Island Man

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Posts by Island Man

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  26

  Rank & file are seeing the money-grubbing

  by Zoos in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  spoke with a fellow apostate from my own area.

  she and i bailed out about the same time and kept in touch.. she used to do secular work with one of the local elders in his cleaning business until she got dfed.

  this same elder was one of the more profound dickheads on my reinstatement committee, before i turned around two years later and daed.. business required her to contact the elder on behalf of an old client.

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  Island Man

  There are many JWs who realize that all is not well with Watchtower, but they choose to remain, being psychologically chained by fear of missing out on paradise if they leave.

  Their rationalizations often involve separating "Jehovah's organization" from the "imperfect" or even "corrupt" leadership (GB) at the helm. They will agree with you on all the ills and hypocrisies of Watchtower as you point them out. But they draw the line when it comes to leaving Watchtower. They will tell you that even if the GB is teaching falsehoods or are corrupt, they must still stick with the organization out of loyalty to Jehovah and trust that Jehovah will rectify matters in his own time.

  They will sometimes draw parallels to Israel of old under the leadership of corrupt kings and say the Israelites were still God's people and one had to remain with the nation to please Jehovah. And I'm sure we're all familiar with the now ubiquitous, Watchtower cookie-cutter platitude of "Where else shall we go? Who has the truth?"

  They are awake, but they are afraid to get out of the Watchtower bed because they see it as the safest place to be, because they have been fooled into thinking that there is a monster under the bed waiting to grab them by the foot and pull them under and eat them alive, if they ever get out of the bed.
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  22

  I have proof Noah built the Ark just like God told him to

  by KateWild in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

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  Island Man

  "Belief in this story in its entirety is a measurement in gullibility."

  ... and/or logistical and scientific ignorance.
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  62

  Noah's ark once again. I hate beating a dead horse, but.

  by James Mixon in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  the altitude problem.

  mt.

  everest today is 29042 feet high and i know some will say it.

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  Island Man

  I'm not sure if there really is an issue with lack of oxygen and the flood. I believe that if you cover the globe with water covering the highest mountains, then the atmosphere gets displaced upward. So you will still be at sea level floating in the ark - the sea would just have risen and the atmosphere would have risen with it. The atmosphere would get a bit thinner though, because having been displaced upward on the global sphere means that the same amount of gas is now spread over a greater circumference. But the difference would not be so great as to make breathing very difficult or impossible.

  There are lots of things wrong with the flood story and which disprove it. But I don't buy the argument about the elevated altitude making it impossible breathe.
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  36

  But where else should we go? Can you answer this question?

  by purrpurr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  having watched many jc youtube videos one question that gets asked is "where else would you go?".

  in other words if not jehovah's witnesses then what other religion or organisation would you go to?.

  it's one that i have trouble answering, what would you say?.

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  Island Man

  I would respond by saying:

  "Is that a question you thought up yourself; or are you just parroting a self-serving platitude that Watchtower has fed you to make themselves seem relevant and to manipulate you to continue as their hapless dependent and slave?

  Maybe we don't have to go anywhere. Maybe we're still in the midst of the apostasy and there is no true organization at present, just as the org. teaches there was no true org. for centuries after the apostles died. Maybe we're still in the midst of the apostasy and all organized religions are false. They certainly all give evidence of being corrupt - including Watchtower. Revelation says to get out of them - but it doesn't say where to go, because maybe there isn't anywhere to go.

  Go read 2 Thessalonians 2. Paul wrote that the apostasy will come and the man of lawlessness will be revealed who will be destroyed at Christ's presence. Paul gave no hint that there will be a restoration of organized true worship before the end comes. The bible seems to indicate that the apostasy will continue right down to the very end when the angels are sent to separate the wheat from the weeds during the great tribulation.

  Watchtower talk of a restoration of organized true worship before the end, is nothing but self-serving propaganda designed to make the organization seem relevant and indispensable - to hook and enslave people to the organization."
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  532

  I conclude evolution is guided

  by KateWild in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  your qualifications are way above mine so i'd love to hear more about the specifics of what you have researched and how that supports the existence of a deity.

  k99, i am not really convinced that you're interested in my conclusions.

  in nature amino acids formed to then form dna.

