chockfull

2 hours ago, Rocky said:

Okay, you don't like me. I accept that. Why, again, would you EXPECT (even if not demanding) me to do anything other than decline to respond to your questions?  

How does your insulting commenting pose anything that a reasonable person would expect me to respond to? 

Put another way, why do you think it is acceptable for you to hijack my thread? 

Why would you possibly think that someone asking you to clarify a post is hijacking your thread?  Maybe your response to the question of “who died and made you God?” sounds more like you are hijacking your own thread with personal attacks.

Certainly your vehement insistence on not answering any questions about what you post could hijack a thread.

Look in the mirror for your hijacking culprit.

3 hours ago, Rocky said:

Gosh, who would guess that wishing someone well could warrant such a response? 

 

Gosh who would guess playing dumb, dodging questions about what you write, and gaslighting people about their supposed mood could possibly make you unpopular?

9 hours ago, Rocky said:

Gosh, I hope you're mood lifts soon. 

 

Clueless deflection completely unaware of negative impact of actions and blaming it on my supposed “mood”.  
 

Coincidentally this mirrors the complete lack of awareness and ownership of words and actions of TWI leadership even though I don’t think this individual was involved in TWI leadership.

14 minutes ago, Rocky said:

Did YOU initiate this thread? 

No but I’m gonna see your “keys to life” on every thread regardless of who initiates it.  Whether I want to or not.

11 minutes ago, Rocky said:

Again, who died and made you god?

Put another way, what makes you think I am required to comply with your demands?

Whose brain died and made you post babbling nonsense?

Put another way how paranoid do you have to be to consider a question clarifying one of your babbling posts to be “demands”?

Feel free to not answer any questions directed at you and to post more nonsense.  Oh wait you don’t need instructions to do that you do it 2x more than anyone else ever has on this site.

2 hours ago, Rocky said:

Your private interpretation of what I wrote about the cult facts website. 

When you write "where you like to label..." what Chockfull claims are, without making clear how/why s/he characterizes said claims as facts...," action(s) are most probably projection.

I acknowledge that by directly pointing out what you said is dubious, I am inviting you, unfortunately not to a discussion of disagreement but to most likely inviting you to defend your claims.

That's, to me, unfortunate. What I'm NOT doing, is characterizing YOU. 

And I'm NOT prescribing what I believe you SHOULD do... about anything.

You are who and what you are and what you want to be. 

IF I were to invite you to discuss particular disagreement about it, I would ask you to define the parameters of this phenomenon you claim is FACT.

Is it solely that some entity (could be human intelligence or artificial intelligence) has a source outside of itself to point to as a source? Or is it important for the source to be determined as authoritative?

And now you are babbling.  That is your “projection”.

And deflecting from answering a simple question - “what facts from cult facts do you disagree with or consider exaggerated?”

1 hour ago, Rocky said:

Wow. "Sounds like you have some issues to sort through." How is that NOT a demonstration of projection?

"I’m not arguing with you about your delusions." Oh, really? MY delusions?

 

It is an observation about your approach to the cult facts website where you like to label facts as something to ignore that robots made up.  (paraphrase of you)  since the observation is of your behavior not mine it is illogical to call it projection.

Yes.  Your delusions.  I tend to call facts facts as opposed to something to ignore that robots made up.

15 hours ago, waysider said:

Building on the left was the BRC/ Building on the right was the limb leader's residence.

Yep. This is what remains of that noble effort that consumed the FellowLaborers' lives, 50 years ago.

Sad 

Menial manual labor is the staple of cult control.

String those chairs.  Break those mints in half.  Pick up that trash it’s not a blessing.  Work full time AND pay fully.  Dig that hole and fill it in.  Make sure those grounds are Disney quality so the MOGFODAT doesn’t have a nervous breakdown and start a cursing fit.

I am done lifting a single finger to enable the idiots whose opinion of themselves is a great world religious leader while they lie, whitewash history and abuse others.
 

14 hours ago, Rocky said:

Facts according to whom?

Just because YOU claim something is a fact?

As the saying goes, who died and made you God?

 

I see.  So you can spread an opinion that bolsters TWI and spreads doubt about the facts in a website labeled “cult facts” but anybody questioning your doubt of the facts gets accused of a God complex?

Sounds like you have some issues to sort through.  I’m not arguing with you about your delusions.

Cult facts is a site about cults that contains footnotes, bibliographical info, and links to sources.  

This stands in direct opposition to TWI who obscure and hide facts about their past to include sexual manipulation and finance manipulation lawsuits.

Pick a side or get a sore crotch.

16 hours ago, Rocky said:

I find it interesting you would characterize the AI claim that way. 

It didn't claim "50 of the Way's past leaders coerced people..." that's what not it claimed.

