Posts by Pete Zahut

22

Do they still do the Written Review?

by Funchback in

i left in 2006. i seem to vaguely recall that the written review was no more but i can't say for sure.. so, do they still do it?

was (is) it a waste of time?

i used to hate it..

Pete Zahut

Ah yes....the rotten review. But for the sound of rustling bibles and the occasional cough, a hush would fall over the congregation. The mental activity and deep though was almost palpable...one would half expect to hear the Jeopardy theme song playing in the background.

I remember at our Hall they had these thin boards they used to hand out for you to lean on while you filled out the questions. A lot of the boards had graffiti and doodles on them, done I assume by bored teenagers over the decades ( AC/DC rules....Disco Sucks etc.)

Like an idiot I used to diligently fill out the questions and strove to get the right answers, until somewhere in early 2000 it dawned on me that all this stuff we were studying was little by little being changed no one gave a rip about the answers...it was all such a joke.

25

The disappearance of the Special Committees

by Hecce in

as a part of the wt judicial arrangement, for many years there was a sort of review procedure called special committee; basically if a person was not happy with a decision or a particular situation they were allowed to write a letter to the society raisin their concerns.. the majority of these complaints were answered with a standard letter with the counsel of “leave matters to jehovah”.

in some instances the matter was serious enough to warrant the need for a special investigation of the case to be done by a special committee.. at one time the travelling overseers were part of this arrangement; eventually they were dropped out of these cases due to the fact of their tremendous input on the decisions and also the implications when a wrong decision was reached.. the reason behind this procedure was that in matters that were really complicated it was not fair to make a decision based in letters and the clearest way was to have “boots on the ground”.

normally a group of local brothers, appointed for this duty heard the cases and make recommendations to the branch.

Pete Zahut

I have a long time friend who was on one of those "special committees" and allegedly dealt with child molestation cases. He was flown around to different places where complicated cases were being sorted out.

He is no longer a JW because he saw so many horrifying cases and was appalled at how they were handled.

He told me about one such case that involved some girls who allegedly were being molested by their JW father. One of the girls attempted suicide multiple times and another was hospitalized after a mental breakdown. After a time, the father was DF'd and even went to prison.

Allegedly, after the father served most of his sentence, he wanted to be reinstated so that he could go back to being a JW after he got out. The special committee voted on it and although it wasn't unanimous, he was reinstated. Allegedly, they wanted to send a letter of warning to the congregation that this guy would be attending their congregation once he was out of prison but the "society" forbade it. My friend sent a letter anyway on his own and allegedly, was removed for doing so. Shortly thereafter, he left the organization completely over this and some of the other alleged "goings on" that one sees at his level in the organization.

Although I use the word Allegedly for obvious reasons, this is how I knew, well before any of the bad press we see today was even out, that there was a big Pedo. problem brewing in the Organization

38

Poor people are sub-human?

by Alostpuppydog in

has anyone noticed how many jw's really seem to be rollin in it?

escpecially the elders, and they treat their subordinates like filthy gum on the bottom of their shoe?

just wondering because i too am poorer than poor and have spent a fourth of my life homeless already and i am 22.. another thing to consider is why domost of the population on this planet seem to hate the poor, even though we outnumber the middle class and the rich greatly?

Pete Zahut

I think you may be confusing Hate, with fear. I think when people see homeless or destitute ones, they realize that should something go wrong, they are looking at themselves and they don't like what they are seeing.

A lot of people, in order to cope with their fears about this, figure the poor ones did something wrong, must have made some bad choices or are somehow to blame for their circumstances. Sometimes this is true but often it isn't and to say that it isn't always their own fault, is the same as saying that they too could find themselves in the same circumstances, even though they think they're doing everything right.

JW's view the world as hopelessly lost and irredeemable and the only solution is total destruction and starting all over from scratch. This is a way of copping out...a way of feeling ok about not doing anything to help anyone who is in actual physical need, right now. They even view the support of organizations who help the poor etc, as a waste of time and as useless as putting a band-aid on Cancer, yet in their own time of need, they take full advantage of what the world has to offer.

10

KH has been sold in Taiwan

by yoko N in

.

Pete Zahut

I think "Buy" our kingdom hall may be broken English for Goodbye to our Kingdom Hall.

What's going on in the last pic with everyone laying on the floor. Is this a reenactment of what it will look like, with the dead strewn about after Armageddon or did they all just finish drinking the Kool-Aid?

