TrueTomHarley

Do you think so? I would submit that the entire letter is strange, and all of it might trigger outrage from an intolerant person. Suppose you were an atheist, for example. Would you not find the 2nd paragraph as objectionable as the third? Suppose you are a “traditionalist” who thinks the role of children is to have fun and play games. Would you not find it really weird (and therefore “cult-like”) that a ten-year-old hopes to “comfort” you? Why, the ten-year-old down the street called you an old fart. That’s the kind of conduct you anticipate from 10-year-olds these days. “Comforting” neighbors is not the expected role of a ten-year-old, you will say, but rather that is the role of adults. Then you will hope they don’t notice that you have nothing to comfort them with. So the letter is all “strange”—not at all what one would expect from a ten-year-old. The reason you find no fault until you reach the third paragraph only reflects your stance that points of view different than yours should not exist. You will allow Christianity but only if it doesn’t carry the 1 Corinthians 12:12 stigma of the body, in which all members are unified and work seamlessly together. You don’t like it that body members should be attached. You especially don’t like it that the body should have a head. If the “body” consisted of amputated limbs, eyes pulled from their sockets and ears torn off the head, you would be okay with it. In short, you are apparently prepared to tolerate Christianity, but only your version of Christianity, in which each member celebrates their independence, in which “everyone does what is right in his own eyes,” the Judges 21:25 type of Christianity. Never mind that God speaks of that period as primitive and undesirable. That said, I’m glad my own children are raised and out of the house. I have no idea how I would train them today. Homeschooling advocate John Holt used to say the reason children go delinquent is that they are shut out of the adult world under the guise of “protecting” them.

If he would be equally outraged at a child expressing support for his school, love for his country, support for some local cause, rallying for some local politician, selling Scout cookies, knocking on his door offering to shovel snow, & such things, then he would be consistent. However, I think most other people would tell him to get a life. Come come, 4Jah, you still claim to be Christian. Srecko may think evangelizing is child abuse, but you should not. What if he made no mention of jw.org, but just encouraged Bible reading, or just spoke of God and Jesus? Would you be as upset then? You’re just snarling every time you see JW.

In the United States, the most frequent litigant in the Supreme Court, apart from the government itself, has been Jehovah's Witnesses, mostly in the 30s, 40,s and 50s. Any student of law learns of their major contributions in clarifying freedom of worship, freedom of speech, and freedom of assembly. Justice Harlan Fiske Stone once said, “I think the Jehovah’s Witnesses ought to have an endowment in view of the aid which they give in solving the legal problems of civil liberties.” They have "solved the legal problems of civil liberties" upwards of 50 times in that one country alone. I do not know what, if anything, they will do with regard to this Australian policy. The only thing I know for sure is that, had you been in America decades ago, you would have cried over each and every one of their cases then, as you do here. There is no "principle" at stake here. They attempted to escape a "fee" they felt unjust and were thwarted. At which point they drop back and say governments have the power and authority to impose or not impose fees. It's what they do, and adjusting to it is no more than obeying the superior authorities. Appealing the verdict of a court is not the same as disregarding the superior authorities. It is a right afforded any citizen or collection of citizens. Will this be appealed? No idea.

It is funny, but more importantly, it is instructional. This is not hypocritical, 4Jah, nor is it hard. Don’t be such a little girl over it. The Aussie authorities devise a plan that fits all other parties for the institutional abuse of their youth clubs, youth schools, youth camps. They invite organizations to join. The WT declines because they do not have such settings. Whatever outlier cases may occur with them they will handle on a case by case basis. The Aussie authorities then say they MUST come aboard, on pain of losing the tax status that is afforded every other charity. At that point, it becomes an operational cost. They still don’t think it is justified, but it becomes a cost of operating in Australia. There are times in life when it is all about money. One of those times is when someone is trying to take it from you and you alone.

I was walking along the dockside when I felt a brushing at my pocket. I clamped my hand down instantly upon another that was trying to lift my wallet! ”What hypocrisy!” the fellow bellowed. It’s all about money money money with you, isn’t it?!!!” Conscience-stricken, I handed over my wallet to him.

What a strange alliance has taken place, for 4Jah frequently makes this point as well.

More

Are you kidding me? She is the patient who begged the most.

At the hospital I run, patients were clamoring for Dr. House. “He is so kind, so tactful, so understanding of weakness, so withholding of judgment!” they said. I couldn’t believe my ears. That ill-mannered lout is the one they wanted? True, he knows his stuff, but what a bedside manner! Then I checked the roster and saw that Dr Cesar was the other doctor on duty that night.

