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DocHoliday

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  1. This is a very interesting thread. I was thinking about this same topic recently. Years ago when I was in TWI, a woman I cared very deeply for (and who introduced me to TWI) was in my Household. She toed the line fanatically, but I knew she had reservations about TWI. Before she broke off contact with me she told me she had argued with her family. To make a long story short, I left TWI. She remained. I understood that her family and her whole life was wrapped up in TWI, so that when a conflict emerged, it was far easier to ditch me than oppose her family, friends, and TWI. About a year later, I heard that she had abruptly left the state. One of her TWI friends approached me (no kidding!) asking if I had spoken with her, which I certainly had not. This told me that she had some sort of issues with TWI, if they suspected that she had contacted me, a total unrepentant apostate. Anyway, despite the hurt that I still felt after the whole episode, I was proud of her for having the courage to leave. Over the years, just randomly looking at social media, I found out she had moved to another part of the country. A few years later I was looking up stuff on TWI, and saw a Corporate listing for TWI in her town. An alarm bell went off in my head. No, it can't be, I thought. But sure enough, the Corporate address for TWI, and her address were the same! Oh, well. Go figure. As the Irish say, agus fagaimid suid mar ata se.....
  2. Exactly right! One of the first terms I ever used for TWI was "A Pyramid Scheme for Jesus". At my first Fellowships, everyone stood up like an AA meeting and recounted fervent story after story about how things were going badly for them until they "gave" to TWI and then their problems were miraculously solved. Usually this revolved around money. I remember one guy declaring that once upon a time he had a choice of either paying the mortgage or Tithing to TWI, and he gave his last dollar to TWI. A few weeks later a check came in the mail which allowed him to pay off his home. I kid you not! Everything was all about how God would reward you if you dedicated your life (and money) to TWI. Not about helping others. Not about giving to others (TWI excepted). Certainly not doing what Jesus and the disciples actually did. This was one of the first fallacies I saw.
  3. Just a random observation: from what I saw, trusting TWI to mediate fairly was like the proverbial fox in the henhouse! The only time I ever saw them try to resolve an issue was when they had stacked the deck in favor of the majority decision. If they couldn't, they just ignored the issue entirely. What was the part about Matthew 18:17 and TWI? I remember my fellowship coordinator explaining it as being that if you pursued an issue with another believer all the way to the top and it was still not resolved, or if they refused to recognize the decision, you could disassociate from the other party as they had shown themselves to act like "a heathen and a publican".
  4. I always thought it was funny how my TWI leaders were so gung ho about my taking the Foundational Class, yet didn't seem to give a whit one way or the other if I left or not afterwards. I thought that Class stats must have been very important to them. And I wonder how long I was still on the rolls after I bailed. Explains a lot!
  5. Yes! I think you are right on the money. First, you are absolutely correct that with TWI or anyone else, you will never get recompense. Trying to get it is a waste of time for the reasons you have stated. That was why I never attempted to contact anyone in TWI again after I bailed, and on the two occasions I came in contact with TWI'ers I walked the other way. If they wanted to contact me, well, that would been their prerogative. But I was just as happy that they did not. I would not have expected any more honesty after the fact than before it. Simply holding people accountable for their actions doesn't mean you haven't "moved on". (I once had a female friend who hired a detective to track down a boyfriend who ditched her because she wanted to "hear it from him" and get "closure". Now that's obsession!) I always have a tendency to dissect things, not out of some kind of obsession, but just as an exercise to learn whatever I can from it. I'm just as likely to have a discussion about Watergate or Gettysburg as something I personally experienced like TWI. Hopefully, discussions can help others avoid the same experiences.
