Yeah that's right! I forgot about the "part time Jehovah's Witness". It's funny how they super-dramatized the "badness" of any life that falls short of being on the uber-dub treadmill, implying that anything short of it just as well may be a life of debauchery...thus the term "part time" as opposed to "full time".
Posts by M.J.
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722009 Drama Synopsis and Comments
by jabberwock inthis year's drama was based on the parable of the prodigal son.
the theme was "your brother was dead and came to life".
as some have probably heard, it is a modern day story based on that parable, so there are no fancy costumes or fake beards.. .
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2009 Drama Synopsis and Comments
by jabberwock inthis year's drama was based on the parable of the prodigal son.
the theme was "your brother was dead and came to life".
as some have probably heard, it is a modern day story based on that parable, so there are no fancy costumes or fake beards.. .
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M.J.
ISOT, saw it live. Actually you had to be there at the convention to kind of follow the buildup of indoctrination, topped off by the emotional climax of the drama. They are slick, polished and on top of their game, I'll give them that.
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2009 Drama Synopsis and Comments
by jabberwock inthis year's drama was based on the parable of the prodigal son.
the theme was "your brother was dead and came to life".
as some have probably heard, it is a modern day story based on that parable, so there are no fancy costumes or fake beards.. .
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M.J.
Saw it. It had some witty dialogue (by WT drama standards) as well as humor and I came away impressed in the effort. In fact it reminded me a lot of some church plays I saw as a kid. Seems like they used some "hip" younger people to write out the script rather than the dorkier old Brooklyn dudes. Al's dialogue came off as a rather clever parody of "common objections" for towing the JW line, i.e., things that "apostates" say. By clever I mean that by simply showing a clearly seedy type of individual, "Al", throw up these objections and "excuses" for skipping meetings, etc., it instantly discredits whatever objections he raises without even refuting them. They come off as simply rationalizations to justify the desire to engage in bad behavior rather than anything that might hold a shred of validity. It really did play on a black-and-white mentality, i.e., fear and contempt for the outside world vs. the idealized comfort of being "in the truth". It was very emotional and I must admit, well done. They really scored some emotional points with this one I think. But like I said, take away the JW peculiarities of the dialogue & story and you have a play that is very similar to something one might see at some evangelical church camp.
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Family Vacation in Colorado. Suggestions?
by M.J. ini would really love to take my family (including a couple of small kids...and maybe the dog) on a road trip to the colorado rockies in late summer.
i'd like to spend at least a week out there.
any ideas on places with some good scenery, activities, places to stay (a cabin would be cool).. i haven't been out there before, and i don't know if i want to just stay in one area or make some sort of "grand circuit".
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M.J.
Thanks for the suggestions. They are great. Plenty to consider.
WTWizard: ha ha good one! I think I'd go ballistic if the Mrs. even suggested that!
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Family Vacation in Colorado. Suggestions?
by M.J. ini would really love to take my family (including a couple of small kids...and maybe the dog) on a road trip to the colorado rockies in late summer.
i'd like to spend at least a week out there.
any ideas on places with some good scenery, activities, places to stay (a cabin would be cool).. i haven't been out there before, and i don't know if i want to just stay in one area or make some sort of "grand circuit".
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M.J.
Hi! I would really love to take my family (including a couple of small kids...and maybe the dog) on a road trip to the Colorado Rockies in late summer. I'd like to spend at least a week out there. Any ideas on places with some good scenery, activities, places to stay (a cabin would be cool).
I haven't been out there before, and I don't know if I want to just stay in one area or make some sort of "grand circuit". Any thoughts? I'm leaning toward finding a good area where we can spend 4-5 days in a condo or cabin, and camp along the way to and from the area.
Thanks!
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Sunday's WT study
by M.J. inhi, just popped in to scan the board for some kind of review of this past sunday's wt study.
i couldn't seem to find anything.. i'm assuming no one is doing a "wt comments" type of thread any more, but i missed it can someone point it out?
i found a couple of interesting statements made and wanted to brush up on the implications (it's been a while so i need a refresher).