Nor do you take it from anyone else. At the tiniest contradiction from anyone you bristle. So unlike our Lord, the one whom we are to follow in his footsteps closely, who, when he was reviled did not go reviling in return. You revile at the drop of a pin. It is why I have thought “how can he be a Witness?” and have pretty much come to the conclusion you are not. On the other hand, you may be some sort of one, but are clearly an outlier. I make a mental scan of the hundreds, maybe thousands of Witnesses I know, and can think of none that would make such an abusive public spectacle of themselves, albeit that you do raise relevant points here and there. Treat people as Jesus did, even those “who have doubts,” even those “unsteady,” even those who may seem in danger of drifting, even those who genuinely are opposed—Lord knows some of them are here—treat them as Jesus did and you will better establish your claim to be one of his followers.

I was in CC’s car group the other day. Alas, we broke for coffee at Starbucks. He had insisted on McDonalds. We were derided as apostates for the remainder of the morning.

On the contrary, I atypically commended him. As that sage JTR used to say, “Even a blind squirrel catches a nut sometimes.” I commended him for pointing out that if you were really a Witness, surely you would know that the latter verses of John 8 are spurious. That you did not simply confirms a growing estimation that you are a fraud—that you are here pretending to be a Witness in order to convey the impression that they are harsh, mean, and dogmatic. I don’t counter that character? How’s THIS for not countering him? https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2021/02/holly-folk-speaks-to-child-sexual-abuse-among-jehovahs-witnesses.html

You haven’t seen anything yet. It may be averted however, if you can grow up and treat people civilly, even those who genuinely are opposed. Below, I have cleverly modified a well-known verse. See if you can spot the change: “But when Michael the archangel had a difference with the Devil and was disputing about Moses’ body, he did not dare to bring a judgment against him in abusive terms, but said: “May Cezar rebuke you.” It won’t necessarily be a bad thing if the two of us get into a cat fight. Presently, 4Jah will start crying, even more than he does now, that his “questions” are not being addressed, even though they have been countless times and he just wants to repackage them and keep running them through in perpetuity. Should that happen to thwart his dastardly scheme, you actually will have contributed to combatting “apostasy.” Absolutely. Finally, finally, finally, 4Jah says something of value. CC certainly should know that. Any JW knows who is not a newbie that.

Here is a brother who got his start in the Bethel art department: https://www.facebook.com/100003863247474/posts/2000662983405790/

I once wrote of Tom Pearlsnswine that I visited one day and mentioned Trump had tied his shoe. “We must be no part of the world!!” he told me. Next day I told him that Hillary had worn a nice bright pantsuit. “We must keep our eyes on Jerusalem above!!” he rebuked me. Next day I stopped by as he was watching the Olympics. “Look at that metal count, Tommy!” he yelled. “We’re cleaning up!”

I will rename the latter DIScomfortmypeople. How’s THAT for “exposing apostasy?”

Yes. But I have no experience working with audio files. Nor do I have any studio. Some workarounds present themselves. But realistically, it will be a while and may not happen at all. I do have a voice though. I have consistently been told throughout my life that I ought to be on radio. (And no, it is not because I show my face on TV)

Well, I would get more of it if you would post the link and not just the cover! For crying out load, you should always do that! What is wrong with you? https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/917311 Don’t forget to point out that it can be had on Amazon, too. And that it will be in print, eventually, as the book on Russia will be first (to accompany its free digital version) And also that it is high time for TTvtA Round 2, though that will have to wait a while Got it? If you are going to do an ad campaign for me, kindly do it right! Or I will pull the contract and let it out to someone more competent! incidentally, even the metadata of this book has more about “combatting apostates” then all of you thousands of vicious barbs put together: ”Fire leveled Rome in 64 CE. Suspicion fell upon Nero. He shifted blame to the new religion of Christianity, it’s members “hated for their enormities,” says Tacitus. They were hunted and killed in heinous ways, History is not now repeating itself—but under the guise of a modern "anti-cult" movement that extends the age-old derogatory C-word to new targets, it is beginning to rhyme a little....”

