JW Kids Who Lack Sincerity: Are You In The Flipping Truth Or Not?

by Apognophos 25 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  Apognophos

  Did any of you know a JW youth who didn't seem to really even try to be sincere about the "truth"? Not someone who led a double life while pretending to be a goody-goody JW. I mean the kind of kid who went to the meetings and did field service while making minimal effort at maintaining a pretense of being a true believer?

  Story 1: I went in service once, while visiting another congregation, with a teenager I didn't know. We were standing on a street corner as a group when one zealous brother in our group trotted after a couple passersby to offer them the magazines. We were there to witness, so why let them pass by without giving a witness, right? It was a very sincere gesture. As we watched from a distance, the teen laughed, saying to us derisively, "What a freak."

  He later related that his favorite kind of service was what we call "driving territory", because "You don't have to talk to so many people." He saw no problem in sharing this with us, half of whom were complete strangers, including an elder. I wanted to smack him and say, "If you don't believe, then bloody leave. Don't hang around and act like you're too cool to even be there. Be sincere about something; about the truth, if you think it's the truth, or else sincere about moving on with your life. Don't be a crappy fence sitter."

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  Story 2: While there were no older JWs around, I once had a JW my age ask me if he should put in a "clean" version of a certain CD or the original, uncensored version. I had never given him any reason to think that I was anything other than a sincere JW, so why did he think this would be acceptable to ask me? I was momentarily too shocked to respond. Once again, it was an assumption on his part, which could be verbalized as something like, "Come on, neither of us is really taking this Witness stuff seriously, right?"

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  What is with kids like this? Do you have any similar stories of JW youths who just assumed you were also as insincere as they were? What jogged my memory of these events and got me started on this rant, was what Hummingbird001 wrote on another thread:

  And my kids and most of their friends they grew up with are not "in" either. This is age group 20's-30's. The few that still go occasionally are clearly only in it for mommy & daddy. They're partying, getting tattoos, smoking pot. I see their facebook pages.

  Before social networks, I would have had no way to know what my JW peers were doing in their spare time, but now when I see the Facebook pages of born-ins in their 20s to 30s, I'm seeing them embrace their worldly careers (and worldly boyfriends!), go to raves, etc. like it's no big deal, then next week I see them come in and sit down at the meeting looking innocent.

  What boggles my mind about this overall behavior is that it's not even a double life that they're leading. When I was a kid, we had to hide it if we were doing things like this! Now they post their activities on Facebook! They don't seem to even really see the conflict between being a Witness and being involved in ____ (fill in the blank). Am I the only one baffled/irritated by this half-in, half-out behavior?
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  snare&racket

  Those kids were the bravest, most real, smartest people in Watchtower world....... My opinion of them has 180'd.

  I must disagree, they were THE MOST sincere of all of us. They did not hide their contempt, their mockery of the rules. They didn't pretend not to listen to 'worldly' music, didn't pretend they hadn't watched violent films. They were real, but this was mistranslated as 'rebelious'. What a disgraceful misrepresentation that was.

  They made it clear they didn't believe it and didn't care for the consequences. Everyone else was living the lie, pretending there were no doubts, conflicts, internal questions.

  Those poor kids lost EVERYTHING at age 16 or 17 and they were not even baptised, their treatment is a bigger disgrace than shunning and disfellowshipping of the baptised JW's. Several come to mind, I remember one telling me he would leave when he turned 16.

  These kids were tough, you don't find their sort here, they got on with life because they had no choice. I am ashamed to think of many who were simply forgotten about when they seperated themselves from the cong at this age, I also forgot about them and it was wrong to. These kids had nothing and nobody.
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  Mum

  When I was 15, I became a JW publisher. That was in 1963. I was the only JW in my family, including extended family. My buddies at the KH were going through their rebellious period. I don't think any of them really disbelieved the nonsense, but they did write hilarious notes to one another during the meetings. I remember having Beatles bubble gum cards at the meetings, and one of the girls I sat with wrote funny captions on them. They would also make fun of some of the older people in the congreation and write phony letters from them, highlighting their weaknesses.

  All but three of them (myself included) for sure are staunch JW's today. I looked up one of the guys on google, and he is listed as a "religious leader, Jehovah's Witnesses." There were two fleshly sisters in our group, one of whom was responsible for the Beatkes card captions and mocking letters. I found their mom's obituary online, and it was clear that they were still JW's.

  Teenagers can't be taken so seriously. The human brain is not fully developed until the mid-20's.

  I feel for the kids who have no choice in the matter. They're doing what's expected by others. They have no power but to be mouthy or appear rebellious.
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  Finkelstein

  He later related that his favorite kind of service was what we call "driving territory", because "You don't have to talk to so many people." He saw no problem in sharing this with us, half of whom were complete strangers, including an elder. I wanted to smack him and say, "If you don't believe, then bloody leave. Don't hang around and act like you're too cool to even be there. Be sincere about something; about the truth, if you think it's the truth, or else sincere about moving on with your life. Don't be a crappy fence sitter."

