So Are All Your Problems Brooklyn's Fault Then?

by Englishman 32 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  GinnyTosken

  Englishman,

  I get the impression that most of us feel like adolescents when we first leave the JW's. Maybe it's the newbie "Outies" that feel the most anger, I suppose it's the sense of betrayal that takes some getting used to.

  I do agree that emerging from the JW world often throws us into a delayed adolescence in many ways. However, I don't think this is limited only to "newbie Outies." It's easy to get stuck in some reactionary role--exJW bad boy or girl, exJW "true believer" and fighter for truth and justice, exJW kind elder/helper, etc.

  I also agree with you when you say,

  If I said that the WTBTS were still having a profoundly negative effect on my life now, after all these years, am I not just giving my power away?

  I do not want the rest of my life to be a reaction to having once been one of Jehovah's Witnesses. If I live that way, they have as much control over me now that I'm out as they did when I was in.

  The world is full of unethical influence--in religion, advertising, politics, etc. I don't react as strongly when I read about insurance fraud or Mormons or Catholics. I pity these folks and wish they had been able to make more informed decisions. I feel the same about those who choose to be Jehovah's Witnesses. I feel most strongly for the children, who have little choice but to be exposed to the religious beliefs of their parents. I can help children by promoting education, critical thinking skills, children's rights, or perhaps by writing children's books or stories about JW life.

  Below is a post I shared in March 2001 which describes the adolescent reactions one often feels as an exJW.

  Ginny

  One of my favorite books is Sam Keen's The Passionate Life. Sam Keen regards eros as an impulse or energy that links us to the whole web of life rather than a strictly sexual-romantic thing. His goal in this book is to help us recover 'a healthy passion' for life. He does so by contructing a life-map that traces transformations of love through the course of a lifetime and describes the psychological orientation characteristic of each stage.

  Reading his work, it strikes me that being Jehovah's Witnesses kept us in a childlike state as far as eros is concerned. The Society was our parent, our mother, and Jehovah was described as a stern father. When we leave the Jehovah's Witnesses' belief system, it is as though we are thrown into an adolescent stage of love development, one that Keen describes as "The Rebel." Here are a few excerpts from the book regarding the Rebel stage:

  To gain our freedom, we must use the knife of de/cision. We come to a fork in the road, either/or. We must choose. . . . To say a single "yes" we must say "no" a hundred times. Thus Nietzsche could say: "I love the great Nay sayers for they are the great 'yea' sayers."

  The first, and hardest, "no" is the de/cision to sever our ties with home, to endure the alienation that inevitably comes from leaving all that is familiar. Our temptation is to remain in safety, beyond tragedy. But if we do, all the delightful virtues of childhood will become twisted into dependent vices. Instead of becoming responsible, we will be reactionary; instead of creative, conservative.

  A passionate life is a continuing dialogue between self and other. And all real dialogue, according to philosopher Karl Jaspers, is a "loving combat." To become who we are we must learn to wrestle. Push-pull. Yes-no. Love must be muscular, to enter the contest, to endure the agony, of the clash between points of view.

  But, sadly, parents, guardians, and authorities often squelch the first trace of rebellion. "Don't you dare contradict me." They demand unquestioning obedience. They react to the young rebel's "no" as if it were an insurrection that must be controlled at any cost. When the authorities are too rigid and insecure to embrace the rebellious ones, either the spark of individuality will be extinguished or the repression will act like gasoline thrown on the embers and inflame the situation.

  In the adversarial personality, the bad boy or bad girl continues to play out the drama of adolescent rebellion. Defiance becomes a way of life. The adversary will always be linked in an antagonistic relationship to some authority. If you live out of a negative identity, the only time you will feel alive is when you are in conflict or combat. Others will always be cast in the mold of the enemy against whom you must struggle. Eros will be reduced to a mode of warfare, life to a battle. You will be aroused by the prospect of violence. If you are "normal" you will limit your love for violence to lawful competition, fighting with your spouse, and voyeurism--a regular ritual bloodbath on TV or in the movies. Your daydreams will be filled with schemes for conquest, plans for achieving what psychoanalyst Karen Horney calls a "vindictive triumph" over others. Even if you don't win, you can achieve a victory by being drunk, drugged, or in disgrace. You will show "them" you can't be bossed around.

  If the adversarial personality is a reactionary prolongation of the style of "bad boys and girls," the pleaser's mask wears the perpetual smile of the good boy or girl. Pleasers are the "yes" men and "yes" women. . . .

