JW Insider

I'll stick my neck out and offer some last words on the topic. You are right that the common expression uses new rope. But it's a dumber, and more ambiguous perspective, in my opinion. As you know I don't always side with JTR, but when I do, it's usually because I think his humor is working. In this case, I think it's a bit funnier with old rope. But I can swing either way with this one. Editing to add that JTR's version reminds me somehow of the 3 men in the process of being beheaded by a guillotine. The first, a farmer, puts his head in the slot and the blade gets stuck, stops short, so the executioner says it must be fate, and they let him go. Same thing happens to the next man, a salesman. The third man, an engineer, puts his head in the slot, looks up and says, "Oh wait! I see the problem."

Some good points: *** w61 11/15 p. 704 Questions From Readers *** In the resurrection of the “other sheep” on earth, no former married person will have occasion to envy another former married person, as would be the case if this latter one got back his former marriage mate who had remained single, whereas the envious marriage mate does not get back his former partner because this partner remarried and survived Armageddon with his new marriage mate. What the resurrection promises men is, not remarriage, but reliving, and this under God’s kingdom by Christ. Is that not something satisfying? Has anyone a right to demand more through Christ’s sacrifice? Christ died for you, not to marry, but to live! Let us not be swayed or overcome by sentimentalism or emotionalism. Of course, some of these types of questions ended up pushing the idea that the Greek Scriptures were written only to the anointed. This is not a point of emphasis any more. More reasonable answers and non-dogmatism are always welcome, especially when we are willing to humbly admit that we just don't have all the answers.

I never said it was for a misguided purpose. I can't say I really agree with the purpose, but that was not a concern of mine at the time. My question was more about whether the book would be re-set (in new molten lead linotype) or whether it would be redone for offset printing, and perhaps even an upgrade to the artwork. Also, we had a set of proofreading changes that were not exactly the kind that that the proofreading department could just fix without permission. (And this has an expensive trickle-down effect on the other language editions.) They would be tied in with editorial decisions. A few month later, for the updated "Truth" book (1968 edition vs the new 1981 edition), several references to 1975 and the probable imminent end in the 1970's, had to be removed and replaced with new content, but this was a more obvious editorial decision, not a proofreading decision.)

Many sincere brothers now are quick to defend the mistakes of the past by saying that the number of little ones who were stumbled was actually a good thing. We've seem multiple comments on this forum that make that claim. As the misguided logic goes, with 1975, for example, it was a kind of test that only stumbled those who were serving Jehovah with a date in mind. To be fair, I think all this talk about the importance of obedience to men is a mistake. It is not hooked to anything so tangible as a calendar date so fewer people will be stumbled outright. But more people will be disheartened over time without being able to put their finger on exactly why. In my opinion it will be because they probably anticipated that association with fellow Witnesses would continue to enhance their love for Jehovah God and Jesus Christ in an overwhelmingly positive, uplifting, encouraging and heartwarming way. In this case, perhaps the brothers in the lead feel that they need to cover all the bases, and prepare us for unknown possibilities. The problem, in my opinion, is that this emphasis on the importance of obedience to men has now been associated (e.g., summer conventions) with a kind of future "fear-mongering" about the conditions we can expect during the great tribulation. It creates an even heavier load by making us overly concerned about the next day, when we would prefer to think that seeking first the Kingdom would have freed us from such anxiety, throwing our burden upon Jehovah, knowing that Christ's load is light, and his yoke is kind. (Matthew 6:33, 34) 33 “Keep on, then, seeking first the Kingdom and his righteousness, and all these other things will be added to you. 34 So never be anxious about the next day, for the next day will have its own anxieties. Each day has enough of its own troubles. But this makes it appear to serve the exact same purpose as 1975. This time, by associating these unspecified ways in which we will need to show obedience to men with a certain level of fear-mongering about the great tribulation, we will pay more than the usual attention to men. It should have the effect of ratcheting up the activity and anticipation by making the end seem even more imminent. It reminds me of an experience at Bethel when I once had an opportunity to question Brother Franz about his plan to have us study a 1973 book a second time in 1981. *** km 11/80 pp. 1-3 par. 5 Part I—Congregation Meetings *** CONGREGATION BOOK STUDY: In January we will start studying the book God’s Kingdom of a Thousand Years Has Approached. This 416-page book, published in 1973, contains vital information that is even more apropos now than when it was first released. Think of the hundreds of thousands of new ones who have been baptized since it was first published. My question was about whether we needed a new edition to change some inaccuracies, or whether it would go into print using the old press plates. His response was basically that we needed no update to it because "this is what the publishers need right now." [The book was basically a history of the Watchtower Society wedged into what are now half-obsolete explanations of Matthew 25.] But his idea was that it would somehow make people appreciate the Society, its place in our time, and therefore raise the level of activity. So ultimately I think that the pendulum will swing the other way again, and there will be a kind of retraction of this method of making the end seem so imminent as a way to raise activity levels. The Bible indicates that this method can backfire. (Proverbs 13:12) 12 Expectation postponed makes the heart sick,. . . Langston Hughes agreed: *** g94 5/22 p. 27 Put Humor Into Your Life *** Poet Langston Hughes once wrote: “Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air, and you.” Oh wait, not that one, but his famous one: "What happens to a dream deferred?" Of course, those who become disheartened (over the current emphasis) will likely be "chalked up to" the fact that this served as a test to get rid of those who were not worthy. For most, including myself, the overall context of these "changes" is not as bad as I just represented it, since the overall point is not to fear men, but to expect Jehovah to come to our aid when the trouble seems completely overwhelming. But unfortunately, I fear that even the perceived combination of emphasis on "obedience to men" and "fear-mongering" will combine to create a new kind of burden that will not appear to reflect the true spirit of Christianity.

