Posts by Sassenach

37

Final Observations

by Esmeralda in

jw
friends

i'm an observant person.

i became that way back in what i call the 'wallflower years' of my life, when i could very easily blend into the woodwork of any room i walked into without anyone looking up.

i became a student of human nature and watched how people interacted, and that study has come in handy at many points.. sometimes, though, i don't realize when i'm opening a can of worms.

I don't agree. A lot of people came in from h2o, but the trouble I've witnessed here
wasn't even from the h2o people! For a while it was a couple of the old timers
that were squabbling, logical was spamming the chat, then some we had some "troll(s)" I don't know
if they were even from h2o.

Most of the ones from h2o that I have had the opportunity to chat with have been fun and
interesting. Sure, there are the odd ones, but you already had some oddities here too!

If Simon wanted a private forum, he could've created one. This is what he chose.

It's too bad you don't feel welcome Esmerelda. You were warmly welcomed and your posts
get terrific responses. I think you're really being unfair. Did you really think you could write
a post accusing people of being unwelcoming and not get a response? I don't believe so.

If someone is insulting and rude (eg. fred hall) and another person tells him so, does that involve you?
It's just bizarre that you've made this about you.

I'm really sorry because I have enjoyed reading your posts. I'm observant too. I've seen people welcome
you enthusiastically and respond kindly to you. They have been receptive and in that last thread you made,
they tried in vain to welcome you (again).

Best wishes,
Take care of yourself.
Sass

20

Hysterical Men & Women!

by trevor in

jw
friends

to waiting - (and all you lurkers out there - what you looking at - this is private?).

i'm little confused.

though i have no recollection of calling you hysterical, let's say i did and i've forgotten.. you say that to call you hysterical is 'a gender related criticism.

Sassenach

And if I could have found the thread, I would have caught my error sooner. I tried "typical"
also - but it pulled up zip.

Hi Waiting,

I got zip at first too, but I'd left it at "7 days" as the search time. I changed it to 3 months and got the thread.

Hope you had a good weekend.

20

Hysterical Men & Women!

by trevor in

jw
friends

to waiting - (and all you lurkers out there - what you looking at - this is private?).

i'm little confused.

though i have no recollection of calling you hysterical, let's say i did and i've forgotten.. you say that to call you hysterical is 'a gender related criticism.

Sassenach

Trevor,

It's easy to find threads if you know the title. I think it was 7of9 that said the name of the thread. I went to search and typed in "typical" because that was in the title and looked back a few months. The thread came up. I was curious enough to look for it and thought you might like to see it too.

Yes, six said it in jest and that was obvious. I didn't post it to make trouble for him, sorry six!!

Take care

Sass

1

The Nun Joke

by Big Jim in

this nunn dies and goes to heaven, when she gets there st.peter tells her that they are all full and that she could pick whoever she wanted to be for a week back on earth.. she tells st.peter she would like to be sandy pippe line.

st. peter does not know who she is talking about so he says he will have to look into the birth records to get more information.. so he looks and he can find no record of a sandy pippe line ever being born and he informs the nunn of this.. the nunn says oh yes let me show you, so she reaches in her pocket and pulls out a newspaper clipping and hands it to him.. st.peter reads it and his face turns all red and he tells the nunn he says no sister this reads the sandy pipe line laid by 100 men in one week.

Sassenach

I love that joke. The version I heard was with "sara pipeline" pronounce pip-ee-lean-ee. Or Sahara Pipeline

20

Hysterical Men & Women!

by trevor in

jw
friends

to waiting - (and all you lurkers out there - what you looking at - this is private?).

i'm little confused.

though i have no recollection of calling you hysterical, let's say i did and i've forgotten.. you say that to call you hysterical is 'a gender related criticism.

Sassenach

Trevor, you said:

I'm little confused. Though I have no recollection of calling you hysterical, let's say I did
and I've forgotten.

In the "disgusted with you" thread, Waiting wrote:

When I was angry about the classification of a "typical
jw woman" - who would not stand up for her children (by Randy Watters)...snip...Trevor lightly said that I
shouldn't "get hysterical" - which I took offense at too (and that is gender related
criticism).

I reread the thread in question: She declined to testify-typical

here it is: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.asp?id=2985&site=3#38801

In the thread sixofnine wrote:

Waiting, aren't you getting a bit hysterical?
Six taking cover now.

I don't even see your name in the thread.

This is funny! I just noticed Waiting's quote above

If you're gonna gripe, gets your facts straight. Author Unknown

21

All us on the board need to pitch in to help JanH

by jelly in

jw
friends

janh,.

i have noticed several times when you refer to americans you use the phrase 'merkins'.

now as far as slurs go that one is pretty lame, really i have lived here all my life (32 years) and i have never heard any american talk like that.

Sassenach

Where I come from we say "merkins" too

No wait, now that I think about it, we actually say "mur-a-kins", with the emphasis on the mur.

