I can imagine the GB drooling in envy reading about the INC leadership buying a $200 million Airbus!
Half banana
JoinedPosts by Half banana
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21
Joe attends Iglesia Ni Christo church service
by joe134cd inwell i have heard various comments about them on here, so last week i decided to do an internet search on them.
i was quite surprised to find there was an inc in my local area and ironically only meters away from the kh.. it was very interesting to say the least, and in the short time i was there i could quite understand how they get there reputation as a high control religion if not a cult.
in some respects i think they are probably more jw than the jws.. let me explain how my visit went.
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Why the JW org should fail.
by Half banana indr margaret t singer, a professor of psychology at berkeley university california has studied the experiences of 700 cult members.
''consciously and manipulatively, leaders and their trainers exert a systematic social influence that can produce great behavioral changes,'' said dr. singer.. .
one of the ways the jw organisation exerts so much influence over its members is because it has created a culture sustained by constant propaganda, which polices itself according to how the leadership has moulded it.
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Half banana
Venus, what a typical and fatuous comment by the WT!
"More recently earnest researchers of the holy Bible have made a re-check of its chronology".
Its wording betrays indoctrination, it completely lacks academic authority, it was written for true believers to pressure towards conformity to their overlord's demands of belief. The statement relies on "earnest" researchers as if they really existed, no proper research project wants earnestness! It wants evidence and objectivity.
The other stupidity of this WT idea is the downright delusion that mankind has been treading the earth only six thousand years. How come humans were having sex with Neanderthals 300,000 years ago? Neanderthals died out around 30,000 years back.
Moral: Never believe anything the Watchtower or the JW org says.
But you're right, JWs are a social club first and foremost. If they stuck with that and dropped the religion they could remain viable (it would still be ugly) however I see them poised to fail due to the increasing light of social and technological progress, The world's toleration of primitive thinking which harms people has a limited shelf life.
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Why the JW org should fail.
by Half banana indr margaret t singer, a professor of psychology at berkeley university california has studied the experiences of 700 cult members.
''consciously and manipulatively, leaders and their trainers exert a systematic social influence that can produce great behavioral changes,'' said dr. singer.. .
one of the ways the jw organisation exerts so much influence over its members is because it has created a culture sustained by constant propaganda, which polices itself according to how the leadership has moulded it.
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Half banana
@ scratchme My feelings towards the JW org will not change by anything they do, whether they morph into a social club cum property scam or whatever, they have caused a lot of misery including pointless deaths and breaking up families including mine.
My hope is simply that they are exposed for the religious charlatans they are and that their grip on their followers' minds is released.
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A Graphic History of the World in Nineteen Minutes
by fulltimestudent ina great animation, showing the spread of humans across the globe (something like a troublesome rash spreading over your body).
then, on to the gradual poltiticisation of humanity.
interesting to watch the animated hi-speed spread of the mongol empire, which scared the sh*t out of europe.. the animation doesn't show religious brands (except islam, which was both a religious brand and a political brand).
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Half banana
Thanks FTS, terrific!
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Older JW: not happy
by Gorbatchov inthis week i visited my sick father in law.. then an old elder from my far away congregation came in for coffee.
did not see him in 15 years.. nice chat.
had a lot to say, is alone, his sick wife disabled and away from home.. he told me: "living alone is so hard.
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Half banana
Yes PE the cult leaders wouldn't want members to spend precious preaching time on helping worn out brothers and sisters instead would they? Yet that sense of family care extended to believers was paramount in the early Christian churches and a reason to join it back then (Jas 1.27).
You said it Lois, they steal lives.
I would like to see all JW literature with a health warning printed at the top of every page:
WARNING: IF YOU JOIN JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES YOU MAY HAVE YOUR LIFE STOLEN FROM YOU.
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Guilt trip
by Jrjw indid anyone have other jws try to guilt trip them when they were leaving or if you were making a decision which jws felt was wrong but wasn't unscriptural?
i'm getting people guilt tripping me to eventually get back with my emotionally, spiritually and mentally abusive husband who i'm separated from.
i feel sick at the thought of getting back together and putting myself through that nightmare again but i'm being told its what jehovah wants coz he doesn't want families to be apart.
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Half banana
Never feel guilty about acting according to your own conscience. The JW org has no right to dictate your moral sense and indeed it does take quite a while to shake off the old JW imperatives but what a relief when you do.
People are guilt tripping you not for your good but to to protect the organisation, an organisation which does nor deserve protection but public exposure!
Your life must be difficult at the moment but given time I'm sure you will sort yourself out... you can look forward to achieving that.
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Why the JW org should fail.
by Half banana indr margaret t singer, a professor of psychology at berkeley university california has studied the experiences of 700 cult members.
