Bring up to the top
jwsons
The Watchtower & the cigarette company
by expatbrit 207 Replies latest watchtower scandals
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DannyBear
How a Christian puts his money to work is for him to decide personally, just as how he works for a living is for him to decide. There is nothing contrary to Scriptural principles for him to let his money help him earn a livelihood. If he invests in stocks, no one should criticize him. He should, of course, be discreet about what stocks or bonds he buys. When he knows that a corporation is devoted entirely to manufacturing merchandise that is used for a morally wrong purpose, it would be improper for him to violate his conscience by investing money in the stock of that company. - Awake!, February 8, 1962, p. 23.
I suspect this quote provides the 'out' for the wtbs. The word entirely.
Although Phillip Morris is in the business of cigs.......it is not entirely devoted to that product.
Danny
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Scully
That's a good point, Danny Bear. I wonder if I could use that same "argument" if I went to the grocery store and didn't spend the "entire" amount of the bill on cigarettes, just one pack, if the elders would accept that rationale if a judicial committee asked me about it??
Love, Scully (non-smoker stirring the pot class)
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Gadget
The wbts are making millions from this trust fund? No wonder they are tripping over themselves trying to get people to leave them things in their wills, ect.
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DannyBear
Scully,
I think that sometimes we latch onto anything that at first glance appears to discredit the wts.
This tendancy imo does little to impress the average r&f jw. They (jw's) are very apt to make very similar concessions of conscience when operating or doing business.
Of course when confronted with blatant hypocracy(usually confessed by the transgressor), like an idividual cashier selling pack of cigs over the counter, they take a strident stand. Yet another jw worker within the samn store (bakery) can go about making a living without the slightest twinge of conscience.
A mire of legalistic thinking, but it is what allows them to function in the world.......yet still remain with a semblance of 'being seperate'.
Danny
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hawkaw
You raise an interesting point danny - as usual.
hmmm ....
What about the words "manufacturing merchandise"?
Does Phillip Morris (Atrel) only manufacture cigs? I know they own other companies or have the majority of shares in other companies such as Kraft. But Kraft does it's own manufacturing.
What do you think?
hawk
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expatbrit
Hello Danny:
That is a very likely "out" response from a JW or the WT themselves.
Question is, does using that response tip the WT further into the pit of hypocrisy? How would it square with the Watchtower's counsel to its own followers to "keep without spot from the world"? Does it enable the WT to measure up to the same standards with which it measures others? Personally, I don't think so.
For instance, suppose Ms. Riley had left her money in trust to her grandchildren, and the Trust had then made this investment on their behalf. If the WT had knowledge of the Trust's activities, how likely is it that some "spiritual counsel" would be coming down the pipeline on making investments in accordance with Christian principles? Very likely, imo.
Expatbrit
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DannyBear
Hawkaw & Expatbrit,
A cursory search on Phillip Morris;
Altria Group, Inc. (NYSE: MO)
120 Park Ave.
New York, NY 10017 (Map) Phone: 917-663-4000
Fax: 917-663-2167
http://www.altria.comCovered by Greg Perliski
The house the Marlboro Man built, Altria Group (formerly Philip Morris Companies), is the world's largest tobacco firm. The company controls about half of the US tobacco market and the Marlboro name, which is one of the world's most valuable brands. Altria also makes the Benson & Hedges and Virginia Slims brands. However, tobacco is only part of the story. The company owns 84% of Kraft Foods, the world's #2 food company (after Nestlé), which makes leading brands such as Jell-O, Kool-Aid, Maxwell House, Oscar Mayer, and Post cereals. The tobacco giant bought Nabisco in late 2000, folding those brands into Kraft's food portfolio. Altria owns 36% of the world's #2 brewer, SABMiller plc.
Knowing the wtbs penchant for excusing any suspect conduct, Altria owning and manufacturing of Food products will suffice them with enough evidence to poo poo any misconduct.
Expat I think the majority of their stands on issues like this are very hypocrital. They surely strain out the gnats but leave HUGE bolders of inconsistancy all over issues like these. Blood, child abuse, serving in the military etc.
But they always seem to answer these liabilities with double speak, persausive enough to allow the rank and file to forgive and forget very quickly.
Having worked a little with the organization on building projects, district conventions, etc. It became apparent to me, even as a devout witness, that when it comes to issues relating to money.......the application of the scriptural admonition to be 'wise as serpents and innocent as doves' is a favorite way for individuals and the corporation (gb) to abate any guilt of complicity.
