Well, Help, that depends. Nothing will be damning in the minds (what's left of them) of the JC. They are the ones most willing to worship the Watchtower printing company. The majority of current elders are the result of sifting out all the men with consciences and any actual Christianity. Men who use "Jehovah", "Watchtower", "faithful and discrete slave", and "me" interchangeably. "If you don't listen to me, you're disobeying God" is their attitude. One more point is they are not "lions"; they are nothing. The only reason to even accept an invitation to a JC is to get a recording of the brutal reaming you're about to give them for being idolaters and blasphemers. This gives the elders the opportunity to show their true colors and lets anyone who wants to see them recite the Watchtower dogma. They will eventually be backed into a corner on issues where there is no Biblical backing for a belief and be forced to recite Watchtower articles as "Scripture". Especially when Watchtowers and the Bible are diametrically opposed, there are many scriptures available to refute their false stance.
When called out on this action, they will ultimately have nothing left but their default reply that JWs are a private club and they reserve the right to throw anybody out who doesn't conform to the bylaws of the Watchtower printing company. This, they started with me, but I responded by reminding them they claim to be "the only true Christians" and Christ extended an open invitation for anyone thirsting to come and drink life's water free. This doesn't sound like a private club, but a very public event that is open to all who wish to attend. If Christianity is public and JWs are private, then JWs obviously aren't Christianity.
If they know you’re packing a recorder, they will not come right out and admit they don’t care what the Bible says, what God says, or what Jesus says and that only the Watchtower matters. This is a reality that only baptized JWs are ever allowed to be privy to, because JWs can be coerced into keeping their mouths shut. If they succeed in DFing a JW, then no JW will believe anything he/she says, because then that person is “apostate” and speaks with the lying tongue of the Devil himself. Audio recordings, on the other hand, don’t lie. Of course, they have to know you’re capable of such a thing and have zero regard for their phony authority. On some level, even the most brainwashed JW elder knows when he’s bald-faced lying. He realizes any sane, rational person will see his lie for what it is. They will act a lot differently when they know they’re being observed, as most people do. They know they can’t DF someone over telling the truth without exposing their true selves and that is something they will not do.
Perhaps these men realize “JJ” is still somewhat indoctrinated. From his videos, I see he calls JWs “the truth”, men he has little or nothing in common with “brothers”, and uses a lot of the Watchtower lingo that normal people just don’t use. I mean, who says “ones” instead of “people”? When he talks, he sounds like a Watchtower article and I think they realize it. He’s still “in”, mentally and emotionally and they’re going to use it against him.
I preached more and with more success than anyone in my congregation and probably district, but rarely attended meetings. They’d give me “We missed you at the meeting last night.” I’d come back with “I missed you in the ministry all week.” I shoved all their saccharine sentiments, phony concern, fake love, and hypocrisy right in their faces and made no attempt to sugar-coat it. I’d call them out as publically as they tried to shame me into conforming to the hive mind of the collective cult mentality. I was verbalizing outright shock at things expressed by Witnesses, printed in articles, and spoken from the podium at conventions for at least a year before I couldn’t take it anymore and just quit attending. I hadn’t attended a “special assembly day”, circuit, or district event in about 2 years. People would gush about how fantastic it was and that I really missed out. I asked them “So, what did you learn?” They’d start recounting various subjects and I’d stop them with “You didn’t already know that stuff?” Of course, they had already heard it all before, so I’d ask again “So, I’m not asking what you heard. What did you LEARN?” Of course, they had nothing. Long before I physically removed myself, they already knew I didn’t see them as any special people with any special information.
Elders are trained to capitalize on weakness and fear. The Watchtower subtly trains everybody to be an opportunist. The “theocratic” “ministry” “school” (wrong on all counts) trains JWs to look for a person’s emotional weaknesses and pounce on them. Do they have kids, handicaps, problems, fears? Use those! Of course, it doesn’t sound like that, especially to the ones being told to do it. Elders are similarly trained to be sociopaths in their dealings in the back room. Even if they themselves don’t realize it, they’re trained to be ruthless pit bulls, sniffing for the easiest way to destroy someone. They’re trained to gang up on and intimidate their prey. Usually people in cults are not confident, knowledgeable, rational, logical, and intelligent. The elders are powerless against these traits and they do not possess them, themselves. Someone questioning or leaving may actually have some combination of these and can use them to deal devastating blow after blow to the Watchtower-worshiping weirdos who are appointed as elders by the power-hungry Society and its self-important overseers.
If someone can think on their feet and has a wealth of Bible knowledge to draw from, the elders will be terrified of you. They don’t expect to be confidently defied from across the table. They are used to trembling, submission, and awe. It totally throws them off their game when you attack them instead of being their punching bag. Especially having been an elder, “JJ” should know what to expect and how to defend against it, if he has done any real Bible study. If he hasn’t, then it’s a little late now to start worrying about how to reply to someone who demands an accounting of his faith.