Maybe, but I doubt it. It's probably quite the opposite. Of course there will be some who think this way, that's why Ted Talks rejected the talk. But those who speak of Ms. Heine are more likely the ones embarrassed by the speech, and who hope that their own agendas are not hurt by those wanting to make pedophilia legal. I see the number of mentions of Ms. Heine as overwhelmingly against making pedophilia legal. A few more might agree with Ms Heine's position that acting on pedophilia is a crime, but that we need more sympathy even for the devils who act upon it. Perhaps you are referring to a "darker" part of the web that doesn't come up in my Google searches and/or newspaper, website, research database searches. I expect that some of those who copy the video are in agreement with Ms Heine's position that acting on pedophilia is a crime, but do not realize the danger of creepy scope creep. I agree with what you said:

Hello Dolly?

After noting those two wrong or at least misleading facts, I decided to do a quick check on the implication above that "they removed it from the list of disorders." The first link that came up actually showed that in 2014 the idea (American Psychiatric Association: DSM-5) was never to remove it from the list of disorders, but to remove the label "Pedophilic Sexual Orientation." This is nearly the opposite of the general point you made. http://jaapl.org/content/42/4/404 Perhaps you are referring to something that came up after 2014. If so, I didn't see that, and didn't look any further into it.

I'm guessing that this "fact" probably came from a fake news source. The LGBT community, as far as I can tell, is vehemently against anything that would harm its social and political momentum. I have heard an interview where spokespersons for this community have explicitly condemned Pedophilia. Where one does find a P suffixed to the acronym, it is supposed to mean "pansexual" described on mtv.co.uk as: "When someone is pansexual it means they are attracted to people regardless of their gender. They are attracted to individuals rather than one particular gender or sexuality, and that can be whomever they fancy." Just like all the other letters in their alphabet soup, none of their definitions would apply specifically to anyone prior to the age of consent. Defining "consent" is another problem, even in the judicial matters of Jehovah's Witnesses. Edited to double-check my guess above: I don't always trust snopes.com unless their research is well-documented, but this article appears to have researched the topic: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/lgbtp-adding-letter/ Is ‘LGBT’ Adding a ‘P’ for Pedosexuals? Claims that the LGBT community is adding a "P" to represent "pedosexuals" originated with a homophobic smear campaign.

