TrueTomHarley

No Did you notice that just after my post I put in another saying I was half-inclined to take it all back? It was for this consideration that I did it. Everyone else says what they have to say without triggering “hot compassionate rhetoric.” (well...actually, that’s not true) Why should it be different for you? There is no harmony and unity here. Okay. I think most everyone else understands that, too. I never misunderstood that point, either. Throw it on the stack. What’s one more? I am among the most tracable people here, doing nothing in secret. Did I not just say that I spoke to congregation elders, explaining what I was doing and why? What about you? Does anyone in the actual world know that you are BillyTheKid? There’s no way on earth that you are going to be deleted unless you break a few lamps in The Librarian’s home. She’s a sensitive old biddy and she treasures her few material things. Okay. Everyone else carries on here. Why shouldn’t you be able to as well? But here is something for you to consider. We are encouraged to freely associate with our brothers (don’t misunderstand - there are few here that I regard as ‘our brothers’ but there are some) to build them up, exhort, encourage, and so forth. Until we hear that they are disfellowshipped, we regard them as brothers. Are we ever going to hear it here should it happen? No. Why? Because the Internet is not the congregation and cannot be made to behave like one. No wonder the GB prefers that you and I stay off it. Now, in your actual congregation, are there brothers not disfellowshipped that you lambaste? I hope that is not the case. The only exception would be if someone had been marked (what verse is that, anyhow?) and you thought you knew who that one was. In that case, you would. But would you go around the congregation encouraging others to follow your course? You know how improper that would be. My point is that online you don’t know who’s who. You never will. You don’t even know that I am a brother. I said I was, but I might be lying. The Internet is the land of the liars and that must be understood. But when you come online and harshly rip into ‘brothers’ with scripture, you are overstepping your bounds. That is the place of the elders. When brothers are yet in good standing and other brothers rip into them online tor doing this or that wrong—well, they would never do it offline. And it contributes to the wrong impression that Jehovah’s Witnesses are the most judgmental people on earth. Elders are the ones who should issue such discipline. You should not presume to step into their role, as though they were falling down on the job and you will take their place. And why don’t they fulfill their role here? Because the Internet is not the congregation and cannot be made to behave like one. No wonder the GB prefers that you and I stay off it. It is not Witnesses that I am writing for, in the main. Loyal brothers are not going to frequent here. It is for non-Witnesses that I am writing. Whenever I address anyone, I am always primarily addressing the unknown audience that lies behind. And that, let me be honest (as usual), is a challenge that I very much enjoy. I don’t mean determined opposers. I mean unalliigned people. There may not be any. There may be many. You never know. They may come along afterwards. I like witnessing to them, not to show that this or that doctrine that they may believe in is wrong, but to illustrate the mechanics and underlying reasonableness of the Christian congregation to people who may have been conditioned to think that we are anything but. Call it PR, if you like. In general we are terrible at PR. If we are not explaining to non-Witnesses something about Christmas being pagan or telling them about the cute animals in paradise, we haven’t a clue how to speak with them, and there are a fair number of friends who will think that we shouldn’t. I like doing PR for the congregation to non-Witnesses on topics that aren’t entry level. I do it in the books I have written. I spend far far too much time here, except that it does in some ways not always tangible help with that undertaking. “How’s that for saying what I mean?” you said. Not bad. How’s mine? We owe each other honesty.

It would not have been there for you to comment on had I done that, would it?

You know, @BillyTheKid46, having written what I just did, there's a part of me that wants to take it all back. it is very hard to address a dozen different points of view expressed here at once and I think I overestimate my ability to rise to the occasion. It may be that everything is exactly as you say. At any rate, I'll keep mulling over the verses you have spotlighted.

