Posts by humbled

10

Interview with an Apostate - Scratchme1010

by scratchme1010 in

for what it's worth:.

tell us a little about yourself and your family.. i am one of 7 children in my family, three boys, three girls and me.

yes, i'm right in the middle, and i'm the pink sheep of the family (or at least the official one).

humbled

Thanks for doing the interview, Scratchme. Reading it, there was a lot that was so different from my life experience. But a lot that was resonant. How you could assess the bullshit of the religion at such a young age really amazes me. I never questioned my world until much much later.

I had a happier childhood but that wasn’t or isn’t what makes a child able to sense BS—I know people who had extraordinary abuse as a child and it’s simply confused them and made them neurotic.

There were anger issues, as well as the footprint of my family culture, things that got in the way. I learned that those things mattered and needed to be addressed.

The above statement struck a chord with me—it was realizing that l had “issues” that l needed help with that made the difference for me. I was barely functional at a point- and couldn’t understand why.

It interests me that as empowered as you were so early on that you saw the anger issues and family culture impaired you. Talking to your friends must have helped? I have discovered so much just in being free to talk without shame or concern to defend myself or others. Just getting to talk.

Some of my family do not realize how unhealthy “kinks” in a family culture and violent events that just “hang” without resolving can subvert our efforts to find happiness or satisfaction.

So thoughtful. I wish you and your spouse well.

Edit: you have a cat? What about “Scratchme” if you don’t mind me asking?

23

Quick hello and recent baby pic.

by Darkknight757 in

just wanted to say a quick hello.

this was a pic yesterday on nurses week at henry ford with one of izabella’s primaries.

the first pic was at her nicu graduation.

humbled

I found the back story, Darkknight.

So l join your crowd of well-wishers: after so much heartbreak so happy this day has come for you& wife & Izabella . Hurrah for love and joy and new life!

31

Do Witnesses Experience Racial Discrimination To Your Knowledge?

by minimus in

jw
friends

my experience in the kingdom hall was that racial discrimination and profiling was not typically practiced....that i know of.

i was in a diverse city with every type of skin color and nationality imaginable.. i’m wondering if the witnesses have changed due to the current affairs exposed by the media everyday.

are there discrimination issues in jw land??

humbled

Hiddleswife— a thread you started @ 2 years ago. https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5439999279366144/org-racist-towards-sisters-color-particular-imo

I read it—the first thing l noticed was how civil the whole thing was. And it went all around.

31

Do Witnesses Experience Racial Discrimination To Your Knowledge?

by minimus in

jw
friends

my experience in the kingdom hall was that racial discrimination and profiling was not typically practiced....that i know of.

i was in a diverse city with every type of skin color and nationality imaginable.. i’m wondering if the witnesses have changed due to the current affairs exposed by the media everyday.

are there discrimination issues in jw land??

humbled

The bus driver story is interesting but there is a lot of conjecture going on. Perhaps you were rude to him and others because you spoke with your phone speaker on. I hate that too and I’m white! lol 😆

that’s true, min. I completely get where you are coming from-and that is a difficulty in most these examples. I would have just been an embarrassed old lady except the young lady who felt so picked on mentioning it. You can see how these things work There certainly is plausible deny ability in this case. But that’s were cell phone video has made a difference. We have too many pictures of unarmed black man being shot not to believe something is going on. ( not to mention the monument to lynchings that was put up this spring down in Mississippi )

About plausible deniability, for instance Stillin’s examplesof white kids called down for behavior— lt is hard to know if it is really justified, right?because after all -they were not being well behaved. A lot of these things are difficult like when someone at work is on your case all the time it’s usually got some grain of truth to it. it’s just that after a while you start to notice patterns.

It was easy talking to the black woman in Hot Springs about it. The constant disrespect that would eat at you-

31

Do Witnesses Experience Racial Discrimination To Your Knowledge?

by minimus in

jw
friends

my experience in the kingdom hall was that racial discrimination and profiling was not typically practiced....that i know of.

i was in a diverse city with every type of skin color and nationality imaginable.. i’m wondering if the witnesses have changed due to the current affairs exposed by the media everyday.

are there discrimination issues in jw land??

humbled

Scratchme- there was racial and ethnic discrimination. However, there was a lot more discrimination based on social status. The haves and have-nots were completely segregated in the congregation.

Class/cash does seem to transcend all. My mother used to say (we were a lot Irish): “ There are two kinds of Irish. There are lace curtain Irish and there are pig-under-the-bed Irish”.

The haves and the have nots—It really bothered you.

35

The Label Of "Apostate" And It's Effects

by pale.emperor in

in my psychology studies we've been examining the use of "labels" and how they influence peoples behaviour.

i sometimes wonder if the gb or their helpers know exactly what they're doing when it comes to psychological manipulation.. it's been observed that by labeling someone or something it changes your entire perception of that person or thing.

it colours it entirely, quite unfairly in some cases.

humbled

Doc- I had to accept that someone in the highest level of the ivory towers of the watchtower KNOW that they are lying, conniving, and serving up fraudulent “spiritual food”.

The GB makes the centerpiece of the Religion all about being the “Truth” , being meticulous, convincing the r&f that they had “accurate knowledge”.

I sent some research that they looked over and agreed in every aspect. In accordance with their professed standards, this would have required changes. But instead they silence people. Throw it off and tell you you have a problem being”stumbled”.

They had no connection with God. No interest in God. Only crude power and control. It was amazing.

