Posts by jwundubbed

44

Things You Still Agree With The JWs On

by Fred Franztone in

aside from obvious things that most people agree on, like theft being wrong and the importance of family, i can't think of a single thing i agree with the jws on, nothing that's specific to their religion anyway.

do you have any?.

jwundubbed

one could have respect toward in certain social behaviors such as drug, alcohol, smoking, lose sexual activity other defilements of the flesh but as its known you dont have to have a religion to self direct yourself to a health conscience lifestyle.

One can engage in all those things and still have a health conscience lifestyle. It really is about how you do it. And yes, I include 'defilements of the flesh' in that statement. It is all about learning to do those things with an understanding of the risks involved, with moderation and balance, with an understanding of why you do those things, and of course with informed consent.

@OP...

There are a few things that I agree with... for me personally, but not for everyone. Abortion and military service isn't for me. I would be devastated if I ever killed a person.

Are we talking about what they teach or what they actually practice, because those aren't always the same thing.

178

Charging $150 To Tell Your Stories

by Bangalore in

jw
friends

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/how-to-escape-from-jehovah-s-witnesses-religion#/.

for $150: collaboration with the backer so that their story of successfully escaping an abusive belief system (300 words max) features along with others in the final pages of how to escape from jehovah's witnesses.

the text will be written by the author but will include a minimum of one quote worded by the backer.

jwundubbed

jp,

I agree with a lot of what you say on this topic of how people don't fully leave the cult and live in the in-between. I worked my ass off to alter myself and change my behaviors and I still feel like I can't function in the mainstream world. Okay, I have odd ideas and I'm not normal by a long shot. But ignoring that part... I have a hard time making friends. I can't get a decent job, mostly because I don't feel I am capable of it. There is just so much to overcome that it often feels like I never will overcome it and live the life everyone else takes for granted. That bar that mainstream people take for granted and is even low for them is set so high above what seems like an impossible accomplishment. It's just out of reach.

If only those people could see how far I've already come. And if only people coming out could see how much more they need to do than just to leave. But the leaving part is so hard and it weighs you down. You lose your family, every friend you ever had. Even if those people don't shun you, you lose them. At a certain point you just have to distance yourself from the people that were part of that. Sometimes it's because they are unhealthy, or you are. Sometimes it is because the memories you share are just too painful. Sometimes it is because they know you so well that you can't get away from your JW persona. There are lots of reasons, but I lost everyone I knew even though many of them have left.

I don't agree that shining a light on the dysfunctional beliefs is the way to get people out of the shadows. That is how help people at the initial stages of leaving the cult. I think we have to shine a light on the dysfunctional behaviors that we learned. I think we need to make a place where people feel safe to consider the possibility that they aren't as good as they want to be. We were taught that we were the special chosen few and our works and deeds were righteous and true. We lose so much when we leave... how the hell are we supposed to accept that we aren't even the good people we thought we were?

I didn't even shun people, or bring in anyone who got baptized, or indoctrinate my children. I don't have any guilt over the way that I treated people in the common JW belief system. It was an awful realization when I realized that the ways that I thought I was being a loving and kind individual were actually abusive and unkind. I can't imagine how hard that must be on top of the guilt others face for acting according to their beliefs.

And in the same way that people can only be helped to come out of the cult when they want to come out of the cult, we can only help people come 'out of the shadows' when they want to face the facts of what all is holding them back in the shadows. They aren't facing the cult then, but their own selves. Mirrors are most people's Achilles heel.

56

Is this life all there is?

by Fisherman in

jw
friends

what do you sincerely think?

do you nurture any hope?.

jwundubbed

I will let you in, just a little bit, into my bizarro world. I have the strangest beliefs.

There is this theory in science .... well two actually. One says that we create our own realities and the other says that there are an infinite number of alternate realities... and there are theories as to what causes the alternate realities.

I believe that death is another reality, different from this one. That is my definite belief. But I also have this odder belief that a person could potentially get to anther alternate reality through death... that in the same way that some people can accomplish lucid dreaming a person could go live an alternate life in an alternate reality and their body here would die. I won't explain why I have these beliefs. They are what they are, and I believe them.

