Half banana

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Posts by Half banana

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  11

  The New World , Utopian or Dystopian?

  by BluesBrother in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  like many others on here i was raised and spent many years of my life looking forward to , and basing my life around the anticipated "new world" .this utopian paradise would "satisfy the desire of every living thing".

  we would enjoy eternal youth in perfect health,have abundant good food ,comfortable homes ,even welcome our parents and forebears back from the dead - what's not to like?i found this description of a dystopian world on the net :"characteristics of a dystopian society• propaganda is used to control the citizens of society.• information, independent thought, and freedom are restricted.• a figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society.• citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.• citizens have a fear of the outside world.• citizens live in a dehumanized state.• the natural world is banished and distrusted.• citizens conform to uniform expectations.

  individuality and dissent are bad.• the society is an illusion of a perfect utopian world."hmm.

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  Half banana

  You can live forever in paradise...yes it is true you can... but only in your imagination!

  Underlying all new conversions to the JW beliefs is this hope of perfection. This dream is a very strong incentive to join and remain in the JW org... but like all delusions it cannot materialize.

  Utopia after all means 'nowhere' and that is where the ideal new world will ever remain.

  The dystopia lies in the present smiley faced “theocracy” of JW org where the members are held in thrall to the deluded leaders by fear and threats to their own disadvantage.

  Much, much, much better is to get a good education and learn how to cope with the real world and dreams should be understood to be just dreams methinks.
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  17

  Watchtower myth: God’s will discerned through committees, not individual leaders

  by Londo111 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  be it the governing body, or the a judicial committee of the local elder body, when a two-thirds majority vote is reached, it is viewed as god’s will, as the action of holy spirit, of jesus nudging the stars in his right hand.

  [and if i’m not mistaken, the minority is encouraged to change their vote, so that is “unanimous”.

  anthony morris alluded to this when he unsuccessfully tried to explain why the governing body is not dogmatic.

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  Half banana

  Yes Londo, perhaps like the camaraderie felt by crooks when successfully executing a crime...Or am I being cynical?
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  13

  Awake no.3 praises Dr. Semmelweiss for discovering disease-causing germs

  by Anders Andersen in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  in awake!

  3 2016, an article on dr. semmelweis states:.

  semmelweis was eventually recognized as one of the fathers of the modern antiseptic technique.

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  Half banana

  Or your lives or ANYTHING for that matter. 

  I wonder why they didn't mention the 1931 Awake (Golden Age?) on their disbelief in  germs?
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  8

  The first known graffiti making fun of Christians

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  what was the graffiti artist intending when he/she scratched this cartoon like drawing on the wall of a building that served as a training school for imperial guards and personal attendants in the imperial palace area of rome.

  it is known as the alexamenos graffito.. .

  our interest may focus on the crucified figure, but as a tracing of the drawing makes a little clearer - there's another figure of interest, a young male whose gestures indicate that he's praying, and the crudely written text says: .

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  Half banana

  FTS, there is a reference to this somewhere in The Jesus Mysteries. More reference might be found in Art and Death in Imperial Rome and Christian Triumph, OUP, 1998. Also J Toynbee, Death and Burial in the Roman World, Ithaca, Cornell University press 1971. My favourite source for early Christianity is JM Roberstson, A Short History of Christianity. Watts and Co. second edition 1937. Robertson uses sociology to describe the religious habits of the worshippers and leaves us with a distinct impression of various pagan christ-cults competing for survival, totally at odds with the modern notion of divine attention given to one small group in the first century.

  The early Jesus cult did adopt certain symbols such as the fish but then this was also found in the pagan christ cults (Pythagoreans and sacred geometry).The real cultural distinctions between pagan christs, notably Dionysus and Mithras and the Jesus cults were defined only after the Roman Church adopted the religion of Constantine in his thrust for unifying all religion. This took place in the first quarter of the fourth century followed by imperial edicts proscribing any other form of Christ to be worshipped and subsequently by careful destruction of evidence for the pagan origins of Roman Christianity; the one universal Catholic Church from which all protestant belief has later come. And I like to point out this includes JW beliefs.

