@Finkelstein What a great article! Thank you for sharing this fascinating read. You can see this formula woven throughout Watchtower's indoctrination methods.
Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
JoinedPosts by Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
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Brainwashing by religious cult leaders (JWS) why and how to identify when its happening
by Finkelstein inhear the term brainwashing and you might think of government agents ‘turning’ unwilling spies against their own countries, or cult leaders using mind control to manipulate their followers.. you might even go so far as to think of the term brainwashing in relation to propaganda spread during the first and second world wars, in order to influence vast amounts of people.. but what exactly is brainwashing and should we confine it to the past?.
what is brainwashing?.
the term brainwashing was first coined in the 1950’s during the korean war.
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How about having a special undercover mode so PIMOs can browse the site with greater security?
by Island Man inwhen you visit the site it says jehovahs-witness big and bold.
a pimo might be browsing the site and a jw might come up behind him unexpectedly and notice he's visiting a site about jws other than jw.org, which can lead to the pimo reported for viewing apostate information.. to help remedy this risk, i was thinking about the possibility of having a button that activates an undercover mode where the title of the site is not prominently displayed so it's not easily apparent to an accidental eavesdropper that it's an apostate website.
also, the color-scheme and graphics can be different so that it doesn't look like the regular site.
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
@Diogenesister I know @stuckinarut2's employee did that to his PC when she was supposed to be working. Went through his history or something and handed him straight to the elders.
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Bible comes alive if we look for meaning behind the symbols it uses
by Ireneus inbible contains too much human thinking presented as though from god, thus much of its information brings dishonor to god.. yet it contains great beneficial truths behind the symbols it uses.
let us take the only two cases of miracles jesus performed without any request from anybody which would show the very purpose of his ministry:.
1) jesus healed a woman who “was bent over and could not straighten up at all.” (luke 13:11-13).
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
Thanks, @venus. I always keep an eye out for both yours and @Ireneus' posts. I know they go against the grain here, but I find it interesting to weigh up different perspectives.
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Bible comes alive if we look for meaning behind the symbols it uses
by Ireneus inbible contains too much human thinking presented as though from god, thus much of its information brings dishonor to god.. yet it contains great beneficial truths behind the symbols it uses.
let us take the only two cases of miracles jesus performed without any request from anybody which would show the very purpose of his ministry:.
1) jesus healed a woman who “was bent over and could not straighten up at all.” (luke 13:11-13).
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
Hey @Irenus, I appreciate you sharing that.
Of course many people think of the Bible as science for stupid people - particularly when it's reduced to its more fundamentalist manifestations. Those fundamentalists who say that the Bible is literally true have shot themselves in the foot already. By default, they are history deniers and have doomed themselves to subscribe to a rudimentary world knowledge before the emergence of science several thousand years later.
However, rather than completely writing off the Bible as merely pre-rational superstition, I give it credit for when it was written with the limited information humans had at that time. These are ancient ideas (the story of Genesis was not a new one and has been around for over 10,000 years) that were created with so much blood and effort that it's incalculable.
For one thing, I don't think it's an accident that the axiomatic Western individual is someone who was unfairly nailed to a cross and tortured. Even the ancient civilizations understood that in order to rise, we must pick up our own suffering and bear it. Like the story of Christ (and unlike our animal ancestors), we should be conscious about others in the process to help move society and, by extension, humanity forward. It's clear that those responsible for propagating such mythological accounts understood that human beings need to make sacrifices in order to progress.
We see this acted out to begin with in the Old Testament where the people made genuine archaic sacrifices. They would take something that they believed had value (often a prized animal) and burned it as an offering to God. That's not as stupid as it sounds. Consider the reason it was burned. As far as I've been able to tell, is because of the ancient perception of the world (a flat disc with the sky acting as bowl on top. Beyond that bowl was where the gods existed). That grand sense of awe a secular person feels when gazing up into the infinitesimal sky was interpreted by these civilizations as something divine. What else were they to think? So if they burned something and offered it up to a deity, the smoke would rise and God would be able detect the quality of their sacrifices.
I see that as a dramatic representation of the fundamental idea that sometimes, in order to make things go well in your life, you have to let go of something that you love dearly, or of something you deeply want to do. Consider the sacrifice of waking up. Many of us have let something valuable go (a belief system, often including family) in hopes for a better future - either for ourselves or for others (our children).
To get to the heart of it - what's the most valuable thing to each and every one of us? Our lives. And that's the central injunction of the mythological figure behind Christianity... someone who voluntarily sacrifices their life for the benevolent will that mankind has a better future. For one of the earliest attempts at surmising the meaning of life, that's not bad at all, if you ask me. But to weaponize these accounts as literal and a means for control through organized religion - that's when the symbols you speak of get muddied, ridiculed and demonized, be it by disenchanted individuals, or entire intellectual movements.
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People are nice and life is awesome.
by OneEyedJoe ini got invited as a +1 to someone's house yesterday to watch the fireworks.
i'd never met the hosts, and it seemed that most of the people in the group only knew one or two other people there.
yet i felt more genuine friendship from everyone there than i ever felt at any jw gathering.
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
If we're not laughing, we may as well be crying, @zeb :P.
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Are Jehovah's Witnesses selfish??
by stuckinarut2 inis the average jehovah's witness selfish and self-centred?.
i know, i know...many will object and say "no - preaching is the most selfless thing a jw can do.
it saves others lives...".
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
A JW parent will shun their child for not conforming to THEIR belief system. If that's not self-centered, I don't know what is. As a parent, my life is one of sacrifice for my child. It's not about his life not conforming with mine. It's an amalgamation and negotiation between making both worlds co-exist in harmony.
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People are nice and life is awesome.
by OneEyedJoe ini got invited as a +1 to someone's house yesterday to watch the fireworks.
i'd never met the hosts, and it seemed that most of the people in the group only knew one or two other people there.
yet i felt more genuine friendship from everyone there than i ever felt at any jw gathering.
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
@OneEyedJoe Lol. You have no idea how much sh*t everyone gave me after the phone got stolen. They saw it as a blessing that was guiding me to the iPhone. Or any other buttonless contraption.
Neverrrrrrr.
I refuse to learn my lesson. #blackberrylivesmatter
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1st Birthday Celebration
by Whynot inyou guys!
our first birthday celebration was a total success😍the kids had a blast.
the neighborhood kids said that it was the best party they have ever been to.
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
I'm so happy for you, @Whynot! Did you stick with the theme of Appreciation Day, or did you go full pagan and decapitate the nearest kid, a lá King Herrod?
Happy birthday to your precious little one. I hope you were able to network with the other parents and build up some contacts in the real world!
Xx
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What is the most troubling or disturbing biblical passage you ever had to rationalise when a Jw?
by stuckinarut2 innow that we have stepped away from the jw faith, how do you feel about the bible itself?.
what about those awkward sections of scripture?
how did you rationalise or justify those sections?.
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
@truthseeker Oh no - the Rephaim were done away with much earlier in the Bible (at the latest, Deuteronomy). If he were a part of that tribe, it would have been several pant sizes ago.
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Street Work With the Sisters
by truthseeker in"be there at 7:30" i'm told.
that's where the action is.. it's early saturday morning in passaic, nj.
it's january and i'm bloody freezing.. i'm standing on the street corner in my black trench coat getting ready to ply my wares.
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Wake Me Up Before You Jo-Ho
"He struck her 15 times with the ax before she collapsed in the street."
Yikes. If you thought witnessing Jehovah was hard, this is next level.