My thoughts on hating the WTS.

by kwintestal 31 Replies latest jw friends

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  Taylor S.

  I spent my first two years after I got out getting even -1989 to 1991. A person has the power the shut down the door-to-door work at a KH, if he wants to put in the time. You can take all the joy out of going to the KH for them and any respect in the community. After 2 years of guerilla warfare, I got on with my life and never looked back.

  shalom,

  Moshe

  Moshe ... I'd love to hear that story. Did you post it anywhere on this site? Not that I plan on any guerrilla tactics, just curious.

  I left the org in '89. But I only recently started hating them. Thing is, when I left, I still believed the big A was around the corner. I was nineteen and knew I couldn't live such boring life ... going door to door was not my thing. I'd always been mortified in field service when I ran into someone I knew, someone from school ... or later in my teens, someone I'd slept with. I'd never been a good little witness anyway ... secretly indulging my lascivious desires since I was young teen. I just wanted to have fun. I wanted a real life. And if I had to go to another 'gathering' where we all sat around playing some word game I would've slit my wrist.

  So I left. Disassociated myself from family and friends.

  But the point is, even as I partied and played I was always looking over my shoulder terrified of my inevitable fate. I was haunted my fear of the big A.

  That was twenty years ago. I had once thought that growing up JW made me a better person. Now I know that it's damaged me. This site is like therapy. I've only been on here a week and I've gone through thread after thread ... reconnecting with a past I've mostly blocked out. I now realized had I not be indoctrinated and mostly assimilated by the borg, my life would have taken a much different course. It's wasn't until my thirties, ten years after leaving, that I began to see the cult-like nature of the JWs, and it began to dawn on me that the big A wasn't coming ... at least not in the way they were preaching.

  I went back to school, and regreted not doing it earlier. I don't hate witnesses individually ... I hate the organization. I hate that my mom is still under their spell. I hate the fact that I lived my life for a decade believing I was on some list of those to die and be eaten my vultures. That supposed inevitablity affects how you live your life. I engaged in every reckless behavior imaginable, drugs & sex (lots and lots of drugs and sex). It took a decade to pull myself out of that hedonistic downslide ... and almost another one to get over it.

  Yeah ... I hate them.

  Someone once said that life begins at forty. Well, in my case ... its 39.

  taylorS
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  lilybird

  The WTS , when you realize what a lying mindgame they play with their followers, is easy to hate. When I left 18 years ago, I didn't hate the org or anyone in it, I was just happy to make my escape. And I was too busy raising 3 kids to think much more about it. Just the last year or so, (maybe as your kids get closer to adulthood and I am in my 40's now) I have become more reflective on just how much damage the WTS did do to my life. While my life has fortunately turned out great, with my husband and kids, I know I would have more choices. That makes me angry and I did hate for a while. This forum has brought out a lot more lies about the WTS that I never knew, and it shocks my husband also. But I have decided that hate is an energy waster, While it is theraputic to discuss our feeling about our time "wasted" in the org, I have decided not to hate. I feel sorry for the friends I left behind who are still under the black spell of the WTS. I am happy to help anyone see the "Truth"about the WTS.But life is too short and I want to enjoy what I have back after so many lost years. Still I am thankful for this discussion forum and for all the insightful postings from others who understand what I have gone through.
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  Will Power

  I hate that the WT teaches to hate what AND who is bad. They use that scripture then say that when the badness is so ingrained in the person, you must hate the person as well.

  Any blind JW would say NO WAY they teach that hate is ok, even tho JESUS is quoted as saying to love you enemies. Who would you rather answer to?

  from quotes site:

  Watchtower 1961 July 15 p.420 A Time and Place for Everything ***

  Jesus encouraged his followers to love their enemies, but God's Word also says to "hate what is bad." When a person persists in a way of badness after knowing what is right, when the bad becomes so ingrained that it is an inseparable part of his make-up, then in order to hate what is bad a Christian must hate the person with whom the badness is inseparably linked. Indicating that Jesus did not mean for us to love the hardened enemies of Jehovah, David expressed this God-approved attitude: "Do I not hate those who are intensely hating you, O Jehovah, and do I not feel a loathing for those revolting against you? With a complete hatred I do hate them. They have become to me real enemies."-Matt. 5:44; Amos 5:15; Ps. 139:21, 22.

  [Emphasis Added]
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  frankiespeakin

  I think hating the WT is misguided it is better to hate the Governing Body that steer the WT. Hate the right ones not an nonpersonal organiztion.

