GrreatTeacher

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Posts by GrreatTeacher

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  6

  Mop and Bucket: A JW minister and Three Incidents

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  three incidents (from my youth).

  in 1972 i had a glorious job as a janitor cleaning fort worth's largest newspaper offices at the star-telegram for $1.60 an hour in the wee hours (midnight to 8 am).. (hold your applause till the end, please).. .

  yes - i was still a jehovah's witness and yes - we young full-time ministers accepted any part-time employment such as mine to survive until 1975 (when the, um, end of human existence would occur; according to watchtower magazine leaders.).

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  GrreatTeacher

  How the hell did he fit all that on his business card?
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  12

  Gog of Magog

  by Truth and Justice in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  can someone explain or produce any information about what the new views are about the subject of gog of magog.

  apparently, it has caused a stir and i like to know a little bit about it.

  especially, when i had a brother who hasn’t talked to me in quite a while, starts talking about gog.

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  GrreatTeacher

  So, a Cryptid.

  I've always known Bigfoot was involved in this!
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  23

  TRICKY WORDS and why not to use them

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tricky words .

  perfectly good words go unused in writing and speaking.

  their meaning isn't clear and the eye is 'tricked' by similarity to other words or sounds.. .

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  GrreatTeacher

  Yes. I've found plenty of sources pointing to British origins online.

  What I'm not finding is colonial American usage which is what I was taught but there seems to be no trace of digitally.

  I clearly remember being taught this. And, I'm not willing to let this one go!
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  23

  TRICKY WORDS and why not to use them

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tricky words .

  perfectly good words go unused in writing and speaking.

  their meaning isn't clear and the eye is 'tricked' by similarity to other words or sounds.. .

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  GrreatTeacher

  Titch, that's the problem with the internet sometimes. It obscures previous information and just presents the new consensus.

  I have plenty of old sources and was taught it was, "Here. Here." as in 'over here, this person here, I agree."

  You would use, "Hear. Hear." in a situation such as, "Hear ye. Here ye." when announcing something.

  But, the term for agreement is, "Here. Here."

  The internet is not the only source or even the best source for historical word use.
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  23

  TRICKY WORDS and why not to use them

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tricky words .

  perfectly good words go unused in writing and speaking.

  their meaning isn't clear and the eye is 'tricked' by similarity to other words or sounds.. .

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  GrreatTeacher

  In my experience, plenty of people pronounce "real" as a single syllable.

  I pronounce realtor as REEL ter. I say it quickly similar to kilter. It would morph from kilter to keelter to reelter.

  As when Canadians don't glide their diphthongs and it sounds like "aboot" to American ears, not all Americans glide the e to a in real. Sometimes it sounds more like rill. And that rilly hurts my fillings. I hate it when my rillter mispronounces things, too. I just sigh and look up at the cilling and pray for his English to have some hilling.

  Regardless, there shouldn't be an "a" before the "tor" syllable.
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  10

  Unitarian Universalist: Anyone Familiar?

  by Darkknight757 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i hope you are all doing well.. has anyone had an encounter with a unitarian universalist?

  my wife has a friend who invited us to their church a few years ago.

  we never went lol.

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  GrreatTeacher

  Yeah. I think Introversion vs. Extraversion can explain a lot about people's preferences, too.

  Extraverts need people around them. Introverts can find them exhausting and need a break from them. Both can be very charming and "social."

  I'm willing to bet a lot of church people are extraverts.

  I'm an introvert. Especially after working all week and being "on," I just need some peace and solitude on the weekend.
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  10

  Unitarian Universalist: Anyone Familiar?

  by Darkknight757 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i hope you are all doing well.. has anyone had an encounter with a unitarian universalist?

  my wife has a friend who invited us to their church a few years ago.

  we never went lol.

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  GrreatTeacher

  Yes. I had a short foray into Unitarian Universalist land about 15 years ago.

  In short, they are very liberal Christians to the point that they're not exclusively Christian or even religious.