  In reality there many people who go to meetings who are your typical fence sitters, this isn't apparent with adolescents alone.

  .

  And yes I've been out in service with people who loved the rural barely populated parts of town for the same reason of that teenager.

  I kind of get that feeling that this teen is just going out in service under pressure from family and peers within his congregation.

  But thats to be expected because many kids who grew up being a JWs found it to be stifling boring and giving talks and service unpleasant but socially

  pressured to do so.

  Some of this liberalism of what teens do has evolved from baby boomers who care to look the other way, until their teens really stop attending meetings, then

  they are more likely to show concern.

  Playing a game of pretentiousness is part of being JWS and it involves a lot toward each individual person from child to adolescents and adulthood.
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  Apognophos

  Well, you guys raise an interesting point. Were they the least sincere, or actually the most sincere? My point was that they seemed to have nothing but distaste for the religion but still went to meetings and went in field service, which seems insincere to me, but maybe they had to cave under the parental pressure for the time being.

  I think this is what mainly bothered me: I didn't believe they had actually taken the time to consider whether it was the truth or not. They just didn't like the rules. It was thoughtless rebellion. I just can't respect that. I do respect that many of them left home at 18 as soon as their schooling was finished and led an independent life, because I couldn't have done that. I can't respect that they were not even considering whether the Bible's prophecies were real and the Witnesses had the truth. They just didn't like sitting in meetings, not being able to hang out with school friends, etc.

  In my opinion, kids like this are fodder for being reactivated later in life when the JWs catch them at an unhappy time. In fact this may have happened to an old childhood acquaintance. He was nothing but trouble and a rebel when we were kids, but as an adult he's probably thinking seriously about life for the first time, and is supposedly interested in coming back to the meetings, etc. If he'd ever rubbed his brain cells together in the first place, he could have settled this whole business in his mind back before he became a punk and made bad choices in life, but now he might fall victim to the religion just because his teenage rebel stage is wearing off and he has a kid to think about, or whatever.
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  JWdaughter

  Man, I was the MOST sincere JW kid I ever knew, until I studied so much that I couldn't believe it anymore! Not knowing what happened to everyone, I do know a few of the ones that seemed to be filling seats are still JWs, even Elders now. I don't know what happened to everyone I hope that the nice ones got out! I see some of them on facebooks connected to my moms though, so I doubt it. Makes me sad.

  Anyone here from the Redondo/Des Moines congregation?
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  Sapphy

  I agree with everything snare&racket wrote.

  It irritates me when anyone doesn't think. But these kids have been trained not to think independently, they are victims of this religion. It takes a lot to give yourself permission to committ thoughtcrime against the watchtower, and even more to leave everything behind.
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  westiebilly11

  such kids/youngsters often had a very black and white view of life..everyone in world was bad and satanic..and all in the hall were true and spiritual....such kids were often mollycoddled by model parents and grandparents who sought hard to reinforce spiritual expectations...and yes some of the youngsters were genuinely nice people...but very knieve....they were conditioned to put their hands up and give pat answers to pat questions...used freely in demonstrations and always ready with prepared paintings for when the circuit overseer was present... grooming.....yes.
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  snare&racket

  The rules used to be very clear, you could not progress in the cong if you have an unbeliever in the house. You couldn't even have a book study at your house if that was the case.

  Those kids were kicked out of their homes as soon as the parents could so...... it is disgusting. Those kids HAD to go to meetings, HAD to begrudgingly go door to door. It was that or be homeless and lose your family and friends.

  It is amazing that so many left so young. I spend my life with 22 year old doctors that still have a bedroom at home and go home on weekends for mums sunday lunch. In Watchtower land, getting booted on to the street aged 16 or 17 happened without a blink of an eye.

  It always intrigued me how many JW kids left aged 16 if they had a non believing parent who lived elsewhere. Basically, if there is a choice, by far most left.

  snare

  p.s. for those that bring up them not knowing doctrine and wanting to break the rules , those kids weren't bad humans, they didn't drive illegally, do heroine, murder or steal. This is important.....because there was no REAL laws being broken, they knew which laws were legitimate (civil law) and which weren't (watchtower law). Again, they were just smarter than you and me. As for doctines, give them a break, I know elders in bethel who were clueless on doctrine, why should a 16 yr old know such garbage when they don't believe it? Again, they were smarter than us.
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  Apognophos

  I dunno. I'll try to think about it from your perspective, but it's difficult for me to understand. I think they were just being emotional and reckless. I didn't say they had to know doctrines, but simply that I would have expected them to consider the religion before running away from it. They didn't know why they didn't believe in it, they just didn't want to.

  As I said, later on in life they may fall victim to the religion out of a combination of factors like raising kids and thinking back to happier times (nostalgia is like rose-tinted glasses, after all). They may be in a relationship with a "worldly" by this point, too, which then leads to the worldly spouse coming on here and asking desperately for help in dealing with someone that they didn't realize was going to be pulled back into the religion some day.