Well greetings, all. I just got back from my convention yesterday evening. I'll be trying to catch up on the posts as time allows, but there is a very large volume; so if I miss any personal replies, please forgive me.
This was my first convention since I became mentally free, and it was just painful to sit through. I used to be one of those dubs who actually enjoyed conventions. Not that I liked every talk, of course... but I liked the talks that were delivered by good speakers, and the overall experience felt positive and spiritual to me. Now, it was just excruciating. It was worse than mere boredom... it was the pain of constantly hearing lies and mind-control, watching so many people around me be blindly influenced by it, and knowing that all my friends would expect me to accept it as well.
During a couple of parts--the release of the Great Teacher book on Saturday afternoon, and the interviews with exemplary youths on Sunday morning--I had to get up from my seat and go pace the corridors, trying to find an area where the PA system didn't reach well. Considering what the WTS did to my childhood, listening to those parts was just too excruciating.
The notes below turned out rather lengthier than I intended. I don't know how many will be interested enough to read them; but I had to sit through three days of this crap, so I'm damn well going to post my thoughts.
Friday Morning
This contained two talks that I hated even when I was a loyal dub. One was the opening talk. Every year, the convention chairman spends half an hour reminding everyone to pay attention, wear modest clothing, etc. I don't think that any further proof of the WTS' infantilization of its members is needed.
The other one was the keynote address. These are manuscripts that the speaker hsa to read word-for-word, and they're invariably deadly dull. This year, however, I could swear that they just recycled the keynote address from the year before last. It was entitled "Glorious Prophetic Visions Spur Us On!" and it was primarily about the transfiguration. I could have sworn that it was the same keynote address that they gave at the "God's Prophetic Word" conventions.
There was also a talk about "Creation Declares the Glory of God", which was essentially an abridgement of the Public Talk with a similar theme. The amount of recycling and reuse going on here would make any environmentalist proud.
There was also an interview with a family (parents and three teenaged kids) who had moved to some tiny rural congregation in the middle of nowhere to help out. They were all either regular or continuous auxiliary pioneers. They seemed like genuinely nice people, not at all full of themselves despite their sacrifices, and very enthusiastic for their work... but also totally brainwashed. It was touching, but sad.
Finally, the talk "Walk in the Way of Integrity" contained such gems as the claim that 'apostates hide their goal of getting us out of the truth', that the 'residing of Jehovah's glory' mentioned at Ps 26:8 is in the knowledge and association at congregation meetings, and that "The Internet has become a manner of assocation with evildoers."
Friday Afternoon
The symposium on Amos was pretty much the standard WTS prophetic BS. One annoying thing, however, was that they re-read the same scriptures from Amos in different portions of the symposium. The reuse/recycle gets even more blatant!
The talk on alcohol was not as bad as I expected. Aside from a brief statement that "any amount of alcohol that impairs practical thinking is too much", the rest of the talk was a pretty sensible warning about the dangers of alcohol abuse; it could have been taken from AA literature, except for the dollops of bible-based guilt heaped on.
The last talk of the evening was the release of the Bible atlas See the Good Land. How the Society managed to make a half-hour release talk about an atlas still boggles my mind. The brother (presumably reading from a manuscript) spoke of the audience's "longing" for geographic information being "fulfilled."
On a positive note, elders were given reminders to be humble, and kind to the flock. Of course, this is rather ironic coming from the WTS.
Saturday Morning
As usual, Saturday Morning had a symposium on the preaching work. I was struck by what others have also noted, the paucity of the experiences. There were two re-enactments of experiences from informal witnessing; one was about a magazine placement on an airplane, and one was about a teacher watching the Stand Firm video (the one about the Nazis) and telling his student that he had learned something. And these were considered DC-caliber experiences!
In an remarkable display of truth, the last part of the symposium actually had the words "do more" in the title; it was: "Doing So More Fully in Our Ministry."