Now now now. You threw this in as an afterthought and you should have left it out. Why not just say: “I am wise. Everyone else is stupid.”? It comes across as judgmental, Billy. And it serves no purpose. You have been at this for some time now, trying to make people behave on this worldly site as though they are in the Kingdom Hall. How’s that project going, anyway? If you choose to write on this forum, you must not write with only brothers in mind. You must write primarily for the non-Witnesses that might be lurking about. The brothers get their counsel at the Kingdom Hall. It cannot be done--converting the worldnewsmedia into a congregation. You only shoot yourself in the foot when you try and you leave a not-so-hot witness by saying things like the above. The internet is not the congregation and cannot be made to behave like one. From where did you receive the commission to declare: “Only 40 days more and the worldnewsmedia forum will be destroyed for its great badness”? You didn’t. It could be argued that you are the most hypocritical one here. I have made no bones about being a bad boy in certain respects. Were I obedient to all aspects of counsel, I would not be here. That is equally true of you, but you don’t acknowledge it. Do you think the GB says: “There are a lot of yo-yos on that ‘out there’ website, but thank God, we have our man Billy to straighten them out”? No. They say: “Oh, man, that TTH is a screwball and now that gunslinger Billy is also carrying on! How come they don’t listen to us and stay on better channels?” I am encouraged, Billy, and probably you are too, that ‘loyal’ ones seldom appear on this open club. If they come online, they stay in the closed club, which is spiritually more healthy. I like that. Don’t you? It shows an obedience on their part that neither you nor I display. I have explained to you more than once my reasons for disregarding counsel on internet association. You don’t accept it, but they are still my reasons. I am a brother neither servant nor elder, though I have served in those capacities previously. I am universally liked in my circuit because I am a peacemaker and I am not wound up too tight, though there are probably a few who think I am a windbag. What am I going to tell them—that I’m not? Recently two elders approached me to say they would like to use me more in the congregation, but was there anything to the rumor that I associate with apostates? I told them that there was not, however what I did came close enough that it might easily be taken that way, and if we apply the direction given young people to all adults, then it clearly was that way, so for that sake we all decided it better to leave things just as they are. I told them why I did what I did—that I learned a reporter who wrote several bad articles about us used a certain apostate Internet forum as his sole source. ‘If that’s the case, maybe others do as well. Maybe I can go there and plant some things that are more balanced,’ I told myself. I have put several long posts there, but afterwards I do not hang out. Each post produces a flurry of protests and I briefly answer a few, but after that I disappear. It is not a course that I recommend for others, and brothers usually get their heads handed to them on a platter when try, being severely outgunned and unprepared for the sheer onslaught that they trigger. It is being disobedient to counsel for me to do it, and I do not try to spin it otherwise. I would not presume to do it but for senior years, a long honed ability to write—if you do anything long enough, you tend to develop a knack for it—and enough humbling circumstances in life that I am not likely to become overly full of myself, much less go the way of these characters. The rules are different here, Billy. It is not the congregation. If you knocked on a householder’s door who was a known ne’er do well and when he answered you saw some brothers inside, you might say to them: “Um, guys, do you really think that you should be here?” But if they did not respond, what would you do? Would you feel it your place to barge into that householder’s home and make those brothers behave as they ought? It is kind of what you are doing here. We must respect our hostess here and abide by her rules--the Librarian, that old hen. Given that I have chosen to be online, I commit no wrong in whatever association I have with @JW Insider. He has committed an extraordinary indiscretion, in my opinion, and I have done my duty as a brother in exhorting, even rebuking him, in the way that is most effective for me—by a skit painting him as the friendly but incredibly naïve poker player who fans out his full house for all to see. That’s about all I can do but it is what a brother should do. It will all be lost on him, most likely, because he sings the "theocracy dies in darkness" mantra more fervently than Jeff Bezos. Do you think that he ought to be disfellowshipped? If so, note that he is not, or at least if he is we don’t know about it, and can therefore with good conscience treat him as in good standing. And why is that the case--that he is not or that we don't know? Because this is the internet, and the internet cannot be made to behave as the congregation. Persons ought not be here if they cannot get their heads around that.

This is better, Billy, but it is still not good enough. The Benefit book says that you must specifically make the connection. Presumably you think this verse will serve as counsel for me or you would not have quoted it. How will it help? What part of it applies? Do you think that I have three wives or that I am a drunkard? For your posts to do what you want them to, you must always say what you mean. And all those passages on conscience. How do they apply? I’ll come to Thessalonians presently, for in this I am pretty sure I know what you mean. The opening verses, too. I can guess, probably accurately, what you mean. But it would still be a guess. I could be wrong. It would be better if you said it. That’s the best way to give counsel.

This is the second time you’ve mentioned annointed in addressing me. I hope you don’t think that I claim to be annointed. You will know the day that I am annointed when you read a Going Out of Business sign in heaven.