I'm sure both TED talks and LifeSiteNews would be happy for me to quote the following article in its entirety to clarify what some might find misleading in your statement, but I will only quote some relevant excerpts: -------------------start of quotations from the site: https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/ted-speaker-pedophilia-is-an-unchangeable-sexual-orientation-anyone-could-b Introducing her theme with the “story” of “Jonas,” a 19-year-old pedophile who studies law and plays soccer, she asked her listeners to put aside their revulsion for pedophiles. “Anyone could be born a pedophile,” she told them. According to the medical student, pedophilia is just another “unchangeable sexual orientation just like, for example, heterosexuality.” Heine asked her audience to differentiate between sexual attraction to children, which she believes should be accepted and tolerated as involuntary “feelings,” and child sexual abuse, which she underscored was always wrong. “The difference between pedophilia and other sexual orientations is that living out this sexual orientation will end in a disaster,” she said. . . . For Heine, pedophilia is not something that someone actually does but something that someone would like to do, as a sexual preference that they would “live out freely,” if only it weren’t contrary to leading “an upright life.” . . . “We shouldn’t increase the sufferings of pedophiles by excluding them, by blaming and mocking them,” Heine said. “By doing that, WE increase their isolation and WE increase the chance of child sexual abuse.” Central to Heine’s argument is that pedophiles are not to blame for their feelings and thoughts, only for their actions. . . According to Breitbart, once it was posted to YouTube, Heine’s lecture resulted in a massive online backlash. In response, the organizers of the independent TEDx event removed the video, and the founding TED Talks media organization has been trying to remove “illegal copies” from the internet. . . . “After reviewing the talk, we believe it cites research in ways that are open to serious misinterpretation. This led some viewers to interpret the talk as an argument in favor of an illegal and harmful practice,” they wrote. . . . TED Talks later added to its statement that it does not support or advocate for pedophilia. -----------------------------------------end of excerpt quotations from site --------------------------------

I think that's very doubtful, unless you think that measuring abuse by all JW congregation members equates to just measuring only the priests and responsible officials of these Catholic diocese. Also, this is just Pennsylvania. You would need to add those reports from Massachusetts (made public in 2002 was it?) and several other states to get a parity population of Catholics here that matches that of the (JW) numbers from Australia. I'm not saying we don't also have a serious problem that most Witnesses know very little about or can't acknowledge. I just don't think you can so easily make a true comparison from these separate "snapshots" of reports/studies. They cover different statistical "populations." One thing in the report I found disturbing is that this was based on church records that detailed the crimes, but also detailed systemic cover-ups and even the promotion of priests and church officials involved in the cover-up. This went all the way up to cardinals and arch-bishops, ultimately even the Vatican. The fight over statute of limitations laws that always comes up as an issue after these reports also tends to become embroiled in its own coverup on the political side. Although anti-Catholicism is common, there are often enough US politicians in high places who fight the change to statute of limitations laws because they are convinced that extending the prosecution window truly would bankrupt the Catholic Church. Governor Brown in California and Governor Cuomo in New York have been rumored to accept that "line" from the Catholic Church. But keeping these laws in effect, knowing the typical way in which abused children wait until they are adults before gaining the courage to face this publicly, these laws help produce a coverup of the number of cases that would otherwise be reported.

There is virtually no Wahabbism in Iran except among the few remaining ISIS supporters and some Sunni extremist terrorists. Saudi Arabia would love to export more of it, but most Muslims hate it. So far, their society wouldn't allow it from the perspective of the government. It's true that the overwhelming majority of Iranian society is rural, conservative, but that is apparently what they want. Iran is still a freer society than the Arabian peninsula. Iran is not strict about the burka (or even lesser coverings for women) where it is still consider extreme and too piously self-righteous. Women are often a part of the government in Iran and the social hierarchy. Iranian women can still visit their conservative grandparents in the country wearing the headscarfs and then go visit their cousins in Lebanon on the weekend and wear a bikini. Both Syria and Iran have been, even very recently, some of the more free countries in the Middle East. Iran is an Islamic Republic, but it's a "kind of democracy" but with a theocratic layer of government that acts like a very conservative "supreme court" that can block laws in the name of religion. They, the mullahs, are also corrupt, trying to control capitalist endeavors. But it is not illegal to be a Christian or Jew in Iran. By comparison there is nothing like democracy in Saudi Arabia, UAE, etc. Human rights violations are not as much of a problem in Iran as they are in say, Israel and Saudi Arabia.

