Has The WTS Reached Its Kobayashi Maru Moment?

by metatron 28 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  metatron

  Hilarious! We've gone from the Borg to the Pakleds!

  To be clear, I greatly doubt that anyone at HQ aspires to make the Organization into yet another burned out Protestant church. Even so, that's the favorable interpretation of how things are evolving.

  You may have folks at Warwick/ Paterson who favor compromise (the ones with cozy jobs and opportunities) while the guys in the field (suckers) must fight the notion that they wasted their lives chasing a fantasy. This might explain things.

  The nastier view would be that they just suffer and die as a washed up cult. My remaining sense of compassion ( and business logic) favors the 'evolving towards a denomination'view.

  metatron
• 

  wizzstick

  

  Star Trek?

  I think you'll find the above is what a Governing Body meeting looks like...
• 

  wizzstick

  

  And here is a member of the GB addressing a recent elders school.

  Note the CO sporting his post DO new livery...
• 

  Vidiot

  OK, Meta, I get what you're saying, now (in this thread and the other one), and I have to say, you make some compelling arguments that I hadn't considered before.

  I was under the impression that Jaracz's iron-fisted reign drove out all the moderates, but if it didn't (and your hypothesis is correct) it would provide a plausible explanation for some of what we've been seeing.

  The thing with raging extremisim or mainstreaming is; neither one spells a particularly sunny future for the Org...

  ...if they mainstream, they're essentially admitting that there's nothing particularly special about being affiliated with the WTS, so there's little incentive to stay.

  However, if they go further extremist, they're virtually guaranteed to alienate a significant chunk of rank-and-filers who are close to or on the fence, effectively eliminating their incentive to stay.

  Either way, you're right, it would be no-win-scenario; a catch-22 that can't help but result in a significant reduction in membership and assets.

  EDIT: All the more reason for them to want to - as I've suggested before - "manage" the decline in a way that will enable the WTS to survive the transition.
• 

  sir82

  All the more reason for them to want to - as I've suggested before - "manage" the decline in a way that will enable the WTS to survive the transition.

  That would be the rational approach.

  I have a feeling, though, that "rational" is viewed with suspicion at best, and more likely outright hostility, the higher up the chain of command you go.

  I think there is a significant portion, if not the majority, for whom any retreat is utterly unthinkable. That bunch would rather stand at the helm of a majestic, but sinking, battleship than meekly clamber into a lifeboat.
• 

  Crazyguy

  Maybe the numbers of actual members is not as high and more are leaving then their actually reporting. Maybe some bean counter also figured out how old most of the members are and they know that a lot of people are going to be dying off in the coming years. So maybe this is why thier going for all the cash now.
• 

  steve2

  Look to the Seventh Day Adventists for examples of "mellowing" (i.e., cautious mainstreaming)and to Exclusive Brethren for examples of "hardening" (i.e., closing the doors).

  Both groups provide telling examples of two very different approaches to the haemorrhaging of active members.
• 

  Vidiot

  sir82 - "I think there is a significant portion, if not the majority, for whom any retreat is utterly unthinkable. That bunch would rather stand at the helm of a majestic, but sinking, battleship than meekly clamber into a lifeboat."

  Hardliners, through and through; and they're usually at the helm.

  One of more consistent errors that religious hardliners have made throughout history is attributing any success (initial or otherwise) to divine support, rather than the simple fact that they acted more ruthlessly than their opponents.

  It's how Rutherford took the reigns.
• 

  metatron

  I apologize for multiplying analogies but consider the Catholic Church as a model.

  They encompass Opus Dei lunatics and apathetic birth control usin', fornicating slackers who only show up a couple a times a year for Mass in jeans and a windbreaker.

  It can be done.

  metatron
• 

  Ding

  Like Ol' Man River, the WT just keeps rollin' along...