  6. You're quite right. For me The Girl was part of a larger package. For me, she had nothing to do with any societal issues: I simply liked her. For the first two months I knew her she never even mentioned TWI. When she did, I assumed that if she were part of this group, they had to be good people. (My error.) I had hoped the "package" was simply decent people who treated you right, with the honest and genuine spirituality that they claimed. Now, when The Girl wilted under pressure from her parents and TWI leaders, who then blatantly changed history, it was still not fore-ordained that I was leaving. If everything else had been upright and on the level, and I got something out of it, it may have been different. But the whole "package" turned out to the rotten to the core: The Girl, who may or may not have intentionally been "bait"; her hypocritical and domineering parents; the leadership from the FC to the Branch C, who were openly manipulators; to the rest of the members, who goose-stepped along with the band. On top of that, we had the whole wacky system of TWI itself, from the spiritual Pyramid-Scheme-for-Jesus to the "two-by-two" nonsense. The whole situation with The Girl was only the initial symptom of a much larger and more virulent sickness.
  7. "If California falls into the ocean like the mystics and statistics say it will I believe this hotel will be standing until I pay my bill..." - Warren Zevon
  8. You're quite right. That's exactly why I bailed without further ado as soon as I saw the lay of the land. It was very clear that The Girl was firmly in the grip of TWI and TWI leaders were willing to step on anyone to get their way. Staying around would have accomplished nothing but making myself a target for more abuse. After I walked away I never spoke to any of them again. I went on the principle that if something feels wrong, it usually is. As the song says, you have to know when to hold 'em, and know when to fold 'em. Funny thing was, about two years later, her best friend showed up at a community event where they knew I worked every year. She came up to my booth, and without preamble, asked me if I had spoken with The Girl. My reply was rather, ah, curt. My guess was that The Girl had bailed. I hold no grudges and I hope that she did actually get out of their clutches.
  9. This is truly masterful! As a history buff I have done personal research projects myself, so I know the effort that must have been involved here. Fantastic! Just fantastic! I agree with your conclusion. I remember when I took the Foundational Class in TWI. The pseudoscience and so-called Biblical analysis bored me to tears. The whole premise was that they had to prove that each and every word of the Bible is absolute truth, because "if one word is wrong, you can't believe anything". I disagree with them. Personally, I don't care if there was "another Earth created between the first and second verses" of Genesis. I don't care how many thieves hung beside Jesus. For me, this has little to do with the message.
  10. I think my group could have used a little of something. I encountered the peculiar attitude in TWI that no matter how badly you were treated, it was still a privilege to be allowed to associate with them. Sometimes they would do things that even they seemed to have trouble stomaching and they would reassure each other with phrases like "The Word isn't always nice." and "No one said the Truth is easy". I remember when the Martindale scandal broke, we had an "emergency" meeting. The Fellowship was asked to vote on whether or not we would continue in TWI. But it was sort of like a Communist election: the result was never in doubt and no dissent was encouraged. One of the Big Fish in the small pond looked at everyone challengingly and declared "Well, I'm sticking. Everyone makes mistakes, and you can't judge someone by a mistake." Hmmmm, I thought. You guys sure do apply that principle selectively, don't you? Just before I bailed, I overheard the Fellowship Coordinator wringing his hands and exclaiming "I just don't understand why we can't attract people. What are we doing wrong?" Man, oh, man....
  11. I agree. Some time ago I was on an internet group supposedly friendly to ex-TWI'ers. When I asked a doctrinal question trying to understand something which had occurred to be during my stint in TWI, one of the members (apparently still active in TWI) blasted me for not "moving on" and then asserted he was "tired" of hearing all the "whining" about TWI and people claiming to be "a victim of everything". My own feeling was that if someone is not interested in a topic, they should simply ignore the thread. Putting people down and trying to dictate what others should talk about smacked too much of TWI for me, so I did exactly what I did with TWI and left. To me, discussing things which occurred, trying to understand them, and talking about your own experiences to show others that they were not along in their experiences is not "whining". There is indeed such a thing as a victim mentality, but simply relating what actually happened or trying to gain insight into what happened is not it. This is not merely useful for gaining insight into TWI. There are many organizations and people who employ the same sort of psychological tactics to get what they want. And just because someone is interested in discussing something doesn't mean they haven't "moved on". If you can identify the tactics in one case, you can be aware of them in all. That's the value of open discussion.
