After leaving the JWs

by punkofnice 19 Replies latest jw experiences

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  punkofnice

  How do I view the world after leaving the JWs?

  1. Most politicians are disgusting filth. Political parties are disgusting filth. As George Carlin commented, 'it's a big club and you ain't in it!'

  Actually, that's about the same as I felt about them in the Jobos. No change there.

  2. the mainstream media is manipulative, devious, money loving scum.

  Again, no change there.

  3. There probably isn't a God, Gods or Godhead. I can't prove this either way but the cards are stacked in there not being a sky bigot. It's all a big fairy story that people have bought into or been forced into believing by unscrupulous attention seeking narcissists in funny hats.

  Part of that is no change...although I wholly believe in God (the big J-man), when I was a Jobot.

  4. People are a let down.

  Nothing much to say about that.

  Much of how I see the world may not have changed much. However, the bit without God is a real game changer because there is no future.
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  Foolednomore

  My feelings exactly- The Watchtower is nothing more then a real estate giant hiding behind a religion. All for profit for some idiots at the top.
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  Simon

  I agree with the top 3

  The vast majority of people are good and decent, but too tolerant and scared to stand up to the smaller group who are violent, aggressive and amoral.

  In no small part because of #1 and #2
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  neat blue dog

  I agree with you punkofnice except for the part about God. I think it comes natural to humans to worship, and politicians and government can easily fill that void. It's no coincidence that some of the deadliest communist and socialist regimes were and are atheist, and that the general decline of religion in the US is accompanied by an increase in government dependency and being suckered into various social justice schemes that take on religious fervor but really serve insidious purposes. That's what made America great, the outright acknowledgement that rights were god-given and therefore inalienable, meaning the government didn't give them and therefore couldn't take them.
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  TonusOH

  I think that we don't change all that much in terms of who we really are, even when making such life-altering decisions. My behavior and general outlook on life changed very little even when I recognized that I didn't believe in god and was free of the shackles of the WTS and was no longer bound by any religious creed.

  Or maybe it's better to say that the changes I have made were driven more by more specific experiences and people/relationships, than they were by a religious affiliation or belief. Our brains don't seem very good at parsing the bigger picture; we focus on the stuff that's close to us and personal.
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  peacefulpete

  Life is an incredible stroke of luck and should be lived with as little needless conflict as possible. I'm going into surgery for advanced cancer tomorrow morn and can honestly say if I don't make it, it's been a good ride with few regrets. Humans are rather amazing given the winding evolutionary road we took to get here. We've made much progress that needs to be treasured and protected. Politics and the media are exactly what should be expected from naked apes that have just recently become civilized. It's the best we got and once in a while politicians raise to the occasion and do the right thing. Also, there are plenty of honest hardworking reporters not simply looking for ad revenue and fame. reward them by reading and weighing the facts. Most days I'm smiling more than not.
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  Biahi

  Oh, peacefulpete, sorry about your illness. Sending prayers your way! 🙏😘
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  Disillusioned JW

  Though many people, books, and web pages say it is "natural to humans to worship", such is not the case for me, at least not for invisible entities that I have no experience with. I've never seen, heard, felt, smelt, or had any other sensory experience of a god/God or spirit (nor have I detected any action which I consider to have been done by such), and thus it is not natural for me to worship such. When was a young child I had to be told (both by the WT literature, kingdom hall talks, and by my mother) to pray to Jehovah God at bedtime, during the start of every meal I have, to listen to prayers at WT/JW meetings (and I was conditioned to say Amen to prayers said out loud by other at such meetings), but I didn't like doing it. When I was a child I asked my mother why I have to pray. I wondered was the point and value of doing such so often. I wanted to not be required to pray to someone who newer communicated to me in any way I could discern at all. But, I continued to pray in all of those settings at least into my thirties (except maybe at bedtimes). During the last two years, or so, that I was assigned to pray out loud at the kingdom hall, I was thinking I wish I didn't have that assignment. That is because by then I had completely stopped believing that prayers in our modern times are ever answered by Jehovah God (even though I was still a ministerial servant at the time I was giving the public prayers).

  If it wasn't for me being conditioned and trained and told to worship Jehovah, I never would have worshipped him and I still wouldn't have worshipped some other god-concept. either. Yes there were times when I prayed in hopes of getting help from Jehovah, but I would never had done such if I hadn't be told for years that I had to pray. If I hadn't been told over and over to believe in Jehovah (and in supernaturalism in general, namely Jesus, Satan, angels, and demons and in alleged actions by them) I would not have believe din him (and them) after age 8 and perhaps I never would have believed in him (and them) - just as I never believed in Santa Claus, supernatural vampires, witchcraft (of kind was said to be without the help of Satan and/or demons), etc. Now a days, to me the idea of becoming an atheist as young child was a natural birth right which was taken away from me by the religious culture (especially in my case, taken away me from the influence of the WT through my parents and directly upon me). As a baby I was born without belief in God (or gods) and thus I was born as an atheist (in the sense of having total nonbelief in God/god), and I if I hadn't been raised to believe in Jehovah God I would never ever had believed in any God/god. Atheism was my natural birthright, a precious gift from nature.

  Yet because I had become so immersed in religion, due to the WT/JW religion's influence, it is hard for me to now completely stop studying religion (even WT literature). Now my studying of religion is solely as an intellectual exercise (to see what I can learn and put to use, such as to find evidence to tell to others that there is nothing supernatural). But I don't worship any more.
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  Disillusioned JW

  It is true that atheism is a core component of modern-day communism (at least the kind based upon the writings of the Karl Marx's, such as in his and Engel's Communist Manifesto), but atheism is one idea which communism got 100% correct!

  I have read some communist literature (including the Communist Manifesto) and by far the best (to me) communist literature I have ever read is the book called AWAY WITH ALL GODS! - Unchaining the Mind and Radically Changing the World, By Bob Avakian. That book is so great I bought a used copy of it. There is very much truth in that book. [I either found that book at a local thrift store or at a book sale by the local friends of the local public library.]

  By the way, according the Encyclopedia Britannica both of Karl Marx's parents were Jewish. The dad who was "a successful lawyer, was a man of the Enlightenment, devoted to Kant and Voltaire" and he converted to Christianity probably in order to keep his professional career. [See https://www.britannica.com/biography/Karl-Marx .] Karl Marx at the age of six years old became baptized as Christian. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, Karl Marx's "Jewish background exposed him to prejudice and discrimination that may have led him to question the role of religion in society and contributed to his desire for social change." Year later he began reading about the ideas of Hegel and eventually Karl Marx became and atheist.

  The Britannica article says that Karl Marx learned of "... Bruno Bauer, a young lecturer in theology, who was developing the idea that the Christian Gospels were a record not of history but of human fantasies arising from emotional needs and that Jesus had not been a historical person. Marx enrolled in a course of lectures given by Bauer on the prophet Isaiah. Bauer taught that a new social catastrophe “more tremendous” than that of the advent of Christianity was in the making. The Young Hegelians began moving rapidly toward atheism and also talked vaguely of political action."
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  Disillusioned JW

  peacefulpete, you made a great post! It is too bad that months ago I ceased being permitted on this site to mark posts "Like". [Nor, can I any longer mark any as "Dislike".]