NotFormer

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Posts by NotFormer

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  6

  Tracy Chapman & John Mellencamp

  by BoogerMan in

  1. social
  2. entertainment

  did tracy chapman "sample" john mellencamp's song for her big hit, "fast car"?.

  @ 47 secs.

  - 55 secs.

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  NotFormer

  I just remembered a striking similarity from the early 70s. Compare Norman Greenbaum's Spirit in the Sky with Alvin Stardust's My Coo Ca Choo. I'm surprised no ambulance chasing lawyers went after that one.
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  42

  New meeting format

  by ExBethelitenowPIMA in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  just watched november broadcast very different order to the leaked agm .

  be good if someone did a deep dive on the difference and why the changes?

  i didn’t time the items but it should be easy to see if edited?.

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  NotFormer

  When hours worked in field service translated into sales of WT and Awake!, counting hours could be roughly translated into spirituality, WT style, that is, dollars earned for the organisation. Perhaps they will have to become more direct in equating dollars with spirituality. Maybe different tiers of donation. Everyone at the Kingdom Hall gets to wear a badge (purchased from the WT, of course!) displaying what level of "generosity" they demonstrated that month through their giving.

  They could, of course, resort to outright Simony and just sell appointments.
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  17

  The Apostates' Handy JW Glossary

  by Vanderhoven7 in

  1. social
  2. current

  perhaps this has been printed here before...but still it gave me a few laughs...so here it is again.. the apostates' handy jw glossary.

  by doug checketts.

  "anointed" - an experience that, unfortunately, no "anointed" one has ever been able to explain.

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  NotFormer

  "Class" - a "greater fullfullment" word which applies to virtually every character ever mentioned in the Bible. In the "greater fullfillment", the "class" which represents each Bible character is somehow applied to JWs. How do ya fit "Onan" in there, anyway?"

  I must ask about "the Onan class", next time a JW comes to my door (if they ever do again).

  But seriously, do they still talk about the various classes, Jonadab, John, etc? Or is that one of those things that is fading, like the whole types and antitypes thing? And 1914...
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  17

  The Apostates' Handy JW Glossary

  by Vanderhoven7 in

  1. social
  2. current

  perhaps this has been printed here before...but still it gave me a few laughs...so here it is again.. the apostates' handy jw glossary.

  by doug checketts.

  "anointed" - an experience that, unfortunately, no "anointed" one has ever been able to explain.

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  NotFormer

  I miss Farkel.

  ...and Minimus.

  I doubt they would miss each other, though!
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  17

  Punishment and control: the secret handbook that rules a religion

  by Tahoe in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  this article is behind a paywall: https://www.smh.com.au/national/punishment-and-control-the-secret-handbook-that-rules-a-religion-20231026-p5ef9z.html.

  a herald investigation has uncovered disturbing practices within the jehovah’s witness church, including the systems for discipline, punishment and control in a secret rule book for church “elders”.. australian children in the jehovah’s witnesses religion are being trained to avoid life-saving blood transfusions and parents are being coached to thwart court processes that may prevent their children from dying, internal church documents reveal.. an investigation following an inquest into the death of jehovah’s witness heather winchester, who died in newcastle after refusing a blood transfusion, has uncovered disturbing practices within the australian church, including the systems for discipline, punishment and control contained in the secret rule book for church “elders”.. the church’s blood transfusion ban forces people to choose between risking death by refusing treatment or being “shunned” – cut off from family and friends under the church’s strict rules – according to 16 former and current members of the church interviewed and the testimony of many others.. .

  some of them believe it has cost hundreds of lives in australia.. “i think it’s truly dangerous for children, who are not old enough to vote or drive, to be coached about how to convince a judge or doctors about a decision that is potentially life-threatening,” said fleur hawes, 32, a solicitor who escaped the religion and is speaking out for the first time.. in public, the jehovah’s witnesses’ leadership downplays the impacts of its ban on blood transfusions, which are based on interpretations of bible passages that say christians should not eat blood.. .

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  NotFormer

  Diogenesister, I suppose it all comes down to the legal responsibility thing. If they tell JWs to keep going door to door in the face of government mandates, it's pretty easy to prove the WT's guilt, and they can have the book thrown at them by the legal system. In the case of the blood doctrine, they can weasel their way out of direct responsibility by claiming that individual JWs choose to exercise their consciences according to Biblical principles. Saving the lives of a few loyal-unto-the-death JWs isn't worth overturning the blood doctrine. I wonder if it makes GB members happy to know that they can order their loyal followers to die?
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  17

  Punishment and control: the secret handbook that rules a religion

  by Tahoe in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  this article is behind a paywall: https://www.smh.com.au/national/punishment-and-control-the-secret-handbook-that-rules-a-religion-20231026-p5ef9z.html.

  a herald investigation has uncovered disturbing practices within the jehovah’s witness church, including the systems for discipline, punishment and control in a secret rule book for church “elders”.. australian children in the jehovah’s witnesses religion are being trained to avoid life-saving blood transfusions and parents are being coached to thwart court processes that may prevent their children from dying, internal church documents reveal.. an investigation following an inquest into the death of jehovah’s witness heather winchester, who died in newcastle after refusing a blood transfusion, has uncovered disturbing practices within the australian church, including the systems for discipline, punishment and control contained in the secret rule book for church “elders”.. the church’s blood transfusion ban forces people to choose between risking death by refusing treatment or being “shunned” – cut off from family and friends under the church’s strict rules – according to 16 former and current members of the church interviewed and the testimony of many others.. .

  some of them believe it has cost hundreds of lives in australia.. “i think it’s truly dangerous for children, who are not old enough to vote or drive, to be coached about how to convince a judge or doctors about a decision that is potentially life-threatening,” said fleur hawes, 32, a solicitor who escaped the religion and is speaking out for the first time.. in public, the jehovah’s witnesses’ leadership downplays the impacts of its ban on blood transfusions, which are based on interpretations of bible passages that say christians should not eat blood.. .

