Watchtower Spies and Secret Agents

by TerryWalstrom 29 Replies latest watchtower scandals

• 

  jp1692

  Oh, I’m sure the “upper management” of this cult knows this stuff goes on. I’m just saying it’s not a formal, well-planned or executed thing.

  I was an elder for over two decades and I can tell you on more than one occasion a CO encouraged the elders to engage in this sort of amateur-hour, “private-eye” nonsense. It’s more Keystone cops than anything.

  I personally never did it because — well it’s just wrong. But there were always at least a few elders eager to play at “cloak and dagger,” spy-vs-spy. It’s pretty immature actually.

  For example, the Orwellian and Puritanical WT mandate that “if two people of the opposite sex spend the whole night together they can be presumed to have fornicated” is all many elders needed as an excuse to pretend to be cops on a stakeout. Some of them just loved that shit. I guess it’s the only excitement in their otherwise dull and dreary lives.
• 

  Faded

  There is so much information on that site, but the racism of the editor is obvious. At no time does the editor describe the color of the person they are reporting on except when they're writing about a black individual. The rest of the stories have no such description. The people written about could be Caucasian, middle eastern, Hispanic, Asian, etc. They never say. But they always have to identify when the person they are writing about as African American. Once you notice it, it stands out every time you see it. I don't even know why they do it. It's like they can't help themselves from drawing attention to the person race.
• 

  sparrowdown

  JP - I agree with you "keystone cops" - indeed, clueless nitwits with delusions of real power. Useful idiots to the GB.
• 

  Wakanda

  Faded, Thanks for pointing that out; it may help me notice in the future. Disappointing. aargh
• 

  TerryWalstrom

  There is a kind of old-fashioned prudery and puritanism among men in JW's.
  I do think there is an attraction of a certain sort of psychology which draws alienated masculinity into the fold.
  It is a kind of attraction/repulsion dynamic I'm unable to describe or comprehend because I'm no clinical psychologist, of course--but I've seen and observed it all my life.
  
  Gossip is a big deal in congregations and my own theory is that wives of Elders get the juicy details and it empowers them as a source among peers.
  When you have no sex life of your own, the 2nd-hand Peeping Tom dynamic asserts itself.
  I've met my share of weirdoes in the religion. Hell--maybe I even was one at one time.
  (It took me many years and several marriages to work out my problems.)
  
  
• 

  Londo111

  My grandfather was an elder since the arrangement began and they followed people suspected of “wrongdoing”, until the Society told them to “stop policing the flock”. So it did used to go on. He followed the Theocratic Ministry School conductor into a gay bar and found him holding hands with another man. He followed another person suspected of having an affair with his sectary, but they never found anything incriminating.

  Even years after this, my grandfather teamed up with a non-JW he studied with for years, who suspected his JW wife was having an affair. Of course, all this was not sanctioned by the elders.

  Unlike Scientology, the Watchtower is very legally savvy, perhaps due to getting in trouble in the past (like the case with the Greek Branch). They know how to dance the line and stay just within what they are legally permitted to do. They also have no problem letting elders fall on their swords and absolving any responsibility.

  Of course, Watchtower really doesn’t need elders to stalk people anymore. The informing system among the members ensures there are eyes and ears everywhere. A person is not safe even with JW family…the least bit of dissent can be reported and put a person on the elder’s radar.
• 

  eyeuse2badub

  Sounds like James Bondage double 0 666!

  just saying!
• 

  TerryWalstrom

  Self-invigilation is the supreme identifying characteristic of a CULT.

  We watch and report on each other.
  
  
• 

  Diogenesister

  They never say. But they always have to identify when the person they are writing about as African American. Once you notice it, it stands out every time you see it. I don't even know why they do it. It's like they can't help themselves from drawing attention to the person race.

  That's nothing (though I agree they can't help but out themselves),if you read further down the ranting about sodomite exjws and their deviant lifestyle would be revolting if it weren't so funny. They leave the judgmentalism of Watchtower but the prejudice remains.

  The Watchtower police state exists, no doubt. All Witnesses are informers to some degree.
  
  
• 

  TerryWalstrom

  You turn up the volume on any "virtue" and it becomes destructive because of an impulse toward purity and compliance at all costs.
  Think of anti-abortionists who bomb clinics. That sort of thing.
  JW's are mostly a menace to their own kind. I don't know if this is a tainted blessing or what.