Posts by maxwell

46

4 year old pushes religion on my kid...

by flower in

so this kid at my kids preschool apparently had a goldfish named peppe who died over the weekend.

for the past 4 days he has been telling my son repeatedly that the fish is in heaven where everyone goes when they die unless they are bad.

my son in turn has been questioning me on a daily basis about death and dying and the like.

maxwell

Alternately (if your kid knows santa is fake) get your kid to respond; "Ha! and I bet you believe in Santa Claus too. Next thing you'll tell me is Oscar the Grouch is real!"

That is funny. When my little brother was in kindergarten, a note was sent home to my parents, because, apparently he was scaring the other little kids by telling them Santa Claus was not real. My parents didn't tell him to anything different except to do as the teacher told him and not to talk when he was supposed to be quiet. And basically my parents were amused that they were threatened by a five year old.

I have no children of my own, but it seems to me that a child that age will look to his parents as the highest authority on any issue. So I basically agree with most of what has already been said here. Kids at school and even teachers can say anything to a child, but the parent is the ultimate expert on any and all subjects for someone that age. The questioning may be annoying, but at least the parent is the one who they respect the most at a young age.

23

Price of gas....

by Atilla in

the price of gasoline sure is getting high, in my area it is about $1.65, i guess not too bad compared to other areas.

i'm not too worried because my camry gets pretty good gas mileage and i don't usually have to commute too far.. however, i think this summer it may reach over $2 in many areas.

i just wonder how this will affect summer aux.

maxwell

Americans complaining about gas prices sounds kind of funny when you hear European gas prices.

36

Do you really want to see JWs wiped out?

by ScoobySnax in

jw
friends

maxwell

Well I don't particularly want the organization to cease to exist, but I wouldn't mind. I don't see them as particularly more harmful than other religions.

Although, I don't subscribe to any religion now, religion has done and still does some good in the world. I can't say it offsets the bad, but I sometimes wonder who would have led the civil rights movement in this country, had there been no religious groups and what would have motivated people. Also religious groups run many charities. Of course, there are charities not associated with churches in any way, but the fact is at present, many charitable organizations are run by churches. So I can't subscribe to the idea of wiping out all religion either. I think a large segment of society needs to believe in something higher, whether real or not, in order to be able to function. You wipe out religion and belief, and you might have chaos or you might have to wipe out 80-90% of the world's population. I prefer the present situation to either of those situations.

35

Moscow court rules against Jehovah's Witnesses

by izobcenec in

jw
friends

moscow court rules against freedom of worship;.

ban of jehovah's witnesses in city to be decided on appeal

moscow?judge vera k. dubinskaya of the golovinsky intermunicipal district court of the northern administrative circuit of the city of moscow ruled today to liquidate the moscow community of jehovah's witnesses and to impose a ban on their activity.

maxwell

I just saw a short blurb about this on CNN. I couldn't find the story on CNN's website. On the CNN TV news they said among other things that they were ruled against because JW break up families. Very interesting.

134

Abortion, and the population explosion, what your veiw.

by frankiespeakin in

one of the very real dangers that we face today is the population explosion.

i read that the world's population "now" doubles about every 40 years,

this explosive rate is like cancer,, that no longer follows the proper cell multiplication arrangement in the body and threatens the life of the organism.

maxwell

I don't usually get into abortion debates because it seems pointless. It is essentially a question of where you define the beginning of life, the creation of ovaries with eggs, the moment the sperm fertilizes the egg, the moment the cell divides the first time, the moment it develops rudimentary limbs... Personally I would have to define life as beginning at birth. I can't deny a woman that choice, but it is also a choice that the man is not allowed. The woman can not have the child or have it without the man's say. If the man doesn't want it, and the woman does she can try to force him to give up money. If the man wants it and the woman doesn't want it she can simply have an abortion. It is not a fair situation, but not something I see any kind of fair way to change either.

It has already been stated that population growth really has no connection to abortion. But I think plain old instinct does have a lot to do with it. Whether you think its evolutionary or a natural desire a creator puts into people, most people want to have babies. The maternal instinct is so strong in some women that they feel incomplete without having children. Some societies look down on women who aren't fertile and don't have many children. I think a certain amount of that even goes on in our society. Couples spend thousands of dollars on fertility treatments. You can't change nature, but I think that's an illogical feeling or instinct that may need to suppressed. A person, even a woman, can still be a fulfilled, complete, great contributor to society without having children. I don't plan on having any children, but I think I have some worth.

