The stress in the day to day scenario for a Jehovah Witnesses trying to live their life through the WTBTS is the same that cause them to work harder until they either work even harder, fade away, or suffer a mental breakdown. Fear of reproof or divine punishment from Jehovah, not love for Jesus, grips their day to day activities as they feel they must fulfill their duties of preaching and attending meeting. Many who came into the organization in the 90’s; came in due to the friendliness of the people and not the reality of the cult. Many in my Kingdom Hall are on anti-depressants, live on section 8, have had a mental breakdown or two or three, etc. On top of this the WT society still has the audacity to come up with yet more “loaded language” to cover themselves, often referring to these sad people as “Spiritually Weak” and in need of more meetings or “shepherding by the loving elders.” What they may need to do is to express their discomfort by leaving.
Notice what happens when a new recruit or “spiritually weak” person gives a talk. The elders and everyone else give out their canned, superficial “Fine Job!” in loads. But you see this superficial “Atta Boy!” is not just the carrot on the stick theory. No. This is necessary to keep those slowly becoming unsure, or “spiritually weak”, around for some more laps because they get a temporary surge of praise.
One Thursday night when a bother sensed everybody was uninterested in the audience he completely changed the subject of his talk abruptly and said “All you serving Jehovah in here in know more than all the scientist at universities or people of the world … because you know the purpose Jehovah has for us and this system of things.” Well it woke the dazed crowd up for a few minutes and from then on changed the tone of the talk to yet another we-are-better-than-world-so-feel-good-slopfest. (You only notice these things after you start looking for them!)
Overtime, though it does nothing to solve the real issues in your life, the gaining of pleasure from praise or flattery from a talk sinks in deep and makes you feel all good inside … especially when you aren’t getting true happiness in any other part of your ministry or service to the JW’s and every one in while remind that you still might not be saved and therefore must do more, and more.
The WTBS and GB manipulation machine works one step ahead of its members as usual by building personal mental barriers that turn into real ones. They “train a boy from youth up” in the JW mindset so that even if the youngster later in life wants to leave … it will be very hard. Even if somehow they overcome all their mental block of spiritual nonsense, the “JW version of a nice guy” way they have been trained to act fails them in “the world” and by proxy forces them to return right back to the KH. You see the JW kids I know are trained to be “approval seekers by doing good” with a guilt trip thrown in and also be emotionally affected if someone says they aren’t doing a good job in what they are doing i.e I placed ten tracks, I helped start a bible study, I went to all the meeting this week and looked up every scripture, I (you get the picture). What happens then?
Suddenly, what you do to help the KH, GB, or WBTS and how you act around each other in some way from the elders, their parents, or Jehovah is what really matters to your entire life to keep your “spiritual fire” going – and it gets annoying. Everyone in the hall knows that we start to get on each others nerves with our very predictable behaviors.
Now they have got you trapped … Why you say?
When that same Jehovah’s Witness who was raised like this, after having been in for their entire life from youth up, wishes to leave and tries to get “worldly” friends (or worse yet a “worldly” relationship) by being a combination of “overly nice, taking all sorts of long-suffering crap from others, and being constantly approval seeking.” It comes across as a sort of “red alert manipulation” behavior to those of “the world” even though it is 100% unintentional and he/she gets “the rude response a.k.a. the shut down” in a conversation even before the conversation has barely begun. Or the alternative is that they just simply can’t handle life on the outside.
So what happens in the mind of the manipulated JW?
Do they make the effort to change? Well chances are they would if they could know where they even went wrong! But the WTBTS has warped their brain into being somewhat spirtually arrogant, over critical of others and into thinking that this is clearly all the big bad world of Satan mistreating you because “Satan takes care of his own” and since you aren’t apart of that, because you weren’t raised with the skills, so you’re not getting along well out here in the big bad Satan Land … well now you really need to come back to the safety of the WTBS.
- In my Kingdom Hall I notice a Clear Difference between Jehovah’s Witnesses who “came in out of the world” and those who were trained in this organization from youth up. Those from the world seem to be … still “like the world” ... meaning NOT gullible, rude at times, self-confident instead of self-conscious, able to carry on a conversation without reminding yourself that you must be “clothed with lowliness of mind”, working at good jobs, etc … their only change is that they now believe ALL the slop from the KH/WTBS and occasionally say “Jehovah blessed me today.” But in every other way they are just like “the world” … there is just something twinkling in their eyes that tells me.
