Good to see the freedom of speech here and the open and direct debate. Closing threads was the worst thing to do. Every story has 2 or more sides.
One question: has the leaving of SBF yo do with this discussion?
Cheers Gorby
Did Cedars manipulate Lee into having a thread closed?
by cedars 164 Replies latest watchtower scandals
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paranoia agent
Bookmarket ***makes popcorn***
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Calebs Airplane
What were we fighting about again?
Not sure...
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Muddy Waters
While the drama is disturbing and upsetting, it is important in a community to have open communication, yes, even with warts and all.
Sometimes moderators are too quick to close a thread or end a debate when things get heated, and to me that doesn't help. It only creates festers and simmering wounds. Sometimes you need to shout and scream and kick. Right? Righteous anger and all that? When mods constantly remind people, "Play nice, speak nice" then sometimes you just get versions of plastic people, like at the KH, all talking nice with smiles on their faces, everybody hiding their real feelings. I am not advocating ad hominem attacks or out and out abuse of any member, but sometimes people need to let off steam and say things.
It may get ugly, but I appreciate a forum where the moderator/forum owner is reasonable in this regard and not so quick to shut everybody up and silence each person's voice. We have certainly had enough of that from the bOrganization!!
It seems to me that, as former JWs, we are not used to conflict. We are used to surface niceness and fake smiles. All get along under an umbrella of insincerity. Stuff is never dealt with, unless you constantly run to the elders, and we never learn how to really stand up for ourselves without being made to feel that we are somehow "bad" for doing so.
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Having said that, I do feel that Simon makes an extremely valid point in saying, "I honestly do think that it's something in the exJW psyche that they are still working out in their head but some people just flip and can't be reasoned with. Obsession takes over and it becomes about payback, revenge or whatever. Maybe the forum does becomes a substitute for the WTS and so I become the target for being the authority on it. Who knows, it's a nice theory if nothing else but I'm no shrink."
It seems like some exJWs, especially those who were raised in the religion/cult, have damage. Men have been taught (from infancy, ha!) that they are superior, yet they are stifled in any personal achievements or goals, unless those goals or achievements further the advancement of the WTS's agenda. As JWs, we are constantly bombarded with how we should be, how we are never good enough, doing enough, etc. and blah blah blah. I think this can create a personality disorder, a prickly personality with ego problems and even "ego dissonance".
But I also agree with the thought about love covering a multitude of sins, about love being patient and kind... all that good mushy stuff we try to apply in our dealings with people, friends and family....
So we may fight and argue at times, sometimes with very valid reasons, but remembering each others difficulties and issues and any resultant psychological damage that may have been inflicted from our bOrg experience or other life experience.
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Paralipomenon
Fame is a powerful drug even in small doses. I am going to hop over the line on this one.
It is human nature to want to be accepted and appreciated, but in some personality types, they get a taste of fame and crave it. There is a tipping point where conversation and posting is less about talking about things that are important to them to being tailored in an attempt to get more attention.
Simon and I have butted heads over my feelings here before but I really do think JWN naturally falls into a mold I can only describe as an "Apostate Kingdom Hall".
Anyone spending a good portion of their life in a controlling environment such as the Watchtower is going to pick up bad habits, the extent of which is going to vary based on time in, level of indoctrination, and other very numerous factors.
To think that a community based on, for lack of a better word, "broken" people would not fall into what is familiar is idealistic.
My guess is that Simon really doesn't like the reference because that would put him in the pseudo position of the Governing Body, which really is not a very flattering comparison. As a disclaimer, as I feel I haven't been clear on it before, I am not comparing Simon to the Governing Body. It is not his personality type but it doesn't change how some view and react to him.
A comment Simon made a long time ago was that it should be the goal of every ex-Witness to become an ex-ex-witness. I think that is the base point that I was trying to make.
There are many people here that that you can see as a Watchtower stereotype that every hall had. You have pioneers that seek personal attention, you have elders that strive for recognition and followers, you have company men that will support the establishment rigidly, you have snoops and spies and tattletales all reacting to a social group environment in the only way they know.
Hell, there are even JWN apostates which is laced is so much irony.