  Precisely what Roman 'religio' was in the second century would be useful to define.
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  44

  Evolution is a Fact #36 - Mass Extinctions

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  250 million years ago a plume of molten basalt gushed up from the earth's core.

  it erupted in an area now known as the siberian traps - back then it was part of the supercontinent pangaea.

  a curtain of lava a mile high and hundreds of miles long lit up the sky.

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  Half banana

  I incline to Smiddy’s point that the benighted creationist or JW hasn’t got a clue as to the reality of the geological record and therefore have little chance of interpreting it. (How could any geologist be a creationist?)

  The Watchtower, in trying to defend its own fairyland vision of reality has decreed that radiometric dating is false and that you can’t trust either science or scientists and that the Bible is the only authority etc. Poor JWs simply do not know which way is up, they are beginning to look like simpletons.

  However this does not stop us imparting the facts as you are doing so well. Your post makes it apparent to me is that we are the children of chance. We happen to be alive, albeit fleetingly, when Earth can support human life and amazingly we have only recently developed an awareness of ourselves as sentient animals, able to know and describe our planet's dynamic past and also the present universe... and hazard a guess at the likely future.

  Life is precious as Louis Armstrong sang, “It’s a wonderful world”, unless that is, your brain has been contaminated by Watchtower or creationist propaganda.
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  47

  Why are witnesses all so highly stressed?

  by stuckinarut2 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  witnesses are so anxious, stressed, highly strung..... so much for ones who are supposed to be "the happiest people"..... thoughts?.

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  Half banana

  Who wouldn't be highly stressed if they had to live their normal life with a heavy ball and chain attached to their ankle...and on this heavy ball is the JW org logo?
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  15

  Higher Education - is it really the end of the WT?

  by OutsiderLookingIn in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  as a non-jw, before i started looking into things, i must say i only encountered intelligent jws.

  so i was quite surprised to read here and in the pew report about their low overall educational achievement.

  granted, my exposure was limited (less than a handful of people over a lifetime) but i met two of them in post-college education (graduate school) at a very good school.

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  Half banana

  The essence of the word "education" means "to be led out"!

  The governing body of JWs insists, "We are not against education, in fact we are for education but of the right sort".

  This  statement shows that they don't understand the meaning of education. It really means to be shown how to think not what to think.

  Constructive, useful-to-mankind thinking can only come from analysis of testable things but JWs can't distinguish between reality and myth...and their leaders want it to remain that way.
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  11

  2016 "Loyalty" Convention

  by Gayle in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  english .

  belleville, mi assembly hall of jehovah's witnesses .

  jersey city, nj .

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  Half banana

  Thanks for that Faye.. damn it!

  Perhaps an electronic spell checker here would be a good idea?
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  17

  Watchtower myth: God’s will discerned through committees, not individual leaders

  by Londo111 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  be it the governing body, or the a judicial committee of the local elder body, when a two-thirds majority vote is reached, it is viewed as god’s will, as the action of holy spirit, of jesus nudging the stars in his right hand.

  [and if i’m not mistaken, the minority is encouraged to change their vote, so that is “unanimous”.

  anthony morris alluded to this when he unsuccessfully tried to explain why the governing body is not dogmatic.

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  Half banana

  The JW org it isn't a theocracy since no god intervenes or has any input, it is simply an oligarchy (rule by the few) who decide on a majority vote.

  Theocracies are names given to the most dire form of political control, as if god were ruling. They have with the most sublime divinely ordained expectations but the worst outcome. It usually involves or invokes death to the non-believer or apostate. They are dystopias; the concerted realizations of foolish idealistic beliefs.

  Hell's bells, I was there once...............
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  11

  2016 "Loyalty" Convention

  by Gayle in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  english .

  belleville, mi assembly hall of jehovah's witnesses .

  jersey city, nj .

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  Half banana

  When the doctrines don't work, when the prophecies fail, when the religion is loosing its grip...what is the message from HQ?

  Well at least you scabby sheep can have the decency to stay loyal can't you?