I also think that it is entirely possible that when one dies they go to the alternate reality that they believe in. So... people who believe in reincarnation would start a new life in a different reality. People who believe that heaven is a place where angels sit on clouds and play harps would find themselves in that reality. Pearly gates or hell... yet another reality. No belief in an afterlife... then no alternate reality.

So, yeah, I have hope.

178

Charging $150 To Tell Your Stories

by Bangalore in

jw
friends

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/how-to-escape-from-jehovah-s-witnesses-religion#/.

for $150: collaboration with the backer so that their story of successfully escaping an abusive belief system (300 words max) features along with others in the final pages of how to escape from jehovah's witnesses.

the text will be written by the author but will include a minimum of one quote worded by the backer.

jwundubbed

300 words isn't even barely a paragraph. When I wrote articles for a college newspaper our articles could be no more than 450 words. So, 300 is hardly anything... and then a small quote from one of those? You don't even get your full story in... just a quote from a synopsis, and a byline! That is not worth paying $150. You know websites that seem free are actually making bank because people give them content. So... this guy is getting not just content but is getting people to pay for the privilege of giving him that content. What snake oil salesman!

If you can't write your own book because you don't have enough content.... put in the work and interview people. Give them the (required, by the way) credit they deserve, and then write your damn book. What fake.

I don't have anything against John Cedars. I like his youtube videos. He puts in a decent amount of work to discredit the JWs and to bring some of their inconsistencies into the open. He does some good work. But dude! Don't think that gives you the right to shit on people and call it rosewater.

But most don't do the hard work to eliminate the cult-indoctrinated negative personality traits which they acquired as a part of their association with the cult. - jp

This is so true. I see a lot of people who have horrible traits and yet assume that they were magically transformed just by leaving the cult. It doesn't work that way. We learned to be abusers. You don't stop being an abuser until you put in the time and effort to stop being an abuser. And pointing out other abusers doesn't make you less of one. You still have to do the time and work of changing your behaviors.

12

Positive Topic - ‘Good Elders’ or Extra Special Kindness shown by elders

by Farmer Jim1 in

jw
friends

after the last topic getting me mad, does anyone have a positive experience of dealing with an elder or a particular favourite elder that was a top bloke?.

jwundubbed

There was an elderly elder in one of my congregations. I can't remember his name now and never could have spelt it. He was kind, always. He was a gentleman and believed in being a gentleman. He spoke softly. He never reprimanded his children in public. He was the first elder to make house calls to people who were infirm, hurting, struggling, and he never passed judgement on them. He may have had the wrong message but he always had good intentions and he just wanted to help people. He let people say what they wanted to say and if it contradicted the organization... he still just let it sit with everyone for a while. Then, if he made an argument it was done with kindness and from a bible point of view. He never made anyone feel like they were stupid or wrong, he just showed them a different way of looking at things. I never saw him disrespect a disfellowshiped person. He showed them the same kindness that he showed everyone else. I'm sure he had worries and conflicts in his life but he never displayed them or imposed his hardships on other people.

When he got really old he started to go senile. He started saying silly things that made no sense. But the brothers never stopped calling on him when he raised his hands. He was so kind that everyone felt a real kindred spirit towards him. He got back the same kind of behaviors that he put towards others.

As far as I know he lived most if not all of his life in the cult. He was a kind and good man. I am really glad that I got to be in the same congregation as him. In or out of the cult, he was someone who knew how to treat people.

33

Have you ever thought what the primary teaching of Jehovah’s Witnesses is?

by Half banana in

it is not “preach the good news” nor is it “believe in jesus and get saved” neither is it “believe in the governing body of jehovah’s witnesses and get saved” although in practice they do teach this.

no, everything they claim depends on a belief in another doctrine which logic decrees cannot be found in the bible.

the leadership of jehovah’s witnesses put absolute faith in a protestant doctrine which is given a latin name, sola scriptura, meaning “by scripture alone”.. good evidence of the governing body believing in the primacy of this doctrine was when being questioned by the australian royal commission, they resorted to the ‘authority’ of scripture to defend their stance on having “two witnesses” when they are investigating child abuse cases.throughout the hearing they paraded their naive trust in the bible as the highest possible authority proudly ignoring the fact that most people regard it as having been superseded by modern scientific evaluations of what is true.. .

jwundubbed

It's conform and obey.