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M.J.
Thanks!
Long time no see, TD! Hope all is well!
I think, despite the fuzzy perception-based statements made by Greenspan, the easiest way to refute the idea that the human condition went to crap since 1914 is in this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population
I don't have time to go through the details, but I found it to contain pretty straightforward info on how conditions dramatically improved in the modern era.
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Sunday's WT study
by M.J. inhi, just popped in to scan the board for some kind of review of this past sunday's wt study.
i couldn't seem to find anything.. i'm assuming no one is doing a "wt comments" type of thread any more, but i missed it can someone point it out?
i found a couple of interesting statements made and wanted to brush up on the implications (it's been a while so i need a refresher).
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M.J.
Hi, just popped in to scan the board for some kind of review of this past Sunday's WT study. I couldn't seem to find anything.
I'm assuming no one is doing a "WT Comments" type of thread any more, but I missed it can someone point it out? Thanks.
I found a couple of interesting statements made and wanted to brush up on the implications (it's been a while so I need a refresher). For one, it mentioned something about JWs (Bible Students) not recognizing the significance of 1914 until 1925...or something to that effect. No further explanation was given. What is the current WT line on what happened in 1925?
The box above the article was interesting as well. It contained some quotes from a book on economics from Alan Greenspan as well as a quote from some other academic type, in order to make a point that WWI was the most significant marker in human history. I was interested in just a bit of background research on the source material, but don't have have my hands on the actual quotes anymore.
Thanks for any info.
M.J.
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M.J.
Contradict husband in front of children. If she disagrees with him , to discuss it in private.
Good advice, but implication here (by omission) is that it's fine for the husband to contradict/override the wife in front of the kids?
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How do you answer "you research just to criticize"?
by undercover inminimus' thread about research got me to thinking about a friend who recently accused me of researching just to purposely find something wrong so i could justify my actions (of becoming inactive).. how would you answer this?.
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M.J.
Hi. It's been a while but I'm back. Cool looking new site.
Anyway if we're honest with ourselves, there is probably some of that going on. It doesn't invalidate the facts, however.
Once we come to accept a certain assumption--that the WTS, in fact, is not what it claims to be--after that point the motivation for further research is to keep reaffirming and further validating that assumption. This is no different from what JWs do. They accept the assumption that the WTS IS what they claim to be and proceed to seek out reaffirming that assumption (with TONS of help from the WTS, I might add).
The point is, then...If I have some valid, objective points to make does it matter what stage I'm at in my thinking?
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Why do you think that some are more "controlled" by the WBTS than others?
by easyreader1970 ini used to think that maybe it was just the people who were raised in the truth, especially from infancy.
they didn't know what life outside of the organization was so it was all they had to cling to.
but that's obviously wrong because many, many have left--happily--never to return.
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M.J.
Just like any group environment. Some are more into the group thinking than others...of course a lot of it depends on the group.
In my fraternity there were those who were very gung-ho, and others who were ho-hum. We, as leadership were confounded on how to get more of the ho-hum crowd transformed into the gung-ho guys. We used some legalism: suspension of those who didn't meet certain requirements. Housecleaning is a common practice among fraternities.
Ritual, we found, was pretty important. Events where everyone worked together and of course socialized together were also important.
Of course the old fraternity stand-by, hazing, or otherwise making people really work hard or go through discomfort to acheive a certain status: a full-fledged "brother", has always been a key tactic that has worked.
Elitism, of course was a big key. Every fraternity is always sizing themselves up to other ones. If someone is in a group filled with people who are perceived to be better than those on the outside, that person is glad to call himself a member of that group. He is very enthused about taking on that identity and will go along with group thinking all the more.
These are all basic group-dynamic forces that affect people to varying degrees. Of course, minimum requirements for being a member will affect the percentage of people that are strongly into the group mindset, as most others will be kicked out. But you have to balance where you set the bar with your concerns for retaining membership and acheiving growth.
Come to think of it, It seems like the guys who were the most charged up about belonging to the group were those guys who never felt like they belonged to anything beforehand.