I always thought it was religion with an American flavor.
Over the years in many other lands, Russia for example, the JWs were accused of spreading American ways of life. The WT never took these accusations seriously.
For example, when Russell started, much of the American community was farming communities. Travelling salesmen in wagon caravans roamed the land, selling everything from snake oil and cigar store indians. The inhabitants also had a craving for obtaining information from books. So Russell sent out colporteurs to peddle books.
To this day the WT blindly follows stupidily. holding fast to the sacrament of going door to door and peddling books replacing the natural easiest method of communication which is effortless two way conversation between individuals.
Many years ago, two missionaries, Jones and King, were arrested in China for insisiting on going door to door. If they had not stubbornly persisted in going door to door the message could have spread far more effectively it they had just proclaimed their religion by '"causual witnessing" by word of mouth, from family to family. Other religions, for example the Pentecostals, have taken root in China, far more effectively than the Witnesses. It was the same during the Stalin years in Russia.
No, the Witnesses had to cling to door to door and place literature, printed from America.
Good news ( bad news also) does not take effort to spread.
There are also many other American "in your face" methods and doctrines that the Witnesses have agressively forced upon other nations that were countrary to the culture and environment of those areas.
belbab
