Lyman Swingle at the Bethel Breakfast table - What fun!

by Dogpatch 32 Replies latest jw friends

  • Dogpatch
    Dogpatch

    https://vimeo.com/41590728

    https://vimeo.com/41590728

    How in the world do you embed videos on this site?

    Randy

  • Band on the Run
    Band on the Run

    They are awfully verbose and awkward for such a short scripture. This is why Witnesses do not know their Bible. It takes eternity to move from phrase to another.

  • botchtowersociety
    botchtowersociety

    You can't embed video unless it is youtube (at least I don't know how).

    Thanks for the video clips.

  • Glander
    Glander

    Not exactly crackling with spiritual energy. The breakfast Rice Crispies had no competition....zzzzzz

  • NewChapter
    NewChapter

    I think you can only embed with youtube. I couldn't listen to it all, but great points on how many people don't wash their hands after using the bathroom or blowing their nose. YUM! Bring on the breakfast.

  • ziddina
    ziddina

    videos worked fine, and as soon as I'm thru vacuuming, I'll go back and listen to the whole thing...

    Thanks for posting these!!

  • exwhyzee
    exwhyzee

    Wow, this brings back memories. Bro Swingle was a nice ol guy. But I'm reinded of how being at Bethel was very often like attending a daily funeral service.

    Where did you get this and what made you post it Randy?

  • Dogpatch
    Dogpatch

    exwhyzee says,

    Wow, this brings back memories. Bro Swingle was a nice ol guy. But I'm reinded of how being at Bethel was very often like attending a daily funeral service.

    LOL it really was, unless Knorr was up at the microphone, which made it like a circus, with someone being stoned to death for some dumb infraction... and he made it quite exciting because he ALWAYS named names and was not afraid to ruin some poor Bethel boy's life.

    I honestly don't know who shot it, but I get stuff like this pretty often anonymously. Obviously it's not a fake... but it is kind of fuzzy and not real well shot, so it looks like it was a Betheliter, or maybe a visiting person, who just pointed their video camera and filmed it. I don't remember any rules against audio or videotaping it. Outsiders joined the Bethelites daily at the tables. I've had this for a couple of years... I just have so much video and audio I forget where it all is. :-)) Terabytes worth. But nothing really damning.

    I came into Bethel in Nov. 1974 and a brother from Hawaii met me in L.A. and we traveled together the rest of the way to Brooklyn. I didn't know him beforehand, nor did I see him again that I can remember.

    But about a year later, Knorr gets at the morning microphone and announced that "Brother so-and-so had been caught visiting the brothels on 42nd street, and has just been disfellowshipped and is now back in Hawaii," or something very similar (he always shared the pettiest of details).

    Then he proceeded with the details.

    It really unnerved me. Why not just ask him to leave? Why not just reprove him and send him home? He was not rebellious. What do you expect from 2000 horny men with a handful of unavailable women? The same thing that happens in prisons and even seminaries. Men get horny, and will take whatever they can. It may be wrong, but why ruin a boy's life over it?

    Bethel had a large subculture back then of about 50 Hawaiian brothers, and they were very tight, and friendly. Brother ____ was from Hawaii, and looked Hawaiian (not a haole).

    Haole

    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search

    Haole ( play/ ' h a? l i? / ; Hawaiian ['h?ule] ), in the Hawaiian language, is generally used to refer to an individual that fits one (or more) of the following: "White person, American, Englishman, Caucasian; American, English; formerly, any foreigner; foreign, introduced, of foreign origin, as plants, pigs, chickens". [1] The origins of the word predate the 1778 arrival of Captain James Cook (which is the generally accepted date of first contact with westerners), as recorded in several chants stemming from antiquity. Its use historically has ranged from descriptive to racist invective.

    So within 10 minutes, several phone calls were made from the rest of the Hawaiian brothers to their JW families back in Hawaii, telling them what had happened. It must have ruined his life permanently... Witnesses would treat him like a pedophile or something. (Sorry, they treat pedophiles pretty good in comparison, even re-appointing them as elders in a few years if they promise not to do it again).

    I never heard from him. But I do know that Bethel was very cruel to the young men that came in for a 4-year obligation to work for $14 a month in the prime of their lives.

    I had a girlfriend at the time I left for Bethel, but the "nearness of the end" and the excitement of being at the hub of "God's organization" was far more important than my primal needs. (I was addicted to this religion. )

    Renee couldn't wait 4 years... we kept in touch and she got married. That's the last I ever saw of her.

    She is on the left, with her sister, having gone back to Florida.

    Randy

    www.freeminds.org

  • ziddina
    ziddina
    "But I'm reinded of how being at Bethel was very often like attending a daily funeral service...." exwhyzee

    Ohhh, yes... That was boring!!! I didn't even get thru all 14 - 16 minutes of the first one!

    To think - having to sit through over a THOUSAND of those - over a period of 4 years...

    No wonder some of the Bethelites cut and ran before their time was up!!

    And another thing struck me - would you want ANY of those men telling you how to live your life? Man, it really hammered home how out-of-touch with reality they are, and very "Stepford-Wife-Stuck-In-The-1950's"...

  • fugue
    fugue

    Oh my dear lord. You folks really got out of bed at the crack of dawn, got dressed in your Sunday finest, went to the breakfast table by 7 a.m........ for THAT?????? He almost put me to sleep within the first 2 minutes, just watching him try to figure out what DAY it was. Holy crap, I wouldn't have lasted 2 days in beth-hell.

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