I like it. It addresses spiritual needs and provides a fine support for service to God. Plus I learn how to respectfully deal with people. Come come, your cover is blown. You’re not a Witness at all, most likely. Have you ever witnessed here? Have you ever built anyone up here? Have you ever comforted the discouraged here? Have you ever spoken gently to those who have doubts here? Have you ever shared any good word whatsoever? Have you ever done anything other than criticize others with a severity that would make Alan blush? At least he doesn’t pretend to be what he is not. You have a encyclopedic knowledge of old WT publications, but Alan’s is no less. Do you do use it for any other purpose than to rebuke others and prove yourself right? Most Witnesses tend to get rusty with the old publications. This is because they stretch forward to what is ahead., and put deemphasize that which they leave behind. You don’t “expose” any “apostasy” here. Rather you lend the impression that JWs are the nastiest, pettiest, most narrow-minded people in the world. I think that is your purpose, as you pretend to be one of them. ”Once you laugh at something, you never quite look at it in the same way again,” it was said of Voltaire. I recommend nothing but laughter as regards you. You overstayed your “welcome” long ago—as near as I can tell never had one—and you prove it with each successive comment.

That’s just it. I don’t want to be a poor one. I want to be a rich one. It hasn’t happened yet. I may have to put a price tag on the Russian one.

Beating up on a sweet, cane-toting old lady of failing eyesight! What is wrong with him? He should be holding out his arm to help the old lady across the street, not shoving her into the path of a semi, much less driving it.

Sorry, you’ve got me going on this new topic. Forget about yours. For many years I worked in what would now be called the gig economy (but wasn’t then). If it is a “fault,” it is my fault and cannot be laid at the feet of the organization. Relatively recently I heard an update of this sister I vaguely know who decades ago said (regarding fellowshopping), “I thought of Tom, but he was too immature.” Let me tell you that my estimation of her rose, for I had been a young elder at that time, and not everyone was so astute. Someone else described me as being “so spiritually minded that I was no earthly good.” As to the “gig economy,” another sister said (not specifically about me) that often really creative and/or intelligent people deliberately choose menial work so as not to hand over their mind and soul to “the man.” I can apply this to myself with some truth, but it also smacks somewhat of putting lipstick on a pig. For the longest time I would say, “If I am good at it, it does not pay, and if it pays I am not good at it.” Thus I took a lot of “gigs,” most of which I enjoyed or made the best of, but they kept me “grounded.” I was not like another friend, a brother with the “Midas touch,” who said, “If it were not for the truth, I could be filthy rich. As it is, I am just a little dirty rich.” Much less was I like “Davey the kid,” who bypassed a college scholarship to pioneer, who loved his time in Bethel but confessed he always felt a little cheated there by not being able to make his own way. Upon leaving Bethel, he walked into the 8-story Medical Arts Building to secure the cleaning contract. The building manager pointed out this and that requirement and challenge, noting, “I don’t know much about cleaning.” “That makes two of us!” Davey said to himself as he signed the contract, “how hard can it be?” “It’s my gift,” he told me later, “they never say no.” He used his gift to good effect, building two Kingdom Halls and one Assembly Hall, more or less taking charge of the latter, and absolutely the former—this was before the days of the Regional committees which was before the days of the LDCs. Being daily at the Assembly Hall, he would receive phone calls. “Sorry, I have to put out a cleaning fire,” he would tell the other brothers, and spend some moments sweet-talking some businesspeople on the phone. Finally he tired of it, took a few college courses, combined it with college credit for “life experiences,” and emerged a psychotherapist. “Poor Davey,” I would joke later. “He always thought half of us were nuts. Now that he is in the field he finds that even those he thought were sane, they’re nuts, too.” He didn’t regard all of his preparatory coursework as nonsense, which he may have assumed would be the case going in. “Some of this stuff I’m not doing myself,” he said, as he applied his new training to good effect. But I digress. I was lost while I was in college, not really knowing why I was there, having merely taken the path of least resistance, not sure where it was leading me, if anywhere, and not sure if I wanted to go wherever it was leading, with a ton of questions, issues, misgivings, and considerable immaturity, that was unaddressed there. I wanted simplicity, yet felt pressured (as though “manipulated”) to “succeed.” Running across Jehovah’s people was a liberation for me. It addressed questions that I didn’t know I had. It pointed towards a way of life where happiness and contentment lay. In short, it offered a way to leave the “rat race” with impunity. It put together the puzzle pieces. I still say that “once you have assembled the puzzle and have reproduced the box top picture, you are pretty much immune to the person who says you put it together wrong. You are especially immune if that person’s own puzzle lies unassembled in the box on his closet shelf.” Yearning for that simplicity, once when I drove home for break from university and I carried a passenger who lived nearby, I mentioned as we approached the Thruway toll station that such a job would suit me just fine. The girl laughed hysterically, certain I was pulling her leg. I wasn’t. She was the daughter of some local politician, lived in a very upscale community—mine was no slouch, but it did not approach hers, and I sometimes wonder what became of her. Decades later, when i just needed pocket money, I quizzed one of those Thruway toll-takers. They were then hiring part-timers. I knew the person hiring, and no doubt could have easily gotten the job had I pursued it. The toll-taker assured me it was peaceful gig and unstressful. “What do you do for bathroom breaks?” I asked him. He assured me THAT was a problem—all the more so for a guy as they reach senior years/ All the toll-takers are gone now. Long after everyone else abandoned them to go the digital scanning route, New York finally followed suit. I noted once how you can drive from Florida and soon after crossing any state line you would encounter a “Welcoming Center.” This happened until you crossed the state line into New York, where you would encounter, “Stop! Pay toll!” In recent years, I got into the habit of saying, “Worth every penny!” after paying this or that toll-taker, just to play and see their reaction. One of them said, savoring his drawn-out words, “It is not!”