That said, there are many here who are ex-ex-Witnesses that are here for the association, here for the memories and here for the social aspect. I am definately not saying that everyone that posts here is trying to recreate a Kingdom Hall environment, but there are enough that have stalled moving on in their life to help others.
That is very dangerous because you never get the chance to heal. Each exposure is ripping the bandaid off anew and opening the wound.
The very long point to this, and where this goes over the line is that I can see Cedars as a 2001 Simon. From my observation, one I will freely admit could be wrong, but Simon found out TTATT and launched into a campaign to raise awareness from which JWD was born. All in all, a good thing that has seriously hurt the Watchtower, but I think it prolonged his own healing. I don't get the feeling that Simon was doing it for self promotion, though accolades (both genuine and flattery) likely would have made it more difficult to step away. I see Cedars as enjoying the personal attention.
At some point, Simon stepped away from JWD for a few years and I think at that point he really became an ex-ex-witness. Opposing the Watchtower is still important, it is a cause worth fighting for, we are all scarred, but some won't let themselves stop bleeding.
For the inevitable blowback I expect this to receive, Cedars, I think you can learn from Simon. You are not the same personality type, it is not the same journey, but you both arrived on the "apostate scene" in a very public way and in my opinion, before either of you had a chance to heal. I am not certain anyone can ever fully heal while attempting to heal others.
I think your heart is in the right place, I think the work you do exposing and highlighting the Watchtower is a good thing, but I also think you care too deeply about recognition and acceptance. If you could find a way to remove your ego from your message, it would be received much better.
My two cents for what it's worth.
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cyberjesus
So AAWA are "JWN Apostates"? lol thats funny
so Simon is the Type and Cedars the Antitype?
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erbie
I didn't realize that Simon said "Cedars desperately wants to be a leader and have followers".
Bang on the money!
Its funny, but as soon as Cedars appeared on this forum I could see that ambition in him and I had the balls to tell him so.
He didn't like it though. And he wouldn't let it go either!
Nevertheless, I stand by what I said back then and have been proved right.
In fact he is so ambitious that I'm surprised he ever left the WT.
He is exactly the kind of person who leaves and tries to draw others to follow him.
It shouldn't be about that but he has a lot of anger to get out of his system but this is not the place.
I'd like to say more but I have to take the kids to school.
Everything will now go along as usual
Cedars, if you now want to have a go at me then do so.
Your words don't mean shit and they never will
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still thinking
Gees...I'm away for a couple of months, come back and Cedars is still whinging like a little girl. Simon, I think you should take the discussion to his blog since he's so keen to bang on about it. He could just wait for you there.... it would be like the sound of one hand clapping...LOL
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Simon
There are many people here that that you can see as a Watchtower stereotype that every hall had. You have pioneers that seek personal attention, you have elders that strive for recognition and followers, you have company men that will support the establishment rigidly, you have snoops and spies and tattletales all reacting to a social group environment in the only way they know.
I think your analysis is spot on, particularly your phsycho-analysis of me, eek!
One thing I would say though is that while there are inevitable comparisons that people see, I think many times this comes down to perception or recognition-bias. That is, we see what we know and have prior experience of.
If you read and watch presentations about online communities on any topic imaginable you see they all face the same issues and have the same problems. Of course only on ex-JW forums do you get the ultimate "you are like the Governing Body" insult. On others people are normally equated to Nazis but it's the same thing. Of course, no one is really like that - it's just an insult.
I remember watching one by the people who created Subversion (I think) which is a source-control system for developers. They went through the different personality types who would appear on their community and how to deal with them. At the end they said something along the lines of:
Not everyone is there to help or be helped or get anything positive out of the group. This is the internet. Some people are just here to disrupt and be assholes. There is nothing you can do but delete those people. Don't feel sorry about it. If you don't they will drain all the time and energy you have - that is the 'satisfaction' they get out of it.
The other phenomenon that exists is that people do try to disrupt and ruin other sites that they see as competition to their own. That has played out time and time again.
That was a little off-topic, I just thought it was interesting and followed on from your observations.
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Finkelstein
I'm glad to see the 250,000 BTs thread left open, It kind of shows the openness to this forum by Simon the owner .
And this thread as well to show what happened during that particular thread topic as it was evolving along.
That freedom of openness adds value to any public discussion for its revealing aspects toward unstructured points of information.
...... NEXT
