Marvin Shilmer

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Posts by Marvin Shilmer

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  65

  Introducing...ME

  by Heartsafire in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  long time lurker here.

  i'm a fifth gen born-in baptized jw.

  to say i've been struggling with doubts is an understatement.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  Hi Heartsafire,

  As you recognize, you're not alone in your circumstance, findings and feelings. You'll find lots of kindred here.

  Check your PM account.

  Best regards,

  Marvin Shilmer
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  120

  The right to shun - wrong?

  by Simon in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  many people are understandably upset and angry at the notion that jws have the right to shun people.

  it seems such an obvious "no brainer" cruel and inhuman thing to do - it must be wrong ... surely?.

  of course we look at things from the perspective of those hurt and harmed by shunning.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  When it comes to shunning and potential statutory remedies to lessen harm there are two areas to concentrate on.

  1. The distinction of personal preference to shun versus organized communal shunning.

  2. Whether a particular shunning presents undue influence over something with a State interest.
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  Do they notice who no longer gives donations?

  by onightdivine in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  because i haven't put in a single dime for over a year now in the box at the kh.

  the usual custom is to put money in there right after the meetings.

  but heck, i already spend so much in car fuel just to attend - i don't care really if the gb starves and dies.. oops.. anyway, do the elders take note who's donating and who's not?.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  Neither local elders nor the Watchtower Society has a process to determine whether particular individuals donate or not.

  On the other hand local elders and the Watchtower Society does have a process in place to determine whether a particular congregation is donating or not by comparison with other congregations in the area or elsewhere. This is a statistic that is watched very closely inside Watchtower as an early warning of something going awry. Watchtower crunches these numbers every way you can imagine for a range of reasons including 1) whether something's going wrong with a congregation, a circuit, a circuit overseer, an internal Branch attendant charged with overseeing a particular geographical area, and 2) projecting future cash flows.
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  11

  Ways to raise an eyebrow or two with bro/sis perfect!

  by Truthexplorer in

  1. social
  2. humour

  jusmy wife and i were out in the ministry today and she was expressing her annoyance at brother perfectionist in our hall and how he is beginning to annoy her as nit picks over everything that the more liberal witnesses view as ok. so we were having some fun about what we could say to him that would really raise his eye brows.

  she then suggested i say ' hey brother perfect, you'll never guess what happened to me.

  i was sitting on the toilet when to my shock and horror, there was no toilet paper left.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  There was a watchtower lying on the unit next to me that I was able to use.

  I've actually seen this in the outhouse of a now deceased JW who was so stalwart as a JW that he served time in jail for breaking blue laws back in the 50s for door-to-door preaching (which at the time and locale was deemed a commercial activity). He had a whole stack of them, and it was the good stuff (like the index pages from the old Sears and Roebuck catalog, the ole-timers know what I mean)!
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  73

  An 11-year-old boy is in custody for murder for shooting and killing an eight-year-old neighbour girl with a shotgun . . .

  by nicolaou in

  1. social
  2. current

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  because she would not show him her puppies.. nobody has to tell you what country this happened in, you already know.. source.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  It only "seems" like there may be a link because both involve guns but there is no causal relationship as far as I'm concerned.

  The cultural bravado of persons willing to prepare themselves with firearms to use in defense of themselves and others is a natural corollary to a willingness to enter live-fire conflicts for essentially the same purpose on a larger scale.
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  73

  An 11-year-old boy is in custody for murder for shooting and killing an eight-year-old neighbour girl with a shotgun . . .

  by nicolaou in

  1. social
  2. current

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  because she would not show him her puppies.. nobody has to tell you what country this happened in, you already know.. source.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  The US culture had nothing todo with their entry into the war.

  Uh... Whatever was the then US culture either would stand for a declaration of war on Germany and Japan or not. It did. Culture had everything to do with every nation's entry (or not) into conflicts of the 20th Century.

  Basically, the obsession with guns now has nothing whatsoever to do with the US involvement in WWII.

  Who's said otherwise?

  Cultures change, and the US culture has surely changed a great deal since the mid-20th Century. Per capita of Euro-explorers/settlers gun ownership on the territory known today as the USA has been prevalent since they immigrated to its shores. It turned out to be an essential element of how the US survived as a nation. Having and owning this personal protective gear and being willing to use it is deep rooted in US culture. My take on current US culture is that gun ownership provisions have been hijacked by paranoids (think: NRA leadership) so that responsible gun ownership has been turned on its head to allow rogue members of society to too easily get their hands on firearms.