"Are those my white knee socks, Jan?"--Marcia Brady

67

Are JW women repressed in the org?

by Tina in

jw
friends

in another thread titled why?

in the beliefs and practices forum,.

i have an exchange going on with another woman.

Sassenach

Hi Flowerpetal and all

I just wanted to add my comments here. The magazines and the talks I have heard acknowledge that women are subservient to men. That the man is the head of the woman and she must be in submission to him. I read one article that said even if a woman is more intelligent than her husband, she must respect him as the head and humbly remain submissive. The jw women I know acknowledge that woman are subservient, but say "but we are happy". They don't pretend that woman are given equal treatment, but excuse it by using scripture to support it.

I heard an experience one time at a convention. A daughter spoke of her abusive father who was in opposition to the "truth". The elders encouraged her mother to remain with him and be submissive. The touching end of the story was that after all those years of abuse, the family was rewadred when the father became a witness. Now if that isn't a recommendation to accept abuse, then I don't know what is.

Sass

114

I cryed today...

by silentlambs in

i recieved this note from a young person i know personally.

it brought tears to my eyes for someone so young to see things so clearly.

why can't six million others see this simple reality and the need for change?.

Sassenach

Hello Wayne,

Thanks for your response. This is from your original post:

And, in all likelihood, if a local accusation of an incidence is "covered up"
within the congregation there was not enough evidence to support the plaintiff. When a
criminal accusation cannot be substantiated by the elders of a congregation the plaintiff
is indeed encouraged not to spread their accusations among the flock. This protects all
of the flock from alienating the one who was not proven to be guilty of scriptural
wrongdoing. However, if the individual plaintiff is convinced that they have a criminal
complaint then they are NOT discouraged from going to the authorities and filing criminal
charges.

To me, it sounded as though you, without any first hand knowledge of the situations, knew exactly what took place and how and why things were handled the way they were. That to me is not balance. That is having a predetermined view and a refusal to actually listen to the particulars of the given situation.

In the accounts that I have read, the individuals were encouraged to remain silent. You maintain that they are not discouraged from going to the authorities--basically calling them liars and dismissing their complaints. "This is the way it is done, end of story". That's not balance.

Thanks again for your reply and I admire you for sticking with the thread and replying to all involved-even though I don't believe you have enough information to make the statement above. I do wonder how much experience you have had with judicial matters--not the receiving end, but from the perspective that Silentlambs has had.

114

I cryed today...

by silentlambs in

i recieved this note from a young person i know personally.

it brought tears to my eyes for someone so young to see things so clearly.

why can't six million others see this simple reality and the need for change?.

Sassenach

Such a welcome. Bring it on so I can cherish the vat [I mean vast]amout of lard, [I mean
love] that I have stumbled into.

I'm not surprised at the welcome you received. You basically brushed away actual cases of child molestation as irrelevent because JWs have a lower incidence than the general population (according to you).

If there were cases of child molestation that were handled improperly by the society's elders, then the society needs to account for that. The incidence does not matter.

BTW, I am also a psychology major (developmental and abnormal psych). I do not believe that you know the incidence of child molestation in the JW society. Even if you had a figure, it would be meaningless, because Silentlambs is also speaking of cases that were not reported. How in the world did you get a statistic from unreported cases of child molestation?

If elders are required to call the head office (or whatever you call the top guys) to ask for advice, then it follows that the head office knows that their elders are dealing with cases of child molestation. It also follows that the society is responsible for ensuring that their elders are equipped to handle such cases.

BTW, welcome to the board

25

1975 - After 26 years isn't it time to move on?

by digderidoo in

jw
friends

i'm relatively new on this site...but one subject i've noticed that seems to create alot of interest is that of 1975.. our family became witnesses it 1983 so i wasn't around at the time.

forgive me if i do not understand why many were so angry with the wts at the time.. i understand the point that the society blamed individual witnesses and didn't take any responsibility themselves.

i can see how witnesses got angry over that.. but, what i do not understand is why many still research into what the society said, or didn't say, or insinuated.

Sassenach

Hi Didg,

Any jehovah's witness that I have asked about the date, denies it. They told me that it was no big deal, no one taught or thought that armageddon was going to happen that year. They said that all the society ever said was that Adam would be 6,000 years old. It's interesting for me to see the research and to witness the group amnesia in action. These people claim that they were around during that time, yet never even noticed anything extraordinary going on. Either they are lying to me, or they have deluded themselves. When you're researching a religion, that sort of thing is significant.

I think it also serves as a valuable lesson-don't put too much trust in these guys. They mislead people and then act as though it was the follower's fault for trusting their lead. How can anyone take them seriously? I hear talks and read articles about listeningt o the ones "taking the lead", that they were put in place by holy spirit. Hopefully people that know the facts of 1975 will think twice before believing that.