True, it said that the mongoose relies on "God-given" defenses and abilities to defeat the cobra. No more anachronistic blaming of the teeth of saber-toothed tigers at least indirectly on Satan and the fall of the first human pair.

Just an aside but this is a fairly recent article in agreement with TTH's statement above: *** w11 2/15 pp. 8-9 pars. 10-13 Holy Spirit—At Work in Creation! *** 10 The Bible goes on to describe what God did during a series of creative days. These are not 24-hour days but are epochs. . . . 13 After aeons had passed and God had produced innumerable animate and inanimate works, the earth was no longer “formless and waste.” But what do we make of a previous Watchtower article, just 15 years earlier, where we still have this: *** w96 4/1 p. 13 par. 10 Praise the King of Eternity! *** 10 Wonderful developments took place on earth during the six creative “days” of Genesis chapter 1, each day covering thousands of years. We know that there is absolutely no reason to put any emphasis on the "6,000 years of man's existence on earth" unless we believe that each of the creative days was 7,000 years long and that the millennium should therefore "fit" into God's rest day before the 7th day is finished. This is why we believe the 7th day is now coming to its close. *** w98 7/15 p. 15 par. 6 Have You Entered Into God’s Rest? *** As “the seventh day” comes to its close, the earth will have become a global paradise inhabited eternally by a family of perfect humans. (Isaiah 45:18) “The seventh day” is set aside for, or dedicated to, the outworking and fulfilling of God’s will regarding the earth and humankind. In that sense it is “sacred.” . . . Though “the seventh day”—God’s rest day—is still in progress, . . . . [v]ery soon, the Messianic King, Jesus Christ, will take action. . . . During Christ’s Thousand Year Reign, Jesus . . . will bring earth and mankind to the state that God had purposed. *** w94 7/15 p. 29 How Accurate Is the Jewish Calendar? *** Many thousands of years went by between the first creative day and the sixth, when Adam was created. Dating the creation of Adam at the same time as that of the physical heavens and earth is neither Scriptural nor scientific. . . . Still, how was it determined that the “Era of the Creation” began in 3761 B.C.E.? [Of course, the point of the article was to dismiss the traditional Jewish calendar date of 3761 B.C.E. for the creation of Adam, even though our own chronology is only different by 265 years.] *** w94 9/1 p. 6 Science, Religion, and the Search for Truth *** Religion Gives Creation a Bad Name In a supposed attempt to uphold the Bible, the “creationists”—mostly allied with fundamentalist Protestants—have insisted that the earth and the universe are less than 10,000 years old. This extreme view has invited the ridicule of geologists, astronomers, and physicists, for it contradicts their findings. . . . Another excess of religion is the way some interpret the six ‘days’ of creation. Some fundamentalists insist that these days are literal, restricting earthly creation to a period of 144 hours. This provokes skepticism in scientists, for they feel that this claim conflicts with clear scientific observations. However, it is the fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible—not the Bible itself—that is at odds with science. The Bible does not say that each creative “day” was 24 hours long; indeed, it includes all these ‘days’ in the much longer “day that Jehovah God made earth and heaven,” showing that not all Biblical ‘days’ contained just 24 hours. (Genesis 2:4) Some could have been many thousands of years in length. The last sentence there was a very important change of doctrine because it allowed that each creative day might be a different length. Of course, this could potentially spoil the idea that the 7th day had to be 7,000 years in length. The idea that each creative day had to be exactly 7,000 years in length goes all the way back to the Photo-Drama of Creation and was a major theme. It was still a crucial piece of the "1975" arguments, both before (as cautionary) and was used immediately after the "failure" of 1975 expectations, as a possible reason for the failure: *** w76 7/15 p. 436 pars. 17-19 Keeping a Balanced View of Time *** There are reasons why we cannot know this. For one thing, even though Bible chronology clearly indicates that we have reached the mark of six thousand years since the time of the creation of the first human, Adam, it does not tell us just how long after that event the sixth creative day came to its close and the seventh creative period or “day,” God’s great rest day, began. . . . 18 But that great rest day did not begin immediately after Adam’s creation. Other events took place after Adam’s creation but before the close of the sixth creative day. One of these is of great importance to all of us. That is the creation of the first woman, Eve. . . . 19 How much time elapsed between the creation of the man and that of the woman? The Bible does not reveal this. Again, the timing of the creation of Eve is meaningless in this context, unless we believe that the creative days were exactly 7,000 years each. The Watchtower was still explicitly arguing for each creative day being 7,000 years even 10 years later. The following from 1987 is one of the last Watchtower articles in Fred Franz style on a Fred Franz topic outside of his work on Revelation - Its Grand Climax At Hand which was also completed in 1987/88 *** w87 1/1 p. 30 Questions From Readers *** Does that Jubilee correspond to the period following God’s creative week of 49,000 years? Because the number 49 occurs in both cases, it might seem that the Jubilee would foreshadow the time following the end of a creative week of 49,000 years. But . . . what occurred during Israel’s Jubilee corresponds more with what will occur during the Millennium, the last thousand years of such creative week. . . . Second, a study of the fulfillment of Bible prophecy and of our location in the stream of time strongly indicate that each of the creative days (Genesis, chapter 1) is 7,000 years long. It is understood that Christ’s reign of a thousand years will bring to a close God’s 7,000-year ‘rest day,’ the last ‘day’ of the creative week. (Revelation 20:6; Genesis 2:2, 3) Based on this reasoning, the entire creative week would be 49,000 years long. Noting the similarity in numbers, some have compared the 49 years of the ancient Jubilee cycle to such 49,000 years of the creative week. . . . and humans have existed, not for 49,000 years, but for about 6,000 years. The Bible shows that some time after Adam and Eve were created,. . . . By the end of the Millennium, mankind will have been raised to human perfection, completely free from inherited sin and death. Having thus brought to an end the last enemy (death passed on from Adam), Christ will hand the Kingdom back to his Father at the end of the 49,000-year creative week.—1 Corinthians 15:24-26. I might move this discussion under a more appropriate topic, but I started it here because, even recently, we do still present ourselves as "young earth creationists." We allow that the earth could have been here for billions of years, but that the creative days were only on the order of thousands of years long. We never print a statement saying they could have been tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands or millions. Therefore, this is still extremely young for the aforementioned geologists who find their evidence for creative days going back at least 125 MILLION years for plants bearing forth seed according to their kind. Something happened to the doctrine between 1987 and 1994, but I don't know if there is any more information on the change other than just the fact that 1994 contradicts 1987 and we should therefore consider it to be 'new light.' But no one has commented on how this might change our view of the millennium fitting into the 7th day. Or whether we should still use Hebrews to show that the 7th day lasts for thousands of years. (Hebrews 4:1) . . .Therefore, since a promise of entering into his rest remains. . .

