Min,
This is what I would say to JW lurkers. Think!
There are a few things the JW's say that convince the not so intuitive bible study or young born into JW that they are speaking the truth. One of them is their little speech about people outside of the religion warning them about the religion and saying it is wrong and staying in it would bring you religious persecution. When people do indeed make those statements to them a little light goes off in their head and they see this little trick as some kind of a god inspired prophesy. They think the JW's must be the true religion because people said exactly what the JW's said they would say.
This is nothing more than a little carnival palm readers trick to convince their paying sucker that they do have the power of seeing into the future and being the only god inspired voice. There was a time in history directly before Constantine did a little politically influenced flip flop and made the Christian religion the official religion of Rome, this statement had some validity. If a Christian admitted his convictions he was indeed persecuted. The JW's take this act of natural concern by friends and family and use it to convince their gullible listener they are right. They go on to convince their "interested one" that they might need to distance themselves from their current friends and family because of this verbal persecution and only associate with those who their friends and family have warned them about. This is a key ingredient in the recipe of creating a cult member. It is the same trick done by all cults to insure the exclusivity of their tight nit group as they take away the minds of their people and replace it with their own collective mind that demands complete obedience.
They seal this twisted cult trick by quoting a scripture that tells the newly converted one that they must choose between their unbelieving mother, father, son, daughter, husband or wife to become a true Christian. At his point, they have redefined the words "love" and "family" and given a new interpretation of them that they now have complete control over because they now have complete control over your mind.
Once this is done, it makes the now converted cult member completely dependent on their new religious social families words and thoughts. The transformation of making this cult their new exclusive family and friends by calling each other "brothers" and "sisters" just cements this born-with need for a triable environment. Once they have been persuaded to make this family conversion it is very hard to break from it and go back to a normal life. Born-in-to's have a much harder time getting out of a cult than those who were hooked by the carnival trick of preaching because their natural family is already a part of the collective thinking cult and they feel they have no place else to go.
To insure their mindless loyalty, they convince their members that reading or listing to anything that talks against their cult family are based on lies influenced by the devil. They also convince them that the smallest doubt they may develop toward the cult is from their own weakness caused by trying to use their own mind that has developed a tiny crack in it and will allow the devil to creep in and destroy them. This develops a psychological batted for those who have an instinctive need to be honest with themselves and explore things that the sliver of individuality they were born with starts to pop up and identify itself.
When this inherent honesty is brought out in the open in a manner to investigate things a person sees as wrong, they then get the speech about how evil independent thinking is and how god wants them to go back the mindless state of blind acceptance. To be a real thinking human and use your own intelligence and logical sense of right and wrong is immediately put down with warnings of everlasting death, destruction, and abandonment by your only true family.
The JW's warnings are now coming back to kick them in the ass. As independent thinking people who have the ability to be honest with themselves, exJW's warn the middle of the road JW that JW's will persecute them if they disagree with just "one tiny thing" written by the WTBTS. It is only the leaders of the cult who are allowed to "present" mistakes as "new light" without fear of repercussions. The average JW can be disfellowshipped as an apostate for "presenting" the same issue as a doubt before the cult leaders are forced to recognize their mistake and deceptively change it to cover their lack of divine inspiration. Many on this board have had exactly that happen to them.
We will also encourage you to be an independent thinker and question and explore those feeling of doubt you have inside. We will not tell you to read or listen to only what we say and write. We will encourage you to explore anything you wish that will help you discover the truth about the truth. We will not convince you that our little group is the one and only group that will bring you happiness, we are simply a stepping stone to aide you in your own self discovery. We will encourage you to open your eyes and see what this beautiful world has to offer.
We will simply help you discover who you are as a person, not as a mindless, opinion-less, cog in the watchtower publication company cult machine that operates on fear and ignorance of their people. We invite questions and opinion that explore all issues of the JW religion and encourage you to discuss them with an open mind. If you wish to keep your mind closed and hide your individualism and inner honesty, then stay exactly were you are.
Dave
