TrueTomHarley

Of course it does. Would one hold Macy’s responsible for the conduct of its shoppers?

Of course it does. Would one hold Macy’s responsible for the conduct of its shoppers?

The reproach of the abuser falls on the abuser, not the congregation. It was indeed a timely attitudinal shift. It’s a chapter that was in TTvtA, and now will have to be included somewhere else.
https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2019/02/the-reproach-of-child-sexual-abuse-falls-on-the-abu.html

The reproach of the abuser falls on the abuser, not the congregation. It was indeed a timely attitudinal shift. It’s a chapter that was in TTvtA, and now will have to be included somewhere else.
https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2019/02/the-reproach-of-child-sexual-abuse-falls-on-the-abu.html

Please do! I look forward to reading the rest of the book.🙂 It's nothing personal that I don't agree with you on the GB part. I love the brothers in Russia, as I love all the brothers (even the GB ones, whether anybody wants to believe me or not). And I love you too, Tom. Thank you.☺️

Given that you feel the way you do about the subject matter, I’ll accept this as high praise.
In the upcoming ‘Last of the Last Days: Faith in the Age of Dysfunction,’ my perennial return visit, Bernard Strawman, (who continues to make find progress! though only I can see it) mutters that our guys are more like ‘janitor/plumbers’ than ‘philosopher/kings.’ He takes colossal pride in his education.

For the most part, they are. It is the theme of yet another book, which is the final proofing stage. (I’ve removed TTvtA for revision.)
Not sure we agree on which issue that is. For the most part it is an asset, though it does come with downsides:

 

Who can respond to lunacy like this, being tagged 3 times in as many hours by a perfect stranger over a point of complete common sense? How can a guy who wants to keep his senses not resort to blocking in such instances?

All I have done is decline to speak with someone who is determined to trash much of what I hold dear, someone I do not know personally, and someone whom I never have had significant interaction with. I think you have to stretch it to pronounce that course a ‘lack of love.’
Frankly, I could just as easily turn it around. I have addressed most of the points you bring up in far greater detail than in all the other commentators put together. This is in the several chapters I have called to your attention of ‘Don’t Know Why’ that deal with brainwashing, discipline, and Governing Body. All of it is original writing. None of it is boilerplate off the Watchtower. In the event you do not finish them all, it can only be through lack of love on your part. I even have a ‘Contact Me’ section at the end of the book, and no, the WNMF is not one of the places listed.
In my social media activities, I will frequently accept a ‘friend’ or new ‘follower,’ only to find they instantly want to set up an individual private conversation. What is it will people so presumptuous as to demand this? We are finite beings who already have full draws on our time. All of us must pick and choose the interaction they deem the most effective. 
I did not say this. I said, based on previous history, that this is probably what happened. I gave no opinion as to whether it was ‘merited’ or not.

Part II of the book, entitled Apologia, is an exploration of all factors that may contribute to the opposition to the JW faith in Russia. Included are chapters entitled ‘Brainwashing,’ ‘Discipline,’ and ‘Governing Body.’ You may find what you are looking for there. I hope you do.
The meaning of ‘cult’ has changed over the years. Many groups that were once on one side of the word are now on the other. If JWs are a cult, it is because the Bible is a cult manual. If it is, they are. If it is not, they aren’t. As long as they find themselves on the same side as is the Bible, they are content. Let others squabble over the verbiage.
You actually don’t know that. When someone resolutely trashes what I hold dear, I tend to leave them to their own trashing, whether they be DFed or not. Nonetheless, I’ve not said an unkind word about you, whereas some of those you label as ‘more loving’ have become so abusive toward you as to (presumably) be driven off the platform by its administator.
Sometimes people disagree.  I can live with that. Do not confuse recognition of that fact with being ‘unloving.’

Part II of the book, entitled Apologia, is an exploration of all factors that may contribute to the opposition to the JW faith in Russia. Included are chapters entitled ‘Brainwashing,’ ‘Discipline,’ and ‘Governing Body.’ You may find what you are looking for there. I hope you do.
The meaning of ‘cult’ has changed over the years. Many groups that were once on one side of the word are now on the other. If JWs are a cult, it is because the Bible is a cult manual. If it is, they are. If it is not, they aren’t. As long as they find themselves on the same side as is the Bible, they are content. Let others squabble over the verbiage.
You actually don’t know that. When someone resolutely trashes what I hold dear, I tend to leave them to their own trashing, whether they be DFed or not. Nonetheless, I’ve not said an unkind word about you, whereas some of those you label as ‘more loving’ have become so abusive toward you as to (presumably) be driven off the platform by its administator.
Sometimes people disagree.  I can live with that. Do not confuse recognition of that fact with being ‘unloving.’

It is true, but that is the extent of my rebellion - right here on the World Forum - home of wayward Witnesses and a few good blokes. I wouldn't try to spin an entire thread out of it.