Yes, I'm sure it's humor. But even humor needs to be down-voted on occasion.

@Gone Away, Thanks for pointing to that thread from last year. I just skimmed it and I think it included just about all I personally would ever want to say about the topic again. I am always tempted to just rewrite from scratch, but not this time. Thanks again.

Wow! I think you should find a Catholic discussion forum and bash that religion for a few years.

It's not a new point. A disfellowshipped, grown child, not living at home should be shunned by the family except for absolutely necessary business that may need to be conducted with the child. This "child" is at least 18. The economy since 2008 has wreaked havoc with this rule, because so many more children in the 18-30 category are no longer able to get out on their own, and more disfellowshipped "children" in that age group claim it's economically necessary to remain at home.

Luke is also the one who gives extra attention to women and women's concerns. The ability to empathize with women has made some think that the author of Luke actually was a woman. That said, it's not quite true what you said. I include things like "It's easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle, the 2-by-4 in your own eye, etc. (See Mark/Matt and Matt) The exaggerated imagery gets attention.

True. And in spite of the seriousness of the overall message, several of Jesus illustrations reach a level we might even call "comedy."

Name was familiar, but his specific role was a blur. NYT has been as untrustworthy as others. I notice, now, that when I clicked on the Twitter account, that the above had been the #1 point of at least 8 separate points made.

