Yes, all the time. It's an effective thought-stopping technique. In fact, I used it on myself for years.
Some have told me "well, nobody else is right." My response was: "remove the 'else' from that sentence and I'll agree with you 100%."
The reason this thought-stopping technique works so well is two-fold. First, it's a nifty twist of John 6:68 where Peter asked Jesus "to whom shall we go, because you [Jesus] have sayings of everlasting life." The Society cleverly applies this scripture to the Society. Thus, when Witnesses make such statements, they honestly feel that they are applying a scriptural principle.
The second reason this technique works so well is that it takes advantage of a built-in assumption that Witnesses already have. That assumption is that God must have an organization through which he is working today. They reason that if the WT Society isn't that organization, what else could it be?
As most of us know, this is a false premise. That false premise can be deconstructed as follows. It would work best if your issue with the Society relates to 1914/607/end-times matters. (note that I don't hold any delusions that this would actually convince your garden-variety brain-dead Witness of anything, but if the person is honest and open-minded it could help).
- Point out that God has not always had an organization. Who could it have been between, say, A.D. 150 and 1850?
- So, if someone studied the Bible in 1420 and realized that the Catholic church was teaching false doctrines, should he have stayed because there was 'nowhere else to go'? Of course not.
- So, what makes today (2010) any different? The JWs will say that it's different because it's the "Last Days."
- So, if we're not really in the Last Days there's not necessarily a single organization, is there?
