Posts by spider

32

New Web Site Introduction

by Marvin Shilmer in

jw
friends

this is to announce a newly refurbished web site at jwtruth.com.

this site intends to work as a clearing house of information about the wts and its religious abuses.

the site will also aid activists who want the wts to stop its religious abuses.

Journal of Church and State: WT NO-BLOOD EXPOSE'

by AndersonsInfo in

(baylor university, waco, tx) an essay entitled, "jehovah's witnesses, blood transfusions, and the tort of misrepresentation," found in the autumn issue of baylor universitys prestigious journal of church and state, published december 13, 2005, exposes the vulnerability of jehovahs witnesses religious organization to massive claims for compensation because of the religions misrepresentation of the medical risks of blood transfusions.

this milestone essay critically examines one of the religions main publications for teaching their children and new recruits about their blood beliefs, how can blood save your life?

the peer-reviewed essay details many misrepresentations of medical facts, which the religion partly relies on to support its blood prohibition, thus denying its members from making fully informed medical decisions.

spider

This is Big news indeed. I am assuming though that this applies only within U.S. law and can't be applied in other countries. Is that correct?

13

JW cd-rom availability?

by spider in

jw
friends

i was looking for a watchtower cd rom, and as i can't go through official chanels, i looked at e-bay to see if they had it.

yes, there it was - but i found to my surprise that people are making copies and selling it - there is one here which is going for $31 dollars so far, and its still got a day and half to go.

check it out (paste it into address field).

spider

I was looking for a watchtower cd rom, and as I can't go through official chanels, I looked at e-bay to see if they had it.

Yes, there it was - but I found to my surprise that people are making copies and selling it - there is one here which is going for $31 dollars so far, and its still got a day and half to go. Check it out (paste it into address field)

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3790&item=7142281507&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW

Seems like an easy money earner - but is there a cheaper way of being able to get hold of one?

40

songs to leave by

by spider in

jw
friends

when you were leaving the witnesses, were there songs you liked to play which expressed something of what you were feeling?.

here are the tracks which i turned up and sang to:.

who wants to live forever?

spider

I actually heard this song a while after I left, but I think the lyrics are spot on:

Its not going to stop by Aimee Mann

It's not what you thought
when you first began it
You got, what you want
now you can hardly stand it though
well now you know

It's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
Til you wise up

You're sure, there's a cure
and you have finally found it
You think, one drink
will shrink you to your underground
and living down

It's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
Til you wise up

Prepare a list for what you need
before you sign away the deed

Cause it's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
Til you wise up

No, it's not going to stop
Til you wise up
No, it's not going to stop
So just give up

40

songs to leave by

by spider in

jw
friends

when you were leaving the witnesses, were there songs you liked to play which expressed something of what you were feeling?.

here are the tracks which i turned up and sang to:.

who wants to live forever?

spider

Yes - I think 'losing my religion' by REM is virtually an anthem for disaffected JW's.

If there were a compilation album called 'songs to leave the JW's by' this would surely be number 1.

40

songs to leave by

by spider in

jw
friends

when you were leaving the witnesses, were there songs you liked to play which expressed something of what you were feeling?.

here are the tracks which i turned up and sang to:.

who wants to live forever?

spider

When you were leaving the witnesses, were there songs you liked to play which expressed something of what you were feeling?

Here are the tracks which I turned up and sang to:

Who wants to live forever? Queen

I don't care anymore - Phil Collins

Losing my religion - REM

There were also lines of songs which I got a perverse enjoyment out of singing, such as Morresseys, Everyday's like a Sunday, he sings - 'come Armargeddon, come armageddon come'.

Singing songs or lines like that used to make the hairs stand up on the back of my neck because it was a small expression of rebellion.

15

Are U.S. witnesses still morally superior?

by spider in

from the perspective of a uk observer it seems to me that the divide between 'the world' as it is in conservative heartlands of the us, and the mindset of the jehovah's witness is getting narrower by the day.. is there really a big difference between a jw and a majority of people in such places?

in the newspaper today i read how the new film alexander was being slated for showing alexander the great as a bisexual.

the uk independent reported that one online critic has warned christians that are considering seeing the film to "speak to your pastors immediately because satan is attempting to enter your mind".

spider

From the perspective of a UK observer it seems to me that the divide between 'the world' as it is in conservative heartlands of the US, and the mindset of the Jehovah's witness is getting narrower by the day.

Is there really a big difference between a JW and a majority of people in such places? In the newspaper today I read how the new film Alexander was being slated for showing Alexander the Great as a bisexual. The UK independent reported that one online critic has warned christians that are considering seeing the film to "speak to your pastors immediately because Satan is attempting to enter your mind". Is this typical? What with this report and the protests that I have read have been made against the film "Kinsey", I feel as though anyone who is a witness in such a climate will fit right in.

So does being a witness mark you out as strange in much of US, compared to the UK for example which is very secular, and where being a witness does set you apart in other's minds from the rest of society.

And what does that mean for the US witness world view which states that there should be a steadily deepening moral decline until the end?

4

online sociological research papers on JWs

by spider in

jw
friends

happened upon a number of research articles written by andrew holden - a sociologist - about jws.

these can be found at

http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/sociology/research/restopic.htm

spider

Happened upon a number of research articles written by Andrew Holden - a sociologist - about JWs. These can be found at

http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/sociology/research/restopic.htm

They are under the subheading 'ethnicity, Identity,migration' and I think they are quite spot on. They are all dated 2002.

