GentlyFeral

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Posts by GentlyFeral

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  9

  Between Halloween And Me

  by messenger in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  between halloween and me.

  i did something that at one time i thought god would strike me dead for.

  i did something that at one time i thought would make satan rejoice.

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  GentlyFeral

  messenger:
  

  FREE CANDY! It was hard to comprehend that there was a day you could simply walk up to any person’s home and they would meet you at the door with free candy. To a six year old it boggled the mind.

  Messenger, I think you blew my husband's mind last night. He's been a real curmudgeon about holidays ever since he unjaydubbed, and Halloween was one of the worst. He thought of it like teejay did, in terms of extortion and silliness. He's gradually cultivating a taste for silliness, but your post made an appeal to HOSPITALITY -- something he has never been able to resist.

  Thank you! :D

  Gently Feral
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  13

  Dressing Up for Halloweenie??

  by safe4kids in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  okay you wild and crazy people...who is dressing up for halloween and whatcha gonna be?.

  i'm going to be maid marion and sit on my front porch handing out candy to all the little neighborhood monsters...my daughter is harry potter this year and my son is some gruesome grinning skeleton with fake blood dripping down his face....what can i say??

  how 'bout the rest of youse guys???.

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  GentlyFeral

  Well, I was Pombagira, the voodoo sex goddess of Brazil...no, this is a real deity, folks, at least as real as deities ever do get. I wore a long black skirt slit to the knee, and a red and black sarong tied over it. Tight red sweater, red-and-black necklace, big silver heart earrings. Once in the Castro, I saw people wearing cute red devil horns that lit up. Turns out a street vendor was selling them, so I bought a pair, and now my costume is complete. Yee haw!

  My daughter wore a checkerboard mask and 18-inch claws. Kept breaking into improvized dances. Amazed everybody.

  On the way home, as we were waiting for the train, she knelt before me and began slapping her clawed hands on the floor. A woman behind me said, in Spanish, "She's praying to the devil."

  Happy Halloween!

  Gently Feral
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  18

  Remember hiding out

  by Parliament in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  remember having hide in the basement or the back room of your house so as the trick or treaters thought you weren't home!!!

  .

  gotta run the door bells ringing.

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  GentlyFeral

  If it's hard candy, or the little mini-candy bars, two or three. A small bag of M&Ms or Skittles, one.

  And why the heck is anyone still hiding out?

  GentlyFeral
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  62

  What R U Reading lately?

  by Tina in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i'm interested in finding out what everyone is reading these days.. or what books have had an impact on your worldview since leaving the org.. what have you found helpful in re-constructing and broadening the way you think and feel?.

  what have you found to be particularly enlightening on 'your journey?'.

  thanks in advance,luv to all.tina.

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  GentlyFeral

  BlackMan,

  Many thanks. I'll probably read Black Skin, White Masks rather than The Wretched of the Earth.

  Yet another brilliant soul whose eyes were bigger than his stomach; some of the broad outlines of his life remind me, just a little, of Arthur Rimbaud's.

  Gently Feral
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  29

  How the JWs helped me

  by larc in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  all of us have had negative experiences as a result of leaving the witnesses, some much worse than others.

  many here, have expressed a bitterness and an anger over loosing so many "wasted" years.

  while these are natural feelings, i think there are several positives we can dwell on as well.

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  GentlyFeral

  I can't find much good in having been a JW. Yes, there was some – but it was pretty damn paltry.

  A large part of the problem is that I'm keeping in mind how well my jaydub training fitted me for the larger world; that is to say, egregiously; and that was the whole point. To make it impossible for me to function in society. The damage is severe enough that the motives are irrelevant to me. It doesn't matter that they were trying to save me from the devil, because they have handed me over to poverty and ignorance – right in the middle of a recession. If I'd never been a jaydub, I'd have twenty years of savings to tide me over; but no, we were too busy being "non-materialistic," hubby working for shit wages while I stayed home with the kids and learned to be unemployable.