15

Toasted daughter: Why Jephthah almost certainly sacrificed his daughter to a complicit Jehovah

by Diogenesister in

jehovah's witnesses insist that jephthah did not sacrifice his daughter to jehovah.

this is important to them because, rarther than jephthah just being a random bad person, jehovah was very much in on the deal.

after all, he made the promise to jehovah that he would "offer up as a burnt offering" on his return the first thing to come out of his house if jehovah would give the ammonites into his hands in battle, and since they were this makes jehovah complicit.. the isrealites had been getting a good thrashing of late, and the gilead elders (oh boy) had come out to ask jephthah, the rejected son of a prostitute (wouldn't you know it) and renown soldier, if he would lead the isrealites into battle for them.. this is when jephthah makes the deal with jehobo, and it all centres on the word for "burnt offering", which is given as "olah".

jwundubbed

My congregation had a recital and a group of teenagers acted out the Jeptha's daughter story. My sister and about 6 other girls danced to that story! We were horrified when we realized (only a few years ago) what they had been dancing about.

And what strikes me now is that the two instances where sons were asked to be sacrificed, they were saved! But the daughter that has to be sacrificed... doesn't get saved and is in fact sacrificed! Gross!

46

What Makes Someone Become a JW?

by minimus in

jw
friends

my excuse is that i was born in the religion.

but if someone wasn’t, why would they become one?.

jwundubbed

I don't understand it myself because I was born in as well. I asked my dad why he joined. My mom joined because she is an evil wackadoo and it suits her perfectly.

My dad is an intellectual type and a scientist, so I was really befuddled that he joined of his own free will. We know the cult preys on people who are vulnerable and at risk. They offer blind and disabled people a community who will love them and take care of them. They offer hope to people experiencing grief and loss.

My dad said that he was approached at a time when a lot of young adults were really scared and unsure of their world. It was during the Vietnam war and a lot of young men were being drafted. There was the sexual revolution going on and the music revolution and kids and young adults were just rebelling like the US hadn't seen before. The future was very uncertain and the JWs had answers. They had really appealing answers and they could tell you how to achieve the goals to get the rewards. And it wasn't super easy to track down all the fallacies in their doctrines and beliefs back then.

Why do people join today? With the internet and access, I don't know. I think people who join are still scared about their futures and want answers. They want easy answers more than they want the truth. And to be honest, I get it to a certain extent. If I didn't know how awful it is already, if I went and got love-bombed and people telling me all I had to do was A, B, and C in order to get this amazing prize... yeah, I might just fall for it too.

31

You may PRETEND to care - in reality you are SELFISH!

by wannabefree in

that;s what my wife (and all jw's) gets to hear about us at the kingdom hall today, (hmmmm, i wonder if she'll raise her hand to answer this one) ... .

watchtower study ... today, apostates and others who create divisions in the congregation use “smooth talk and flattering speech.” (romans 16:17, 18) they may pretend to care about others, but in reality, they are selfish.. (the watchtower - study edition (simplified version) 10/17 page 4 paragraph 7).

jwundubbed

This is nothing new. 'Apostate' is the one really bad insult this religion has. Apostates are everything bad and nothing nice. They have been teaching people this all along. Just because we got out into the world and found out it is all lies, it doesn't change what they have been and continue to teach the people who are in it.

Quite frankly, I am shocked at anyone who is surprised by this. This is how they operate and always have.

20

Does anyone like Steampunk?

by days of future passed in

i love people's being creative with this genre.

i stumbled on this video which is a lot of fun.

past the end credits is out takes and how it was made.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=211lnk5vnjm.

jwundubbed

@Days of Future Passed,

Awesome name! Fits JWs and the Moody Blues!

I just saw something on the instrument you mentioned. Found a ton of amazing instruments on youTube. All new to me.

If you are going to do art then you should stick with the mac. Mac is good because they get less viruses, but most people who use art programs use the mac. What they have is just miles better than everything else.