  Beneath the smiling mask, we can see the injury that results from a deficiency of rebellion. The nice ones are never quite real. They lack self-definition, self-confidence, because they have never created boundaries and limits for themselves by making decisions. Having never dared to break the taboos they suffer from shame. Their sins are ones of omission rather than commission. They "have left undone those things they ought to have done," most especially deciding for themselves what is good and evil. Being impotent because they have never dared to assert themselves, they continually play the blame-game. They are innocent and powerless and, therefore, others are always to blame when things go wrong. In their world, the only authorities are God, the church, the Bible, the government, the boss, and what the neighbors think. They have yet to bite the apple of consciousness. The price they pay is high, although not often visible. Their repressed negativity erupts as ulcers, gut reactions, boredom, depression, suicide, and, occasionally, murder. Notice how frequently the newspapers, when interviewing the neighbors of the latest mass murderer, report: "We don't know how he could have done it. He was such a nice boy. Something of a loner, but everybody liked him." Repressed rebellion seethes beneath the pleasant facade, but eventually breaks forth in violence.

  After talking about the various faces of adolescent love, Sam Keen describes adult love, when one has grown beyond both dependence and independence to the realization that we are interdependent--individuals in need of a community:

  . . . The social contract is not based on a cynical compromise that we make because without the laws of civility we would be enemies to each other; rather, it is based on the visceral knowledge that we would die without communion with our own kind. The singular life, as we are discovering now that western individualism has destroyed the basis of community, leads to alienation, anomie, and apathy. The motive power for the individual life, paradoxically, is inseparable from community.

  Within the ambience of the group, it is not intense passion that is valued so much as orderly care, not wild encounters with strange loves, but quiet kindness. Society tames us, teaches us to keep our Dionysian impulses in control (except during Mardi Gras, Fasching, orgies on the Sagittarian moon, and occasional affairs). It is not prudery that leads the tribe to domesticate eros, but the observation that it is patience, day-to-day kindness, basic trust, and competence that makes for a full life. For cooking, one wants embers, not flames. For a bountiful harvest, seed must not only be sown but cultivated. Stability is the precondition for the development of intelligence and love.

  from http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.asp?id=8187&site=3
• 

  hillary_step

  Ginny,

  As ever, a thought provoking post thank-you, I was especially impressed and in total agreement with this comment:

  I do not want the rest of my life to be a reaction to having once been one of Jehovah's Witnesses. If I live that way, they have as much control over me now that I'm out as they did when I was in.

  I think that this it at the crux of the problem, only an objective view of the situation can lead to the clear thinking neccessary to get to this point in our journey.

  Best regards - HS
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  Jankyn

  I spent a lot of time when I first got out thinking that the WTBS had ruined my family. While I still think that the incredibly rigid and dogmatic thinking made things worse, the more I find out about my family (both those in and out of the WT system), I think that the dysfunctional behaviors were already there. For instance, an uncle who was never a JW has a nasty habit of getting ticked off at relatives and not speaking to them for years. Yes, he "disfellowships" us for all sorts of reasons. The WT just gave some family members an excuse to use beyond mere grudge-holding.

  Which leads me to wonder if there isn't something about self-selecting for the JW mind-set. I don't think that's true for those of us who were, unfortunately, born and raised in the so-called "Truth," but I do think there were probably all sorts of dys- and mal-functions in my family members that predisposed them to be attracted to the WT's judgemental teachings and world-view.

  And, like many here, I have to take responsibility for what I do as an adult. I agree with Amazing about how things come up years after leaving that show how being part of the Borg altered and twisted my thinking. But it's my responsibility to seek recovery, and to develop as best I can.

  Of course, when I left the Borg, I was, as Englishman notes, emotionally adolescent. Since I was nineteen at the time, I suppose that's to be expected!

  Great topic and discussion.

  Jankyn
• 

  Englishman

  The one good thing that came out of dub-dom for me was the public speaker training.

  I find it an absolute doddle to address a large audience.

  Englishman.
• 

  Nathan Natas

  I have a lot of admiration and respect for JanH, so I have no problem cutting him some slack if he says something I don't immediately agree with. JanH is one of the "old soldiers" who were willing to engage the WTS Lie Machine online years before I came along.

  If his judgements are a bit severe on the "new troops", that's okay, for as the saying goes, "rank has it's priviledges."

  I may even agree with him if I'm around long enough.
• 

  Soledad

  All I know is that 4 years after I DA'd the anger has finally risen to the surface. I spent the last couple of years sort of in a blur, basically pretending that life outside of WTS wouldn't be that much different, but I was wrong. When I see how their policies and attitudes affect so many people, especially innocent children, I cant help but feel my blood boil over. So I may use a forum like this one to vent, every now and then. But do I believe that Brooklyn is to blame for all my problems? No.
• 

  CPiolo

  Even though I’ve never been a JW, I thought I’d add my voice to the chorus.