Actually, I wrote up that post in haste. I hadn’t noticed. But billion just sounds so much better. Besides, it’s just a zero. And what is a zero? Nothing! You’re getting all worked up over nothing! I can’t ask the Librarian again, noble old girl. So we’ll do it like when Billy Graham was kicking back at criticism of his supposedly loving material things, according to someone’s satire: For the Lord’s sake I would gladly walk about in rags, but the fact of the matter is that I look so much better in this two thousand dollar suit!* *adjusted for inflation.

You know, it’s all very well that this fellow wins the $1.4 billion Templeton Prize and I don’t. “He’ll be throwing his worthless gold in the street, someday,” I chuckle gleefully. Oh yeah, I am having a wonderful time here. https://news.yahoo.com/physicist-marcelo-gleiser-science-does-not-kill-god-090100672.html There’s nothing here that I haven’t said. There’s nothing here that tens of thousands of people haven’t said. “Hee hee, hee,” I mock this poor fellow. “Just wait till he gets his tax bill. nyuk nyuk nyuk.” “Atheism is inconsistent with the scientific method," he told them. “Atheism is a belief in non-belief. So you categorically deny something you have no evidence against." Everybody who has any sense says that and nobody pays them $1.4 billion. “I'll keep an open mind because I understand that human knowledge is limited," he added. There’s money in them thar open minds. I mean, he didn’t actually do any work. He just gussied up common sense a little and held out his hand for the payoff. “The author of five English-language books and hundreds of blog and press articles in the US and Brazil, Gleiser has also explored in depth how science and religion both try to respond to questions on the origins of life and the universe,” the article says. Actually, I’ve just written four, not five books, and my blog posts are on many things, not just...oh...wait....the article’s not talking about me. It’s talking about someone with a cool 1.4 billion. I wouldn’t take it if you got down on your knees and begged me. “This fundamental curiosity unites science and religion, though each provides very different answers: science has a methodology, where hypotheses are eliminated. "Science can give answers to certain questions, up to a point," Gleiser pointed out. "This has been known for a very long time in philosophy, it's called the problem of the first cause: we get stuck," the physicist, a father of five.” Maybe that’s where I went wrong. I didn’t have five kids. I should have had more. "We should have the humility to accept that there's mystery around us,” he says. “He accuses the "new atheists" of doing a disservice to science by making an enemy out of religion: notably British scientist Richard Dawkins.” Uh, yeah. Haven’t I said the same thing, like, forever? “It's extremely arrogant from scientists to come down from the ivory towers and make these declarations without understanding the social importance of belief systems.....When you hear very famous scientists making pronouncements like ... cosmology has explained the origin of the universe and the whole, and we don't need God anymore. That's complete nonsense," he added. “Because we have not explained the origin of the universe at all." Ha ha ha! Wait till he is flooded by “friends” who want a piece of his prize, ‘earned’ by pointing out what any donkey of a believer could have pointed out. Then he’ll be sorry. Then he’ll wish that I had been awarded that prize, and not he. But it will be too late. He’s stuck with it. Ho Ho Ho. I’ll send him my address just to mess with his mind a little, but I won’t accept his prize, no matter how much he pleads. Sheesh! 1.4 billion. It’s all in who you know. Now, hand me that hammer so I can tap the starter on my car, the way you have to do to get it running. “Go get em, Tiger,” I tell myself. They’re running a ‘Buy One Get One’ at WalMart today.

Just another example of people bowing and scraping and acqiescing to my every whim. It gets so old.

Look, the only people who have a clue that there even is such a thing as anointed as separate from every person just trying to be good is Jehovah’s Witnesses, and you have severed ties with them. I felt closer to God being out in the woodlands today, Nature is great.  It is, but it is the Book of Creation. It testifies much about God, enough to feel close to him, but by no means all.

Yeah, it isn’t entirely clear, is it. Think Franz Kafka and you will have a better idea of where I am going with this. It isn’t for everyone, and there are no demerits for not going there. It is just as likely to be an utter waste of time if you do.

Alas, I can’t change the heading. I would if I could. Hey, ol girl @The Librarian, can you do it? Even she may not be able to do it. The heading becomes an Internet placeholder and to change cuts it off and sends it whirling rudderless in cyberspace.