''consciously and manipulatively, leaders and their trainers exert a systematic social influence that can produce great behavioral changes,'' said dr. singer.. .
one of the ways the jw organisation exerts so much influence over its members is because it has created a culture sustained by constant propaganda, which polices itself according to how the leadership has moulded it.
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Half banana
Dr Margaret T Singer, a professor of psychology at Berkeley University California has studied the experiences of 700 cult members. ''Consciously and manipulatively, leaders and their trainers exert a systematic social influence that can produce great behavioral changes,'' said Dr. Singer.
One of the ways The JW organisation exerts so much influence over its members is because it has created a culture sustained by constant propaganda, which polices itself according to how the leadership has moulded it. Do you remember being a JW? One of the favourite subjects of conversation was to discuss the boundaries of what was, and what was not acceptable.
Let me give you a vignette showing the level of idiocy to which the Watchtower has sunk. About four years ago I steeled myself to view the JWTV and saw governing body member Tony Morris whose aim on this occasion was to decry “critical thinking”. The lack of critical thinking is the common objection to Watchtower indoctrination by its critics. Morris’s argument, if you can call it that, was that to examine a subject from different viewpoints was in itself “manipulative”! It takes very little education to see the crass illogicality of this comment but alas! JWs are discouraged from getting more than the minimum of education and worse still, they are made to feel socially compelled to believe what the organisation says “whether reasonable from a human standpoint or not".
“The systematic social influence” as Dr Singer called it, reached into every aspect of your life starting with defining approved people (those who believe the governing body) and the doomed outsiders (everyone else). It reached into what you said, what you thought, what you would wear what you did in the bedroom and virtually into every pore and molecule of your being. This is one reason why it is so hard to leave Jehovah's Witnesses and adopt a normal healthy viewpoint again. The other obstruction to making an easy exit is the threat of further social manipulation due to being shunned by your 'loving' family.
Surely an organisation which functions with these oppressive constraints should fail? The Watchtower cult has been predicting the end of the world since 1879 and never has had the slightest flicker of success, just a list of dire disappointments weathered manfully by the hapless membership.
The world is rapidly changing, we are vastly more informed and consequently are able to make balanced judgements ourselves, the old guide lines are being discarded and will leave 19th century Bible literalists like JWs as an appendage of religious history. The internet is giving access to a transparent appraisal of the workings of everything, including abusive and anti-social cults.
The JW organisation has no record of “divine” approval, it has lost credibility with repeated date failures, most especially the “generation of 1914”, it is intellectually bankrupt, the Bible is no longer seen by the majority as the ultimate guide for life and JW dirty washing is now being aired in public.
The JW organisation therefore is poised to fail?
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You might surprised how many JWs are homosexuals
by Roger Kirkpatrick incontrary to common belief, neither the bible nor the watchtower condemns homosexuality; however, they do condemn the practice of fornication.
homosexuality is same sex attraction whether such attraction is acted upon or not.
leviticus 20:13 describes a man having sexual relations with a man, or the act of fornication.
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Half banana
Sticking what out Slimboy?
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Anyone struggle to find meaning in life?
by Good JW injust wondering if this is a common thing for you guys and girls?
when i left the jws it was hard to make a connection with people, much of the time i felt that whatever they wanted to talk about just didn't seem relevant/deep/meaningful.
i find myself filtering my mind to get to a level with others (small talk mostly).
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Half banana
I want to blurt out that life doesn't intrinsically have a meaning. Why should it? That doesn't mean it's not worthwhile enjoying all the marvellous things in the world.
Life is short, we might as well enjoy this amazing experience before we return to the oblivion we came from.
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What Is The Major Reason Jehovah’s Witnesses Exist?
by minimus ini understand that cults and religious groups will always exist.
but why do jehovah’s witnesses continue as a religion that people will join?.
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Half banana
You might first ask, “Why does any religion exist?” Existential comfort is probably the briefest explanation as Xanthippe explains.
People want some certainty in a changing world and people want an explanation for why things are like they are. Explanations might satisfy emotionally but they need not be true. Most people who use rational thinking e.g. in the world of academia, conclude that there is no need to invoke spirits, gods or magic to explain our universe.
So down to the specific question “What is the reason that JWs exist?” I would suggest that it is due to the efforts of entrepreneur CT Russell and the fact that his Watchtower outfit had commercial success; an understandable event considering the religious appetite of people in the US at the end of the 19th century. Secondly, that JF Rutherford, after great membership loss, was able to print 400 million pieces of brain numbing literature at a profit to make the Watchtower rich. However under NH Knorr the biggest source of wealth was the impetus given by declaring the doomsday year 1975 which accelerated membership numbers and yielded a vastly larger income platform as a consequence.
What then is the major reason they exist? It is because they have a history of successfully deluding millions into a false belief of a reward of paradise if you comply with the demands of the JW org-- and making billions of dollars from it. Who but an honest moralist would bother to kill such a productive cash cow?