Posts by Seeker4

95

Cognitive Dissonance is killing them.

by IP_SEC in

jw
friends

no not the jws.

its killing the obama people who are now finding out he's just as stupid/crooked as gwb.

"give him a chance".

Seeker4

Hey, BTS, on this board I'm wearing my just-a-human-being hat, the one with strong opinions about the WTS, science, religion and politics, just like you bro.

When I'm practicing my profession, I'm as even-handed as they come. I did a nice pictorial on the local KHall Quick build last year, I did quite a nice profile on a Benedictine monastary a couple of years ago, and my interviews with all the gubenatorial candidates in my state this past fall were without bias, and I voted for the Republican.

I'd be as fair with you.

It's just that, on this board, I can express my frustration with the nay sayers shitting on a two week old presidency. It's pathetic. Christ, last week I interviewed a guy who wrote the most outrageously prejudiced, anti-Obama letter to the editor I received last year. His view now? "Hey, we elected this guy, I like what I see and hear, let's give him as much support as we can. We sure could use the changes he's talked about."

Compared to you guys he sounds like an Obama worshipper - and he was totally against him.

No, I'm sorry, but you guys sound like the old farts sitting in front of the country store, railing against "that dang blamed" change and progress, sitting on fat asses and just complaining, loving the sound of your own voices. For christ sake, if there were ever a time the country needed everyone to lend a hand to create change, it's now. All I hear from you is the same old same old.

We need some serious changes. Lend a constructive hand or get the fuck out of the way and eat the dust as the future passes you by. It'll give you more to sit there and complain about.

S4

95

Cognitive Dissonance is killing them.

by IP_SEC in

jw
friends

no not the jws.

its killing the obama people who are now finding out he's just as stupid/crooked as gwb.

"give him a chance".

Seeker4

Not cognitive dissonance so much. I'm more worried about the folks who just want to sit back and whine no matter what happens, who are just cynical and defeatist and depressed. They're killing us all.

Sorry, Ip, you're usually my man, but I gotta call you on this one. I need to have a sense of hope after these past eight years. I'm trying to pull myself out after feeling like I've been buried in shit up to my neck.

I know Obama's expectations are too high to attain, but I've gotta have a sense of hope that he's bright, surrounding himself with bright people, and I'm pleased as hell with what I've seen so far - despite the tax issues with a few of his first choices. Daschle is gone, maybe for good or maybe not. Everyday I'm reading and hearing things that I really like. We may not get paradise, but I'm not expecting it. I just want to be proud to be an American again.

Sorry, I think it's time to stop faultfinding and nitpicking and time to start helping out and building a sense of hope.

Than again, I'm a cheerful optimist, and it drives my depressed co-workers nuts!

S4

64

Your best pick-up line?

by Newborn in

jw
friends

i've got a few "would you care for a nice massage?

" lately... and guys i have to tell you... it's not working!!!.

/newby.

Seeker4

My favorite pick-up line:

"I just read something very interesting in the latest Awake! magazine I'd like to share with you (insert fascinating point from latest magazine here). If you'd like to learn more, I'd be glad to leave you this issue of the Awake! along with its companion magazine, The Watchtower. The magazines are free, but if you'd like to make a donation to our world wide preaching work, I'd be glad to accept it."

I always found this approach appealed to women of fine, spiritual virtue who would appreciate a youth of righteous inclination and wearing a nice white short-sleeved dress shirt with a narrow tie, such as myself.

You can find similar, super-effective lines in most any Kingdom Ministry.

S4

13

If I had been on that US Airways plane...

by Newborn in

jw
friends

...that crashed into the hudson river...i'd never go on a plane again.

amazing noone was killed - i salute the captain as well!!.

/newborn.

Seeker4

I have a pilot's license, and though I don't fly commercial planes like that one, I understand what an incredible job that pilot did.

At the speed that plane was going, hitting the water in the wrong way would have been little different from hitting concrete.

With both engines out and literally having to respond with incredible precision essentially every second of the event, these pilots brought that plane down perfectly on the river. Dipping one wing down, catching one of the engines in the water and not the other - any slight mistake in control would have resulted in many, many deaths.

I salute that pilot's skill and professionalism.

I agree that flying is the safest way to travel. But when things go wrong, the chances of surviving a plane crash have to be much lower than your chances of surviving a car crash. Fortunately, there are far fewer plane crashes!

S4

18

What is jw view on vanity publishing?

by badboy in

jw
friends

have they ever said anything about the subject?.

Seeker4

The WTS helped Marley Cole initially vanity publish his "Faith on the March" personal history of the JWs.

I found that out when my then-wife, many decades ago, sent for some self-publishing info for me, and there in their advertising lit was info on Cole's book, which with the WTS's help, they noted, became one of their biggest sellers.

Self-publishing today is becoming a much more acceptable means of getting your work out, made easier through computers, the Net, and print on demand.

S4

15

Why r JWs allowed to buy/trade with stocks when lottery is forbidden?

by Newborn in

jw
friends

it's basically the same thing?.

but then again there's a lot that doesn't make sense, at all....

