I just wanted to take a minute and express the appreciation I feel for this place. Simon and Angharad, thanks to you two for putting up with the crap necessary to keep this place available to disenfranchised outcasts like me. Also, thanks to the Forum Administrators who work to keep the place relatively cordial and welcoming.
But really, this forum would be nothing without the posters. Thank you all. I read a lot more than I post these days, and I enjoy reading the ideas expressed by almost everyone here—even the ideas I disagree with. I have met some really great people here and I expect I will meet many more. Most of these people are not appreciated by their childhood friends, many have been lopped off from their families, some are afraid they will lose their spouse, some have already lost their spouse, some have lost their children, others are afraid they eventually will lose their children, some have never been Jehovah's Witnesses and are struggling to help shake to their senses a JW or two that they care for.
I have learned more from posters on this site than I could have acquired in years of independent study on my own, I have been handed references (both secular and WTS) that would have taken me months to find if I had not had this resource, I have come into contact with many who have great ideas for exposing information to the public about this religion, as well as ideas for Web-based methods of stunting recruitment success. I am confident that it is only a matter of time before we start to become what the WTS fears most: active groups of community educators, resources for JW information, anonymous informants (for those still in) on recent disfellowshippings so we can make sure those who leave are welcomed out of that oppressive environment and into one that tolerates them and appreciates them.
It is only a matter of time before the WTS has to mandate Internet avoidance. This beast is bleeding from many poisoned and barbed daggers already twisting in its bloated body, it will fall.
I just wanted every poster here to know, your presence here is appreciated. Your thoughts are appreciated. Your willingness to share them is appreciated. You are doing a tremendous thing, you are causing people to think, you are helping those who hurt to laugh, you are making people who have little else feel cared for, you are distracting people from the frustrations they experience daily, you are helping people be patient with their family members, you are giving people hope.
Thank you (((all)))