Danny
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sf
Just a current news item I viewed today:
Changing World Envelops Tobacco Growers
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20031130/bs_nm/biztobacco_dc_2
By Steve Robrahn
SHELBYVILLE, Ky. (Reuters) - Kentucky farmer Paul Hornback strips tobacco leaves from their stocks, forming bales bound for America's cigarette factories. It is timeless autumn toil in a land where the golden dried leaves were once a currency of their own.
But these are strange times in the U.S. tobacco world: A harvest some farmers think may be one of their last, cigarette companies are broadcasting health warnings even as they lay off workers, declining U.S. cigarette sales and perhaps the sunset on a rural way of life rooted in colonial times.
Farmers like Hornback in states such as Kentucky and North and South Carolina have an eye on Washington, thinking they may some day be paid to give up protections under a system that has propped up the price of tobacco and set limits on its production since the 1930s.
The prospect for such action in the current session of Congress is dim, but pressure for the change is likely to continue. Much of the attention has been focused on proposals from tobacco state lawmakers that would pay farmers $13 billion over six years to phase out the system.
A tax on tobacco products would foot the bill and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ( news - web sites ) would gain regulatory control over tobacco products under some proposals. The European Commission ( news - web sites) has also proposed reforms under which national tobacco quotas would eventually be abolished.
If the U.S. Congress eventually ends quotas and price supports, tobacco farming could still continue. But many of those who grow it today under the decades-old protective system would likely find no future in the business since they are mostly small farmers who couldn't make enough money on the amounts they grow once the price falls.
And U.S. production might actually jump. With the limits gone, new larger farms could come in, able to compete with imports and make a profit at lower market prices because of economies of scale.
There is still a big demand for tobacco but half the amount put into cigarettes in the United States is imported, the highest level in history. Foreign tobacco was once a poor quality cousin but better growing methods have changed that, the Agriculture Department says, and the U.S. share of the world tobacco market has fallen to 8 percent, the lowest on record.
DECADE OF CHANGES
Hornback, whose family has raised tobacco for more than a century on land just east of Louisville, knows that much of the traditional ways of tobacco production are coming to an end.
"There's a lot of farmers who are not doing well -- the ones who really concentrated on tobacco and haven't diversified," said Hornback, who is bracing for the coming crunch by investing in new crops and other business endeavors.
The only question in his mind is whether that will happen next year or perhaps the year after. Already, changes during the past 10 years have been profound.
A decade ago Hornback would have had help with the crop and harvest from family members or locally hired hands; today he depends on migrant workers from Mexico. In the past he would have taken his crop to a local tobacco warehouse for auction; now he grows leaf under contract to Philip Morris USA and ships it to the company directly.
There were 136,682 tobacco farmers in 1987. Currently there are about 80,000 farmers who grow flue-cured or burley tobacco, the two types covered by the quota-price system, which account for 93 percent of the U.S. crop.
Since 1998 there has been a 50 percent cut in the amount of tobacco farmers are allowed to grow. The quota is based on how much the tobacco companies expect to buy.
That has already forced many small growers to all but abandon tobacco, Dru Terhune among them. After a lifetime of farming, Terhune took a job three years ago with a local manufacturing company at age 53.
At one time, he grew 20,000 pounds (9,000 kg) of tobacco per year. Last year he produced only 6,500 (2,950).
"So, I'm done," Terhune said during a visit to Hornback's farm. "My intentions are not to raise next year no matter what. But I may be forced to" be eligible for any buy-out.
In order to qualify farmers must be active growers or landowners with tobacco-growing rights.
In Kentucky, where an average 6-acre (2.4-hectare) farm produces about 12,000 pounds (5,450 kg), a burley grower would receive $138,240 in a buy-out, by one government estimate. Those who own leases but don't farm would also be reimbursed, with the owner of the leased quota in the above 6-acre (2.4-hectare) scenario receiving $53,760.
Hornback said as many as half of all growers could quit after a buyout. Those who don't would probably try to find niche markets such as specially grown tobacco for Europe or Japan, Hornback said. Or they may choose alternative crops.
"We need to get the issue resolved," Hornback said. "Either we are going to have a buyout, or we give it our best shot and we don't get it, and you go on from there."
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sKally
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JT
It would be like them accepting money from a company that is a chain of "whore houses", however I think the WTS would accept it anyway knowing where it came from.
Seedy
SEEDY now this funny
HO HOUSES
