I'm new as a member but have watched the site for a while.
One of my kids, who lives in another part of the country, came for a summer visit from another state and asked to go on a Bethel Tour. She lives with her JW mother and is surrounded by Jws and they even baptized her recently. Her sister couldn't come to visit me this summer because "she is pioneering" so I thought a bethel tour would be a good idea. We couldn't find anything on the website about tours, like where they are, where to park, how to get there, etc. They don't even have a phone number to call on the website. Sure seems odd since I was told all my childhood how special bethel was and how all good witness boys should go there.
I decided to get married at 18 to avoid sinning rather than bethel... although that didn't exactly work (shhh, my ex is still a JW and has never admitted to it!).
We called information for a telephone number to get the hours and used Google to see what all the tour companies had to say. My daughter was excited but I was apprehensive wondering if they had some way of figuring out who I was. The alarm bells didn't ring when I walked in... then approaching the counter I told the person sitting there we were hoping for a tour. He looked us over, asked who we were, and asked about my daughter. I thought for sure that was going to be it, the ninja elders would grab me and take me into a back interogation room. That didn't happen but may be because I avoided giving the spelling of my name. We got our own private tour away from all the dressed up people...
When my daughter went to the bathroom while waiting for a tourguide, the greeter called me over and said, "Brother samiam2b, we normally would expect people to be dressed like they are going to meeting but since your daughter is visiting from out of town, it will be ok". Gee, golly, thanks "brother". I wonder why he assumed I was a brother, believe me I did not give any sign of it... The message was recieved loud and clear, only then did I notice everyone else had ties and dresses on. We (small group) had shorts and tshirts like tourists. Nothing like that to make you feel uncomfortable, I could've walked out right then if it weren't for my daughter.
I have toured a lot of museums and sites of interest but never was I as disappointed in a tour as the Bethel. Our guide was nice enough, as she told us several times that it was an honor for her to be there since they don't let many single sisters go... but anything doctrine related was said as a "they believe" rather than "we". I wonder how much training and programming goes on to prepare tour guides, do they have a tour guide school like KMS? The tour walked us around the hallways to look at posters of all the work happening around the world... a KH build in Brazil, a printing press in Germany, lots of smiling portraits used for WT publications, etc.
I did notice outside there were several groups of "hotty" bethel girls greeting the bethel boys walking on the sidewalk. I found that somewhat humorous for some reason... maybe because the vow of celibacy is so unrealistic with young attractive people who are far away from home but need constant robotic mind control to keep them inline.
Overall it was the most non-tour of a tour I had ever seen.... the time spent in Manhattan and Time Square was a lot more fun for all of us. ;-)
I'm not sure what the point of my post is... other than that was the most time spent around JWs in the last 8 years or so and it was very wierd to hear them talk, having cleared my head of the lingo that they use in such a forced anthropological way. I'm so burned on religion that my mind blocks out all thoughts/questions/concepts having any ties to JW stuff. I'm not sure if that would be considered better or worse to them than if I became a catholic or lutheran or something...
Finally, I'm not an activist and just mind my own business. I made up my mind for myself and think others should do the same. Just posting this message though probably paints me as apostate, which is a big risk considering my daughters nieve young minds.
Cheers
-samiam2b