Seeker4

If you think buying stocks in a company carries the same odds for success or failure as buying a lottery ticket, you don't have much of an understanding of our economic system! As the current situation for most stocks shows, there can be serious downturns and people can certainly lose a lot of money. BUT, overall, historically the market has MADE money over every decade. While your odds of buying a winning lottery ticket are perhaps millions to 1 against, the odds of making money over the long term from investing in a good mutual fund, say, are very much in your favor. Personally, I don't slight the WTS at all for allowing members to invest their money. Also, how do you get paragraphs on this new website, using a G4 Mac with Safari??? S4

58

Did You Know Any "Gay" Jehovah's Witnesses?

by minimus in

jw
friends

i suspect a few witnesses were not "straight" but didn't act on their sexual preferences.. i knew one up and coming bethelite who was approached by the bethel heavies and talked to about his "effeminate mannerisms" and was pretty much told that he could become a more prominent menmber of the bethel family if he "became more masculine looking" and preferably found a bethel sister to marry.

he followed the counsel and was thereafter a regular designated bethel speaker at district conventions.

interestingly, all of his bethel buddies thought the whole scenario was a hoot, knowing that he was really an effeminate man suddenly now looking very hetero..

Seeker4

Oh yes! I always said straight out (pun intended) for years that there were gay JWs, and gay JWs at Bethel. Some JWs were shocked at that statement, and I was told by a few, "You can't be gay and be a JW!" But you most certainly can - you simply cannot in any way ACT on your homosexuality. I had many a discussion with long time Bethelites who spoke openly about the gay brothers at Bethel, and I've met more than one obviously gay Bethelite. No surprise there - I would imagine that a lot of gay brothers see Bethel as a "safe" way to remain a faithful JW. But, as the gay scandal at Bethel in the 60s or 70s (can't remember which years) where some 50-60 were removed shows, Bethel might be the LEAST safe place for gay bros! Needless to say, that is a huge burden, and most of the gay JWs I know went the route that many here did - they left the Witnesses and went on to enjoy a full gay life. I had three close elder/MS friends who were married with many kids each who eventually left their wives for gay men. I had two very close friends who left and came out of the closet. One actually came back and was reinstated. He lived with his JW mother and recently died. I always wondered how he did that, and I recently talked with his ex-wife (he tried marriage, very unsuccessfully two times!), and she told me that after he died she and his daughters had to go through his belongings, and found a lot of gay porn. Guess it was a little harder to get out of the gay life than he expected. There was a well-known elder in Maine that I knew, who was gay, and had openly lived that life prior to becoming a JW. Needless to say, he didn't last as a Witness. I know a family of Witnesses here in Vermont. They have five grown kids, the three girls are out of the Witnesses, the two boys are in. One is married, the other Pioneers and is, as his sisters have told me, "gay, but he just doesn't know it yet!" I only know right off of one sister, very beautiful, who I was told by her friends that she definitely preferred women, but being a good JW went into what seems to be a sad and frustrating marriage and Pioneer life. Wait, I remember that who used to post on here as Dedalus, his mother eventually came out and is in a happy lesbian relationship the last I heard. And, oh yes, a lot of these brothers were definitely counseled to act "less gay." Ha! S4

46

Another 1975 explanation - get your barf bag

by kurtbethel in

this is from a jw discussion group that tends to be full of apologists for the teachings.

when we lived in livermore, ca a special talk was given by brother from bethel.

he used an illustration that really stuck with me to describe the role of the fds.

Seeker4

I used your points, ONTheWayOut, when I was on the wayout and a CO and a local elder came to see me.

In the middle of the discussion, I told them, "The F&DS can be either a bunch of men making the best cases they can, or they can be directed by god's spirit, but they can't be both. They can't be just men when they screw up but directed by Holy Spirit when they think they've hit a home run."

That "spirit directed" concept is just such utter nonsense.

S4

74

What's Happened To The Boston Celtics?

by minimus in

jw
friends

the world champions can't win a game anymore!.

who do you think will win the championship this year?

if i were to have answered that question a month ago, i would've said celtics all the way!.

Seeker4

Warlock, is there nothing we can agree on??

S4

8

Big HS Reunion this year. classmates.com anyone?

by coffee_black in

jw
friends

my 40th reunion is coming up this year...

yikes!!!!!!!

anyone else here listed on classmates.com?

Seeker4

Hey, JagBass, I graduated in 70!

I live in the area I went to school in, so I can sometimes visit the RiteAid and have a class reunion! My class was small, 90-something, so we all pretty much knew each other.

The only guy I ever had a serious beef with in my class turned into a thug and went to prison and may be dead now for all I know. He was one of those guys that looked 35 when he graudated!

Other than that I was pretty well liked and got along with everyone, not bad for a JW who didn't go to any dances or play any sports. Hey, by this time in my life I've even slept with te girl that I'd always wanted to sleep with in high school - so even the fantasies have worked out.

I've been to my 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th, 25th, 30th and 35th reunions. Now we have them at really well-liked (gay) classmate's house, rent some tents, tables and chairs, cookout, drink, relax, talk and work on a class float for a week or two. A few classmates that I really liked have never come to one, and often don't live in the area. I watch the obits, and if I happen to see where one of them has lost a parent or grandparent, I'll go to the visiting hours to say hi and see how they are doing.

Ah, smalltown life where alumni is a HUGE, four day event timed to coincide with Father's Day every year.

S4