I'll freely confess I was wrong. When I first found sites like this one, I still thought that ethical reform of the Watchtower was
possible. If you're a lurker here, you need to give up on this naive notion and stop wasting your life.
I was wrong because I failed to consider the unusual - indeed breathtaking nature of the Society's resistance to moral change,
even when practical events cry out for them to do.
For example, consider the case of Gilead missionaries. For years in Bethel, we would never get an official answer
about the 'washout rate' of missionaries. At one point, there was a rumor that they generally lasted about two years
- often with those years utterly wasted because of severe tropical diseases and difficulties with languages and other matters.
I wondered why Jack Redford once gave a remarkable talk called "Do Not Expect Anything From Anybody" in which
he offered counsel about how they shouldn't even expect to be picked up at the airport, on arrival!
There's more I could go on about - but it just amazed me that they treated people this carelessly and that
the washout rate meant nothing, no matter how high.
And then there's Witness kids: Do congregations lose 80-90% of kids "raised in the truth" ? Apparently so -- and yet
this heartbreak to Witness parents never results in any meaningful change. Again, it just seems to be "written off"
with no change in sight - regardless of how bad the problem has become. You just say "Satan did it" and forget about it.
And if any of you lurking elders think this is going to change, volunteer to do the baptism count at your local assembly.
The demeanor of Witness kids waiting in line, with their towels, is little different from waiting in queue at the school
cafeteria. Just something I hafta do.............
There's many more examples to consider: The often poor treatment of Circuit Overseers - even when the Society
had trouble finding suitable ones ( a letter to elders telling you what not to pay for) and years of gradual decline
in conditions at Bethel - while the Society grew desperate for good workers.
What seems so foreign to many of us schooled in modern business, is that nothing seems to happen.
As long as you have enough willing robots to peddle magazines and attend meetings, why treat them like
people? What's the benefit in that?
Witness loyalty ends up being its own best punishment - they drag themselves to assemblies and meetings and
field service and the Society, already unfeeling, finds no reason to change - and doesn't!
If you are lurking here and hoping that things in the organization get better,
ask yourself, why should they? Why should anything ever cause the Theocrats to doubt themselves
in any matter requiring kindness or justice? What's the difference?
metatron