listed as separate 'lands'.
The former Netherlands Antilles are part of the Netherlands, but make up six separate 'lands'.
Two extra 'lands' each are squeezed out of Denmark's and Portugal's territories.
The Federated States of Micronesia is counted as four separate 'lands'.
If Saint Kitts & Nevis is satisfied with one seat on the UN, how happifying it must be to make up two separate JW 'lands'.
Even Mauritius gets two separate 'lands'.
Norfolk Island is part of Australia but is a separate JW 'land'.
Though they are 'not involved in politics', the Watch Tower Society recognises Kosovo, Palestine and Taiwan as separate 'lands'. If they ever want legal recognition in China, Taiwan will probably have to disappear from the list first.

The 'logic' employed is not always clear:

Hawaii used to be counted as a separate 'land' but for several years, this has been 'reinstated' as part of the United States (along with Alaska which also used to be reported separately). It is not clear whether these unruly states had been disfellowshipped or 'disassociated by their actions'.
JW literature has reported that there are members on Easter Island (Chile), but this apparently is not a separate 'land'.
The Watch Tower Society seems unfamiliar with the English names for East Timor and Ivory Coast.

The Watch Tower Society reports that they also preach in 30 "other lands", though there are 33 UN-member states not included in their report. Of course, if they have trouble in those countries, there's plenty of other ways to 'increase' the number of 'lands' in which they're 'active':

Resume counting Hawaii as a separate 'land', and extend this 'logic' to Easter Island (Chile), Tasmania (Australia), Tokelau (New Zealand), and other islands as deemed necessary.
Resume counting Alaska separately, and extend this 'logic' to Åland (Finland) and Kaliningrad (Russia).
Count Britain as four separate countries (though this would reduce their statistics for 'Ireland', which they think includes Northern Ireland), and resume counting the Channel Islands as separate 'lands'.
They've already set several precedents for hiving off Tobago as a separate 'land' from Trinidad. While they're add it, count Barbuda as separate to Antigua.
Do some 'prison witnessing' on Christmas Island (Australia). Maybe send a sacked 'Bethelite' to Cocos Island too.
Send a sacked 'Bethelite' to freeze to death in Svalbard (Norway).
Separate Bosnia & Herzegovina into separate 'lands', and add Srpska to get three 'lands' from one country.
Grant 'recognition' of Azad Kashmir, Nagorno-Karabakh, Northern Cyprus, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Transnistria and Zanzibar. (Cyrenaica, Kurdistan, Somaliland and Western Sahara are in places that are somewhat less friendly and wouldn't do them much good.)

33

Creative day 7000 years, is this correct and how did the Org come up with this idea?

by Crazyguy in

any body know?

Jeffro

ttdtt:

They have kinda backed away from that, admitting the creative days may have been "many thousands" of years long.
Kinda.

Kinda is right. They don't still directly claim that the so-called 'creative days' were 7,000 years each, but nor has it ever been explicitly disclaimed. They now refer to the collective 'creative days' as 'many thousands of years', but never refer to them as millions or billions of years (though they apply such terms for the imaginary period between the fairytale-ish 'in the beginning' and the 'first creative day').

42

2016 Yearbook of Jehovah’s Witnesses

by wifibandit in

the 2016 yearbook is now on the official site.

pdf.

it has been added to the archive of all prior yearbooks.

Jeffro

The increase in peak publishers is 0.2% - the lowest since 1979.