by The Real Edward Gentry 44 Replies latest jw friends
Not to be overly harsh...but if you just left, what the hell were you thinking? Between 1995 and now, you never did an internet search of "Jehovahs-Witness" or "Watchtower"? Good god.
The heyday of ex-jw boards was 15-20 years ago. And its all still out there. As is everything. What the hell were you people thinking? Did you not own a computer?
I guess I was just kind of dumb. Thanks so much for reminding me ...
Freddo u were not dumb. Discussion Boards were little more than venting machines where people seemed to enjoy going on the attack.
Hi Ruby ... I was being at least somewhat tongue in cheek, but thanks.
Question for OP.
When did you leave, Sherlock?
freddo so was I especially in view to the title of this thread. I think there are plenty of bruised and battered people around who would enjoy real discussions about their faith and whatever else ....
editt: 15-20 years ago was a period of financial affluence for almost everyone and those who'd made it financially were better off than today and could offer something from their own experiences out in the world.
I was terrified of looking up JWs on the internet. I remember i'd read a news article and get really angry inside as if was being attacked personally.
Although the O.P may upset some recent leavers, the question crossed my mind some time ago, I reasoned "If they haven't awoken by now, they never will". This was when the overlapping generation rubbish came out.
I came to realise though that the JW mind is taught that if you don't "understand" the Orgs explanation ( "understand"= cannot swallow it ) then "leave it in Jehovah's hands" it will get sorted eventually, just stop thinking and carry on !
Of course, most JW's are shit-scared of anything with a whiff of Apostate about it, so will not read any Sites that seem "anti", hence the wealth of information and fine reasoning to be found on-line never gets a chance to be considered.
They are trapped in a mental Prison. They build and maintain the bars of the Prison themselves, thinking they are doing the right thing. Sad.
They are trapped in a mental Prison. They build and maintain the bars of the Prison themselves, thinking they are doing the right thing.
That's exactly why I never really researched JW beliefs until I allowed myself to do so when I was already 35.
It takes time to chisel away those prison bars, especially when it's yourself who is building and maintaining these bars at the same time....
Phizzy you are 100% correct. The overlapping generation thing made no difference to me. Jehovah will sort it out. Getting the new bible annoyed me and seemed like a waste of resources. Still Jehovah will sort it out.
It wasn't until I was trying to teach my children that the red flags started to come up. Explaining things we believed sounded ridiculous coming out of my mouth and my children's faces said it all. Lol.
Never never would you willingly come to a forum such as this and read the words of apostates. Satan will enter your mind and lead you astray. Pft.
I think that the answer to the OP is that the trigger that awakens people is almost, if ever, logic.
The reason is that logical thinking has itself been subverted by JW conditioning. After all, if it was simply a matter of assembling and assessing the facts, then there would be no JW followers. None.
If you accept the premises that the world is full of evil people and that anyone who speaks against the JW organisation is an apostate who only tells lies. If you accept that the GB are, at the same time, fallible humans and yet divinely directed\inspired, then it doesn't matter how rational, intelligent or logical you are. In fact! These attributes will work against you as you will use those abilities to defend and reinforce your beliefs.
The factors involved in a trigger that awakens people are complex and almost random. Take the child abuse scandal for example. In theory that should be enough to awaken 100% of JW's. But a percentage of those on hearing about the child abuse scandal will "Wait on Jehovah", a percentage won't believe it at all and some will even not have heard about it at all. Of those that would be woken up, some will remain JW's through fear of losing their family, some through fear of death at Armageddon and so on. It's a minor miracle when all the factors align for a single person to wake them up.