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  NotFormer

  Kerry, as someone who has always been an outsider to JWs (I never joined), I was flabbergasted to find that, two decades after I had lost interest in all things WT, they had abandoned the door to door work, merely to comply with a Govt requirement. The door to door work was sacrosanct, back in the day! It was their go-to distinction that proved that they were "Jehovah's people". And they dropped it like a hot potato at the first sign of government pressure!

  I said that to the first JW who came to our door after the WT lifted their lockdown procedures, that their "cowardly governing body" had folded in the face of government pressure. The lady said "But it was a government directive!"

  I said "You've defied government directives before!" (We all know how proud they are of Rutherford's jail time and how they sent loyal JWs to prison during the Vietnam war) She couldn't disagree with that, so she and her husband left.
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  31

  Has the Watchtower Faithful Slave become the Evil Slave?

  by Vanderhoven7 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  what evidence suggests to you that the wt f&ds is actually more like the es of matthew 24?.

  45¶who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season?.

  46blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing.. .

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  NotFormer

  Who forced the WT to forgive the Kingdom Hall loans?
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  9

  Lessons in Deception

  by Sea Breeze in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i recently came across a piece of historical trivia: italian singer adriano celentano released a song in the 70's with complete nonsense lyrics meant to mimic american english, to prove italians would love any english song.

  it was a huge international hit!.

  it made me think how the wt simillarly used a lot of stage props and nonsensical religious sounding words to fool millions into destroying their families and futures.

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  NotFormer

  They were great perpetrators of the lie, Seabreeze. Many people of talent and intelligence were caught up in it. And then that talent and intelligence was trained to be focused on sales and sales recruitment. While being told that it was doing God's work. The lie was enabled by the sound of religious noises. It's a bait and switch tactic. You're told you're joining God's true religion, but you're actually a salesperson for a publishing company.

  It reminds me of Amway's bait and switch. Amway is a business, and tells you up front that you're in business with them, although you are an (IBO) Independent Business Operator (it used to be "distributer" back in the day, compare that to "publisher"). They tell you that the Amway business revolves around selling product, to avoid accusations of being a pyramid scheme (pyramid schemes sell distributorships, not product, you see!) But the real business model of Amway is that you, the IBO, buy and use Amway products and recruit people under you as your "downlines". That means pestering friends and family to take a look at some mysterious "great business opportunity".

  Once you sign up as an IBO, you begin to be immersed in the real world of Amway. The emphasis shifts from selling and using the products to buying the marketing "tools" from your upline. These are various self help books and tapes that supposedly help you set up your downline businesses. The secret of making the big money in Amway is in selling the motivational stuff to your downlines. The Amway myth is that you make the big money by being "rewarded" for the business volume of the product being shifted by you and all your downline organisations. Those rewards come with titles, such as Gold Producer, Emerald Distributer and so on. It's when you hit around Diamond Distributor level, that you hit the big time.

  The compensation you receive from Amway itself at this level is OK, but it's not the licence to print money that you were told it was. The big money starts when your downline businesses are spun off as a separate Amway Motivational Organisation. This is when all sales of the motivational materials are by you to your downlines and you get all the profits. Unlike the selling of Amway product, your downlines see no part of that action. The real money in Amway is made by these AMOs, trading off the back of a somewhat successful product marketing enterprise.

  This is the bait and switch. You are told that you are creating a downline business that sells Amway product. But what you are doing is buying books and tapes from your upline, and encouraging your downlines to do it too.

  And when you join the WT, something similar happens. You start off attending "Christian" meetings, reading the Bible, saying prayers, attending home study groups. But you soon find that the emphasis is on Kingdom Business, selling magazines and books. The Theocratic Ministry School is a sales course, and the Kingdom Hall is a distribution warehouse.

  Or at least, that's how it was. As the publishing business fails, they are ironically finding themselves morphing more into the form of a religion. Time for a different method of bait and switch?
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  42

  New meeting format

  by ExBethelitenowPIMA in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  just watched november broadcast very different order to the leaked agm .

  be good if someone did a deep dive on the difference and why the changes?

  i didn’t time the items but it should be easy to see if edited?.

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  NotFormer

  Ex-bethelite, what is the change you refer to?
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  3

  Memorial Attendances 2020 to 2023

  by slimboyfat in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  following from the convention attendance thread i looked back on my notes to see the memorial attendances over the pandemic.

  this is what i found.

  i don’t have any pre-pandemic attendances but i’d estimate them around 80 to 90 or so in recent years.

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  NotFormer

  If you add the zoom numbers to the physical attendance, that seems to be a healthy increase. Do you believe the figures?

  BTW, whenever I see your screen name, I hear Weapon of Choice in the background 😁