  As US culture continues to changed I think the day will come and should come when access to firearms in the USA is much tighter than it is today. I don't know when, and I don't know how, but I think the day will come, and probably the result of the whole world advancing socially and not so much just the USA.
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  73

  An 11-year-old boy is in custody for murder for shooting and killing an eight-year-old neighbour girl with a shotgun . . .

  by nicolaou in

  1. social
  2. current

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  because she would not show him her puppies.. nobody has to tell you what country this happened in, you already know.. source.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  Honestly, the low hanging fruit on the subject of this thread is requiring gun owners to secure their arms and penalizing them severely if they do not.

  It's sad that this has not already taken root and been firmly planted in the USA by both state and federal statutes. It's a fairly rare thing to hear about a parent/guardian serving jail time for leaving firearms available to children who end up hurting/killing someone with them. We spend more time hunting down peaceful users of Mary Jane and punishing them while law-abiding gun owners leave loaded guns accessible to kids. Maybe we need an AGM (All Guns Matter) movement.
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  73

  An 11-year-old boy is in custody for murder for shooting and killing an eight-year-old neighbour girl with a shotgun . . .

  by nicolaou in

  1. social
  2. current

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  because she would not show him her puppies.. nobody has to tell you what country this happened in, you already know.. source.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  First of all - which tyrants did the US overthrow? I presume you mean the British? I would strongly recommend doing some historical research instead of regurgitating what is essentially propaganda you've been fed all your life. Next you'll be telling us that the rebels were standing up against taxation that the British wanted to impose

  I'm quite sure I mentioned something about matters of the 20th Century. Little hint there...

  As for later oppressive governments - many, many people from different countries fought to end the threat of Nazism, not just the US and many of those were fighting while the US wasn't. For some countries WWII started in 1939 (or earlier).

  Of course many countries fought against Nazism, that's not the point. The point is that without US involvement in those efforts arguably it's highly unlikely that Germany would have been defeated as it was, not to mention Japan's then aggressive imperialism. If true that US involvement made the difference in outcomes then the US culture leading to that involvement was an essential element leading to defeat of tyrants of the 20th Century. Gun ownership is part of that culture. As said already, whether that citizenry's culture would have developed as it did to perform as it did in the 20th Century without its precursors holding very personal views about gun ownership I don't know.

  Besides, even if correct, to use that as some justification for justifying kids and teachers to be armed in order to avoid being gunned down today is simply a huge stretch IMO.

  Who's argued that?
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  73

  An 11-year-old boy is in custody for murder for shooting and killing an eight-year-old neighbour girl with a shotgun . . .

  by nicolaou in

  1. social
  2. current

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  because she would not show him her puppies.. nobody has to tell you what country this happened in, you already know.. source.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  The US is by no means unique as a country which has armed its citizenry in order to overthrow an oppressor. It happens often in third world countries to this day. And to suggest that it was because of a US gun culture that tyrants were overthrown is quite a claim. I assume part of your claim refers to Adolf Hitler. If this is the case, the influence of gun culture could hardly be accepted as a cause for Hitler's defeat except in perhaps the most minutely debatable way - the noteworthy reasons for his defeat wouldn't even entertain your suggestion.

  SSC, I'm not sure what you mean. It's the culture of the then US citizenry that led to it engaging 20th Century tyrants as it did. Prevalence of gun ownership was only a piece of the overall construction of that culture. Whether that citizenry's culture would have developed as it did to perform as it did in the 20th Century without its precursors holding very personal views about gun ownership I don't know. The argument is not mine, but when you think about events of the 20th Century and the role played by US citizens in defeating genocidal governmental tyrannies one has to wonder whether the US gun-owning culture played a role in US citizens' willingness to do what they did to prevent an even worse world than we have now.
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  73

  An 11-year-old boy is in custody for murder for shooting and killing an eight-year-old neighbour girl with a shotgun . . .

  by nicolaou in

  1. social
  2. current

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  because she would not show him her puppies.. nobody has to tell you what country this happened in, you already know.. source.

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  Marvin Shilmer

  The notion that you need guns in civilian population to have an effective army is funny. Maybe if your army is a bunch of amateur militia types then yes, but we expect professional soldiers to be trained and again, the professional military equipment has no place on the streets in the hands of civilians which renders the argument void.

  I don't think the argument is as simple as needing guns in the civilian population in order to have an effective army.

  Insofar as it's been presented to me the argument is more along the lines of a US population that has established a culture of standing up against governmental thuggery to a point that its citizenry is willing to put itself at risk in order to further what is in their mind a better way of governing. This willingness includes a willingness to fight and die for other peoples under threat. It happens to be the case that gun ownership has played a role in the construction of this culture. As the argument goes, without personal gun ownership its uncertain that the citizenry of the USA would have evolved the culture that led to this willingness, which in turn led the US citizenry to help defeat horrendous governmental aggression of the 20th Century.