this is sort of a continuation of threads on dubs and how they are conditioned to discipline their children.
someone questioned whether the society actually encouraged dubs to whup their children.
i only had enough time to dig up a few salient quotes from the wt magazine.
Jackson's blatant dishonesty at the ARC regarding corporeal punishment prompted the following article. It was a tough question, due to laws in Australia limiting violence to children.
https://www.jwfacts.com/watchtower/child-discipline-corporal-punishment.php
I remember the Hobart Central congregation Watchtower study conductor stepping off the stage and spanking his teenage child in front of everyone. And he was one of the nicer Elders.
october 1, 2017 to all bodies of elders in nigeria re: local needs for the week of october 16-22.
It is not a tithe, as they stress the amount is voluntary. This is about regularity, and well supported by the Scripture. It is not really that new, we have had this 30 years ago when building a Kingdom Hall.
Agreed that they are shameless in the constant discussion of money over the last couple of years. It seems they are intent on copying all aspects of the wealthy growth religions.
Too late, you are forever tarnished with the Apostate brush. This is your first step down the rabbit hole.
this just in from the 2017 annual meeting:.
1. watchtowers and awakes won't be released regularly, at least three watchtower and awakes per year.
6 magazines a year.. 2. a new book is being released: remain in god's love, more of an update like how they did for the what does the bible really teach book.
Study Watchtowers will now be simplified or rather be in a simple language
How much more simple can they get? The only thing stopping them becoming comic books is that the ink or pictures costs too much.
Cut backs are not the way to grow a religion. They need to offer more entertainment; become ever more like TV evangelists and Pentecostals.
i'm inactive here to the local jw's as i have faded.
i've been slandered and all that, shunned by some but not all, but the elders basically leave me alone.
i still run into to people all over though.
Brilliant come back.
When he tells other people about bumping into you and your son, he will probably leave out the last part of your exchange together.
1) he wrote woman are not qualified to teach (1 corinthians 14:34).
in my experience, i have been taught by both teachers—male and female.
some of the female teachers were too wonderfully effective.
Paul's beliefs were a product of his environment and times. His true genius was being instrumental in building a religion tenet that is now the world's largest. I imagine if he was born today, he would use his lust for power, drive and intelligence to become immensely wealthy running large capitalist corporations.
no doubt this has been discussed before, but if the 1975 event had never happened where would watchtower be now.
comments please..
1975 turned out to be a great marketing ploy. It is a bit like giving away a free trial, the ones to leave don't matter, what matters is that you end up with more customers than if you hadn't given the free trial.
The tremendous growth pre-1975 was far greater than the number that left, and the children of those converts are the elders and parents of many of the current crop of followers.
Get them in at any cost, and then let the indoctrination do it's work to keep as many in as possible.
i am translating jwfacts to spanish.
i am doing the "statistics" section.here are two graphs that show that the statistics have never been worse for the watchtower:quantity of hours required for 1 baptism: note how low it went in 1974-1975, and note that 2016 is much higher than the slump of 1978... about double, to be exact.
2016 was a historical record in this statistic (higher is worse for watchtower).. this stat is the baptisms as a percentage of the publisher average.
SBF- thanks for the link. The information is fairly general, so does not really present any solid conclusions. It is interesting to see that the growth of Mormons has not collapsed as much as JWs. Although their beliefs seem crazier than JWs, (although the "never die" teaching of JWs is crazy with far greater ramifications) they are more integrated into society, which seems to go a long way in those involved being content not to look elsewhere.
i am translating jwfacts to spanish.
i am doing the "statistics" section.here are two graphs that show that the statistics have never been worse for the watchtower:quantity of hours required for 1 baptism: note how low it went in 1974-1975, and note that 2016 is much higher than the slump of 1978... about double, to be exact.
2016 was a historical record in this statistic (higher is worse for watchtower).. this stat is the baptisms as a percentage of the publisher average.
Pornography
I am surprised this is not getting a mention. Internet pornography is changing attitudes to sex. It is readily available and IMO a reason there are a shortage of brothers reaching out. The higher that people get up the cult ladder, the harder to leave. Conversely, all those that are holding back for reasons of porn based uncleanness are more likely to become inactive or fade.
i am translating jwfacts to spanish.
i am doing the "statistics" section.here are two graphs that show that the statistics have never been worse for the watchtower:quantity of hours required for 1 baptism: note how low it went in 1974-1975, and note that 2016 is much higher than the slump of 1978... about double, to be exact.
2016 was a historical record in this statistic (higher is worse for watchtower).. this stat is the baptisms as a percentage of the publisher average.
SBF - Mormons did an analysis of their figures and concluded the Internet was not an important factor in growth or decline.
I would like to see their reasoning.
When it is said that the internet is not the only factor, do they mean that apostate sites are not the only factor, or the internet in general. Whilst apostate sites have limited reach, the Internet is critical to the collapse of Watchtower and religion in general.
There are a range of factors in addition to apostate sites. The generation changes since 1995, 100 years of no-show from Jesus in 2014, porn and the relaxation of attitudes to sex, the rise of acceptance of homosexuality, finding support groups through social media. Each of these have some relationship to the internet and access to information in general.
The decline of religion in general is largely to do with information, which is being more and more rapidly dispersed due to the internet. There are two areas that information helps, the shrinking God of the Gaps due to Science, and the realization that it does not make sense to say God resides in only one religion, when religion affiliation is mostly decided by one's place of birth.
I don't know how it would be possible to work out how much affect each attribute has to the overall decline of Watchtower, but it needs to be recognized that the internet is tied very much to so many of the reasons for declining growth.
