The letters from '34 were attempting to fend off persecution from the Nazis, who viewed their beliefs as a threat to the Nazi order, thus the ‘we support you’, or rather what it actually said “Instead of being against the principles advocated by the government of Germany, we stand squarely for such principles.” If you notice in the following sentences and paragraph:
Regarding the resolution in 1936 condemning Nazism, why on earth would you choose not to believe it because of a letter in '34 where they tried (and failed) to convince the Nazis of their harmlessness, and in the intervening year the group was nationally banned by the Nazis, the group was infiltrated by the Gestapo to identify members, members were arrested and jailed for the crime of continuing to meet and 400 were sent to concentration camps for refusing the draft? Mind you, all of this information is historical fact regardless of how you feel about it being an ‘assertion’. You’ll also note the source of this information is not the JW, but the Jewish Virtual Library which is using the US Holocaust Memorial Museum as a source.
Look, I don’t have a dog in the fight about Jehovah’s Witnesses. I think Uber_the_Goober is coming across as an idiot, but I also think he’d be coming across that way regardless of the topic. However, bringing up Jewish persecution and mass murder at the hands of the Nazis as an example of what ‘real’ persecution is displays an ignorance of history; the Jehovah’s Witnesses were sent to the same extermination camps by the Nazis, who also shot 200-250 of them for refusing to perform military service when drafted. The upper end of the estimates of the numbers killed in concentration and extermination camps (5,000 out of a population of 10,000) rather closely matches the percentages of the second largest group of victims of the holocaust, Soviet POWs, who suffered a 57% mortality rate at the hands of the Nazis, again quoting the USHMM:
Your attempt to paint JWs as ‘friends’ of Hitler and the Nazis is frankly offensive, regardless of how one feels about JWs, especially considering that all they had to do to avoid being murdered for refusing the draft or murdered at extermination camps was renounce their faith, an option not open to most other victims of the Holocaust. They refused to do so, and were murdered for it.
Well, my ignorance has been fought once in this thread (CLee is a CHICK?).
I’d appreciate having another slab of it battled, Uber, if it’s not too much trouble. Renal hemodialysys involves removing blood from the body and putting blood INTO the body. Does the fact that it is the patient’s own blood make it doctrinally okay, or is hemodialysis out of bounds as well?
My wife used to lie about being a JW to get rid of creepy guys annoying her, worked like a charm too she said. She had the impression they are the kind of christian that doesn’t even believe in sex after marriage
You misunderstand - atleast in the letters in 34 they were trying to be ‘friends’ with hitler and the government - my comment re: the 36 letters and information is that I don’t have it to review in comparison to the article you linked to. I only felt that the first comment in regards to the first letters was a bit ‘whitewashed’ - I was not saying that the info from 36 was incorrect or that I didn’t believe it.
The bigger point - to the JW community anyway - is that they attempted to show sides when they should have not been - as truly “not part of this world” - etc - they should have left it “in gods hands” as they so often tell the followers.
And, as my post said - all of that was prior to the really bad events starting. There is no doubt that the JW were actively persecuted for their beliefs at that time - they were not singled out for it, however - as stated , anyone that refused service went to those camps as well.
My point was simple. The OP is not being persecuted in this thread merely because people are disagreeing with his stupid and often dangerous religious beliefs. Implying as such is ridiculous. Despite his repeated implications, no one here is calling for he and his fellow JW’s to be shipped off to concentration camps. We’re just challenging his ideas and beliefs.
I’m rethinking that last paragraph - its in error - they were ‘banned’ they were looked for - that qualifies as being singled out - and I withdraw that comment.
I always suspected the existence of the Dope was proof of Satan ruling the world. :eek:
Previously unrevealed factoid: as a child, my mother played piano in a one-time performance on a Watchtower radio station. If there were any conversion attempts involved, they failed miserably.*
*of course, no JWs ever attempt to convert anyone to their beliefs. We have that straight from the OP.
Why would you think what you really look like matters? The judgement of “terrible person” you’ve received is based on the opinions you hold and the way you support what we consider terrible acts of the organization you are a part of. I doesn’t mean we think you drip infectious pus or burn the eyes of those gazing on you.
Terrible people have social interactions we non-terrible people every day. Being able to share a civil breakfast with someone is not even close to a good test of non-terribleness.
