Born ins..Were You Forced to Be a JW Growing Up? (page 5)

WTWizard

Children not forced to be witlesses?

Suppose, as a born-in, you didn't want to go out in field circus. I have seen children getting dragged out in field circus during their whole school vacation, all day, because their parents wanted to pious-sneer for April. None of them actually had any choice in the matter. It was go out in field circus.

Suppose you wanted to miss a boasting session. You have homework that night, or just received an assignment that you want to get a start on, or a test to study for. You wish not to put it off to the last minute, but there is a boasting session or Family Waste the Evening night. How many children have the option to skip the boasting session or Family Waste the Evening night so they could study for their test or do or start homework? Or, if there is a test on Friday and there is a boasting session Thursday evening. How many children are allowed to skip the boasting session so they can get adequate sleep so they can do reasonably well on the test the next day?

Or, what about spending Christmas vacation with an unbelieving relative? Your uncle is planning a big Christmas celebration, and you are invited. How many witless parents are going to allow their children to celebrate Christmas? Or, there is an unbelieving parent that wishes to take the child to regular church, and the child wants to see what regular church is like. How many witless parents would consent to the child going to regular church that once?

out4good3

When my son made clear to me that he didn't want to go to meetings anymore, I made clear to my wife that the guilt tripping and coercive tactics she was using to force him to would stop. She was not happy, but, what could she do after i asked her how she would feel if, in front of all her witness friends, I dressed up the house for every holiday and used those same tactics on her to force her to participate?

He was only "strongly encouraged" to get his own place when he decided that he wanted to party with his friends all the time, stay on the internet all day, quit school, and disrespect my house by waking eveyone up coming in at 3 and 4 in the morning.

Sometimes, pulling out that "head of the household" card works.

diana netherton

I couldn't take it anymore and left at 18. Fortunately, I refused to consider getting baptised since

I knew I was going to leave as soon as I could.

I hated the threats. Like God wasn't going to love you if you didn't want to go and sit through

hours of boring crap THREE times a week.

I am actually writing a book on how it was growing up JW AND having a weight issue and how

I finally made peace with myself....

OUTLAW

I don`t know any JW Kid that wasn`t forced into being a JW..

There was no choice..

....................;-)...OUTLAW

N.drew

diane netherton Hi! I'm getting my first Christamas present in 20 years. It's a Kindle. So when you have finished your book pm me and I'll buy it.

james_woods

Their unbaptised kids have free choice? Then what if they need a blood transfusion?

JW free choice does not exist unless you use your free choice to get out of it.

blondie

My mother went back and forth...she was really interested in keeping my non-jw father happy. We moved a lot and except for jw relatives far away, we socialized mostly with my non-jw father's non-jw friends. We celebrated birthdays, halloween, christmas and missed lots of meetings. It was confusing but I learned that even if non-jw, my father's word was king per the WTS. I learned how to manipulate that to my benefit.

NoRegrets

I went to view the PDF of this entire article and am still amazed at the circular logic the WT uses. On page 19 they state that it is a myth that JW kids are forced to be members but by page 21 they say this:

"The book Questions Young People Ask—Answers
That Work, Volume 1, states: “As long
as your adolescent lives under your roof, you
have the right to require compliance with a
spiritual routine."

All I can say is WOW!!!

BTW I was completely forced to be a JW as a child and even as an adult was blackmailed to stay in or lose all family and friends that I grew up with! Eventually I had to make the sacrifice and leave completely, but it wasn't remotely the simple and easy choice the WT makes it seem. The choice is basically stay or we'll kill you! (Figuratively kill you, but not an exaggeration as your entire history is basically erased with a wave of their hand....)

clearpoison

Well it says "When child becomes an adult, he or she will make personal choice", until that you are under "parents strive to inculcate love for God", whatever means that require

CP

LostGeneration

@clearpoison- Actually they don't really answer the question they ask, they divert off into the choice an adult has.

Myth: Parents who are Jehovah’s Witnesses
force their children to follow their faith.

The answer they give talks about when they become adults, not what options they give them as a child. As all of the posters who contributed to the thread, a combination of physical and verbal threats are consistently used against children to "force" them to attend meetings, and strongly coerce them into baptism.

@ no regrets- That is strange indeed, its like they don't have an editor for these articles. Oh, thats right, three GB members read each article before publication, guess thats good enough!

Born ins..Were You Forced to Be a JW Growing Up?

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