  It's true, as Steve Hassan says, that the "good" in cults appeals to the "true self" – but so does some of the bad. The dream of the paradise earth appealed to my hair-trigger sense of justice; "wait upon Jehovah" appealed both to my laziness and my fears about actually working for justice.

  I’m conquering those fears now – oh how slowly! But to do it, I have to break some WTS regulation virtually every step of the way.

  Gently Feral
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  20

  So Will This Be Your First Christmas?

  by Englishman in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  funny how the prospect of christmas takes me back to my pre-dub days as a 7 year old.

  christmas eve was spent making my present request list, duly guided by both my parents as to what to ask for.

  once completed, the coal fire was stoked up and the precious list was allowed to be carried up the chimney where waiting elves promptly delivered my requests to santa.

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  GentlyFeral

  I'm loving this thread. And here's a crossover from the "how is your parenting different?" thread:

  I told my daughter (the 18-year-old boygoth) about the youth who said, "I don't really want anything for Christmas, Mom. Let's go to the homeless shelter and give to the kids there." Her face lit up and she said, "That would be cooool!" Only she's not averse to receiving presents for herself, as well. So we'll probably do that, and I thank whoever it was for the idea!

  GentlyFeral
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  8

  Take Sides With Granola

  by LizardSnot in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  loved ones,.

  liz here with some wonderful new kingdom songs that we came up with tonight in the jw chat room.. take sides with granola.

  bless granola, o my soul.

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  GentlyFeral

  HOW COULD YOU have forgotten my contribution --

  "Get Your Ass Back on Jehovah's Ark of Salvation!"

  GentlyFeral
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  32

  trick or treating

  by teejay in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  of all the holidays, for me halloween has the least appeal.. i have a memory of going trick-or-treating once, at my "worldly" father's insistence (he roasted peanuts in the oven for the door-knockers... i remember), about the time my mom learned the truth.

  i must've been about five years old.. despite the fact that i'm a hard-core agnostic and a fear of gods or demons are a non-issue, i still have trouble encouraging kids -- under the guise of costumes and fun -- of extorting treats from neighbors.

  can i get a witness?

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  GentlyFeral

  I still have trouble encouraging kids -- under the guise of costumes and fun -- of extorting treats from neighbors.

  The "trick or treat" expression is not an honest opening to a free and friendly dialog. It is "extortion". Look up the word and find me a better one. EXTORTION is what it is, clear and simple.

  Looks like you made up your mind even before you asked the question. So why play the game if you don't approve of the rules?

  Usually I'm much more benign and less snippy when extolling the holidays to xjw's. But Halloween -- Samhain -- is even more sacred to me than I realized before I read your post.

  The whole point of this holiday shtik is to begin by stripping out everything that is meaningless to you. Good luck.

  GentlyFeral
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  4

  "We'd have them back next year"

  by Seeker in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  remember the annual km about the summer convention, and the experiences listed therein about how the brothers were so well behaved some convention manager would say something like, "we'd have them back next year.

  " and remember how this was used a one more proof that jws had the right religion?

  well check this out from the ap newswire:.

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  GentlyFeral

  There's at least one XJW on that cleanup crew: my son has been a Burning Man groupie for the past six years, and has been on the cleanup crew at least twice.

  Gently Feral
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  26

  Bumper stickers

  by target in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  saw this one the other day.

  "jesus loves you!

  everyone else thinks you're and asshole"

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  GentlyFeral

  My husband is the only driver in our family. All through our adult life, we NEVER had bumper stickers on our car -- not "theocratic." Five years after we un-jaydubbed, we still don't have bumperstickers on our car, 'cause he's afraid the neighbors would resent his REAL opinions if they saw them.

  So I found this at my favorite witch store:

  MY CONVICTIONS ARE NOT FOR PUBLIC DISPLAY

  But, dammit, he won't put that on our car, either.

  GentlyFeral