Okay. Done. It was a good review, @BillyTheKid46. Thank you for that. I like them. They’re scriptures. For the most part, though, they are long passages of scripture. From each, one might draw 12 different lessons. You must tell me which one you would like me to draw. I say this not to be difficult, but to be genuine. I will take counsel from you, for I respect where you are coming from. Still, if you are going to offer counsel, you must do it as the Benefit book advises. You cannot just throw a boatload of scriptures at someone then get mad if they do not glean from it whatever unspecified thing that you want them to glean. That is not too much different from what Witness does coming from the other direction. I have called her scriptures “irrelevant.” They’re only irrelevant because she rarely makes specific applications. She just throws a few chapters at you, convinced she is thereby proving her point. She’s not. Don’t be like her. Somewhere the Benefit book says that in reading even one verse, (let alone dozens) you cannot just assume that your audience gets the connection that you wish to make. You must plainly state what that connection is. AND, don’t forget, unless you’re goal is simply to slap people down, which is a goal that should be most rare for a Christian, you must convey Christlike concern for your audience, making use of winsome words and not wincing words.

Sigh.... Witness trying to pull me from the bright side to the dark side. Billy trying to pull me from the dark side to the bright side. What’s a TTH to do? Nonetheless, there are abundant scriptures here from someone whose motive is not to show that the GB is doing it all wrong whereas she can do it all right even though she is not doing anything at all so far I can see in contrast to they who are doing things abundantly. I’ll review them. Not now, it’s late. But tomorrow.