  First of all, when reading JanH’s post, I didn’t feel he was addressing everybody on this forum, but rather “a group” or element here. Of course, it would be easy, within any diverse group of individuals, to pick out a group that share a particular characteristic, be it good or bad. That in no way invalidates, what I feel, is Jan’s correct criticism.

  Pointing your finger at some external entity as the cause of one’s problems is something most, if not all, human beings tend to do. I’ve done it and am sure I’ll do it again. Most here, including Jan have also done so at one time or another. It’s always easier to blame someone or something else for our problems. Sometimes we are correct, other times it is a rationalization we use to avoid self-examination, or to avoid putting in the effort and work necessary to change our lot in life.

  That being said, those who do blame the WT for most or all of their ills, difficulties and/or misfortune are a diverse group of people in and of themselves. As others have already pointed out, they are in various stages of recovery and discovery. They came into the WT organization under many unique and individual circumstances and they left the same way. Some where raised as Witnesses and knew nothing else. Some where brought up in the organization by their parents beginning at various stages in their childhood/adolescence. Others chose, for whatever reasons, to become Witnesses on their own, under diverse circumstances and for diverse reasons. The circumstances that led up to the decision varied greatly as well. This board is a testament to that. It consists of individuals from countries throughout the world, form distinct cultures, races and ethnicities.

  Here is where I feel Jan may have gone wrong. He lumped a group of people sharing one common trait into a group of “them” – those naysayers and whiners who blame everything on the WT. All who have been Witnesses have valid and real reasons to blame the Society for some of the bad aspects of their lives – for wasted time, for lost opportunities, for lost friendships and familial relationships, for lack of education, for false hopes and more.

  How much blame the WT organization shoulders varies greatly dependent upon the individual circumstances of the individual. I don’t believe an adult who made the decision to become a Witness has as much to blame the Society for as does someone raised in “the truth.” The adult made an individual decision with far more knowledge, thought and life experience than did the child whose parents made the choice for them.

  I will give a personal example. My wife was raised in the organization from an early age (4 or 5 or so). She knows almost no other religious point of view other than that provided by the WT. She’s been inculcated to fear all other religion, to distrust and view suspiciously any who are not part of “God’s organization,” and has been told what most here know very well the WT teaches its members is necessary to gain God’s favor and an opportunity to survive the ever impending Armageddon.

  Does this cause problems in my relationship with my wife and in our marriage? It certainly does! Is the WT to blame for all our problems or even everything about my wife that causes conflict between us or those things “distinctly” Witness. I don’t believe so.

  The Society isolates and insulates its members, to the best of its ability, from the outside influences and “the world.” In addition to that, my wife’s parents were over-protective and insulated here from much as well. The WT is totalitarian in its authority, oppressive and accepts no dissent or criticism without inflicting severe penalties. My wife grew up under a repressive and violent military dictatorship, where to openly criticize it or to do anything they deemed as “wrong” or contrary to their interests was to risk one’s life.

  I don’t know how much blame belongs to the WT, how much blame belongs to my wife’s parents, how much belongs to her country, and how much she shares. There are many other factors to consider as well. Of course, I am responsible for some of our problems as well, and share the blame with my wife for others.

  As Ginney, Amazing, Simon, Hillary_Step, Jankyn and others have already said, one can continue to blame the WT and feel sorry for themselves, or they can recognize the influence (both good and bad, for as they say in Spanish: “No hay mal de que bién no venga.” There is no bad from which good doesn’t come.) the WT has had, take the bull by the horns and get on with life. The ease of doing this depends upon individual circumstances. But to let the WT continue to effect how you live your life and what you do or don’t do as an individual is to let them win.

  CPiolo
• 

  Kenneson

  The PROBLEM?

  The problem is I.

  The SOLUTION
  
  The solution is I.
• 

  Yadira Angelini

  huuuuummmmmm !!! I have witnessed and I continue to witness how my dauhgter's life have become different since she joined the cult.

  She would like to be married and have her own kids... but! how? there are not many prospects coming her way... she broke up her engagement to a great guy due to him not wanting to join the WT with her.

  She stopped from furthering her education in Sociology as was her previous plan.

  She looks depress and sad regardeless of her efforts to show our family otherwise.

  Her whole life has been changed! I think though that she needs guidence and structure. But when she is out like many of you, from then on, she has to live her live according to her free mind but the damage has been done. "Mis dos".

  Yadira
• 

  Lady Lee

  Are all my problems Brooklyn's fault?

