WT filters and why people don't see what's right in front of them

by Lady Lee 28 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  Lady Lee

  Many of us find it hard to understand why we didn't see/read/understand what was right in front of us all along. We get frustrated with those who are still in who can't see what we have discovered.

  I think I just found a similar reaction.

  I've been playing an on-line game called Luxor. I've been playing this for months now. Today was the first time I realized that whenever I got a score the score would pop up over the game. I was so busy looking for the links to shoot down I never saw the scores popping up.

  This same phenomenon also occurs in people who have been traumatized. They are so intent on focussing on one detail that they miss everything else.

  The WTS teaches JWs to tune out everything that does not support their worldview. In fact they are so good at teaching this skill that JWs not only tune out information from the outside but learn to tune out their own doubts and questions. Catch phrases such as:

  • In God's due time
  • do not be running ahead of the organization
  • that was old light
  • doubting the org is the same as doubting Jehovah
  • independant thinking

  and many others stop a person from thinking about and reflecting on many of the serious flaws in the WTS' beliefs.
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  MadTiger

  Excellent post.

  Reminds me of one of my first cases of independent thinking. I did not agree with the society's view on marriage for resurrected people after Armegeddon. I unfortunately voiced this to a goody-two-shoes MS who "corrected my thinking." Or so he thought. I knew they were bass-ackwards on it. And they thought so too, a few years later.

  I pose the question to the MS, reminding him I had the Society's new view several years ago. He said I was still wrong for running ahead the Slave. Condemnation for logic.

  The beginning of the end for me.
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  carla

  Some cults use chanting to stop 'negative' (independent) thoughts. The jw's have developed their own 'unique' way of stopping independent thinking. How sad to associate using the brain God gave you as something evil.
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  jeeprube

  Terrific post Lady Lee! Sometimes I become so frustrated with family members who refuse to see what is so painfully obvious. It's not really their fault though. Anymore I just feel pity and sadness for them.
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  freedomlover

  excellent thoughts Lee.
  
  I too have been so surprised at times that I even let myself start to think for myself. Growing up a JW and having two parents who basically treated us as a nuisance and worth nothing, I had serious esteem issues. Us kids were never allowed to think differently than my two parents and if we did have an independent thought it was squashed immediately.
  
  I have come leaps and bounds in my esteem issues and so much of it was breaking the toxic relationship with my parents and then the org.
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  inbyathread

  Lady Lee and Carla, thank you. The ideas of WT catch phrases and cult chants is very interesting to me. I've been putting little phrases and such on business care sized notes and putting them in my wallet. When the elders come a calling then I can pull those phrases out. My memory is lousy so I need something written down to help me. Anyway I can use the thoughts of chants being scripturally wrong and 'dangerous' but then bring up these WT phrases that are ALWAYS used. 'Just go back to the meetings' is another chant that we have drilled into us each time a friend(tm) comes up to us.

  I'll need to ask them if saying "Jehovah will take care of it" over and over again will solve the problem. Then sitting in a lotus position and chanting 'OOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMM' will be acceptable as well.
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  garybuss

  Witnesses have a form of amnesia. They don't remember anything from their past that does not conform to their internal model of that which they wish the past really was. If the past agrees with the model of the past then all works today. If all works today, all expectations for the future remain intact. If the future is secure, all is well,
  
  
  
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  Lady Lee

  Carla

  Some cults use chanting to stop 'negative' (independent) thoughts. The jw's have developed their own 'unique' way of stopping independent thinking.

  Yes I think the loaded language has the same effect as the chanting. It stops the thinking process. When I would go though those "how to recognize a cult" lists the chanting never fit. But if the WT phrases are used instead of the chanting (which is simply the repetition of a word or phrase) then it is the same process in the mind.

  inbyathread Great idea

  Gary

  I agree there is a certain amnesia about the past. But I really do think they don't have a choice. The cognitive dissonance would be too great. If they remember what really happened and all the old beliefs it would create so much mental distress. It is just easier to go along with the "new light" whatever that happens to be for the moment. Challenging God isn't a good thing to do according to the WTS. The WTS has it set up so there is too much to lose if they actually started thinking
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  garybuss

  Lee, I think they learn history. It's another doctrine. They're told the past, they remember it. I agree, they choose to remember it as taught just like they choose to suspend their disbelief.
  
  
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  heretic

  -independant thinking, urrggh this is a dangerous one. when i first heard it it hit me, 'thats what ive been doing i should just trust the org'.. now i see its real intent