Saturday Afternoon
The afternoon opened with more excellent but hypocritical counsel on humility. Then it went into the talk "Tired but Not Tiring Out," the usual old rehash of Isa 40:28-31. The WTS continues to miss the distinction between physical and emotional energy. (And yes, I know that they're interrelated. But they're still distinct.)
"Be Liberal, Ready to Share" was a 25-minute-long guilt-trip to try to get people to give their time, efforts, and money to the WTS. One line struck me: "Are yoyu holding back from serving as a Ministerial Servant or Elder because of the work involved?" Obviously, a lot of brothers don't want to deal with the BS of 'serving'. Witness men have always been encouraged to 'reach out', of course, but that is definitely the most pointed, guilt-based appeal I have ever heard.
There's already a thread about the "Voice of Strangers" talk, so I'll post my thoughts there. I will just say that it was one of the most incredible demonstrations of manipulativeness and control that I have ever seen. It also frustrated me personally, because I've been thinking a lot about the possibility of getting some of my friends to leave with me, or at least that they might respect my decision and be willing to remain friends. The WTS seems determined to make sure that doesn't happen.
The mind control wasn't over, however, since the next talk was all about "unity." A couple of points stood out from this talk. First of all, the speaker redefined the "pure language." The Society has traditionally held it to refer to Bible truth as a whole; but the speaker said that it was "particularly the truth regarding the Kingdom", a "truth", of course, which is unique to JWs.
Also, there was very strong admonition to elders not to base their counsel on 'worldly philosophies.' I think of all the witnesses with various psychological problems... not just mental illness, but often co-dependency and similar emotional issues. The WTS seems to be blocking the elders from providing the help that these ones most need. The talk claimed that if the counsel was "bible-based", they could be assured that it would never lead to harm.
Sunday Morning
After the daily text, the first hour of Sunday Morning was "family hour." There was a talk on child-rearing which was, abolve all, a pitch to take your kids out in service. It also contained an interesting question: "Are we arming our children spiritually against predators within the congregation?" In context, he was talking about 'bad association'; but it seemed to be a worthwhile warning if taken in other ways.
The drama was not as horribly groan-inducing as some of the recent ones have been. Of course, the Society followed their practice of throwing modern buzzwords into the drama (e.g. the Pharisees are said to be spreading 'propaganda' against the Christians). What struck me the most was how the drama could be reinterpreted... with the JWs in the role of the Sanhedrin, and 'apostates' in the role of the Christians. The apostles justify publicly exposing the Pharisees, saying such things as: "These people believe that the Sanhedrin speaks for God, just like we used to believe. If they don't know the truth, they'll never come to believe in Jesus." And the Pharisees angrily say to a Christian on trial: "You are one who willfully opposes the arrangement of Jehovah." Sounds spookily familiar.
After the drama, of course, as if it weren't obvious and heavy-handed enough, we had to have a 20-minute talk explaining the lessons from the drama. The speaker said: "Do not water down the judgment message." Apparently, a lot of dubs aren't particularly comfortable telling all their neighbors that they're going to die. And in a surreal moment, he stated: "Nor does this mean that we want to interpret each negative event as a form of religious persecution." Wise advice, which the Society would do well to listen to.
Sunday Afternoon
The public talk was one of the most arrogant ones I've heard in a while. The speaker spent fiteen minutes dismissing the notion that anyone other than Jehovah's Witnesses was giving any glory to God. He stated that "[organized religion] has diverted glory from God by means of false teachings", a statement that I thought applied remarkably well to JWs. And he bald-facedly claimed that "Jehovah's Witnesses have rejected false religious teachings, and teach the pure truths of God's Word."
The concluding talk contained yet another negative mention of the Internet, referring to "those who promote their perverse opinions through the Internet." It included the ten-point resolution that has already been discussed elsewhere. And it included an announcement of a revised pioneer book.
Anyway, those are my highlights from the convention. I left the stadium hot, tired, depressed, and determined to never go to another one of those f***ing events ever again. I do have to go to at least one more assembly, but I hope I never see the stage of a District Convention again.