Posted by Friend [Friend] on April 02, 1999 at 13:23:08 {ppHCdFLRUMBao8LWLRQ.OgnjR4Br/g}:
In Reply to: **Known to be Untrue, Part 2 posted by COMF on April 02, 1999 at 11:53:08:
COMF
As I said earlier, there are no absolute numbers of how many JWs were imprisoned during W.W.II by Nazi Germany.How do you know this, Friend? They never said it. If the figures were guesses, then they should have said their numbers were guesses.
How do I know? First of all, just look at those nice round numbers, they�re all to the nearest hundred or thousand. Only idiot would think those numbers are exact counts. Secondly, the Society was admittedly using someone else�s estimations, your first article demonstrates that.
Let me ask you a question. If you knew for a fact that your neighbor was raping and killing...I think was is the operative word here. These reports were all published after the war was over.
Come on, COMF. Get real. Even if you found the evidence after the fact you know good and well you�d do just as I described, we all would. As
for those reports being published after the fact, so what? Name me one person who held or holds exact counts of how many JWs were murdered by Nazi Germany. You�ll not find even one. As I�ve already expressed, even those numbers in the
1974 Yearbook are estimations, albeit more objective ones. As of that date the Society was no longer leaning First of all, Friend, let's acknowledge that telling the truth one time does not make you a truthful person. Present-day honesty does not undo past dishonesty. Now, about being careful to point out
where other estimations come from... since the 1989 Watchtower was published after the 1974 yearbook, and since in it they quoted an outside source, in harmony with your statement they will have noted the sources of his estimation and
explained that it varies greatly from their own. Did they do so? True, telling the truth one time does not make you a truthful person. However, on the issue before us you have yet to demonstrate deceitfulness. All we�ve
seen is the Society�s use of various outside estimates of particular statistic. Let�s not loose site of this fact: never did the Society emphasize any of those number statistics prior to 1974 as exact counts. After W.W. II everyone was
quite aware that atrocious and horrendous acts of inhumanity had in fact been committed by Nazi Germany and were likewise aware that in most cases those acts were so massive or secretively committed that statistics were only
estimations and even then hard to come by. Do you know just exactly how many Jews died at the hands of Nazi Germany, does anybody? To this day do you really think there is some archived record of exactly how many of Jehovah�s
witnesses were killed by Nazi Germany? If you think so you are living in dreamland, such absolute records do not exist. To this day we only have estimations, though more objective ones. Anyone who thinks that numbers presented in
the1974 Yearbook are absolute is completely off their rocker. No historian worth their salt would conclude anything but that those numbers are estimates. As for the Watchtower of January 1st, 1989, the very paragraph you
quoted has a footnote sending readers to the 1974 Yearbook. Otherwise, that same Watchtower made it clear that the figure used was from the book Mothers in the Fatherland. Keep in mind that, regardless of whose
numbers were used they were all estimations. Do you know for a fact just whose numbers are correct? You see the problem? That a great atrocity was committed is clear to all, it is a fact. On the other hand, just how extensive in terms of
how many were killed by Nazi Germany remains an estimate, even for the Society. Of course that is what you would see, since that is what you look for. To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. They started out at 1000, doubled it to 2000, then doubled that to 4000, never once saying,
"The reader should note that these are our guesses, not the result of any actual investigation." Then in 1974 we get a realistic figure: 635. I am not a man with a hammer looking for a nail. The WTS has made some serious
mistakes, of which I have pretty aggressively pointed out, even on this forum. I am not even of the mind that anyone must associate with the WTS. As is, your analogy is nothing but a red herring. Why should the Society had
pointed out what was painfully obvious? Remember those nice round numbers? One other thing, you use the term �realistic figure� relative to the count of 635. Tell us, just how do you know which figure is realistic and which one is
not? Again, do you have some unbeknownst information? If so, there are several historians that would like to examine it. As is, the information we use today to somehow quantify the atrocities that Nazi Germany committed against
Jehovah�s witnesses is at best an estimate. Information has migrated via different historians or researchers so that today we can collectively examine details and be more objective in our statistical attempt to quantify
something that really is beyond quantification. Obviously, the same can be said of other groups that suffered under Nazi Germany, I cannot write posts like this and forget any of them, regardless of their disposition. At this point,
COMF, I contend that you have ignored good sense in your denial of what I have presented. You are the proverbial man with a hammer, seeing nails. FriendSince the WTS more objectively researched the issue
resulting in its own published statistics (1974 Yearbook, which is still an estimation), the WTS has been careful to point out just where other estimations come from and usually they refer readers back to there own estimations for sake of
accuracy. To me, that is honest.
I see no hint of dishonesty in what you�ve presented but rather a normal and legitimate migration of information and sorting out of details as
time went along.