  It's mostly a feel good meeting place for agnostics who still like the the comfort and ritual of meeting together at "church."

  The one I visited a few times had Christian groups, Jewish groups, and pagan groups meeting separately. There was a feel good generically inspirational service on Sunday mornings as well as children's Sunday School.

  I only met one person I knew there. After the meeting I saw my sister! We had both left the witnesses a few years earlier. I think it was an obvious step down from JWism to non attendance.

  I now don't feel the need to go to any services and am rather atheistic. I think there was an element of buying in to societal expectations that "good people go to church."

  I'm beyond that now and enjoy my relaxing Sunday mornings at home snoozing in and making homemade pancakes.
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  18

  Child pornography should NOT be automatically handled by a judicial committee

  by pistolpete in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  new information added to the "shepherd the flock elder's book" .

  they have updated their policy on viewing child pornography.. from a congregation standpoint it is not viewed as child sex abuse and is something that should not be automatically handled by a judicial committee.

  it states that a person viewing child pornography should be strongly counseled.

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  GrreatTeacher

  Yes, call Legal.

  Disgusting.

  I'm a mandated reporter. That means I must make the report myself. I can tell the guidance counselor or principal, but I have to make an official report myself, regardless of what they say.

  I don't know how those elders justify it to themselves when Legal says not to report and they follow that bad advice.
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  31

  I have come to the conclusion that a lot of JWs don't care if the end is near.

  by mickbobcat in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i was in the cult for years about 40. fourth gen born in cult member or for me ex cult member.

  i have seen so many cult members who don't seem to really care if the end is near or not.

  they are much more concerned with the idea that this is their social network and they need and or want it just the way it is.

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  GrreatTeacher

  It's not about Covid at this point.

  If Zoom meetings caused them to lose too much money, they'd be right back to meeting in person.

  Likely, Zoom has reduced expenses for physical buildings, and they have managed to convince enough people to continue their regular donations online so that they are doing even better financially.

  I expect more Kingdom Hall selloffs. They might keep some assembly halls for megachurch style meetings periodically for extra donations.

  Watchtower is interested in money, money, money. How to spin it doctrinally is a minor consideration.

  I'm sure any of us old timers could come up with two good sounding Watchtower articles easily, one FOR going back to in person meetings and one AGAINST.

  Anyone have 20 minutes and want to give it a try?
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  23

  TRICKY WORDS and why not to use them

  by Terry in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  tricky words .

  perfectly good words go unused in writing and speaking.

  their meaning isn't clear and the eye is 'tricked' by similarity to other words or sounds.. .

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  GrreatTeacher

  Another one:

  It's PREROGATIVE not PEROGATIVE.

  I'll retain my PREROGATIVE to silently judge you on your grammar.

  And, dear God, if one more person starts a sentence with "Me and my friend," I think I'll have a stroke.

  You cannot start a sentence with "me." Everyone actually knows this because you never hear people say, "Me went to the store."

  But, SOMEHOW, when you add your friend in, it's suddenly okay? "Me and my friend went to the store?" No! "Me" is only used at the end of a sentence ( loosely speaking, it's an objective pronoun) as in, "The clerk told ME that the store was closing soon."

  The beginning of the sentence pronoun is, "I." "I went to the store."

  Also, when speaking of yourself and others, you don't mention yourself first. It should be, "My friend and I went to the store."

  I hate, hate, hate this elemental piece of grammar mistake. And, I even hear some teachers using it. I can correct my students, but I can't correct other teachers.

  Since when do we not even care about basic grammar?!?

  PS Runner up: "Gonna." Many people use this in casual speech and I don't have a problem with that.

  But, the number of newscasters on TV, who should be speaking Standard English, who say, "gonna" instead of "going to" is mindblowing in the US. Listen carefully and count how many times this happens. Local news, national news, all of them. And usually they're reading teleprompters which likely have "going to" spelled out properly and yet it gets read as "gonna." This is not a writing problem, but a speech problem.

  Seriously, watch multiple newscasts and count the numbers. It's actually shocking.