  12. I'm not a "hardcore" vegetarian in that if I should happen to eat something with a mean by-product in it and find out later, I just avoid it in the future. If there is literally nothing else to eat, or if I make a mistake, no big deal. I was at a cookout once where I had brought Boca burgers, but the host got it mixed up and served me a hamburger by mistake. They looked about the same off the grill with everything on them. She was horrified. It was sort of funny because she looked like she expected me to turn into the Hulk for something. But I just laughed and told her not to sweat it. Then I asked the person who got the veggie burger how it tasted: I used it as an promotional tool, so to speak. But I know some people who would literally die rather than eat meat.
  13. I can sympathize! I have been everything from Episcopalian to Mormon and found much the same. Back in the late '80s, I even ran into some group that was much like TWI in some respects. Going door to door, they claimed to be a "Bible Study" group, and a bunch of cute college girls were bopping around with them. At the first meeting, it was a friendly little event where we just read and discussed the designated chapter. One of the girls was sort of flirty and shared her Bible with me. By the third meeting, all the girls had vanished. There were only three guys who sat down with some kind of guidebook and told me firmly what the "correct" interpretation of the Bible verses was. When I mentioned some book I was reading on Biblical scholarship, they snapped "This (the New Testament) is all you need. God doesn't want you to read anything else. Everything you need is. Right. Here." Needless to say, that was my last meeting. Come to think of it, I had a similar experience in TWI. At one of my first fellowships, the "lesson" was something to do with Jerusalem. Afterwards, while everyone was socializing I mentioned something I had read about Biblical archaeology and Jerusalem. The Fellowship looked at me like I was speaking Swahili. Later, the Fellowship Coordinator ranted that I "wasted everyone's time" and "no one understands anything you say". With 'friends' like these, who needed enemies? At the Foundational class, I bought a couple of VPW's books and the Branch Coordinator and his wife seemed shocked. I think this was one of the things that convinced them that I was "hooked". But I'm a bibliophile and I have quite a few books just for their weirdness factor. And there was plenty of weirdness to go around there!
  14. I'm a history buff and an historical reenactor. When I joined, I had just finished several books about the Earps, and I love Val Kilmer's portrayal of Holliday in Tombstone. I spelled mine with one "L" just to be different.
  15. I have a cousin who mixes black-eyed peas and mayonaise. Supposedly it's some sort of Southern thing, but I've been down here all my life and it's the only time I've seen it! As a Vegetarian sometimes I find my otpions are limited, as I'm not much of a chef. It's also trying sometimes because I was always a big BBQ fan back when I ate meat. I found some imitation BBQ at Whole Foods that was the most horrible stuff I've ever eaten. I vowed to just go and eat a real BBQ sandwich before ever eating that faux-BBQ goulash tasting stuff! The first time I did the Mac and Cheese recipe, I used Boca crumbles with straight BBQ sauce. That was much too strong, so now I just add a bit of BBQ sauce to the Manwich and it works better. I have also found that it is better on stuff like Arnold's bread or a coarser type bread than regular sandwich bread.
  16. Hiway, I think you are absolutely right: when you get to a certain point, nothing you do matters. It's more about their agenda than you. It was pretty hard just walking away, but in the end was the best thing. It was fairly clear cut by the time I decided to bail. I imagine what it would have been like if I had managed to have a relationship that was 'sorta' working. As time went on it would have been harder to leave like in some of the other situations I've read about. In retrospect I guess I was lucky that those people were so transparent and not actually clever!
