FFGhost

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Posts by FFGhost

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  137

  Masks Are Coming Off

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  a number of states are allowing people to not wear a mask.

  some think this is disastrous!

  what’s your view?.

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  FFGhost

  f off with telling me what to do

  But government tells you what to do all the time.

  Governments.....um....govern.

  The government tells you that you can't murder other people, it tells you that you can't sell rotten food to the public, it tells you you can't start fires on someone else's property (and it provides you with a fire department in case someone does it anyway)...

  Protecting the health of its constituents is a legitimate function of government. You can't "pursue happiness" and enjoy liberty if you're dead or on a ventilator.

  If there is a once-a-century pandemic that can potentially kill millions if ignored, and the government says "hey, you know, maybe not quite so many hundreds of thousands have to die if we mandate that you take this painless, mildly inconvenient step"....I'm OK with that.

  Commence with the "slippery slope" arguments if you please, but that's the way I see it.
  
  
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  137

  Masks Are Coming Off

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  a number of states are allowing people to not wear a mask.

  some think this is disastrous!

  what’s your view?.

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  FFGhost

  In all the houses I've ever lived in, I've always locked the front & back doors, every night, without fail.

  Why? If someone really wants in, all they have to do is throw a brick through the window and climb in. In some cases, even simpler - just break the glass beside the door, reach in, and turn the bolt.

  Likewise, I lock my car every time I park in a public place.

  Why? If someone really wants to steal my car or search it for valuables, he'll just break a window.

  So why all the obsession with locking things up? It's not 100% foolproof, so why bother?

  We bother because it "discourages the amateurs". Most thefts are crimes of opportunity - the thief can easily gain access, no one is looking, he can be in and out in a few seconds. Locking the doors prevents most thefts, though, again, not foolproof.

  Why wear a mask? The virus can still get through, right?

  Sure - masks are not 100% foolproof. No one has ever said they are perfectly effective at preventing transmission.

  But they "discourage the amateurs" - in the case of the virus, they stop the majority of any exhaled virus from getting too far.

  It's not perfect, it's not 100% effective - but it's the best, cheapest, most effective way to help (not fully prevent - help) control the spread. Even if X% of the population don't wear it correctly, the rest of the [100 - X]% still make things better.

  It's literally the least you can do to try to control the spread of a deadly contagious disease.

  By now I shouldn't be, but I continue to be amazed & depressed at how such an astonishingly high percentage of the population more highly values their own hurt sensibilities due to "it's wrong for the guv-mint to tell me what I gots to do" vs. any concern over spreading disease to vulnerable people.
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  11

  Should I continue to help an "unbelieving" husband?

  by RiverPeace in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i know there are a lot of 'wise heads' out there on this forum - so i would appreciate your suggestions.. several years ago, i studied with a guy, whose wife is a jw.

  (he had studied with several elders before i came along).

  the study went reasonably well.

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  FFGhost

  An effective approach might be "what would it take to convince you that the JWs are wrong?" And don't let him wriggle out of it, get him to commit to some answer.

  Virtually anything he might say, it should be fairly easy to come up with examples.
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  28

  Australia: Jehovah’s Witnesses to join redress scheme for child sexual abuse survivors

  by yalbmert99 in

  1. watchtower
  2. child-abuse

  australia: jehovah’s witnesses to join redress scheme for child sexual abuse survivors.

  https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/2021/03/03/jehovahs-witnesses-redress-scheme/.

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  FFGhost

  So the JWs are apparently doing the right thing!

  Hmm, I wonder what their motivation is?

  Could it be remorse over their past failings?

  Maybe it's recognition of their moral obligation as a "spiritual" organization?

  Or, could it be they're concerned with "not bringing reproach on Jehovah's name"?

  Oh - they provided a quote in the article explaining why:

  The organisation says it will sign up because of new rules introduced by the federal government, which mean it would lose its charity status – and subsequent tax exemptions – for continuing to hold out.

  So there you have it - the reason they are joining is their utter abhorrence.

  Not abhorrence of child abuse, mind you, as they often pompously proclaim.

  Nope - what they really abhor is the payment of taxes.

  Decades of abuse of thousands of children by thousands of JWs - but they are not moved to try to reconcile their past sins out of shame, but rather a desire to hold onto as much of their money as they can.

