More extreme witnesses

by freedom96 14 Replies latest jw friends

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  freedom96

  A recent thread about "bad" music groups reminded me of when I was growing up. My mom went through my record collection, and literally scratched with a nail all the "bad" songs on the record. In some cases, I was lucky , fortunate to keep one or two songs on an album.

  Sure enough, years later, as a fan of music, I kept many old albums, and going through them I saw how many scratches were on the records. Deep scratches, so you could not play the song at all. And then, sometimes she would mess up and accidently cut into a good song.

  The PO of our hall even came over and gave his approval or more often than not, his disapproval over my record collection.

  Not only did I have to answer up to my parents, but the damn elders! And my dad was an elder, and anything I did wrong I still had to answer up to the elders, like having two sets of parents!

  We all remember the core rules, but what extremes did you experience?
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  refiners fire

  When I was a kid I had a lot of trouble with the Old Man because of comic books I used to buy. These were super hero comics, Captain America and the like. He read one once, it was called Mighty Thor, and he decided this was Satanic information sneaking in the back door of my conciousness and he blanket banned all comic books. Of course, I bought them in secret, and, when caught, copped a hiding.
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  refiners fire

  You cant ban people from having things they want, you cant stop people seeking things they need. I recall reading that members of Davis Koresh Waco group, when they occassionally were allowed into town could be found gorging themselves in Kentucky fried and McDonalds.Feasting in the Ice cream parlour. Eating of the "forbidden food" till they were fit to burst.
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  Francois

  You cannot convince a man against his will. He will continue believing just as he did before, even if he does fake it for appearance sake.

  francois
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  Eyebrow2

  I have to admit...I was a bit of a Nazi witness at times...

  my poor younger brother: my mom and I would gang up on him and make him go through his comics, and take away what was violent or demonic....he has since forgiven me =)

  I also totally destroyed a huge collection of tapes I had....all of my Grateful Dead tapes, and a bunch of others when I decided to get serious about 'the truth"....

  The worst thing I ever did was read my sisters diary when she had gone "astray". I found out that a ministerial servent, who was getting married in a few weeks, had ripped opened her shirt and asked to touch her breasts. He was a very good friend of mind, and I was so angry that I took one of my other friends from the hall, a brother that he studied with and confronted him. I found out about a year after he got married...and his wife never knew. I told him he had 1 week to go to the elders or I would. He was counseled, and my sister was reprimanded, and was not allowed to go out in service....dare I say this helped push her out, and caused a rift in our relationship.

  I should have just kicked his ass.....that would have been more appropriate, and a lot more fun. (I'm a big girl, I coulda taken him hahah)

  Boy was I an extremist bitch! Luckily, my sister has forgiven me.
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  mattnoel

  My Mum wasnt too bad but when that b*stard stepfather came along he took some music away from me, took the tv outta my bedroom, took the phone out my bedroom, moved me into the box room, didnt let me watch a lot of things on tv, didnt let me read worldly books and so on.

  I know of some witnesses that were only allowed to watch Thomas the Tank engine on tv and some no TV at all. Very sad, these are kids, why cant they live like kids !
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  rocketman

  I'm happy to report that nobody went through my LP collection, because my parents were reasonable people. But there are enough posts and various accounts to substantiate that the jw mindset on the matter is ridiculously restrictive. There is another thread still active, about 'music groups that pi$$ ooff the jws' that relates some experiences.
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  Ghosthunter

  When I was about 15 or 16, back in the 80's when all the "backward masking" crap was rearing it's ugly head, my mom went through my albums and threw away just about everything I owned. Led Zeppelin, Styx, Rush, Fleetwood Mac (Stevie Nicks was a witch), etc. She threw it all in the dumpster behind the apartments we lived. Weird thing about it was is that I went back to look at all my albums the next day and they were all spread around the dumpster, even though my mom put them in a neat pile. My mom FREAKED and said it was demons that moved the albums around and that I should thank her for getting rid of them!!!!!!!
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  hippikon

  I was harder on myself than any elder was
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  zucker

  I was also my worst enemy. I destroyed dozens of my cd's and games in a effort to get serious about da truth. Then I would buy them back becuase I loved them so much and destroyed them again when I tried to get back into being a perfect witness. I grew tired of being someone that wasn't me.