  17. On a recent TV show I saw a spot about a popular snack wagon called the Grilled Cheese Truck that travels around LA serving a sandwich made of Macaroni and Cheese topped with Barbecue and carmelized onions. called the Cheesy Mac and Rib, this is wildly popular. As a vegetarian, I am not down for the BBQ. But I decided to try to make a substitute Cheesy Mac and Rib sandwich. The first time I used only Mac and Cheese. This was a bit too bland. For the next try, I used Mac and Cheese with a bit of dry stuffing to make it firmer. Instead of BBQ I used Boca crumbles and Manwich sauce. Finally I put a slice of cheddar cheese on top and baked it for a few minutes. I did not substitute the onions. It is not bad at all. The Vegetarian manwich offsets the Macaroni and Cheese nicely. There is still room for improvement, and I am trying different ingredients and breads.
  18. DocHoliday

    bin Laden is Dead

    I have been taken aback by the many people I have seen on various forums who criticize the killing of Bin Laden because they say we have done nothing but "provoke" Al Qaida into killing more people. But they have been killing people steadily anyway. For example, over 50 people killed in two attacks in Pakistan alone the month before his death. They are terrorists and that is what they do. I don't think this is a logical reason to decry Bin Laden's death.
  19. QTBA, many people have posted some great replies here which contain many excellent observations. I'd just like to add that I was the exact situation as you when I joined TWI. I emailed and talked on the phone with The Girl for several months before our first date, and she never mentioned TWI. Our first date was simply fabulous. (For the first time, I understood why the Troubadors of old could write poems about a single kiss for the rest of their lives.) She casually mentioned the "fellowship", and said that I was welcome to attend, but it didn't matter to her whether I did nor not. Later, I often wondered if this was a subtle warning to stay away. She also remarked that I was the first guy she had ever dated without her parents meeting him first. I really liked this girl a lot, and felt that we had a real connection. Everything was fine until she introduced me to her parents. It was immediately clear that they did not approve. As her family and I went on an evening walk, we lagged behind and I asked her if her parents had some sort of problem with us going out. "Yes", she said. "But they will just have to get over it." To make a very long story a wee bit shorter (but not by much, heh) they didn't get over it. She gave me very ambiguous signals for a few months. I know that she had some heated arguments with her parents, and for awhile I hoped that if it came down to a choice between TWI or me, she would choose me. But this was not to be. After I took the Foundational Class, she broke off all contact and showed up at Fellowship with someone else. Her Mom looked at me smugly beyond belief, but her Dad couldn't look me in the eye. I saw that to stay around would just be keeping myself in a bad situation, and I left not long afterward. I do not know if she intentionally tried to "lure" me into TWI. Or if she simply succumbed to massive pressure from her domineering mother and TWI leaders. I really want to believe that she was sincere when we dated, but I will probably never know. I saw her a number of months after I bailed from TWI at a local club, and she walked by without a word. Hopefully others here wiser than I can provide some helpful insight. I wish you the very, very best of luck in your situation.
  20. Thanks, Waysider. Truth is truly stranger than fiction! Oh, that's right : she told me that the Adversary would try to prevent me from completing the class, and that she would be there to "help" me when the Adversary threw "stumbling blocks" in my path. They were correct that I would complete the class with her accompanying me. But on the other hand, it was a big contradiction for her to "help" for the Class, then tell me to take a long walk on a short pier when it was over! After the class I received a nasty email from her mother, telling me that I would never speak to her daughter again. She said point-blank that the only reason her daughter had spoken to me in the first place was to "lead me to Christ like the Apostles." I subsequently called the Branch Coordinator out on this. I told him that apparently the only reason she had dated me was to lure me into TWI. Two interesting things happened. First, TWI's "official position" was that we had never "dated", but he did not dispute this or even mention it at all. (I guess it all depended on the definition of the word 'is', oh, sorry, wrong date!) Second, he suddenly became a wimp. It was apparently one thing to be big and strong when you were standing with five other men in front of a crowd, but another thing to talk to someone one-on-one. He hemmed and hawed a bit, then very weakly said that he had known her for years and he "[didn't] think she would do that sort of thing". This was fascinating because what she did was obviously with the approval (and perhaps direction) of her parents and TWI, as they had all pretty much told me. But now, he was basically putting it in her lap. There was no talk of meeting with all parties and resolving the issue like I had been told was the case when "problems" arose. I told the BC that if the Apostles had brought people to Christ by dancing, dining, going to concerts, etc. then Jerusalem must have been a totally rockin' place. Party on, Dudes!
