OneEyedJoe
JoinedPosts by OneEyedJoe
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47
I Ain't Got No Religion No More ... (But I Like to Get Myself Some Gospel Music)
by Simon ini love gospel music.
i don't feel like i need to believe in "jebus" to appreciate the music.
i can't go into a gospel church because i might just get religion again - that or i'll be grabbing the mic on be on the stage waving my hands and praising the lord.. i particularly like dylan's gospel period.
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17
Antiwitnessing: cowards
by john.prestor inso i'm downtown and i see two jws hanging out on a bench by a cart.
i approached them and said, i saw you guys on the news, there was a child abuse cover-up in philadelphia.
they don't respond and just look at me.
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OneEyedJoe
This approach seems unlikely to accomplish anything other than giving you a feeling of superiority.
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OneEyedJoe
Why do they need a picture to let someone apply to work for free? That's just creepy.
Always nice to see that the org's sexism is still in tact - why do they need to specify that a sister applying to volunteer needs to make arrangements for any minor children? Wouldn't a man with minor children need to make exactly the same arrangements? Is this something that a man would automatically plan for but when a woman is involved it might just slip her mind?
It's pretty sad when you have to send a letter to a bunch of grown adults to remind them to actually finish filling out a form before sending it in...
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45
A&E - Cults and Extreme Belief - Jehovah's Witnesses
by Incognito ini haven't seen this posted.. tuesday may 29, 2018 @ 10pm (new york time zone).
cults and extreme belief - jehovah's witnesses.
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OneEyedJoe
I thought this was really well done. It might've been good to add a little more about how they control members, but obviously there's only so much time for the episode. I think this is the first thing I've seen on JWs in the media where they I didn't catch minor mistakes that'd turn off normal JWs... I'm not sure if that means it was especially well done (I think so) or that I've just been out long enough that I'm not so sensitive to mistakes. In any event, it's wonderful to know that, at the very least, lots of non JWs are now inoculated against this cult.
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Random Musing of an ex-JW between a rock and a hard place.
by StarTrekAngel inmany of you may recall pass postings of mine where i mentioned my plans of moving away from my current neighborhood.
mainly because my office got moved and now my commute is about one hour each way.
my employer is pretty flexible so showing up on time, for now, is not an issue.
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OneEyedJoe
I'm sorry you're put in such a difficult situation. You're clearly a very generous and giving person, trying to take care of your mother-in-law as you have been and are endeavoring to continue doing. It's terrible that she's trying to take advantage of that altruism to manipulate you even further. Honestly, though, she's an adult and she ought to be well acquainted with the concept of living with the consequences of her actions. If she should decide not to move with you, then that in no way obligates you to provide her alternate housing, especially when doing so would be a large burden on your finances. You've given her a generous offer and she's spat in your face and asked for more. You're not required to take care of her, and if she doesn't want your generosity unless it's on her unreasonable terms, then she should have to live with the consequences.
Try and remind yourself regularly that not everything in the world is your responsibility. A lot of people see problems and feel that if they don't solve them, no one will - even if those problems aren't really theirs to solve. Just like when parents are too quick to solve the problems of their child, it results in over-dependence on the parent, the same can happen in any relationship. It often happens that children supersede their parent's maturity and responsibility, and when the children feel an obligation to ensure their parents' lives don't go awry, the relationship can invert and the child ends up parenting the parent...it sounds like that's what's happened here. Just like a good parent ensures that children learn to solve their own problems and take responsibility for their mistakes, your mother-in-law is unlikely to ever stop relying on you (and still manipulating you) until you force her to face the consequences of her actions. So, my best advice to you would be to free yourself from feeling obligated to anyone's unreasonable demands.
I definitely understand how you're feeling with regard to the cult being inescapable. I remember at one point when I was going through the process of trying to get an agreement from my exwife to finalize the divorce, she forced me to jump through several cult hoops and in that moment it felt like such a setback - I'd made so much progress removing myself from the cult but it was still controlling my life. But I promise you, you can get completely free. Unfortunately, though, that might just require finally letting go of the manipulative and abusive people in your life that seek to control you and take advantage of you.
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The emotionally manipulative techniques JW families use.
by stuckinarut2 ini am really disturbed by some methods that jw family members try and use to emotionally manipulate us back into the organization.. one of our fellow posters here has had a family member send several photos of them as a child either out witnessing, and at an assembly.. no words - just those pictures.. it seems such an infantile and manipulative technique to employ?!.
do they think that we will all simply ignore the logical and factual reasons we no longer attend, just because we see some sentimental picture?
do they not see that this actually may reinforce our understanding that we were raised as children in a high-control religious group where we had to please our parents.
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OneEyedJoe
Haha well I'm glad my inane ramblings could be of use to someone.