Those New Testament epistles reveal abundant energy devoted to countering those who oppose. See how Paul battles with the “superfine apostles” at 2 Corinthians 11, for instance. Why think it would be different today? ............... I'm not completely sure what this thread is even about. Offhand, it seems like an attempt by the hypercritical people to get the picayune and the righteous-overmuch people going. We all know what Jehovah's Witnesses believe. So whatever is seen is Chili either squares with it or it doesn't. If it does, then there will be some trickery involved to get people all incensed over it. It may be fraud by photoshop or trespasser sabotage. Or there may be something circumstantial or cultural that we know nothing about.. If it doesn't. then it will be corrected, now or later. It always is. Once I came after you with the charge that you had an agenda and you responded with: 'Of course, I have an agenda.' I said to myself: 'The old pork chop is right. He does has one. So do I. So does everyone.' Stay here any length of time and it becomes clear who the players are and what are their agendas. They range in shades of from off-white to downright black. Thus everything anyone offers ought to be seen in this light, and the posts of some ought to be 90% dismissed on this basis alone. The ideal is what C.T. Russell stated, that he would accept a truth even if it was from the Devil himself. But the reality is, how would you know it is the truth? Far more likely is it that he is just lying like he always does, using abundant tricks of the trade to make you think he is telling you the truth. The tools for lying are legion today, far more than in Russell's time, what with photoshopping and all. Even without photoshopping , we all know the reality of information selectively given without context or in manufactured context in hopes that people will come to false conclusions, so that Wayne finally has to say: 'I'll go down there myself and shake the truth out of those bad brothers (if bad brothers they be).' Obviously that is something few brothers can do, not just on account of resources, nor even on account of time, but on account of best use of time. And if we get so worked up about reports from those whose agendas are manifestly cockeyed, if not downright foul, in these days of photoshop, what on earth will we do in the days of 'deep fakes', a day that is rapidly dawning? If anyone doesn't know the term, a casual Google search will reveal that it is the manipulation of video evidence, so that any head can be attached to any body and be made to say anything the poster wants? Are you going to lose you're cookies, then, when a GB member appears in skin tight pants smoking weed to recommend that we all start showing a little more sympathy for the Devil? Because you know that day is coming. (My own prophesy, by the way, is that deep fakes will instantly be turned upon children, as technological advances usually are, for the sake of ratcheting up the bullying that they are already taking their own lives over. Since generating those deep fakes is only possible with an abundance of still photos to feed into generators, any source of those abundant photos is going to be sued off the planet. It will not be enough for social media sites to say that what they did was perfectly legal at the time and was agreed to by their users. Laws will be reinterpreted to say that they have violated them. You think lawsuits today have gotten out of hand?) So you have to go by someone's manifest agenda. In this regard, Billy’s comments are among the most appropriate, even if he is prickly is his presentation. Witness the modern sanctification of the term 'whistleblower'. Whistleblowers are useful, of course, but they are more useful in blowing the cover off an evil organization. Almost all of the self-styled 'whistleblowers' on this particular thread think that Jehovah's organization is evil. If you are one, like me, who doesn't think that, then you discount their comments on that basis alone. People's veracity should be judged by always keeping in mind their overall agenda. It is like a WT article that dealt with those occasional Bible accounts that are downright strange and even paint God in a bad light. 'All we see is a little snippet,' it said. 'What do you do with a close friend who has had your back and earned your trust over time and you know him through and through, but then you hear a bad report about him? Do you say: "YEAH! I knew it! He is a rat!" ? Unfortunately, it is a crazy age we live in in which loyalty is seen as the mark of a chump, and there are many people who are that way. It is like when I pointed out that the Geoffrey Jackson on Twitter was not the real Geoffrey Jackson and Wilma took a breather from bludgeoning everyone with irrelevant scriptures to say 'How do you know that it is not him?' It has his picture, doesn't it? 'He' even said pray for our brothers in Russia. Duh. You know it is not him because she says that it is. Presently it was revealed that ‘he’ didn't give a hoot in hell for 'our brothers is Russia.' - kill them all as far as he is concerned. It was all a ruse so as to capture the attention of naïve brothers and redirect it to unflattering reports elsewhere. Oh, yeah. Sure. He’s going to start up a Twitter account. After all he’s said about social media. Look, if they ever did do some amazing about face and start giving updates on Twitter, it would be a dramatic change in method of communication. There would be ample notice on trusted channels that such was about to happen. ........................ “These are the problems I see when witnesses from a free society don’t understand the prospects of other countries. They think they can instill western values in areas that reject them.” Exactly “Therefore, the only ones worthy of accommodating the brotherhood in Chile, are Chilean Brothers, no one else.” Exactly. When Billy is hot, he’s hot. It is not unlike the situation described at Acts 21:20 “and they said to him: “You behold, brother, how many thousands of believers there are among the Jews; and they are all zealous for the Law. But they have heard it rumored about you that you have been teaching all the Jews among the nations an apostasy from Moses, telling them neither to circumcise their children nor to walk in the [solemn] customs. What, then, is to be done about it? In any case they are going to hear you have arrived. Therefore do this which we tell you: We have four men with a vow upon themselves. Take these men along and cleanse yourself ceremonially with them and take care of their expenses, that they may have their heads shaved. And so everybody will know that there is nothing to the rumors they were told about you, but that you are walking orderly, you yourself also keeping the Law.” The governing arrangement back then assumed authority to do such things, even telling Paul to act differently from what he would otherwise do, so as to counteract hurtful reports and reassure others. They were not to be second-guessed in such decisions. They “girded themselves as men” and directed a course of action that easily could have been criticized by ones having inadequate knowledge of the culture and circumstances. In fact, on ancientsocialmedia.com back then, they did take a lot of heat for it. ....................... My throat got dry on the trail the other day so I stopped in at the saloon for a brew. I grabbed my mug, threaded my way through the floozies after telling the barkeep to keep those drinks coming, and settled in for some serious contemplation of the vicissitudes of life. ”Join us for some poker, pardner?” came a friendly voice from the next table. A Chilean flag flew over that table on some days, but not others. Why not indulge him? I took the chair offered and the dealer shot out the cards. The friendly stranger took a quick peak at his then put them face down on the table. Presently, looking sly as could be, he picked his cards up again and slowly fanned them face side out, and I was surprised to see that he had a full house. I heard some tittering from the floozies, and I weighed his hand against mine with an inward smile. I would hand this gringo his head on a platter. But then my conscience started to beat me. This was going to be too easy, like taking candy from a baby, and I don’t cotton to beating up on babies. “Say stranger,” I said. “Did you know that you are doing it all backwards?” ”Don’t worry,” he replied. “I know what I’m doing. The public has a right to know.” ”Maybe some good will come out of it,” he spoke up again. “The name’s Wayne, by the way. Pleased to meet you. Maybe we’ll have the pleasure to meet again someday ,” he said chattily as I raked in every dollar he had laid down. How’s that for admiring him, Billy. Out here on the trail everything is relative. “Admirin’s got nothing to do with it.” https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2019/03/skirmish-200317.html

It’s a far nicer response than I was cooking up. Let’s see what comes of it.