So which is it? Are you so stupid you think having breakfast with someone proves you’re not a terrible person or are you just trying to dishonestly paint a more pleasant picture of yourself?
I’ve made no noises about the existence of a God, I just think this group which demands exceptional people while treating people inhumanely is a net suck on society. When even the ancient and stodgy Catholic Church evolves and offers more warm and inclusive environment it becomes clear that this sect was built on a rotten foundation. Let this discussion serve as a reminder that among the Witnesses are folks living in fear and desperate to escape but terrified of being alone, so if one strays in your direction, please offer her shelter.
What is it about the veil of time that causes people to romanticize foolish behavior? No one told these people to martyr themselves, and if I understand it correctly, Jesus offered himself as a sacrifice so that his followers wouldn’t have to. They could have lived by uttering a few simple words and gone on to spread their message but committed suicide by Hitler instead? How does that make them exceptional? Do you feel the same about the man who committed immolation at the Capitol a couple weeks ago? Was his a noble act, or a foolhardy one?
It really doesn’t matter if you romanticize those “willing to die for their beliefs” if those people are willing to let their own children wither and die for their beliefs. How noble and virtuous is that, to sacrifice your own child for the sake of your beliefs? It’s unthinkable evil.
I’m not misunderstanding anything. The JW were not trying to be friends with Hitler and the Nazis, and your continued stating of this remains extremely offensive. The Nazis murdered them in the Holocaust, just like they did the Jews, Slavs, homosexuals, Roma, and numerous other groups. Apologies to others for the bolding, but this just doesn’t seem to be sinking in for you. Nothing in the 1934 letter states that they are friends of Hitler, Nazism, or any such thing. It was a letter appealing to not be persecuted by the Nazis, again the part you bolded and seem to think indicates friendship with the Nazis is no such thing - “Instead of being against the principles advocated by the government of Germany, we stand squarely for such principles.” They were facing persecution by the Nazis for holding principles that the Nazis considered to be contrary to those advocated by the government of Germany, i.e. the Nazis. The Nazis were not persuaded in the least that they shouldn’t be banned and persecuted; the '34 letter was written in October of 1934, and the JW’s was nationally banned by the Nazis on April 1, 1935.
The hell you didn’t:
If you weren’t saying the information from 1936 was incorrect, what exactly does the word either in the bolded bit mean exactly? Again, the information from 1936 is coming from the Jewish Virtual Library and the USHMM, not a group of JWs with an agenda.
Again, it is offensive and a gross perversion of history to claim the JW sided with or tried to side with the Nazis. They tried to convince the Nazis that the principles they held were not incompatible and deserving of persecution, banning, and being sent to the concentration camps. Calling this siding with the Nazis is repugnant.
Horseshit. Really bad stuff was already happening to them from the moment Hitler took power.
The October 1934 letter was in response to this, and seven months later the JW were banned by law throughout all of Germany. How exactly is that not being singled out? Being a JW alone was enough to be sent to the camps for; one didn’t have to just refuse the draft.
I am neither romanticizing nor defending the Jehovah’s Witnesses belief system. As I said, I have no dog in the fight, and that you can make what you will of the fact that JWs could avoid being murdered by the Nazis by renouncing their faith, unlike Jews who the Nazis were going to murder regardless. This is what I meant by that, one could view it as foolish of them not to have taken the out that was possible.
What I am doing, however, is taking issue with simster’s grossly offensive mischaracterization of the JWs as being friendly with Hitler and the Nazis when they were in fact being persecuted by them, and upwards of 50% of them were murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust for the crime of being Jehovah’s Witnesses. It is one thing to have been unaware that they were victims of the Holocaust as well, it is entirely another to be fully aware of it and claim that they were friendly with Hitler and the Nazis.
I’ve read the things simster pointed to and, frankly, I think it does look an awful lot like they were trying to side with the Nazis against the Jews. The fact that the Nazis decided to kill them doesn’t make them better people, though it doesn’t absolve the Nazis for responsibility for their own actions.
Some of the apologists for the JWs quoted on Wikipedia said things like (paraphrased): “The fact that the JWs used anti-Jewish slurs doesn’t mean they were anti-Semitic.” Which is… more than slightly goofy.
Exactly. If a grown adult chooses freely to make a sacrifice, that’s one thing, but to sacrifice children? Intolerable.