  I don't think all types of hate is destructive to the hater,,in fact some hate can be very productive if we express it properly and intelligently. If you suppress your hate for the Governing Body or maybe "repression" is a better word. If you simply repress your hate for the Governing Body you do more harm to your psyche. One needs to find legitimate outlets or socially acceptable way to deal with the anger and hate one feels towards the Governing Body. After all the Governing Body has done great harm to many by thier lies and cruel treatment through enforced shunning. I think we hurt ourselves greatly if we just bury it or repress these feelings. They will bite you in the ass latter if you just repress these feelings.

  Some legitimate ways of expressing hatred for the Governing Body:

  Posting on this forum and exposing them for what they are (within the bound of propriety).

  Making websites that expose the Governing Body cruelty and hypocrisy (Quotes comes to mind as well as many other sites).

  Mailing information exposing the GB

  Getting information out to the public about the GB

  Lawsuits aimed at crippling the GB

  There are many healthy ways to deal with the anger that don't involve repression, that don't involve harmful destructive emotions. Maybe even imaginary inactments like going out in the woods with a stick and makeing beleive a big rock or tree is the Governing Body and beat the shit out of it while you scream letting out your pain that the Governing Body has caused in your life.

  I guess it all depend on who much the Organization run by the Governing Body has hurt you personally, would determine what steps to take some have not been hurt that much others have been greatly hurt.
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  jeanniebeanz

  LOL @ Dave

  Personally, I believe that hate has its place. It keeps us from getting involved in unwanted/destructive behaviours, and can help with the resolve to move past a problem. Not all hate is wrong.

  Do you hate Child Abusers, Rapists, Ax Murderers? The WTBTS has earned the hate of some of us by taking evil actions in our lives. We do not sit around and simmer in it, but it is there. To discount our feelings without knowing more about what they did to us individually is ignorant.

  Jeannie
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  HadEnuf

  I hate them but I try not to think about them (then why am I on this site??? Hmmmmmmmm!!!!) because I have to watch my blood pressure. I read a lot of books on forgiveness; but so far I haven't been able to reach that point.

  Sometimes I wish I would get clunked on the head and suffer from selective amnesia concerning anything to do with my life in the borg.

  Cathy L.
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  Mary

  I'm sure many of Jesus' new followers would start threads about having their hands cut off, being stoned and the secret backroom shenanigans of the Pharisees

  Now that's just silly talk. How on earth could they have started a thread if their hands had been chopped off?? Write with their toes?
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  Goldminer

  The bible says Jesus left us a model to follow his footsteps closely.Well,Jesus stood up to the hypocrisy of the religious leaders of his day! Shouldn't we?

  That's how I see it.
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  MAHABA

  To hate them would be equal to hate myself, because for a long time , I share to a certain extent their thoughts. I think we don't have to hate anybody. Only their wrongdoing. Each one of us is an island which as been assaulted in various way by the WTB&TS. Some of us as been raped from the youth, on a spiritual level, by parents who were trying honestly(for most of them)to teach them by what they believed to be the will of God. Some of us has submitted volontary to spiritual deflowering because we were at that time subjugates by the words we were taught. Some of us have willfully dispised those who where not thinking like us, when whe where JW's. Some of us have go to the point of disfellowship some of our fellowbelievers. So in that case, we have to hope mercy of those who have been harmed by us. Just reflect about those who follow during WWII Hitler, honestly believing that he would be the kind of leader who would brought wealth and hapiness to the German Nation. Our life is too short for consuming it in hatred. Nevertheless I think that for people who have been injured in their flesh and soul by some in or by the WTB&TS,a feeling of hatred is normal. But this feeling have to disseaper, in order for the harmed to be healed. Ivan.
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  trevor

  Most Jehovah?s Witness are sincere people, who have in many cases been attracted to the movement by a genuine desire to understand the Bible and serve God as best they can. They are often very kind people who have become unwittingly involved. Their distant and sometimes hostile attitude towards those outside the movement is a result of what the Society term ?mental regulating,? in the form of books, magazines, lectures, question and answer discussions and private counselling - coupled with a fear of expulsion if they associate with anyone who their Society see as a threat to their cause.

  Most members would show a great deal more empathy if they were not actively encouraged to view all outsiders as sinners who are about to be killed by the God they love. After many years in the movement and being trained to view all outsiders with suspicion, believing that they are a threat to their salvation, it is inevitable that some Witnesses have lost a great deal of their feeling towards people who are not part of their organization.

  I don?t hate them but see many of them as victims of a cult. It is one thing to disagree with them and be aware of the harm they do but to feel hatred is a negative response that weakens those who cannot get beyond it. Hate has its place for a moment but is a destructive emotion that does harm to the person who allows it to continue to exist in them for the long term.