  No way

  Early in life I was sexually abused. Needless to say we had an extremely dysfunctional family. No one in the family got any help - doubt anyone did in those days.

  My mother started to study with the JWs when I was 11. She was living with a man - she had his baby and he was sexually abusing me. When my mother found out about this she sent me into foster care and stayed with him. The elders strongly encouraged her to marry him. Another extremely dysfunctional arrangement but this time with the blessing and encouragement of the elders. The elders knew about the sexual abuse but still encouraged her to stay with him. No police report was ever made.

  After 3 years of foster care I returned to live with my mother. The man was gone - he refused to marry her and took off leaving her with a lot of problems.

  At 17 my mother pushed me into a marriage with a young man who was baptized the week before the wedding - lord knows she could not have arranged this any faster. I realized after 2 weeks that it was a terrible mistake and stayed for 15 years of abuse, trying to be a good wife and mother and a good little JW wife - submission and all.

  I suffered PTSD, depression, was suicidal, had panic and anxiety attacks, was a caretaker for far too many people and perfectionist.

  Now how much of this is the WT responsible for?

  Well they are not responsible for what happened to me before my mother got involved. They are not responsible for the sexual abuse by my fatehr or mother's boyfriend.

  They are responsible for not reporting this man to the police after they knew what he had done. He was going to meetings. He had a long history of abusing young girls - his 3 daughters from before he was with my mother, my aunt(same age as me) and me and later on my younger sister. I discovered much later that he moved to the states and married a woman with children and they fostered kids - all girls.

  As for the marriage hmm this is a little more difficult to answer. While the WT is not responsible for this person's abuse to me and my children their teachings certainly gave him the ammunition he needed to justify his actions/abuses. He used WT teachings to beat his children. He used WT teachings to control us and manipulate us to being perfect little JWs so he would look good. This only got worse after he became an elder. He used WT teachings to have sex on demand without regard for my health or feelings. When I went to the elders about issues and problems they supported him. The WT is definitley responsible at this point.

  Is the WT responsible that I didn't leave? Well if I hadn't been taught:

  that he was the head of the family and I had to be in submission
  that wives had no voice
  that marriage was until death with no other way out
  that I would lose all family, friends, faith and community if I left
  that the WT org was the only true path to God
  that I was not respectful of God's arrangement
  that my willful spirit was being tested
  that God would take care of it in his own time
  that as parents it was our responsiblity to beat our children
  that there was no where else to go

  maybe I would have left at 2 weeks - or 3 months - or 2 years - or...

  maybe if I felt like there were choices I might have discovered my power a lot earlier. I would say the WT IS responsible for what they teach people.

  As for the depression PTSD anxiety panic.... well some of that is pre-JWdom. Some of it is from the abusive marriage.

  BUT a lot of that comes from teachings that leave a person feeling there is no choice. Obey or else.

  After I left I still had to deal with ALL the abuse issues - the sexual abuse, the physical abuse, the emotional abuse. That was the order I dealt with them. And when all that was done the was one more to look at - spiritual abuse.

  The whole issue of spiritual abuse had been longer - probably because the others were much more pressing for me when I first left. But after about five years out I found a great anger, sadness and grief at the spiritual abuse. Again I had trusted someone - something and had been badly hurt.

  I had been conned and lied to. Information had been withheld. I was controlled and manipulated.

  I will be 50 years old in a few days. I went to a 1st birthday party for a friend's little boy today. I sat there watching this little guy dig into his birthday cake. Fists full of icing and cake smeared all over his face. He had a ball. Just like all the pictures we see of baby's and birthday cakes. It was delightful to watch.

  But underneath my delight at watching this little fellow was a sadness that I never got to watch my children do this when they were little. So many things we missed out on becuase they were "wrong" or "pagan" and therefore "Satanic"

  I don't remember birthdays before the JWs. I had my first birthday party when I turned 40. Now this isn't a problem but it makes me - us - different. How many things have we missed? How many times have you entered a situation and not known the "rules" or expected participation? What do you say when someone asks you about birthdays and xmas and all you are stuck with is a blank history or "I went on service"

  I see that there are many times when I am in a new situation - one that most people are familiar with - that I am out of my element. I find myself sitting on the sidelines watching how people "do it"

  Not problems really - just little things at this point. Customs - socialization - ways of being that were missed and need to be learned now.

  Sometimes it is adolescence, sometimes childhood, and sometimes a stage of life later on that we need to go back to and learn

  Tehy are not responsible for everything but theyare responsible for some things and they certainly contributed to a lot.

  A not-so-silent lamb
  
  Aspire to inspire before you expire