Exactly. They tried to make friends with a hideous growling slavering amoral monster, and somehow seemed surprised when the monster bit their legs off. It’s like the mad doctor in an old movie screaming at his monster, “Kill him! Kill him! HIM, you fool! Not me, HIM! Aieeee!” Monsters are not a wise instrument of policy.
The bolded part is one of the critical aspects of the letter - yes, they were trying to avoid persecution, by claiming that they and the german govt held similar principles - you call it for self preservation - I call it trying to be friends with them.
My sense of timing for when the persecutions started aside - this means that they knew EXACTLY what the German Govt was up to at that point (re: the Holocaust) so ANY attempt to “stand for the same principles” can now only be read in the harsher light - couple that with Rutherford’s earlier comments with regard to the Jews AND his ‘anti-American’ stance and it forms a more complete picture.
again - my point - poorly worded - was that I only had the information from 34 in front of me, so I could not compare and contrast the wording with the information from 36 - my bolded part means exactly what I said it means, that the JW/Watchtower (and/or whomever provided said info/article/information) to the USHMM is doing what you are attempting to do - and thats paint the information from 34 in a more favorable light.
I have no opinion on the information from 36 - as I have not read it - and its no surprise that they would then be ‘firmly against’ the German govt - after all , they lost their “lets be friends” bit in 34.
<bolding mine>
not really - since they already knew what was going on - the bolded part again being key - they tried to convince the gov’t that they were not ‘incompatible’ - what the fuck doe s that even mean if not to say that they were ‘compatible’.
repeating above - then they knew full well what Hitler’s Govt was up to and planning to do - sending ANY KIND of ‘friendly overture’ to ’ stop hurting us’ is a bullshit thing to do - period.
I was giving them a little benefit of the doubt - that the really ‘bad stuff’ had not yet begun, so they were only trying to be peaceful - now that we know thats not the case - that doesn’t really help them.
We need to be careful here - it was the organization’s Governing Body - the Watchtower, the ‘faithful and discreet slave’ - Rutherford, etc - that were trying to be ‘friendly’ - to keep the doors open - The ‘rank and file’ on the ground in Germany - the ones actually persecuted - the followers - no - they were not trying to be ‘friendly’ - and there is no doubt that they were persecuted and killed for their beliefs. Rutherford fueled that fire in the publications as well, with his ‘drawings’ and other assorted propaganda - which started up after he was rebuffed by the German Gvt.
Rutherford was a very angry man when he took over - made more so by his own failed ‘prophecies’ and his incarceration at the end of WW1 for being ‘anti us’ (ther’s a better word that escapes me - when he was pushing via the literature to break the draft rules, etc - it was actively illegal at the time) - He is the one that turned the ‘Bible Students’ into the ‘Jehovah’s Witnesses’ and turned them into the spiteful, hateful organization they are today - or atleast set them on the path in a firm way.
If you can’t see those points - we do not have alot to discuss here.
I already retracted my ‘singled out’ comment - I was thinking at the time I wrote it of only the instances of ‘refusal of the draft’ - they were not singled out for that - They were singled out otherwise - and that is why I retracted it.
So - keep that in mind - my ‘fight’ is not with the followers - it is with the hypocritical nature of the Watchtower Organization itself and their uncaring attitude when it comes to the affects on the ‘followers’ - and to the JW - this ‘letter’ is something the watchtower likes to gloss over - why? because it is exactly what it is - if it wasn’t they would be more open about it. But that begs the question - if they are ‘God’s chosen channel’ - why should they have to beg a Govt to ‘keep the doors open’ at all? thats the part I want JW to recognize here.
My sense of timing for when the holocaust started aside - this means that they knew EXACTLY what the German Govt was up to at that point (re: the Holocaust) so ANY attempt to “stand for the same principles” can now only be read in the harsher light - couple that with Rutherford’s earlier comments with regard to the Jews AND his ‘anti-American’ stance and it forms a more complete picture.
I don’t know. If I were in a situation where I was scared of persecution from an anti-Semitic government, I might say anti-Semitic things without actually being anti-Semitic.
But there seems to be sort of a double standard here? Because on the one hand, they do try to stay true to their beliefs in spite of persecution and they get criticized like this:
And they write a letter to Hitler saying, “Hey, you’re cool. Don’t kill us. We’re all for you! Please don’t kill us!”, and people say,
So, what should they have done? If sticking to their principles and getting persecuted is bad, and bending their principles to avoid persecution is bad, it seems like they can’t win.