  I don't speak Australian, but I think the term for folks like this is "F*cking wankers".
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  37

  Why Do Jehovah's Witnesses Dress Up For Meetings?

  by RULES & REGULATIONS in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  library.

  books & brochures.

  who are doing jehovah’s will today?.

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  FFGhost

  Probably not quite the answer you were looking for but...

  One principal reason is that JWs confuse "conformity" with "unity".

  JWs have a breathtaking, remarkable degree of conformity. They think this makes them "united", but that's not really the case. They are externally and superficially similar but that's not "unity".

  Conformity in dress code is just another example of this.
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  14

  Are parables literal or not?

  by RULES & REGULATIONS in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  “bible illustrations [parables] have more than one aspect.

  they … often have a prophetic meaning and application.

  moreover, some had a prophetic meaning for the time when they were spoken or shortly thereafter, and some were to have, in addition, a fulfillment in the distant future.” (insight on the scriptures (1988), wtbts, vol 1, pp.

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  FFGhost

  JWs follow the Golden Rule of Biblical Exegesis for Fundamentalist Religions:

  If a particular Biblical text supports your preferred doctrine, it is absolutely literally true. If a particular Biblical text contradicts your preferred doctrine, it is absolutely figurative and/or symbolic.

  The GB enjoys the power of having control over the actions of their adherents, so to better achieve that aim, they have decreed that Matthew 24:45-47 is literal - it is a prophecy of actual, true, concrete reality.
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  4

  helpful advice

  by stan livedeath in

  1. social
  2. humour

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  FFGhost

  I'd pay good money to see someone eat the pizza before opening the box.
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  113

  Try To Be Less White

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  that’s what coca-cola is telling their employees.

  .

  this is ridiculous!.

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  FFGhost

  Seriously, what has happened to this site?

  It's become an un - Q - lified success.
  
  
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  56

  JW Net and Politics

  by snare&racket in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  this site was and remains instrumental in assisting people that want to leave the jw's.. there has been political discussion here for some time now, a good couple of years and it makes me feel a little uneasy.

  i just opened up the site for the first time in some weeks, of the 10 posts being discussed, 4 were by the same poster, about politics, promoting their right wing beliefs.. this has been the trend for some time now, the same name behind a peppering of posts stirring the right v left of politics.. i remain forever grateful to the site and it's founders simon & angharad, i appreciate that simon shares some of these these political beliefs.

  it would be a shame to see the site evolve from a place for jw freedom of thought and escape, to political squabbling, that the world is frankly tired of right now.. just to clarify, politics is my hobby, whilst my friends read the football scores, i'm reading polling data.

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  FFGhost

  It would be a shame to see the site evolve from a place for JW freedom of thought and escape, to political squabbling,

  I fear and suspect that corner has been turned.

  it isn't a debate, it's a promotion of western, right wing, American conservatism

  Indeed, it seems to be more along the lines of "ha ha, let's pwn the libtards".
  
  

  
  
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  25

  Genesis 1:16 and apologists- vegetation before the Sun?

  by joey jojo in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  gen 1: 11 says: .

  11 then god said, “let the earth sprout [j]vegetation, [k]plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit according to [l]their kind [m]with seed in them”; and it was so.

  12 the earth produced [n]vegetation, [o]plants yielding seed according to [p]their kind, and trees bearing fruit [q]with seed in them, according to [r]their kind; and god saw that it was good.

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  FFGhost

  As I recall, the official JW doctrine on Genesis chapter 1 is that it details the order of creation "from the perspective of an observer on the earth". I have no idea which orifice they pulled that one from, but there you go.

  So, based on their tortured reasoning, the sun was created "in the beginning" at Genesis 1:1. Its light came through to the earth, but the earth was covered by thick clouds 100% of the time over 100% of the surface, so an "observer on the earth" would never have perceived the yellow ball in the sky providing the light. But the light would have been sufficient for the plants.

  Afterward, the teaching goes, God "thinned out" the cloud cover enough so that our mythical "observer on the earth" could perceive the yellow ball "from his perspective".

  The "water canopy" that supplied the water for the global deluge of Genesis chapter 6 is mixed up in there as well, at some point.

  Please, please, I know this defies about a hundred laws of physics, and things didn't really happen this way. I'm just saying what the JW explanation is, which works well enough on their adherents who are routinely counseled against reading information contrary to JW positions.