No one "MAKES" you do this or that.....Yes they do. No one "MAKES" a wife stay with an abusive husband. No one "MAKES" a child continue to be abused, especially if the child is in their mid teens. No altarboy was MADE to do perverse things to the priests. No one "MAKES" an employee stay at a job where they are discriminated against......Sure, no one "MAKES" us do anything. That is a faulty argument in my opinion.When persons exercise undue or excessive influence upon another, they can "MAKE" a person do or not do something against their natural wishes.
Jehovah's Witnesses Are Under Mind Control
by minimus 207 Replies latest jw friends
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undercover
Thus the control part. I see both ends of the argument and both sides have valid points. But having been there and done that, I have to agree that there is some kind of control that keeps us there. It's only when we are willing(or able) to break that control that we can be free or feel free from oppression.
Basically I agree with you, Minimus. But I understand the other side of the coin as well.
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Mr Lebowski
Just as I was getting ready to stop reading this board any more, Gary and others "grabbed the wheel" and swerved the thread onto a road I'd like to travel.
Are witnesses controlled? Yes - by their own insecurities, fears, motivations, and personal psychology. Not by the Society. They're like a fisherman that dangles bait - some fish take it, some fish don't. (With apologies to Peter.)
If Victor Frankl wasn't controlled by the Nazi concentration camp guards, in the most vicious and inhumane circumstances imaginable, then I certainly don't get to claim "Mind Control" for having played the JW game. (Frankl was a noted author - he was a trained psychiatrist and neurosurgeon when imprisoned in WWII by the Germans, and survived to tell the tale and write the book Man's Search for Meaning - I highly recommend it.)
I stayed in it because I was afraid - afraid of rejection by my family (especially my mother, whose conditional acceptance behavior predated her exposure to "the truth", but was magnified by it), afraid of rejection by everyone I knew, and a belief that I held no value apart from being the member of a group and couldn't make a difference in the outside world.
But acting out of fear is not being under "mind control". Many of the techniques some of you guys describe as mind control are used by many organizations - the military, many religious organizations, large corporations, etc. It would make a fascinating philosophical/scientific discussion - what is Mind Control? Where does the line get drawn? - but with all due respect, it probably isn't best answered in a forum with a lot of people who feel that they are victims of mind control - it's too hard to be objective. Many of us get too angry and too righteous, and I'm not sure what I learn when I'm in those states, but I personally feel that for me they feed that internal desire to play victim, rather than take responsibility.
I decided to go to meetings. I decided to knock on doors. I decided to not go out on dates. I decided to shun df'd friends. And eventually, I decided to leave the witnesses, and I knew that part of the price I would pay would be rejection by people close to me. I didn't like it, but you know what? The universe didn't care! That was still the price, and my job is to deal with it. My job on this planet, as far as I can tell, is to deal with what is, rather than resisting what is. Neither mentally "beating up"the Witnesses for "doing it to us" nor beating up ourselves for buying into it will change a darned thing. What do I want to do now?
You can't enslave a free man - the most you can do is kill him. Robert Anson Heinlein
Peace and compassion,
El Duderino
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minimus
Of course you agree with me Undercover. What I say makes sense.
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undercover
What I say makes sense.
Ooops, you posted on the wrong thread. The "nothing" thread is a few threads down.
I stayed in it because I was afraid - afraid of rejection by my family (especially my mother, whose conditional acceptance behavior predated her exposure to "the truth", but was magnified by it), afraid of rejection by everyone I knew, and a belief that I held no value apart from being the member of a group and couldn't make a difference in the outside world.
A good point, but, is this before or after you realized that you were duped? If you stayed in after knowing the "truth" isn't the truth, then yea, that was your own doing. But before knowing about the deception, the tactics used are to keep you duped and to keep you under their power. There, I have to go with being under their "control".
I think some of us are afraid to admit that we were under "control" like that. It makes us a little more insecure or embarrased or something.
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Mr Lebowski
So if someone lies to me, and I act based on believing that lie, am I absolved from responsibility for my actions?
I would answer "no". I would say that a defining condition of adulthood is taking responsibility for what we beleive, say, and do. I would further note that ignorance of the truth is not a defense in legal issues, dating back to the Magna Carta, I think...but that might be an irrelevant digression.
Actually, I suspect that the opposite of what you say is true. I think that many of us would rather beleive that we were controlled, that someone "did it to us", rather than say to ourselves and the world, "I freely chose of my own volition, to shun people that had been my friends, despite the pain I can now clearly see it caused them, because I was more afraid of what would happen if I broke the rules". I think that saying that out loud is seen as more embarrassing by most than saying, "look what they did to me!"
It's certainly easier to view others as responsible. I doubt that it gives us a useful place to answer the "what do I want to do now?" question, though... because asking the question presumes that we are responsible.
Big purple dinosaur feelings,
El Duderino
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undercover
I had a nice long post, but sumthin happened and it didn't work, oh well.
Anyway, I see your point and it has merit. I have mixed feelings on this subject. I see both sides. But having been in the organization, I see the tactics used to control how the JWs think, act, even speak. Maybe we can't blame everything wrong in our life on the WTS, but they have lied, deceived and played God to millions of people. I see that now and they won't control me anymore. From here on, I'm on my own.
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Mr Lebowski
Rock on, UC.
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heathen
Well now this has been a most interesting discussion. I was never in the org . so I'm merely trying to get an idea of exactly what the mentality is of these people . So far the majority of you are convinced that they are socio paths . I get the feeling that there are alot of people in the org. that have only one ideal and that is to put up a front of piousness above and beyond the call of duty . I must conclude here that these people are serving their own interests .
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minimus
The world is made up of "blamers". I agree that if ANYTHING goes wrong in their lives, some people like to blame the Witnesses for everything. But what needs not to be ignored, is that, to be a good Jehovah's Witness, you MUST follow the dictates of the organization.If you think otherwise you will wind up on this board. JW's are without a doubt affected and controlled by the machinations of the organization. I don't believe anyone could honestly refute that.