Oslo 07.12.92

WTBTS

25 Columbia Hights, Brooklyn

N.Y. 11201, USA

Att: Dan Sydlik

This letter is to be read at the first full meeting of the Governing Body.

I have just joined a newly formed group of ex-witnesses and therefore i naturally want to keep you totalitarian leaders of the gerontocracy fully informed of the progress we have had in our effort to spread correct information about your organization here in Norway.

The distribution of our well documented information has been richly blessed as we grow in numbers day by day. Daily we talk to people who have had their lives completely ruined by your "loving" organization. We enjoy widespread publicity and respect from the public. We will express our sincere gratitude to you for providing us with so much excellent written material, which is really making it so much more easy to document the facts.

When looking through the literature you have printed up through the years it is really amazing how you have been able to produce so much totally hopeless, inconsistent and contradictory printed matter, but its really wonderful material for us.

In particular we want to thank you for the wonderful publication "Branch Office Procedure" which has brought us great joy and blessings. Your "Pay Attention" publication is also very handy, you know the one that the elders should not show even to their own family. When it comes to documentation we have had immense benefit from The Watchtower magazine. We especially appreciate all the numbers from 1920 to 1925, but mind you, the 60's the 70's and the 80's aren't so bad either, and you are really showing promising signs with the Watchtowers now in the 90's. Your highly detailed manuals for the hospital information service representatives are also much appreciated and are currently making quite a stir in the media, and new "secret" publications keep coming in from our members within the organization. So you can look forward to many exiting moments as these stories unfold before the public.

It is indeed a privilege to inform you that you can expect quite a "stunted" growth in the number of publishers in Norway the coming years. As correct and well documented information about your organization keep coming out, people who are about to join your organization will for the first time be able to make decisions based upon correct information and not the totally false propaganda that you present.

This information work has been existing in a relatively short period. As the output of information still is picking up speed you have probably "ain't seen nothing yet". As mentioned above, the excellent material that keep pouring out of your presses is really making it so much more simple. It is really exiting to read the Watchtower and see how you sometimes manage to express several totally contradicting statements on the same page.

It is also interesting to watch as your growing paranoia and siege mentality unfold in the new editions of the Watchtower. Like the old leaders in Kremlin you seem to have only one answer to all your problems, more - and still more of the same - don't ask questions, just obey, obey and obey, be loyal. Do you think you know more than the organization? To this question we must answer that almost anybody over the age of 4 know more than the organization! In particular do the average 4 year old know more about Jehova's chronology than do anybody in the governing body.

It would not however be right to give the whole credit of the success to the distribution of information. It would be a great injustice to your representatives in 1914 Enebakk not to express our profound gratitude for their cooperation in this matter. Their consistent and predictable way of handling the media, has earned them an incredible reputation in the Norwegian press. One can really wonder how it is possible to antagonize the entire press in a country i such a short time, but Niels Petersen and Thor Samuelsen has had an almost unparalleled success in this. This has naturally contributed to the organizations very limited growth in Norway, and will hopefully lead to a good decrease in the future.

The effort these two has put into this matter has really made a difference. It has really made a lasting impression even on the "loyal" witnesses to see their leaders lying through their teeth on national television and several newspapers. In the best Watchtower tradition they have also been giving contradicting statements to the media, and has on numerous occasions been caught lying to journalists. We are confident that we will continue to benefit from their activities in the future.

All we can say is thank you very much for appointing them and keep up the good work.

If you (God forbid) should decide to replace them, we remain confident that you appoint somebody with the same remarkable talent for public relations as you seem to have unlimited resources of people with this talent in your organization. This fact has become abundantly clear when we notice that your man in Denmark, Jørgen Larsen has shown even more of the same remarkable talent with the media as his colleges i Norway. A fact that no doubt has contributed to the sound decrease in publishers in Denmark the last two years.

Now, what are you going to do with your time bomb the "1914 generation". By now it must begin to be obvious even to your most loyal and faithful followers that this is yet another of your now long and quite impressive list of total failures as "Jehovas prophet". Is the solution to the problem Fred Franz comment that he would wait a "million years"? Or should you dust off the solution worked out by Schroeder, Klein and Suiter by connecting the "generation" to the launching of the Russian satellite Sputnik in 1957? Or are you going to ignore the whole matter? We are undubtedly in for an exiting decade because of your constant overexposure of the year 1914. You have made your whole doctrine dependent of this year. It will be difficult to make the same effective operation as Rutherford did when he turned the year wich ended Russells chronology - 1914, into the beginning year of your present, and no doubt just as hopeless chronology.

We would also like to draw your attention to the question of blood. In this matter you have clearly demonstrated how far you are willing to go in misleading people. It is also a wery sad example of the saying, "Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we set out to deceive." You have chosen to continue to deceive your loyal followers, with disastrous results for many of them. How does it feel when you play god?

We bet that this it is the most exiting letter you have had in years, and that it is bound to liven up your otherwise dull sessions in the gerontocratic body, which for the most part consist of deciding if some petty and ridiculous action of a poor witness is a disfellowshipping matter or not.

We must say that we are impressed with the wisdom of many of your decisions. In particular are we impressed with your ability to deal swiftly with witnesses who have made such grave transgressions against "biblical" principles as participating in sailing regattas and having books that you do not approve of in their homes. These hideous crimes against the Watchtower Society should of course be dealt with according to their seriousness. There is only one verdict fitting and proper for such evildoers - eternal death! It is quite understandable that you are afraid of books and literature. Many of your spiritual brothers has down through history had the same fear and hatred of the information contained within books and has done whatever evil deed necessary to keep that information away from their "loyal" followers. So history repeats itself.

We are also very impressed of your way with words. Take for instance a widely used phrase i the Watchtower, the word "Truth". This word has been misused and abused in your magazines and books to an extent that we did not consider possible. When you are constantly falsifying your organizations history, when you are falsifying and twisting quotes to fit your purpose, you present this before your loyal followers as "truth". In other words, you lie to protect the "truth". One of your faithful and "loyal" witnesses somewhat accidentally summed up the whole matter with the following words: "I firmly believe in the truth whether it is true or not." Your concept and definition of "truth" is therefore quite extraordinary as it includes outright lies.

Well, that's all for now. We do not claim to understand what motivates your behavior.

We will not speculate on what forces that drives you when you seize control of millions of human lives by demanding their blind and unquestioning obedience, by claiming to be appointed by the Almighty God, Jehovah. We do not expect that you will reform or do anything that could remotely resemble the decent thing. We will therefore not try to appeal to your conscience, we will not honor you by even suggest that you posses one. You will undoubtedly continue your steady course down the drain of history where you will join your spiritual brothers on history's enormous scrap heap of cruel totalitarian leaders worthy only of all decent human beings deepest contempt.

P.S. Remember to awake those members of the Governing Body who are sleeping before you read this letter so they can enjoy the full benefit of its contents. This letter may be distributed freely to the whole Betel family.

Regards

Norman Hovland