The essay below was written by Mick on Ronnie's board. It has been up for a couple of months, but it is so good, I obtained his permission to paste it here. It is among my favorite top 2 or 3 essay's I have ever seen on in the ex JW cyber world.... I hope you enjoy it.... ATJeff
O.k… so you are a Jehovah's Witness, but you are unsettled about it. In fact, you're downright miserable, confused and slightly angry about certain things. If this was your position pre-internet, then what were your options back then?
It would still be possible to do the 'fade.' Difficult….but not impossible. You'd have to navigate the psychological fallout involved with abandoning the theology, and also re-build your entire social network from scratch.
The odds would be strong that you'd have to do this alone.
Other than Jehovah's Witnesses themselves, the only other people whom you would be able to relate to would be ex-Jehovah's Witnesses.
But remember, it's pre-internet.
The only ex-Jehovah's Witnesses you are likely familiar with are those weird people who picket assemblies and conventions with banners about 1914 etc….
The much feared and despised 'evil slave' class to be precise.
They'd understand what you're feeling though surely?
After all, many of these people used to be Jehovah's Witnesses themselves at one time.
They are the ones who might just have something in common with you.
Namely:
They seem to be prepared to cast a ferociously critical eye over the J.W faith and it's central administration.
Perhaps they really DO know something about the faith that you don't know?
The problem is, you'd have to talk to them to find out, and you've been warned about talking to 'apostates' in no uncertain terms.
But still, they might have some valuable information. Some reservoir of alternative knowledge that you are not aware of, because all of 'your' information comes straight from the Society's literature.
Now unbeknown to you, the 'evil slave class' has long been compiling a negative and incriminating portfolio about the faith to which you belong.
A very very useful portfolio for anybody who may want to know things about the Society, and which the Society would rather not have it's members exposed to.
But what has been the motive behind this portfolio's construction?
Predominantly, it has been constructed by people who want to free people from the clutches of the 'Watchtower' with a view to bringing them to Christ.
But what if you don't actually want to be brought to Christ?
Whilst you are a Jehovah's Witness, and still steeped in their theology, it's highly unlikely that you actually know what you want, other than that you want to try and make some kind of break from an extremely controlling religion.
However, the cold hard reality is that these Christians have got a lot of the 'information' that you need in order to adjust your perception of the Society and thus feel a tad more justified in making that break.
It's still pre-internet though remember, so by and large…Christians are the predominant peripheral gatekeepers of converse knowledge about the Society in terms of it's history and it's theological control mechanisms.
These ex-Jehovah's Witness Christians do not want bring people to Atheism, they do not want to bring them to Agnosticism…nor Wicca…nor any kind of vague New Age embrace which involves crystals and fairies.
They possess a lot of the special knowledge that you might just need for your own cerebral liberation, but they also have some very firm ideas about just where they believe your next theological port of call really ought to be once you decide to leave the faith.
Running The Gauntlet
Because Jehovah's Witnesses draw a firm line between those who are in the faith and those who are on the outside of it, this creates a rather unique dynamic.
It creates a 'periphery.'
It's an area which exists but that the J.W executive cannot actually control. It closely orbits the mother-faith, and it has plenty to say for itself about that mother-faith, albeit in a negative and condemnatory fashion, especially in aspects of theology which pertain to scripture and specifically…Jesus Christ.
Historically, Christians have owned this periphery for a long time.
The cold hard fact of the matter is that any Jehovah's Witness who wants to try and place some cerebral distance between themselves and their former faith, must run the gauntlet through the Christian periphery, and this Christian periphery totally envelops the J.W faith, patiently waiting as a ready made emotional catchment for any who, for whatever reason….happen to stray outside the faith.
Post Internet
The one thing the advent of the internet facilitated, was an ever increasing ease of access to information. More pertinently in the current context, information could now be accessed 'anonymously.'
The portfolio of critical information which the Christians had long been gathering about the J.W faith, rapidly began to appear on the web along with many other slightly more learned critiques which began to be harvested from their more academic sources.
As far as the average 'pissed off' J.W was concerned, the dynamics of the existing periphery were about to change dramatically.
The Christians rapidly realised that the web would be a marvellous utility for evangelising Christ to Jehovah's Witnesses who may be tempted to make an egress, or indeed, who may have been forced to make one by means of the J.W shunning policy.
However, the Christians would now have to share their long monopolised periphery with other opinions about just what it actually is that is so 'negative' about the J.W faith.
Not least of all amidst these vociferous contributions, were the thoughts and feelings of ex-Jehovah's Witnesses themselves. Now liberated from their enforced silence and more than ready to add their own personal 2-cents to the J.W debate.
The Christians soon realised that there were some ex-Jehovah's Witnesses who seemed to be slipping through their nets, and very much arriving at their own conclusions as to what was wrong with...not just the J.W faith, but with religion in general…and of course, even the Bible itself began to receive severely critical reviews by many.
Ex-Jehovah's Witnesses seemed to be scattering everywhere and anywhere in terms of their newfound worldviews, and the Christians began to realise that the internet, although useful to them, was also shattering their long-held monopoly over the ex-J.W periphery.
Jehovah's Witnesses everywhere were reading Christian websites and just filtering out the useful, backdated 'information' about the Society's shenanigans, without it necessarily leading them to make a dedication to Christ.
It was a little bit like mice stealing the cheese of the traps.
Many Jehovah's Witnesses just had a ferocious appetite for knowledge about the Society, but did not necessarily want the additional religious steerage that always seemed to accompany that knowledge.
Witnesses were actually running mental 'filters' on the Christian websites. Taking what was useful off them and rejecting that which they thought was nothing but highly emotive, subjective 'crud.'
In a true sense, the liberation exercise was well underway, and to their disdain, the Christians realised that there were now ever widening gaps opening up in the ex-J.W periphery, and that many ex-Jehovah's Witnesses were just bypassing their commentaries altogether and pushing out beyond their zone of influence in favour of alternative worldviews.
Ones that made much more sense to them personally, and were not limited or restricted by religious dogma, or scriptural creed.
Recent events on this board suggest that there are still some ex-J.W Christians who have failed to grasp that there now exists, ever widening gaps in the ex-J.W periphery.
Perhaps these gaps where simply not there when they themselves were hoovered up by the peripheral Christian agenda?
One thing's for sure however, the gaps are there now, and the peripheral Christian dams which surround the J.W faith are steadily being burst open by an ever increasing thirst for rationality and reason .
Occasionally, some extremely naïve Christians will belatedly attempt try and re-build the dam, lest ex-Jehovah's Witnesses journey out of the faith, zooming straight past Christ, straight past the Bible and out to that netherworld of who knows what which lies far far beyond the dogmatic religious periphery which once used to make leaving the J.W faith, and enjoying a more balanced, rational outlook... truly one of the most difficult and emotionally arduous tasks known to either man or woman in the latter part of the 20 th century.
Mick
An Illustration Of The J.W Egress Dynamic As It Currently Stands?