Whereas those “raised in the truth” from youth up in the KH’s often face
. Low Self-Esteem or Self Worth
. Not able to stand out with any individualism
. Rejection (from the many JW Cliques)
. Manipulation (from those that know we were not raised with a worldly shrewdness/attitude)
. Getting Used (i.e. ride people all around and give, give, give … when nobody else is doing a thing)
. Confusion (they were raised not to think critically, only follow, because that might be a danger to the organization later on … well now as adults when they see wrong things like flip flops and double standards going on … well they don’t know how to deal with it properly which often leads to a mental breakdown)
This OFTEN happens because:
Jehovah’s Witnesses who come in “out of the world” into the organization know that there is a good chance that you are not street smart - and they are often right - you are not street smart due to the years of mind numbing “always be good and long suffering” JW programming hammered to them in the formidable youth years. So they simply cut them out of any after-meeting parties or trips because they don’t want to be around you because you can’t “keep up” with them. (“worldly attitude” anyone?) So those raised in it simply have meetings, field service, crap job, no real friends, no true JW friends, in a daze waiting for some end from Jehovah, and are in the mean time left to wonder … Why?.
Now I just to give you a little snippet of all the stuff that has gone down at MY Kingdom Hall. I’m sure that worse has probably gone down at your hall so if you want to skip this be my guest J
A) There are several elders at my hall and one of the elders teenage daughters commited fornication and got pregnant by a “young worldly man.” The judicial response? No disfellowshipping, no three-elders-in-the-back-room-judicial-meeting, NOT even a public reprove of any sort even though EVERYBODY in the hall knows about it – all the elders agreed to just bury it. A week later when a sister brought it up at the end of our book study the elder in charge (you know those extra zealous/pious kind) simply said “that is not relevant to what we are doing now and you would do well to make sure nothing happens to your daughters … we wouldn’t want to have them reproved” (I wanted to physically beat the s**t out of him on the spot)
B) A Ministerial Servant named ---- is just one of many guys (5 to be exact) in my KH who is a 45+ Year Old Virgin. That’s ok. What’s wrong is that he has no DRIVE to do anything with his life and stays at home with his mother all day unless its time for the meeting or field service. At first I though it was his own lazy self that didn’t want to accomplish anything but the KH’s agenda. Until I found out that it was the JW’s that ruined his drive. Growing up he was a ambitious student and got a scholarship to some university around 1980 – and he wanted to go – but through “sound spiritually counseling” he was soundly defeated by BOTH his mother and grandfather. F.Y.I. his grandfather is none other than BROTHER MITCHELL (FITPATRICK) – Yes the 100+ old man in service to Jehovah that, like many others, got put on the Watchtower to share his “happy story” in the late 90’s. It is so obvious now that his own grandson Dave is a textbook case of a repressed male in all ways. All the sisters make ruthless fun of him whenever they have a get-together but then ironically, faithfully show up to hear talks on “No Gossiping” or all the other “be good” talks – all the while using their perfected Stepford Smile.
C) In our hall just this past year a recently young baptized brother has completely mentally cracked from his bi-polar and schizoid tendency, left home in a daze with dirty clothes on, and is somewhere homeless in the streets. I feel his schizophrenic mental disorder was caused by the JW’s and his own father who everybody knew was a zealot for the JW/GB/WTBTS. Tony is about the same age as me but I knew that he was headed for trouble 5 years ago when we were having hospitality for the CO and at the gathering while we were all watching basketball on TV he suddenly got up and said “oh I cant play right now because I have to finish my watchtower and do the bible reading for the month.” I was completely stunned. Only fifteen at the time but knew that time boy was headed for mental trouble and that it would ultimately be this borg that pushes him over the edge. The father said that he had no time and STILL HAS NO TIME TO GO LOOKING FOR HIS OWN SON because he “left the organization” – this is small mindedness at its worst. The poor boy Tony B cracked to pieces because the boy got no help from his father, the elders, or the JW organization who were all far too busy following the line “there is much to do in the work of the lord.”
The ultimate insult is that he still, YES HE STILL GIVES TALKS AND DOES NOT SHOW AN INKLING OF CONCERN, REMORSE, OR EMBARSEMENT AND JUST KEEPS GIVING TALKS AS A WELL STANDING ELDER. His wife is simply beside herself not knowing where her son is now and we all know it and can clearly see it on her face too. She occasionally shoots glaring glances up at hubby Brother X while he gives his talk and many in the hall agree with her - in silence of course.
D) Many so-called JW’s love to say that they are serving Jehovah but do everything except. Many cut as many corners whenever possible. Those who act in a very black-white staunch JW attitude cause normal people aka “wordly people” to not want to be around you because you are unreasonable … and you don’t even realize it. I guess this maybe ok for those who have it firmly set in their minds to be this way and never even think about changing. But sadly many youths try their best to fit in “the world” after having been brainwashed by JW’s and accidentally bring this staunch attitude to their regular lives and then wonder why nobody but a JW would want to be around them.
Personal Ending Note
I just want to say your mind opening information here has been more the spiritual brother/sister to me than any at the Kingdom Hall. That last publication from the TMSchool was a REAL eye opener to the control that this organization run supposedly by Jehovah really has on people. I tried discussing this with a Witness out in service and she said that “anything that tries to shake my faith in this organization originates from the Satan and must be avoided” … I tried.
Thank you, With Love