My throat got dry on the trail the other day so I stopped in at the saloon for a brew. I grabbed my mug, threaded my way through the floozies after telling the barkeep to keep those drinks coming, and settled in for some serious contemplation of the vicissitudes of life. ”Join us for some poker, pardner?” came a friendly voice from the next table. A Chilean flag flew over that table on some days, but not others. Why not indulge him? I took the chair offered and the dealer shot out the cards. The friendly stranger took a quick peak at his then put them face down on the table. Presently, looking sly as could be, he picked his cards up again and slowly fanned them face side out, and I was surprised to see that he had a full house. I heard some tittering from the floozies, and I weighed his hand against mine with an inward smile. I would hand this gringo his head on a platter. My conscience started to beat me. This was going to be too easy, like taking candy from a baby, and I don’t cotton to beating up on babies. “Say stranger,” I said. “Did you know that you are doing it all backwards?” ”Don’t worry,” he replied. “I know what I’m doing. The public has a right to know.” ”Maybe some good will come out of it,” he spoke up again. “The name’s @JW Insider, by the way. Pleased to meet you. Maybe we’ll have the pleasure to meet again someday ,” he said chattily as I raked in every dollar he had laid down. How’s that for admiring him, @BillyTheKid46? Out here on the trail everything is relative. “Admirin’s got nothing to do with it.”

Trust me. He’s an idiot.

 Yes Anna, probably "wind of change" introduce new view on beard issue. So, "my truth" about it till the 2015, the year of my leaving JW, was true also. :)) Oscar Oxgoad entered the Kingdom Hall as he always does that day—clean shaven. But at the end of that Watchtower study he bent over and fumbled about in his overstuffed bag—I couldn’t make out what he was doing He straightened up and walked about after the song with a huge Santa Claus beard. I knew he was going to do something like that! I knew it! He is such an idiot.

Exactly Exactly. When Billy is hot, he’s hot. It is not unlike the situation described at Acts 21:20 “and they said to him: “You behold, brother, how many thousands of believers there are among the Jews; and they are all zealous for the Law. But they have heard it rumored about you that you have been teaching all the Jews among the nations an apostasy from Moses, telling them neither to circumcise their children nor to walk in the [solemn] customs. What, then, is to be done about it? In any case they are going to hear you have arrived. Therefore do this which we tell you: We have four men with a vow upon themselves. Take these men along and cleanse yourself ceremonially with them and take care of their expenses, that they may have their heads shaved. And so everybody will know that there is nothing to the rumors they were told about you, but that you are walking orderly, you yourself also keeping the Law.” The governing arrangement back then assumed authority to do such things, even telling Paul to act differently from what he would otherwise do, so as to counteract hurtful reports and reassure others. They were not to be second-guessed in such decisions. They “girded themselves as men” and directed a course of action that easily could have been criticized by ones having inadequate knowledge of the culture and circumstances. In fact, on theancientworldnewsmedia.com back then, they did take a lot of heat for it.

Some evenings after supper we dribble the basketball out in the driveway and throw it a few times through the hoopla.

This just says it all. It really does. It is a little mean for me to do this. I agree with you on that and I’m not necessarily proud of it. I apologize. But for the sake of drawing out such a remark as you made above that clearly shows you regard yourself as a shining light in the darkness, even as you miss no opportunity to malign the GB, (although you have offered nothing tangible to establish your own authority, other than an ability to quote scripture, as anyone can do) it was worth it. You quote so many long passages that I would have to make my reply a mile long—nixxing this and okaying that—and I just won’t do it. It reminds me, though it is not exactly the same, of Jesus telling ones that they were searching the scriptures because they thought that by means of them they might find life, when all the time he was there among them. They were reading scripture far more than the ones who actually chose to follow Jesus, many of whom doubtless could barely read, but their obvious high self-regard for themselves torpedoed most of their search.