Noted, and probably deserved. It is good for me to be rebuked on this from time to time, for I might be far worse without it. On the other hand: Actually, arguing doesn’t play a role in “scriptural arguments.” You know the verses as well as I: debates about words, leave blind guides be, answering a fool, even spreading pearls before swine. At least if I spread stuff before “swine,” it is not pearls. I can think of a way of solving that problem. In addition to blasting away at everyone as “apostate,” your weird mistake is in thinking you can convert this forum into a Kingdom Hall. You can’t. The internet is inherently a lawless place, where nobody’s identity is known for sure, where it is so easy to hide who and what you are, where rocks lurk to rip the bottom from your love feast boat, where there is no spiritual food, where there is no stabilizing presence of elders, and where any claim of anyone who says he is an elder is unverifiable. Do you think that which is crooked can be made straight? Or perhaps you somehow think you have a “sacred calling” to argue, but in that case you are in direct contradiction with the Bible and the earthly organization. On my blog profile, I do nor say that I am. Nor do I have what many seem to feel is the obligatory link to jw.org. That’s deliberate. Everyone has some idiosyncrasies (Lord knows you have some! to the point where your identity itself is questionable) and if you link to the Witness website you convey the impression that you got it from them. I’d rather not tarnish them that way. Of course, one can read my posts and readily conclude I am a Witness, which I am, but I don’t outright say so on the front page. I admit I veer into the crass at times. There is one stereotype I like to counter, and that is that JWs eat Bible sandwiches—that is, apart from the Bible, they have no interests at all, from which some interpret that they are nothing but self-righteousness on steroids. I like to counter that with an image of someone more true to what I think Witnesses really are, who lives in the world, and as such reacts to it, but attempts imperfectly to be no part of it—in short, a regular joe that other regular joes might relate to. Of course, there are some Witnesses who do eat Bible sandwiches. To these, some of what I write is a turnoff. And as stated, to those who heed the WT’s advice as to hanging out where there is riffraff, anything written here is questionable.

This is the case with many unsavory personalities. They have to be given the last word, because they WILL NOT yield. If you insist upon it yourself you will write until well past Armageddon (and possibly be distracted from it on that account) The trick is, not to insist upon the last word, for you will not get it, but to make your own words cogent, reasonable, and persuasive. Write a little and rest from your labors while they flail away at points already addressed. On the other hand, to the extent this really is an “apostate” site, as he contends—certainly there are some of those ne’er-do-wells here, who cares? Strictly speaking, no one ought to be hobnobbing with these characters anyhow. The fact that some are, self included (and among the ‘worst offenders’), indicates that they all have unique reasons, purposes, intentions, circumstances, etc. The more long-winded threads are, the more likely that anyone with any value on their time will stay away from it. A great way to deal with “apostasy” is to encase it in so much nonsense, like T-cells encasing a virus, that it all but sinks from sight.

Yes. It’s a valid question. Though, of course, I have done the same (or parallel) Speaking of “anti-cultism,” I quoted someone saying, “Oh, sorry for not having a PhD in whatever b******t you have your PhD in.” Everyone knows what the word is. Language changes. I have always avoided that acronym but, as above, have said things just as bad. I even had some fun with it in Tom Irregardless and Me. Some heavy-metal group, I forget which, had just released a critically acclaimed song, with lyrics raging at the current state of the world: ”We are so f**ked, s**t out of luck!” (asterisks the writer’s) I recapped it as: Yes! Exactly! Now you’ve got it! You are so f**ked! You are shit out of l**k! But it doesn’t have to be that way! Clean up your act! Pick up those Bibles! “Shave off those beards! Apply yourselves and maybe a year or so you can do one of our original songs! Why—with your background, maybe you can do two!” I’m still waiting.