It claimed conspiracy.

Conspiracy is a very specific word, the meaning of which is NOT encompassed by how you apparently paraphrased it.

Therefore, I AM saying, your paraphrase thereof, or characterization is NOT what the AI alleged.

As far as "sex outside of marriage..." consider there are approx 8 BILLION people alive on Earth at this time.

Sex is universal. Pretty much everybody does it.

As to your effort to pigeon-hole me into "debating" or even answering the question the way you phrased it, I am not interested and will not do so.

As to the old Wierwille tactic of answering a question with a question, in this case, I explained to you why I will not "debate" the question as you asked it.

Have a nice day, and a Happy New Year.   

Just trying to confirm the position that you are waffling on.

You stated the cult facts website had exaggerated claims.  I was just asking what exactly you felt they were.

Waffle on.  Happy new year

16 hours ago, Rocky said:

Are you asking me to justify to you how I view that site?

Why would you need me to do that?

Fine, you believe/view it differently than me. I don't see that as a problem to be overcome.

I don't need you to agree with me.  

No I was delving into what you understand about AI since you now have it personified and identified wrongfully as the author of the cult facts website.

As usual you pontificate off the top of your head then refuse to own anything you say.

This is about facts not whether someone agrees with you or not.

Its amazing how even facts get twisted up when people are involved in cults.

Happy New Year spotters!

I am bumping this thread for all those who may still be stuck in TWI nostalgia bias.  Perhaps you like me have seen a recent depiction of the “Jesus Revolution” with all of the social happenings in the 60s and 70s that preceded the Way Ministry and other groups like Calvary Chapel and all of the tales about the groovy Christians of Rye NY or the Life magazine articles or the House of Acts in SF California.

Seeing all of that I was reminded of the motivation I had in my youth to seek out grassroots truth in the form of spiritual wisdom from the Bible and Christian fellowship.

As I pursued that as a primary goal in life, got married, had kids, and worked out how to live as a Christian man father and husband I ran into direct conflict with the cult I was in, The Way International, and what the Bible taught about Christian life, marriage, family, careers, debt, and many other major categories of life where they were stepping beyond scriptural boundaries and into areas of life in the nunya category.  Nunya d@mn bidness.  I also witnessed several leadership couples where the Way broke up their marriage, convinced them they had major spiritual problems and forced them back into their training program again.  And I witnessed the Way performing libelous acts talking about these people to their congregations and acting well beyond any authority reasonable for a church group.  I witnessed any attempt to restore equal balance met by excommunication.  

So the times I could be swayed by nostalgia and the idea of a large church with many friends (they were fake) I recollect the doctrinal and practical manipulation of these people and others who have published their accounts, and I thank God on my knees that I am no longer subservient to little Napoleons and their Machiavellian imaginations and their evil acts against those in their own house.

I thank God for freedom, like the freedom that the concept of the United States of America can bring when people aren’t being political moral midgets, like the freedom that emancipation can bring and has brought to minorities, like the freedom to worship God without any sense of lack of worth that another man or woman tries to introduce.

There is a time for nostalgia.  I can break out an old vinyl album I replaced and go back to my roots, to a simpler time filled with faith without manipulation, to a time of infinite possibility.

But I have zero nostalgia of being under the authority of moral midgets and performing rote roles of service to magnify others and their egos.  I will not sacrifice my future and family’s future to run a church for a group too cheap to build one in my house and try and hype a new lie which is the same old lie.  God did not speak to Victor Paul Wierwille and give him divine instruction for all mankind that he would teach “the Word” like it hasn’t been known since the first century.  That is a lie from a book they no longer claim and a lie that is not in the man’s biography written by his spouse.

Freedom > Nostalgia

https://www.reddit.com/r/exjw/s/pzhpfhyFun
 

Here is a thread that contains accounts of people dying due to the JWs policy of no blood transfusions.  They include many accounts of people lying to the JW elders and taking them anyway.

Cults get into a strange dynamic of making up restrictions and placing them on others to their detriment.  This is putting people in bondage.  It causes poverty, slavery and even death.

More reasons to avoid cults.
 

On 11/18/2023 at 1:40 PM, Rocky said:

Somebody put A LOT of work into this linked website. Overall, the site is not limited in its research/claims/explanations of the cult with which we are most familiar.

However, the eye catching claim at the top of the page for TWI is "Up to fifty high-ranking members conspired to coerce followers into having sex with the leaders"

https://www.cultfacts.com/cults/the-way-international

If you don't want to check it out, that's okay with me too. 

Are you saying you don’t think that 50 of the Ways past leaders coerced people under their authority to have sex outside of marriage?

I would disagree.  I probably could get to close to that account from stories I have heard where they are in a private enough setting where they are authentic.  Not saying I have firsthand knowledge of that many.  But internal rumors heard I would place at above that number.

