Posts by Xanthippe

14

Strange conundrum

by doubtfull1799 in

i just had a thought inspired by @newboy's recent post:.

why is it that despite the watchtower corporation being arguably the biggest publishing house in history, having produced billions of tracts, brochures, magazines, books for o very 100 years, and having the largest army of volunteer publicity agents on the planet, that 99% of the population is still clueless as to what their message is all about?.

if you ask random people what jw's beleive you will rarely get the so-called "good news": gods kingdom is going to soon usher in a paradise earth and fix all the worlds problems under the 1000 year reign of christ.. you will instead get: "they're the people who... 1. don't celebrate christmas or birthdays, 2. don't take blood, 3. go around with the watchtower, 4. have big assemblies... etc etc".

Xanthippe

you will rarely get the so-called "good news": Gods kingdom is going to soon usher in a paradise earth and fix all the worlds problems under the 1000 year reign of Christ

Yeah this frustrated me for years that people see the JWs as harmless, nicely dressed people who knock at the door. When I tell them JWs actually believe Jesus is going to rule the world and they're never going to die they wonder why I didn't leave sooner!

I think many of them are embarrassed to tell people the crazy beliefs and the public don't read the literature they give them so they don't know what they believe. That's why the JWs like cart work so much now, they don't have to actually say anything.

91

Proof of God

by MrDantastic in

i'm an atheist as i do not see any evidence for the existance of a god.

i encourage critical thinking in everyone and am ready to debate anyone on whether or not there is a god and what that god might be like.

hmu..

Xanthippe

Thanks SBF, interesting man.

7

The transition from Faithful Slave to Governing Body

by john.prestor in

what i'm about to describe may have some bearing on the question of motives in the organization and the degree to which the governing body or the high-ranking men beneath them are self-aware.

a few months before the organization began teaching that the faithful slave meant the governing body and not the 144,000, so around early 2013, a circuit overseer visited one of the congregations where i was gathering data.

he introduced this teaching subtly in two of his three talks (the extra midweek meeting, the midweek meeting, and the weekend meeting).

Xanthippe

Yes I remember many times they would slide a new teaching in covertly like this. Then a few months later there would be comments in the Watchtower or by the CO saying "some brothers have not understood that ............. is the correct understanding of (insert scripture here) now! How sad that our dear brothers are refusing such meaty food from the FDS!"

Then you would be made to feel guilty for not noticing the weird new truth that had been secreted in while you were trying to catch your breath from all the JW commands to do more, more, more.

114

The biggest news of the year for Mr. and Mrs. Totally ADD

by Still Totally ADD in

jw
friends

this is bigger than christmas and birthdays wrap into one.

thanks to the australian royal commission our youngest son has woke up.

we received a e-mail from him tonight where he apologized to us for shunning us all these years, how bad he felt for doing this.

Xanthippe

Welcome former2free! I'm over the moon for you and your parents. On top of that you've no idea how much hope it gives those of us on the forum for our own families. So glad you could make it to the party.

88

Favourite female heroes in film ...

by LoveUniHateExams in

... well, obviously not rey (daisy ridley) from the latest star wars films.

she's a complete mary sue.

but, before hollywood tried to force sjw propaganda down our throats, there were lots of powerful, legit female characters in film.. here are some of my favourites .... ripley (sigourney weaver): i though this character was great.

Xanthippe

Geena Davis in The Long Kiss Goodnight. So badass when she reverted to her real assassin character and yet she saved her family. That immortal line when her daughter was hurt, "life is pain!".

I loved Sandra Bullock in Speed. The film focuses on Keanu Reeves doing heroic stuff but no matter what happens, even when she runs out of road and has to make a jump for it, she just keeps driving that damn bus.

Oh and I love Ripley in the Alien films too!

23

How do you feel you have progressed ?

by stuckinarut2 in

in the months or years since leaving the organization, how do you think you have progressed as a person?.

(or if you have regressed too i guess?).

what aspects of personal development are you happy with?.

Xanthippe

I try to avoid seeing people as faceless crowds. People are individuals and even in a group, family, work department, neighbourhood, race, they're all different. This took quite a while. I hope I've left black and white thinking behind, life is full of grey areas, nothing is simple.

I've stopped regretting my JW upbringing because there are so many reasons people live lives of poverty, lacking education. Often it's simply the country they're born in. So many reasons for life to be hard, being born into a cult is just one of them. I see it anthropologically, humans invent gods and religion to try and explain reality. Eventually these will fade away and I think history will show that sadly we were born at the tail end of that era but not quite out of it.

I've progressed physically and not just ideologically. I got a distance learning degree, a job, a little house and I'm enjoying travelling, seeing the world.

47

Why didn't I leave back then???

by silentbuddha in

sunday my old bethel roommate came up to visit me.

he left a couple years ago and he wanted to catch up and reminisce.. while we sat back remembering crazy things we saw take place at bethel he reminded me of a creepy instance with bro.

swingell.. it was a saturday morning and we decided to actually go get breakfast.

Xanthippe

But Orphancrow isn't this one of the guys who decided my sister and sister in law couldn't have IVF and would remain childless? My mother would have to stay with my dad because she couldn't have a scriptural divorce. The seventeen-year-old boy in my old congregation had to die after a car crash because he couldn't have blood.

Wasn't that demented old man part of the group that sat around a table and decided those things? I think I would have laughed, cried and left. Perhaps the op writer was too shocked and just laughed like a lot of young people do when shocked.

56

Do You Ever Wish That Hillary Was President?

by minimus in

jw
friends

hillary is very supportive of doing whatever it takes to undermine trump.

would you be happy if she were your president?.

Xanthippe

Hello from a country outside the US. There's a big world out here.

114

The biggest news of the year for Mr. and Mrs. Totally ADD

by Still Totally ADD in

jw
friends

this is bigger than christmas and birthdays wrap into one.

thanks to the australian royal commission our youngest son has woke up.

we received a e-mail from him tonight where he apologized to us for shunning us all these years, how bad he felt for doing this.

Xanthippe

I'm crying for you, such wonderful new. So happy for you!

25

Encouraging the nasty angels of our nature

by Lee Elder in

i see stories like this one, and think we are losing our way as a nation.

reverting to tribalism and racism.

i wonder if its always been there lurking beneath the surface, and it just took someone to encourage it a bit.. https://edition.cnn.com/2018/06/26/us/woman-berates-man-viral-rant-don-lemon-cnntv/index.html?utm_medium=social&utm_content=2018-06-26t08%3a30%3a04&utm_term=link&utm_source=fbcnn.

Xanthippe

Obama justified racial violence and tried to bias criminal cases. He was definitely more articulate, charismatic and a great orator (more like a cult leader than Trump, for all the accusations of the opposite). But when it came to policy he made things worse.

I don't live in the US and you may be right as you live closer than me but can I have the proof please?