Armageddon?

Times of TW

Mammon, Jehovah and the Witness of Armageddon

By Kent Barker

I fear I may have been a bit rude.  I mean, once I knew who they were I virtually slammed the door in their face.  It’s true I was in a bit of a hurry.  But what I wish I had found time to say was this: “Look how would you feel if I turned up at your house on a Saturday morning and tried to persuade you that your beliefs were wrong and there was no God, or supreme being, or single deity, and no Jesus Christ and no heaven or hell?  In fact, in short, you ought to convert to Humanism or Atheism pronto.”

A friend pointed out, they’d probably actually engage in the debate and keep me arguing for ages.  But my general point holds good.  Surely it’s a tad arrogant for them to think that their ‘beliefs’ are better than mine and that they have a duty to persuade me to adopt their view? It’s the proselytising nature of so many religions that causes half the problems and has led to religious wars down the ages.  Arguably it’s what’s behind the current rise of militant Islam.  (Though before we rush to condemn, perhaps we should remove the mote from our own eye and remember the nine Crusades Christians launched on Islam between 1095 and 1272).

Of course the strife is not only between different religions, but often between branches of the same religion.  Catholics and Protestants down the ages and still evident in Northern Ireland.  And what about the poor Cathars?  A couple of weeks in the Languedoc and you realise just how brutal the Roman Catholic armies of the early 13^th century could be.  Not content with subjugating Muslims in the ‘Holy’ land they rampaged round southern France maiming and slaughtering families and entire villages for no other reason that they followed different branch of Christianity.

Anyway I didn’t have that conversation with the Jehovah’s Witnesses at my door and, instead, rushed off to Hastings with my anti-TTIP petition and posters and leaflets to try to persuade the good citizens that they were in error if they believed that the proposed transatlantic trade agreement was a good thing.

What depressed, if not entirely surprised, me was that so few people had even heard of TTIP.  Come on, put up your own hand up if you know that it stands for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.  Mind you if you didn’t know about it, it’s not unduly surprising– that’s the way they want it.  TTIP is a series of trade negotiations being carried out, mostly in secret, between the EU and US designed to hugely reduce regulatory barriers to trade for big business. Things like food safety law, environmental legislation, banking regulations health provision and the sovereign powers of individual nations.

 So I harangued Saturday morning shoppers about the dangers of deregulation that TTIP would bring in.  I told them how I was convinced it could end effective food labeling, and allow the use of Neonicotinoids which would kill the bees and that the government wouldn’t be able to do anything about it because the pharmaceutical corporations would be able to sue them if they stood in the way of their profits.

But as I handed leaflets to people quietly lunching al fresco in George Street I did see some parallels with that couple who’d knocked at my door earlier in the day.  Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that destruction at Armageddon is imminent, and that the establishment of God's kingdom over the earth is the only solution for problems faced by humanity.

TTIP opponents believe that it could effectively lead to the destruction of democracy by the multi-nationals. As Lee Willams pointed out in the Independent recently: “One of the main aims of TTIP is the introduction of Investor-State Dispute Settlements (ISDS), which allow companies to sue governments if those governments’ policies cause a loss of profits. In effect it means unelected transnational corporations can dictate the policies of democratically elected governments.”

One of the results of TTIP would be to open up public health, education and water services to free competition.  But that would mean that US companies could effectively take over – and privatise – cherished European institutions like the NHS. And there would be nothing the Government could do about it without the risk of being sued.

After witnessing the recent rapaciousness of the Banking sector, is it entirely fanciful to argue that TTIP, the multi-national corporations and and the forces of capitalism are the very things that are leading us to destruction?  Perhaps we could do with something like an Armageddon to beat them back and establish a new world order based on people rather than profit.  But I am not sure I’m prepared to give up my Saturday mornings to knock on doors to proselytise these beliefs.