It was a real problem in TWI history and leadership.  VP and Howard would identify women who experienced sexual assault in their youth and childhood and victimize them and pass them around like a harem.  So did many other high level leaders.

A very clear reference on this site are accounts of the John Schoenheit adultery paper that was a simple word study that caused a firing and excommunication apparently because VP vehemently disagreed with doing a word study on adultery.

I would actually say 50 would be a low number in my estimation.

13 hours ago, Rocky said:

Why would it bother me? 

AI wouldn't be familiar with how wayfers talk.

My favorites? What on Earth are you talking about.

I am convinced the website was built by an AI.

There was far more work that went into the site than any person or small group could have done.

And a large group would not have been able to do it either.

I also have no problem with you viewing the website differently than I do. 

 

I don’t know why it would bother you.  You said the site has “exaggerated claims”.

The site seems to present factual statements backed up by sources.

It seems like the word “exaggerated” means you disagree with some of the sites claims and facts.  I asked for one example.  I get nothing but double talk in response.

Let’s go back to “what do you feel is factually inaccurate about the site or is exaggerated exactly?”

Or is this just a fleeting commentary which was the first thing that popped into your mind and I shouldn’t take your words seriously or literally?

12 hours ago, Rocky said:

Why would it bother me? 

AI wouldn't be familiar with how wayfers talk.

My favorites? What on Earth are you talking about.

I am convinced the website was built by an AI.

There was far more work that went into the site than any person or small group could have done.

And a large group would not have been able to do it either.

I also have no problem with you viewing the website differently than I do. 

 

So your sole reason for believing AI was involved was the amount of work into the website?  

In your mind what does “the website was built by an AI” mean?

Can you walk me thru the steps the human would take to do this?  Or to build the website via AI?

Where would any inaccuracies come in there?

I have modified my view of this that whoever put this stuff up may have used AI or some form of search aid like Bard to collect the source quotes from victims.  That is a simple collation from internet sites.

The cult pages themselves were done by people.  People selected what to put on the title page and how to arrange the quotes and claims using a template.  They did this to expose the facts about cults.  They did a good job and are factual and thorough.

What is your problem with the site exactly?

56 minutes ago, Rocky said:

Yet cultfacts website notably differs from GSC. The cultfacts AI generated website doesn't have ANY first person accounts of the things it claims, does it? 

We tell the truth here? For the most part, hopefully, YES. Most significantly, when a person tells her or his first person account, they aren't slandering twi, per se. They are telling THEIR OWN truth.

This sounds like it needs a Grey Poupon reference.  Does it bother you that the cult facts group was never involved in TWI (they are unfamiliar with innie jargon) and yet have done a better job collating personal accounts than any other site including your favorites?  Does that devalue their work that it is not their personal account?

On 12/30/2023 at 8:24 AM, chockfull said:

Another cult called “The Twelve Tribes”. They run Yellow Deli restaurants.  Here is an expose:

 

I enjoy researching various different cults as opposed to focusing on the personal dirt related to the cult from my story.

I also share my observations surrounding TWI here on this website under a pseudonym as opposed to having a profession as a published author or having my personal identity as always associated with this particular cult.

I started this thread because there was a church doing a study on various cults including TWI which I was in.  I personally participated in that series of study and along the way shared many fruitful points of similarity in how cults function to TWI.

This thread is my personal experience in cult recovery.  As well as a topic for how different cults function similarly.

47 minutes ago, Rocky said:

I see them as exaggeration. Your dichotomy, IMO, doesn't represent the entire universe of possibilities. 

That a "footnoted" source isn't a bona fide truth, in some cases (e.g. making a claim it says is fact, but not necessarily from a credible source. If a footnoted source references an actual legal/judicial ruling, it can reasonably be inferred to be factual) If a claim is just "my AI found it in writing on line somewhere" it's not nearly as credible.
 

That's how I, after mulling it over for a month or so, can reasonably infer some of the claims are exaggerations, some of them more exaggerated than others.

The first claim on the cultfacts site, regarding TWI, is "up to 50 high-ranking members conspired to coerce..."

Cannot be found to be credible on its face. "Up to..." is a rhetorical expression (often used in marketing contexts) reasonably understood to be vague enough to dismiss on its face (prima facie).

50-high ranking members? Legally speaking, there are no where near 50 "members" of TWI. In this context, one might reasonably expect the so-called members are voting members of the legal body known as TWI. Even IF there were 50 "high ranking" members, what's the likelihood of getting those 50 "members" to likemindedly conspire anything?

"A conspiracy, also known as a plot, is a secret plan or agreement between people (called conspirers or conspirators) for an unlawful or harmful purpose, such as murder, treason, or corruption, especially with political motivation,[1] while keeping their agreement secret from the public or from other people affected by it."