I've heard numbers like this, too. I recall that when Obama's collateral damage numbers seemed too high, the administration chose to at least call all males of potential military age "combatants." Whether they were doctors, nurses, teachers, students, or whatever clearly didn't matter. Of course, he was neither the first or last to try to cover for a very successful imperialist agenda. I personally should be more upset, based on Bible admonition to love one's neighbor as oneself, but I am sadly still "underly" upset. It's difficult to empathize as we should. As Witnesses, we can fall back a bit on John 3:16, but it's difficult for us to fathom that kind of love, even for "enemies" and those not related to us in the faith. Also the fact that when undenied State Department videos and communications get released through FOIA or leaks, etc., we find that it was not through the "fog" of war, but through highly focused satellite lenses. What we hear about as accidental collateral damage is too often the primary focus. As if the existence of combatants are the excuse, and sometimes, therefore, the actual collateral damage when real targets, at times, really are the women, children, the sick, elderly, life-sustaining infrastructure, food supplies, clean water supplies, etc. Imperialists have long known that war must often focus on the latter to bring real terror and chaos to the enemy.

Don't know Kurt Eichenwald, but his statement is very well put. It is absolutely correct based on all the evidence we have about US support of the Saudis against Yemen. And it now fits several recent admissions by the US. I suspect that this Kurt guy has already been providing evidence and posting evidence of this claim for a couple years. At least I know that several others have been providing evidence of this particular involvement for that long. US Senators have put forth measures to halt US support of Yemen bombing raids. The US has admitted to picking the targets for Saudi Arabia, not speaking out against the atrocities, selling them the equipment, and managing the refueling process for the bombing raids with our own ships in the region. Obama favored bombing people here with drones that ended up hitting wedding parties, school buses, hospitals, women and children. All this from Obama's leadership through and including Trump's leadership has continued to turn Yemen into one of the worst humanitarian crises in our time. Cholera, famine, etc. The United States finds its own reasons to continue supporting and promoting war crimes, and this often means that the United States must align itself with the worst regimes it can find. If ever a "need" for regime change arises, and the US needs to invade another country, we will always have the excuse we need. Of course, I am not picking on the US. Every imperial power does such things. When something is close to common knowledge outside the US, but is kept from US citizens through the corporate media filter (including Vox, Fox, Vice, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, etc.) it's usually still easy to get bits of the truth through accidental admission or state department correspondence. In this case just go to Google (which also now filters against truth about US involvement in atrocities in the name of protecting us from "fake news") and type in "US support of Saudi Arabia against Yemen." You will get many sites that report on what is already public about this war. (Some of the things I said above.) But the most important clue is how General Mattis, for example, responds to the allegations, by not denying them and admitting there is truth to them: Mattis said the U.S. assistance, which includes limited intelligence support and refueling of coalition jets, was ultimately aimed at bringing the war toward a negotiated, U.N.-brokered resolution. (Reuters) “We need to get this to a negotiated settlement, and we believe our policy right now is correct for doing this,” Mattis told reporters, as he flew back to Washington from the Middle East. (Reuters) You can't trust many headlines on their own even when they all say the same thing from 100 different sources. But if you keep in mind the portions that the US has already admitted, then several of these results from the first page of Google can be more revealing: About 163,000,000 results (0.51 seconds) [in other words, there were more results than just what showed up here on the first page!!] https://www.theguardian.com/.../yemen-saudi-arabia-war-us-support-senator-push-to-... Feb 28, 2018 - Three US senators have introduced a resolution that will force the chamber to vote for the first time on whether the US should continue to ... Yemen war: Senate rejects ending US support of Saudi-led campaign ... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/20/yemen-war-us-saudi-senate-support Mar 20, 2018 - Bombed into famine: how Saudi air campaign targets Yemen's food supplies ... Yemen war: senators push to end US support of Saudi Arabia. U.S. Support for Saudi Military Operations in Yemen | Center for ... https://www.csis.org/analysis/us-support-saudi-military-operations-yemen Mar 23, 2018 - Since 2015, the United States has provided intelligence, military advice, and logistical support to the Saudi Arabia–led military intervention in ... Senators doubt benefit of US support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen ... https://www.aljazeera.com/.../senators-doubt-benefit-support-saudi-arabia-yemen-180... Apr 18, 2018 - US senators demanded answers from the administration of President Donald Trump on its continued support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen. U.S. is resisting calls to end its support for Saudi-led coalition in ... https://www.washingtonpost.com/.../yemen...us.../5c8c3bd2-294b-11e8-bc72-077aa4da... Mar 20, 2018 - The Post's Missy Ryan explains who the key players are in the conflict in Yemen and why the United States is supporting Saudi Arabia there. Mattis: Don't restrict U.S. support to Saudi-led forces in Yemen | Reuters https://www.reuters.com/.../us-usa-yemen.../mattis-dont-restrict-u-s-support-to-saudi-le... Mar 15, 2018 - WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Jim Mattis defended U.S. military support to Saudi Arabian-led coalition forces in Yemen on ... Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Arabian-led_intervention_in_Yemen A military intervention was launched by Saudi Arabia in 2015, leading a coalition of nine .... Yemen's foreign minister, Riad Yassin, requested military assistance from the Arab League on 25 March, amid ... Saudi Arabia began airstrikes, reportedly relying on US intelligence reports and surveillance images to select and hit ... Top stories Yemen airstrikes: Pentagon can't say US-made bombs used to kill kids Vox · 5 hours ago US urges investigation into Yemen attack amid accusations of support for Saudi Arabia - Xinhua | English.news.cn Xinhua · 3 hours ago Saudi coalition airstrike hit school bus killing dozens of children in Yemen The Independent · 12 hours ago More for US support of Saudi arabia in yemen Web results US senators want vote to end support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen war https://www.defensenews.com/.../us-senators-want-vote-to-end-support-for-saudi-arab... Mar 1, 2018 - A bipartisan trio of U.S. senators have introduced a measure aimed at ending U.S. military support for the the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen's ... How the U.S. Is Making the War in Yemen Worse | The New Yorker https://www.newyorker.com/.../2018/.../how-the-us-is-making-the-war-in-yemen-wors... Jan 22, 2018 - Yet the U.S. and Great Britain have continued to support the coalition, ... As Gregory Gause, an expert on Saudi Arabia who teaches at Texas A.