You have misunderstood my comment and it is my fault for not being more clear. 
If it was up to me, we would drop our emphasis on always being so immaculate in appearance. Just last week a householder gave me what he thought was a helpful tip that if we didn't dress to the nines routinely, our message would better resonate with the average Joe. 
When in the ministry, I dress as casually as I can without triggering alarms, for a full suit with shined shoes fails to do it with the average householder, IMO.. Having dressed down just a bit, I am content,. On a few beastly hot evenings last year,  I dispensed with a tie altogether in the ministry. 'Let them come out themselves and stop me,' I told myself.
I admit the overall picture is not going my way - it is just one of those things to adjust to and keep in perspective  - because I see fully attired brothers on the website trekking through the wilds where anyone else would don safari gear. This is only minor grousing - don't take it as anything more. I realize that it is a matter of showing respect and that you'd don't go slumming with the Lord. We just overdo it sometimes. To the extent formal dress is almost exclusively the realm of the political, legal and business worlds, I even think it feeds the perception of JWs being "corporate." @adminhimself would agree. 
I'd be happy if there was no correlation at all between photos of dress and lessons about Christian conduct.
 

No, this is entirely wrong. Tharcisse would be much displeased with you. His writing says exactly the opposite of what you allege. How you can pull a “good people are in all religions” lesson out of his book is beyond me.
The non-Witness you may be thinking of is Tharcisse’’s own wife. She was not a Witness at the time of their trials but later became one. In her part of the saga—the same events are related by different participants—she says: 
“The stifling conditions, lack of sleep, scanty food, and darkness had a numbing effect on our minds. But one thing I knew: I, my husband, and all five of my children were alive because our Jehovah’s Witness friends had repeatedly risked their lives to save us. Their faith was like a rock. They lived for peace. No one could force them to use weapons against their neighbors, even those of a different ethnicity. They would sooner die than harm others. They were Hutu, just like the machete-wielding murderers who spilled rivers of blood. It pained me to think of it, but I knew in my heart that the vast majority of Hutu killers claimed to be Christian. Most of them belonged to my Catholic church.”
Did non-JWs help him? Yes. After the genocide, some academic non JWs encouraged and enabled him to publish his experience. And leading up to as well as during the genocide, one was never in danger from one’s own Tutsi tribe, only from the opposing Hutu tribe. And there was a very small Hutu religious component who held themselves back from the mass-murder. But holding oneself back is not the same as putting oneself forward to rescue a family in distress. The book’s foreword, written by a non-Witness professor of philosophy, acknowledges that the Seminega family survived “mainly because of help they received from their fellow Jehovah’s Witnesses who were Hutu.” It wasn’t ‘nice people in all religions putting their neck on the line’ for he and his family.

Good choices. Here is my book review of No Greater Love:
https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2020/07/no-greater-lovehow-my-family-survived-the-genocide-in-rwanda-a-book-by-tharcisse-seminega.html

I'm enjoying it already...😁 (I love My Fair Lady, and beavers are cool😎)
 
"“Dam, dam, dam, dam!” to misquote Professor
Higgins. “They’ve grown accustomed to my face.” And I have
customers to face. How am I going to face them with a new book I
say is stellar when I have firmly planted the notion that I
originate rubbish? Someone should have told me the ebook needed
work. Then the present salvage would be unnecessary. That’s the
trouble with the friends—they’re either too polite to tell you that
your work stinks, or they have such a low bar of approval, happy to
read anything complimentary, that they don’t think it does. And no,
I did not misspell dam. I spelled it the friendly beaver way
for the sake of my people. Not only does the homonym not trigger
offense, but it puts in a plug for education. Everyone knows that
beavers are highly educated, graduates of Dam U, every one of
them.”  😆
Excerpt From
I Don't Know Why We Persecute Jehovah's Witnesses: Searching for the Why
Tom Harley
https://books.apple.com/us/book/i-dont-know-why-we-persecute-jehovahs-witnesses-searching/id1560211086
This material may be protected by copyright.
 
Thank you!☺️

During the trials to ban the Witness organization, to ban the NWT, and to confiscate St Petersburg Bethel, Anton Chivchalov summarized the events by tweets at intervals of every few minutes. He said I could make whatever use of them I wished, and they appear almost in their entirety in 
https://mybook.to/Dontknowwhywepersecute
A labor of love, the ebook version is still free or nearly so.

A veritable love-in between Boyle and JWI.
I never thought I’d live to see it.

A veritable love-in between Boyle and JWI.
I never thought I’d live to see it.

Not even that one

A veritable love-in between Boyle and JWI.
I never thought I’d live to see it.

The times they are a changing.

The times they are a changing.

I think she may be speaking of the parrot in the old Soviet joke about the man who implored the police to understand that the political views of his parrot were not his.

Not so thin-skinned, if you please. I'd rather go back to peace. You can suffer a rebuke now and then without thinking the rebuker an enemy. Nor is it necessary to compare to see who else is rebuked. I believe there are scriptures on both of these points.