A Corporation

31

Do Witnesses Experience Racial Discrimination To Your Knowledge?

by minimus in

jw
friends

my experience in the kingdom hall was that racial discrimination and profiling was not typically practiced....that i know of.

i was in a diverse city with every type of skin color and nationality imaginable.. i’m wondering if the witnesses have changed due to the current affairs exposed by the media everyday.

are there discrimination issues in jw land??

humbled

Still in-

what did you understand when you left? Did none of the brothers talk about the problems you described until the CO came? Was there friendships between different races at that hall? How do you feel now?

here is a story this reminds me of:

l am a white haired white woman. I rode a bus from Fayetteville to Little Rock, Arkansas to see my sister this winter. A massive young man in sunglasses and a marine-style haircut, was driving us. He was perhaps 12 feet from me when my phone rang. I am a little hard of hearing and to hear the call l put it on speaker. l didn’t think it was so loud but then again lol—l don’t hear that well.

But this l did hear:

”Whoever has their phone on speaker is unbelievably rude. “ it was the bus driver bellowing at me”I don’t know where you learned your manners but that is about the rudest thing anybody can do on s bus. Whoever it is you better get that phone shut off right this minute”

If I had believed he did not know who he was talking to it wouldn’t have stung that much. Of course it was humiliating to be call down in such a demeaniing tone and loud! But the thing that was patently obvious was this young fellow had me in his crosshairs. There was no one else in the front rows of seats.

It was a pretty remarkable dressing down. I believe there’s no one on that bus that missed the lesson. Later at a rest stop a young woman stepping out to complained to me about his rude treatment of her st an earlier stop“ l don’t know why.” She said it really bugged her.

When l arrived in Little rock and waited for my sister to retrieve me, I watched this tall young man who had treated me like a third grader speak kindly and familiary to many of the people in the bus depot-and l realized they were all black.

I studied him sideways and saw that though he had pale honey gold skin he was “black” and, likely, had been treated “black”and seen his dear granny treated with unwarranted rudeness...as he had treated me.

l realized then that the young fellow had given me and the other aggrieved young (white)woman the Rosa Parks treatment.

I told that story to a my sister’s friend, a black woman a little older than myself when we got to her home in Hot Springs and we just shared those stories back and forth for hours. I felt it so briefly and she and her husband Paul were dealing all along the time l was there...but that’s another story.

31

Do Witnesses Experience Racial Discrimination To Your Knowledge?

by minimus in

jw
friends

my experience in the kingdom hall was that racial discrimination and profiling was not typically practiced....that i know of.

i was in a diverse city with every type of skin color and nationality imaginable.. i’m wondering if the witnesses have changed due to the current affairs exposed by the media everyday.

are there discrimination issues in jw land??

humbled

Hear, hear, Londo—Shirley W and Doc. (Edit: l was writing this while you other guys were posting. I went ahead with my post.)

“Do Witnesses Experience _______to Your Knowledge?”

The only way to know if someone experiences a thing is to believe them when they tell it.

Sex abuse in the congregations was not not done in the open. Racial discrimination and profiling would likely be covert as well. So someone who experienced that treatment would have to risk stepping forward now. And being believed.

We are all ex-JDubs here

.....No comments?

There you go.

Obviously, there was no racial discrimination or profiling.

18

JW and communion

by Canadian Sunshine in

a few years ago i attended the kingdom hall during "easter" as my mother in law asked me to come to a service.

i was hesitant at first, being a christian and a believer in jesus, she told me that jw believe in jesus and to come see for myself.

i finally agreed to go.

humbled

4 These are the ones who were not defiled with women, for they are virgins. These are the ones who follow the Lamb wherever He goes. These were redeemed[a] from among men, beingfirstfruits to God and to the Lamb. Rev 14:4 NKJV

This is one scripture the elders agreed to look up with me before my final interview.

Questioning the FS teaching clearly created a great problem for me. But worse by by far was the bind the anointed faced in their obligation to also follow the Faithful Slave in order to follow the Lamb. But the scriptures show it doesn’t work that way- if you follow man you are not following the Lamb.

The scripture above states one of the identifying features of the 144000 : they follow the Lamb wherever He goes. The reference to being”virgins” is their not following man’s religion.

Any who claim to be anointed are compromised if they are false to the spirit within them that disagrees with policy yet follow it-essentially endorsing men ahead of the Lamb.

It is obvious that the Truth forces the anointed to lie and/or stfu. So this is God’s arrangement?

9

Interview with an Apostate - Wozza

by wozza in

born in the early 50’s in london england to non jw parents and when i was young we moved to adelaide south australia and there my brother was born .

i contracted tb on the ship over and was treated in hospital for months with a antibiotic which is banned for humans here now .

my father would tell me tearfully over the years how horrible it was for me and them .even then ,dad was told by doctors i may have nerve and brain damage from the treatment and an unstable temperament.. .

humbled

Wozza, you had an upstream battle from the beginning. Somehow you made it. And kept a kind heart..a braveheart.

That divination stuff. That stuff has always puzzled me because there are people I’ve known that l believe are sound in their mind and perceptions who tells stories such as yours. I don’t know where these stories fit in my own understanding. I certainly have had unusual and inexplicable events that I don’t honestly know how to fit into a worldview that rejects the possibility of something beyond what I can see. That’s as far as I can go towards describing something beyond my understanding but that l must admit it’s having occurred.

It is an uncomfortable subject. You are gutsy to bring it up. I respect it if you have nothing further to say on it. It is a topic my Welsh/ Irish Grandma introduced among others.

Wellsir, wozza. Thanks for your backstory.