One of them, called 'cavorting with the Devil: Jehovah's Witnesses who Abandon Their Faith', is probably refering to this site:

http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/sociology/papers/holden-cavorting-with-the-devil.pdf

It is also worth noting that at the time of writing, several websites have been established both by lapsed members who seek the support of those who claim to be equally traumatised, and by those still in practise who fear the consequences of defection. Needless to say, data of this nature need handling with caution. Like new converts, defectors ?rehearse? their confessions and testify to anyone who is willing to listen. More seriously (at least as far as validity is concerned), these accounts often contain the kind of rhetoric adopted by anti-cultists who are on a mission to protect so-called vulnerable people from the seductive powers of religious extremists. Notwithstanding these caveats, sociologists of religion cannot afford to ignore defectors? testimonies. For one thing, these accounts contain rich data that convey first hand the poignant experiences of the disaffected devotee, and for another, they represent the main primary source on which academics are dependent in the pursuit of objective research.

7

should witnesses be vegetarian?

by spider in

vegetarianism and the respect for life .

or why aren?t witnesses vegetarian?.

this is not my own argument for vegetarianism, but merely one which i might challenge a witness to, from the perspective of their own belief system.

spider

Yes you are right - I completely forgot about Abel's sacrifice. All the same, one might argue that there is a distinction between sacrifices and diet. Sacrifices only became necessary due to sin. This was not necessary before Adam sinned and according to the bible, would not be needed after the sacrifice of Jesus body, which these sacrifices prefigured.

Also yes, Jehovah is very content to kill people as he has done with great regularity. There is no doubt about that but the fact still remains that we all used to show people the paradise brochure and read verses from isiaah etc, about how lions were going to be peaceful and not eat the little boys who were beside them. We were all supposed to be vegetarians in the future - that is obviously closer to Godly perfection, so why don't they start now?

I am not arguing against you on this - I am just practicing in the event that I were ever strongly challenged by witness relatives about why I became vegetarian. It gives me a way of gaining the moral high ground with them.

7

should witnesses be vegetarian?

by spider in

vegetarianism and the respect for life .

or why aren?t witnesses vegetarian?.

this is not my own argument for vegetarianism, but merely one which i might challenge a witness to, from the perspective of their own belief system.

spider

Vegetarianism and the respect for life

or why aren?t witnesses vegetarian?

This is not my own argument for vegetarianism, but merely one which I might challenge a witness to, from the perspective of their own belief system. It is not meant to attack those who eat meat for their own reasons, but as an argument to those who, like the Pharisees to Jesus, would make judgements on me while giving no attention to weaknesses of their own behaviour because it is allowed according to their code. It strikes me that witnesses live by so many petty rules, which I am condemned for not living by, yet one rule which I have recently set myself - that of minimising the damage I do to other creatures - they find curiously unnecessary.

Witnesses are not vegetarians because there is no law which says that they should be. According to biblical text, Noah was told by God that he had permission to eat animals. This was not challenged in the new testament, with Jesus eating the Passover lamb the same as everyone else. Witnesses reason : we are allowed by God to do this thing, therefore we do it. Any pang of conscience about being part of a system which massacres billions of animals is circumvented, because God says it?s all right, just as no guilt is felt about being part of a system which, they believe, will see the brutal deaths of billions of people at Armageddon. God says its fine and so there is nothing more to think or feel about the matter.

From a witness perspective, if the bible does not condemn something, does this mean it is the ideal way to behave? It is clear from the issue of marriage that this is not always the case. A scripture early on in the bible shows that marriage between one man and one woman is the ideal, yet the practice of multiple female partners continues to be accepted until a law is made later. It would, though, have been more acceptable to God for a man to have had only one wife at that time, even though there was no law about having multiple wives, because God?s feelings had been indicated on the matter. It is the understanding of witnesses, that we are able to learn how God feels about an issue through careful study of the bible. In this way, we learn how best to serve him, even when there is no explicit rule of conduct defined in the bible text. This is why Witnesses celebrate no holidays, including Christmas and birthdays, and do not undertake acts which are not overtly ruled out in the bible, but which the leadership has banned.

How does this relate to vegetarianism? It would be difficult to see how, at the time Noah left the ark, (particularly as presumably every single plant would have been wiped away by the flood) he and his offspring would have been able to survive well without meat in their diet. There was not an adequate substitute for meat and there were not the kind of alternative staples such as rice, pasta and potatoes, which we take for granted today. It is the same in the Roman period, and so Jesus would have continued to rely on bread, fish and meat.

Noah was permitted to eat meat on the condition that he show respect for the life that he had taken by pouring its blood onto the ground. The principle was given that life is sacred. The status of ?meat eater? was not the ideal human condition, as according to the bible, Adam and Eve, and implicitly, everyone else that followed until Noah, had not been allowed to eat meat. From the biblical texts that witnesses use to construct their vision of the new system, they believe men and women will go back to vegetarianism. The animals will no longer kill each other for food, and humans will live in harmony with this peaceful arrangement.

With this being so : with the understanding that God views vegetarianism as the ideal state - that mankind came from this and will go back to this; that God told humans they could eat meat out of necessity, with the proviso that the blood is poured out on the ground to emphasise that life is sacred; that they were told this because there was no substitute for meat that would sustain them adequately - with this all being so, does it not make sense that now that the technology and range of foods exist today to allow the possibility of not eating meat, should we not show respect for God?s feelings about the sanctity life by stopping eating meat now.

Given the choice between

a) showing respect for life by killing animals and pouring out their blood, or

b) showing respect for life by not killing animals at all,

which makes the most sense to you?

Of course, witnesses choose the former, which demonstrates the same kind of reasoning which has them showing respect for life by allowing their children to die for the lack of a blood transfusion. In both these instances it seems to me, their actions demonstrate a complete absence of any respect for life.

Note : this is my argument for why witnesses should be vegetarian, but I have not researched the diet of those living in the biblical period, and I do not know if there were people who survived well without meat with the alternative food types that they would have had available to the Israelites.