Jitters, I want to say this absolutely clearly: throughout history people who don't want others to see the truth about themselves always discourage them from reading sources they didn't produce. This isn't just true of JW's, I'm gonna quote a poem by Ephraim Syrus, he's an early Catholic 'church father' who wrote in the 4th century:
The Lord will bless you oh faithful church, for you are not concealing the book of the insane Marcion, nor the books of the mad Mani
Might not rhyme in English but you get the point. Ephrem's telling his congregation not to read people who disagree with him. Remember, the Catholic 'church fathers' claim that the canonical gospels came from the apostles, which makes them the only true Gospels. This disqualifies all competing Christian faiths at the time (many existed l, few survived), and elevates the Catholic Church. But Marcion and Mani wrote in those books mentioned in the poem that the apostles didn't write the canonical gospels, which of course undermines the Catholic Church fathers' claims to Authority. Obviously, Ephraim wouldn't want his congregation reading that.
If a group tells you not to read their critics or at least not look at the evidence themselves, they admit in doing so that they don't even believe what they say. Don't listen to these people anymore. Hell, dont listen to me either except what I'm gonna tell you right now:
Listen to yourself. Go out and do the research, don't take my word for it, dont take our word for it, go to sites like jwfacts.com, you can find PDFs of some of Russell and Rutherfords works online, there's also a lot of good scholarly work on Jehovah's Witnesses too. If you want some places to start PM me. Best of luck on your journey. You're doing great already.