Were you ever surprised by who DIDN'T shun you?

smack

yeah, everyone........all my relatives didn't. All the old cong didn't.

Go figure.....

Steve

berylblue

Sister O. was one tough cookie. An elderly Greek woman, she had spent time in prison in Greece for being a Witness.

I hated being around her. Hated going out in service with her. She found fault with everything I said or did. She counselled me on my clothing more than once (there was nothing wrong with my clothing.)

After being DF, I was walking down a street and lo and behold, a car group of dubs. I hadn't seen any of them for months. Sister O. runs up to me, takes my hand and starts telling me how much she loves me.

I said, "Sister O., I am still DF."

"Oh, I don't care about that." She embraced me and she started conversing. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her son, the elder, coming toward us.

"Sister O. I am so glad you spoke with me, but your son is coming, and I don't want you to get in trouble."

"I don't care about that,"

But I sure cared, didn't want her jerk son counselling her, so I said my farewells and moved along down the street.

Also, an annointed elderly man regularly spoke to me when I was DF.That, actually, didn't surprise me once. He often spoke of the abuse of DF.

nobody told me

An elder just bullshitted about his truck being hit, where I was working. No one was around, so no one could see. Fear of man is really what they have, doesn't he know god can see all things?

garybuss

I was shocked I was shunned at all. I was still a believer. It was 1992. I had been inactive 18 years and never shunned before. I had just written "Jehovah's Witness" on my hospital registration religion of choice the year before.

The shunning started before my investigation started. The shunning prompted it. When the shunning started, all the subsurface anger and unanswered questions came flooding to the surface. Those were so painful that they interfered with my life and they required attention and resolution. By reading history and talking to former members and confronting "them", I achieved satisfaction and then peace. The shunning was a gift in that it was the motivation I needed to challenge the unchallengeable. I was surprised my parents rejected me. I would have bet my life they would NEVER reject me.

Now the shunning is a gift because it keeps "them" away and our family is functioning and we all are doing better without "them". I hope it continues. Once a person identifies themselves as one who will shun or snub me because of something I did when I was 12 years old, I am happy to exclude that person from my life forever. I won't insult my current friends and my healthy family by mourning over "them".

The ones who don't shun me are expected to not shun me. There's nothing surprising about a person being decent. That's expected. Witnesses are like anybody else, they have free will and freedom of choice and they are held accountable for their own behaviors. Good topic, thanks for starting it. GaryB

Holey_Cheeses*King_of_the juice.

The ones who don't engage in such fanatical behavior towards me (or others who may be in a similar situation) are those that I consider fair and reasonable people (i.e. 'borderline' jws). They treat people as they deserve to be treated - displaying what the dubs like to be known as the christlike personality.

In return I give them the respect they deserve, even though I have no time for the religion which they still cling tenuously to, for whatever reason.

cheeses.

refiners fire

This matter of shunning is something ive never thought over much about because my whole family left the org about the same time. So it never caused me any serious inconvenience, certainly it never caused me deep hardship such as a poster like "ozziepost" suffers at the hands of his own children.

But this week, for some reason, I have been thinking upon it and remembering things. Remembering how, whenever i encountered a dub I would never know, as they approached me, whether they would stop and speak, or address me and keep walking, or move past pretending I didnt exist, or turn aside with a look of disgust on their face. Even after many years out of the org, whenever I was forced by circumstance into their milieu ( such as at my fathers funeral) I would find myself suffering silently as some treated me like something that crawled from the sewer while others came up all concerned and emotional, all touchy feely with me.Its a hurtful thing to see someone you thought was fond of you turn aside from you with a facial expression like you are a slug that just crawled from under a rock. Why should THEY have that right? Why do I put up with it?

I eventually tired of playing their game and became exceeding angry over the whole thing. Why should they dictate the terms of association after 25 years out of the org? So I choose, if I encounter them again, to ignore them all now, even the ones who would give signals that they might approach me.We have nothing in common any more anyway.

Were you ever surprised by who DIDN'T shun you?

berylblue

smack

berylblue

nobody told me

garybuss

Holey_Cheeses*King_of_the juice.

refiners fire

SadElder

Brummie

berylblue

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