Thanks for all the comments. This news has just reopened a tightly closed boxed with many different emotions flooding out.
BluePill2 really nailed some points.
"it reminds anyone of us that there are people who will feel sorry and pain for this. "
Every time I hear of a suicide, it reminds me of the first JW suicide I personally knew. I was in bethel attending a congregation of a very different culture than how I was raised. As sad and upset as I was by AJ's suicide, the funeral was beyond what I'd expected or ever seen before... or since. These people really knew how to express their grief. Tears poured from every eye in the place. In addition to the local congregation were a few from other congregations and many family and neighbors. The place was packed with mourners weeping, sobbing, clinging to one another, crying out his name and asking "why?". His mother fainted. The sight of his big, tough father crying like a child and hugging his other children so tightly... it's a sight that will never leave me. Tears are rolling from my own eyes as I recall the events. And we all know how the JW funeral talk is just a WT infomercial, but nobody was really paying much attention to the brother trying to follow that script. This was all very different than my culture and my JW training. It was all very real and honestly expressed at least some of the pain that all of us felt about this tragedy.
Attending AJ's funeral left a permanent mark on my brain. Forever after whenever I got deeply depressed and contemplated suicide, the memories of his funeral came flooding back. And then I'd cry. And then I'd get on with life because despite whatever emotional pain I was feeling, I couldn't endure the thought of causing others so much pain. Although I know that my family and friends would have stuck to the rather stoic script that goes with being JWs, I saw a vivid demonstration of how my friends and family would really feel.
Gayle: "The WTS doesn't help people at all, just makes people feel worse."
LisaRose: "just being a Jehovah's Witness is, in itself, a risk factor for suicide. The crazy black and white thinking and extreme views are not mentally healthy. And I believe the WTBTS is invested in manipulating people so they will feel guilty, as it helps them maintain control."
WT puts so much emphasis on perfection that it's unhealthy. For someone like AJ, he decided to end his life because he was convinced that he'd committed the "unforgivable sin". If he wasn't a JW, the incident would have just been embarrassing, certainly not criminal or anything serious. But all the crap that goes with being a JW convinced him that this was worth dying over, since he'd fallen from "perfection". And for me, the striving after perfection made for a life I didn't find worth living. I was supposedly doing everything right but I was exhausted and dissatisfied. Life was bland and everything I said or did was subject to scrutiny. "Perfection" came to mean a torturous, dull pain for me.
