How do we know JWs are wrong and how do we convince others JWs are wrong: logic versus persuasion

by slimboyfat 57 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  OUTLAW

  OutLaw there's a difference between what JWs are supposed to do and what they actually do. The very fact that so many Watchtowers warn against: education, marriage outside, friends outside, joining groups in the community, losing contact with Kingdom Hall when relocating, is telling. If these things were not a problem among JWs they wouldn't need to write about it all the time. They warn against these things because they occur so frequently and because they are likely to draw people away from JWs.....SBF

  Very true..But..

  Until a JW questions the WBT$.....Or..

  Goes against the instructions of the WBT$..

  There is no window of opportunity for them to start thinking for themselves/break away from the WBT$..

  Most JWs are happy not to think for themselves..So you don`t have a "snow ball`s chance in hell" with them..

  Your looking for a Specific Group,a Target Audience..

  JW`s Who (whether they know it or not) Are Already On Their Way Out..

  .................................................................
  

  .....GOODBYE WATCHTOWER!!.....

  
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  Ucantnome

  How do we know that JWs are wrong

  I understand that theologians argue about things. a JW that i have talked to although agreeing with me on some things felt in their opinion being a JW was closer to the first century. a theologian said to me that the early christians faith was more works based than today, maybe closer to the JW I thought.
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  Xanthippe

  I think like many people we were 'softened up' first by the attitude of elders and my husband having an inside view of how they treated the congregation, especially the very vulnerable. The depressed, the sick and elderly and women on their own.

  Then we found Crisis of Conscience in the library and started to address the facts. The 1914 teaching because of what Franz found while researching the Aid Book, the history and structure of the organization and the disfellowshipping of doctrinal dissenters.

  I don't think it's something to hide or be embarrassed about that you first were affected by the lack of love. They were always saying that in public talks weren't they? Brothers say there's no love in this organization. Tut tut. They meant weak people of course. They talk endlessly of love and goodness so if it's lacking it's no surprise people will remark on it and wonder if it's really the truth.

  So SBF it can be a response to poor treatment that starts people looking for the facts but after all the religion preaches love is a sign of true Christianity so those who despair of finding it in JWs and start to wonder about it all are facing facts. The truth about religion and its inability to bring peace and love.
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  TTWSYF

  Some of my observations include

  1] Overwhelming commitments by the org itself prevent some from having the time to research truth. And may make folks too tired to research.

  2]Total and overwhelming love bombing about the org lets others feel ok about guilting anyone who has the inclination to research the truth.

  3]And this is the most important in my mind, the [liminal and subliminal] teaching or training of shutting down mentally whenever any negative thought about the org enters the mind.

  This happens to everyone on the org, and simple knowing the truth about the truth [TTATT] is not enough. You must remove observation 3 before you can acknowledge the truth.

  My elder brother [like many posters] would say that Jesus quote "' you know a tree by its fruit' and the JWs are the only ones going door to door restoring the true name of God"...you all know the line, But when I told him that going door to door was a work and not a fruit he could only reply over and over that "those are fruits, those are fruits."

  No dear brother, those are not fruits and you need to address observation #3 before acknowledging that works are not fruits because then, very quickly, you would see that there are no fruits and you never would have joined or been baptized in the org or anything else org related.

  TTWSYF
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  Phizzy

  Having thought a little about what happened in my case, I do think that I am probably a little unusual.

  My parents drummed in to me the need to be a lover of truth.That stuck. So when I found that the JW religion was not true, I was actually afraid of being part of it. I thought a God of Truth would act against it.

  So I walked away, as an act of self-preservation. Looking back now,as you have forced me to do Slimboy ! I do not see my exit as either noble or courageous, more done out of fear of a vengeful god.

  I don't think any of this will help present JW's, they obviously, to a man, do not care about truth, despite, ironically calling their religion "the truth".
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  cofty

  Not to be rude but my impression of people who believe they have left JWs for purely doctrinal reasons is that they are a bit unreflective, not to say enamoured by an idealised version of themselves and motivations. - SBF

  Yeah right, not to be rude or anything. Arrogance of the highest order.

  Why do you imagine you know me better than I know me?
  
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  Finkelstein

  There is a large portion of people who left the JWS solely upon the fact that its expressed doctrines were concocted for literature proliferation, more so than accurate bible interpretation.

  ........that's why I left, I didn't want to participate in a commercialized fraud , consciously aware I might get published for doing so, I left the Org. a true god/bible believer.
  
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  never a jw

  logic versus persuasion

  It's like saying Honda original parts versus Honda Civic.

  You may want to compare apples to apples.
  
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  slimboyfat

  Cofty I think none of us know ourselves very well.

  Like I said above, I have been reading books about what influences us and why we make decisions and I find many of the arguments compelling. Two major reasons we do things are 1) we perceive others making a certain choice and figure that it must therefore be a good choice to make and 2) we follow what are (or appear to be) authoritative instructions. These influences account for most of the decisions we make in life big and small. Yet when we explain our decisions to ourselves we explain them in terms of rational choices and logical arguments. This is not a crackpot theory about human decision making, from what I can gather this is a mainstream consensus in psychology about decision making. As someone who respects expert opinion and academic consensus you could maybe look into it if you are interested. In particular the work Robert Cialdini.
  

  And I think it's a bit incredible to claim to have left JWs and joined a mainstream alternative without any outside influence. If outside influence played no part whatever, why didn't your search for the truth lead to Lutheranism, or the Orthodox Church, or even Jainism, or whatever else? Why did it just happen to lead you to join a church belonging to the dominant Protestant faith in your country? There was no influence from anyone around at all? None? It's an amazing coincidence that a pure search for truth just happens to lead to the church down the road.
  

  Like Dawkins says, children of Anglicans, in normal circumstances, grow up to be Anglicans. It's an accident of birth. We are influenced by the people around us, ex-JWs are no exception.

  Was there no friend, no workmate, no family member, no person on the bus, in the gym, or at the local shop, who said anything to you to indicate that leaving JWs might be a good idea and that there was a better alternative that others have chosen? I had many such interactions during my short time as a JW. It's hard for me to tell which were most significant, but they all surely played some part.
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  slimboyfat

  By the way, when reading about logical fallacies, I came across the name for the logical fallacy you use when dismissing my arguments about perspectivism: argumentum ad lapidem.