I'm not completely sure what this thread is even about. Offhand, it seems like an attempt by the hypercritical people to get the picayune and the righteous-overmuch people going. We all know what Jehovah's Witnesses believe. So whatever is seen is Chili either squares with it or it doesn't. If it does, then there will be some trickery involved to get people all incensed over it. It may be fraud by photoshop or trespasser sabotage. Or there may be something circumstantial or cultural that we know nothing about.. If it doesn't. then it will be corrected, now or later. It always is. Once I came after you with the charge that you had an agenda and you responded with: 'Of course, I have an agenda.' I said to myself: 'The old pork chop is right. He does has one. So do I. So does everyone.' Stay here any length of time and it becomes clear who the players are and what are their agendas. They range in shades of from off-white to downright black. Thus everything anyone offers ought to be seen in this light, and the posts of some ought to be 90% dismissed on this basis alone. The ideal is what C.T. Russell stated, that he would accept a truth even if it was from the Devil himself. But the reality is, how would you know it is the truth? Far more likely is it that he is just lying like he always does, using abundant tricks of the trade to make you think he is telling you the truth. The tools for lying are legion today, far more than in Russell's time, what with photoshopping and all. Even without photoshopping , we all know the reality of information selectively given without context or in manufactured context in hopes that people will come to false conclusions, so that @JW Insider finally has to say: 'I'll go down there myself and shake the truth out of those bad brothers (if bad brothers they be).' Obviously that is something few brothers can do, not just on account of resources, nor even on account of time, but on account of best use of time. And if we get so worked up about reports from those whose agendas are manifestly cockeyed, if not downright foul, in these days of photoshop, what on earth will we do in the days of 'deep fakes', a day that is rapidly dawning? If anyone doesn't know the term, a casual Google search will reveal that it is the manipulation of video evidence, so that any head can be attached to any body and be made to say anything the poster wants? Are you going to lose you're cookies, then, when a GB member appears in the nude to recommend that we all start showing a little sympathy for the Devil? Because you know it is coming. (My own prophesy, by the way, is that deep fakes will instantly be turned upon children, as technological advances usually are, for the sake of ratcheting up the bullying that they are already taking their own lives over. Since generating those deep fakes is only possible with an abundance of still photos to feed into generators, any source of those abundant photos is going to be sued off the planet. It will not be enough for social media sites to say that what they did was perfectly legal at the time and was agreed to by their users. Laws will be reinterpreted to say that they have violated them. You think lawsuits today have gotten out of hand?) So you have to go by someone's manifest agenda. In this regard, @BillyTheKid46's comments are among the most appropriate, even if he is prickly is his presentation. Witness the modern sanctification of the term 'whistleblower'. Whistleblowers are useful, of course, but they are more useful in blowing the cover off an evil organization. Almost all of the self-styled 'whistleblowers' here think that Jehovah's organization is evil. If you are one, like me, who doesn't think that, then you discount their comments on that basis alone. People's veracity should be judged by always keeping in mind their overall agenda. It is like a WT article that dealt with those occasional Bible accounts that are downright strange and even paint God in a bad light. 'All we see is a little snippet,' it said. 'What do you do with a close friend who has had your back and earned your trust over time and you know him through and through, but then you hear a bad report about him? Do you say: "YEAH! I knew it! He is a rat!" ? Unfortunately, it is a crazy age we live in in which loyalty is seen as the mark of a chump, and there are many people who are that way. It is like when I pointed out that the Geoffrey Jackson on Twitter was not the real Geoffrey Jackson and @Witness took a breather from bludgeoning everyone with irrelevant scriptures to say 'How do you know that it is not him?' It has his picture, doesn't it? 'He' even said'pray for our brothers in Russia. Duh. You know it is not him because she says that it is. Presently it was revealed that he didn't give a hoot in hell for 'our brothers is Russia.' - kill them all as far as he is concerned. It was all a ruse so as to capture the attention of naïve brothers and redirect it to unflattering reports elsewhere.

I confess I haven’t actually been following this thread in any depth. One would think that would prevent me from weighing in.

Okay, I’m a brother. I shouldn’t do this. I really shouldn’t. I really really really shouldn’t. I know better. I’m NOT ALLOWED!!! Ah, well. I’ll ask for forgiveness later. I’ll give 3:1 odds that JWI finds it’s all a bunch of hoopla. Nothing less than $100 bets will be considered. After all, what’s one more odd look? I’ve been in trouble ever since I pointed out that nature itself testifies to the value of higher education, since the most formidable beavers are graduates of Dam U.