11

JW eBay Feedback Comment "Time Is Running Out!"

by pale.emperor in

jw
friends

so i did a huge book clearout before i moved house a few weeks ago.

among the books for sale were some watchtower books that had become obsolete, old light or had since been "clarified" by the society.

so i thought they'd be wanted by ex-jw's or active apostates for their research.. unfortunately, it looks like an active jw is so brainwashed that they not only bought the "old light" version of gods kingdom rules but they even suggested that i read it because "time is running out".

Pete Zahut

A book so "excellent" that it was taken out of print because the information it contained (although supposedly sanctioned by Jehovah), proved to be too inaccurate and misleading for even Jehovah's Witnesses to read..

33

Another "pull the football away just before you can kick it" comment made by Circuit Assembly's special guest, Thomas Chicky

by sir82 in

jw
friends

i started a thread on this guy's comments about building kingdom halls here.. the guy also said this (again, not a word for word quote, but the gist of his comments):.

"the primary hope of salvation is the resurrection.

jehovah does not promise anyone that he will survive armageddon.

Pete Zahut

Non JW's who have a hope of a (heavenly)resurrection, hope to be included in it when it happens. Until then they do the best they can and go about making their lives now, as good as possible. They don't forgo getting an education, marrying and having children or pursuing their talents and interests. A hope is a hope whether it's earthly or heavenly, it comes after they pass away. They haven't been taught and promised since childhood that there was a certainty that they'd never have to experience death.

Like anyone else, they don't want to die but they've known from the beginning that the reward they hope for comes after they die but at least when they do, they've had the chance to choose what they wanted to do with their lives rather than be strung along with man made false hopes that led them to put everything off for a day that never arrived.

27

Brooklyn Brothers Signworks... WUT?

by schnell in

jw
friends

the ad for this site came up here on jwn.

http://www.brooklynsignworks.com/jw/?gclid=cp7ppbzr_tacfy-baqodwocm1a.

i was not aware that these cart signs were being made and sold by essentially a private company or proprietorship.

Pete Zahut

So how does it work? Do individual JW's buy their own carts or does the congregation have carts available for the publishers to check out and use?

I can't imagine why there are so many different individuals producing and selling this stuff. It seems like the Society would make them and send them out to each congregation as a means to distribute their publications.

28

Greetings and would like some advice about a potentially fun idea

by towerwatcher in

jw
friends

hello fellow apostates!

my first post and a long time lurker here.

i would like to thank all of you for the existence of this board as this has been instrumental for me in leaving the place i once knew as "the truth".

Pete Zahut

As a former JW, I get the irony of these T-shirts but younger JW's wouldn't get the point, as these books went the way of the dinosaur decades ago and older JW's wouldn't really care since they view new light as a good thing. Besides, the wearer of the T-shirts would be plagued by questions as to their meaning, from non JW's and end up wasting more of their lives because of these publications.

Perhaps a huge gathering of former JW's grouped outside an assembly with t-shirts emblazoned with the photo below, might have an effect.

11

My Mother reach out to me AGAIN!

by HereIgo in

about 3 weeks ago i created a thread due to my mom reaching out to me (we hadn't talked in over 2 years due to typical jw politics).

well, today she reached out again thought facebook messenger saying " i'm so sorry i hurt you my beautiful baby boy.

i'm hurting very much also.

Pete Zahut

Why would she shun you then contact you just to rub it in and say that it's your fault that you're being shunned? That's not loving....that's just messed up. I think what you said was spot on.

16

Would you trust your Doctor if he got things wrong??

by stuckinarut2 in

just thinking..... assume we had a family doctor that we had seen all our lives, perhaps he had been the doctor for your extended family too.

he is lovely man, very kind and honest hearted.. but if he had prescribed treatment or medication that was wrong, and had bad effects on you, then changed the medication to something else, then randomly changed it again etc, how would you feel?.

if you did some research into him, and found disturbing facts and things in his history that made you question his qualifications, how would you feel?

Pete Zahut

Many JWs are very decent people. Many are very intelligent people too. So it's not about their values nor their capacity to think; its about how they feel.

JW's when talking about other religions love to apply the scripture at 2 Timothy where it talks about those who want to have their ears "tickled". The reality is, JW's are no different, they want to hear whatever soothes their fears about the future, regardless of the facts.