Thanks. I understand much better what you were saying now. I agree with more of it this time around. ?

Yeaaahh! I know persons who have been pushing for the "PVG" program going on 40 years now. It's really great to see it happen! I hope it expands further. Could also legitimize the work of the HLC in some hospitals where they are currently under suspicion too.

I wish I knew exactly what you are saying. I haven't kept up with any hate crime issues in the UK. I think I follow a lot of what you have said, but I can't tell if I am reading you as intended, and I can't say that I totally agree with some apparent assumptions of yours. I think you are saying that it may very well be the case that the perpetrator will turn out to be a disfellowshipped person. I meant the kind of disfellowshipped person who doesn't feel that he can come back to the fold, therefore I also called him an ex-JW. The idea that he has psychological issues seems obvious to me, based on the type of crime, although I really don't know much of anything about psychiatry. But then you responded that I might be right because "it is stated by former exjws known as anti-jws, having both jws and exjws (pretty much atheists) that a stabbing of a jw in the UK somewhere was a hate crime by means of influence . . ." I think you are saying (in the next part of the sentence) that the UK has acknowledged that there are hate crimes against Muslims that are influenced from anti-Muslim rhetoric and hate speech. Perhaps you are saying that exjws who are anti-JWs are also influenced by anti-JW hate speech. This is always possible, although I would guess that the combination of factors influencing a person to do this crime will not be clearly traceable to influence by others. My guess is that he is mentally unstable and that whatever action was taken against him personally is perceived as a humiliation or rejection that he perceives he cannot or will not be able to overcome. Rather than merely producing anger, he is lashing out wildly and perceives himself to be punishing the system that is humiliating him, rejecting him, or treating him unjustly. What you speak about is another possibility, that of a person (likely unstable) being influenced by others to lash out based on a frenzy whipped up by others. And another possibility is that the person really was treated unjustly and knows no other world, or feels trapped that he has no other means of survival but to to lash back at the "power" over him. What I don't believe is a generalization that exjws are pretty much atheists. Perhaps the most vocal online are, and even there I wouldn't know. I suspect that out of one million exJWs in the world, that 990,000 just drifted into a different type of belief in God that didn't require certain activities that they no longer believe are a requirement from God. Of the other remaining 10,000, many of those are quite angry at policies that left them without access to their loved ones, or made them angry enough to look for reasons to dismiss religion altogether. This same group would be expected to produce the online opposers.