Well, I'm here at the convention, and boy is it a dozer. All the speakers blur together - they all sound like the same exact person with their superficial emphasis on the "key points." Today was a tad juicy, with the "stay away from the demon-enhanced apostates" symposium and the "you don't need an education to scrub toilets, jerk" talk as well. Nothing really new - just the same old poop.
How does daniel-p handle sitting there for the entire session, you ask? Well, he - er, I engage my faculties in people-watching. It affords me as much pleasure as I could have in such environs. I saw a hilarious scenario of motherly-discipline play out among a look-a-like trio of roundish women - a mother and two daughters around 14 and 15 - on the floor section for all to see. The mother - think Tracy Turnblad's mother except less good-humoured - commanded the girls to take notes and write down scriptures while she was gone to the bathroom, and upon returning, found that one of her portly offspring had only scribbled sprawling, surreal landscapes in blue ink. The girl thrust the paper out at her mother's command, whereupon she acquired a downcast look, scowling so much I could no longer discern the resentful glint in her eye due to the ruffled skin flaps on her brow. Big Mama then led her daughter across the floor, poking and jabbing when she wanted her to turn, and into the rear of the building where I imagine some sort of arcane Okie discipline was administered. That fiasco occupied my time for a good 35 minutes, until I went back to imagining myself racing my bike in circles around the floor sections while everyone gazed on glassy eyed, in their waxen rapture.
I now believe the WTS has perfected the art of keeping people barely interested - tenuously teetering between paying attention and not paying attention. I think this stateof mind is ideal for inculcating the more important things, like "forget the annointed - we are the faithful slave and we lead you," "don't question us or your local elders," and of course the "sheep come a runnin' when they're called - so you better too, asshole." Such messages are covered in layers of mundane rhetoric - almost soothing in their pace and repetition. I find myself leaning back and reverting to an infant-state, where warm, fuzzy memories creep up of me lying on the cool concrete floor underneath my mother's legs, comfortably dozing amidst the repetitive, reverberating din of the speaker's voice. Of course, it would just be unseemly for a grown man to crawl down on the floor, stretch out, and stare at the bolts holding the seats down, but for some reason that's the one thing I want to do most when I'm sitting there in the middle of all that dub-rabble.
Yesterday there was a family with a little baby-toddler (I couldn't determine - suffice it to say the limbs were still rubbery) sittitng in the row in front of me. The little guy offered much entertainment for a few hours, fussing about and staring at me a few times with saucer-black eyes, straight into the depths of my heart. Then he screamed and I wanted to swat it away.
More than anything else this convention, I've noticed how EVERY SPEAKER SOUNDS EXACTLY THE SAME. Just plain creepy. I could turn on any televangelist and within 3 minutes be all into it, throwing my arms up and praising the Lord, compared to these mono-masters of the English language. And don't get me started on substance. I could read Harry Potter and get more substance about human nature, motivation, etc. than there is in any of these talks. It's all the same scriptures - already I've heard several used many times over. And the general lack of Biblical bases for their points is also obvious. I estimate an average of 4 scriptures used for each talk. I could be full of shit though - it could be about 3.
The JWs are probably one of the most pathetic religions in the world. It's a constant case of mass-amnesia, mass-denial, and mass-dissonance. However, I can see how it's so easy to slip into a mind-state of depending on others to tell you how to think, what to think, and when to think. It somehow removes ultimate culpability to their life. They can always fall back on "Jehovah's blessings" and "Jehovah's council" to keep them from choosing the hard choices. I've also noticed a definite lack of outward displays of happiness - or joy, in dub-speak. The cogent happiness is replaced with content madness. The hordes of dubland-denizens swarm to the stadium like the beautiful people in that one movie where the guy goes into the future like 10,000 years, shuffling their feet, fooled into thinking they're happy, waiting in line to get their brains scooped out with a blunt fork. In some I can see a faint glimmer of SELF under the monastic woodenness of their face, but in most I see the willful letting-go of anything that would make living a one-time deal, an exciting adventure. What's to do but make babies and constantly beat yourself up for not doing your family study last week? Get yourself a wife and take pleasure in the only thing the WT allows you to have behind closed doors - mediocre sex.
Today I had trouble not standing up and screaming obscentities. Surely they would carry me away and label me insane. I must bide my time, wait here beneath the stadium lights, occasionaly soothing my eyes with the sight of ample-breasted females. What can I say? I'm a man. And almost all men are pathetic in the simplicity of their biology. It's the complicated biologies you must beware of.
Till I can muse and mull over the convention again, signing off -
-dp