March 24, 2006
Return to Sender: All Along the Watchtower
To the Jehovah’s Witnesses who like to wake me up on those rare occasions on which I get to sleep in:
First of all, you are traveling around University City. Near Penn’s campus. As any Philadelphian knows, there are a lot of Jews at Penn. Being one of them myself, I know that Jews don’t usually appreciate proselytes. Also, that we don’t much like the pronunciation of the word “Jehovah.” Maybe you should just wait, like the Mormons do, and get us after we die.
Secondly, I know that in the real world, eleven a.m. isn’t too early to expect someone to be awake, but if a person opens the door at eleven a.m., bleary-eyed and bathrobe-bedecked, it’s safe to assume that that person was in bed. Maybe some people are agreeable to everything when they’ve just woken up. I am personally not one of them. You said yourselves, I looked tired. So why did you shove a tract in my face and try to talk to me about conversion? You could have said “sorry to bother you,” and gone on to wake my neighbor. I really didn’t want to slam the door in your face, but it seemed like the only way you’d get the message. (And yes, I was showing very, very poor manners in doing it.)
And here’s the kicker. You only believe that 144,000 people will gain entrance to heaven. There are around six billion people alive in the world today – and your religion has been around since the late nineteenth century, so we’ve got to count the current six billion plus everyone who died between 1869 and 2006. By our estimates, that’s more than 144,000 people. It’s kind of like when Vanity Fair throws a party with a too-exclusive guest list. You might accidentally blacklist Paris Hilton from heaven. If it were me, I’d keep things much more on the down-low. Becoming a Jehovah’s Witness should be a lot more like trying to find a woman’s G-spot. You have to be patient, try a few different approaches, go slow. You can only get that far if you’re invited and pass a series of tests (ranging from financial background to skill at bra removal). If you’re worthy, or lucky, you figure out what works, and you get to be one of the 144,000. Embracing the faith, like finding the G-spot, should be a lot more work: you won’t find most women going door-to-door inviting people to embrace their vaginas, so why should you go door-to-door asking people to embrace your religion?
Of course, come to think of it, maybe selling your religion that way would make it more attractive to potential new recruits.
Hey, whatever works.
Image via Think About Eternity. It's amazing the kind of websites you can find by performing a simple Google Image search!
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Ha ha, if only you knew the workings of the JW mind. They won't let you go back to bed because, ultimately, they don't really care about you. It's about them.
AND, technical note: most JW's don't aspire to be one of the 144,000. Their reward is supposed to be to live forever in a post-armaggedon paradise on Earth.
Sorry they screwed up your morning. Think about how much worse it would be to be raised into that idiotic religion!
Oh, and one more thing - slamming the door is fine with them. They get off on it - it just confirms their worldview (that the average person is wicked and unwilling to listen.)
A MOUTH THAT PRAYS A HAND THAT KILLS
Up close and personal Jehovah's Witnesses can be wolves in sheep's clothing.
Think about this-When the devil comes knocking on your door he may not have the 'dark goth look'.They could be smartly dressed and wielding the Christian Bible.
I have Jehovah's Witnesses family in the usa who practice the Watchtower JW enforced ritual shunning that i have not seen or heard from in 15 years.
The central CORE dogma of the Watchtower is Jesus second coming (invisibly) in 1914 and is a lie.Jehovah's Witnesses are a spin-off of the man made Millerite movement of 1840.
A destructive cult of false teachings, that frequently result in spiritual and psychological abuse, as well as needless deaths (bogus blood transfusion ban).
Yes,you can 'check out anytime you want but you can never leave',because they can and will hold your family hostage.
The world has the Internet now,and there are tens of thousands of pages up from disgruntled ex-Jehovah's Witnesses like myself who have been abused by the Watchtower cult.
Jehovah's Witnesses are often a mouth that prays a hand that kills.The Watchtower is a truly Orwellian world.
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Danny Haszard former Jehovah's Witness X 33 years and 3rd generation www.dannyhaszard.com
Wow, I didn't realize Phillyist was now a place to express ignorant prejudice. Bravo, really.
It's neither ignorance nor prejudice that led me to write this column. I know several practicing JWs (I've even attended a JW wedding) and hold nothing but the highest respect for them. Really, I respect anyone -- even including fundamentalists -- who actually feel strongly enough about their religions to practice them. Does that mean I agree with their practices? No. Often, not at all. My annoyance at being woken up doesn't mean I'm prejudiced against them. "Return to Sender" is usually meant to be taken with a grain of salt. I can think of about two previous RTS postings that weren't. And you'll find that Phillyist's snark, overall, is usually significantly upsetting/offensive/incindiary than the humor of most comedians/ comedy writers.
Yeah, I can't see how the essay qualifies as "ignorant prejudice." Where's the "prejudice," exactly?
The whole essay is:
1) Jill didn't want to be proselytized to. You can't really argue with that.
2) Some fasicious (and yes, uninformed) analysis of the 144,000 thing.
Who's being judged as anything?
I, on the other hand, am happy to assert that they are a bunch of self-centered, idiotic phonies.
I was refering more towards the comments which followed the post.
I hardly see evidence for them being self-centered, or phonies for that matter. You could say that anyone who's beliefs you don't share is a phony. Practising what they believe hardly makes them phonies.
Well, my comments, though uncharitable and certainly slanted, are based on direct experience, as I implied in my first post. I was raised as a JW, and thus am quite familiar with all their jargon, their beliefs, practices, and attitudes about the world.
Their beliefs have social ramifications.
1) They think they are the only correct religion. They actually believe that any other brand of Christianity (not to mention the other major belief systems) are inspired and influenced by the devil. (Idiotic.)
2) They believe that human society is essentially corrupt and can only be improved by an apocalypse. They do not think humans can make the world a better place by any other means - thus, they engage in NO charitable work and see no kind of career choice as socially beneficial. They don't even vote. (Self-centered!)
3) They discount any source of information other than the Watchtower society as being biased and devil-influenced. Thus, despite their apparent committment to discourse and study, they really are totally closed off intellectually. (Phonies.)
4) So, while they may ACT very nice and polite in day-to-day interaction, this is out of a strong sense of superiority. After all, they're members of the one true religion. You, on the other hand, are a hopelessly deluded sinner who will soon die in the apocalypse.
I'm not even getting into all the particular doctrines they espouse and the flimsy bases of them.
Perhaps, dfgif, you may know some of these folks. If you pressed them on any of these assertions I've made above they would hem and haw and say that I'm obviously bitter and biased about them. Yet they really believe these things - the average person whose door they knock upon has no idea.
But, dfgif, you obviously know more about them than I do. Perhaps you can show me how I'm being ignorant and prejudicial.