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  Island Man

  Well your conclusion doesn't seem to be based on any real evidence. I mean, It's not like there aren't any credible, logical, natural explanations for the LH amino acid issue. I get the sense that you just want to believe there is a god and so you're using bias to see the LH amino acid issue as evidence for a god when it really isn't.

  To me the whole issue of an all-powerful, super-intelligent God using guided evolution to create his designs makes about as much sense as using a Rube Golberg Machine to flip a light switch.
  
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  23

  1914.... current significance?

  by NeverKnew in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  it seems that when i ask witnesses questions about 1914, they really don't understand the relevance to their message today.

  i am told that they preach about the coming kingdom and that they don't preach a message of 1914. if a person doesn't understand 1914 then i can clearly see how showing them the inaccuracies of the doctrine wouldn't matter.

  can we compile a list of ties 1914 has to their current beliefs?.

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  Island Man

  1914 is perhaps the most convoluted piece of rubbish to ever come from the printing presses of Watchtower. I'm still surprised that Trinity-bashing JWs can't smell just how stink with falsehood, 1914 is.
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  15

  Russia's Supreme Court shuts down Church of Scientology

  by OrphanCrow in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  russian church welcomes shutdown of "moscow church of scientology".

  moscow, july 1, interfax - the russian orthodox church has welcomed a ruling by the russian supreme court which yesterday upheld the legality of a shutdown of the "church of scientology of moscow".

  "the upholding by the supreme court of the legality of the shutdown of the so-called church of scientology is seen as an important precedent demonstrating the state's determination not to recognize as religious those organizations that use people's religious feeling for malign purposes, " russian orthodox church spokesman vakhtang kipshidze told interfax-religion.the ruling in the scientologists' case is not a breach of the religious freedom since "it was proved in court that the very activity of this organization is an affront to human freedom as such," kipshidze said.the russian orthodox church regularly comes into contact with people whose membership in totalitarian sects left them deeply wounded spiritually and mentally, ruined their lives and happiness, the spokesman said.

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  Island Man

  Yet here we are 2,000 years later. We have the internet. We're more literate. And yet people still believe those myths and superstitions from 2,000 years ago. And new ones like scientology are growing.

  Actually, the non-religious worldwide are growing, in large measure due to the growing availability of information on the internet. It will take some time for religion to retreat to a small minority. After all we didn't get to this stage over night, but over the course of thousands of years. I highly doubt scientology is growing in developed countries where there is ready access to information about the religion through the internet.
  
  
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  43

  At a regional convention today....

  by Nobodyspecial in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  it really stands out to me just how phoney the bonds of forced brotherhood are.

  the smiles are paper thin when they see each other in hotels.

  the laughs forced.

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  Island Man

  "The smiles are paper thin when they see each other in hotels. The laughs forced."

  Many JWs exhibit a scripted, put-on kind of love and warmth that originates from a prideful need to prove to themselves and the world that they are true followers of christ. Watchtower constantly tells them that JWs are true christians and that true christians have love for one another, this causes many JWs to feel obligated to perform plastic smiles and plastic hugs to boastfully support the claim that JWs are true christians.
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  12

  unemployed bethel art dept. personell surface.

  by aintenoughwiskey in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  my jadar lit up.

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  Island Man

  Yes it's brimming with Watchcraft!
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  47

  Is the Bible God's word? Help please.....

  by Freeandclear in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  so real quick, i know this comes up now and then and i've looked over some of the posts from the past but here's the thing.. when i was a jw i drank all the cool aid, i was 100% and so i have all my own arguments (from the jw's) for why the bible is inspired.

  i no longer believe this but i'd really like to read something that is pretty much 100% academic on this subject.

  i want to read what scholars have to say about the authenticity of the bible and it's claim at being the inspired word of god.

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  Island Man

  "To be fair, the bible is suppose to be symbolic in parts. Problem is which parts?"

  Which parts? The parts that explicitly contradict [insert name of denomination]'s religious teachings.