  21. For me, the short answer is "date and switch". But it's really a but more complicated. By the time I took the Foundational class, I was beginning to see warning signs. Her parents clearly did not approve of their daughter and I dating, nor did TWI. She gave me ambiguous signals A) I like you but B) I want to obey my all-knowing leaders. I do not know if this was a genuine quandary or just part of a Con. Her parents were the Big Wheels in the Fellowship, and her mother had actually asked the FC to move me to another Fellowship. He approached me, but when I questioned why he backed off, unwilling to order me to leave. Then it got interesting. When I agreed to take the Class, all talk of my departure was put on hold. And even better, it was agreed that the Girl was to be my study buddy or Class guide or whatever TWI calls it! She took the class with me. She called me multiple times a day to chat and see "how I was". We sat together at class, went out to dinner afterwards, sometimes even dancing! (This is too strange to make up!) But I had a strnge feeling that at soon as the class was over, she was going to ditch me, and one of the main reasons I stayed through the class was to see if my instincts were correct. The class itself was disappointing. I had hoped to see how one was supposed to apply the principles of TWI to your everyday life. What I got was a hodge-podge of pseudo-science and weird biblical "interpretations". It was great entertainment for a mere $100. A few times I had to bite my fist, am I the only one questioning this bunk???? There was some great material for Saturday Night Live skits! In the end, my suspicions proved absolutely correct. As soon as the class ended, the Girl broke off all contact with me. A few weeks later. I was "confronted" in front of the Branch and ordered to toe the line or leave. I stayed around a few more months, for grins and giggles, but I finally bailed. The Class seemed to be very important to them. Amazingly, They didn't want me to hang around Her, but were willing to lay this completely aside to see me finish this Class! Then they had no problem with seeing me leave. Looks like the Numbers game gone mad. A) They must have really been hard up for stats. B) Stats must have been really important, and C) stats mean more than actually keeping people. Fascinating stuff!
  22. "date and switch", that's great! Ha! I'm amazed that they actually expect people to be cool with this and stay around!
  23. Absolutely right. When I first became involved in TWI it was like a page right out of Ca ult training manual. First I was "love bombed". I was the greatest thing in the world, and everyone was "so glad" that I was there. Then when I took the Foundational class, and they thought I was "hooked", the whip came down. Suddenly I was given "confronted" about all of my deficiencies n front of the entire branch and given an ultimatum: toe the line or get out. They suddenly had no concern for my feelings or at all. They had used the fact that I cared deeply about one of the members of the Fellowship to get me to that stage, and then when it appeared as though I had invested totally TWI, her parents and the Leadership declared that I would have no more contact with her. The next week she showed up with another Prospect in tow. The Fellowship and Branch leaders seemed to be confident that I would still toe the line. I bailed. And never regretted it. The entire time I was in TWI, I thought, "Man, I need to keep a journal: this is textbook case of indoctrination techniques!" Yet they were incapable of figuring out what to do when someone went off-script. As Mr. Spock would say, "Fascinating"!
  24. I just found this thread, but, eh, better late than never. I had been wondering about this for awhile, so I am happy to see this info. Looks like Sofla really took a hit. 48 was way down from what it was in 2000 when I jumped ship. I am not surprised at all, though. Even in my last days I could hear vague rumblings deep in the ship that sounded like the bulkheads cracking!
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