WELCOME stm!! I'm glad you're here to give an ex-elder's point of view. There are still some nice decent elders out there but they are a vanishing breed.
Were You Afraid Of The Elders?.Did Ya Love Em?...What Was Your View of Them
by minimus 33 Replies latest jw friends
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Poztate
I just try to avoid them.I regard them much the same as I regard a rattlesnake.I keep my distance but when I get too close and hear the rattles start to go off I back off.They have a hard time hurting you if you keep a low profile and keep out of their way.I need to do this right now because of family that is in and this is why the WT still has so much control over people.If we could all tell them to F#@k off and take our familys out with us the WT would soon be shutting their doors. At least in the part of the world that has HIGH SPEED INTERNET....
Welcome STM
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karategirl
I wasn't afraid of them because I was one of the drones that never questioned as was labeled one of the "good youth" that didn't lead a double life. No, I was deathly afraid of my abusive step father who went on to become an elder years after I was df'd.
Funny, but I actually felt nervous around the higher up ones, ya know the POs, COs and the like. Like they were the freaking President of the United States or something. Especially the wealthy ones (which were many of them). See as a woman in the organization I already had low self esteem and felt inferior to such an important MAN. Almost like you wanted to put a scarf over your head just to talk to them.
Then there were the ones that you never could understand how they were elders because you knew how they treated their children and wives. I remember the perve that was on my first JC when I only got privately reproved. He asked so many details about exactly what me and my boyfriend did I thought he was going to start masturbating as we spoke. He wouldn't let up, "when he touched your breast was it over your shirt or did he slip his hand under your clothing and was that under your shirt but on top of your bra or did he unhook your bra too?" Seriously.
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BluesBrother
Like many other here, I was an elder.. I served (with some breaks when I moved congs.) for 24 years. Like STM I agree that the best ones are disappearing fast. Not all, but one or two that I served with were excellent people who managed to tread a line between the "Society's direction" and basic common sense , and they really cared for the flock - although I now accept that we were all barking up the wrong tree. My theory is that those men were better because they had experience of life before joining the dubs. Typically they came out of the armed services at the end of ww2, dissollusioned, and then fell into the WTS. By then they had seen and done a lot and knew how to handle life. Too many of the current crop are those who were brought up in the borg and have known nothing else. They are relatively young,(usually not the sons of the aforementioned elders - have you noticed?) and in terms of experience and judgement they have nothing to offer except a good knowlege of "What the society have said".. They have bred a generation of company men who have had only a basic education and pioneered .....what can one expect?
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Tim Horton
Powertrip, powertrip, powertrip. One elder even told me depression didn't exist. It was in my head and to just snap out of it. That was the P>O. His daughter has left the truth now. Disassociated herself actually. I wonder why eh. CHris
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tata
I don't love them, but I wasn't afraid either, I just respect them.
This is so true:
Brothers change when they become elders. I had good friends in the congregation, and when they became elders, they changed radiacally. Instead of remaining close friends, they distanced themselves from me, and made new friends amongst the productive ones.
My brother now is an elder and he change radically. When he became an elder I tell him not to change like everybody does, he said to me NO, but yes he change. -
minimus
Karategirl, Unfortunately, it is the Society that teaches these elders to ask such personal questions to see if your course of action was pre-planned or a momentary act of horniness.
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babygirl
being married to an elder for many, many years i did see a lot, elders reminded me of politicians, in the beginning wanted to reach out and help the people, only to get disillusioned, get caught up in the politics, the fights with the other disgruntled elders...eventually changing little by little til they get complaisant or just disgusted and don't care anymore. fortunately my husband had enough...he stepped down no longer wanting to mislead, eventually with a long stuggle i followed suit...did read coc and cried, got angry and fell away...now sometimes i still feel afraid of them coming after us, and becse lke most hve sme family who i see and assoc. with (conditional friends are gone)...it's funny though, my unconditional "worldly" family welcolmed me back w/open arms & no judgements.
yes this is my very first post
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minimus
Welcome Babygirl.
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franklin J
my Dad was an Elder; so I was never "afraid" of them. Dad was a considerate, mild mannered professional. He took his Eldership very seriously. But I can never accept the fact that he "bought into it".
even as a child; I percieved the elders in the former congregation we attended , Huntington NY., to be pompous and very pretentious. And they had no reason to be. My perception all these years later has not changed.
Simon summed it up in an old post ; which I still chuckle at to remember. In describing his local elders " Pathetic little men in cheap suits".