by rather be in hades 6 Replies latest jw friends
last time i was there, they had meetings for book study in individual homes. now they have them in the halls.
i dunno how it was for many of you, but the book study i went to from...maybe 10 - 15, had "goodie night" on the first weds of the month (my bs was on weds, pun totally intended)
did they take away one of the last bastions of fun with the move to the halls?
When did you leave?
that's hard to really pinpoint.
i pretty much fell out by 2007/8 and stopped attending meetings, but it was a slide well before then as my meeting attendance and all of that was pretty spotty from 2004 until then. that whole period was so f'ing awful i've blocked a lot out.
i remember telling the elders at the hall i grew up in on the week of my birthday that i was turning 18 before the watchtower meeting so they needed to transfer my cards to the hall i planned on going to because that was the last day i was going to their hall. by that time, they knew how i was being treated so it wasn't on bad terms with the elders that i spoke with as they aren't all demonized monsters. some are really nice, just unfortunately trapped in a cult
We used to have a wine and cheese, or a single malt whiskey night (with nibbles) once a month at our group.
The kill-joys that are the GB just hated the idea we might actuall y enjoy ourselves, so knocked it on the head.
I think actually they were more concerned about their legal liabilities.
you had wine and cheese??? awwww man! well, i never would have been able to partake, though i would have killed the cheese, depending... :P
i used to make cakes for goodie night.
In some studies we used to have something once a month in others not. But always sat after and discussed about anything. Nice times, now killed by the spims of the GB.
They have been doing away with all the fun. First, it was the gatherings not for the purpose of field circus. This was completely phased out after roughly 1998. Only boasting sessions, field circus, and Kingdumb Hell cleanings were still allowed--they used the stupid argument that someone committed fornication (a false flag?) after an event to snuff them out.
After a while, about the beginning of 2009, the separate book study was lost. They combined that into the other evening boasting session. The excuse was high gas prices, while they batted liability issues and having pedophiles at private homes as reasons. The more likely reason was to eliminate comments that go off-topic, limiting them to reading the answers in the words of the paragraphs. A side benefit to them is that most of the fun was lost--no more goodie nights.
And now I am hearing scattered rumors that the 3-day Grand Boasting Session is going to be knocked down. While this remains to be confirmed, if true, it will eliminate the opportunities for "brothers" to meet "sisters" from outside a relatively small area. Instead, there will now be a Big Boasting Session (1 day) and two Great Boasting Sessions (2 days). That will also eliminate much of the excitement that remains for the witlesses, so they can funnel it all into the REJECT Astaroth Party (this year, March 27).