I also agree with asleif_dufansdottir. We use an enormous amount of energy in this country and then defend it calling it the American way of life. We definitely have luxurious and convenient lives, so of course, other people in the world will strive to have a similar type of lifestyle. If everyone in the world starts living this way, eventually, we will either have to severely cut back our energy usage or we'll have to find it somewhere other than the earth.

3

ALL BLACK TO ME

by moses in

jw
friends

i don't know about other parts in the u.s. but here in chicago i went to a circuit assembly last year in romeoville and it seemed that 85% of those in attendance where black the speakers,volunteers,and those in attendance there were so few white people,i am not a racist but it just seemed so odd because i remember when i was younger it was the other way around is it true in cities and is the wts attracting more black followers?

maxwell

Yeah I agree its mostly the area. The US is still a majority white country and the JW's are still a majority white. I used to attend a mostly black circuit assembly back in TN, but then the city of Memphis is majority black, so it was expected depending on how they cut the circuits across the city. However, I would also bet that the percentages of black and hispanic JW are higher than the percentage of blacks and hispanics in the general population simply because religion generally appeals more to people in lower socio-economic classes. Growth in my area has been mostly hispanic congregations.

43

anyone now have an aversion to dress clothes?

by spike2 in

anyone else have an aversion to dress clothes, now that you aren't forced to wear a suit and tie (women insert their version here) to sit a stadium for 8 hours on a summer day?

being forced to do this as a young child traumatized me pretty good!

maxwell

I always preferred casual clothing, but I don't really have an aversion to dress clothing. Honestly, I would enjoy a few occasional events that require a suit and tie. When I first started my job, traditional dress was a shirt and tie and maybe a jacket. Then we moved to business casual so now I rarely ever have a need to use my suits or dress shoes. I have only used a suit and tie once since leaving the JW on a dinner cruise. It was nice change of pace. Maybe we'll go to a play or the symphony and that'll give me an excuse to pull it out again.

23

Will someone invite you to the memorial?

by JH in

jw
friends

.

most of us didn't go to the memorial since years.

do the elders come over once a year to invite you to go, or maybe a friend?.....or do they just ignore you?

maxwell

No no one invited me. I was disfellowshipped, so I don't think anyone will ever be inviting me. My mother did call and ask if I was going. She seems to be having a hard time grasping the fact that I will never return to the JW's. I told her last year I wasn't going to the memorial and repeatedly over the last year I've told her I have no intentions of making any steps towards rejoining the JW's. But she doesn't bother me about it too often.

14

Fling The Cow Game....

by FlyingHighNow in

http://www.flingthecow.com/flash/

see if you can score 300 or above and get into the hall of fame.

flyin'

maxwell

It took me three tries, but I finally got a score of 360 on the third time I played the game. If I'm counting seconds accurately, seems like a time of more than 1 but less than 2 seconds is needed to get a score of 40. I counted 1 thousand 1, 1 thousand 2, but if I wait till 2 it will go to far. If I let go on the last syllable of the second thousand, I usually got a 40. A relatively precise time piece and a little patience and this game would be a cinch after you figured out the exact time to hit 50.

56

What would be your dream career?

by LyinEyes in

jw
friends

if you could have any job, career .......something you are very passionate about , what would it be?.

i would be a photographer,,,,,,,taking picutures world wide, and hopefully be on the cover of time magazine , national geographic.. my second choice would be a makeup artist like kevin alcoin ( sp) , he could do magic and make anyone look like who he wanted them to be.

truely an artist and too bad he passed away.

maxwell

Porn superstar actor!

But more down to earth, I'd love to have a dual career. Half the day I'd be an electrical engineer designing circuits for and testing electronic musical instruments like keyboards or electric horns and maybe developing some new stuff. When I was in college, I read about some research done at MIT and a few other places on instruments that you don't even have to touch to play. You just move around in a particular space.

The other half of the day, I would play jazz music hard bop 50's and 60's style and some contemporary jazz stuff in the style of groups like the Crusaders or the Yellowjackets. I'd play my saxophone and maybe some keyboard or maybe the electronic instruments that I helped design.