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23
The emotionally manipulative techniques JW families use.
by stuckinarut2 ini am really disturbed by some methods that jw family members try and use to emotionally manipulate us back into the organization.. one of our fellow posters here has had a family member send several photos of them as a child either out witnessing, and at an assembly.. no words - just those pictures.. it seems such an infantile and manipulative technique to employ?!.
do they think that we will all simply ignore the logical and factual reasons we no longer attend, just because we see some sentimental picture?
do they not see that this actually may reinforce our understanding that we were raised as children in a high-control religious group where we had to please our parents.
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OneEyedJoe
While the emotional manipulation that we become subjected to upon leaving is, obviously, in large part due to explicit encouragement of manipulative tactics from the cult (i.e. shunning, telling people "we miss you" all the time, only calling when there's some special meeting we're supposed to go to, etc) I suspect that another significant component is just the level of emotional immaturity that the cult fosters in people in order to control them. Things like the culture of "stumbling" teaches people to blame others for their emotions - if someone does something that's not prohibited and you have a negative emotional response, they've stumbled you. Their advice for dealing with strong emotions is also terrible - essentially JWs are told to push their emotions aside and wait for god to fix it. So, instead of learning to take responsibility for their emotions and face/address them head-on, a culture of hiding their own emotions from themselves and blaming others for any negative feelings arises.
All this comes into full swing when they deal with people that have left. They refuse to acknowledge that they're sad because they're being artificially restricted from seeing someone and take responsibility for their own choices and feelings - instead they feel a bad feeling and blame the supposed proximate cause (which, by habit, is another person) and that person becomes labeled as bad. Then, when they engage in the instinct to seek empathy, they're so out of touch with their emotions that they can't tell you how they're feeling and take responsibility for it - instead they simply try to make you feel how their feeling via emotionally manipulative letters, phone calls, emails, etc. And because they've already labeled you as 'bad' and 'guilty' they'll refuse to acknowledge their immature behavior even if it's clearly pointed out to them because they're on "god's side" so they can't possibly be even partially wrong in the situation.
As I'm getting out more into the world and interacting with a range of new people, I've run into some other sorts of very controlling people outside of the JW cult - the more exposure to this sort of thing I get, the easier it is to see how a controlling cult-like system could spring up completely unintentionally out of a combination of emotional immaturity, insecurity and veiled narcissism. Some people just learn subconsciously that they can get people to do what they want that way, and don't even realize they're doing it. With JWs it's explicitly trained into them, but that doesn't mean they're any more aware of what they're doing.
So, while I refuse to have people in my life that are going to treat me in such manipulative ways, more than anything I feel sorry for these people that are floating through life with the perception that their emotional state is completely out of their control - being blown about by the winds of the world around them. We're all quite lucky to have escaped that.
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23
Banned words in the organization
by Addison0998 ini was talking to my sister in law the other day about death, and i mentioned something about the afterlife, i don’t remember what i said but it was nothing shocking .
but she squealed, “we don’t believe in the afterlife!
!” and i reasoned, well we kinda do...life after death is the after life..and she just insisted no no it’s not the same thing.
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OneEyedJoe
Hell my ex-wife once scolded me for saying "god" too many times in a conversation. "Why do you keep saying 'god?' His name is Jehovah!"
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Leah Remini to tackle JWs in new special
by betterdaze inthe star has a previous first-look production deal with the network to produce unscripted series following the success of her emmy-winning show “leah remini: scientology and the aftermath.” according to the hollywood reporter, remini will produce a special for the network during the break following season 3 of the acclaimed docuseries.. it notes that jehovah’s witnesses, while based on biblical teachings, have come under fire over the years for similar practices to the church remini left years ago.
for example, practices of ousting or shunning members who have dissenting views, a blanket refusal to participate in politics and government as well as not celebrating christmas or birthdays are all things that the special will reportedly cover.
additionally, the religion has predicted the literal end of the world several times, obviously to no avail.. .
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OneEyedJoe
In my morning haze I read the title and the image of Leah Remini jumping out of some bushes to tackle JWs while they're writing down not-at-homes came to mind. Now I'm not sure which show I want her to make.
It's lovely all the press JWs are getting lately between this and the upcoming "Cults and Extreme Belief" documentary. I hope they all manage to do a good job and aren't full of minor mistakes that JWs will seize upon.
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Cults and extreme belief
by Butyoucanneverleave ina&e has a new show this season called cults and extreme belief.
the second episode will air on 5/29 at 9:00 pm and jehovah's witnesses will be featured.
hopefully they do a good job exposing them for what they really are.
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OneEyedJoe
I looked on their website and they name lots of cults but not the JWs. I hope they show up...The first episode is May 28 and is on the group Nxivm. That is the group that came out in the last few weeks where celebrities and others were held as sex slaves for a nutty guru.
As mentioned in the OP - the second episode airs 5/29 and is about JWs.