Which would you choose: Being born or the WTS never having existed?

by Elsewhere 16 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Elsewhere

  Those of us who are multi-generation "born into the WTS" people, exist only because the WTS exists.

  My grand parents were all JWs, both of my parents were born and raised in the religion and I was born and raised in the religion.

  The simple fact of the matter is that if it was not for the WTS existing neither of my parents would exist and therefore neither would I. Sure brings and interesting new twist on the time travel "go back in time and kill your father before you were conceived" paradox.

  Its an odd feeling owing your life to the very thing you hate most.

  Anyone else in the same situation?
• 

  under74

  yeah.

  It is odd but at the same time I've excepted it. Also, I don't regret being brought up JW. Would I have liked for it to be different? Sure. But being brought up the way I was and rejecting it later taught me a lot -so I don't regret it.
• 

  logansrun

  Its an odd feeling owing your life to the very thing you hate most.

  The JW organization is the thing you hate most, huh? Yeah, that big, mean, nasty WTS is just the most reprehensible thing on the planet! I surely would give up my very existence so that humanity could be saved from their evil.

  Give me a fucking break.

  Bradley
• 

  franklin J

  Think of it this way....

  the same wind that blows a ship across the ocean; can dash it to pieces on the rocks. It is the set of the sails that makes ALL the difference

  It is the perception in our minds that drives US. Do we really hate the Watchtower? No , I do not believe that. We no longer will let them control us or influence our decisions concerning our lives. WE MAKE OUR OWN DECISIONS and CAN THINK FOR OURSELVES.

  The Watchtower is nothing more than a group of men with differing opinions; amongst many other groups in existence.

  Life is a gift; our lives will be what we make of them.
• 

  logansrun

  franklin,

  It is the perception in our minds that drives US. Do we really hate the Watchtower? No , I do not believe that. We no longer will let them control us or influence our decisions concerning our lives. WE MAKE OUR OWN DECISIONS and CAN THINK FOR OURSELVES.

  I think that many ex-JWs do indeed hate the WTS. In fact, I think a lot of the hate on this site is really just pent-up feelings of REVENGE and FRUSTRATION. Most ex-JWs I've encountered don't seem to believe the wise words you write in the above, franklin. To their discredit...

  Bradley
• 

  JustTickledPink

  I don't think our parents having sex and procreating had anything to do with the WTS.

  I'm pretty sure if they weren't as busy with "field service" you'd actually have more family members, not fewer. They would have been home more making whoopie.

  The WTS always encouraged pioneering and singleness and holding off on having children because we were living at the time of the "end" so you being born wasn't a result of their allegience to the WTS, rather their need to just have sex.

  Your religion has been passed down, but so has your language, your color of eyes, lots of things.
• 

  NeonMadman

  I don't think our parents having sex and procreating had anything to do with the WTS.

  I'm pretty sure if they weren't as busy with "field service" you'd actually have more family members, not fewer. They would have been home more making whoopie.

  That might be true, assuming that they ever got together in the first place. But many people met who they met and married who they married because both were JW's. I'm safe, because I was a convert. But had I not been a JW, I would never have married my first wife, so my daughter would not exist. I might have other, different kids, but not the daughter whom I cherish. So I guess 30 years in cult hell did have a silver lining...
• 

  stopthepain

  I cant tell sometimes who I am angrier at,my parents or the wtbts.Both let me down considerably as a child.
• 

  logansrun

  Oh, for chrissakes what if the first proto-mammal had been killed by a falling meteorite? History would have been changed forever!

  If the Holocaust had never happened I'm sure I would never had been born as the interdependent nature of reality would have been radically altered. Am I glad the Holocaust happened? No, even though I owe my life to the slaughtering of 6 million Jews.

  Live in the present moment.

  Bradley
• 

  undercover

  Interesting theory, but you said:

  The simple fact of the matter is that if it was not for the WTS existing neither of my parents would exist and therefore neither would I.

  Almost anyone can say that if you change one factor in life. What if my great grandfather was killed in WWI or my grandfather killed in WWII? Then I would have never been born. The WTS is the factor that brought two people toegther somewhere in your ancestors history. It's not that you owe the WTS life, that's for sure. It's not a choice between existing as an ex-JW or not existing at all. We're the products of our ancestors, their history, their choices.

  Some are born into better situations than others. We can't change that, but we can choose to not let past generations dictate who or what we are.