IOW, twi will likely bristle a LOT over this, but eventually will get over it without these claims having any legal impact.

You may (reasonably) not be convinced the site was built by an AI, but I am convinced.

Actually, it's not a bad first effort to do so. 

I appreciate your probing reflection on the situation. 

There are no voting members of TWI outside the directors.

The explanation was in terms the general public would understand not an insider.  To me the site looks like it was compiled by people who were not on TWI.

I am actually walking back my initial observation of AI here.  It is definitely a website template that has similar pages per cult.  Beyond that I think people were referencing accounts on the internet that are public domain.

10 hours ago, Ham said:

and at night.. I will still read the Bible.. books on mathematics, and pray for divine wisdom.  For Fellowship with God..

 

What about you.. 

 

 

Yeah I still read the Bible and pray.  I haven’t come across much inspiration in math lately - most of the modern AI is elementary statistical modeling with a huge training set.

Praying kind of is a fellowship with God to me.

Wisdom is a mixed bag.  Most of what I have I gained through pain.  I have had a few you could call “divine intervention wisdom” where certain info got to me to change my action course.  Mostly I feel it is developed through being aware of yourself and your surroundings - the constructs of emotional intelligence are the beginnings of wisdom.

Religious zealots have a remarkable lack of awareness of any self flaws and society so are very low on the wisdom scale of any kind including God rescuing their sorry behinds.

Yeah just navigating my own salvation and growth in Christ and it looks a lot different than the construct under cult authority.

“Up to 50 high ranking members coerced others into sex”. 
 

I mean if TWI is feeling squirrelly there is a statement of fact that if proven wrong could sustain slander charges.  Yet no action at all.  Why?  Because it is true and truth is a defense to slander.
 

This is similar to GSC.  The Way leaders have tried multiple tactics to get this site torn down, kicked off its hosting platform, etc.  However we tell the truth here and you can’t shut down truth.  So they failed every time.  Paw can tell plenty of stories there not sure if they have kept up these attacks recently.

17 hours ago, Rocky said:

Thanks for bumping the thread. I just viewed this YT video from 60 MInutes coverage of AI, several segments, one of which is from 2109.

One of the important points 60 Minutes made, is that AI is NOT always correct. 

When an AI makes mistakes and says things that are NOT true, the industry calls those instances "hallucinations."

IIRC, when I first (or shortly thereafter) saw the cultfacts website entry for TWI, my impression was 1) it was built by AI, and 2) it was not 100 percent correct, even though it had notes/citations for the claims it made.

Now, I am not as concerned about whether TWI will challenge the factual basis or legality of the claims. However, I still wonder how they've responded/reacted to it.

Ok first I am not 100 percent certain AI was involved at all with this site so I don’t know how AI hallucinations might come into play or not.  It may be involved as a tool or not.  Second the fact that generated items may not be true in < 5 percent of cases does not mean “discount the source if AI was involved”.

I’m sure though that TWI leadership finds ANY reason WHATSOEVER to discount external sources.  JWs and Mormons do the same.  First question is “is this an approved source?”  If not they label it an “apostate” source and excommunicate any bringing it up due to superstition.  Usually the response to new technologies are call them devilish and warn people away.

I am sure that “innies” will not like the “feel” of that site as it ties the current leaders to the past culture which they are so desperately trying to distance themselves from while retaining all the power.

This does not discount footnotes, sources, bibliographies as these are proof and factual.

Did you find even one example of a footnoted source that was inaccurate or are you just spreading false rumors?

I’m not bothered by any of this discussion.  This gets down to what people look to for inspiration.

If there is some kind of common code for virtue a society can agree on it helps things flow in a community type of construct.

If there is not then you have megalomaniacs setting themselves up as the sole source for virtue.  And varying degrees of disagreement based upon the success of the narcissistic message.

Bumping this up again.  
 

https://www.cultfacts.com/cults/the-way-international

It is just amazing how with every claim they make of cult behavior they footnote it and cite the source.  Look at all those (source) links.

This is not a manipulation this is real live sources presenting how a cult really functions as opposed to their brain numbing depiction of themselves as Jesus Christs personal representatives of “the truth” as opposed to a false prophets ministry based upon deception and manipulation.   The closer you get to the so-called revelation from God about teaching VP “the Word” like it hasn’t been known since the first century the more you see that nobody in the first century was quite that gullible and would not accept VPs lazy research, lying and stealing, or aggrandized homiletics as anything other than a narcissist with opportunities to amass a fortune through aggrandized fictional tales.  This mimics the way the Mormon cult amasses riches.
 

Another cult called “The Twelve Tribes”. They run Yellow Deli restaurants.  Here is an expose: